Where Rivers Part (8 page)

In her own—Juliet would never forget she was responsible.

 10 

T
he morning of the funeral dawned unusually blustery. Thick clouds, heavy with moisture, had rolled in the evening before, drifting up from a tropical storm in the gulf, while a cold front swept into central Texas from the west. Just as a hint of light showed up on the dark horizon, the two weather fronts collided and rain fell from the thunderous sky, as if heaven too might be overwrought with emotion.

Juliet didn't know what the angels had to cry about. The celestial beings should be rejoicing. They had her mother now.

She did not.

Despite the storm, cars crammed every space in the parking lots surrounding Talavera Community Church. Inside the door, strains from “Be Unto Your Name,” her mom's favorite song, met people arriving, along with the scent of the floral bouquets spilling over the stage.

Neighbors, fellow church members, and staff from New Beginnings filled every inch of seating in the sanctuary where Carol had worshiped each Sunday. Juliet's mother lived in San Antonio for over thirty years, and it seemed every person she'd met was here to pay respects and bid a proper goodbye.

When the service got under way, Juliet stared at her lap and tore
a tissue into tiny bits during the opening prayer, keenly aware her father sat next her.

Were his hands trembling?

First on the program were the musical selections, one by a young girl with an amazing voice and another sung by the youth choir. She knew the songs, the flowers, and the sympathetic looks were meant to comfort, but nothing about this formal service abated the pain she felt—the deep despair residing inside her soul. She wasn't comforted at all. In fact, she was more agitated by the minute.

What was the use of any of this, when the person you most loved and needed was no longer here?

Finally, Pastor Roper made his way to the front.

Juliet swallowed against the lump in her throat and stared ahead, trying to focus on the pastor and not on the shame building in her gut.

“Carol Ryan was a woman who didn't fear death,” he began. “She knew where she'd live once she departed from this world. Not because of her good deeds, although there were certainly many, but because Carol trusted in Jesus. She never doubted his promises because he'd already proven she could count on him.”

Her mind shifted back to that night on the Riverwalk. By the time Juliet made her way back to the table, the vacant look in her mother's eyes left no doubt her mother had already left her.

Who could blame her?

Juliet had acted like a spiteful prepubescent, stomping off in a fit. And now? Well, now she could never tell her mom she was sorry.

Not now. Not ever.

She watched the blue-suited pastor at the podium. His words echoed in her ears.

“Once, I overheard Carol counseling an unwed mother. The young girl was frightened, felt like she had nowhere to turn. She was out of options and dangerously close to making a decision she didn't really want to make. Carol told that mother-to-be she'd found
that when you go through the deepest waters, the Lord goes with you. But giving counsel wasn't enough. Carol wrote the woman a generous personal check. Here at Talavera, we call that an example of Jesus with legs.”

Pastor Roper gripped the edge of the podium and directed a quiet smile out over the audience. “That young woman is here with us today and serves as a board member of New Beginnings. Lord willing, she'll carry on Carol's vision to provide free resources to women who need help.”

A woman sitting across the aisle lifted a handkerchief to her eyes.

Why had Juliet never heard that story about her mother?

She sniffed and bit at her lips. What else had she failed to learn about the woman who had spent her life loving and nurturing her only daughter?

Exhausted, she looked around at the walls of the church. Plain, and not at all like the gilded cathedrals portrayed in most movies. No stained-glass windows or soaring ceilings. No statuary or chords playing on an organ. No officiates in robes.

Her mother's church, although large, was sparsely decorated except for a massive wooden cross on the wall behind the stage.

Once, Juliet had boldly challenged her mother. “How can you pray to someone who might not even be there?”

“Oh, he's here,” her mom answered. “You just have to quiet your heart and listen for him.”

Up front, the pastor slowly closed his Bible. “Carol Ryan loved Jesus and spent her life proving it. In the days ahead, every time she comes to mind, which will no doubt be often, I'll think of this quote from Proverbs 31.” He looked directly at Juliet and her father. “I believe this scripture describes Carol Ryan perfectly. ‘Her children rise up and call her blessed. Her husband also, and he praises her. Many daughters have done well, but you excel them all.'”

He sighed. “I know I join many here in saying I will miss her terribly.”

The pastor left the podium, and Juliet felt her father lift from his seat. He stepped into the aisle and walked slowly forward, stopping at her mother's closed casket. Juliet noticed his shoulders sag as he touched the corner of the smooth, dark wood.

Her father trudged slowly up the two steps to the podium. After adjusting the microphone, he swiped his handkerchief across his eyes, then looked out over the audience.

