Last One Home (10 page)

Laurie glanced over at her. “That was intense. I didn’t know you had another sister.”

“I don’t, not really. Cassie ran away from home when I was fourteen; it was like she disappeared for all these years. Now she’s divorced and wants back into the family as if nothing happened. It’s been weird, you know. She reached out to us once and it was all so awkward and uncomfortable. We didn’t have anything to say to one another. I haven’t heard from her since.”

“Have you contacted her?”

“I tried. I mailed her a Christmas card, which was returned with no forwarding address. Apparently, my sister moves around a lot.”

Nichole was tense and uptight, although she tried hard to relax. “I could use a fruity drink. How about you?”

“Should we?” Laurie asked guiltily.

“We should. It’ll wear off before we head home.”

Laurie was game. They went into the hotel attached to the shopping mall and let a cool mojito work its magic. When they finished, they returned to Nordstrom.

On the way into the department store, Nichole passed the purses on display and stopped cold. She grabbed Laurie’s sleeve.

“Laurie, do you see what I see?”

Her friend stared in the same direction as Nichole and then shook her head. “What?”

“That Michael Kors bag,” Nichole whispered, as if she were speaking in church.

“Nichole, they’re hundreds and hundreds of dollars.”

“I know. I know. It’s the alcohol talking. I’d be nuts to even consider buying it.”

“Then you’d better stop looking at it.” Laurie wrapped her
arm around Nichole’s elbow and said, “Turn your head this way and pretend you didn’t see it.”

“I can’t
not
look,” Nichole said in a breathy voice. “I would so love to own that bag. Go and check the price and then come tell me.”

“You sure?” Laurie sounded skeptical.

“I think so.” Nichole’s head was spinning and her stomach was in turmoil.

“Call Jake,” Laurie advised.

“You think I should?”

“Yes. He’ll tell you you’re out of your mind, and then buy it for you himself on your anniversary.”

“Good idea.” Nichole reached inside her purse for her phone.

Laurie walked over to the purse on display. A sales clerk was immediately there to assist her. She asked the price, nodded, and then turned back to Nichole and held up seven fingers.

“It’s seven hundred dollars,” Nichole told Jake, who was on the other end of the line.

“Seven hundred dollars for a purse?” Jake repeated, sounding shocked.

Nichole knew the price was above and beyond anything she should consider spending. “It’s too much, isn’t it?”

“Oh honey, that’s a lot of money.”

“I know. You’re right. I’m being ridiculous.”

Jake hesitated and then said, “All right, baby, buy it. You’re the most amazing woman in the world and you deserve beautiful things. We’ll find a way to pay for it.”

“You don’t mean it.” Nichole was nearly speechless.

“Do it, honey. You buy yourself that purse.”

That was all the incentive Nichole needed.

Saturday night, Cassie turned off the light on her nightstand early. She was exhausted. She’d worked at the salon all week and then gone to the construction site and put in extra hours. It remained light until nearly eight, which helped. For most of the time, Cassie managed to keep out of Steve’s way. He seemed to be preoccupied with the business at hand, which was just as well. Either that or he chose to simply ignore her.

After a hectic week, Sunday wasn’t going to be a day of rest, but Cassie wasn’t complaining. She was thrilled to have gotten work with the caterer for the Sounders soccer match.

“Mom?”

“Yes, honey, what is it?” Going to sleep early didn’t seem likely if Amiee was in a chatty mood. Her daughter’s shadow filled the doorway leading to Cassie’s small bedroom.

Amiee sighed. “What was it like when you were my age?”

Cassie sat up enough to lean on her elbow. Ever since she’d gotten the letter from her older sister, Amiee had besieged her with questions about the two aunts she’d yet to meet.

“How do you mean?” she asked. “I can tell you right now we didn’t have cell phones.”

“I know that. What I want to know is what’s it like having sisters. Did you share clothes?”

