A Sundog Moment

by Sharon Baldacci

  “Of course I would want you to go, too,” Carol said, chagrined. “I thought I made myself clear about that.”

  Mehalia frowned, shook her head helplessly. “Good Lord, child, I can’t afford a trip to New York. With the little pension I get, I still have to clean houses to keep this roof above our heads and food in the cupboard.”

  For the first time, Carol actually took notice of her surroundings. The home was clean and tidy, but worn and tiny, inhabited by people living on the edge of their money. Suddenly she felt ashamed of herself again, for not making things crystal clear. “Mehalia, I’m sorry. I mean you would come as my guest, both of you, of course. My production company would pay all your expenses as well as a monthly stipend—”

  “That’s a monthly paycheck,” deciphered Gordon, wanting Mehalia to understand completely.

  Red with anger at herself, Carol shook her head and wondered where her brain was. “Of course, a monthly paycheck to keep all your bills here paid and to keep you in spending money in New York. I promise you would lack for nothing.”

  Exhausted, Mehalia sat back in the rocker stuffed with pillows she had bought used over the years. All this was coming too fast and furious for her; it was muddling her mind. But the question was, Did she have a choice? No indeed, her grandbaby was out of her reach and control, and Lord God only knew how to bring her back. She wondered if these people really knew what they were getting into, because Serenity had been able to fool her for a long time. The child was so good at changing into whatever personality would be most beneficial to her. The back door slammed shut and they all heard the quick footsteps and the call, “Granny?”

  Carol leaned over to Mehalia. “Say yes.”

  The old lady nodded, passing a hand over her eyes, despair dropping over her as surely as the years had chipped away her own youth.

  Serenity stood in the doorway, suspicion holding her erect and poised for flight. She had seen the car parked out front, the shiny sports car.

  “What are you two doing here?”

  “They want to talk to you, Serenity,” her grandmother began.

  “About what?” Chin up, defiance outlined every muscle as she eyed them both with contrived dignity.

  Carol bit back a smile and stood up, her face and her own manner suddenly changed into a maternal drill sergeant. “About offering you the deal of a lifetime.”

  Serenity snorted, her eyes rolling, and folded her arms across her chest. “Sure. Right.”

  “Serenity, will you please shut up and listen to what she has to say?” Mehalia pleaded, hating the airs her granddaughter wrapped herself in with the unconcern of a queen bee.

  The girl leaned against the doorjam, a sarcastic smile playing over her lips. Her money was hidden in the woods where no one could find it, so these people would not be able to trick her out of it, no way. She wasn’t going to lose anything by listening. “Okay. Shoot.”

  Carol’s words were cool and professional. “I am a writer, and I have an agreement with one of the television networks to start production on a new series I’ve developed. I’ve been looking for a new, fresh talent and I think that maybe—just maybe—I’ve found what I’m looking for in you.”

  Serenity ducked her head to hide her surprise, but Carol was much too observant not to see. “I want you and your grandmother to come to New York for an extended stay, at my expense.”

  Serenity couldn’t hide the triumphant gleam in those beautiful eyes, but Carol wasn’t going to let her think it was that easy. Oh, this brat was going to have to want it so much and then work her tail off for it.

  “The first thing we have to do is film you. Frankly, if the camera doesn’t love you, if you don’t photograph well, we can just forget it, and I’ll bring you back here and we can forget the whole thing ever happened.” She watched with perverse satisfaction as the girl’s face paled.

  “I think—I hope—that won’t happen. And for the record, I did not like what you did to my cousin,” she said sternly, “but I was impressed with the way you did it. You may have a natural acting ability. I’ll have to get you under the tutelage of one of the best acting coaches I know, and let me tell you, it will be rigorous and unrelenting training. Think boot camp, and you might get a faint picture of what your life will be like.”

  “What’s that word, tootlidge, mean?” Mehalia whispered to Gordon.

  He whispered back, “Teaching—you know, tutoring.”

