“Oh, Alexis, honey. I didn’t know that. I chose dates from a list your father’s attorney handed us.”
“He hadn’t asked me in January.”
“You could have come next week…”
“And been tossed off of first string because I missed a soccer game…We have lives, Jennie, lives that don’t revolve around you. You simply don’t care how many people you’re hurting, do you?”
“I don’t mean for you and Christa to be hurt…”
“How about Dad, and Emma, and Tasha, and Amy? You don’t care about them, but they’re parts of our lives and we love them whether you like it or not. You know, it hurts when you scowl every time one of us mentions Emma. If we visit you, you’re going to hear her name.”
Jennie closed her eyes and gathered her thoughts.
“Alexis, I told you that you did not have to come back. Why did you?”
“Partly because Dad said you can’t overrule the judge.” She looked at Amy again for a long moment. “Then, too, Christa…”
“Watch me,” Christa shouted.
While they had been talking, hurdles had been placed down the center of the track, and Christa was preparing to jump them. The other riders had taken their horses to the rail or had left the ring entirely. Only Christa was jumping.
Jennie started to panic. Should she let her do this? What if she falls? Breaks her neck? Is paralyzed? She started to scream for Christa to stop, but Alexis placed a hand on her arm, their discussion seemingly forgotten.
“Piece of cake. Christa takes jumps that high with closed eyes.”
Christa’s horse sailed over the jumps. As she cleared each one, stable hands raised the bar. Christa took the higher jumps, and the bars were raised again. Finally, each was twice its original height.
Jennie glanced around. The fence was crowded with spectators, people arriving for the trail ride, she assumed.
“There’s Mr. Smyth,” she heard a woman say. She looked where the woman pointed and caught sight of a tall man with graying hair standing by the gate with two of his employees. She suddenly realized that Christa’s upcoming jumps were anything but ordinary. She looked carefully at the jumps, at how high they were, and she felt her stomach flip over.
“I can’t watch.” Jennie placed her hand over her eyes.
Alexis laughed. “Don’t worry. It will be beautiful.”
A hush fell over the crowd as Christa brought her mount around the turn and approached the first jump.
“Tell me when it’s over,” Jennie whispered and Alexis chuckled. A few seconds passed.
“Terrific,” someone shouted.
“Good girl,” Alexis whispered.
Seconds later, several people cheered.
“Two down.” Alexis was jumping in excitement.
Jennie peeked just as Christa’s horse soared high above the last jump, landing gracefully on the track as a cheer went up from the crowd.
“Beautiful,” Alexis screamed. “Christa, you’re the best.”
Jennie realized that her entire body was tense and that she had been holding her breath. She let the air out with a rush and breathed deeply.
Christa took a victory lap, then pulled up at the gate. Mr. Smyth walked into the ring to shake her hand, something unheard of, the woman standing next to Jennie said.
As the crowd began to disperse, many heading into the stable to secure mounts for the trail ride, Christa guided her horse toward them. A smile spread across her face, she was still bouncing in excitement.
“Did you see me? Did you see me?”
“It was terrific, Christa, just terrific.” Alexis bounded toward her. “Plenty of height, good form, you didn’t even bobble when you hit the ground.”
“I’ve never jumped so high in my life. I wish Dad had seen me.”
“He’d have loved it. Emma would have too,” Alexis added, glancing at Jennie’s face from the corner of her eye as Jennie tried not to react. “She was the one who first took you riding.”
“I’ll call them both when we get back to Jennie’s.”
“Wait, you told me she had done this before.” Jennie frowned at Alexis. “I would have stopped…”
“I said it would be beautiful…And it was.” She gave Christa a thumbs up. “Way to go.”
“You did do a very good job.” Jennie patted her leg.
“Thanks, Jennie.”
“I was scared to death, though.”
“Hid her eyes.” Alexis laughed.
“Simba helped, of course.” Christa patted her horse’s neck. “He’s a wonderful horse. I wonder how much he would cost.”