The memories wrapped themselves around Cassie like curling ribbon atop a birthday gift. “All the time,” Cassie whispered into the dark.

“Did you ever do stuff like date the same boys?”

“Never. Dad wouldn’t hear of it. Karen and I were the closest in age. She’s two years older.”

“Your dad used to take you fishing, didn’t he?”

Cassie could only wonder how her daughter found that out. “How’d you know about that?”

Amiee went silent. “You wanted to take me fishing once and Dad wouldn’t let you. You tried to explain that your dad took you fishing and Dad got really upset with you, remember? He said you were putting him down and … and he hit you.”

Cassie swallowed against the tightness in her throat. “Yes, I remember,” she whispered. Trying to divert the conversation, she lightened her voice and said, “My dad took the family fishing quite a bit when I was young. We’d catch the fish, clean them, and cook them up for dinner over the campfire. Those are some of my best childhood memories.”

Amiee stepped into the room and Cassie tossed aside her covers, inviting her daughter to climb into bed with her. All too soon Amiee’s cold feet were tucked against her much warmer ones.

“Tell me some stories of when you were my age.”

“Let me think,” Cassie whispered, wrapping her arm around her daughter’s thin shoulders. She’d been raised in a loving home. Her mother had been a homemaker until Nichole was old enough for school and then she’d gone to work in the school cafeteria. That way she was home in the summers with her daughters. Her mother was far less outgoing than their father, who made everything fun. Cassie hated that her last conversation with her father
had been an argument. From the onset he hadn’t liked Duke, and he’d done everything within his power as her father to keep the two of them apart. Sadly, his demands had exactly the opposite effect. Cassie was convinced she was in love and Duke encouraged her to meet him on the sly, which she’d done.

“Tell me about camping,” Amiee urged, snuggling closer.

Talking about happier times in her childhood was certainly preferable to delving into painful memories. “Dad bought a big tent the year I turned ten,” Cassie told her, pressing her head down on the pillow close to her daughter. She lowered her voice, hoping that it would lull Amiee to sleep. “I helped Dad set it up while Mom and Karen and Nichole unloaded everything from the station wagon. Mom had a folding table and a cookstove and a cooler filled with enough food for three days.” It’d been a privilege to be asked to help her father, and they’d gotten the tent set up in record time.

“Were you in the National Forest or at a campsite?” Amiee asked.

“Neither. Dad knew some people who had acreage near Colville, which is a town north of Spokane. A bubbling brook that had fish ran through their property, and Dad got permission to camp out there. It was an adventure—no one else around. We had the entire field to ourselves …” Or so they’d thought, Cassie remembered, smiling now at the memory.

“Were you excited to go fishing?”

“We all were. Karen kept saying if she had to put a worm on the hook she refused to fish, and Nichole stood on the edge of the stream and called out, ‘Here, fishy, fishy.’ She seemed to think she could lure them onto the land so she could scoop up a fish with her bare hands, and then when Dad caught one she wanted to name it.”

Amiee giggled. “How old was she?”

Cassie had to think about that. “There’s a four-year span between the two of us, so she would have been around five or six at the time.”

“Did you have fun?”

“We did until Karen woke us up, screaming hysterically.”

Cassie could feel her daughter relax against her. She enjoyed hearing these stories as much as Cassie enjoyed telling them.

“What happened?” Amiee asked. “Why was Karen screaming? Did a bear come after her?” Wild animals were always a concern to Amiee.

“Not a bear; it was something else.”

“Tell me, Mom, don’t keep me in suspense.”

“Okay, okay, remember I told you that a friend of my dad’s owned this property? What he failed to mention was that he’d leased the land to a local rancher who raised cattle. And, in case you didn’t know, cattle are curious animals. They wanted to find out what that funny-looking structure was in the middle of the field, so they came to investigate.” Cassie struggled not to laugh out loud. “We were surrounded by cattle. They leaned against the tent and toppled the table with the cookstove, and then, to complicate everything, the tent collapsed.”

