Grady pulled up on the grass in the front yard and Hannah did the same as there were already two vehicles parked in the space along the side of the house where her parents used to park, closer to the back entrance. Tonight she was a guest being received at the front door.
Her fingers shook when she reached for the keys in the ignition. She grabbed that hand with her other and held them in her lap for a second, taking a deep bracing breath. She might have taken several more—and hyperventilated—if she hadn’t glanced up through the windshield to see Grady waiting for her. He winked and flashed his dimples at her. He had her back.
Right. She turned the engine off and pulled the keys out.
“. . . and I’ve been on pins and needles all day. I can’t believe it,” Mrs. Steadman was saying when Hannah opened the car door. “All this time and you’re back. Look at you, all grown up. And so beautiful. You always were such a pretty girl and now look at you . . .”
Mrs. Steadman taught freshman algebra at the high school and talked faster than a speeding bullet. Blessed with this knowledge she repeatedly invited her students to ask her to slow down if they needed her to, but neglected the offer during her less complicated social discourses—which tended to run on. She was very kind, Hannah recalled, from the few times she’d gone to her after class for extra help. And trustworthy . . . if she’d never told Grady about the night before she left town.
She dressed in the same skirt, blouse, and cardigan sweater–a style she’d favored years ago—perhaps a size or two larger—in a tasteful shade of dark plum, not black. Time had taken its toll gently on her face; her curly cap of dark brown hair had turned to white, but the generous smile remained the same.
“A grown woman. My stars, it’s like a miracle that you’ve returned to us.”
Hannah stood beside the open car door as Mrs. Steadman reached her, then reached for her, pinning her arms to her sides in a smothering hug. Bending her arms at the elbows—for balance mostly—Hannah patted the woman’s hips in greeting.
“Hi, Mrs. Steadman. It’s good to see you, too.”
“Let her get out of the car first, Mom.”
“Oh. Yes. Of course.” She captured Hannah’s face in her hands. There were tears in the hazel eyes behind the thin pink plastic-rimmed glasses. “It’s you, isn’t it? I can’t believe it.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I’m so glad to see you safe, dear.” She searched Hannah’s face thoroughly, and when she was satisfied that all was as it should be, she lowered her hands. “Now, where are your things? In the trunk? Grady. Get her things, dear, and bring them into the house. Let’s get you in out of this cold. March is always so unpredictable. Last Wednesday the children went to school without coats. Can you believe it? How was . . .”
Grady circled them, stopped beside Hannah with his hand out for the keys. She looked up, met the merriment in his eyes. Obviously she looked as uncomfortable as she felt and this wasn’t the part where he would come to her rescue. She was on her own with his mother.
But before she could glare at him, the screen door squeaked, drawing their attention to the porch.
A stocky young man dressed all in black—jeans, T-shirt, and boots—and silver—chains, rings, earrings, and eyebrow stud—stepped to the edge of the porch. He tilted his head—and the jet black shag of hair thereon—to one side and stared down at them.
Someone gasped, soft and incredulous. Hannah could feel herself staring. My God. A Goth in Clearfield. Some things had changed—a lot.
“How was your trip?” Mrs. Steadman drew a second breath. “You must be tired. Oh, here they are now. They’ve been so busy. The children are very excited, you know. They worked like troopers today, getting things ready. They’re eager to meet you and they’ve been asking questions for two days solid. Since Grady told us you were coming, and . . .”
“Careful,” Grady whispered. He had to reach in front of her to get the keys still dangling from her right hand while she remained rapt by the boy in black. “He’s a visiting dignitary. This is a test, and you are the United Nations.”
The nylon of his jacket grazed the wool of hers; his shoulder blocked her view all too briefly. The impulse to hide her face against his chest until this whole nightmare ended was almost more than she could bear.
She turned to look at him, hoping for more of an explanation, but he’d turned to the rear of her car. She started to follow but the screen door opened again—for a girl wearing what Hannah could only describe as fairy-clown clothes.