  He smiled as she shook her head, murmuring, “Why can’t she say what she means using words people know?”

  He covered her hand and gave it a soft squeeze. “I wish I knew.”

  By the time Carol had finished talking, Serenity was sitting cross-legged on the floor, a nervousness starting to jitter inside her that she was trying hard not to show. She almost succeeded but it showed in the way she chewed her lower lip.

  “What do you think, Granny? What should I do?” Serenity was seeing a bright dream suddenly placed on a silver platter in front of her. What girl hadn’t thought of going to New York and becoming a big star? But now that this had been presented to her, she was terrified. What if she got there and couldn’t open her mouth to speak? What if she stunk? What if she was so awful they had to come back home? Then she and everyone else would know she was a . . . failure.

  Serenity pressed a hand over her racing heart and realized she was trembling.

  “What do you want me to do?” Those beautiful eyes were unguarded and, for once, as young as their handful of years.

  Mehalia looked deep into her granddaughter’s soul and could have cried at the alarm she saw there. The child was scared, which was a good thing. Fear could make you humble as long as it wasn’t the dangerous kind.

  She slipped her hand over Serenity’s and felt the child clutch hers for support. Suddenly, in that instant, Mehalia was the grandmother, the rock in the swirl of change, and her words would carry the authority this child needed.

  “We’ll try it together, child. Together, we’ll see.”

  The next day, just as visiting hours began, Adrienne motored into the hospital, picking up some water bottles in advance for Carl. She turned a corner heading toward his room and nearly collided with a nurse.

  “Oh, Mrs. Moore!” Marianne was startled. “What are you doing here?”

  “Why, I’ve come to see Carl Sanders. I told him yesterday I would.”

  Adrienne watched the girl’s face flush red. “But, but . . . Mrs. Moore, I don’t know how to tell you this, but Mr. Sanders died last night.”

  Adrienne blinked. Died? Stunned, she looked at the girl again, shock momentarily sweeping speech away.

  She finally found her voice. “What happened?”

  Marianne shook her head and shrugged. “We don’t know, but the doctor thinks his heart might have given out. You know he was in a great deal of pain. It’s not unusual, and we were having a real hard time medicating him.”

  “Yes, I recall.” Adrienne shuddered, thinking they had hardly done anything at all until the doctor authorized that last shot.

  “Will there be an autopsy?”

  The girl grimaced. “I don’t think so. Ma’am, excuse me, but the doctor’s waiting on these papers.”

  And then she was gone, leaving Adrienne to wonder what she should do next. Carl dead? Its very newness made it unbelievable. She had just seen him yesterday. Less then twenty-four hours ago.

  Sighing, she turned the cart around and slowly made her way back the same way she had come. Thoughts flickered like lit candles—would there be a funeral? A memorial service? She knew he didn’t have any family, but what about friends? She wondered what Ian would say and the rest of the support group. Carl’s personality was sometimes as grating as sandpaper, but she liked him, and they all had gotten used to his sharp edges. Pain could do that. Still, she had enjoyed conversations with him. Pain had not erased his wonderful memory and he was able to pull out quotes of philosophers, even at times Scripture, to defend his disbelief.

&nb
sp; She was near the front desk before it suddenly dawned on her that she and the others were his friends. She turned the scooter around and headed back to find out whom she needed to talk with about arranging a funeral.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  The Northern Neck Neuromuscular Support Group met for its April meeting. Wearing a low hat and dark eyeglasses, Elizabeth arrived just as the meeting started. When she ducked into the room, her face blazed scarlet as spontaneous applause erupted from her friends gathered there. She froze, the door half open, uncertain what to do.

  She had hoped to slip inside unnoticed, but as soon as she pushed the door open, Claude Nolan motored up to escort her to a seat of honor next to Adrienne, who was grinning from ear to ear. Elizabeth had just talked to her friend yesterday, and there had been no mention of any such activities. As a matter of fact, Adrienne had known explicitly about Elizabeth’s wish to be as private and anonymous as possible.

