by Jodi Thomas
“My Connor always said those buildings were sleeping.” Gram laughed. “Suddenly he doesn’t have time to worry about me. He’s working night and day. Which is fine with me. I don’t need him hanging over me.”
“Tell me about it,” Sunnie added. “Good news is he’s finally stopped calling me five times a day. Bad news is I had to chase him down to get my allowance.”
Gram held her arms up for her daily hug. “I’m getting stronger every day. Soon you won’t have to rush home to take care of me. I’ll be back with the girls at the shop.”
Joe puffed up a bit as if he were part of the cure. “You are doing better, Jeanie—just great, actually. Another month and I’ll take you two-stepping. Remember when we used to dance in the sixties?”
“I remember. Benjamin was always too tall to be a good dancer, but he’d watch, laughing at us as we tried every dance that came along.”
“Right.” Sunnie fought down a giggle. Even if Gram’s leg healed, Joe and she were still over eighty. She wouldn’t be dancing again in this lifetime.
He slowly stood and leaned over to give Gram a kiss on the cheek. “See you later, Jeanie. I’ve work to get back to and you need time to help Button with her homework.”
“Don’t have any, Joe, it’s Friday.”
Gram patted Joe’s arm. “You coming for dinner later?”
“Not tonight, but I’ll be here tomorrow, same time. I got a meeting to go to. All of a sudden, folks want my advice, like it’s not the same I’ve been giving them for years.”
Sunnie watched him shuffle away. When he closed the front door behind him, she crawled up on Gram’s bed to cuddle. No matter how old she got, Sunnie knew she’d always love being close. Gram smelled of lavender and starch.
“How was school?” Gram patted Sunnie’s cheek, then wiped the bit of black mascara she’d encountered on the sheet.
“The same.”
“Did you break up with that nice boy, Reese?”
“Nope. I thought about it, but he said he’d bring the fixings for tacos and the two of us could cook dinner for everyone tonight. So I decided to keep him around.”
“I’m glad.” Gram sounded sleepy.
“Yeah, he’s all right, I guess.” Sunnie had to admit it. Reese was growing on her. She liked the way he never took touching her for granted. Even if just holding her hand, he’d touch lightly first and pull back as though he was testing a stove to see if it would burn him before he committed.
Sunnie rested her head on Gram’s shoulder. “But I don’t know if I want a nice boy. I kind of want a wild one. Adventure. Excitement. Maybe I’m one of those girls who likes the bad boys.”
Gram squeezed Sunnie’s fingers. “Like that other boy who came by the shop that day. He was good-looking, but the like wore off of him pretty fast.”
“Derrick? No, I promise I’m not going anywhere with him. I think all the adventure and excitement around him was probably in my dreams. He had the look, but nothing else going for him. Kind of like you want your neighbors to be quiet, but not a living-next-to-a-cemetery kind of quiet.”
“I understand. Life is a hand-sewn quilt, Sunnie. Sometimes you got to think about whether you want someone to be a piece of fabric that fits into your life or not. As you sew the strips in, they become a part of what you do, how you think, how you end up. Good or bad, that’s something you can never rip out and remake.”
While Sunnie thought about what Gram said, she watched the old woman drift into sleep. Just before she completely relaxed, her great-grandmother said, “Tell Chloe to put her shoes by the fire if she wants them to get dry.”
Sunnie put her arm around Gram’s thin shoulders and held her close, knowing that she was slipping away a little more each day. Chloe, Gram’s younger sister, had been dead for years. Gram’s mind was time traveling again. With them one minute and in another world the next.
In the silence of the house, they both slept as they had years ago when Gram would keep Sunnie on afternoons when her mother was shopping. As she did all those years ago, Gram hummed in her sleep, as if her dreams came with their very own score.
A few hours later, Sunnie heard a tapping on the kitchen door and slipped from the hospital bed.
Gram slept on as she pulled the blanket over her shoulder and Sunnie noticed she was smiling. Maybe she was dancing in her sleep.
Tiptoeing to the door, Sunnie wasn’t surprised to see Reese waiting, all six feet of him. She swore he was so skinny his folks must stretch him on a rack every night. He was so thin, even skinny jeans wouldn’t look good on him.
“Shhhh. We were sleeping,” she whispered as she let him in.
He nodded and thumped his way into the kitchen. After he set the groceries on the counter, he looked down at her, both eyes finally open. “Sunnie, you think we’re ever gonna sleep together?”
She smiled, thinking of what Gram said about letting people be part of the fabric of your life’s quilt. “I don’t know. Maybe someday, if you want to?”
“No. Not yet. I don’t think I want to get in that race right now, though my body argues with my brain most of the time. Way I see it, if you start early, you play out early. I don’t want to turn thirty and realize I’ve used up all my sex life. What would I do for the next forty or so years?”
“I don’t think it works like that.” She wondered if Reese got his sex education from bathroom walls. “What does your dad say?”
