Lookin' Back, Texas

by Leanna Ellis

  Praise for Leanna Ellis’s Elvis Takes a Back Seat

  “Leanna Ellis takes a back seat to no one. So put on your blue suede shoes and come along for a most entertaining ride to Memphis—and to the healing place closest to the heart.”

  Debbie Macomber

  New York Times #1 best-selling author

  “Heartwarming, funny, delightful… . I was floored by the way this book made me feel. Elvis Takes a Back Seat is first-class entertainment.”

  Romance Reader At Heart

  “Brilliant! Charming! I absolutely adored it! Elvis Takes a Back Seat is an emotional journey well worth taking. I laughed, I cried, I sighed in contentment. Leanna Ellis is a gifted writer.”

  Lorraine Heath

  New York Times best-selling author

  “Elvis Takes a Backseat is full of surprises, drama, and humor, just like the King of Rock ’n’ Roll. Welcome to a talented storyteller and a fun, deep, unexpected book.”

  Kristin Billerbeck

  Author of What a Girl Wants and The Trophy Wives Club

  “Absolutely brilliantly written…. This book has everything a good read should have: some tears, a little witticism, meaningful connections, a few good belly laughs, and hugs.”

  TCM Reviews

  “A charming and heartfelt story of three women recovering from loss and on a journey of discovery. Claudia, Ivy, and Rae will curl up inside your heart and stay with you long after you’ve put this book down. I loved this book from the first page to the last.”

  Sharon Mignerey

  Author of Shadows of Truth and Too Close for Comfort

  “This book is gritty and real and full of hope, faith, and redemption. Leanna Ellis raises the level of contemporary faith-filled fiction. All I can say is, ‘Thank you. Thank you very much, Leanna!’”

  Lenora Worth

  Author of Fatal Image and coauthor of Once Upon a Christmas

  Copyright © 2008 by Leanna Ellis

  All rights reserved.

  Printed in the United States of America

  978-0-8054-4697-5

  Published by B&H Publishing Group,

  Nashville, Tennessee

  Dewey Decimal Classification : F

  Subject Heading: MARRIAGE—FICTION FAMILY LIFE—FICTION PARENT AND ADULT CHILD—FICTION

  Scripture quotations is taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version (NIV), copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society.

  Publisher's Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.

  “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against the house, and it fell with a great crash.”

  Matthew 7:24–27 (NIV)

  Contents

  Praise for Leanna Ellis’s Elvis Takes a Back Seat

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4 Drew

  Chapter 5 Suzanne

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9 Drew

  Chapter 10 Suzanne

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14 Drew

  Chapter 15 Suzanne

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20 Drew

  Chapter 21 Suzanne

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27 Drew

  Chapter 28 Suzanne

  Chapter 29 Drew

  Chapter 30 Suzanne

  Chapter 31 Drew

  Chapter 32 Suzanne

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Acknowledgments

  To Gary.

  Always.

  1

  Suz.” Static crackles over Dad’s voice. “I need your help, sugar beet.”

  Phone in hand, I turn toward a bank of windows in my kitchen. Yellow sunshine pours through as I look out at the shades of blue undulating with the waves of the Pacific Ocean. “What can I do, Dad?”

  “Your mother … she’s gone off the deep end this time. Maybe you can talk some—” His voice cuts out. The distance between California and Texas seems further with every second I wait.

  “Dad?” I pull the phone away from my ear, check the electronic window to see if we still have a connection. It seems so. “Are you there?”

  “—can’t blame—” His voice returns, then is gone again, giving my heart whiplash like when my son, Oliver, who is learning to drive, steps on the gas then, in quick succession, the brake.

  I try to piece Dad’s words together to make sense of what is happening, and find myself mentally stretching out a hand in an effort to brace myself. Maybe that’s what prayer is. My gaze shifts to a framed picture of a sand castle my son once built on the beach near our house. The empty silence on the phone makes my stomach tighten. “Dad? You’re breaking up. I can’t—”

  “—drag you—this, but—”

  Static once again takes over, then fades into nothing. Silence throbs in my ear. As if I could reach out and touch my father, I straighten the corner of the white wooden frame holding the picture of Oliver grinning in front of a spectacular, if not lopsided, castle. His footprints crisscross the scooped-out moat. The towers behind him lean and sag, their foundations melting under the encroaching waves. But still, the castle stands. Barely. I straighten the framed picture, remembering those simple, uncomplicated days of sun and surf.

  “Dad?” I try again, my voice peaking in desperation.

  “What’s wrong?”

  I turn as my husband, Mike, walks into the kitchen, his feet slapping the ceramic tile floor. His tan, lean chest is bare, his hair damp from his shower. He carries an empty coffee mug in his hand, looking for a refill.

  “Dad called.” The receiver now shows the call has been disconnected. I click the off button but hold onto the phone in case Dad calls back. “I lost him.”

  Mike’s arm is warm, comforting as it wraps around me, strong and secure, but I feel a trembling begin deep inside as he kisses my neck. “Something wrong?”

