Love Letters from Ladybug Farm

by Donna Ball

  I’m glad I got to see you grow up to be well and strong and happy. That was more than I ever expected, or probably deserved. I wish I’d had more time, of course I do. I wish we could have spent some of it together. But after everything else, it didn’t seem fair of me to ask you to spend your teenage years watching your mother die. And that’s the only reason that I’ve stayed away from you this past year. Because, by the time I fouud you, it was too late.

  Over the years, when I really didn’t know what had become of you or where you were, I kept you alive in my mind by writing letters to you. Of course I didn’t know where to mail them, but I always believed that one day I’d give them to you in person. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to do that.

  I don’t have much to leave you, just my words. I hope they will remind you that you were loved every day of your life—

  Mom

  From This Day Forward

  15

  On Tending Gardens and Taking Chances

  The one immutable rule on Ladybug Farm was that time stopped for no one. There were eggs to be gathered and animals to be fed, rows to be weeded, ponds to be cleaned, beans and squash to be harvested, herbs to be cut, roses to be watered, flower beds to be mulched, bird feeders to be filled, compost to be turned, grass to be mowed. Sometimes a delay of even a day or two could mean the difference between a healthy plant and a dead one, an abundant harvest or no harvest at all. And sure enough, when they returned home from the memorial service, Ida Mae announced that cutworms had taken out half the tomato vines, and potato bugs had infested the potatoes. Everything came to a halt as all able-bodied hands rushed to the garden with cardboard collars for the tomato plants and insecticidal soap for the potatoes.

  “You spent more time mulching and less time on that computer,” Ida Mae observed dryly, knocking potato bugs off a leaf and into a tin can with a stick, “and you wouldn’t have to worry about bugs.”

  They all knew she was probably right. But there were also one hundred ladybug cookies to be baked, decorated, and packaged, twenty large and one hundred small gift baskets to be packed and wrapped, twenty-five gallons of cherries to be made into cherry wine jam, and twenty champagne glasses to be converted to table decorations—all before the end of the week.

  Noah fed and watered the animals, cleaned their pens, mowed the lawn, harvested crops, and attended to his other regular chores without interruption. But for the most part he spent his time alone, either roaming the woods or in the art studio, and the other members of the household gave him his privacy.

  “The thing I feel the worst about,” Lindsay said, piping black dots onto the red frosting of a ladybug cookie according to Bridget’s instructions, “is that we’ve been so busy with our own problems we didn’t even notice what was going on with him.”

  “That’s not true.” Cici was still pitting cherries. “We knew something was bothering him. We should have tried harder to find out what it was.”

  “Having once been an actual teenage boy myself,” Paul said, glancing over the tops of the half-rim glasses he wore for close work, “believe me when I tell you that there is always something bothering them. Trying to stay on top of it every single time is crazy-making.” He hot-glued another perfect cluster of miniature apricot silk roses into the center of an ivory bow and passed it to Lori, who used florist wire to secure it around the stem of a champagne glass.

  “Come on, Uncle Paul. I mean, I know it was hard for you, growing up gay and all, but you went to Choate and spent summers on Cape Cod. It’s a little bit different for a kid like him. Not,” she added guiltily “that I’m one to be talking, with all my whining about missing out on Italy. I never spent one day of my whole life without knowing that I had two parents who loved me. And that’s why I don’t think people like us can really understand what it’s like for him.”

  Paul smiled at her. “Truer words, princess.”

  Bridget took another pan of cookies from the oven and set it on a wire rack to cool. “That day we came back from the hospital,” she said, “and he had done all that work sprucing up the place and keeping up with everyone’s chores ... we thought it was because he was trying to get out of the trouble he was in. Now I think it might have just been his way of saying he was grateful, you know, to be here.”

  “He is a remarkable young man in so many ways,” Cici said. “I just wish there was something we could do to make things easier for him now.”

  The screen door squeaked open, and there stood Noah. “You already have,” he said.

