The Christmas Secret (28 page)

I leave the car running as I grab the flowers and close the door. A few inches of snow is on the ground so I hold up my dress and walk to the spot, placing the flowers atop the gray marble. “I got your flowers last year so I thought you should have these,” I say, reading the words on Linda Marshall's tombstone: A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies. “You'd be proud of your men.” Dennis's grave is not far from this spot but there's too much snow on the ground to cross to it. “Thank you!” I shout in that direction.

The car is warm as I slide back inside. I drive around the square and claim a spot in front of Wilson's. People watch as I run the two blocks and slip in through the side door. “Where did you go?” Mom asks. She is wearing a light teal dress with chiffon sleeves that hangs to just below her knee and is absolutely beautiful.

“I put flowers on Linda's grave,” I say, catching my breath.

“Today?”

“It's her day, Jeanette,” Betty says, straightening the back of my dress. “She can do whatever she wants.”

“Spoken like a true grandmother,” Mom says. “The grandchildren can do no wrong!”

Mom sat Betty down on the day after Christmas last year and had a long tear-filled conversation with her. There were no feelings of resentment or bitterness that Mom had feared from Betty but only acceptance and more love than any of us expected. She's head-over-heels crazy about Zach and Haley and smashes my cheeks between her hands at least once a day to say, “Let me look at you. Beautiful. Just beautiful.” She is the second grandmother I had always dreamed about.

Haley is wearing a soft pink dress with bright pink crinoline on the bottom that she says is “good for spinning.” I haven't seen Zach since we arrived but I took pictures of him in his blue suit next to Haley at the house before we left. He held up two fingers behind her head and made a silly face. In a year when I've been busier than ever, the kids have been their happiest. I worried about going back to school but between their Grandma Betty, Jason, Gloria, Miriam, and Dolly watching them while I am in class they have thrived and even learned how to make cream cheese bear claws!

I work at Betty's three mornings a week and go to college the other two days and two evenings a week. I started in February and am on the fast track to receive my teaching degree in another eighteen months. Betty and Gloria helped me research every scholarship possible and Betty is paying the rest. “No, no, no,” I said, the day she came over to talk about it.

She grabbed my face between her hands. “If Dennis had known he had this wonderful person in the world called a daughter he would have helped. Not at first. Not the way he was. But the way he became. He would have wanted to help you.” I opened my mouth to speak but she talked over me. “And I am going to honor him by doing this.”

I want to teach high school literature. Most people think I'm crazy to teach high schoolers but I loved my literature teacher. She developed my love for reading and I want to do that for other young people.

Brad found a job and moved to the next town over. He has called sporadically over the last year saying he wanted to see the kids but he never followed through with child support payments or interest. It's sad, really. He has no idea what he's missing.

Jason found a job at a small accounting firm in town and does the books for Wilson's. “Judy's always hated doing it,” Marshall said. I met Judy for the second time last Christmas and she looked remarkably better than the first time I met her in my driveway. Jason and Marshall took me to her home and her husband hugged me so hard I could barely breathe.

Marshall and Gloria got married six months ago. “Why delay it?” he had asked. He moved into Gloria's house and cut back on his hours at work. Gloria and Miriam still meet for breakfast three times a week before going to Glory's
Place and Miriam has now changed her order from a boiled egg to a poached one.

Tamara is here today. Her kids are with her and although she's still too thin, she's glowing. She graduated from the women's rescue mission's program and moved back to her hometown where she lives only a few blocks from her ex-husband and children. She has proven herself before the judge and her ex-husband and now shares joint custody of the children. Her life will never be what it was but she continues to take one step forward each day. It's the best that any of us can do.

I catch Mom wiping a tear from her cheek and I laugh. “Are you going to keep it together?”

“I'll be fine,” she says.

The music swells and Richard leans toward us. “Come on, you two. It's time.” I hug Richard and he kisses my cheek.

I reach for Mom and feel her melt into me. “I love you, Mom.”

“I love you, too, sweet pea. You're more beautiful than I ever imagined.” She pulls the veil over my face and holds out her arm.

Haley leads the way, sprinkling rose petals down the aisle. She dumps the last of them at the end and Zach smacks his head, watching her. My half sister, Lindsey, is a bridesmaid along with Renee, my longtime friend from Patterson's. They take their place at the front and I can see Jason, handsome
and beaming in his tux. What started out as infatuation with him turned into something deeper and stronger than I could ever imagine. He is smart and compassionate and every time he's with the kids, he's a natural. I don't even know when I started thinking of them as his children. They still call him Jason but I know it's only a matter of time before we're back from the honeymoon and living in the same house together as a family that they claim him as their dad. Mom clutches my hand on her arm and together we walk down the aisle.

I smile as I walk, amazed at the faces in the church. When I stand back and look at the people in my life I continue to be surprised and grateful. There have been so many moments in the last year—everyday, commonplace, but glistening moments that pass through my mind. There's nothing sensational, cinematic, or mysterious about them; they would never make it on the evening news or daytime talk shows but they all point to the same conclusion—that we are all here to help one another move the boulder.

That
is the secret of the treasure.

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