  I nod, distracted by Dad’s distress call, lost in a memory of my own. When I was in high school, I sat on the back porch of my parents’ home with my father and patted his shoulder. “She didn’t mean it, Daddy.”

  His head bowed low and his hands pressed together between his knees. The lines in his face looked deep and cragged. His shoulders were rounded.

  “I know,” he said, his voice fracturing. “She means well. But …”

  That’s all he ever said. But. The word, heavy and bulky, sat there between us. He always stopped with but.

  “What’s going on?” Oliver plops down at the kitchen table and pours Toasted Oats into a bowl. “Has Grandma called the sheriff again?”

  “I don’t know exactly.” I pour more coffee into Mike’s mug.

  “Think her neighbor is after those flies again?” Humor laces Mike’s words as if a punch line is forthcoming. Whenever I get exasperated with Mother, Mike seems
to have the tolerance of a saint or a comedian looking for new material.

  I begin to fill the coffeemaker, scooping ground beans, pouring water. A little Gevalia and I’ll be smiling again soon. “It was more than Mr. Ned swatting flies, Mike.” Mother always has good, solid reasons for whatever she does. “He was on his front porch naked.”

  My husband’s mouth pulls sideways into a wry grin. He likes hearing the goings-on of a small Texas town, says it’s more interesting than the L.A. of his childhood. Family dynamics are fascinating to him since he grew up without one. “So what would you have done?” He nudges me playfully in the side. It’s the subtle question I’ve often asked myself, wondering if I’d react like Mother. “Gotten binoculars?”

  That makes me laugh. “Mr. Ned is ninety-two. With no teeth.”

  “Not your type, eh?” He kisses me quick, like lightning, and heat shimmers along my nerves.

  “Why couldn’t Britney Spears live next to Grandma and Grandpa?” Oliver opens the fridge and pulls out the milk carton.

  Smiling, I reach for the plug on the coffeemaker, but it’s already in the wall socket, so I flip the switch. Immediately it belches, and wet, goopy grounds pour out over the carafe. A tiny gasp escapes me, and Mike reaches over to shut off the machine.

  “I wondered what you were doing. You already made coffee.”

  “I knew that.” But some part of my brain must have fractured. I’m not sure what I was doing, why I was making another pot of coffee when the carafe was half full already.

  “Your dad’s call must have upset you more than you realize. Here, let me fix it.” He pulls the machine across the granite counter toward the sink and starts dumping grounds down the disposal while I mop up the mess on the counter with paper towels.

  Then the phone rings again. I leap for the receiver. But this time it’s not my father. Instantly, though, I know it’s about the situation back home because of the area code and the Texas accent on the other end of the line. “Something’s not right with a woman who can’t shed a tear over her dead husband.”

  Linda Lou Hoover, known as the woman who sucks up information better than any vacuum cleaner, pauses for emphasis. When I realize the widow she’s discussing is my mother, my heart gives a jolt. I get off the phone as fast as I can and punch in the number for my parents’ home, my fingers trembling.

  “Mother?” I say when she answers, trying to push down the panic that threatens to detonate inside me. “Mrs. Hoover just called.”

  “Oh, you should know better than to listen to her.”

  “What’s going on?”

  She sighs heavily into the phone as if the question is as exhausting as lifting one of the fifty-pound feedbags Daddy sells to local feed stores.

  “Has something happened? To Daddy?”

  “Not yet.”

  Her words feel like a hard slap. Heat burns my cheeks. Behind me, I hear Mike turn the water off in the sink. I can sense him watching, waiting. “What do you mean?”

  “Your father … well, he …” There’s another long, drawn-out sigh. “I suppose you’ll find out soon enough.”

  My heart begins a labored beating. “Is Daddy …” I hesitate, scared to even voice my fear, “… dead?”

  “Depends on who you’re asking.”

  “I’m asking you, Mother!”

  “To me, he is dead. But don’t let that trouble you. He’s alive and well enough to still be a nuisance.”

  I probably should let the conversation go as small-town gossip and another argument between Mother and Daddy. It’s not the first and most probably won’t be the last. I weathered a few squalls of hurricane proportions when I grew up. Once Mother threw all of Daddy’s clothes out on the lawn. She had, what she thought, good reason. Another time she cordoned off part of the house, designated each side his and hers. It was to make a point. But I stood on the line, not knowing which side to lean toward, tugged one way by Mother’s demand for loyalty, tugged the other by my father’s soft heart. Another time Mother was convinced Daddy had a lady friend out of town and tracked her down, only to learn that Ida Mae was a prize-winning hunting dog Daddy had purchased without Mother’s consent and was keeping her in Marble Falls till he could figure out how to break the news to Mother.

  Mother always has a good reason for the things she says and does. Daddy doesn’t mean to be thoughtless or irresponsible. Daddy is just Daddy. Mother is just Mother. Which amounts to oil and water some days, peas and carrots others.

