A Stillness of Chimes (15 page)

She raised her right hand. “That was me.”

“Why?”

She sighed. “Because I thought I saw Dale’s truck pulling in there. I’m not absolutely sure because I didn’t see his face. Whoever it was, he was trespassing. I didn’t like it, so I put up the signs.”

“I’ll find out if it was Dale.” Tension stretched over Sean’s features.

“No, let it go. Don’t worry about it. Focus on your business. On whatever it is you need to do to get ready for the festival. Are you making any progress?”

“Yes ma’am, so I’ve earned the right to badger you about changing the locks.”

Maybe she could still make him drop the subject. “What did you accomplish today?”

“I picked up my new business cards, wrote up a brochure, and updated my fancy-pants website.”

“You have a website?”

“I’ve had one for years. You think I live in the Dark Ages?” He dug out his wallet, pulled out a card, and handed it to her.

“Sean Halloran, Luthier.” The printing blurred in front of her eyes before she could read the details. She’d never forgotten the dreams he’d shyly shared with her when they were fourteen and he’d just started music lessons with her dad.

“Do you still dream of playing Nashville?” she asked.

The half smile came back. “No, I’m a little more in touch with reality now. I’ll never be that good.”

“But your instruments are good enough to be onstage, in the hands of big-name artists. It’ll happen someday.”

“You know what I’d rather see? My instruments in children’s hands.”

“Children can’t afford your instruments.”

“There’ll be a few who can,” he said. “One way or another. I’ll see to it.”

“I bet you will. You’d be a good teacher.” She tried to hand the card back.

“Keep it,” he said so tersely that she wondered if he meant the card or the sentiment. “When can I change your locks?”

“When I say so.”

Sean muttered something. He got to his feet and walked toward the door, where he faced her again. “I’ll lock up on my way out. Is the other door locked?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” He studied the journals piled around her, then met her eyes. “It’s hard to lose your mother. I remember. For me, it came in waves. I’d think I was past it, and then it would hit me again, and I’d be back where I started, crying like a baby.”

“You were only ten. You practically
were
a baby. And believe me, I’ve done my share of crying too.”

“But never when I’m around. What’s with that? Scared I’ll give you a hug?”

She had to smile. “Something like that.”

“Yeah, something like that. One of these days.” He winked and slipped out the door before she could answer. Not that she’d had an answer handy.

Laura took another look at his business card. Her dad would have been so proud of his protégé.

If only they could be reunited, the master and the apprentice. For just one day.

Outside, the truck’s engine started. The headlights came on, and Sean flashed them—off, on, off, on.

“Stop it, you brat,” she said under her breath.

When they were in high school, he’d told her the flashing lights meant “Good night. I love you.” It had taken her a couple of weeks to work up her courage and flick the porch light in response. Then she’d made a regular habit of it, but she’d never said “I love you” out loud. She’d never written it either.

They must have written a million notes to each other in high school. They’d left notes under windshield wipers, in jackets, in schoolbooks. He’d closed each one with
Love, Sean
or
I love you
, but she’d always been afraid to use that dangerous word.

Back when Sean’s sister-in-law was almost a big sister to Laura, they’d had some heart-to-heart talks. As much as Annie had tried to play matchmaker, she’d been honest about what she called “the Dale problem.” He was a horrible father-in-law, although he’d never hated Annie and her family like he hated the Gantts.

Maybe love could conquer hatred. Or maybe not. Laura was still afraid to put it to the test.

Surrounded by the flowery scents of detergent and fabric softener, Cassie was folding the last of her laundry when she heard her mom calling from halfway across the house.

“Good morning, Cassie! I hear you rattling around, but where are you?”

“See, I told you this place is way too big,” Cassie bawled back. “Laundry room.”

Back in L.A., she had to round up a pile of quarters, lug everything down to the basement, and hope the washer and dryer were available. Here, doing the laundry was almost fun now that she’d figured out the controls. Her mom’s expensive new appliances offered too many options.

Cassie pulled her thrift-store find out of the dryer and shook out the wrinkles. A soft blue, the beautiful, hand-embroidered peasant shirt might pass for vintage. And vintage was cool.

Her mom walked in, wearing a dark, shapeless sack of a bathrobe. She unwrapped one of those low-calorie breakfast bars that always seemed to leave her starving. “Look at you. So industrious so early in the morning.”

“It’s not early. I did your jeans load and some of my stuff.”

“Thanks, sweetheart. What a pretty shirt. Did you make it?”

Cassie laughed. “Me? Sew? Are you out of your mind?”

“I used to sew, but I don’t have the patience for it anymore. That’s why
I started scrapping. It’s my way of journaling, I guess. Everybody needs a good hobby.” She took a bite of her breakfast bar. “What are your plans for today, hon?”

“Hanging out with you.”

“Oh, good. You can help me plan the party. I’m so glad Laura and Sean are coming.”

Cassie groaned. “I still can’t believe you actually invited them. They’ll find a way out of it.”

“Why?”

“They hate birthdays. Remember? Elliott drowned just before their birthdays. The same week. Close, anyway. So don’t be surprised if Laura suddenly has other plans for Saturday. Besides that, she and Sean haven’t been a couple since high school. And anyway I doubt they’ll care about a little boy’s party, Mom.”

“Sure they will.”

Cassie refrained from rolling her eyes, but even she, the aunt, wasn’t especially excited about Trevor’s fifth birthday party.

