A Week Till the Wedding

by Linda Winstead Jones

  When they reached him, Lily shot daggers his way with her dark eyes. Daisy turned and dipped her head and whispered something to her sister, and Lily reluctantly released Daisy’s hand and headed for the steps, a path that took her right past Jacob. As she brushed by him she muttered, “Addams family.”

  He ignored her. She had every right to be angry.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said when he and Daisy were alone. “I didn’t have any idea what she’d done.”

  “I know,” Daisy said, her voice so low he could barely hear her. “Everyone at the table looked so surprised. This mess appears to be all your grandmother’s doings. Maybe she really is unwell, just not the way we thought.”

  “Maybe. Personally I think she’s just a world-class control freak and she wanted what she wanted and would do anything to get it.” His words were sharp, condemning. And, he was certain, right.

  Daisy nodded. “That’s probably so. I suppose I’d prefer to think that a woman I once admired was sick, rather than cruel and manipulative. All evidence to the contrary,” she whispered. She lifted her head and looked him in the eye. “So, are you still sticking around for the reunion?”

  “I don’t think so.” He walked toward her, but the way her body stiffened when he moved in her direction stopped him from closing the gap between them. He wouldn’t do anything to make her more uncomfortable. He wouldn’t stay for his family, but he’d stay for her, if she asked him to. What were the odds of that happening? Slim to none, he figured.

  “I don’t have any proof, but I suppose it was your grandmother who bought my downtown space.”

  He would have proof soon, if Ted did his job. “I’d guess so. No matter who it was, I can make it right for you. I can stop the deal before...”

  “Don’t,” Daisy said sharply. “She can have it. Martin wants to retire, and it’s a good deal for him. Besides, I’m not staying in this town, no matter what.”

  His heart sank, a little. Bell Grove without Daisy in it was just wrong. He didn’t have the right to try to change her mind. “You’re going to Atlanta with Lily?”

  She nodded. “Not right away. I still have to finish cleaning out the shop, and there will be papers to sign to get the house on the market. Someone will have to replace me on my Monday meals run, and...well, there are a million small details to take care of before I go.”

  She looked so vulnerable, so sad. He didn’t think she really wanted to leave Bell Grove: she was being forced out of town. He felt helpless, and he was angry for her. His mother had been right; he’d just been slow to accept the truth. He did still love her. Not the same way he’d loved her years ago, not in a way he could explain. But there it was. Too late.

  Maybe not too late. If Daisy knew that he still loved her, if she knew he’d do anything to keep her...

  “Daisy, I...” he began.

  Lily came storming through the door. “You won’t believe it! Miss Vivian and that psycho are chatting it up like lifelong buds, and she’s not ready to go. The psycho said she’d have someone drive her guest home later.”

  “Miss Vivian was okay with that?” Daisy asked, more than a little confused.

  “More than okay. She’s fine here, trust me.” The middle Bell sister stormed past Jacob without acknowledging his existence. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  Daisy nodded, and Jacob watched as she got in the car. The passenger seat. Lily jumped behind the wheel and took the keys from her big sister. Just as well, Jacob supposed. Daisy was badly shaken and had no business driving. He could see the women through the windshield, watched as the engine revved and the car slowly backed away and made a sharp one-eighty. Daisy never so much as lifted her head to look his way.

  Jacob stood there and watched the taillights fade away. His frustration grew, second by second. He wanted to do something; he needed to fix this mess...but it wasn’t an easy fix. He couldn’t buy a solution or hire a team to make things right.

  They were back to square one, just like that. He was leaving town without Daisy. And this time, she was leaving without him.

  * * *

  Everyone who came into the shop on Saturday wanted to know about Daisy’s move to Atlanta. Daisy smiled a lot. She never hinted that the relocation was anything other than something she desperately wanted to do. She didn’t complain about the space being sold out from under her, or an old woman’s lies to get her way, or Jacob breaking her heart all over again. Instead she talked about being closer to concerts and ball games and shopping. She told everyone she’d probably lease a chair at a salon in Atlanta. More than a few customers said they’d still come to her to get their hair done, even though they’d have to pass a lot of salons along the way to get to her.