“He says to be careful. In some cases beauty is only a flip of the light switch away, and come dawn, ugly lasts all day long.”
Sunnie had no idea what that meant. “You know, Reese, half the time I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. But if we ever do sleep together, you have to wear pajamas.”
“I don’t wear pajamas now. Do you?”
“Of course. Everyone does, except the people at your house apparently.”
“Why? Just seems like more laundry you’d have to do every week.”
Sunnie didn’t answer. How was it possible to always argue with him over nothing? “Never mind. I don’t even know what we were talking about.”
Reese started pulling ingredients out of the bags. “That makes two of us, but I do know how to make tacos. After we eat, I thought, since it’s Friday night, I’d take you out driving around town. We could stop for a malt.”
“In that junker truck of yours?”
“Yeah.”
“You don’t have a license, remember? I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“I could teach you to drive. You’re old enough to get a license. Then you could drive me around.”
“Not happening. I don’t even want to think about telling Dad we’re in a car alone together.”
He nodded, almost as if he hadn’t expected any other answer. He just started chopping tomatoes, not looking at her.
She couldn’t stand that she always seemed to be turning the guy down. If nothing else, he had “trying” going for him. “How about we watch a movie? I need to stay around here anyway. Dad might be working late tonight. If Joe has a meeting, my dad will probably be there. I don’t think he’s missed any town meeting for fifteen years.”
Reese looked up without a smile. “So...we watch a movie in your room? With the door closed?”
“If we watch the movie in my room, it would have to be with the door open. I’d need to hear Gram or the nurse if they needed me.”
He slowly smiled. “Any chance you’ll start those kissing lessons? I’ve been patiently waiting for a while, you know.”
“No, not tonight. We’ll probably be downstairs tonight watching a movie with Gram and the night nurse. They already invited me to watch Gone With the Wind, and I really want to see it.”
“That’s a movie?”
“Of course it’s a movie. How could you not know about Gone With the Wind?” She caught the hint o
f a smile and knew he was teasing her. “And we’re catching every minute of it. We’re even sitting through the intermission.”
“Will there be popcorn?”
“Sure. The night nurse will insist on it. The last movie she popped a bag for each of us.”
“Then I’m in. No long drive. No making out in the dark. No wild exploring. Just me and you and Gone With the Wind. And the night nurse. And your great-grandmother who keeps calling me Danny. And probably your dad who thinks we’re really in deep conversation when he asks me a math question.” He shrugged as if facing reality. “You’ve got more people watching a movie here than at the Paramount. But it will be dark. Sounds like heaven.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek.
She slapped his shoulder, but he didn’t stop smiling. “I’m growing on you, honey.”
“Don’t bet on it. I’m thinking of breaking up with you if these tacos don’t turn out great.” He didn’t look worried, and she realized that Reese might not be so bad to have around. He put up with her wild moods and seemed to like being tortured. The perfect guy for her.
Her cell rang, and she moved to the hallway to answer. It was Dad telling her he’d be late, but to call him if she needed anything.
“I’m fine,” she answered. “I’ll make sure Gram eats, and Reese is here to help with the dishes. The night nurse should be here at eight to get Gram ready for bed, then Reese is going to stay and watch a movie.”
When she hung up, she realized her father had not mentioned the meeting everyone in town was talking about. The old district was coming alive. She had no idea how involved her father was in the planning stage and didn’t intend on asking.
It didn’t really matter anyway. Her father never did anything interesting. No one over twenty ever did.
28
Connor walked through his dark office, realizing he hadn’t spent any time on this side of town for days. Between Joe setting up equipment and building inspectors telling him all that needed to be done on the warehouses to get them functional, he’d been too busy to write his online paper or spend a few hours writing his stories for weeks.
He tried not to be disappointed that no one in town had mentioned the absence of the online paper. He had to admit he loved all that was going on in the district. It might just be baby steps, but Connor felt like his town was learning to walk, growing, coming alive.
Yet, with all the excitement, when he tumbled into bed every night after midnight, he still couldn’t sleep for thinking of Jillian. They’d had lunch every day, talking about the quilts and the happenings in the district and Gram’s recovery and Joe’s success.
They’d eaten at almost every place in town, and she didn’t seem to mind that he put his arm around her waist when they walked out. They were a couple, something he hadn’t been a part of in years, and he didn’t care if everyone knew it.
Connor and Jillian talked about everything but them. Both ignored the future, as if by doing so, it might never come.
He loved talking other things over with her. Planning what they needed to do next. Dreaming about what the district might look like in a year and how the new factories and stores might bring in enough money to improve the town, and the schools, and the library.
But neither of them ever brought up the question of what would be next with them, or even if there could ever be a them.
He wanted to run away with her. Live out of suitcases. Go where the wind blew them. See the world with her.
He didn’t want to think of what the days would be like without her. How dark his world would be once she was gone.
But with each passing day, there was less time. The county museum was clearing space for the quilt display. When it was finished, she’d be driving out of his life.
