Welcome Back

by Lin Stepp

  “I remember Neal always championed Mary Beth when all the boys teased her. Insisted she get to play their games many times when J. T., the twins, and Dean announced them a ‘no girls’ activity.”

  John laughed. “I’d forgotten that.” He looked thoughtful. “I think those old protective feelings about Mary Beth may still be lingering around—along with a little more.”

  Lydia turned to him in surprise. “Mary Beth and Neal?”

  A half smile played over his lips. “I’m not sure Mary Beth has noticed except around the edges. But Neal’s a good man. It wouldn’t trouble me to see the two of them get together. Mary Beth deserves some happiness.”

  Lydia released a deep breath. “Sonny Harper always seemed an impulsive, reckless boy,” she said. “It troubled me when I heard Mary Beth ran off and married him.”

  “She was passing through an unruly time then,” John explained. “Got caught up in the drama of Sonny and his band, the Flat Ridge Boys. She sang occasionally with the band. Went to performances. Felt important with all her peers.”

  John saw Lydia grip the fence rail while he talked, her face tense.

  “I knew she’d grown enamored with the band,” he continued, knowing she needed to understand, “but I had no idea she and Sonny had become that serious.” He frowned. “They’d dated off and on a little, and then Sonny asked her to the senior prom.”

  John paused, looking back. “Mary Beth looked so pretty and grown-up on prom night in a long, fussy white dress, and Sonny wore a rented tux, his dark hair all slicked back nice and neat. Just two kids, excited about a dance. It never dawned on me they’d run off and get married that night.”

  He raked a hand through his hair. “She’d turned eighteen the week before. I couldn’t annul what she’d done, Lydia, and she seemed purposed she’d done the right thing. All starry-eyed and in love with Sonny. She moved in with him into his parents’ basement apartment in town, next door to Sonny’s father’s upholstery shop.”

  “What happened?” She put a hand on his, sensing his discomfort.

  “I don’t fully know.” He threaded a hand through his hair again and sighed. “Boy started getting wild. Acting irresponsible. Took off on trips with the band. Stayed gone too much.” John shifted restlessly. “Mary Beth got pregnant the first summer after they married despite the talks I had with her about that. Soon she couldn’t travel with Sonny. Then she had twins on top of everything else.”

  Lydia squeezed his hand. “Poor child. I remember how hectic that time was when our twins came—and we had J. T., too.”

  He sat down on the old bench beside the garden fence, and Lydia sat down beside him.

  “Mary Beth’s been a good mother,” he told her. “Had to grow up quick. Too quick and with too many sorrows for a young girl. Those babies weren’t even two when Sonny took off on one of his road trips and never came back.” He kicked at the dirt near his feet. “He finally called his parents after a few months to tell them he wasn’t ever coming back, that he and the band had found some big opportunity out in California. Said it wasn’t any place for a woman and children.”

  “He didn’t even call Mary Beth himself?” Lydia’s eyes widened.

  “No.” John felt his anger rise. “Just expected his parents to take care of her. He left Mary Beth in an embarrassing situation. As soon as I heard about it, I went to get her. Brought her and the babies, Billy Ray and Bucky, home.”

  “I’m proud of you for that.” Lydia squinted in the sunshine to catch his eyes with hers. “It couldn’t have been easy.”

  They both left unsaid between them the difficulties it must have caused with Estelle. A proud woman, she wasn’t fond of being a part of failures or embarrassing situations.

  John moved over the unspoken thoughts between them. “Mary Beth’s doing all right, Lydia. A few years ago, she renovated the old building on the highway, on that piece of commercial land we own, and opened a country store. Did you see it driving in?”

  “I did.” She smiled. “It looked good.”

  “I remember you always wanted to open a store there. Insisted it would bring in extra money and could be successful. You pointed out how it would complement the farm, appeal to the tourists, being on the main highway, and draw in locals if the store carried some basic groceries.” John looked down the avenue toward the direction of the store as he talked. “You claimed it would save folks a run into Waynesville to the market when they just needed milk, bread, or pickup items.”

  “And has it been successful?’

  “Yes.” He spoke the word with a tight nod. “We should have opened it years ago. It’s actually giving the farm more of a reputation, drawing visitors to the tours and events we host at the orchard. You should go see it, Lydia. I think you’ll be proud of what Mary Beth has done with it.”

  “I’ll go down soon.”

  He threaded his fingers in a familiar gesture. “The store quickly got too busy for Mary Beth to handle on her own, so she hired her friend Nancy Grace to help her with it.”

  “Nancy Grace Killian?” Lydia’s face lit up. “Mary Beth’s best friend when they were girls?”

  “It’s Nancy Grace Peterson now—and they’re still the best of friends. She married a boy who teaches in the Fish and Wildlife Management Program over at Haywood Community College. Nice young man. Seems a good match.”