“Oh no.”

“Can you picture that?” Cassie asked. “Mom, Karen, and Nichole panicked while Dad and I tried in vain to get the tent back up.” It’d been dreadful at the time, but the story had Cassie smothering her own giggles.

“Mom, Mom, stop … I have more questions.”

Cassie wiped the mirth from her eyes. “Sorry. It’s been a lot of years since that happened. I’d nearly forgotten about it.”

“Did you ever go fishing in the brook, and did you catch anything?”

“I did,” she boasted proudly. “I hooked a trout and it was a large one, bigger than any my dad caught.”

“Did Karen or Nichole catch a fish?”

“No. Nichole never gave up on the idea she could catch them with her hands. Dad said Karen had to bait her own hook and she refused.” The three sisters had bickered on the long ride home. In retrospect, Cassie realized Karen had been jealous of her. She’d taunted Cassie mercilessly, simply because she’d caught a fish and Karen hadn’t. It was Karen’s own fault, but she didn’t see it that way.

According to Karen, Cassie caught that fish because she was their father’s favorite, which made no logical sense. This rift between them—over Cassie being the favorite—was the cause of so much jealousy.

At age ten she thought Karen had it wrong and that her sister was being ridiculous. In retrospect, she realized her sister was right. Her father did favor Cassie. He’d found a way later that same summer to get her a piano, for one thing. And she was the only one he let trail along with him when he ran errands.

Cassie was the daughter with the good grades, the fearless one, blessed with what he called
grit
. She was like the son he never had. He taught both her and Karen how to change a flat tire, but it was Cassie he showed how to check the car engine and how to change the oil. When Cassie turned sixteen he’d promised her his mother’s cameo and said Cassie could wear it on her wedding day. Instead she’d run away and married Duke just weeks before she was scheduled to leave for college.

The cameo.

Like the story of camping in the open field, Cassie hadn’t thought about the cameo in years. The memory brought with it an ache—it seemed to symbolize everything she had lost when she became estranged from her family. The cameo was the most precious jewelry her grandmother had owned, and her own mother had worn it on her wedding day. She wondered which sister it had gone to after she left home.

The soft, even breaths of her daughter told Cassie that Amiee had fallen asleep. Gently, she swept the hair off the twelve-year-old’s forehead and brushed her lips over the smooth skin of her daughter’s cheek.

Pressing her head down against the soft pillow, Cassie closed her eyes as scenes from her childhood played through her mind like an old silent movie.

There’d been good times and bad times with her two sisters. As the three had grown older they’d had some wretched fights, but their disagreements never lasted long. At one time the three of them had been close. Even now Cassie found it hard to believe that she had gone years without talking to her sisters. Those years seemed like an entire lifetime.

Sunday morning Cassie had to be at CenturyLink Field by nine. Russell, Rosie’s cousin, had her fill out the proper paperwork, gave her a uniform complete with an apron, and assigned her six suites. Her job was simple enough: She was to deliver the food order each suite owner had emailed the Wednesday before the game. This was a golden opportunity and she was anxious to do everything right. She needed this job, even if it meant she had to work seven days this week. Too much was at stake.

Never having been inside CenturyLink Field before—let alone attend a Sounders game—Cassie was amazed at the size of the stadium. A light mist had started to fall, but a little rain didn’t discourage the fans’ enthusiasm. They crowded into the stands as an air of excitement filled the stadium. Cassie couldn’t help but feel it herself.

The suites were luxurious and for the most part empty while she delivered the first round of the orders. She filled all the refrigerators with the drinks, mostly beer and soda. She noticed Russell kept close tabs on her, which caused her to work all the
harder. She double-checked to make sure she had the right order in each suite.

Behind the scenes, the activity was fairly hectic.

Cassie’s next job was to deliver the hot food about thirty minutes before the Sounders match officially started. Everything was going well until she entered Suite 36.