It wasn’t his fault. He was adorable. That was the problem, actually. Tigger’s perfect little family was one hundred percent adorable, happy, and successful, and Tig could never shut up about any of it. She’d been a stay-at-home mom from the beginning too, without even cramping their budget. Sometimes it didn’t seem fair.

“Sean’s such a nice young man,” Ardelle added. “I’m glad your father made that call.”

Startled, Cassie started paying attention to her mom again. “Call? What call?”

“When he sicced the authorities on Dale.”

“Huh?”

Ardelle gave her a look of big-eyed innocence. “Oh. Never mind.”

About to ask questions, Cassie began to suspect that was exactly what her mother hoped for. It seemed like a ploy to open up a subject that might have been better left alone, so Cassie stayed obstinately quiet.

The silence wasn’t broken until the cat sidled into the room, meowed piteously, and shook herself, releasing a long white hair to drift to the tiles. She meowed again.

“Arabella Antoinette, stop your begging,” Ardelle said. “I already fed you.”

“I still can’t believe you named her that. Our other cats never had middle names. Or pedigrees.”

“She knows she’s in real trouble when I use all three names. Like you and Tig always knew. Watch this.” She leaned over. “Arabella Antoinette Bright!”

Arabella laid back her ears and nipped out of the laundry room, her fluffy tail dragging the tiles.

“Cute,” Cassie said. “You have a real way with animals.”

“Don’t I?” Ardelle peeled the wrapper of the breakfast bar down to the bottom and popped the last bite into her mouth. “I’ll include Sean and Laura in the head count for the party.”

“Plan on having leftovers, then,” Cassie said, wishing she could ship them to Drew.

“They’ll come. You wait and see.” Ardelle dropped the wrapper into the wastebasket and yawned. “I didn’t sleep well. Did you hear the thunderstorm about four in the morning? I lay awake for hours, thinking of poor Jess out there in the graveyard.”

Obviously the weather didn’t matter to Jess anymore, but Cassie reminded herself to be diplomatic. “Has it been hard on you?” she asked gently.

“Hard? To lose my very best friend in the world?” Her mother’s voice trembled. “What do you think?”

“Mom, I only—”

“Don’t you roll your eyes like a bratty teenager, Cassandra Jane, and don’t be so cold-hearted.”

Wanting to argue that she tried to keep her heart at an acceptable temperature, Cassie made herself think of a softer response. “I’m sorry. You know I loved her too.”

“I know you did.” Ardelle started rubbing her thumb and forefinger together, making a whispery sound. It was one of her annoying new habits. “Jess was such a sweet soul. I just wish she hadn’t soured on church and all. She was starting to think she only believed in auras and angels and whatnot.”

“I don’t think she believed all that New-Agey stuff. She just liked to push people’s buttons by talking about it.”

“She believed it, all right. Once she told me she thought death might be some kind of recycling process and she’d be back, somehow, watching over us like a guardian angel.”

Talk about recycling. It was the same little speech she’d made the night before, almost word for word.

“Mom, have you ever thought about talking things over with your pastor? Or a counselor?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I don’t need counseling. When we face losses,
we just have to accept them and move on. Like the adults we are.” Her chin quivered, but she straightened her shoulders and walked out of the room.

Cassie shook her head. Her mom acted normal most of the time, but like an orchestra with just one instrument out of tune, something wasn’t quite right.

At least she wasn’t keeping the obituary on the kitchen table anymore. That was an improvement.

Cassie pulled her threadbare pajamas out of the dryer and buried them under the other clothes in the laundry basket. Her dad knew she and Drew were barely scraping by, but they hadn’t told her mom. She had enough troubles already.

Bluegrass rang from Laura’s house as Sean climbed out of the truck. He ran up the back steps, rapped on the door and waited in the warm twilight.

She wasn’t playing just any old bluegrass album. It was a CD Elliott and his band had made, back in the day when it was a big deal to produce a CD. Sean was only a kid then, and he wasn’t accomplished enough to join in. How he’d envied them: Elliott, Doc, and Noodle, with an occasional assist from Gibby if he was in town.

Sean knocked again, to no avail, and finally tried the doorknob. Unlocked.

“Figures.” He stuck his head into the familiar kitchen, and the music blasted him. “Laura,” he called. “It’s me.”

Still no answer, so he walked in, shutting the door behind him. The
song had just hit the bridge where Elliott went nuts on the fiddle, leading the rest of them on a merry chase.

Sean had planned to take fiddle lessons from Elliott sometime, but after he’d drowned it didn’t seem to matter anymore. Sean had never even looked for a different teacher.

The music grew louder still as he followed it across the living room and down the hall. He stopped in the doorway to Jess’s room. Laura sat cross-legged on the bed, surrounded by piles of clothes. She’d draped one of her mother’s worn flannel shirts around her shoulders.

“Laura,” he called.

Still deaf to his voice, she pulled the shirt’s sleeves around her front. As if a shirt could be a stand-in for her mom’s hug.

Laura let the sleeves fall. She folded a black-and-white bandanna into a triangle and tied it on her head. Unaware of her visitor, she studied her reflection in the mirror on the bureau. Her face reminded him of a picture of a saint in some old book. Solemn eyes, deep sadness, deeper calm. Like she had touched God, had survived with scars. It was like the Sunday school story about Jacob, who’d wrestled with an angel or maybe with God Himself. The man was marked for life. Crippled. Yet the crippling would make him think of God with every step, so even the injury was a gift.