by Lori Wilde
Madison gritted her teeth. No one here had any idea what she was going through. It was so easy for them to judge. They saw the external trappings—her own TV show, a glamorous life in New York City, enough money for a very comfortable life. But it came at a price and they had no idea of the personal cost, or how much she’d paid.
Because you’re too proud to share that with them. It was Finn’s voice in her head again.
“The upshot is that Shelley has graciously volunteered to run the Moonglow Inn.” Darynda’s tone was light, but her expression left Madison feeling scolded. “Don’t dismiss your sister out of hand.”
“If we’re going to keep the inn open, we’ve got to renovate,” Gia said. “Or we’ll have the same problems with those Yelp reviews.”
“How will we afford the renovations?” Madison asked.
“You’re rich.” Shelley drummed her fingers on the table. “Why don’t you pony up the cash?”
“My money is tied up in investments.” Heat burned up the back of Madison’s neck. Did they expect her to sacrifice her future to save the inn?
“Madison shouldn’t have to foot the bill for everything,” Gia said. “I could ask Mike to donate his time. He’s good with his hands. And the three of us could do the rest. Paint. Replace the kitchen tile . . .”
“Yes, yes. We’re on a roll.” Madison rubbed her palms together. She liked having a plan of action. She was at her best in motion. Brainstorming with her sisters was not the worst idea in the world. There was trouble at the Moonglow Inn, but there were also answers. Fingers crossed they could find them together. “Keep going.”
“What do we sell in the pop-up store?” Shelley asked. “What services can we offer?”
“I can offer my kites,” Gia said. “But my inventory is pretty small since they’re handmade.”
“That’s your livelihood.” Madison shook her head. “We can’t ask you to do that.”
“You’re putting in your own money to catch up on the back payments.” Gia fingered the woven bracelet at her wrist. “I can do this. Let me do this.”
“You’re just getting your business started. It’s not wise to deplete your inventory. You need something to live on.”
“I can give up my new apartment,” Gia said. “Move back in here. And I can let go my roommate who I hired to help run the kite shop part-time.”
“Ouch.” Madison winced.
“If you fire your assistant, then you’ll have to spend all your time at the kite store,” Shelley pointed out. “When would you have time for the renovations? Or your fiancé? Or finishing the quilt?”
“I’ll do it,” Darynda piped up. “I’ll run the kite store and free up Gia’s time.”
Madison looked at the elderly woman and shook her head. Darynda might be in great shape, but at her age, things could go wrong at the drop of a coin. Grammy, a case in point. “Not a good idea.”
“Madison,” Darynda said. “Let me do this . . . for Helen.”
“It’s too much to ask.”
“So only you get to make sacrifices?” Shelley launched in on her. “Only you get to martyr yourself for the cause?”
“I’m not . . .” Madison clamped her mouth shut. Shelley was just trying to get a rise out of her. “Fine. I accept your offers. Yes. We’ll put kites in our pop-up store. Yes, Darynda, please help Gia with the kite shop. Yes, Shelley, you can run the inn.”
Everyone stared at her.
Great. What had she done wrong this time? Madison resisted rolling her eyes. “That is, if it’s okay with you all.”
“It’s more than okay, Maddie. It’s nice that you’re letting us shoulder some of the burden.” Gia smiled, and it felt like a gift-wrapped package. “We feel useful.”
“Wow, is this really happening?” Shelley pulled an incredulous face. “The Moonglow sisters becoming a democracy? Never thought I’d see the day.”
“Watch it,” Madison said, feeling weirdly lighthearted. They were joking about it. That was positive. “I reserve veto rights.”
“I knew it was too good to be true,” Shelley mumbled.
“Baby steps,” Darynda said.
“Back to the pop-up store.” Madison motioned for Darynda to write it down. “I can make door wreaths to sell. People go crazy for my wreaths. It’s sort of a mystery to me why, but hey, if it works, it works. What about you, Shelley?”
