Return to Paradise

by Laina Villeneuve

  Shawneen scrunched her mouth to the side before she laughed. “Dennis would never go to all that effort.”

  “I’m going down the canyon next week. I could take a look. I have a truck, so it would be easy to toss a door in the back if I find one.”

  “Depends on how much it is,” Shawneen said, the flirtatious tone she sometimes used on me creeping into her voice. I don’t know what bothered me more, that she was using it on her daughter, unknowingly, but still…or that she completely overlooked Madison’s generosity.

  I wanted to shout at her, make her see who was in front of her and ask how much more damage she could do. It took everything I had to keep the words in my mouth. I had to say something, so I told her to give me a week to see if I could track down a door. I wanted her gone so badly, I was tempted to drop my argument and let her have the Nova back to do as she wished. Dennis pulled up in his battered flatbed.

  “Let me see what he thinks,” Shawneen said. “How much do you think it’ll cost?”

  “Somewhere between fifty and a hundred for the door. You can YouTube a video and replace it yourselves, or I’d do it for a hundred and fifty.”

  Lips pressed in a firm line, she sauntered over to the car to consult with Dennis through the window. I tried my best to keep my eyes averted from the sight of her rear stuck out at an unattractive angle, but Madison was the most logical place to look, and it pained me to see her discomfort.

  Shawneen finally stood and sang out, “If it’s any more than a hundred to pick up the door, no deal. Call me!” She scuttled around to the passenger side, and they disappeared, Dennis gesturing something between a salute and a wave as he backed out of the drive.

  I was finally able to give Madison my full attention. She had her hands shoved deep into the pockets of thickly woven charcoal cords and let out a deep breath when I finally turned to her. “I’m so sorry. What a terrible way to start a date.”

  “’S’okay. It’s not like I have much to hold it up against.”

  I didn’t see how that could be possible. “You haven’t had many girlfriends? Or boyfriends,” I added to let her know it wouldn’t bother me if she’d dated guys.

  “I went to a few dances in high school. Homecoming. Prom. But only because I didn’t want Ruth and Bo to worry about me, not because I was interested. Beyond that…” She smiled timidly.

  “This is a first first date?” I asked, a wave of anxiety washing through me. She nodded, not looking nervous despite the admission. I followed her lead. “Well, then. Let’s get it started. I’ll ask that you ignore the fact that your date needs a quick costume change. I’ll see if I can’t get the cat to keep you company.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Madison

  Lacey led me past a tidy den to the kitchen. “Can I get you anything to drink?”

  I was glad we’d moved past the incident with Shawneen. It had rattled me, but I had moved back to Quincy in part to figure out why Charlie had left, so I was going to have to drop the bomb of who I was to her sometime. “Whatever is fine.”

  She poured red wine into two glasses. We clinked, and she took a long drink. I sipped mine, knowing if I had much more before eating, I wouldn’t be good for anything. Lacey shut her eyes, and I imagined the rush of warmth that so much alcohol would whoosh through my body. When she opened her eyes again, she rolled out some kinks in her neck and smiled. “Better already.” She set down her glass. “Midnight’s likely to be lazing in a patch of sunlight somewhere. Feel free to look for her if I take too long.”

  “Take your time,” I said, and she disappeared at the end of the hallway to the right.

  The kitchen had been remodeled. I’d memorized every detail of the few childhood pictures I had, most of which were outside. There were a few of me covered in spaghetti sauce in my high chair. The floor had been oak in need of refinishing. Now it was a rich brown tile that complemented granite countertops.

  The window above the kitchen sink opened to a full greenhouse. Inside were many colorful orchids as well as some trays of vegetable starts. The dining room and kitchen were open plan, with a large table that matched an ornate hutch. Sliding glass doors gave a view of the backyard beyond a generous deck. As Lacey predicted, I found a short-haired black cat dozing in a patch of sun by the sliding glass doors. It glanced at me before resting back with its eyes closed. At my approach, it stretched out and purred.