“I met Carol Gandiaga on a fall day much like this one over thirty-four years ago. In a crowd of hundreds, I spotted this redheaded fiery gal dancing like she didn't care who was watching.” He paused and looked up at the ceiling. “Uh, sorry, honey. She'd say her hair was
auburn
,” he corrected, giving everyone a crinkled-eyed smile. “Anyway, I wasn't the only guy noticing her that night. The luckiest moment of my life was when she looked over and caught me staring. She smiled back, with one of those looks that sends your heart racing.”

Juliet's father rubbed his hand against his chin, his eyes glazed with a faraway look. “I didn't deserve a woman like that pretty redhead. Not even close.”

Juliet nervously picked at her thumbnail and swallowed the knot tied up in her throat.

Her father cleared his throat with a slight cough and blinked several times before looking back out at the crowd. “Carol stood me up on our third date. Liked to have scared me to death. I thought she'd finally wised up and ditched a poop like me. Turns out she was handing out freshly baked cinnamon rolls to people who lived in tents down by the river. That was before cell phones, mind you. Not exactly a safe thing to do—especially by herself. When I chastised her, she simply said, ‘Oh, Bennett, you worry too much.' Months later, after she agreed to become Carol Ryan, those folks from the river showed up to help load the moving truck. When she bid that tattered group goodbye, their eyes clearly revealed they'd joined the rest of us who were completely and forever smitten.”

Her father ran his hand through his hair. He swallowed as if trying to keep his composure. “My Carol's no doubt up there now with twelve guys better than me chasing her around.” He paused and looked up to the ceiling again, tears pooling.

“Always remember, Mrs. Ryan, . . . how very much I love you.”

After the service, family friends gathered at her parents' house, arriving with arms laden with casseroles, platters of turkey and sliced ham, rolls, and gelatin salads in a rainbow of colors. Added to the collection of pies and homemade cakes already parading down the kitchen counter, and a person could think today was some sort of celebration, not the end of Juliet's world.

She couldn't stomach calorie one, which is why when everyone else heaped mounds of funeral food onto sturdy white Chinet plates, she hid out in the study, wondering how a person could be in a crowd of people and feel this alone.

The luxury of a cigarette might dull this pain. For reasons she didn't understand, and perhaps only years of counseling would reveal, hot acrid smoke filling her lungs would provide a temporary respite from the severe isolation of soul she carried around like ashes inside her chest.

Juliet resisted giving in. She knew she'd go outside and stand near her mother's terra-cotta water fountain in the backyard, ready to light up, and she'd hear her mother's voice. “Honey, don't fill your lungs with that poison. Instead, breathe! Isn't the air delicious this afternoon? Even in the rain?”

Her mother seemed to be everywhere. Her voice, her presence. At times, even her smell.

Especially in this room.

Her parents' rim home overlooking the golf course was nicely decorated in a Santa Fe style—oh, not the magazine layout kind, but upon entering, a feeling of home greeted you. Her mother had a
certain knack for placing comfortable sofas with interesting tables in a pattern that invited you to kick off your shoes, pull your feet up, and settle in for a chat.

Who would Juliet bare her soul to now that her mom—her best friend—was gone?

Juliet stepped to the bookcases lining the wall and dragged her finger across the spines of her mother's books while listening to the chatter filtering through the door wedged partly open.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo
's Nest
rested comfortably in the first spot on the middle shelf, authored by Ken Kesey, who had lived just outside Eugene, her mother's hometown in Oregon. Next, her fingers slid across a tattered paperback copy of
The Thorn
Birds
by Colleen McCullough.

The books on the top shelf generated the most familiarity. The entire Nancy Drew mystery collection lined the bookcase.

Juliet closed her eyes, imagining leaning against her mother's chest and the sound of her mom's voice as she read to her before bed.

“Juliet? Are you okay, honey?”

Juliet startled. She turned to an apologetic Sandy LeCroix holding a steaming mug. “I thought you'd like this,” she offered.

She didn't. To be polite, she took the coffee. “Thanks, Sandy.”

“You've got to quit beating yourself up over this.” Mimicking something her mother would do, Sandy brushed Juliet's hair off her face. The gesture made the skin on the back of her neck tighten.

She looked at her mother's best friend, all else fading in the bright light of one soul-piercing fact. “It's my fault, Sandy. The one time she asked me for something, I told her no. Our bickering killed her.”

“No one is to blame. You heard the doctors. A clot . . .”

Juliet shook her head. “But the last thing my mother saw . . . was her daughter walking away from her.” Tears burned at the back of her eyelids. “Not after saying ‘I love you, Mom'—but in anger.”

Sandy reached for Juliet's arm. “Carol wouldn't want—”

Juliet pulled back, glancing frantically out the window where her mother's carefully tended knockout roses mocked her, the blooms stripped of petals from the pouring rain.

Outside the door, her father's voice mingled with laughter. She placed the mug on the bookshelf. “Look, I've got to go.”

“No, Juliet. Please stay,” Sandy implored. “He needs you. You need each other.”