  Lydia sighed and stood up, brushing off her slacks. She turned to John and smiled. “I’ve enjoyed this talk, John. It’s helped me catch up. Thank you.” She looked across the Farm Road. “I need to go see if Clyde is finished with my car now so I can go back to Hill House and check on the kittens.”

  “How is that going?”

  “They keep me busy.” She laughed. “I’m actually glad now there are two of them. They play together, sleep together, and entertain each other.” She laid a hand on his arm as he stood. “I hope we can talk more later. It’s been good.”

  He wanted to respond that they had their whole lives ahead of them to talk all she wanted, but he decided not to press his luck. She needed time to reacclimate and settle in. To feel at home again.

  Instead he asked, “Did you talk to Ela about coming down to the house for dinner tonight?”

  She looked toward the imposing brick house on the hillside knob. “Yes. I said I’d come, but I asked if we could eat picnic-style on the back porch instead of in the dining room.”

  John nodded in understanding. He knew the formal dining room held some of the worst memories for Lydia. Estelle, seated royally at the head of the table, would inevitably wield her tongue in subtle criticisms and innuendos toward Lydia while she held her captive through family meals.

  “I’ll see you then.” He looked at his watch. “I’d walk with you to get your car, but I need to meet with Neal again before he leaves the farm.”

  “I’ll be fine.” She sent him a sunny smile and turned to walk across the avenue and back down the side road to the Sheppards’.

  CHAPTER 5

  Gathering her courage, Lydia drove directly to the Cunningham Farm entry road to Main House for dinner that night. The Avenue rolled gently uphill into the family orchard, framed by neat, gray-weathered fencing that marked off the boundaries of the fields. Spreading oaks reached their leafy arms across the drive, lending to the ambience of the Avenue’s charm. On a high knob, Cunningham’s Main House stood in tall Georgian splendor, an imposing two-storied statement to the wealth the Cunningham family accrued in the early 1900s.

  From family stories, Lydia knew the area in and around Asheville rose in prominence as a curative destination in the 1880s to 1930s, drawing tourists, health seekers, and wealth to its doors. In that early season of its booming economy, Asheville became known as the hub of North Carolina. Agriculturalists, with rich lands and products to sell in the city, prospered. John’s grandparents, John and Mary Cunningham, built and expanded in this era, cashing in on the rising tourism and economic development.

  She remembered feeling entranc
ed the first time she drove up the road with John to meet his family and see his home. Lydia bit her lip. Now she felt anxious. Her stomach hurt and she was filled with dread.

  Lydia pulled into the drive beside Main House, stopping as she got out of her car to admire the symmetrical, orderly shape of the large brick house, with its paired chimneys and long windows neatly aligned on both stories of the home. A tidy walkway led to the wide, decoratively crowned front door, sheltered beneath a pillared porch entry with its crisp, white balustrade railing over the roof.

  The family had always been so proud of the house built by William and Elizabeth Cunningham, so proud of the farm and the land and the family’s long heritage in the area. She crossed her arms against herself and thought, It’s not that they shouldn’t be, it’s just that . . .

  Her thoughts trailed off, and Lydia sighed. It was just that Estelle Cunningham took pride one step too far and turned it into prideful cruelty. She ruled like an autocratic queen. Her critical spirit always found ways to condemn, and she seldom offered a word of encouragement or praise. Lydia frowned. Estelle had a way of sucking all the joy and gladness out of any fine moment, of making you feel guilty to laugh, to love, or to enjoy life.

  With resignation, Lydia turned her steps toward the winding walk that led around to the back of the house. Here a broad screened porch stretched under shady maples with a patio and a green lawn behind it.

  Ela Raintree waved at Lydia from the porch, coming to open the screen door for her. “Come in. Come in.” Her broad face, wreathed in smiles, helped Lydia to relax.

  Mary Beth looked up from where she decorated a long table, draped with a colorful runner and set with festive stoneware. “What do you think?” she asked, smiling and trying to smooth over the awkwardness of the moment.

  “It looks lovely,” Lydia said, noticing all the special touches in the napkins and table decorations her daughter had added.

  Lydia stood silent then, letting her eyes move with hungry delight over her only daughter, so grown-up now, so softly beautiful with her reddish-brown hair, much like Lydia’s, brown eyes like her father’s, a face round and gentle, her mouth lit with a tentative smile.

  “I’ve changed a lot.” Mary Beth ran a hand nervously down her yellow blouse, smoothing it.

  “Yes. You’ve become a beautiful woman.” Lydia walked over to give her daughter a hug, but the embrace felt stiff—the two of them so unused to hugging.

  “Rebecca told me you’d rented Hill House to help us keep it in the family. Thank you for that.” Mary Beth chewed a nail. “I know it will make more of a commute for you when you start your work at Western.”