“I suck at arts and crafts. The only reason I can quilt is because Grammy insisted I learn,” Shelley said.
“So, we make quilts.”
Gia looked alarmed. “How? There’s no time for quilting. Not in the midst of renovations.”
“If we got on it seriously, the three of us could crank out a quilt in a week,” Madison said.
“That’s assuming we work ten hours a day. A brutal pace.” Shelley wriggled all ten fingers. “Especially for these fingers. Remember how stiff your finger joints get when you quilt for too long without a break?”
“And what about my wedding quilt? We have to finish that for my wedding,” Gia said.
“The wedding quilt can wait.” It would suit Madison just fine if they never finished that damn quilt. “You’re not getting married until next September, right?”
Gia made a face.
“Right?” Madison repeated.
“We need to finish the wedding quilt for when Grammy wakes up.” Gia reached in her purse and pulled out the letter Grammy had written her.
Just Gia. Why hadn’t Grammy written a note to Madison? A pang punched her in the heart. “If Grammy wakes up,” Madison said.
“She will wake up.” Gia stubbornly set her jaw.
“She’ll understand that saving the inn is more important than finishing the wedding quilt,” Madison said firmly. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Shelley, is there anything else you can offer for the pop-up?”
“Yoga classes.”
Lame idea. There was no space for yoga classes in a pop-up store, but Madison held her tongue on that. “All right. I’ll make wreaths, Gia will donate kites, we’ll all work on quilting—”
“The Quilting Divas will help with the quilts,” Darynda said. “So that it’s not just the three of you building inventory. Many of our members have quilts they would donate. I have three at the house that I’ve never used. Presents for friends who passed away before I could gift them.”
“You’d do that for us?” Shelley asked.
“You girls are like family,” Darynda said. “The granddaughters I never had.”
“I could ask Mike if he’d donate some of his furniture.” Gia tapped her chin. “And build us a kiosk for the pop-up.”
“We’ll have to look into getting permission from the city,” Madison mused. “If we get the permits, we could sell right here on the beach. You can hold classes on the beach, too, Shell.”
“Politics are your bailiwick,” Shelley said. “We’ll leave that up to you.”
“It’s a good start,” Gia said. “I feel better.”
“Thank you.” Shelley met Madison’s gaze.
“For what?”
“Letting us have a voice.”
Madison studied her sister. She knew that she tended to rush in and take control, but until this minute she hadn’t realized that Shelley and Gia really wanted a voice. She’d taken control because no one else stepped forward.
Or she’d never let them before.
“We have a mission,” Madison said. “This is good. But for now, it’s my turn to sit vigil at the hospital. Darynda, can you give me a ride?”
“Indeed.” Darynda took her car keys from her pocket.
Madison shooed Pyewacket to the floor, gathered up the bills, and carried them back to the desk where she’d found them, and for the first time since coming home, she felt like she could finally breathe.
* * *
HALF AN HOUR later, Madison was back at Moonglow Cove Memorial, standing in the doorway of Grammy’s room, her hopeful mood eroding.
Nothing had cha
nged. Same beeping machines. Same nurses moving quietly through the intensive care unit.
“You can go on in,” said a voice behind her.
Madison turned to see the large nursing assistant who’d pestered her for an autograph the first day she’d arrived. May June, the woman of the folksy stories. “Oh, hello.”
“Don’t be scared of the machines—”
“I’m not scared.”
“It’s still your grammy underneath the whistles and bells.”
“I know,” Madison said, but her voice rose at the end making it sound like a question instead of a statement.
May June walked into the room, pulled up a chair at Grammy’s bedside. Patted the seat. “Get close. Talk to her. They say that hearing is the last sense to go.”
“Go?” Madison’s throat tightened. “She’s dying?”
May June smiled kindly. “We’re all dying, honey.”
“You don’t think she’ll make it.”
“Only God can answer that question.” May June fingered the gold cross on her necklace. “But either way, talk to her. What’s it gonna hurt?”
Madison nodded, too close to tears to speak.
