Summer's Road (27 page)

That conversation with my mother loomed over me like a cloud. My first instinct was to shut her out of my life for good this time after what she’d said about Daddy. But, when I’d thought about it later, guilt set it. It must have taken a huge amount of courage to show up on her daughter’s doorstep after twenty-eight years and say she was sorry. To take all the blame and bare her soul.

It hadn’t been easy for me growing up. Daddy loved me, provided for me, gave me everything I desired and filled in Sharon’s absence the best he could. Most of all, he tried so damn hard to get me not to hate her. But I did. When it came down to it, I’d hated her for every tear, every insecurity. She’d walked out on us, simple as that. But I was starting to understand why she’d done what she had, and though I could never make the same mistakes as her, a part of me identified with her actions. Now she wanted to walk back into my life.

And Daddy? I knew he’d done what he thought was best for me, at the risk of his own happiness and heart. But he’d lied to me. I’d had him up on this pedestal my whole life, and he’d come down last night. I should be devastated by that alone, but instead it left me with some semblance of closure to know he was human, that he made mistakes.

I could still smell my mother’s scent in my living room this morning. In my father’s stories, Sharon had planted the lilac bushes on the south edge of our property when they’d first bought the house. It was about the only proof she’d ever been here in the first place. Not one to wear perfumes, I often used lilac bath scents and lotions. My favorite. Comforting. Was it because, subconsciously, the flower was a tie to my mother?

I gazed across the expanse of the yard. Lilies and irises were starting to wilt to make way for the chrysanthemums and crocuses. The black-eyed Susans, coneflowers, and asters would hang around another month or so. It had taken me a number of years to get my perennial garden in order, and had kept me sane those years Daddy had been sick. It had also been therapeutic having my hands in the soil, bringing life outside while he’d been passing away inside.

Matt’s car pulled into the driveway. I pocketed my mother’s card and pulled out the engagement ring. This wasn’t going to be easy, and I prayed he wouldn’t hate me. I had a lot of great memories summering with Matt and, in a way, he’d helped to point me in the right direction, had shown me what I didn’t want from life or love. To settle. He’d make a great husband to some lucky woman, just not me.

Matt made his way out of the car, and I rose to meet him at the bottom step. His face was blank, but the way his gaze skimmed over me indicated he was completely prepared for rejection. God, I hated hurting him. He kissed my cheek, not my mouth, and it confirmed my suspicion he knew. Palm up, I offered the ring inside the box.

It took him a moment, but he accepted the box and nodded. Flipping open the lid, he fingered the ring. “I spent two hours in the jewelry store picking this out. I couldn’t decide which one you’d like. Gold, silver, big, small.” He looked up at me with a cute half-smile. “I should’ve known then this wouldn’t work. I couldn’t even pick out a ring because I had no idea what you’d like.”

The diamond was too big for my taste and I much preferred white gold. Still, it was a lovely ring and a lot of thought had gone into it. “You made a good choice. It’s beautiful.”

He looked relieved and sad at the same time. “We’ll always have Seasmoke in July?”

I smiled at his sweet, old fashioned revere. My heart broke a little for what might’ve been. “Always. And I want approval before you marry someone else. She has to measure up and be good enough.”

He laughed, but it was strained. Then he sobered, a wrinkle between his brows. “Ian has my approval for you.”

My breath hitched. I cupped his cheeks and brought his forehead to mine. “Thank you for being so good to me, so patient.”

His eyes fell closed in a slow blink. “It was nothing, Summer. Only what you deserved.”

Ah, he was such a good guy.

The screen door behind me snapped shut, and there stood one-hundred and eighty pounds of pure pissed off Ian.

Ian

B
efore Summer could get a word out, I vaulted down the stairs where Matt was backing away, palms up, and stepped between him and her. Fury pushed around inside my chest, knocked at my temples.

“I was just saying goodbye.”

“Ian...”

I shrugged off Summer’s hand. “Done. Now go.”

Matt’s gaze slid to Summer and softened. Something seemed to connect in the space between them. “I approve.” Then, a slow grin spread across his face and I nearly plowed my fist into his jaw. Matt looked at me. “She needs a guy who will fight for her.”

I felt the color drain from my face. Hell.

And then something crazy happened. Matt started laughing. Not a nervous I-don’t-get-the-punch-line kind of laugh. No, it was a hysterical, frenzied roar aimed at the sky. “I expect you’ve been wanting to knock my lights out for some time now, Ian.” His laughter died to just a grin. “I should have known better than to get between you two. Godspeed.” He rounded the hood and opened the driver’s door.

Summer ran over to the car, kissed him on the cheek, and shut the door for him once he was inside. She watched his car leave the circular drive until he was out of sight before she whirled on me. The look on her face was sheer ice.