  I lowered myself fully to the floor next to her and looked out the window. Had I been allowed to play in the backyard? Did Shawneen sit on the porch or explore with me? Would Shawneen watch me from the kitchen window as she made dinner? Was Charlie ever home by then? I tried to imagine what my life would have been like if the three of us had remained in the house.

  Lacey’s footfall pounded down the hallway. Had I ever walked with such purpose, it would have rattled everything in Charlie’s trailer or called much too much attention to me in Bo and Ruth’s place.

  “So you found Midnight?” Lacey stood above me in worn hip-hugging jeans and a plum long-sleeved shirt that accentuated her very feminine curves.

  I stood and took in how relaxed she seemed. “You were popular in high school, weren’t you?”

  She took my hand. “I had friends. Why?” she asked with a confused grin.

  “I can feel how loud this house was. I feel like I can hear you and your brothers slamming this door and your mom reminding you to slow down.”

  “The worst was summertime with the screen door. Someone was always running right into it. Without fail, my mom would say ‘don’t run through a screen door. You’ll strain yourself!’”

  I laughed at the joke but stilled when she put her hand to my face.

  “Hi.”

  The simple gesture and word made my heart pound fiercely in my chest. “Hi,” I managed shakily.

  “There’s something I have to do before I’ll be safe to cook dinner.”

  “Okay,” I answered, suddenly panicky about the impression our first kiss would make. I was pretty sure when she invited me over that we’d kiss, at least I’d hoped we would, but I wasn’t expecting it to happen right from the…

  Her sweet soft lips halted all thought. She brought her other hand up and cradled my face, and together they worked like blinders, limiting my focus to only what was in front of me. Her silky warm lips were my whole world and ignited a sparkler within me. My skin felt like the sparks that fly from the wand, and if you’ve ever held one of the wands, you know how the end glows red hot and races downward. Lacey’s kiss did that to me too, and just like a kid whose sparkler has burned down, the moment the kiss ended, I wanted another.

  When she pulled away, her fingers stayed on my cheeks and felt like the afterimage you can see when you close your eyes and your retina remembers. My skin glowed hot like that wherever her fingers rested. “All week I’ve been thinking about how I should have done that in your barn,” she said softly.

  “I thought you were interested in Houdini,” I said, still amazed that someone like Lacey wanted to kiss me.

  “I’ll have to be more clear in the future,” she said.

  I bit my lip and blinked away from her intense stare.

  “But first dinner.”

  As she pulled ingredients from the refrigerator, I found myself back at the sink looking at the greenhouse.

  “My dad put that in for my mom. The orchids are some she left behind.”

  “You’ve been here a long time, haven’t you?”

  “I practically grew up here. We moved in just before Cal was born. He’s the baby.”

  “Did you know anything about…” I left the thought unfinished.

  “It had been empty for a while when my parents bought it. After I found out you lived here, I called them. My mom said that the realtor was relieved to have an offer. It had been on the market for months.”

  How long had Shawneen lived in the big house alone after Charlie and I left? That much space with one person must have felt oppressive. The silence s
tarted to feel weighted, and I worried that Lacey was thinking I was mad at her family for buying the place. Her parents had obviously filled it with joy. I could feel that. It wouldn’t have been the same for a small family of three or for Shawneen on her own. Of course, Lacey lived in it alone too, but she’d converted much of the space for her shop. “Aren’t your brothers or sister mad you got the house?”

  My question eased the awkwardness. “Are you kidding me?” Lacey answered lightly. “None of them wanted it. Once Cal graduated, my dad applied to various firehouses down in Chico because my mom was itching to live close to Chrystal once she started providing grandbabies. Anyway, my dad hoped to sell this place, but it wasn’t moving. He said I’d be doing him a favor if I’d use it.”

  “None of your family stayed in Quincy?”

  “Cal only recently moved. Trevor is relatively close in Chester, but has his own family to take care of, so I hardly ever see him. Bennett’s up in Washington State, so he’s the one I see the least. With Gran still here, most of the time we all round up at her place around the holidays.”