  Elizabeth glared at her friend, whose grin only widened. Rat, Elizabeth mouthed and then glanced down at a sheet cake in front of her that was frosted with red, white, and blue icing and held the inscription: Thank you, Elizabeth! When the going gets tough, so do you!

  She couldn’t help grinning. They saw it and applauded again. She waved them off. “Stop!” She laughed. “You are being so foolish!”

  “No, we are not,” declared Adrienne, clapping her own hands even harder.

  Everyone nodded and applauded for a long time before they finally quieted down.

  “We are really sorry you ended up being the fall guy for the experiment,” insisted Albert Stoddart.

  “Indeed we are,” Claude Nolan said. “Do you know what’s going to happen, what you’re going to do?”

  Nicole Anderson, quietly sitting at the other end, shuddered slightly at how close she had come to being involved in this. She was sorry Elizabeth had been caught, but so extremely thankful her children would never know. Relaxing enough for a smile to slip on her face, she hoped Elizabeth wouldn’t have any repercussions healthwise from all this stress. It was good to see her.

  “Yes, I know what I’m going to do,” Elizabeth said firmly. “I’m taking the coward’s way out—”

  “She is not!” Adrienne interrupted just as firmly. “She’s doing the most intelligent thing she can do.”

  The two women smiled at each other, and Elizabeth waved a hand toward Adrienne. “She’s my legal adviser. Maybe you should just ask her.”

  “What I want to know is, how I can get me some more?” Pearl’s face was determined. “Can’t you give me the number of that little girl who was getting it for us?”

  “Why, Pearl, was it doing that much good for you?” Adrienne asked, surprised. Frankly, she could see nothing different about the woman at all.

  “Made me feel better,” asserted Pearl, “and that’s a long shot better than my doctors can do.”

  “Is that really enough, just feeling better? I mean, you could get caught, just like I did, Pearl,” Elizabeth said, concerned.

  “It don’t matter to me if I do. I liked the stuff; I liked the way it made me feel. I didn’t half listen to the old man after I smoked it.”

  Adrienne thought Pearl had a lot more issues to deal with that couldn’t be smoked away. For once she was pleased to realize she couldn’t help on this one.

  “I believe that source, that young girl who helped us, is no longer living in the area,” Adrienne began, looking toward Elizabeth, who immediately nodded.

  “That’s right. She and her grandmother are in New York City for . . . an extended period of time. I have no idea when they’ll be back.”

  Pearl wasn’t going to give up. “Do you have her phone number? Maybe I could call her and ask her where she got it from, then I could just go . . .” Flummoxed, her voice trailed off as all the shaking heads were unanimous. She didn’t care a hoot for what anyone thought, but still . . . It didn’t look like she was going to get any help at all. She kept a frown fixed on her face for the rest of the meeting, thinking hard about any other source she could investigate. Who knows, if Sandra Little could get it from her neighbor, maybe it would be a good time to go visit and check out who lived next door. She started making plans in her head while the rest of the group discovered what Elizabeth’s plans really were.

  “I think you are doing the best thing”—Albert Stoddart nodded—“absolutely.”

  Everyone else also concurred with Elizabeth’s suggestion for the end of the year meeting in May. “I think a picnic would be nice, perhaps at the new state park near Lively,” she suggested.

  “Let’s all bring something to eat. Here, I’ll send a sheet of paper around. Write down what you can bring and I’ll supply the drinks,” Adrienne offered.

  She listened to the chatter as she sat back in her chair and wondered for the umpteenth time whether she should share what else was in the letter that Carl’s nephew had sent. She had received it earlier in the week and had been carrying that secret around like a bruise that wouldn’t heal.

  On Uncle Carl’s desk was a letter almost finished, written “To whom it may concern” . . . It was an explanation of what he hoped would happen in the hospital. “I just didn’t want to die alone,” he wrote over and over in capital letters . . .