  They all turned guiltily and he gave a one-shouldered shrug, and a rueful, fleeting smile. “It’s okay if you talk about me. I just don’t want to ... you know, I’m more the kind of guy who likes to work things out for himself.”

  Lindsay straightened up from the tray of cookies. “We know,” she said gently. “But if you ever want to talk, we’re here for you.”

  “All of us,” Paul added.

  Lori added, “Yeah.”

  Noah said, “Yeah, I know. But it’s nicer to know I don’t have to.”

  Bridget smiled at him. “That’s fine, too.”

  He looked around the room at all of them for a moment, then he said, “There’s one thing I wanted to say. Then maybe ... in a week or two, when things kind of calm down around here, maybe we’ll talk, you know, about that other thing.” He looked at Lindsay, an uncertain mixture of shyness, pretended nonchalance, and hope in his eyes. “That legal thing you told me about in Richmond.”

  Lindsay had to swallow before she could speak, but she could not restrain her smile. “Okay. That would be great.”

  Noah went on. “What I wanted to say was, I know ya’ll are thinking I’m mad at her. My mom. But that’s not it. I don’t blame her, not now. I’ve been reading her letters. I think about her writing them to me when I was just a little baby, and she didn’t even know where I was. She was kind of funny.” He smiled a little, faintly. “And interesting. She sounds like somebody I might have liked to know. So that’s the thing. I had a whole year, after I knew where she was and who she was, and I could have talked to her. But I wasted it. I wasted it trying to punish her, or trying to prove I didn’t care, or I don’t know, a lotta different things. But that’s what I’m mad at. Nothing else.”

  He glanced around the room once again, a little more quickly, trying to hide his embarrassment, and his gaze landed on Cici. “You want me to do the cherries?”

  Cici smiled, and handed him the cherry pitter. “Thanks, Noah. That would be great.”

  He sat down beside her, and as they all worked together in companionable ease the atmosphere around the table was a bit more thoughtful than it had been before.

  Trucks arrived. The UPS truck, bearing apricot and spring green frocks for Bridget and Lindsay. The postal carrier in his mud-stained red station wagon, with jar labels and cellophane bags. FedEx, with embossed place cards. UPS again, with stockings and shoes. Party Favors out of Charlottesville, with glassware, china, and cutlery. FedEx with monogrammed napkins. UPS with bolts of ivory scrim and satin ribbon. Two hearses, filled with chairs, and a Silverado carrying tents. Rebel started to lose his voice and, toward the end of the week, made only a token charge at the wheels of each vehicle before he retreated, panting hard, to the shade under the porch. The goat ran away twice and, somewhat to their dismay, returned each time. The hens stopped laying.

  Paul orchestrated it all like a Broadway director on opening night. He found a hands-free telephone headset and managed to hook it up so that he could direct boxes to the kitchen, chairs to the barn, and fabric to the parlor, all while ordering table covers from a restaurant supply and measuring the rose garden for the placement of chairs, and, of course, never missing a call from Catherine or Traci. Noah was sent to town to buy every white candle he could find, and Lori spent the day wrapping them in apricot tulle. A bow-making assembly line was formed.

  “We’ll gather the scrim and tie it every five feet with floral wire,” Paul explained to Lindsay, who wa
s with Bridget in her room, trying on their dresses for the wedding. “Then we’ll drape it around the tents to hide the name of the funeral parlor, and let it float down over the tent poles like a cabana. Bows at each corner, and no one will ever know they aren’t custom wedding tents.”

  “Perfect,” Lindsay said, scrutinizing herself in the mirror. “I hate this dress. Don’t you think it makes my hair look orange?”

  “You were born to do this,” Bridget told Paul, adjusting the neckline of her own spring green dress. “You’re the one who should go into business. I look like a cupcake.”

  “I have a job, thanks. This is just a fantasy.” He tied the satin ribbon on the front of Bridget’s dress and stepped back to observe her critically. “Lose the bow,” he advised.

