Love Finds You in Sisters, Oregon

by Melody Carlson

  “And maybe she’d start acting more normal.”

  “I think she would.”

  “Will you tell her to get help, Aunt Hope?” he pleaded. “Because even though I said all that stuff about her being neurotic and nuts…I do love her. I mean…she’s my mom.”

  “And she loves you—more than you’ll ever know. She told me that you were all she had. Can you imagine how bad she’d be hurting to lose both you and your dad?”

  He just shrugged.

  “Not that I’m trying to pressure you to stay here in Sisters,” she assured him. “I totally respect your choice in this. And it’s a lot to ask anyone to leave their home and friends and everything.”

  “I don’t have all that many friends at my old school.” He looked surprised that he’d said this. “But don’t tell Mom.”

  “No, I won’t. Still, there’s your dad and your home and what’s familiar to you.”

  “Don’t tell Mom this either, okay?”

  She held up her hand as if to pledge.

  “Well, I was kinda open to the idea of a fresh start here. But not if my mom’s going to be all weird and crazy on me. I cannot handle that. But, if she got help, you know, like we were talking about…well, then I might consider moving here.”

  “I think I understand.”

  “But no way am I going to tell Mom that.”

  “And if your mom thinks you don’t want to be here…” Hope was thinking out loud now. “Well, maybe you could use that as a bargaining chip, you know, to get her in to see a counselor.”

  “But she won’t listen to me. She keeps telling me I’m just a kid and that I don’t have a vote.”

  “You do have a vote, Monroe. And in cases of joint custody, like your parents have with you, the judge usually takes the teen’s wishes into consideration.”

  “Meaning I can live where I want?”

  “Sort of. It’s not quite that simple.”

  He let out a relieved sigh and leaned back. “Man, I think I’m stuffed.”

  She nodded. “Me, too.”

  “You don’t seem like a mom.”

  She laughed. “Maybe because I’m not a mom.”

  “I mean like Cherry and my mom. They talk down to us kids, like they think they’re so much smarter. But you talk to me like we’re the same.”

  “We are the same, Monroe. It’s just that I’ve got a few more years on you.”

  “Would you talk to my mom for me?” His brows arched hopefully.

  “I’ll talk to her, but you’ll have to talk to her, too.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “And you have to promise me you won’t go running off like you did either.”

  “If it makes you feel any better, it wasn’t much fun. Maybe a little at first. But all those guys up there just want to be drunk all the time. What’s the fun in that?”

  “Nothing that I can see.”

  “But I did make a friend and he’s not into the drinking thing either. He’s the same age as I am, and his folks are divorced, too. His name is Alex, and he plays the guitar. He told me that Sisters has a really cool art and music program.”

  “That’s great, Monroe.”

  “But don’t tell my mom, okay? I don’t want her thinking she’s going to get her way without getting some help first.”

  “You have my word.”

  “And just for the record—without telling Mom—I can’t stand my dad’s lady friend, and that’s enough to make me want to live in Sisters.” He grinned. “And it’d be nice having an aunt around, too. Someone who’s easy to talk to.”

  “And it would be nice for me, too. I’ve missed being around family.”

  They left the restaurant, and Hope dropped Monroe back at her house to “hang” while she went to talk to Faye. She wasn’t sure that she’d be able to convince her opinionated sister about much of anything, but for Monroe’s sake, she’d try. And it wouldn’t be easy, but she would allow Monroe client-confidant privilege by not disclosing any of his secrets.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Honestly, Hope, I’d like to know what makes you think you’re such an expert on parenting.” Faye was pacing back and forth in Jody’s living room now, where they’d gone to talk privately. Or sort of.

  “I’m not an expert. I’m just telling you what I think is going on. You are hurting, Faye. Everyone around you can see it. And until you get healthy, it’s going to be difficult for anyone—including your own son—to be around you.”

  “Did he say that?”