He couldn’t hold her back. She’d never lied to him. From the beginning, she’d said she’d leave. She’d told him how she followed her father’s logs, hoping to find pieces of him, or at least a reason why her mother disappeared and he never settled down.
The fire chief, Bob Stevenson, still called her Little Lady, and she’d started calling him Big Chief. They had spent an hour one morning talking about the rodeo thirty years ago. Bob had been a bit younger than her father but he’d never missed a Pioneer Days Rodeo in his life.
The chief had been a volunteer fireman the night her father had been hurt. He described every detail he could remember about wrapping the wound. How it looked. How her father never cried out or said a cussword. He just stood there taking the pain, turning it inward.
Jillian had asked questions, but Stevenson didn’t remember any other people around or anything her father said. “We didn’t have an ambulance then, so I’m guessing one of his buddies or maybe one of the rodeo organizers took him somewhere to get sewn up. I never saw him after that night, but I remember being surprised when one of the oil field workers told me James had gone back to work that following Monday.”
She’d thanked him, then Connor, for helping her find this one thread that linked to her father, but Connor had the feeling it wasn’t enough for her to stay longer.
Reality finally rolled over him like a boulder. He could not leave Laurel Springs. No matter how much his heart wanted to. If Jillian left, she’d leave without him.
So they played a game. Not talking of the ending. Acting like nothing was about to change.
He lived for the good-night kisses when, if only for a moment, she was his and the world stood still.
As he walked across the street, he looked up and saw her staring out at him from the shop’s window. For a moment, before she realized he saw her, he read the heartbreak in her face and knew it was time for the pretending to end. They needed to talk.
He forced a smile and stepped into the shop. “Did you have a good morning?” he asked, almost managing to pull off cheeriness.
She moved out from behind the counter. Both were very much aware that the quilters were in the back, probably listening. “I finished a few more of the quilt stories and talked to the county museum. The curator told me I could start moving them over anytime I was ready. I thought I’d do a few at a time. Setting each one up before bringing more in.”
Connor took a deep breath. “Wait until Gram says she’s ready. I promised I’d bring her in for a few hours next week. If you show her what you’ve done, she’ll see how grand this display is going to be.”
Jillian nodded her understanding. It was Gram’s decision.
He lowered his voice. “I just stopped by to say I can’t go to lunch today. Meeting a crew across the creek. If trucks are going to be moving in over there, the roads should measure up.”
Jillian’s lip came out in a teasing pout. It took all his control not to pull her close and kiss her.
“How about dinner tonight?”
She laughed. “Let me guess? Your house. Two old people. Two teenagers.”
“No. Just you and me. Joe told us to get lost for a while, that he was cooking tonight.”
“Can he cook?”
“Who cares?” Connor laughed. “If not, they can eat one of the dozen frozen casseroles people have delivered. If Gram doesn’t recover soon, I may have to buy another fridge. As for tonight, they’ll manage while we’re getting lost.”
“I’d like that.” Her fingers found his and she whispered, “I miss the feel of your hand.”
He smiled down at her. “I miss the feel of you.” He wasn’t a man who knew how to flirt, and she probably knew it. But he wasn’t sure if she knew just how much he meant what he said.
A few minutes later, when he walked away from the shop, he knew he’d spend the day working his way back to her. There might be budget meetings and contracts to sign and people who wanted to talk to him, but at the end of the day, Jillian would be waiting.
It was almost seven by the time he made it back to Main. The closed sign was on the A Stitch in Time wind
ow, but the office lights were still on. Connor let himself in and moved silently through the shop.
He found Jillian at her laptop in the cluttered little office. “Evening,” he said as he moved into her line of sight.
She smiled. “Evening.”
He didn’t miss the tear she brushed away. “You all right?”
“Yes. I was just reading over all the quilt stories. Happy ones, sad ones. They all weave together to showcase the life of a town.”
He moved to her side. “I figured they would, but I never believed they’d be so rich. This is just a poor town in the middle of Texas. No famous people live here. Nothing ever happened that the world will remember Laurel Springs for.”
“But the quilts tell a rich story.”
He smiled and repeated, “‘But the quilts tell a rich story.’” He took her hand. “Come with me. I’ve got one more story to tell you before it gets dark.”
She followed him out of the store. For once silence rested between them. They had a few hours and neither seemed to want to waste a moment.
He drove outside of town until the buildings of Laurel Springs disappeared. The sun was almost touching the horizon when he turned off onto a gravel road. The first hint of spring showed in wild sunflowers growing near the fence.
“See that line of trees?” He pointed to a windbreak that seemed to run a quarter mile. “My great-granddad planted them when he came here in 1900. Gram told me once that folks used to say he was wild as the West Texas wind. Sunnie must have inherited those genes.”
Connor pulled up to a house built low to the earth with a wide porch running its length. “The first Larady built this house. My grandpa and gram lived here after he died. My father and mother were living here when I was born, then moved to town to run the paper.”