Starting from the bottom up, she had on black high-topped army-type boots with thick red tights or leggings, a yellow floral-print silk or nylon skirt with multiple handkerchief hems, and a purple cable-knit sweater. She didn’t appear to be pierced anywhere but her earlobes, and her hair was short and straight . . . and pink and orange, if the yellow bug light on the porch wasn’t affecting it.
Following her, a relatively bland couple: a tall, lean youth in jeans and a Clearfield High School hoodie with short, soft brown curls and Grady’s mouth set mutinous and grim on his face. The girl wore jeans as well, with a yellow-and-white striped V-neck T-shirt and red tennis shoes. She had thick, long wavy blond hair, like her mother—and an oval-shaped face with a straight narrow nose set between Hannah’s eyes, and a wide, full mouth. She was disarmingly pretty.
“Of course, we didn’t know what all to tell them about you, we’ve been out of touch for so long. In . . . in fact, some people thought you were dead, dear. At first . . . But we’ll get caught up in no time, you’ll see. Come down everyone, don’t be shy now. Hannah’s come a long way to meet you.”
“Come help me here,” Grady called out with his head in the trunk.
The boy in black skipped down the steps, loped toward them, chains clinking, loose and graceful despite his size. The girls followed at a slower pace. The other boy remained on the porch, leaning against a support post, his arms folded defensively across his chest. Did that mean he didn’t want to meet her?
Already she could feel the young people communicating in a language she didn’t understand—and they had yet to speak. Or was she overreacting again? It made perfect sense that they would understand one another’s moods and nuances better than she did. One step at a time, Hannah.
Grady hung the strap of her garment bag on the boy’s shoulder and gave him her small tote bag and briefcase, going back for the larger, heavier suitcase himself. He pulled it out of the truck like she’d packed two weeks of feathers and set it on the ground. By the time he’d tapped the lid of the trunk down, the girls had joined them on the dry brown lawn.
“Hannah, let me introduce you to everyone,” he said. She pulled her gaze from her niece’s face and looked at Grady. He picked up her bag and motioned with his head to the Goth. “That’s Biscuit.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake,” Grady’s mother interrupted. “That’s Bobby Walker. I don’t know why you people insist on calling him Biscuit.”
“We told you, Gramma,” the fairy-clown said, even as she watched Hannah like a carnival attraction. “His head’s shaped like a biscuit.”
“Why, it is not. His head’s shaped like a . . . ah . . . the business end of a dust mop today.”
“Not his hair, his head . . .”
And while the two debated the shape of Bobby Walker’s head, he smiled at Hannah and said, “My mom calls me Sweetie-pie and my dad calls me Mr. Lippy.”
There was a warm, intelligent look about his eyes that led Hannah to believe his mother understood him best.
“What would you like me to call you?”
“Biscuit is okay.”
“Just don’t call him to dinner,” Grady said. “He’ll eat your cupboards bare.”
“Man, Sheriff, do you have to spoil all my fun?”
“It’s my job, son.” He walked by them to stand near the girls. “This is my little Lucy.”
“Dad.” The girl with the pink and orange hair had his eyes . . . and gave them a practiced roll.
>
“Colorful, don’t you think?” He nodded his head at her as if he was indeed pleased with her creativity. She didn’t seem to be embarrassed by the introduction. Or maybe she was simply too busy checking Hannah out to notice.
The boy, Biscuit, looked interested in her quietly elegant Volvo—one of the top three safest cars in the world, the insurance agent in her was always willing to point out . . . just not today.
“Hi, Lucy, it’s nice to meet you.”
“Hello.” Her smile polite, but cautious.
“My son, Calvin.” Grady motioned with the suitcase to the boy on the porch.
“Named after my husband, you know,” his mother injected. “He passed, too, while you’ve been away.”
“I’m sorry to hear it, Mrs. Steadman.” She waited a moment, then called, “Hi, Calvin.”