Alexis rubbed the horse’s side. “Christmas for the rest of your life?”
“Probably so.” Christa sighed.
Jennie’s eyes roved across the coal-black horse. Its back was higher than her head, and she wondered how Christa had managed to mount him. “He’s beautiful.”
“You two need to saddle up for the trail ride. I’m staying on Simba. Come on.” Alexis and Jennie followed Christa. As they reached the stable, Christa called to one of the grooms. “Bill, this is Alexis and this is Jennie. They need horses for the trail ride.”
Bill sent Alexis off with another groom. “Kenny will help you, and I’ll find a mount for your mother.” Alexis made a face when Bill called Jennie her mother, but she followed Kenny into the stable. Christa and Simba waited outside.
As they walked toward the stalls Jennie leaned in to Bill. “I haven’t ridden in over twenty-five years. Find me something gentle, please.”
Bill chuckled. “Don’t want to be tossed off of your steed in front of your daughters, I’m sure.”
“I’d be mortified.”
“Especially after Christa’s performance.”
“Exactly.”
Bill led a dark brown horse with white markings out of one of the stalls. “Bess is as gentle as they come. The staff call her a granny horse because they would send their grandmothers off on her.”
“Just my speed, but please don’t tell Christa.”
Bill laughed again. “Mum’s the word.” He helped Jennie to mount. “She’s a good trail horse. Get in line, and she’ll follow the others. Pull on the reins to stop. Tug left or right to turn. That’s it…Oh, and stay in the saddle.”
“Thanks a lot.” Jennie made a face at him, and Bill smiled.
“All set.”
The ride itself was mostly uneventful. Bess performed as Bill had said she would, and Jennie decided that she pulled the whole thing off rather well, except for one occasion when she needed Alexis to help her slow Bess back to a walk.
They reached Whitesburg about five o’clock. Christa had chattered with Alexis the entire way about the stable, her horse, the jumps, even the trail ride, which Jennie had suggested must have been rather tame for her.
“I don’t get a chance to ride on a trail very often,” she had replied. “It’s a totally different type of riding. Thank you for letting us go, and for coming with us. I know you didn’t want to ride.”
When they reached the house, the girls went into the bedroom to change. Jennie overheard Christa describing the event to someone, and Jennie assumed she had called Thomas.
***
A little before six Jennie entered the living room, fiddling with the clasp of her necklace. She had been thinking about her conversation with Alexis. She felt both angry and depressed, and also strangely excited by their conversation at the stable.
A self-centered witch. Jennie could not even imagine what would have happened if she had said such a thing to her own mother. She doubted if Alexis could talk to the goddess in that fashion and live to tell it. In fact, Jennie had been about to slap her, but she had caught herself as her arm began to move.
She was excited because, even though Alexis had made her dislike quite clear, she had been willing to talk to her, and to talk about something that was important. Jennie knew people who had been married for years who would never discuss feelings with each other, but
Alexis had done just that.
She was depressed because Alexis had given her the first concrete example of the effect their visits were having. Jennie knew that missing a dance would not be a major issue in the long run, but her heart ached for Alexis now. She had been told repeatedly that her request for visitation would disrupt her children’s lives, and she had repeatedly insisted that it was not her intention. She couldn’t let anything similar happen in the future.
She stopped short when she found Alexis perched on the sofa, slowly turning the pages of a photograph album. Jennie had not intended for her daughters to see the album, but she had neglected to put it away on Thursday night. Alexis glanced at her as she entered.
“Is this you?” Alexis turned back to one of the first pages. Jennie sat beside her and looked at the photograph.
“It is. I was in college.”
In the picture Jennie was twenty years old and wore a dark blue, two-piece bathing suit. It looked rather frumpy to her now, but at the time it had been quite daring and she would not have allowed her father to even suspect that she owned it. She was standing beside a swimming pool, holding a plastic bucket. It appeared that she had just emptied the bucket’s contents on a guy who was sitting beside the pool with his legs dangling in the water.