  She was flattered, and pleased, and more than a little teary-eyed. Maybe her subconscious motives for staying put had been wrong-minded, but she had a lot of friends here, friends who had become like family over the years.

  It was Lily who called a local real estate agent and made an appointment for that afternoon, after the shop closed. Houses didn’t exactly fly off the market in Bell Grove, but by signing the papers she’d set things into motion.

  Daisy only thought about Jacob every ten minutes or so, which was an improvement over the mostly sleepless night before, when she’d almost felt as if he were still lying beside her.

  Her anger had faded as she’d tossed and turned, and by morning she’d been left more sad than anything else. Still embarrassed to be such a fool, hurt that she’d been used as a patsy, but mostly she was just sad.

  As she walked through the house the real estate agent—a middle-aged man who was fond of telling bad jokes—suggested improvements that would make the house more attractive to potential buyers. New wall colors, decluttering, new appliances. He told her how much more she’d get for the house if she made those improvements.

  He made a suggestion about paint color as they stood in the doorway of her bedroom. Daisy couldn’t see a new color on the walls. Instead she saw Jacob in her bed. She saw the two of them dancing in the dark, her skin against his, the music washing over them. She saw herself, thinking—knowing—that she still loved Jacob and couldn’t live without him. It would take weeks, maybe months, to make all the changes the agent suggested. She didn’t want to drag this painful process out any longer than was absolutely necessary.

  She’d kept the house almost exactly as it had been when her parents had died. Someone else would have to remake it into something new and different.

  “Put the house on the market as is,” she said as she and the real estate agent sat at the kitchen table with a stack of papers between them.

  “But you could get...”

  “I don’t care,” she interrupted sharply, not caring—too much—that she sounded almost rude. She just wanted out, as soon as possible. She didn’t want to spend weekend after weekend here painting and remodeling. No, she wanted to escape every memory—the good and the bad. Now. “Get what you can for it, that’s all I ask.”

  He shook his head and pushed some papers toward her. She signed, blinking twice to clear the annoying tears from her eyes.

  * * *

  Jacob was accustomed to sleeping in hotel rooms, but the one he woke in late Saturday morning was not exactly up to his usual standards. The bed was hard, there was the unmistakable hum of the interstate too close by and the walls were so thin he could hear the television—and some of the conversation—in the room next door. The hotel he had chosen was close, right off the interstate in between Bell Grove and Atlanta. He was tempted to get in his car and head a little farther south so he could get on a plane and return to San Francisco today.

  Instead of hopping out of bed and doing just that he lay there for a while. Running away was too easy; it was the coward’s way out. It would be so easy to fly away from this mess and tell himself that he and Daisy just weren’t meant to be. Soon enough he’d be back in the swing of things, and he’d relegate her to the back of his mind, as best he could. He�
��d bury himself in work, and tell himself it was all for the best. But Daisy was worth fighting for. He knew that, now. He wasn’t at all sure that she wanted to be won—not by him, at least—but if he didn’t try he’d always wonder.

  He wasn’t going to San Francisco without her, not without a fight. The life he’d lived for the past seven years, the job, the money, the travel, the excitement...it didn’t look very attractive to him anymore. In fact, from a distance it looked downright sad.

  It would be very easy to hop on a plane and resume his life as it had been before. Daisy would be fine. She had her sisters, and a million friends who would be there for her if she needed them. No matter what had happened in the past couple of weeks—the good and the bad—they could both return to the lives they’d made in the past seven years. And they’d grow apart all over again. It would hurt more, this time, but life would go on.

  Jacob showered, he dressed, he walked to the restaurant next to the hotel for a big breakfast. Back in the hotel room he sat at the faux-wood desk with a crappy cup of in-room coffee and answered a few of the emails that had piled up during his vacation. There were enough messages in his in-box to keep him busy for a week.