  Hope shook her head. “This isn’t about what Monroe did or did not say, Faye. It’s about you. You are suffering because Jeff hurt you. As a result you’re lashing out at everyone—including me—in an effort to feel better.”

  Faye sat back down on the sofa again, folding her arms across her front and scowling darkly.

  “But is it working?”

  “What?”

  “The way you’re hurting others, pushing them away, saying mean things…is it making you feel any better?”

  “What do you know about how I feel, Hope? You go about your carefree little life, doing just as you please, wearing your fancy clothes, inheriting money you don’t deserve, coming between your sister and her child. You don’t live in my world—you don’t know what it’s like…so don’t tell me how to live my life. And if you don’t bring my son home immediately, I will call the sheriff and have him picked up.” Then Faye stood and marched back into the room where she was staying.

  Hope didn’t know what to do, but as she was leaving, Faye’s old friend Jody appeared from out of the shadows and followed Hope out. Hopefully not to continue Faye’s tongue-lashing, although Hope knew these two friends were thick and went way back.

  “Just so you know,” Jody said quietly, “I agree with everything you said.”

  Hope turned and looked at her. “Really?”

  Jody nodded. “I’ve tried to say the same—well, maybe not as well as you just did—but she won’t listen.” Jody pointed to her own chest. “And I am a parent. I have an eighteen- and a nineteen-year-old—probably had them too soon. Aaron and I were barely out of high school, and I don’t recommend it. But I do know a little what I’m talking about, and the way Faye is handling Monroe…” She shook her head. “Well, it’s no wonder that kid took off like that. I wouldn’t have been a bit surprised if he’d hitched all the way back to Seattle.”

  “Well, maybe you can talk to her.”

  “And that bit about calling the sheriff?” Jody rolled her eyes. “She wouldn’t even call the sheriff when Monroe was missing. I had to do that.”

  “Good to know.”

  “I better get back inside before Faye comes out here and lays into me. She’s been a real loose cannon.”

  “I’ll try to get Monroe to come back to her, but I won’t promise anything.”

  “That poor kid might be better off with his dad…at least until Faye gets her act together.”

  Hope thanked Jody then drove back home. She had no idea how to handle this but decided she would let Monroe call the shots. If he wanted to go home to his dad, and if his dad was willing to have him, Hope would put him on a plane. If he wanted to stick around here, Hope would try to help him do that. Because right now both Monroe and Faye were hurting almost equally, but the difference between the two was that Monroe wanted help.

  Hope went into the house and told Monroe how it had gone with his mother. Without telling him everything, she was honest. “So, I’ve decided,” she said finally, “that I’ll back you in whatever you choose to do. Well, unless it’s something dumb like running away.”

  Monroe looked confused now.

  “If you want to go back with your dad, I’ll get you a plane ticket. If you want to go back with your mom, I’ll drive you over. If you want to stay here—although it’s going to be a construction zone, you’re more than welcome.”

  “I’d like to stay here then.” He made a weak smile. “Until I figure it out.”

  “That’s fine.”

/>   “And I can help work on Nona’s house, too.”

  “Sure, if you want to. That’d be great.”

  “Do you think they’d let me help tear something out?” He looked hopeful.

  She laughed. “I’m sure they’d be happy to let you sling a hammer. I’ll let Brian know that you’re going to help.”

  And so, by the time Avery and Lucy arrived, wearing their shopping clothes, Monroe was wielding a hammer and a metal bar and he was tearing the tiles out of the bathroom. “Have fun,” Hope called out as she left.

  “I like your car,” Lucy told Hope as they drove to Bend. “It’s cool.”

  “It was my great-grandma’s,” Avery told her. “But she hardly ever drove it.”

  “And I’m getting so used to it, I don’t know if I’ll want to bring my city car back here or not,” Hope admitted.

  When they got to Target, Hope started to park, but Avery suggested that she just drop them off at the door. “That way you can go look at appliances while we try on swimsuits. Lowes and Home Depot are both right over there.” Avery pointed across the parking lot.

