Honeyed Words (16 page)

The bills went onto the desk, and I was out the door. I was looking forward to seeing Katie.

Twenty-one

Katie had gotten a new Miata—stunner. It seemed everyone owned one. She wanted to surprise me with the fact that she got the midnight blue, instead of her usual red. “You can even drive it,” she’d said.

I’d given her the stink eye, like I’d be seen driving such a chick car.

She punched me, the harlot.

Dinner was brief, Mexican down the street, but the conversation was excellent.

She’d been exchanging e-mails with Cassidy Stone of The Harpers. He wanted her to jam with them again sometime. She was so damn cute about it. With Ari out of the picture, their tour had come to a crashing halt, so they were back home in Boston trying to figure out what they were going to do next.

By the time I dragged myself back up the stairs to my apartment, the earlier trauma had been wiped away. Damn, that girl had a way of turning my head round and round.

With her kiss still lingering on my lips, I jogged up the stairs three at a time. I was feeling springy. Julie wasn’t home but I could tell she’d been there, since the cards I’d left stacked on the counter were opened and displayed around the dining-room table. That’s something my mother would have done.

Well, Mom would have stacked them across the top of the television first, but the leftovers would be on the dining-room table.

I was getting a glass of water when Julie came in. She walked across the room with just her cane. I watched her, making sure she was okay, admiring the way she didn’t fight it but let things happen at the pace they needed to work.

“Evening,” she said, approaching me.

“Been out, I see.”

“Mrs. Sorenson is teaching me the finer points of gin rummy.” Julie settled into a chair across from me and leaned her cane against the table. “How’d it go out at the Circle Q?”

I watched her for a second. I was fairly sure that Frank would have called her already. Was she fishing for different news? Looking to see how I handled things? Or maybe Frank hadn’t called.

I shrugged. “You heard Steve and Jack took off, leaving her high and dry?”

Julie just nodded, her lips a tight white line across her face.

“Well, I stayed after we finished up with the five horses today, and I mucked stalls.”

“Really?” She seemed genuinely surprised.

“She needed the help, and I need the money.” Same story as always, I thought.

“About that,” she said and pointed to my computer. On the screen was my accounting software, open with a big fat negative number in the pending column. “Couldn’t help but notice,” she said, not showing a second of remorse.

“I’ll be okay,” I said. “Not like this is new for me. I’ve had plenty of thin times.”

She shook her head. “You are a stubborn one. Not that I’m much better.” She dragged her fingers through her hair, pulling it back off her face. “You know I have some money coming in, Sarah. Disability and insurance.”

“No way,” I said. “You need to save that to rebuild the smithy.”

A little smile flickered across her face. “Stubborn as a mule and as optimistic as Susie Sunshine some days.” She reached over and put her hand on mine, squeezing it. “You let me stay here, ornery girl. Least I can do is kick in for some of the utilities and such.”

I glanced over at the computer. Wouldn’t take much to get me back in the black, to be honest. A few hundred a month would be a huge help. Then, maybe I’d quit thinking about that damn check.

“Not too much,” I said, feeling a little chagrined. “Just enough to cover the gap until the movie money kicks in again.”

“We’ll see how it goes,” she said, pulling a check out of her shirt pocket. “Here’s for half the utilities and rent—”

I started to rise, a protest fully formed on my lips, but she pulled me back down by the hand she held, forcing the check in it with the other.

“—not asking your permission,” she said. “Last I checked, I’m the one teaching you things. Isn’t that the arrangement?”

I sat back down, resigned. I could really use the money, but I owed her, damn it.

“Okay, just for a little while,” I said. “But I’m banking any extra for the smithy myself.”

“It’s your money,” she said, smiling. “Do what you think’s best.”

I sat back, looking at her. She had a way with the world that I both feared and admired. I hoped I had my act together as much as she did when I was her age.

“Now, tell me about Ms. Campbell,” she said, crossing her hands in front of her on the table.

I told her how the day went, explaining that Frank was gonna call her, and even got around to talking about the rumors, and the semiconfession I’d given.

She just nodded, pretty grim at the thought of her peers talking smack about her, but glad that Ms. Campbell had our collective back.

“She’s a good one, that Mary Campbell,” she said, smacking the table when I was done. “If you end up working for her on Saturday, maybe I’ll go out with you, spend some time with her, have some tea and chat about things.”

It was good to have that particular part of my past out in the open. My heart felt lighter.

“One more thing,” Julie said.

I scowled at her; I could tell by the way she looked at me. I could be downright petulant when I tried. “Can’t we just leave this on a good note?”

She smiled and pulled an envelope out of her pocket, sliding it across the table to me.

I didn’t touch it, fearing it would bite me. It was the envelope from Mom.

“I threw that in the trash,” I said, feeling the heat on my neck.

“Missed,” she said. “Found it on the floor beside the can. Sorry.” She looked like she was, honestly. “With all the other cards, I thought it was one of mine; just figured it had fallen to the floor. Wasn’t until I’d opened it with the others and began to read it did I realize it was for you.”

She watched me, expecting something from me. I had been very clear with her how I felt about my parents. Can’t say she ever really approved, but she’d respected my position.

“I don’t need another preachy lecture about the sins of my life, or how much I’ve disappointed them.”

“I read the letter,” she said, staring directly into my eyes. “Has your mother ever once said she was disappointed in you?”

“She doesn’t have to say it,” I said defensively. “You should know how easy it is to make your opinions clear to those around you. You don’t always tell me when I’m screwing up, but I get the message loud and clear.”