  I don’t want to die alone. Those words chilled Adrienne as she kept replaying those last few moments they had been together. Carl had asked her to stay until he fell asleep and she had done so willingly, glad to be able to do anything for this poor man who was in so much pain. Had he taken something more than a sleeping pill?

  If so, she was partly responsible for his death, which was devastating. It meant she had been instrumental in his death. She had to keep reminding herself again and again that guilt over which you can do nothing is masochistic; it kept haunting her.

  At the same time she was glad he was out of pain, but . . . Ian had chided her again last night not to dwell on this. “It’s like a dog chasing its tail—you’ll keep going around and around in circles, and you’ll only make yourself sick about it.”

  He also thought this should not be made public. “Will it do anyone any good, Adrienne? I can’t think of how it would, so let’s just keep this quiet. Just be glad the poor man is no longer in pain.”

  She heard a shriek of laughter at the other end of the table as Albert had just finished telling an Irish joke. She had been too distracted to hear any of it.

  Shaking off all the bad feelings for once and for all, she asked him to repeat it, apologizing for her inattention. He immediately donned an Irish brogue again, enjoying the retelling as much as the first time.

  “Well, listen up, then,” Albert said, his voice lilting with an Irish cadence. “It seems there was this Irishman who was at the bar drinking late one night. Finally the bartender said no more and began closing up. So the man got up and turned to walk away and fell flat on his face. ‘Oh, well, I’ve had a mite too many, I’ll just crawl outside and get a breath of air,’ he said. He did so and pulled himself up, breathing in the cool chill air. He turned to walk and fell flat on his face. Not to be deterred, he crawled to his house and pulled himself inside. Thinking surely he must be a little bit more sober now, he stood up to walk into the bedroom only to fall flat on his face once again. Well, blast it to the devil himself, the man thought. And he crawled into his bedroom where he stood up one last time, and then fell flat onto his bed and went fast asleep.

  “Well, the next morning his missus was standing over him, face like a thundercloud, arms crossed in anger, and she bellowed out, ‘So, you were at the bar drinking again last night, were ya?’

  “‘What makes you say that?’ the man asked quickly, unwilling to fess up.

  “‘The bartender called,’ his missus roared. ‘You left your wheelchair there again.’”

  Adrienne laughed until tears started streaming, thinking Carl would find this just as funny, and she hoped—somehow—he was listening.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Kellan
drove the now familiar path to Fredericksburg, her spirits floating and bubbling, so wrapped in romance. Life had taken on an opulent grandeur since she had discovered and donned the fabric of love. It was too magical and wondrous, and at the same time she knew these words were corny and nonsensical, but she didn’t care. She was in love and was loved, and there was simply no help for it.

  God, she was happy!

  Had it been a mere two months since Gregory Jamison had enveloped her life? How had she lived before without knowing him? The simple truth was she had not. She had merely been skimming a surface that had no depth, no layers—until now.

  The humming that started in both of them the moment they met swelled into something so rich and wonderful words did not exist to describe it. It was a new discovery, mystical and magical, that belonged only to them.

  There were dim memories of past relationships that paled quickly because they were so inconsequential. All those relationships had started the same way; bright little moments that sputtered and ended for a lack of something crucial.

  Now she understood what had been lacking.

  Love. Trust. These two powerful energies between her and Gregory melded to create a bond so valuable, so enduring, it took her breath away. She was still using the guest bedroom, and there was that invisible line he would not cross as he had done with Melanie, but there were no doubts that the future would belong to them. She knew hers was the only heart in the world right for this man. And she knew he felt the same way.

  This afternoon she was on a quest he didn’t know about. She was supposed to be at his town house tonight for dinner, but she had come to Fredericksburg this morning. It was Friday, and she had been able to shift things around to free up some hours.

  She intended to check out Mary Washington College, an old and well-respected school of higher learning just minutes away from where he lived.