“Let me just turn her and I’ll get out of your way.”
“Can I help?”
May June looked surprised and pleased as punch. “Sure, that would be nice.”
The nursing assistant showed Madison how to take hold of the folded support sheet underneath Grammy and use it to turn her on her side. “On the count of three . . . one . . . two . . . three.”
Madison lifted her side of the sheet and Grammy smoothly sailed up in bed. It surprised Madison how light she was.
“Now, I’m going to take your side of the sheet and roll her over, while you stuff that pillow against her back. We don’t want her getting pressure sores.”
Once they finished positioning Grammy on her side, May June smiled again and reached over the bed to pat Madison’s shoulder. “It’s gonna be all right.”
Easy for her to say. She had no idea of the chaos at the Moonglow Inn. “Thank you for saying so.”
May June left, and Madison sat down in the chair next to the bed. Grammy looked so lifeless, as if she were already gone.
Stop thinking that way.
She scooted the chair closer to Grammy’s bed, reached for her hand. “Gram? It’s me, Maddie.”
Grammy didn’t move. Not that Madison expected her to.
“I found out about the inn. I wasn’t snooping. The bills were right there by the computer. I’m so sorry I wasn’t here to help. I’m so sorry you felt as if you had to handle things on your own.”
She took a deep breath, paused. Peeked over her shoulder to make sure May June hadn’t lingered to eavesdrop. “Why didn’t you tell me the inn was in trouble? Why didn’t you call me when you found out about the brain tumor? I would have dropped everything. I would have been here in a heartbeat.”
The minute the words were out of her mouth, irony hit her. Grammy had gone it alone, preferring not to bother her granddaughters or her friends with her burdens. Madison was exactly the same way. She hadn’t told anyone about Finn, or the . . .
Swallowing hard, her fingers reached for her purse. She opened it and took out the piece of paper buried at the bottom.
The sonogram picture.
A snapshot in time of the baby she would never have.
“Guess I’m a fine one to talk, huh?” The tears she’d been holding at bay broke loose and slid down her cheek. “I’ve kept just as many secrets as you.”
Pain twisted her stomach in a tight knot, wringing her out. “I never told you about Finn. I wanted to be sure of him and I didn’t want a repeat of Raoul . . . but he left me anyway.”
The tears came faster now. Madison laid her head on the mattress beside her grandmother and wept.
Finally, she sat up and dried her eyes. “What is wrong with me? Why can’t I find someone to love me?”
In her mind’s eye, she saw her grandmother as she remembered her. Strong, but kind. Raising three little girls on her own while she was in her sixties. Even back then, Madison didn’t cry easily, but sometimes at night, when her responsibilities got too great for her, Madison would sneak from the bedroom she shared with her sisters and find her way into Grammy’s bed.
Grammy would scoot over, lift the covers, and pat the mattress beside her. She’d wrap her arms around Madison and hug her close. There, in the comfort of her grandmother’s arms, she would sob her troubles away. Grammy would rock her and coo to her, give her a tissue and kiss her forehead, and tell her how courageous she was. How unfair life had been to her, but the challenges made her stronger, smarter, braver.
The memories spurred more tears.
“I thought I’d found the One with Finn. Of course, I thought that with Raoul, too. Finn was bright and ambitious. He got me. We finished each other’s sentences the way you and Darynda do. I thought that meant we were compatible. But then I got pregnant and what I thought was a miracle turned into my worst nightmare.”
She reached for Grammy’s hand.
Clung to it.
Clung to her.
But there was no warm squeeze in return. Grammy’s hand lay limp and cold.
“Finn said it was too soon to have a baby. He wasn’t over the moon the way I was. He didn’t suggest I not keep her, but I could tell that’s what he was thinking. I resented him for not being one hundred percent on board and I think he knew that.” God, she’d been such a fool. “I told him I was going to have the baby with or without him. He called my attitude selfish, Grammy! He said it was always my way or the highway. I know I can be controlling, but I was thrown for a loop. Was he right? Am I selfish?”
