Shore Lights (46 page)

Carol placed her hands on her heart and beamed a megawatt smile. “They make the whole thing worthwhile,” she said as her smile dimmed. “I hear your grandbaby is in ER.”

Rose was painfully aware of Maddy standing in the stairwell, watching and listening to every word.

“She is,” Rose said, praying the elevator would show up and whisk the woman away.

Failing that, a tornado would be nice.

“I'll stop by the chapel on my way home,” Carol said. “A little prayer never hurt, right?”

“Right,” said Rose. “We appreciate it.” Prayer was probably all she had left at this point.

She turned toward the staircase. Where was the elevator? Why wasn't there a crowd of people milling about? Why was Maddy just standing there, recording it all like a reporter at the scene of a crime?

“Rose, while I have you here—”

Rose moved toward the door. “Carol, I'm sorry but I must run. I have to—”

“Just one second,” Carol said. “We still need the signed consent form so we can send your records to the Breast Cancer Institute for study.”

Five years of secrets, of elaborate excuses and complicated lies, up in smoke, and all it took was a simple request from an overworked office assistant with one more item to check off on her To-Do list.

It was so pathetically ridiculous that Rose wanted to laugh. She did laugh, bending over at the waist, holding her stomach, big painful full-body laughs that almost split her in two.

“Rose?” Carol took a step closer. “Are you okay?”

Rose only laughed harder. Tears streamed from her eyes and down her cheeks.

“Mom?” Maddy was standing beside her, a cautious hand on her shoulder. “Is everything all right?”

Was it possible Maddy hadn't heard Carol? Was there still a chance?

Her laughter tightened up into choking sobs. Please, God, maybe she hadn't heard. . . .
Please, God, I want her to know
. . . .

The elevator chimed.

“I hate to leave her this way,” Carol said, “but I need to get back to my desk.”

“Go,” said Maddy, forcing a smile. “I'll stay with her.”

“I'll say a prayer for your daughter.”

Maddy thanked her. So polite. Maybe she hadn't done such a terrible job with her after all.

Carol stepped onto the elevator and just before the doors closed, she called out, “Give me a yell when you find out something.”

“What's your extension?” Maddy asked.

“Just ask for Carol in Oncology,” the woman said. “They'll find me.”

And the jaws of the trap snapped shut.

 
MADDY'S FOCUS NARROWED until there was nothing in the world but her mother.

“Tell me,” Maddy said, her tone steely-hard and uncompromising.

Rose lifted her head and looked up at her. “I think you already know.”

“You have cancer.”

“No,” said Rose. “I
had
cancer.” She forced a shaky smile. “A very significant distinction in certain circles.”

“I don't understand. How could I not know this?”

“Very simple,” Rose said. “I didn't tell you.”

“How long?”

She heard her mother's sharp inhalation of breath, the pause, the shaky exhalation. The ex-smoker's canto. “A long time.”

“
How
long?”

“Five and a half years.”

“Jesus!” She backed away from Rose. “When were you going to tell me?”

“I wasn't,” her mother said. “But Lucy has been—”

“Aunt Lucy knows?” Rose nodded. “Who else? Gina? Denise? The Loewensteins? The Armaghs?” She tried to lower her voice but failed miserably. “Am I the only one who doesn't know?”

“Lucy knows,” Rose said, tears still streaming down her face. She hesitated. “And your father.”

That little piece of information hit Maddy like a kick in the gut. “You're telling me that Bill knows?”
My father? Daddy?

“When Irma was dying.” Rose's voice had been reduced to a whisper. Maddy had to lean closer to hear her words. “I didn't mean to tell him. I didn't want to, but she was so frightened and I—”

“If you're looking to score points as a humanitarian, don't bother.”

Rose turned and punched the Down button.

“You can't leave now,” Maddy said, starting after her mother. “You can't drop a bombshell like this on me and walk out.”