  When Ted called that afternoon, Jacob wasn’t at all surprised to hear that it had been his grandmother who’d set the sale of a strip of downtown Bell Grove into motion. And all this time he’d been feeling sorry for her...

  “Thanks,” Jacob said. He wheeled the creaky desk chair around and ran anxious fingers through his hair, trying to decide what to do. Usually he knew exactly what should come next. That was his job, after all. In business, though, not in life. His life held no surprises, no tough personal choices.

  Before he hung up the phone he said, “There’s something else...”

  * * *

  Eunice sat in her favorite spot, staring out the window. It was a beautiful summer day, bright and green. She half hoped to see Jacob’s rental car heading down the long, winding driveway, but no such luck.

  He hated her. She couldn’t blame him. Well, she could blame him a little. Why couldn’t he—and everyone else—see that her intentions had been good? She wondered if he’d ever give her the opportunity to explain herself. If he’d ever forgive her.

  It was after lunch when she saw a bit of dust kicked up in the distance. With her eyes squinted so she could see farther, she waited to see who was coming this way. She hoped for Jacob. She even said a quick prayer that her grandson was coming home to make things right. Instead her tired old eyes eventually identified an ancient pickup truck she had never seen before. It was one Jacob wouldn’t be caught dead in, she knew that much. The vehicle she watched left the driveway often, jerking off the asphalt and then back on again, sending dirt and dust flying each time the wheels left the path.

  A drunkard, Eunice thought. A lost drunkard who could not keep control of his vehicle. It was a rusted pickup, she noted as it jerked to a stop at the front of the house. Perhaps it had once been red; it was difficult to tell.

  The very loud engine was silenced with a sputter. The driver’s door opened with a rusty squeal, and—surprise—Vivian stepped out of the truck.

  Eunice was at once envious of her old friend for being so limber—and able to drive at all—and at the same time she was furious that someone who drove so badly would get on the road. She could’ve been killed!

  A small brown dog followed Vivian out of the vehicle. Eunice was horrified. She would not allow that filthy creature into the house!

  She heard the doorbell, moved her chair away from the window and pretended to be surprised when Lurlene knocked on her door and introduced the guest.

  The dog followed Vivian into the room, ran toward Eunice and—horrors—jumped into her lap.

  “Oh, oh, oh.” Eunice attempted to move her face away from the mutt’s slobbering attempts to lick her on the mouth. She failed miserably.

  “Settle down,” Vivian said with a smile. “Buster is an affectionate animal. And besides, you should be glad that someone still likes you.”

  “Take him! Take him! Get this creature off me!”

  Vivian chuckled as she reached out and grabbed the dog, who gratefully turned his attentions to her. She smiled as Buster licked her face and then settled into her arms, a dirty bundle of long brown hair. The animal apparently didn’t have a care in the world.

  “What kind of dog is that?” Eunice asked with disdain.

  “Buster is a mutt.”

  “I see.”

  “Don’t turn up your nose that way. There’s nothing wrong with being a mutt. You need to get that stick out of your ass, Eunice.” Vivian sat on the edge of the bed and placed the dog beside her.

  Eunice bit back a command to get the mutt off her bedspread. But the damage was already done, and since the animal settled down in one place and didn’t seem inclined to romp further, she let the infraction go.

  “Did you apologize to Jacob?” Vivian asked.

  Eunice felt her lips tighten and thin. “No. He left last night without seeing me, and he’s not answering his cell phone.” Not to her, at least. He had caller ID—everyone did these days—and he might be purposely avoiding her. Might be? Of course he was purposely avoiding her.

  “Did you call Daisy?”

  It took everything Eunice had not to drop her head in shame. “No. I...what can I say to her? How can I explain over the phone what I did and why? I really did have her best interests at heart, but she won’t believe that.” Besides, Daisy was almost certain to screen her calls just as Jacob did. If she tried calling from another phone, well, Daisy would surely just hang up when she answered and heard Eunice’s voice on the line.