She paused, straightened, reached for another tissue. Dabbed her eyes. “Finn said losing the baby was for the best. That nature had a way of working things out. I was shocked to hear him say that. We broke up. Finn never really wanted her, and I wanted her more than anything in the world.” Madison held up the sonogram as if Grammy could see it, hiccuped. “Best-laid plans, huh?”
The beeping of the machines was the only sound in the room.
“I started getting everything ready for her arrival. I turned the guest room into a nursery. I sailed right through the first trimester and just when I was starting to show, when I was about to tell my producers that I was pregnant . . .”
Fresh tears blazed down her cheeks. Damn, she hated to cry, but losing that baby had just about killed her. “In my fourth month, I had a miscarriage.”
The sob that wrenched from her throat was pure anguish. It took her several minutes to get control of herself. “The doctors say I have an incompetent cervix. I could have more miscarriages in the future. I don’t think I can go through this again.”
She raised her head, wiped her face. “Biggest irony? Madison’s Mark, the nexus of my success, is about making a home warm and inviting. I’m a professional homemaker without a family to make a home for. How’s that for a laugh?”
Outside it started to rain. Wind gusted at the window. Raindrops hit hard and fast against the glass.
Madison shivered. “You know, I almost told you when I came home for Christmas, but I couldn’t bring myself to ruin our visit. I’m glad now that I didn’t. It might have been our last Christmas together.” She squeezed her grandmother’s hand again.
The sonogram slid off the bed, floated to the floor.
Madison stared down at the image of her loss. The baby she’d been holding on to. She’d been carrying around this secret for six long months and it was eating her up inside. What had Grammy’s secrets done to her?
Let go.
She heard Grammy’s voice so loudly in her head that she startled and dropped her grandmother’s hand.
“I can’t let go of you. You’re all I have left.”
That’s not true. You have Shelley and Gia. Hold on to what you’ve got. Let go of what’s gone.
The sonogram was a symbol of her deepest pain. Of t
he relationships that had fallen apart. The baby she’d never hold in her arms. She’d been nursing her grief.
Feeding it.
She couldn’t start healing as long as she carried the sonogram around with her. It was time to let go. Some things in life were beyond fixing, and this was one of them. A fresh tear warmed her cheek as she leaned over and picked up the sonogram and studied it for a long time.
Memorized it.
Tucked the picture far back into her mind.
Then slowly, deliberately, Madison tore the image of her loss into pieces and watched them flutter brokenly to the ground.
Chapter Ten
Gia
IN-THE-DITCH: Stitching next to the seams on the quilt surface; often used to define blocks or shapes.
WHAT HAPPENED IN here?”
It was the next morning and Gia looked up from her store kiosk counter where she was dabbing the spinach-kale-kiwi-cucumber mess off the stingray-inspired delta kite that had taken her two weeks to make. Her pissed-off employee/roommate had thrown the drink against the wall when Gia told her she’d have to let her go and that she was moving out of their apartment.
Mike stood in the entrance of the small kiosk. He had a sprinkling of sawdust in his hair and a bemused smile on his face. He wore aviator sunglasses, khaki cargo shorts, a blue chambray work shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and deck shoes. He looked as cool and easy as the Gulf breeze.
“It was a thing. It’s over.” Gia rolled her eyes. “Don’t ask.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yes, sure. Why wouldn’t I be okay?”
“You look . . .”
She raised a hand to her face and realized she hadn’t applied any makeup this morning. Why bother? The ocean spray wiped it off anyway. And yet, she couldn’t help wishing she looked her best for Mike. “What?”
“Gorgeous,” he said. “But not your usual self.”
“No?”
“You’re not smiling. I’m used to the smile.”
“Things are tense these days.”
“I know.” He paused. “That’s why I came by.”
“Oh?” She tried to sound casual but feared more trouble. It seemed that kind of week. Trouble around every corner. Inside every smoothie glass.