  I tried to imagine what it would have been like to grow up with four siblings. Then I added in the spouses and children she’d mentioned so far. “How does everyone fit?”

  “The kids don’t stay still long, and Chrystal’s man is out of the picture. Like I said, Bennett hardly ever makes it back. We usually max out at a dozen.”

  “It must get so loud.”

  “When we kids got too rambunctious, my mom would grab the nozzle from the sink and start spraying people to get our attention.”

  “Inside?” The idea completely shocked me.

  “Oh, yeah!” Lacey’s eyes sparkled. “Shut us up real quick. But then we’d be screaming to get away from her!”

  “What would your dad do?” I tried my best to imagine the kind of family she described.

  “Get a mop.”

  She cooked chicken and made a white sauce with sautéed vegetables served on bow tie noodles. Lacey said that when they’d had the meal as kids, her brothers would all get in trouble for fishing out the noodles with their fingers and holding them up to their throats like little sticky ties. Once she started telling stories, she kept them coming, and I happily listened, enjoying the way she painted a vivid picture of the chaos that had been her childhood.

  I’d meant to ask her how she’d decided to be an auto technician, but when she leaned across the table and nestled her lips to mine, I forgot everything else. I meant to ask if the vegetables in her greenhouse were her idea or her gran’s. I meant to ask how many girls she’d kissed, but all that slipped away as I learned how much my lips could say without uttering a single word.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Madison

  People had tried to tell me about the wonders of dating, but I never got it, not until Lacey kissed me and turned my whole day into wondering when I’d get to see her again. My productivity suffered as I got caught in daydreams about her mouth on mine and how much I wanted her lips elsewhere, feelings so new they literally stopped me in my tracks.

  Midway through the week the buzz of my cell snapped me out of one such pause.

  “Hi Ruth,” I answered, clicking the phone to speaker, so I could continue with the trim I was painting.

  “I finished up the last set of curtains. They’re ready when you are.”

  “I can’t wait to get them up. I’ve got the living room painted and am almost finished with the first room.” With the progress I was making, I would have no problem opening by spring, just a few weeks away.

  “What did you decide for the living room?”

  I’d texted her photos of the paint chips for the other rooms, remembering how good she’d been at talking me out of Pepto Bismol pink when I was a child. “I went with that peachy color, Sippin’ Cider, for the living room.”

  She clapped her hands. “I was crossing my fingers for that one. The name alone makes you want to sit and relax, which is exactly what you want in that space. It has a nice view?”

  “A gorgeous panorama of the sunrise. You’re going to love it. Once I finish up a bedroom, you and Bo have to come up.”

  “We’ll be your first paying guests.”

  “You know I wouldn’t let you pay. I already owe you and Bo so much.” My words were met by a pause I didn’t expect. I stopped painting, going over what I’d said again, wondering why it had caused Ruth’s quiet.

  When she spoke again, there was a sharper edge to her words. “Should I expect you for lunch Saturday?”

  “My plans have changed a bit.” I set down the brush and picked up the phone clicking it off speaker.

  “Oh?”

  “Turns out a friend of mine is looking for a car door at the junkyard in Chico. I’m going to drive down with her Friday morning. I really have no idea how long we’ll be there, but we’ll be in Paradise by evening.” I rubbed at paint on my hands, not knowing how to tell Ruth that I’d invited Lacey to stay overnight. I’d danced around the invite, knowing that her sister and parents lived twenty minutes away in Chico. She had already told me she was overdue to see her parents, that she often spent weekends there, so I knew she could stay with them, and I could pick her up when I headed back on Sunday. I worried about it being too early to ask her to come home with me. When we were together, I still found myself bewildered by her attention, sure she must have something better to do. But I really wanted to spend the weekend with her and was thrilled she’d agreed to stick with me the whole trip.