  “What are you going to do about your column?” Lindsay asked. “You’re not missing deadlines because of us, are you?”

  “Are you joking? This is my column—for about a month. And you two in those outfits will be one entire installment. Talk about what not to wear.”

  “Thanks a lot.” Lindsay cast a speculative look toward Bridget’s spring green dress. “I should have been in green. You should have been in apricot.”

  “Neither one of you should be in green or apricot,” observed Paul. “And you’re both too beautiful—and smart—to let a spoiled twenty-three-year-old tell you how to dress.”

  “And too old,” agreed Bridget unhappily.

  “We’re billing her for these dresses,” Lindsay said. “My hips look huge.”

  Paul said, “I almost forgot why I came up. Company’s downstairs. That fellow Dominic.”

  Lindsay looked quickly interested, and Paul did not fail to notice.

  “He’s talking to Lori,” he added casually. “He asked about you, Lindsay. So for God’s sake don’t wear that dress downstairs.”

  She scowled at him. “Okay, very cute. Now get back to work before I rent out your room.”

  He left the room with a speculative grin on his face.

  “What you have to understand about wine,” Dominic was saying to Lori, “is that it’s more alchemy than science, and it always has been. That’s the magic of it. When you hear a vinophile use words like precocious and impudent or dark and brooding, or when they start going off with all sorts of flowery terms to describe the flavors, the tendency is to think they’re just being pretentious. But wine is a living thing, and that’s not just a metaphor. Every wine has its own character, its own personality. It takes on the taste and the texture of the very soil in which it was birthed. That’s what you have to understand, Lori, if you want to make wine. The magic.”

  A big worktable had been set up in the grand parlor, which was crowded with cardboard boxes, cellophane-wrapped baskets, piles of white satin bows, and stacks of tablecloths. Every immovable surface was lined with tulle-wrapped candles, beribboned champagne glasses, and little net bags of birdseed that the guests would toss over the bride and groom in lieu of rice. Dominic sat at the table across from Lori, his tone earnest and his eyes alive with quiet passion, and while he spoke his fingers worked with equal passion on forming a large apricot satin bow. Lindsay watching from the doorway felt a smile start deep in her belly and spread, inexorably to her lips, where it grew so big it actually hurt her face.

  Lori, who was so entranced by his words that her own bow lay forgotten and unfinished on the table in front of her, saw Lindsay first. “Aunt Lindsay!” she exclaimed.

  Dominic immediately leapt to his feet and turned, stumbling a little over his chair, his completed bow clutched to his chest.

  Lori’s face was alight with excitement as she continued, oblivious, “Did you know Dominic went to Cornell? Just like I plan to! He got his doctorate there. And his father was the vigneron at Chateau Ellyson, which was the most prestigious winery in France before the war! He said he would be my mentor.”

  Dominic held up the bow with a self deprecating smile. “And I can make bows.”

  “So I see.” Lindsay came into the room and took the bow from him, pretending to inspect it. “Very nice. Do you work on commission?”

  When he smiled at her, Lindsay was glad she had changed into jeans and a T-shirt before coming down. He said, “Lori was telling me about her plans. I was telling her she’s missing out on the true soul of wine making if she doesn’t spend some time in France.”

  “Actually” Lindsay said, “the real history of modern wine making can be traced to ancient Greece.”

  He lifted an eyebrow. “As can everything else, in theory.”

  Cici appeared behind them. “Lori, sweetie, I know you’re busy, but I need you for a sec.” Then, “Hi, Dominic. I didn’t know you were here.”

  “I just stopped in to say hello, and got drafted.” He handed the bow to Lindsay. “But I think my job here is done.”

  “I’ll walk you out,” Lindsay said, and he looked mildly surprised, and pleased, as they left.

  Lori struggled to get her crutches under her. “You know, Mom, getting from one place to the other is a little bit complicated for me. Couldn’t you get someone else to do whatever it is?”

  “Not this time. Besides, you’re supposed to get up and move around every hour. It’s good for your circulation.”

