Winter in Full Bloom (19 page)

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

The rains fall soft upon your fields.

And until we meet again,

May God hold you in the palm of His hand.”

Yes, until we meet again. O Lord, please do keep Marcus in the palm of Your hand, but remember our affections and do let us meet again. Let this be the beginning to our lives together and not the end.

Camille handed me a wad of tissues
. “Guess I should have brought another box.”

I chuckled. “I’ll be okay now. It hurt a little more than I thought it would … this prying my heartstrings loose.”

Camille looked out the cab window.

As we rode along, various scenes played out before us—a child swinging between two parents, a camera flashing among friends, someone running late for something that must have been important. Life went on, even when hearts were breaking.

“Imagine being with your guy for a year and then saying goodbye,” Camille said, still staring out the window.

Surely she wasn’t still pining after that horrible man. “I’m sorry for the way he hurt you, but somewhere deep down … aren’t you relieved that he’s gone?”

“But I still miss some things about Jerald.” Camille shrugged. “As crazy as it seems to you.”

“I didn’t know the man. Hard to judge fully.” It was easier to give her a little leeway on the subject since we were heading far away from him.

“Do you love Mrs. Gray even though she’s made you miserable?” Camille asked.

“Yes, but isn’t that different?”

She looked at me. “How?”

“I didn’t choose Mother for my mother. It was just the way it happened. I’m trying to make the best of the mom God gave me. You could choose a finer man, one who deserves you.”

“I suppose. I should choose somebody like Marcus?”

“Yeah, somebody like Marcus. But
not
Marcus.” I grinned.

Camille chuckled and gave me a dainty punch on the arm.

Could it be that Camille was envious of my relationship? Guess I wouldn’t know until I asked, but that query wouldn’t come today. “We did miss a lot of fun growing up.”

“We could have played such tricks on our boyfriends,” Camille said, “as we switched back and forth. Loads of mischief. I can just imagine it.”

The cabdriver gave us a grin into his rearview mirror.

“I suppose so. Although I didn’t have that many beaus to tease.”

Camille slipped a cough drop into her mouth. “Hmm. I wonder which one of us was born first.”

“I have no idea. What made you think of that?”

“I just thought that whichever one of us was born a few minutes earlier would probably end up acting like a big sister.”

“Well, I think in our case we need to be each other’s big sis.” I gave her sleeve a tug. “You know, watch each other’s backs.”

“It’s a deal.” We hooked pinkies and shook. Then we laughed.

All the various stages of check-in at the airport went smoothly enough, and the long flight to Houston, with a layover in LA, was not nearly so stomach-twisting as the one going over. Not because it felt less bumpy, but because I was a more seasoned flyer, and I had a sister to enjoy. But during the tossing and turning hours, trying to get some shut-eye, my mind became occupied with plenty of other matters—such as how Mother was going to react when she saw Camille, and the other way around. Hard to fathom.

And then there were the endless little reveries about Marcus, wondering if his promise to visit me would get pushed off so many times that he’d no longer remember why he was coming at all. Or if the intensity of joy we felt now would get watered down in the never-ending flow of daily struggles. Only God knew the answer, but I would need to leave that last question far behind like the vapor trail in the wake of our jet.

After we landed at Intercontinental Airport in Houston and picked up our bags, we stopped in the garage for my car.

“Don’t you have a friend to pick you up at the airport?” Camille asked. “It must get expensive to keep your car in the garage.”

“I didn’t want to bother my friends. To be honest, I don’t have a lot of close friends. You know, the kind you can call up at 3:00 in the morning to go to the hospital?”

Camille raised an eyebrow as she heaved our suitcases into my trunk. “Or even any friends to take you to the airport at a reasonable hour of the day?”

“No, not really.”

“You sound like me. If I had left Australia for good, there weren’t really that many friends to say goodbye to. I can be a loner at times. Not sure why. That’s a part of me I’m still exploring.”

“Maybe that’s the one thing we have in common with Mother. That she’s had to pay a woman to be her friend.” I turned on the engine and then looked at her for a straight answer. “So,
did
you leave Australia for good?”

“I don’t know, but we’ll see how it goes here. It would be a leap for me, but I don’t feel I have all that much to go back to now.”

I pulled out of the parking garage, and before long we were whirling down the Beltway toward my house in Northwest Houston.

“So, this is Houston … where I started my life. The palm trees are pretty, and the crepe myrtle and oleander, but it’s more humid than Melbourne. That’s for sure. I noticed the sauna as soon as we left the building.” She gave her blouse a few fluttering tugs to let in some air and then lowered the window. “You’ve got mozzies too.” She shooed out a buzzing mosquito.

“You might want to switch to natural fibers until it cools down some. Cotton will breathe better in this warmth and humidity.” I grinned. “But you’ll get used to it, just like I was beginning to get used to the cold in Melbourne. But as I’m sure you know, while you all were heading into spring there, Houstonians are moving into fall now. It’ll be a little cooler soon and drier.”