“Of course I can't,” Rose shot back. “That's your job, isn't it? You're the one who walks out when the going gets tough.”

“Unfair,” Maddy said, her voice shaking with outrage.

“Is it?”

“Look at me, Rose. I'm not running. I'm not walking out.”

“This isn't the time,” Rose said over her shoulder, “nor is it the place.”

“Maybe not, but here we are and I'll be damned if I'm going to let you walk away from this. You
owe
me, Rose. You owe me an explanation.”

“You may not like it.”

“Try me.”

“
There
you are!” Aunt Lucy seemed to appear from nowhere. “I've been looking all over for—” She stopped, looking from Rose to Maddy. “What's wrong? I know it's not Hannah. I was just in there.”

“She knows,” said Rose.

It took Lucy a second, but then her lovely face broke into a huge smile. “Oh, thank God! Honey, I told you it was time, didn't I? I'm so glad you don't have to walk around with that terrible load on your mind any longer.”

“Maybe we should open a bottle of champagne,” Maddy said, glaring at the two women. “A toast to keeping secrets . . . where would a family be without 'em?”

The elevator clanked into position. The doors creaked open and a score of DiFalcos spilled out. Aunt Toni and Aunt Connie. Gina and Denise and their kids. More cousins and nephews and nieces than Maddy could take in. She was passed from hug to hug, moving on an unexpected wave of love and support. They brought food with them and newspapers, knitting projects and coloring books.
We're here for the long haul,
their actions proclaimed.
You're not in this alone
.

Rose was crying softly, her forehead resting against Lucy's soft shoulder. Maddy felt a quick stab of guilt but pushed it away as the others gathered around the two sisters.
Your choice, Rose
. Over and over, in every given situation, Rose had always made the choice to be alone.

Her sisters and nieces and nephews and cousins and friends would have been there for Rose, gathering around her like a human shield, protecting her from outside invaders. They would have ferried her to doctors' appointments, held her hand during chemo, driven her to radiation. They had done it for their own before. Rose was their blood. They would have done it for her, too.

Maddy would have been there for her mother as well. She would have put aside old differences and come home to help her through. That was what families did when they were given the chance.

But Rose never gave any of them the chance.

Look at them over there with Rose. Look at the kindness on their familiar faces, the love and concern. In that throbbing mass of family love only Lucy knew Rose's story. Only Lucy had been given the opportunity to hold Rose's hand, a gift whose value Maddy was only now beginning to fully understand.

Maddy slipped away from the knot of family and moved quickly down the hallway. She felt numb and bruised. Too much was happening. Her little girl's illness, Rose's revelation, the sense that she was beginning to see her family clearly for the first time in her life. She had been gone for almost half her life. She was a virtual stranger to most of them. But they loved her just the same. It was a revelation to her. They had opened the circle wide enough to let her slip inside and bring Hannah with her. They were her tribe. Her people. Even if she packed her bags and disappeared for another fifteen years, they would be here waiting for her when she came back. The circle would open wide again.

The third-floor lounge swarmed with people. She saw Kelly's boyfriend, Seth, at least a dozen familiar faces from around town, Claire and Billy Jr. She ducked into Hannah's room seconds before the dam burst, and the flood she had been struggling to hold back finally broke free.

 
AIDAN SAW MADDY disappear into Hannah's room, three doors down from Irene. She looked exhausted, terrified, on the ragged edge of losing it.

The hell of it was, she had every reason to be scared shitless. He'd overheard the doctors talking in the hallway and it was clear they were flying blind. The kid was sinking fast, and unless somebody threw her the right lifeline they were going to lose her.

If he needed proof that God had left the building, he was looking at it.

At least Irene was leaving with all flags flying. They had begun to arrive an hour ago, people who had crossed paths with Irene over the years and been the better for it. Each new revelation reminded him of how little he knew about the woman who had raised him and Billy.

“I'm pulling for her,” Tommy said. “This town won't be the same without her.”