He gave her a short nod as his sister said, “Cal, unless you’re mad at him.” She slid a disapproving glance at her father, which he ignored.
So it was Grady’s fault the boy stayed on the porch—the relief amazed her.
“And this stunner is your niece.” He put his free hand on the girl’s shoulder and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “Anna, this is your Aunt Hannah.”
Their tentative, hello-stranger smiles were all but identical. Never much of a hugger, Hannah made a supreme effort and stepped forward with both arms out for a hug—at the same time the girl stepped up with her hand held out for a friendly shake. Hannah lowered her left arm for the shake as Anna brought hers up for the hug. They laughed, as awkward as the moment.
Hannah held out her right hand again. “How about we start with this and work our way up.”
Anna took her hand and smiled, relief in her eyes. Hannah could look straight into them. They were the same height. Grady said she was small and blond like Ruth, didn’t he? But she wasn’t as small as she was thin. Eating-disorder-thin came first to mind, but the smooth lean muscles of her thighs under the denim and in her arms, and a respectable bustline, dispelled the idea. She was simply tall and young and mostly muscle.
“That’s one thing I never made you kids do . . . hug strange relatives.” Mrs. Steadman motioned everyone back toward the house with her arms. “When your Aunt Kathy, my own sister, came to visit I didn’t force you to hug her, because she came so rarely I knew she was like a stranger to you, though she’d been here years before and we talked about her all the time. You were always more comfortable meeting strange relatives when you knew you weren’t going to have to hug them . . .”
With the Steadmans leading the way to the house, Hannah leaned toward her niece and murmured in a low voice, “Just so you know, I’m not a strange relative. I’m a relative who’s been a stran-ger.”
Anna’s shy smile widened and her eyes lit with amusement for a second or two.
“Besides, there were always hugs all around by the time Aunt Kathy had to leave. It never failed. There’s a reason why people say that blood’s thicker than water and that’s because it’s true . . .”
Lucy’s smile, however, was not shy . . . and neither was she. Dropping back two paces she slipped into the space between Hannah and her niece and whispered, “Gramma’s a little wound up right now, but when she runs out of steam we have, like, a million and a half questions we need to ask you.”
“Great.” Hannah appreciated the warning. “I’ll look forward to answering any I can. I have a few of my own.” She hesitated. “Nothing too tough though, right?”
Lucy scrunched her face and shrugged ambiguously.
They followed Mrs. Steadman up the steps. Cal opened the door for his father who carried the greater load, let Biscuit follow, and stood waiting for his grandmother and the girls.
“I’ve seen it a hundred times or more,” Mrs. Steadman rushed on. “People always bond faster to their own flesh and blood than they do to people who are not related. And that makes sense, doesn’t it? Go ahead and take those up, please, boys. The girls made up the bed in the last room on the left for Hannah.”
From his place several feet inside the door, at the bottom of the stairs, Grady caught her attention as she stepped up onto the porch. He was merely checking on her, making sure she was still all right, and for that he got a grateful smile.
“And we made a nice Sunday supper. Grady wanted to have you over to the house, Hannah, but the girls thought you’d be more comfortable here, and after driving all day it would be a shame for you to have to get back in the car and drive all the way out here with your stomach full. That’s how accidents happen. You’re tired, you get a full stomach and there you are, asleep at the wheel. Grady’s seen it a hundred times or more, haven’t you, dear?” He hummed something in the stairwell. “And we all decided that on this first night you and Anna wouldn’t mind a little company, what with the newness of everything, and the funeral tomorrow and whatnot. And it’s pot roast, you know, so we can clean up quick and leave early if you’re tired from the drive.”
“It smells wonderful. This is all . . . very thoughtful of you, Mrs. Steadman. I appreciate it.”
“Oh Lord, call me Janice, dear. I’m not your teacher anymore. I retired several years ago, you know. How many now . . . ? Let’s see . . .”
Chapter Five
As there were more of them than would fit around the small Formica table in the kitchen, someone had cleared away the boxes of . . . stuff that had covered the dining table for as long as Hannah could recall, and piled them in two corners of the room.
