Return to Paradise

by Laina Villeneuve

  She’d turn right around. In my mind I heard her arguing with her manager.

  I will not stand by and tacitly condone their behavior by serving those people. Too vividly I remembered the icy tone she used when she talked to me now.

  Because the world revolves around you, doesn’t it, Shawneen?

  I easily imagined her hateful gaze when she delivered our water and the force she would use when setting the glasses down.

  Lacey would engage her in conversation about the Nova, ask how it was driving, suggest that she take the tan door to the body shop that had done such a good job on the Bug. I knew that it was killing her that Dennis had helped out by spray-painting it red, which made it look worse, but she had promised to let it go and so far had kept her mouth shut.

  “You okay over here?” Lacey asked, sitting down next to me. Either I’d drifted more than I realized or she’d left her shop doors open and could see me watching Shawneen.

  “Did you know Woodrow Wilson said that the one swimming against the stream knows the strength of it?”

  “You just read that?”

  “No. I was thinking about where I want to go for dinner.”

  “Are you the one swimming against the stream, or am I?”

  “I’m the swimmer. Shawneen’s the stream. What if I had my mouth set on Chinese?”

  “Then I’d say let’s go.”

  “Even though you know it would make her steaming mad?”

  “I liked how Dani and Hope left when she came up to Hot Rocks spewing all that hateful stuff. She thrives on conflict, and if we avoid the restaurant where she happens to work, then she wins. If we go, we show her that we don’t care and that her hateful words don’t hurt us or change who we are.”

  We sat together for a few minutes as the truth in her words sunk in. I didn’t want to give Shawneen power by avoiding her. I also didn’t want to let her keep the lease on the space she had occupied for a very long time in my brain and heart. “What if I don’t want the stress that would come from sitting there pretending her anger didn’t hurt my feelings.”

  Lacey sagged next to me. “I’d be so relieved! I’d gear up for it if you had an investment, I promise, but pizza and beer sounds so much better to me!”

  “Pizza and beer it is.” My mind relieved of the worry of Shawneen, I remembered a message I was supposed to deliver. “Oh, I stopped by the post office on my way over. Nathan said he picked up…what was it? Some old car…”

  “An Oldsmobile?”

  “Maybe?”

  “From the seventies?” Lacey sounded excited.

  “How am I supposed to know?”

  “You’re the one who was talking to him!”

  “And why in the world is he talking to me, the one who knows nothing about cars, instead of calling you?”

  “That’s the way it works in a small town. He’s probably been meaning to let me know, but it took seeing you to remind him. He’s been talking for a while about finding an Olds like the one he learned to drive on and restoring something like I did with the Beetle. Good for him. I’ll give him a call.”

  She didn’t move to get her phone or shut her shop. Instead, she leaned against me. We watched traffic go by, a fair number of drivers saw us sitting there and tooted their horns.We waved back, Lacey identifying the driver if I didn’t recognize the vehicle.

  “It’s better than TV,” I said.

  Lacey laughed. “Back when I was little, we’d be driving my mom up the wall, and she’d tell us to sit on the porch and count cars. We couldn’t come in until we’d seen ten cars the color she chose.”

  “That’s not true. Why wouldn’t she send you in the back where there’s a fence?”

  “Oh, she’d try that first. But we were loud, and she’d get tired of hollering at us through the greenhouse. We’d hear water hitting the glass as she tried to get our attention. We knew we pushed her too hard if she stormed out and marched us through to the front porch to count cars. Sometimes she’d say count to a hundred, but if she was really mad, she wouldn’t let us come in until we’d counted twenty yellow ones. My brothers were sneaky though and would look for campers that had yellow logos painted on them. There were days we were still sitting out there when my dad got home.”

  “Would he be mad?”

  “Nah. Most of the time, he’d join us and help finish up our count. He’d get us to confess all the trouble we’d gotten into while mom cooled down.”

  “Hearing you talk about your family is like learning a completely foreign culture.”

  “You sure you’re up for hosting the Fourth of July festivities this year?”

  “I’m sure,” I said. I remembered that it was her family’s favorite holiday and had spent the last week in a frenzy of buying all the supplies.

  “Are Charlie and Ruth going to make it?”

  “No. Ruth doesn’t want to drive up on the holiday weekend, and Charlie doesn’t trust anyone with the ranch yet. Besides, this is your holiday. I promised them they’d have us Thanksgiving weekend.”

  “I like the sound of that.”

  “Thanksgiving weekend?”

  “Us. Now let’s get us some food.”

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Madison

  “You little stinker!” I swore, tearing after Bruno. I was certain I’d be able to catch an eight-year-old, but he easily left me in the dust, disappearing into the woods. “Who got into the silly string?” Hands on my knees, I stood there panting, swiping at the green strings that hung from my head, not registering how quiet it had become. The whole property was still.

