And later, when he drove away from the lake, he could feel true, bitter grief start to well in him, clogging his throat, forcing him to wipe his eyes more than once. Whywouldthe universe allow this to happen? It defied all logic.
28
Amy returned later that afternoon to her house in Willow Valley with her paintings. One with a new smear of mustard that Ethan had accidentally managed. She was right about the laundry, but she hadn’t anticipated the number of dead things in the fridge. Dead vegetables, dead meat. If she wasn’t here to pull them out and cook them, they were left to smother and die inside a very cold tomb.
The next morning, she entered her Bossy Posse quintet of paintings in the contest. The gallerist at Hillside Art Gallery cooed over them, said they wereso goodand that Amy had real talent. At first, Amy was delighted. But as the gallerist continued to praise her, going far beyond what was necessary, she began to wonder if there was something wrong.
She tried not to let the thought that her paintings really weren’t good enough ruin her reunion with her boys. She tried not to obsess if she would be entered into the contest after all. She focused on making Christmas magical for her kids, insisting they bake cookies with her. And when that devolved into a fight between brothers, she turned it into a game, and they ended up throwing dough at each other. That naturally drew Kevin’s interest, as well as Duchess, who frantically searched the floor with her nose for dough.
Amy laughed until she almost cried.
She didn’t know what genius had scheduled diversity training the week before Christmas at work, until she remembered it was her. Early in the year, she’d convinced herself it was a great idea for a nothing-really-happens week. The men sat around in their blue work shirts, their legs splayed apart as only men could do. They received the mandatory training just as Amy knew they would. When she asked what diversity and inclusion meant to them, they responded in a way she could see Jonah and his friends responding—with a lot of sexual innuendo and sniggering. But just like her sons, they didn’t mean any harm, and when she insisted they listen, they did, and asked good questions. She appreciated them for that.
She finished her Christmas shopping and, with her mother’s help, developed a Christmas Day menu. When she returned from her second trip to the grocery store since the end of her time off, she cried out with dismay to see her dad and Kevin manhandling a shed through the fence to the backyard. She stopped her car in the middle of the street and ran to stop them. It was too late—the fence was down. “What are you doing?” she cried.
“It’s your new artist studio,” Kevin said proudly.
She looked at the corrugated steel. “My what?”
“It was Kev’s idea,” her dad said. Kevin beamed proudly beside him.
Amy was stunned. “You did this for me?” she asked, trying to understand the small miracle.
“Yep. I can’t look at your weird art in the sunroom anymore.”
“It’s not weird,” she said, punching him in the arm. “But I love it.” It did seem a perfect solution, and she wondered why she hadn’t thought of it before. It had two windows, a tiny, covered porch landing. The floors were plywood, but a good rug would cover it up. She had a fan and a window air-conditioning unit in the garage. She could make it work. She had an honest-to-God she-shed, and she was ridiculously pleased with it.
She looked at her brother. “You really did this for me?”
“Don’t look so surprised,” he said, and threw his arm around her shoulder and ruffled her hair. “I can be a good guy. I had to do something—I’m not going to be here much longer, and those two kids of yours will never let you paint. You need your own space.”
Tears welled in the back of her eyes. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you’ll make tacos tonight,” Kevin said, and his dad laughed. They picked up their tools and left. It wasn’t until later, when she happened to see Duchess wandering blindly around the front yard, that she realized they had not put the fence back up.
By the end of the week, she learned she’d gained a spot in the final contest. She was one of five artists selected. The winners would be announced on Christmas Eve, just a few days away. Amy was, of course, very happy with the news. She tried to reach Harrison to tell him, but his phone kept rolling to voicemail. She knew he was very busy, getting ready for a lengthy time away from Miami. So she left him a message. “Guess what? I made the finals. TheBossy Posse Christmasseries is going to be in the final show.”
She was happy. But she was also aware that being part of the contest didn’t seem so important now. Something had happened to her over the long two weeks spent away. She’d realized she didn’t need to escape her life. She had a pretty good one. What she needed was to make more room for her. She never had been a Carrie, she realized—she’d always been a Charlotte.
She received a text from Harrison that night.
So awesome, babe! Wish I was there to celebrate. In meetings all day will call later.
He didn’t call later, but she received a huge bouquet of flowers the next afternoon. “Are those from Dad?” Ethan asked.
“Dad? No.” Amy laughed. “They’re from the man you met at the cabin.”
“What man?” Ethan asked.
“You don’t remember?”
“No,” he said, and scurried off to find his soccer shoes.
Amy wished he remembered. She really wished her sons knew Harrison.
Just after the flowers arrived, someone fromTheDallas Morning Newscalled. “I’m an intern,” the woman explained. “An art history major at SMU, and I’m writing a story about some of the art contests in north Texas. Could I interview you?”
“Sure,” Amy said. She glanced at her watch. “I have to be back at work, but—”