“You were beautiful.”
“Thank you…There is your father.” She pointed to the guy. “He wouldn’t get wet, so I dumped a bucket of water over his head.”
Alexis chuckled. “That’s Dad? He looks so young.”
“We both were young.” Jennie turned the page and found a photograph of her wearing a short red dress and a white corsage. Thomas was standing beside her, his arm around her shoulders, wearing a black bowler hat and waving a black walking stick.
“Homecoming. Senior year. Senior boys dressed like that on homecoming, something about the sheriff who had to accompany the students to class back in the eighteen hundreds.”
Alexis laughed again.
As they paged though the book, Jennie told her about each picture. There were beach parties and football games, bon fires and graduation.
“This is my wedding portrait.” Her voice broke and she dabbed at her eyes. “Probably the happiest day of my life.” Alexis looked at her questioningly, but didn’t speak.
Pictures of Alexis and Christa followed. Baptisms. Bike rides. Picnics. Finally, they reached the last page.
“This was Christa’s first birthday.” The photograph showed Christa in a highchair, Jennie standing on one side, and Alexis handing her sister a cupcake with a single candle. A stack of wrapped boxes covered the table behind them.
“Can you believe all of the presents?” Jennie shook her head. “For a one-year-old who had no idea what was happening.”
“That’s the last picture.” Alexis had turned the page, looking for more.
Jennie nodded.
“Why did you stop?”
“I was already getting sick by that time.” She bit her lower lip and looked away. “From when I was in college, up to about the time of that photograph, that was the happiest time of my life. Those are the things I want to remember, not what came before, certainly not what came after.”
“Where did you get the photographs? I thought you just walked out one morning, spur of the moment.”
“My mom had some of the pictures. Sarah and Si gave me others. A friend from college found a few when she was moving and mailed them to me. I started the album nine or ten years ago. I wanted something to help me remember the good years.”
Jennie wiped her eyes and they sat in silence for a minute.
Alexis held up an envelope. “This fell out of the album when I picked it up. It’s addressed to me.”
Jennie nodded. “It’s a birthday card. I sent it for your sixth birthday.”
“But the address is wrong.”
“It’s the address of the house we had rented in Charleston. I…I left about a month before we had planned to leave Atlanta. Two years had passed, though, so I suppose you had moved again by then. The card was returned. I had no idea how to find you so…the three of you were truly gone.”
“So you did think about me?” Alexis’s voice cracked. Jennie saw tears in her eyes and reached over, taking Alexis’s hand in hers.
“I’ve thought about you almost every day of my life for the past ten years—you and your sister and your father—wondering if you were happy, wondering how things went so wrong, wondering what might have happened if I hadn’t…”
“Sorry I took so long.” Christa breezed into the room. “I smelled like a horse, so I had to take a bath. Then I had to call both Dad and Emma to tell them about today.”
When she heard Emma’s name, Jennie clenched her fist, took a deep breath, and her eyes narrowed, but she caught herself and looked away. When she turned back, she saw that Alexis was watching her, and she sighed.
“What’s the matter, Alexis?” Christa reached out and wiped a tear from her sister’s cheek.
“Nothing. We were just talking…How did Amy do in the horse show today?”
“She won. Isn’t that great…Are you sure…”
“Good for her. We knew she would.” Alexis turned to Jennie. “Amy is Emma’s daughter. She had a show in Columbia today. She and Christa are major competitors, and Amy has been excited all week. Since Christa is here, she could not compete, and Amy felt certain she would win.”
Another disruption, Jennie thought.
“Are we ready?” Christa slipped on her coat and headed toward the door.
***
The car was silent as they passed the Blue Belle Café. Every muscle in Jennie’s body was tense. She never knew what mood her father would be in. She could not anticipate what he might say or how he would react to what someone else said or did. If he was in a good mood, she never knew what might make him angry. He’s a lot like I used to be, she thought. He probably has the same problem. Even if meds would help, she knew that the probability that her father would take them was zilch.