  “You can start with I’m sorry.”

  Those words did not come easily to Eunice. They never had.

  “You need to stick with the truth,” Vivian instructed dryly. “Think of telling the truth as a new experience. Prove to your family that you’re an old dog who can learn new tricks.”

  Eunice was tempted to kick Vivian and her mangy dog out of the house. No one spoke to her this way! But she couldn’t deny that she perversely liked having the plain-spoken Vivian back in her life. Last night they’d talked for hours, catching up on the time that had passed. It made Eunice regret deeply the lost years, the years they could’ve been friends if she’d only made the first move and said she was sorry.

  “That’s not going to be easy.”

  Vivian snorted. Such unladylike behavior! “Try actually having dementia, if you want to imagine something that’s not easy. Remember Jean from our class? She died five years ago, but not until she’d forgotten everyone in her family, not until she’d completely lost touch with the world she lived in. You pretended because it suited your purpose. She lived with it. For years. Her family truly suffered, the way you made your family suffer because you wanted to get your way.”

  A sharp retort was on Eunice’s tongue, but she bit it back. Jean? She hadn’t seen or heard about Jean for years, but she still remembered her as a pretty young woman with a husband who loved her and a handful of rowdy kids. The family had moved to Chattanooga years ago, but maybe she’d moved back. Maybe Vivian had kept in touch all these years. Eunice fought back tears. Had she lost touch so completely with the world around her?

  “I didn’t mean to make light of...I just didn’t think...was it bad for her, really?” Pretending not to remember had been convenient and—yes, she’d admit it—occasionally fun. But even to imagine truly being in that state was painful.

  “It was bad.” Vivian stroked her mutt’s fur and looked away for a few moments. The silence that followed was maddening.

  “You’ll stay for dinner,” Eunice said as she regained complete control of her emotions.

  Vivian’s head snapped around and her eyebrows shot up sharply. “I will?”

  Eunice took a deep breath. Good heavens, this was difficult. “Vivian, would you please stay for dinner?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t like to drive after dark
.”

  “From what I saw, you shouldn’t drive by the light of day, either,” Eunice snapped.

  Vivian glanced toward the window that looked out over the front of the house. “You saw me coming and then pretended to be surprised. Why?”

  “I don’t know,” Eunice admitted. Had lying become the norm for her? Was it her natural mode of operation? “I suppose I don’t want everyone to know that I sit here at the window and watch life pass me by.”

  Vivian nodded as if she understood. “I don’t drive often, and I will admit, that old thing doesn’t steer the way it used to.”

  “I’ll ask Caleb to look at it,” Eunice said. “He’s always been quite good with cars. He and Jacob both, though of course Jacob isn’t here.” She cleared her throat. “Caleb can drive you home later tonight.” She added, in a lowered voice, “If that’s all right with you, of course.”

  “Fine by me.” Vivian looked pointedly at the wheelchair. “Since I’ll be here for a while, I have some exercises I want you to try.”

  “Exercises?” Eunice repeated sharply. “I’ll have you know, I do not exercise.”

  Vivian harrumphed, and there went those eyebrows again. “Maybe that’s why you’re in a wheelchair.”

  Dogs, exercise, apologizing. Eunice very much wanted her old friend back in her life, but she had a feeling that if she gave in nothing would ever be the same. Exercise! Horrors.

  “The Braves are playing a day game today,” Vivian said, heading for the small television Eunice rarely bothered to turn on. “You do have cable, don’t you?”

  Baseball? Oh, the sacrifices...

  “Of course,” Eunice said.

  “We’ll exercise between innings, and after the game we’ll try making those phone calls.”

  As much as Eunice hated the thought of talking to Jacob or Daisy, of facing what she’d done, she knew her old friend, who was perhaps going to become a new friend, was right.

  Chapter Sixteen