  “You won’t be staying, then?” Ruth’s voice remained formal as if we were conducting business. I wanted her softer voice back.

  “I was actually wondering if it would be okay if she stayed too?” My thoughts raced. I was still working on how I was going to introduce Lacey. If I had her with me, maybe they would see how over-the-moon happy I was, and that would be enough for them to understand that we were dating.

  “Of course, of course,” Ruth gushed. “I was afraid you were going to say she needed to get right back up to Quincy. I’ll make up another guest bed.”

  She’d returned to herself with the last statement, revealing how much Ruth had invested in my spending the weekend in Paradise. I was glad that having a friend along wasn’t a problem. It had been a long while since I’d asked for a sleepover. While I was happy to end the call on a more normal tone, I kept thinking about the conversations I’d had with Ruth in planning the curtains and my trip to retrieve them. She had said that she was happy to have me close to home, but home was a tangled notion. I’d always assumed that Bo and Ruth would reclaim my room when I left for college. Now I realized they were counting on my using it more.

  I lay down on my side, anxious to finish the trim on the bedroom closest to the kitchen. I’d chosen the smallest of the four rooms for myself and decided on a soft lavender. Lacey didn’t see the logic in starting with my bedroom, but I argued that I needed my space to look nice too, and if I left it for last, I risked it getting pushed so far to the back burner that it would fall off forever.

  “Madison?”

  Her voice at my front door brought a smile to my face.

  “In here. I’m almost finished for the day, I promise!”

  She followed the sound of my voice and paused by the door. “Is it still wet?” she asked.

  “That’s where I started, so it should be dry now.” I stood, paintbrush still in hand, to deliver the kiss I’d been dreaming about before Ruth had called. Her lips still impossibly soft on mine, she ran her hands along my tired shoulders and down my back. I groaned.

  “Tired?”

  “Exhausted. The walls took two coats, and the trim always takes so much longer than I think it should.”

  “It looks amazing. This is such a good color.”

  “I’m glad you like it.” I turned to survey it with her, happy when she kept one arm wrapped around my waist.

  “If I didn’t, would you have changed it?”

  “Seeing as I hope you’ll stay with m
e sometime down the road, I weigh what you think pretty heavily.”

  “Sometime down the road?” She pressed.

  “I…” I didn’t really know how to respond. That our relationship was heading toward an intimate one was a given, but it seemed to be moving so fast.

  “I wasn’t putting you on a deadline,” she laughed, squeezing me.

  Relieved, I stepped away. “I have fifteen, twenty minutes to get these baseboards done, and then I can clean my brushes. Do you mind if I press on?”

  “Not at all.”

  I returned to my spot on the floor and told her about my phone call with Ruth. “I hope you don’t mind that she’s making up a separate room for you.”

  “No, not at all. We haven’t…” Her words trailed off to where I’m sure my mind had been wandering.

  Quiet lingered between us and fueled my desire like someone winding an old music box.

  “This is a nice door,” Lacey said, snapping me back to my day’s work. She tested the paint and then traced the beveled edges of one of the four raised panels.

  “Someone must have locked a dog in here, and it tore up the bottom panel. It took me all morning to putty in where it scratched and gnawed on the wood.” It had been a bigger chore than I had anticipated, but buying a new door as solidly built as the original one would have cost a bundle.

  “I can’t even tell now. It looks awesome. You want me to put the hardware on?”

  I rocked back on my heels. “I didn’t want to put it on until I fix the locking mechanism. Bo said he didn’t have the first clue, and I didn’t have a chance to ask Charlie.”

  “I’m guessing one of them is your dad?”

  I went back to my trim, feeling the same unease I’d felt talking about Bo and Ruth with my friends. If anyone asked about my mom and dad, I answered from my experience with Bo and Ruth, but I’d always introduced them as Mr. and Mrs. Betters. I’d never called them Mom and Dad. I’d never called either Bo or Charlie Dad. I bit my lip trying to figure out how to explain. “Charlie was married to Shawneen.”