I eat the rest of my cookie and smile fondly. “Mine too.”
“Does she have a special man in her life?”
Now it’s my turn to choke. “Wh-what? Why would you ask that?”
My cousin pounds me on the back and gives me a wry grin. “Why not? Aunt Ophelia’s a pretty lady, and she’s been divorced for years. I bet she goes out partying at the club every weekend trying to pick herself up a stud for the evening.”
A growl escapes from my throat at that mental image. “Dutton…”
He hoots out a laugh. “Dude, chill. I’m just kidding about the club. She probably gets her studs at a martini bar or something.”
“Do not use the wordstudin the same sentence as my mother’s name,” I warn.
“How about gentlemen callers?”
I scrunch my nose. “That seems somehow worse.” My mind works back through the years. “I’ve never really thought about it, but Mom never dated while we were still living at home, unless it was on the weekends we were with Dad. I did see her out with a guy at a restaurant a couple years ago, but I could tell it wasn’t going well when I stopped by the table to say hi. He was some investment banker or something, and she looked bored to tears.”
We both look over to where she’s laughing with the mayor and a group of other friends. “You know lots of people, Remi. You should set your mom up on a date with a nice older guy. Just look at her. She’s still young and vibrant.”
Reaching for another cookie, I unwrap the pink elephant and snap its trunk off. “I would love to, but I can’t think of a single man who would ever be good enough for my mother.”
CHAPTER TEN
A weird phone number
Mindy
The rumbleof the backhoe fades away, leaving me standing in front of the flower-covered mound of dirt. The winds of January are blustery, pressing a coldness into my bones that matches the temperature of my heart.
“I’m going to miss the way she said Walmark instead of Walmart,” Caroline says from beside me, drawing the first genuine smile that’s crossed my lips in a month.
“I’m going to miss the way she had to use her GPS just to get to the grocery store.”
“Which was only five blocks away,” Caroline adds with a soft laugh.
We’re silent for a few minutes, just standing in front of my mother’s grave, our arms linked together. The scent of carnations tickles my nostrils, cloying and sweet.
My voice sounds small when I finally speak again. “I’m going to missher.”
“I know, Mindy. I am too,” Caroline sniffles. I lean my head onto her shoulder, and she tilts hers over to rest against mine. I feel her warmth, though I’m still cold inside. I’m not sure I’ll ever be warm again.
We’re still standing like that when Caroline’s boyfriend and parents approach. All the other mourners have already gone.
“Sweetie…” is all Erica Wright has to say before she has me in her warm embrace. It’s not one of my mother’s hugs, but it’s damn close, so I cling to her, feeling the tears return. I thought I’d depleted my supply the past few days, but apparently my tear ducts have restocked.
After a long hug, she passes me off to her husband, Phil, a barrel-chested blond man who always smells like Old Spice. He’s worn the same cologne since I met him when my mom and I moved to Galveston right after my own father died.
I was thirteen, and I met Caroline while we were moving boxes into our sweet little house not far from the Seawall. She bounded over, all gangly legs and braces, holding a plate of brownies her mother made for us.
After that day, one of us was always at the other’s house, easily falling into a friendship that we liked to call a sistership since neither of us had any actual siblings. Phil went with me to buy my first car and showed me how to check the oil and tires, though it wasn’t unusual to walk outside and see him in our driveway with his head under the hood of my little Kia. He’d stand and wave, calling out, “Heya, missy. Just making sure everything’s ticking along in here.” God, I adore this big, sweet man.
Phil runs a hand down the back of my head and pats twice between my shoulder blades before releasing me. His eyes are suspiciously damp.
“Your mama was a good lady,” he says gruffly. “Beat the odds and held out longer than those doctors said she would.”
“Eight months,” I acknowledge with a weak smile hiding behind my tears. “Stubborn till the very end.”
Caroline’s boyfriend, Brayden, stuffs an honest-to-goodness linen handkerchief into my hand, and I use it to dash away the re-emerged tears.