“I think I should start saying that too … you all with that Texas accent you have.”

“Well, to say it like a real Texan you have to jam the words together.”

“Y’all. And I could buy some cowgirl boots while I’m here too.”

I chuckled. “They would look good on you, especially with your white dress and jean jacket.”

“Well, whatever would look good on me will look good on you. By the way, is it true that everybody in Texas carries a weapon like the gunslingers in the old West?”

“Only in your imagination.”

Camille grinned. “Didn’t think so, but I thought I’d ask.” She stretched and yawned. “Sorry to conk out on you, but I need a catnap. I was too restless to sleep much on the plane.”

“Go right ahead. With this rush hour traffic you should get a thirty-minute nap.”

Camille rested her head back and within a short time she was happily snoring away. Loudly, just like I did, enough to frighten small animals.

I glanced over at her, still amazed that she had actually come home with me. So few things in life worked out that way—like you want them to—but God had ordained that I should have my sister back. And I couldn’t have been more thankful.

But invariably when I had most of my ducks in a row, and the aviary brood was reasonably happy, I couldn’t celebrate. I had to chase down those last ornery ducks. In this case it was Marcus and that gaping hole he left in my heart.

Everything I looked at made me think of him. Truth was I already missed him with a vengeance. How could it have happened? If life were a mystery, then love was beyond understanding. It was a puzzle with half of the pieces missing. Some of the pieces got vacuumed up. Others got forever lost under the couch. But the box, oh the picture on the box. What delight God had made when He created love between a man and a woman. Oh, no, there was that word.

Love
.

While Camille was still deep in slumber my thoughts ran amok. The little-big word
love
played in my head without supervision. Apparently my thoughts needed supervision. No one could fall in love in three weeks. My emotions had merely spent too much time on the treadmill of jet lag.

“So, when do you think is the right time for me to spring myself on your mother?” Camille said suddenly in a groggy voice.

I startled. “I don’t know. Maybe we could go over to her house tomorrow after we’ve had a good night’s sleep.”

Camille picked up a lock of my long hair and studied it. “You don’t cover your gray, do you?”

“No. Not yet anyway.”

“Hmm. I have to, but then I have more gray hair than you.” Camille scooted up in the seat. “All right, we’ll wait until tomorrow to see Mrs. Gray, but if you think I’ll get a good night’s sleep on the eve of when I finally have a chance to give my biological mother a piece of my mind, you’re dreaming.”

I winced. “The way you worded that just now … well, it doesn’t sound like the comment of someone who wants to reconcile.”

Camille adjusted the cool-air vent so that it blew right on her. “You are such a dreamer, Lily. I wish I were. You’ll have to teach me. I used to be when I was younger, but I guess life crushed it out of me.”

“No one’s ever said that before … that I was a dreamer.” Sounded nice.

“Well, you are.”

She rubbed her neck. “Besides, true reconciliation includes discussion. Maybe even a heated debate or two. Otherwise it’s anemic and worthless. It isn’t real, and it won’t hold up. It’ll only be made of paper if we don’t get down to it.” She looked at me. “Lily, don’t ever forget, our mother ruined my life.”

She said the words—
our mother
—and it was such a unique thing to hear, I grinned.

“And just what is so funny?” Camille asked.

“It’s the first time you called Mrs. Gray
our
mother.”

“Well, I slipped.” She stared out the window. “I should have used the word
biological
. She’s that and nothing more. But I mean it. I’m not going in there to kowtow to that woman. I’m going to stand my ground. To find out some things. To open some secret boxes hidden in the attic so to speak. I want to know what happened. All of it in her words. And I want an apology from her lips. If it causes an all-out war, so be it. Wars do end.”

I sighed, thinking of my ducks—one more darted out of line and maybe even headed for a busy street. “Yes, wars do end, Camille, but not without casualties.”

That night, after I got
all tucked into my pillow-top bed, wearing a fresh pair of jammies and knowing that my identical twin sister slept in the next room and that my own sweet Julie was excited about coming to join our happy reunion, I should have been near comatose with contented slumber.

But I wasn’t.

Even though most folks would have called my Australian journey a roaring success, I couldn’t sleep. I hated conflict, and I knew we were headed for a verbal bloodbath in the morning with Mother. Not to mention the fact that I cared for a man I had no business caring for because he lived on the other side of the globe.

But eventually, the sandmen gave it their best shot, and I floated off for a while. I woke to blaring sunlight and to Camille jumping on my bed.

“Are you going to sleep all day?” she asked.

I opened one eye. “Are you actually bouncing on the bed like a five-year-old?”

“Yeah.” She danced a jig with movements that were so deliberately understated it looked hilarious.