Julie laughed at that. “Lord, girl, if only that were so. You are the most stubborn person I’ve ever met. There have been moments when I thought the only way to get through your thick skull was to crack it open with a hammer.”

I scowled at her. She didn’t look like she was busting my chops, but she wasn’t lying.

“I can be defensive,” I agreed. “But you’ve got no clue what it was like growing up with those folks!”

She sighed, a tired, deep sigh that felt part sympathy and part lecture. “Sarah. How old is your sister?”

“Megan?”

“Do you have another?”

I thought about it. I hadn’t been home in five years, so I guessed it was possible. But I doubted they were writing me to tell me they’d had another baby, not at their age.

“Megan would be almost seventeen.” Damn, really? I did the math in my head. She was ten years younger than me—no, wait. I counted back. Twelve. “She’s fifteen.”

Julie patted the card and letter in front of me. “You might read that. I didn’t see a lecture in there.”

“Doubtful,” I said honestly.

“Well, I don’t have your background for reading into family dynamics, but she mentions Megan.”

“Megan was a good kid, but I haven’t seen her since she was ten. She probably doesn’t remember me.” That wasn’t exactly a stellar argument, I knew. “I love the kid,” I went on. “Hell, she looked up to me as far back as I can remember. I was always finding her in my room, digging through my stuff, pretending to be me when she didn’t know I was looking.”

“I’m not surprised,” Julie said.

I plowed on. “And I left her there, of course. Not like I had any business looking after her; I can barely keep myself out of the poorhouse.”

“Sarah, she’s not yours to raise,” Julie said quietly.

I didn’t slow down, just rambled. “Besides, Mom would look out for her, shield her from the crazy. Of course, she’d done such a quality job with me.”

Julie let me run down, watching my face. I hated when she did that. It was like she was peeling my face away to look deep inside me.

“From what I can tell,” she said, “you turned out to be a helluva woman. Can’t say they did too bad a job.” She leaned against the table, leveraging herself up. “I’m going to bed. Big day of PT tomorrow.”

I gave her a feeble wave. “Night, boss.”

The path to the bedroom had been cleared just after she’d moved in. I ditched the beanbag chair and moved the coffee table over in front of the stereo so she could walk back and forth without much chance of running into things.

Made me think about my own life, and how I managed to run into every bitty bit between here and there. I waited until she’d closed the door, drained my glass of water, and set it on the envelope. I just couldn’t face that tonight. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to face it ever.

I went into the living room, opened the hide-a-bed, and got ready for sleep. Tomorrow would be a long day.

Twenty-two

I tossed and turned for a good hour. I kept thinking about Megan and the way she looked up to me, how she wanted so much to please me when we talked on the phone. When I’d gone away to college it had about killed her. Now, I’d gone and given her up as bad rubbish.

Five years. I’d thought about her in that time, off and on, but had never mustered enough gumption to call her. Not like talking to Ma or Da on the phone would hurt or anything. Besides, I could call when he was at work. Gave me even odds she’d answer the phone.

But I was a coward. I’d left her to the world I hated so much. Not like she was my daughter or anything, and they weren’t beating her. I just couldn’t take their politics and their attitudes. Too much hatred and fear for my tastes.

And if that wasn’t abuse enough, whom was I fooling? Don’t need to beat a body to break ’em.

I got up, knowing I’d never sleep at this rate. I grabbed the glass off the envelope, filled it with water, and sat down.

Julie had slit the envelope open with a knife—there was no ragged edge. I tipped the envelope to the side, and a small card poked out. It slid out easy enough, another piece of Ma’s stationery. I’d gotten that set for her when I was eleven. That was sixteen years ago. Surely she’d gone through it all by now?

But then, whom did she have to write to? Her parents were both gone, and she was an only child. Da never kept us anywhere long enough to make any friends, up until we landed out in Crescent Ridge. Anyone she knew there, she knew through church, and she didn’t need to write them letters. She saw them three days a week.

Last I heard, she’d been homeschooling Megan. Poor kid.

I picked up the card and a picture fell out. It was Megan, taken when she wasn’t expecting it.

She was leaning against the family pickup truck with her arms crossed and a sullen look on her face. She looked just like me, at least body language–wise.

What shocked me the most, however, was that her hair was short. Well, short by Da’s standards. When I was her age, I could sit on my hair, it was so long. One of the reasons I shaved my head when I got to college.

Megan’s hair was shoulder length, but there was a wide purple streak across her bangs. Cutting her hair and dying it? Brave girl. And the skirt she wore was scandalously close to her knees. And … sure enough, she was sporting combat boots.

Our dear father must have gone out of his mind. Maybe things at my place had changed more than I’d imagined possible. But not too much. She had the look of someone who rarely saw anything outside her own head. I recognized the look, that far-off stare, wishing you were somewhere else … were someone else.

Megan was beautiful, that much I saw. She’d gotten more of Ma than I had, where I had more of Da. She was probably beating the boys away with a stick.

And winning a might more at home than I ever had.

I stared at the picture for a few minutes, then flipped open the card. Inside were a few handwritten sentences.

Thinking of you. Wish you’d call or come by
.

There was a letter inside. One page only, covered in tight script I recognized as Ma’s.

Dearest Sarah,

I pray every day that you will find it in your heart to come home to us, even just to visit. Your father and I miss you fiercely.

I put the letter down and rubbed my temples. Da only missed controlling me.