“Surely there were signs along the way.”
Jessica sighed. “I can see that now. Looking back, there were so many red flags. But I was naïve. I thought he was mysterious, the strong but silent type. Like my dad. Dad doesn’t talk much, but he’s solid, you know? He’s always there for me. And I thought maybe Hilton was like him in those ways. Very different in other ways, of course. But he reminded me a bit of my dad at first. I was stupid.”
“Tyler isn’t like him, though. Is he? I haven’t spent much time with him, so I can’t really say for sure. But my impression of him is that he’s a normal, nice, and very extroverted guy.”
Jessica laughed. “He is definitely more extroverted than I am, and the complete opposite of Hilton in that way. I like that he’s friendly with everyone. People seem to like him. That’s a good sign. Hilton never had any close friends.”
“I don’t want to see you miss out on something special because you’re holding back.” Teja carried her empty bowl to the sink and rinsed it out.
Jessica followed her and did the same. “I don’t want to miss out either. I’m going to try to let go of my worries and let myself fall…”
“In love?”
“In… whatever. I don’t know if it’s going to be love. But at least I have to give it a chance to be. Don’t I?”
Teja hugged her. “Definitely. I think that’s a great idea.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The closet was a mess. Rita had been going through it since before her chemo and trying to weed out all the junk, but once treatment started, she didn’t have the energy to keep it up. And now it sat in disarray with dust coating everything. Her parents had stored a lot of things in the spacious closet and locked the door. She’d discovered secrets about her family’s past in there — letters that had unraveled the truth about what had happened between her father and his brother, and her mother’s affair. But now, it was time to get back into the space and organise it.
She’d set up a filing cabinet in one corner and had filed the letters in plastic sleeves. But there was so much more to go through. She moved things around and began sorting items into stacks. There was a pile of linens that looked like they were about fifty years old — why had her parents kept them in here? She had no idea what they’d been thinking. And there were framed photographs as well as photo albums. Finally, there were several pieces of framed art. She picked them up, one by one, and blew the dust off the frames to place them against the wall. She’d have to do something with them. She hated to throw things like that out. Someone had put a lot of time and attention into painting those pieces, and surely there was a person out there who’d value them. Maybe she could hang one on her wall.
She went through them again, this time more slowly, looking over the paintings. The first was of a landscape — it looked like the Smoky Mountains, perhaps. She didn’t know the artist’s name, but her parents used to love to go to the mountains for the weekend. They often stayed in Helen, a tourist town with several galleries, and might’ve purchased the painting there. Her parents had loved the place, had named her sister after the town. It had a special place her heart.
The next painting was another landscape. It had to be the lake view from her house. If she sat on the back deck and imagined that the trees were much shorter, and the lakefront less built up with vacation homes, this was what it would look like, she was certain. She tried to focus on the artist’s name, but it was too hard to read without her glasses.
By the time she’d found her reading glasses on the bedside table and shuffled back to the closet, she was starting to feel the effects of so much dust in her lungs. Her asthma didn’t usually cause her much trouble—until she surrounded herself in a cloud of dust. Then, the coughing started. She pressed a handkerchief to her mouth and pushed the glasses up the bridge of her nose, then peered at the painting again.
She could’ve sworn the name of the artist was Lambert. Her maiden name. Her parents’ surname. The initial looked like it could be an S or an R. Her father’s name was Ray, her mother’s Sylvia. It was impossible to tell, from the way the paint had been applied on the canvas, which one it might be. But her brow furrowed at the revelation regardless. Since when had either of her parents been an artist? The landscape was pretty good. She had to admit that there was a great deal of skill in what they’d done, not that she was an expert on the subject. But it was definitely something she’d happily hang on her living room wall.
Rita racked her brain for any memory of one of them painting, or even mentioning art at all. Her mother had taken them all to the Atlanta Art Gallery one time. There’d been a Van Gogh exhibition, and she remembered liking his paintings but being more enamoured with a statue in the centre of the room. Meanwhile, she didn’t recall her mother showing any particular fervour over the exhibit, and her father hadn’t attended at all.