“She put me in touch with Charles at the bank,” Julie said. “I doubt I could've gotten the coffee shop renovated and relaunched without her help.”

“I owe her big time,” said Mel Perry. “She wrote a school recommendation for my kid the lawyer. Made all the difference.”

Jack Bernstein tried to say something, but the hitch in his throat rendered him mute.

The crowd in the third-floor visitors' lounge overflowed into the corridor. It seemed to Aidan that Grandma Irene had touched the lives of almost everyone in town and they were determined to thank her before it was too late.

He and Kelly watched, astonished, as one familiar face after another stepped into Irene's room and whispered a few words of friendship. It was a thankless exercise. Irene gave no indication that she was aware of any of them, but still they came. He sat there taking it all in, wondering about the secret lives people led and how they intersected with each other in the strangest and most profound ways.

But it was when Claire showed up with Billy Jr. that he nearly lost it.

She hugged Kelly, then grabbed him by the biceps, her tone fierce and loving. “Not for her,” she said. “For us.”

Their family. It was worth fighting for.

The DiFalcos were there in force, too, gathered together to support Maddy and Hannah in every way they could. All of the sisters. The cousins. Spouses, current and ex and almost. Nieces and nephews. A huge outpouring of love that spilled over onto Kelly and him until you couldn't tell who belonged to whom.

Gina spent a few moments at Irene's bedside. He didn't know what their connection was, but at this point nothing would surprise him. Denise. Toni DiFalco and her husband sipped coffee and watched the kids. Rose sat by herself near the window, her body language an expression of sorrow in its purest form.

Minutes passed. An hour. He got up to stretch his legs, grab a can of juice from the kitchen fridge at the end of the corridor. His head ached from the continuous low buzz of conversation, from playing host at a party nobody wanted to attend.

Maddy was in there, leaning against the sink, holding a can of orange drink to her forehead. Her eyes were closed. Dark shadows were clearly visible.

“Pretty crowded out there,” he said. The things he wanted to say had no place in this room today.

Her eyes flickered open and she offered him a weary smile. “I'm surprised the staff doesn't kick some of them downstairs. Looks like O'Malley's on a Friday night.”

“Ten years ago maybe.” He had the feeling his own smile was almost as weary. “Our Fridays aren't what they used to be.”

“How is your grandmother?”

He shook his head. “It won't be long.” A beat pause. “Hannah?”

“They don't know.” She placed the can of orange drink on the counter and wrapped her arms across her chest. “All of the advances in medicine, all of the expensive equipment they keep telling you will save your life—” Her voice broke and he looked away while she regained her composure. “If they can't pinpoint the cause after the lumbar puncture, then . . .” Her words trailed off.

Neither one of them needed a road map.

He grabbed the can of orange drink, popped the top, then handed it to her. She murmured her thanks, took a long swig, then handed it back to him. He could taste her warmth on the metal rim. They stood there for a long time, leaning back against the counter, leaning into each other.

“I owe you breakfast,” she said, taking another sip of orange drink.

“Name the day.”

“The second Hannah's out of here, we'll—”

He held her as she cried, shielding her with his body from curious eyes. He wanted to tell her that Hannah was going to be okay. He wanted to tell her that nothing bad ever happened to the people you loved, but she would know he was lying. Bad things happened every day of the week. The only sure way to keep your heart from breaking was to lock it away. But that wasn't living. It had taken Aidan a long time to figure that out, but now that he had he wasn't about to let her go.

 
BILL BAINBRIDGE SHOWED up around suppertime. Rose flew into his arms and didn't let go for a good five minutes. Maddy watched from the entrance to Hannah's room, eyes wide with shock, as her parents kissed, looked deeply into each other's eyes, then kissed again.

They're in love
, she thought in amazement. More than that, it was clear they always had been. She was too tired in body and soul to question any of it. If love showed up, you would be a fool to show it to the door.