  Maybe that’s all this is, some misunderstanding. Nothing out of the ordinary. Maybe Linda Lou Hoover has lost some of her suction on gossip, letting bits and pieces slip away. But I can’t forget my father’s call for help. So I call the airlines for a ticket home to Luckenbach.

  It’s been ten years but feels like a lifetime since I breathed Texas air. We’ve offered to fly home for holidays, but Mother and Daddy (mostly Mother) always insist on coming to California. Frankly, it’s easier that way. Less hassle with presents, especially when Oliver was little and Santa brought bulky toys like a train table or cardboard rocket ship. Besides there are more activities to keep us occupied in Southern California. Mike thinks my folks have a penchant for Mickey Mouse, but sometimes I get the feeling they just don’t want me to come home.

  * * *

  THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON I’m standing on the front porch of my parents’ home. The windmill behind the house creaks in a slow turning motion. Mother surprised Daddy with the kit one Father’s Day in the early ’80s. She thought a windmill added charm and atmosphere to the house. During the process, Daddy slammed hammer against thumb and lost his nail. Now the wheel looks like my parents’ marriage— weathered, worn, and nearly busted.

  I glance around at the gently rolling hills where I grew up. The house is not in Luckenbach proper. There is no proper in Luckenbach. The town was established as a trading post in 1849 and hasn’t changed much since. The sign outside of town still reads “Population 3.” The days here are long, the nights longer. The place is sometimes jokingly referred to as Lookin’ Back, but reminiscing is not my favorite pastime.

  Luckenbach sits in the hill country outside Fredericksburg, within spitting distance of several peach orchards and wineries. The latter might be the reason it’s a favored spot among retirees and bikers. Waylon and Willie made the town famous, but if someone’s GPS system goes on the blink, they might blow right past the turnoff and never realize it.

  Where I grew up is not quite a neighborhood but more of a hodgepodge of houses located near one another, their styles a mishmash of brick, wood, siding, and stonework. Some neighbors built their houses themselves, not bothering with contractors. The Lindseys down the crooked gravel drive lived in a full-sized tepee for three and a half years while they built their house brick by brick. Each home sits on five or more acres. That much real estate would be obscenely expensive in California. But here in the hill country of Gillespie County land is cheap (unless oil is bubbling beneath) and hearts are humble. Most are anyway.

  For some reason today cars jam the narrow lane leading up to my parents’ limestone ranch house and are parked in no particular pattern on the front lawn. It looks as if Mother is throwing one of her famous parties. Folks in Luckenbach and nearby Fredericksburg and Stonewall are known for thinking up any excuse to party, whether it’s celebrating Waylon Jennings, Chester Nimitz, or mud daubers. Mother may be difficult to tolerate as a neighbor (and even as a parent at times), but no one gives a party like Betty Lynne Davidson, the resident Martha Stewart. Everyone who receives a coveted invitation is certain to come.

  But why today? When I spoke to her on the phone from California, she didn’t say anything about preparations for a party.

  “You know your mother,” Mike said when he dropped me at the airport midmorning. “No telling what’s going on.” Now I wish he were here with me, supporting and encouraging me—and guarding my back.

  Bracing myself for the unimaginable, I knock on the door of my childhood home. Throu
gh the paned windows, the Texas drawl I’ve worked so hard to eliminate from my own speech mingles, male and female, in low tones I can’t decipher. The house is awfully quiet for a party.

  I suddenly have the urge to run back to my car. Can I make it back to Austin in time to catch a flight home? Maybe Mother’s mellowed with age. I toss up a quick but fervent prayer for an extra dose of love. And patience. And self-control. And—

  The door opens. The weather stripping makes a sucking sound, and Mother’s serenely smiling face comes into view. When the realization hits her eyes that it’s me standing here, there’s a brief flutter of shock, then panic. It’s only a flash, here then gone. Most people who don’t know Mother would miss it. She recovers quickly, her smile remaining intact. Always. It’s the way she trained me.

  With a glance over her shoulder, she whispers to someone I can’t see, “Excuse me, will you? Oh, yes. I’ll be right back. No, no, I’m fine.”

  Mother is always fine. Unflappable. I didn’t inherit that trait. On the outside I might seem fine, but on the inside I’m usually a wreck. My ability to hide my insecurities and fears has taken years to develop.

  She squeezes through the partially open door and closes it quickly behind her. She may have inherited the German bone structure and coloring with blonde hair and blue eyes, but she isn’t big-boned or sporting the pounds from too many potatoes. Still, she is formidable. Mother takes my arm and leads me along the front porch to the swing, then stops as if repositioning our greeting. “Why, Suzanne!” Her accent is good and thick as white sausage gravy. She gives me a brief hug, and I catch a powdery whiff of Chanel No. 5. Her smile is unwavering, but all my senses go on full alert. “What are you doing here, dear?”

  “I’m concerned, Mother.”

  “About what?” A tiny wrinkle appears between her carefully plucked brows, then she erases it just as quickly, jerking her chin, opening her eyes wide and innocently.