  Hope wasn’t so sure. “Don’t you think I should go in with you?”

  “No, that’s okay,” Avery assured her. “As long as we stay together, it’s all right. Mom does it all the time.”

  “Are you certain?”

  “It’s true,” Lucy backed her up. “My mom does it, too. As long as we stay in one store and stay together, it’s fine.”

  “And we all have our cell phones,” Avery reminded her.

  “If you’re positive.” Hope reached for her purse and extracted the amount of money that she’d planned to pay Avery.

  “Totally.” Avery’s eyes lit up as Hope handed her the cash. “Wow, this much?”

  “I’ve been keeping track of your hours; you’ve earned it.”

  “Thanks, Aunt Hope.” She put the cash in her purse then carefully zipped it.

  Hope looked at her watch. “It’s close to noon now. How about if I pick you up at one?”

  “How about one thirty?” suggested Lucy. “It can take a long time to find the right suit because you can only take six items in at a time.”

  That actually made sense. “Okay. One thirty. I’ll come inside and look for you in the lobby, okay?”

  “Okay!” Avery waved and the two girls went into the store.

  Hope felt a little guilty, but then she remembered how she used to run all over town by herself at their age. And then, once she was looking at appliances, she put the two girls out of mind. But she did pay attention to the time. At first anyway.

  “Wow, I never worked with a woman who could make up her mind so fast,” the young sales guy told her.

  “Well, I have my measurements, I know what I want, and I want to keep it simple. Just basic white appliances. No big deal.” It was only twelve thirty by the time she’d opened an account, which saved her ten percent, and her appliances were paid for and the delivery arranged. Then, seeing a huge selection of colors, she decided to pick up paint samples for the interior of the house. But once a friendly woman started helping her, she quickly nailed down the colors. The woman figured out the amounts and talked her into low-VOS paint and soon began mixing. While she waited, Hope noticed the lighting section and wondered if it might be fun to switch out some of the lights in Nona’s house.

  But by the time she’d decided on several lights, picked up her paint, and was waiting with her oversized cart in the checkout line, she realized it was already one thirty. The girls would be done and waiting for her. And by the time she was driving back to Target, she was a full fifteen minutes late, and her blood pressure was rising as she imagined those two darling eleven-year-old girls being swooped up by a stranger! Really, what had she been thinking? Why had she left them there alone? What would Cherry say? Or Lucy’s mother? Really, what made Hope think she knew how to do this? What if she’d made a horrible mistake?

  But to her great relief, the girls had just finished shopping and actually thought they were the ones who had been late. She didn’t even bother to straighten them out. Instead, she offered them lunch. Then, after eating at a Mexican restaurant, the three of them stayed together and looked in a few more shops. Hope was amazed at how much Bend had grown and changed. And, according to the girls, this was just one of the new shopping complexes.

  Then, as they pulled into Sisters and Hope was looking forward to being home and putting her feet up, she remembered that Nona’s house would no longer look like a home. During her absence, the little house had become a construction site, complete with a bright blue Porta-potty now planted on the front lawn. But at least the trucks were gone and it seemed quiet inside.

  Avery and Lucy thanked her for taking them to Bend and to lunch, and then Hope went into the house to begin estimating the damages. Or progress, depending on how one looked at it. The kitchen looked sad and barren. It had been completely gutted. All the carpeting and linoleum were now gone, exposing old wooden floorboards with cracks between them where it looked like spiders and bugs could easily crawl in.

  “Monroe?” she called, knocking on his door then opening it to see only the bed in his room, pushed up against a wall, probably to tear out the carpeting.

  She checked her room to see that its carpet had also been taken out, and her bed, now shoved in a corner, looked forlorn and lonely. But the biggest surprise was probably the bathroom. It, too, had been gutted. No shower. No sink. No toilet. Only the claw-foot bathtub remained. Thankfully no one had taken a sledgehammer to that. She tried the faucet and was surprised to see it still worked. So now she had running water (in the tub) and a toilet (in the front yard). Luxurious.