  I’d ordered a whole crate of the stuff since there were way too many trees on my property to do any fireworks. It was supposed to be a fun activity during the afternoon, and I’d had a plan. Being ambushed by an eight-year-old wasn’t in it, and now I wondered if Lacey had set me up. Slowly I started backing up toward the house. They came from everywhere, behind trees and bushes, from every side, the house included, all of the silly string aimed at me. Where was Houdini when I needed him?

  Lacey broke through the circle and handed me a couple of cans to defend myself.

  “Sorry,” she said without conviction. “We couldn’t resist!” Trevor shifted his aim to his boys, winding both Bruno and Eric in a web of string, but Cal kept his aim on me. He had bigger cans of silly string, and he’d taped them together and rigged them somehow to shoot at the same time. With that setup in both hands, he had four lines of silly string going.

  Both Iris and Lacey’s sister, Chrystal, were trying to distract him, but he kept squirting like he planned to cover me completely.

  I finally started hearing the hissing indicating the end of the can, a sound I’d never been so grateful to hear.

  “This was the best idea ever!” one of Chrystal’s kids said. Wesley, maybe. I still hadn’t squared away the names of all the family I was meeting for the first time. All I knew was that they’d arrived wary and were all now smiling.

  “Let’s do it every year!” Trevor’s Eric said.

  “What do you think?” Lacey asked, helping me remove the mass of silly string that covered me.

  “Will the cleanup keep them busy the rest of the afternoon?”

  “It’ll at least keep them outside,” she commented as we watched them picking up longer strings in attempt to cover each other again.

  “Hope you’re not mad,” Cal said, shaking his can, trying to get something more to squirt at me.

  “Not at all,” I said.

  “Don’t tell him that,” Chrystal said, joining us. “It’ll only encourage him.”

  “Whatever happened to the newbies being safe for a year?” Bennett said.

  “I don’t see why you’re asking. You’ve never got anyone to bring home,” Cal said.

  “Neither do you, loser,” Bennett shot back.

  “Not true.” Cal squirted air at his brother. “I have a girlfriend. She just couldn’t make it today.”

  “She couldn’t make bail?�
� Bennett saw Cal move before I did and was off running.

  I was doing my best to keep up with their rapid-fire conversation and not worry about the boys running around in the woods.

  “It’s a lot to take in, isn’t it?” I hadn’t even seen Lacey’s mom, Delphine come up beside us.

  “Lacey tried to prepare me, but…” I shook my head.

  “When Matt and I decided to have more than two, the idea was that they’d play with each other and keep each other occupied. I never thought that they’d try to rip each other apart.”

  Breathing hard, Bennett stopped next to us though he kept a wary eye on Cal who had stopped next to the bucket of drinks I’d put on ice. Cal pulled out a bottle of water and remained by the porch to drink it. Lacey poked me, and I realized I’d missed something.

  “I’m sorry?” I said.

  “My boys said that you named this place after a hot springs. Is it within walking distance?” Delphine asked.

  “It’s a little bit of a hike, but it’s doable. The little kids might get tired on the way back, but I could see if Houdini is around.”

  “Houdini?” Delphine laughed.

  “A horse. He came with the property but doesn’t stay put.”

  “Perfect name.”

  In a flash, Cal was running again, this time with a bucket in his hands. Bennett grabbed me and spun me around using me as a shield. Cal didn’t hesitate at all. I saw the ice water crest and hover in the air. My brain froze before it even hit me, just me, because Bennett had jumped out of harm’s way.

  “Calvin Melville McAlpine!” Delphine gasped as I stood there shocked and frozen. “Matt, get us some towels out here! Lots of them!” she called.

  Lacey placed a hand on my shoulder. I was soaked head to toe, the tee cold and tight, and jeans shorts heavy on my hips. Water dripped from my short hair.

  Chrystal hollered at her brother, but the way my ears rang, I only caught snippets. “…can’t believe…idiot…” All the kids came running to see what the shouting was about. Cal yelling back, arms waving as he shouted like a child, “you’re not my mom.”

  “Oh, If I were…”

  “…don’t even think…”

  Goose bumps covered my body, and my teeth chattered.

  “If Bennett hadn’t…”

  Lacey looked so worried, and I realized how I must have looked standing there dripping.

  That idea kicked through the shock, and I couldn’t help but laugh. I threw my head back and howled with laughter. The kids joined in first, and the adults, once they realized I really was laughing, joined in.

  “Are you okay?” Lacey asked.

  “I’m so sorry,” Cal said. “That was totally meant for my idiot brother.”

  “You can’t blame me!” Bennett exclaimed.

  “Guys, chill,” Lacey said, and I could hear that she was still worried about me. I was laughing so much that tears were rolling down my face. I couldn’t control either one, the laughing or the tears, not to mention my shivering, and it felt so good. All that noise. All the chaos.

  It felt like home.

  It felt like family.

  My own paradise.

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