Possibly, they were not the same exact boxes of stuff that had been there before, but boxes of the same sort of junk that crammed every nook and cranny and cupboard and drawer; that was stacked in layers around the edges of every room and piled high on every flat surface of furniture in the house.
Stuff. Like trash bags of clothing coming from or going to Goodwill; stacks of newspapers and magazines someone may or may not get around to reading someday; thirty-year-old lamps that are perfectly good except for a short in the wiring; ancient broken toasters kept for just-in-case; bags of knitting yarn and oil cans and hats, a few books, picture frames . . . stuff.
And it wasn’t like her mother had been a terrible housekeeper. She’d done her best. Level II hoarding was a gene in the Benson DNA and her mother had acquired the habit by marriage. She couldn’t bring herself to throw anything away. But Hannah knew as well as she knew her own name that most of the junk got dusted off on a routine basis up until the day her mother died.
To tell the truth, Hannah wouldn’t have recognized the place if it had been any other way.
And she did recognize it—from the scratched and scarred dark-pine floors and trim to the faded pastel paint on the walls . . . though the color might be different, so it could have been painted at least once since she left. Or not.
She recognized it but that was all she allowed herself. She sensed the memories crouching in the dark corners and shadows everywhere she looked, but that’s all they were, right? Just memories as old and worn as the living room couch—which was also new to the job since her time, but shabby and frayed nonetheless. At the moment there was no lingering sense of evil or danger—or joy, for that matter. It was only a tired, old rundown house . . . full of stuff. No more.
Mrs. Steadman gave everyone but Hannah a chore to do before dinner—the boys setting the table, the girls helping with the meal. Grady made a brief call on his cell phone from the kitchen, then came looking for her. He found her in the hall outside the living room, looking in.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she said, turning to him, leaning back with her hands between her and the wall. It was a whole new jolt of strangeness to see him without the brown jacket, wearing the khaki-tan uniform with the brown epaulets and insignia and the shiny gold star on his chest. Not that he didn’t look good in it . . . and it wasn’t purely that thing about a man in a uniform. Grady wore the uniform like a comfortable second skin, and there was something about that she found . . . . well, arresting. “Don’t you wea
r a gun?”
“My mom won’t let me wear it or my hat at the dinner table.” His tone was grievous and childlike for a second before he sobered to ask, “Is this too much? Did you want to be alone with her?”
“God, no.” She put her head back against the wall. He smelled good, like soap and starch. “This is . . . awful but much nicer than I anticipated. Thank you for thinking of it, and for going to all the trouble.” She skipped a beat. “Will your wife be joining us? I’d like to meet her.”
“No. She doesn’t eat with us anymore. She left when Lucy was four.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
He shrugged and looked away. “It happens. Lucky for me she left the best parts of herself behind.”
“So it’s you and your mother raising your kids.”
Nodding and frowning absently, he rested his hands on the top of his belt as he surveyed the living room in the low lamplight. “They had that in common. Lucy and Anna, back in kindergarten. They were both being raised by their grandmothers essentially, so they ended up friends. Jesus. Will you look at all this shit. Your mother really was a pack rat, wasn’t she?” He shook his head. “You’ve got your work cut out for you here.”
Denial muddled Hannah’s mind. Her gaze roamed, slow and befuddled around the room, over the heaps of clutter, then up to his face. “What?”
“Well, if you and Anna plan to sell this place, you’ll need to clear it out first.”
“Get real. There’s no way to get a backhoe in here without widening the front door first . . . or removing one side of the house.” He laughed. “I’m serious. I’m not going through all this stuff by hand.”
“It’s the only way you’ll know what to keep.”
“Job done. I don’t want to keep any of it.”
“Anna might.”
The sudden picture of hauling all this back to Baltimore rocked her. She envisioned her three-bedroom condominium bulging with junk and a teenager. Suddenly she wanted to weep.
What Happened to Hannah Page 5