Damn. Feeling a little exposed between her glacial stare and my lack of attire, I shoved my hands in my pockets. I’d heard Matt’s car, their voices, and hadn’t bothered to put on a shirt. I’d shoved into the tuxedo pants from the night before, which were wrinkled and hung loosely around my hips. I may or may not have forgotten to button them.

She wove around me and stomped toward the porch, fury making her visibly shake.

Double damn. “Summer, stop.”

She did, halfway up the porch steps, but didn’t turn around. She spoke so quietly I had to strain to hear. “I think that’s exactly what we need to do, Ian. Stop.”

No.
What?
“What?”

She turned around. Slowly, she lifted her watery gaze and looked me in the eyes.

And I knew,
just knew
she was going to run from me, like I’d feared from day goddamn one. A deadly fist clutched my heart and squeezed the beat right out. “I’m in love with you.”

A quivering breath escaped her lips. “And I love you.”

I waited for her to finish that sentence because, as sure as the sun rose, there was a
but
coming.

She turned and walked into the house. I took the stairs in one leap and followed her.

She paced in front of the fireplace, tension vibrating off of her. “Do you want marriage and kids?”

I was starting to get whiplash, but this was Summer in front of me and her mind went off on so many tangents, I had to force myself to remember that in order not to lash out. “Yes. With you.” I wanted it all with her.

“Even with the risk of them inheriting my depression?”

I frowned, not liking where this train wreck was headed. “Yes.”

“Even though you don’t trust me?”

She couldn’t possibly be serious. I bit my tongue and let her pace some more until she spit out just what the hell she meant by that. Instead, she turned her back on me as if she were going to bolt.

“Don’t turn away from me. You can hide from everyone else, but not me.” She stopped. “Explain, Summer, because I’m not getting it.”

Defeated, she hung her head and faced me. With a gaze heavenward, she sighed. “You never believed I could make it.” She brushed her tears with an angry swipe of her hand. “Time and time again, you pick me up, fight my battles, and all because you don’t think I can do it myself. I love you for wanting to protect me. I love you for all you’ve done for me and the man you are. But I’m not going to break, Ian.”

I reared and ran a hand down my face, over my neck. Hell. She wasn’t wrong. She was one of the strongest people I knew, had risen from ash too many times, but protecting her had always been my habit. A knee-jerk reaction.

“We have to stop doing this to each other.”

My gaze flew to hers.

She rubbed her arm, looked away. “I keep stuff from you. I know that, and I shouldn’t do it. It’s just...I’m hesitant to tell you certain things because you don’t have faith I’m strong enough. I have depression, and if not for you, I might not be here.”

Her voice broke, and my throat closed in response. She pressed her palms to her eyes and it took everything in me not to pull her in my arms.

“I’m not ever going to allow myself to sink that far, be that selfish. I know what my actions did to you and I’d never hurt you like that again. At some point, Ian, you have to trust me. And you just don’t.”

Visions of her after her father’s funeral flooded me. An assault of memory designed to cripple me where I stood. Me, helpless to do anything. Her thin, pale body lying in bed. Her completely unresponsive to anything I’d attempted to do to bring her back. Her sobbing uncontrollably, pills in her hands, prepared to...

The last hold on control I had slipped between my fingers. The gut-wrenching, bone-jarring terror from back then, and now, and every moment in between slammed into me. Hot, repressed tears burned my eyes, falling unbidden down my cheeks and over my chin. My chest hitched and I couldn’t bring in air. I was shocked the memories took this long to come, considering the magnitude of all I felt for her.

She stepped toward me, eyes round in anguish, in torment.

I lifted my hand and shook my head. I couldn’t do what we both needed if she touched me. She was right. She didn’t trust that good things happen without a price, that I could love her no matter what. And I couldn’t trust her not to...
die
.

I fisted a hand over my tense stomach and wiped my eyes with my forearm. I drew in a ragged breath just deep enough to speak. “I have to leave you, Summer.” Christ, this was agony. More tears threatened. “I believe this might be the only way I can stop the pattern. I need to walk away.” Her worst damn fear, but what other way was there for me to stop hovering, for her to grasp my love? “I think only when you are truly alone can you see you never were.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Summer

W
ithin moments of Ian leaving, my cell rang. If I hadn’t been so shocked, I probably would’ve ignored it. But at that point, I was still numb, staring at the door, shaking uncontrollably.

“Summer, it’s Elizabeth.” The elementary school principal. Why was she calling on a Sunday? In summer? “I’m sorry to report Jon Melbourne died late last night.”

I stared at the kitchen doorway, at the pictures my students had made for me posted on the fridge. Jon’s was right on top. A cute scene of us holding hands in the grass. In the picture, he’d given himself back the hair chemo had stolen.

