Jane Darrowfield, Professional Busybody. Barbara Ross
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progressive glasses on her bedside table. She put on sunglasses but tucked an old pair of readers into her purse, in case she was called upon to review or sign some kind of contract. Satisfied, but still nervous, she’d headed out the door.
At Walden Spring, she stopped on the other side of the archway to take in the view. Two long, four-story apartment buildings formed an L-shape around a large, rectangular lawn with paths running through it. The green space had a lovely campus-y feel. On the third side of the rectangle, a freestanding building had a sign over its doorway that read, CLUBHOUSE. The fourth side of the lawn was open to the golf course.
Just inside the archway, she found the management office. Jane entered an ample reception room and knocked lightly on the open door to the only office. Paul Peavey stood up from behind his enormous mahogany desk and greeted her warmly.
“Mrs. Darrowfield—”
“Jane.”
“Welcome.” He motioned for her to sit and got down to business. She’d expected he would give her more background about her assignment. Instead, Peavey started right in, as if the deed were done.
“I think Mrs., um, Jane, the best thing to do is to treat you like a prospective buyer. It’s common for people who are considering purchasing at Walden Spring to move into one of our guest units and spend a little time getting a feel for the community and what it has to offer. I’ve asked our realtor to take you on a tour as she would any other prospect. She doesn’t know why you’re here.”
“Move in?” Jane was nonplussed. The idea had never occurred to her. “I’m terribly sorry. I wasn’t planning to move in.”
“But you must. I don’t think you’ll get to the bottom of it if you don’t.”
Avoidance seemed like the best tactic. She’d tell him she wasn’t moving in after she had something to report. “Can you tell me more about your problems? Get to the bottom of what?”
Peavey looked uncomfortable. “I think there’s a natural tendency in humans to gravitate to people who are like us, people who have similar interests and values.”
“That hardly sounds like a problem.”
“It’s not. But when there is hostility between groups of people, it can create a lot of tension and unhappiness.”
“Hostility?”
“Yes. You know, rivalries.” Now he looked not just uncomfortable but unhappy.
“Are you telling me you have gangs at Walden Spring?” For a moment, Jane flashed to a chorus line of elderly Sharks and Jets, snapping arthritic fingers and singing.
“Certainly we do not have a gang problem. I think it’s best for you to see for yourself.” Paul punched the numbers on his phone and then spoke into it. “Can you come over now?” After he hung up, he turned back to Jane. “Regina Campbell is our in-house realtor. She handles all our properties at Walden Spring.”
A few moments later, Regina strode through the door. She was broad-shouldered and tall, towering in her high heels. In her late twenties, professionally dressed, she had a pretty face framed by brown hair curling to below her shoulders.
“After you take Mrs. Darrowfield around to see the properties,” Paul told Regina, “could you give her a tour of the clubhouse and perhaps leave her there for lunch?”
“Lunch on her own? In the dining room? We don’t usually—” Regina seemed more than reluctant.
“Yes, please, Regina. I’m sure Jane will be fine.”
For the next hour, Jane and Regina toured the model apartments of Walden Spring. Patiently, Jane let Regina show off the granite countertops, the Jacuzzis in the master baths, and the large balconies overlooking the quad and the golf course beyond.
The two-bedroom models, the Emerson and the Alcott, appeared to be mirror images of one another. The smaller units were called the Hawthorne and the Thoreau. When Jane told Regina she expected the Thoreau to be a single room with no heat, the realtor stared at her blankly. Surely it couldn’t have been the first time she’d heard that joke. The Thoreau was the smallest of the units, just one bedroom, but turned out to be very nice. Open plan, spacious kitchen with plenty of storage, light and airy throughout.
The apartment buildings had multiple entranceways, which meant only eight units shared each small foyer and elevator bank. As they walked from one unit to another, Regina and Jane used a wide path that ran around the perimeter of the quad. People seemed to have golf carts to haul their groceries from the parking lot to the entrances to their buildings and generally to get around the complex.
“What’s that?” Jane pointed to a medium-sized building, more institutional looking than the rest of the complex. It sat a ways down a narrow paved roadway between the golf course and the woods.
“The long-term care facility,” Regina said quickly, as though she preferred to talk about anything else. “And of course, we do all the maintenance for your unit,” Regina prattled on, keeping to her script. “No more cleaning gutters or shoveling snow.”
The more Regina talked, the more appealing Jane found the whole idea of living in a place like Walden Spring. Like most houses in Cambridge, hers had no garage, and for close to forty winters she’d scraped ice off a succession of cars and dug them out of snowdrifts.
Why am I so determined to keep my house, Jane wondered. It was too big, now, certainly. Perhaps it had always been too big, even when three of them lived there. After her husband left, all she could think was, I must keep the house, I must keep the house, I must keep the house. Of course, she wanted Jonathan to stay in the same school, keeping his life as stable as she could while his parents’ problems swirled around him like flakes in a shaken snow globe. And Jane’s friends, her bridge group, lived nearby. What would have become of her in those first terrifying months without their support, their humor, their love? And during all the years that followed.
They had almost reached the clubhouse, Regina chattering the whole time about the “amenables.” The clubhouse was built on a slope, so they entered on the second floor. A balcony overlooked the tables of the empty dining hall. From below came the tinkle of glasses and cutlery and the aroma of lunch being prepared. A two-story wall of windows faced the golf course. There were no white tablecloths, no formal place settings on the tables. Perhaps that was reserved for dinner, or a mere fantasy for the Walden Spring website.
Three doorways, widely spaced, ran along the back wall of the balcony. Regina guided Jane to the first one. Inside, music boomed from an iPod dock. A group of fit-looking women and men who had left fifty-five years well behind were doing the Funky Chicken. There were some scary spandex costumes along with some nearly see-through yoga pants in that room. The woman who was leading didn’t look any younger than the group at large.
“Very impressive,” Jane commented. Cambridge was a walking city, and she relied on that, plus her garden work, for exercise.
In the next room, classical music played softly and a dozen or so people wearing smocks stood at easels painting a fruit bowl that stood on a center table. It seemed like a happy, focused group. A familiar-looking woman with a head full of lavender ringlets and bright blue eyes smiled from behind the easel nearest the door. Jane smiled back tentatively. The face seemed familiar, but Jane couldn’t place her.
The third room had two billiards tables and a poker table in its center, and flat-screen TVs hooked to video consoles were along one wall. A group of men, most wearing black leather jackets, were hanging out. Two played pool while six others played cards. In the corner, a man dressed entirely in black—jeans, T-shirt, and leather jacket—hung his head out the window.
“Mike! Mike!” Regina’s tone was sharp. “See that sign? NO SMOKING. How many times do we have to tell you? And Leon in here with his oxygen. You could get us all killed!”
Mike threw his butt out the window and turned to look at the interlopers. His gray hair was greased back. “Sorry, ma’am,” he mumbled. Someone at the poker