  She went outside and called for Monroe, but he didn’t appear to be anywhere, and she wondered if he’d gone home to Faye. Or perhaps he’d gone somewhere with Brian. She was tempted to call Faye and check but knew how that could go. If Monroe wasn’t with his mom, Faye would blame Hope and wonder if he’d run off again. And if he was with his mom, well, that would be Monroe’s choice and he would have to deal with it.

  And so, feeling exhausted, Hope kicked off her shoes and took a nap. But when she awoke, she could smell something terrible. It seemed to be coming from the bathroom, and when she went in, she saw a lot of nasty greenish water on the floor. Alarmed, she called Brian but only got voicemail. So she went outside to get some fresh air. As she pacing the yard wondering what to do, Drew pulled up and waved.

  She waved back, smiling feebly.

  “Nice little toilet facilities you got there,” he teased.

  “I’m having some work done.”

  “Everything okay?” His face was shadowed by his cowboy hat as he stood on his side of the yard, but the concern in his voice sounded genuine.

  She just held up her hands in a hopeless way. “No…not really.”

  “What’s wrong?” He was walking toward her now. Big, tall cowboy strides, like he was starring in some old western movie, going to come over to help the little lady and make everything all right. She almost laughed.

  “Well, they’re tearing everything out to replace things in there.” She nodded to the house. “Which maybe wasn’t such a great idea. So anyway, now the bathroom has this horrible smell and—” Hope stopped talking as a whole new horrible realization hit her. “Andy!” she cried.

  “Andy’s made a bad smell in the bathroom?” Drew looked puzzled.

  “No!” She looked around the yard, horrified. “Andy—I’ve lost Andy.”

  “Oh, well, that’s not the end of the world.”

  “But it is!”

  “So what’s the deal with your bathroom?”

  “It’s got a problem,” she yelled as she ran around to the backyard, calling for Andy. Then she looked at his bed on the porch, calling and calling for him. Oh, how could she have lost Andy? Dear sweet little Andy. The one precious thing Nona had so wanted Hope to take care of—and not only had she lost him, but she’d totally forgotten about him, too. Hope felt
sick—truly sick.

  She was walking up and down the sidewalk, literally wringing her hands and still calling for him and thinking the worst, when suddenly Avery popped her head out the front door. “You looking for Andy?”

  “Yes!” Hope cried. “Have you seen him?”

  “He and Monroe are in the backyard right now.”

  Hope let out a cry of relief. “Thank God!”

  “You want me to tell them to go home?”

  “Not unless they want to. It’s kind of a wreck over here.”

  “Okay.”

  “Thanks, Avery!”

  Hope hurried back to her house to find Drew pounding on something in the bathroom. She thought about offering to help but then realized that room was too small for two people. Plus it stank. After about twenty minutes she heard the water running in the tub. Hopefully he wasn’t taking a bath. And then he emerged with dripping hands. “I think that should take care of it. Just a cap had popped off. You got a towel anywhere?”

  She removed his cowboy hat from where it was hanging on the door handle and reached into the linen closet then handed him a towel. “Thanks so much,” she told him. “And I found Andy, too.”

  He kind of frowned. “Well, I’m not sure that’s such good news.”

  “It is to me. And it turned out he’s at your house.”

  He looked alarmed. “Does Cherry know about this?”

  She shrugged. “Avery said Monroe brought him over. They’re in the backyard.”

  “Oh, well, as long as he’s not in the house, Cherry shouldn’t care.” He handed the damp towel to her in exchange for his hat. “So Monroe made it back then?”

  She nodded. “He spent last night here.”

  “Does Faye know about this?”

  “Of course.”

  “Oh, good.” He slowly put on his hat, kind of shaking his head, as if trying to grasp something. “You three sisters…”

  “What?”

  “It just boggles my mind.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean how three women couldn’t be more different if they tried. I actually find it hard to believe you’re all related.” He made a funny face. “You sure your mom didn’t have more than just one husband?”