It took me three attempts to find my voice and thank Elizabeth for calling. My phone fell from my limp fingers.

Everything seemed to wash through me in that moment. Every single thing. Daddy. My mother. Jon and all my other students. Ian. It all erupted from that cavern where I shoved things, stored them away to compartmentalize. Tears brimmed my eyes until the room swam in splotches of color and light with no shape.              

Daddy was gone. I couldn’t trust Sharon’s motives for returning. Sweet Jon was dead.

Ian left me
.

And just like that, quick as a rapid blink, I was the little girl all alone. The girl who had no one. Except this time, Ian wouldn’t be there to make it okay.

Without much conscious thought to what I was doing, I retrieved my phone. My fingers shook over the keypad as I typed in the foreign number on the card from my pocket. It rang. Once. Twice. A soft, confused voice answered.

Pressing my fingers to my mouth, tears poured out of my eyes as I fumbled with what to say. “Mom?” My voice broke and torrents of anguish pummeled my chest.

That seemed to be enough for her. Sharon said a bunch of nonsense with noises in the background like drawers opening and closing, and then we disconnected with assurances from her she was coming over.

Twenty minutes later, there she was, on my front porch and catching me moments before I collapsed. My sobs quaked against her chest while she kissed the top of my head and patted my hair. We made it as far as the entryway and I slid to the floor.

It hurt so damn bad.

Sharon didn’t ask what was wrong, didn’t offer meaningless platitudes. “Let it out,” she’d said. That was all. “Let it out.” She’d come without question.

How many times had I cried for her? How many miniscule tragedies had there been growing up she should’ve been there for? That she was here now didn’t compute, was illogical. I barely knew the woman whose shirt I drenched in my fisted hands. This was...wrong. Fury surged to smother my grief. Yes. Anger was so much better than misery.

I stilled. Jerked away from her. She looked at me, compassion and understanding in eyes that were a mirror of my own. I couldn’t...I just...

Slowly, I got to my feet and backed away. I don’t know how my legs held me up, but I bounded up the stairs. I paused outside Daddy’s old bedroom, now a guest room, and flinched when I noticed she had followed.

My gaze ran over the photos on the wall and something dark, something mean and cruel blackened me.
Make her hurt as bad as I do
.

Stepping into the room, I tore a framed photo off the wall. “See this? This was my senior prom. Dee did my hair because you weren’t here. Ian’s mama bought me the dress.” I smashed the photo on the floor, scattering glass everywhere. “And this one. This was my tenth birthday. Daddy spent that whole week making me a hope chest.” I smashed that one, too. “And this was my confirmation.” Smash. “Ian and I playing by the creek.” Smash. “Rick and I trying to make Easter dinner.” Smash. One by one, the photos came off the wall until there weren’t any memories left to throw in her face.

I grabbed my chest, soughing for breath as my heart kicked my ribs. She stood calmly in the doorway, silent tears trekking her cheeks. Her apologetic gaze roamed my face, taking the awful moment like she knew it was her due.

It hit me hard that I didn’t have any right to punish her. I had depression, too. If not for Daddy and Ian, I might’ve made the same poor choices as my mother, kept chasing a high which never could never be caught. Happiness, true happiness, came from within. The little things like a quiet summer night watching fireflies. The first sip of coffee on a cold fall morning. The laugh from a child I made feel better. Waking up next to the person I loved most in the world.

Yeah, she’d hurt me. She’d hurt Daddy. But she’d hurt herself most of all. Something I understood.

I looked at the pandemonium around me and started shaking. “Oh God. What have I done?” Not just the glass and splintered frames, but with Ian. Chaos. Everywhere, chaos.

Sharon looked down at my feet, seemed to note they were bare. “Um, don’t move.” She ran down the hall, opening and closing doors until she stood in the doorway again. Laying a blanket over the broken glass, she urged me over. “Come here.”

I did. Setting the past aside, I walked right to her. And the darkness lifted.

With an arm around my shoulders, she ushered me into my bedroom to lie down. Mom sat on the bed, back against the headboard, and urged my head into her lap. She held me tight against her, not letting up when the tears came again.

“I...miss...him.”

“I know,” she said, as if she did know. As if she’d been there too and knew exactly how empty I felt.

After some time, there were no more tears and my breaths hitched. “I got your shirt all wet.”

She brushed the hair away from my face. “Just a shirt. It’ll dry.” I took the tissue she passed me and wiped my nose. “Feel better?”

I groaned, laying sideways on a frump of blankets by the foot of the bed. “Yeah. A little. No.”

She laid next to me, our faces close, and I couldn’t help but be reminded of all the times Ian and I had lain like this together.