Christa, she knew, was afraid of her father. Alexis—she rolled her eyes—would prompt fireworks, if not tonight, then at some point. Her father was still angry at her interference when Christa had her allergy attack. The fact that Alexis had actually saved her sister’s life was not relevant to her father. His only concern was that she had not obeyed him. Jennie could not picture Alexis backing out of a fight.
What if Alexis were to say something to him like she had said to Jennie? She shivered. No, she told herself, he will never hit one of my children. Those children are mine, not his.
If they stayed true to form, the girls would say very little during the dinner. That would probably be best. Less opportunity to antagonize him. Of course, if he wanted them to talk and they didn’t…
She shook her head. Her stomach felt queasy and she wished they were on their way home rather than on their way out.
Her parents seemed to have been watching for them to arrive. Even before Jennie pulled to a stop, the front door opened and her mother and father stepped out onto the front porch, welcoming smiles on their faces. Jennie sighed with relief. The evening was beginning well, at least.
“Come in. Come in. It’s so good to see all of you.” Jennie’s mother hugged her and each of the girls. Alexis and Christa gave her token hugs, each placing a hand on her back as she wrapped her arms around them.
Her father hugged both girls. Neither protested, but neither returned the hug either. Jennie recalled their first visit, when she felt as if she had hugged boards when she welcomed them to her house. Her father seemed to have the same experience, and he stepped away quickly.
“Christa, are you doing all right?” he asked. “No more trouble?”
“No, sir.”
Jennie shook her head. Here we go again. Two word responses.
“Call me Grandpa. This is Grandma.” He gestured at Jennie’s mom. “That’s what Sarah’s kids and Si’s children call us.”
He looked as if he expected a re
sponse, but Christa simply stared back at him. He turned toward the door. “Come on in. Grandma has dinner almost ready.”
They stepped into a long central hallway. A sitting room opened to the right, the dining room to the left. The kitchen was behind the dining room, and he led them in that direction.
“I hope you’re hungry,” Jennie’s mother said.
“Growing girls are always hungry, aren’t they?” When no one responded, her father continued. “Your ma, when she was your age, she could eat a horse three times a day and ask for more. I’ll bet you two are the same.”
“I’m starving,” Jennie said when neither girl responded. “We went horseback riding this afternoon.”
“Well, I have pot roast, rice, butter beans, corn, and rolls for dinner.”
Ding.
“Time to put the rolls in. Everything else is ready.” Jennie heard the oven door opening and closing. “We have chocolate chess pie for dessert.”
“What’s chess pie?” Christa wrinkled her nose.
“Don’t wrinkle your nose at Grandma’s food. Everything she cooks is good, and we’ll all eat it and like it.” Her father lowered himself into a chair at the table in the kitchen and took a long drink from a tall glass. Beer, Jennie thought with a sinking feeling. It was Saturday and if he had been drinking all day…
“She needs to know what is in it, Jennie,” Alexis warned quietly.
“I’ll find out.” She consulted with her mother. “You’ll be all right, Christa.” She told her the ingredients. “And chocolate. It tastes like fudge.”
“Yum,” both girls said together, and Jennie and her mother laughed.
“Jennie, we’re eating in the dining room…”
“I told her that was plain silly,” her father interrupted. “You aren’t company. You three are family.”
“How can we help, Mom?”
She looked around. “Alexis, can you take up the butter beans? Christa, we need ice in the glasses. Jennie, help me with the roast.”
Neither girl spoke, but both began to help.
Fifteen minutes later, dinner was on the table, and Jennie’s father began to pray. He mentioned his bad back—which felt much better—the spring-like weather—which had arrived early this year—Alexis and Christa’s visit, the new preacher at the church, the county’s decision to repave the road on which they lived, the rain that had fallen earlier in the week, the fish he and Jennie’s mom had caught the previous weekend and which now filled a freezer in the utility room, and, finally, the food on the table.
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