  Cici placed a light protective hand on Lori’s shoulder as she hobbled past, and Lori gave her an annoyed look when Cici gestured her toward the sunroom. “Mom, what .. .”

  “Wait a minute.” Cici stopped her at the doorway and reached into her back pocket for a compact.

  “What is that?” Lori flinched away as her mother began dabbing the makeup over the fading yellow bruises on her cheek.

  “Just a little coverage. There.” She surveyed her work. “You can’t even see the bruises. Hold on. Just a little lip gloss...”

  “Mom! What’s going on? Are you crazy?” She shrank back, trying to brush Cici’s hand away, but Cici smoothed a peachy coat of gloss over her daughter’s lips and tidied the corners before she stepped back.

  “Probably” she admitted. “But there’s a nice young man waiting to talk to you who has been worried sick about why he hasn’t heard from you. The least you can do is thank him for his concern.”

  Lori stared at her, and Cici directed her attention to the laptop computer that was set up on the wicker table that served as her temporary desk. Lori hobbled over to the computer, dropped down into the chair in front of it, and gasped. “Sergio!”

  “Lori, bellissima! It is you, at last!”

  Cici saw her daughter’s face light up in sheer delight as she exclaimed, “But how did you—when did you.. .”

  And Cici closed the door quietly behind her as she left, smiling.

  “So,” Lindsay said, as they walked toward Dominic’s truck, “how did you get from here to Cornell, and then back again?”

  “Short version? I had this grand scheme to establish the finest winery in the U.S. Remember back then, no one believed California wines had a chance, and nothing decent was being produced south of New York, so after college I started apprenticing in some of the top wineries in the region ... which is where, of course, I fell in love, got married, and realized I had to have a real job. So I got into the graduate program at Cornell, thinking a degree would be the fastest way to a higher-paying job. I ended up teaching agriculture at Clemson for about twenty years. And after my wife died I decided to come back here. I’d always loved this part of the country, and I liked the work. I’ve been back eight years now.”

  “How long were you married?”

  “Thirty-three years.”

  “You have children, don’t you?” She thought she vaguely remembered him mentioning a daughter, or perhaps a son, in one of their lazy front porch conversations.

  “Three.” He grinned. “Two of them work for wineries in California. Seems that everybody was wrong about California wines.”

  Lindsay smiled. “I feel like a bad neighbor. We’ve been acquainted for over a year, but never really got to know you.”
r />   “We keep missing out on that dinner.”

  “My fault.”

  A short, rather awkward silence fell.

  Then he said, “I remember the parties Judge Blackwell and his mother used to give when I was a boy here. They’d park cars three deep all up and down the driveway, and have somebody shuttle the guests up to the house.” He grinned. “I earned enough in tips to buy my own first car that way.”

  “So, that’s how they did it!” Lindsay exclaimed. “I was wondering where everyone was going to park.”

  “Sure:” He gestured toward the flat grassy area that spread out on either side of the tree-lined drive. “Get a couple of kids to direct traffic, there’s plenty of room. And I wouldn’t mind taking my old job back driving the shuttle if you need the help.”

  She tilted her head at him. “You’d do that?”

  “Sure. It’s not as though I have anything else to do on Saturday.”

  She regarded him thoughtfully smiling. “You really are a nice guy, aren’t you?”

  He shrugged. “I try to be.”

  They had reached his truck, and he turned to look at her before opening the door. “Well, you let me know if you need any help.”

  “Actually,” Lindsay said on a sudden breath, “I’m glad you’re not busy Saturday because as it happens I need an escort for the wedding, and I don’t suppose you’d be interested. In being my escort, I mean.”

  A smile started in his eyes, and traveled to his lips, where it lit up his whole face. “I thought you’d never ask.” He opened the truck door. “What time?”

  “Two o’clock.”

  “I’ll be here at one,” he assured her, as he started the engine.

  Lindsay clapped her hands together like a girl, laughing, and did a little twirl in the driveway as he drove away.