“You don’t have to say anything you don’t want to, but I’ll listen if you tell me what happened.” Mom tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear. 

I had no idea when I’d started thinking of her as
mother
instead of
Sharon
, but it felt good to drop the pretense. Lightening, actually. There it was. All of my childhood wishes lying right beside me, comforting, listening.

I think only when you’re truly alone can you see you never were.

Ian was right. Daddy had been there. Rick and Dee had been there. Ian had been there. I’d foolishly taken them for granted at times, in the silly hope of having this very moment with my mother.

So I told Mom everything in a hushed whisper, as if speaking in a normal tone would break the bond. She would occasionally nod her head, encouraging me to keep talking, but she never interrupted. It was reassuring. It was cleansing. It was
family
.

When I was through, she talked about her life in Texas. That she was a secretary in a real estate attorney’s office. She liked gardening and crafts, but she wasn’t good at either. She had nice neighbors, but no real friends, because she always thought of her old life here and that’s all she dreamed about. So, for twenty-eight years, she’d lived in Houston, never falling in love, going through the motions, and wishing to come home one day.

Eventually, we ate some chicken noodle soup in the kitchen and then returned to my bedroom where she rubbed my back until I fell asleep.

I woke at dawn the next morning, feeling like a freight train had plowed me over. Twice.

My mother wasn’t here.

After using the bathroom and confirming that I
looked
like a freight train had hit me, I stepped into the hall to go downstairs. A note was taped to the guest room door.

I’m sorry you had such a rough night last night. I cleaned up the mess. I thought it was time to do that. I didn’t want to assume anything, so I’m at the hotel. Just call if you want. Mom

Opening the door, I came up short, my jaw dropping. It was clean. All of the pictures were in new frames, back up on the wall as if last night had never happened. The glass had been swept up and removed.

Heading downstairs, I started a pot of coffee and dialed Mom’s number while leaning against the counter.

“You didn’t have to do that, but thank you.”

She didn’t answer right away, the silence heavy. “Yes, I did.”

I pressed my lips together, nodding. And there was nothing more to say. It would take awhile to completely forgive and forget, but we were on our way.

I smiled. “You want to do lunch today?”

“I would love to.”

I
’d taken Mom to my studio to show her around and it dawned on me how much time we’d already wasted. Over lunch, she had tentatively asked how I felt about her moving back to Wylie. The next day, she’d flown to Houston to make arrangements to put her condo up for sale. I’d spent the next two days idly, painting or cleaning or anything else to get my mind off of Ian.

At the cemetery, I breathed humid air and watched Jon Melbourne’s tiny casket as it was lowered into the ground. There wasn’t a sadder sight on earth than a coffin that size. I stood alone, behind the family as they mourned a child taken too young. A child who would never have a first kiss or fall in love. Who would never go to college or grow up and become a man.

How many years had I wasted being scared? How many years had I not lived? Loved?

Ian hadn’t returned any of my phone calls. I’d tried to go over there to tell him about my mother and everything else, wanting to show I wasn’t afraid to talk to him and, if for no other reason, to just see him. But the door remained locked. I had a key to his house somewhere at mine, but he’d never locked his door before. I got the hint and didn’t push.

Eventually, he would have to face me, though. I loved him. I was through hiding from myself and from my friends. Especially Ian. And the fact he’d stayed away from me this long proved he was trying to let me stand on my own without help. It had to be killing him, but he was doing it.

I’d been hollow since he walked out my door. Since he’d looked at me with tears in his eyes and sobs wracking his chest. Because of me. Because of us. Love like ours shouldn’t be separated. Something I’d rectify soon if I had to chain him down to hear me out. Yet the time apart had been therapeutic, something we’d needed.

Rick had come to Jon’s funeral, but not Dee or Ian. He stood on the other side of the casket, making no attempt to join me. I couldn’t help but notice the void. After the service was complete, I looked over at him and offered a weak smile.

Heading across the cemetery toward my father’s grave, Rick fell into step with me. We were silent until we reached the grave marker. A small potted orchid sat next to Daddy’s headstone. I tried to rub the pain out of my chest, but it was a futile effort. Ian had been here. He’d come to see Daddy and had left the flowers. Orchids, my favorite.

Rick wrapped an arm around my waist and drew me to his side. He looked at the plant. “Ian comes here on Sundays when you and Dee are at lunch.”

I didn’t visit Daddy’s grave very often. To me, he wasn’t here. This was his body, but not him. He was in the house we’d lived in, inside the photos on the wall, at Seasmoke in a chair by the ocean, inside my heart. Not here. Perhaps the real reason was, by coming here, it reminded me he was well and truly gone.

“How is Ian?” I asked, unable to help myself.