She set that painting aside and then studied the final piece. It had the same artist’s name, and this time the subject was a person — a woman, seated on a chair reading a book. The perspective was from behind, so the woman’s face couldn’t be seen. But it might’ve been Helen, her sister. She’d been a big reader, her head always bowed over some kind of book when she wasn’t playing the piano.
A lump formed in her throat as she let the memories wash over her. She set that painting aside and then found herself face-to-face with a stash of moonshine. No doubt it was Tyler’s. She knew he was making the stuff, but she hadn’t expected to find it in her house. How did he get into this closet? She’d told him about it, but he must’ve found the key in the drawer of the hall table. That was something she’d have to speak to him about — he couldn’t just go about breaking into people’s closets and stashing his illegal liquor. She had no desire to get involved in his venture.
What she really wanted, if she was being honest, was for him to stop. He was such a good man. Had so much potential. She was proud of the way he’d served his country and how well he’d done in the military. And now he was going to bum around and make illegal liquor to sell to his friends? That wasn’t the future she’d envisioned for him when he first told her he was coming home. She’d hoped he’d make a new life for himself, one in which she could finally be a part. And now especially with the addition of his newly discovered daughter, he had a responsibility to get himself together and find a real job.
Was she being too hard on him? He hadn’t been home long, and she didn’t want to be that kind of mother. He was an adult. It wasn’t up to her to prod him into action. That was his responsibility. If she saw him making a real mess of his life, she’d have to speak up. But so far, he was only moonshining — there was no real harm in that. In fact, it was a time-honoured Southern tradition. As long as the police didn’t get involved, he should be fine.
She left the moonshine where it was and spun about, noticing the rocking horse again. Maybe this was something she could give to Cici. It was still in good shape. A bit of wiping down and it would be good — some of the hair on the mane and tail looked a little thin, and there were some worn parts on the fabric body. But it would hold her steady and rock just fine. She tugged it out of the closet and to the laundry room, where she got to work on it, excited to see little Cici’s face when she showed her the horse and explained that her own father, Tyler, had ridden it countless times when he was a boy.
He’d dressed in a cowboy hat and vest, with little boots and spurs. He’d also carried a cap gun in a holster around his hips. She still had the costume somewhere. She’d have to look through the attic and see if she could dig it out. Cici would look adorable in it. She smiled as she worked, feeling a mixture of sadness that she’d already missed so much of Cici’s life, and joy in the knowledge that she was a grandmother.
There was nothing that made her happier at this time in her life than the idea of a house full of grandchildren, and she’d been beginning to despair that it would ever happen. The revelation of a granddaughter had given her a new zest for life, and she couldn’t wait to see her again. This time she’d bring a rocking horse, cowboy costume, and baked goods. She was going to love that little girl with everything she had.
Chapter Twenty-Two
On her way home from work, Matilda pondered the events of the day. She’d finished her shift with an emergency — a Labrador retriever had eaten a bone that got stuck in his gut and perforated his stomach. She’d had to perform surgery, and even though it’d gone well, he was still critical. But she was headed home—her staff could handle the nightshift without her. She was utterly exhausted.
Her phone rang and she glanced at the screen, but she didn’t answer. That was the tenth missed call, but it was a number she didn’t know, and she was driving. Also, she needed this time during her commute home to decompress so she could face the evening and her husband with a semblance of a smile on her face.
She’d thought this clinic was a dream come true, but it’d turned into a nightmare. She couldn’t even remember what she’d liked about it. Perhaps it was only the idea that she’d been excited for. She certainly hadn’t understood what it would be like to run her own business. If she’d wanted to go into business, she’d have studied that in college. Instead, she’d wanted to spend her day treating animals, and as it was these days, she only did that for a few hours. The rest of her long days were spent behind a computer trying to figure out staffing, managing conflicts, ordering supplies, and paying bills.
Then there was the lawsuit. The case was over, and they were waiting for the verdict to come in from the judge. The stress of it had given her a migraine for three days in a row. She was fine today, although it felt as if all the strength had left her body.
When she pulled into her driveway, the phone rang again. She parked and looked out across the lake as she answered the call. The trees had lost all of their leaves and stood like lonely sentinels guarding the water, which was still and dark beneath their branches.