  “It isn’t that far, and I like Hill House,” she replied, offering Mary Beth another smile.

  Lydia hated that the two of them felt like strangers, working hard to make conversation. Once they’d been so close, lying in bed together to laugh and talk, sharing the happenings of their days.

  John and Manu came in the back door, easing the tension. With them came a big collie, pricking his ears at the sound of a new voice.

  Lydia squatted down to hold out a hand to him. “And who is this?”

  “It’s Cullie.” John laid a fond hand on the dog’s back. “Say hello to our guest, Cullie.” The dog put up a paw appealingly for Lydia to shake.

  “He looks like Shep,” Lydia said, remembering the collie at the farm when she left.

  “Probably kin somewhere down the line. We lost Shep two years before Mother died. Got Cullie then for the boys.” He smiled. “It wouldn’t be Cunningham Farms without collies and calicoes.”

  “Speaking of cats, how are those kittens doing?” Manu asked, heading for the kitchen to help Ela.

  “Just fine,” Lydia said. She’d insisted Manu and Ela join them for dinner, an unheard-of event in Estelle’s time.

  Estelle snorted in derision once when Lydia dared to suggest it in the past. “You don’t eat with the help, Lydia. Surely even you know that.”

  Embarrassed, Lydia had to disinvite the Raintrees to John’s birthday party, which proved no surprise to Ela. “I figured you didn’t check with Mrs. Cunningham first,” she said with a twinkle in her eye. Ela had always taken Estelle’s ways in stride in a way Lydia seemed unable to do.

  Bustling out from the kitchen now, Ela brought the last of several steaming dishes to the brick sideboard along the wall. John strolled over to examine the offerings. “Umm. Umm. Pork loin roast, fresh green beans with new potatoes, corn casserole, sugar-glazed carrots, fresh yeast rolls, and homemade coconut cake. This looks like a fine dinner.”

  Mary Beth blushed. “Daddy, you don’t have to catalog everything like you’re reading out a restaurant menu.”

  “And why not?” He grinned and reached over to buss her cheek. “We have the best restaurant in town with Ela doing the cooking.”

  Ela smiled with pleasure, but then looked around with annoyance. “It’s time to eat. Where are those boys? Here we are ready to sit down to dinner and those rascals aren’t home.”

  “Oh. They’ll be along any time,” John said, filching a stalk of celery from a relish dish. “I saw them playing near the old hunting lodge earlier.”

  Mary Beth looked out the screen door with irritation. “Well, they were supposed to be back by four to get a bath and clean up.”

  “Don’t worry. Lydia’s seen her share of grubby boys before.” John sent a grin her way. “I don’t think she’ll mind if they’re not spit-cleaned and polished.”

  “Not at all,” Lydia agreed, washed in the sweep of old memories that John’s words brought to mind.

  Just as Ela started to shoo them toward the table to sit down, the boys came racing across the side yard, hollering and screaming as they ran.

  “We saw the ghost! We saw the ghost!”

  Lydia managed to catch their words as they banged through the screen door, letting it slam behind them.

  “Whoa!” John reached out a hand to catch one and then the other of the six-year-old twins.

  Both boys turned huge brown eyes to his. “No kidding, Daddy John, we really did,” said one excited voice after the other.

  Manu came in from the kitchen, carrying a pitcher of tea. “I saw those boys through the kitchen window running like the devil himself was chasing them down the hill. What’s going on? They hurt?”

  “We saw the ghost, Manny!” a young voice piped in to explain, as Manu set the tea on the sideboard. “Billy Ray and me both saw it—all creepy and white, slinking out of the woods.”

  Billy Ray interrupted. “It had blood on it and everything. It howled and waved its arms at Bucky and me.” He moaned and demonstrated.

  Bucky pulled on John’s arm. “It said for us to go away and never come back, and it had a scary, dead voice like this.” He parroted the words in a gravelly voice with more dramatic hand gestures.

  This caught Mary Beth’s attention. “Where were you?”

  “Just playing around near the old hunting lodge.” Bucky shrugged and then his eyes grew large again. “Do you think the ghost lives there?”

  “I don’t believe in ghosts.” She shook a finger at them. “And neither should you.”

  “But we both saw it!” Bucky protested.

  “Someone probably played a trick on you.” She walked over to smooth down their brown hair and tuck in their polo shirts. “Now, both of you need to calm down and get ready for dinner.” She nodded her head toward Lydia. “Your grandmother is here, and you haven’t even said hello.”

  The boys turned dark chocolate eyes her way. “Are you Nana Lydia?” asked Billy Ray.

  The sound of the name warmed Lydia’s heart. “Yes, and thank you for the nice welcome sign you made me.” She walked over to lay a hand on each of their cheeks one by one, not sure whether they’d like to be hugged by a grandmother they knew so little.

  “Is the sign still hanging on your porch?” Billy Ray asked. Lydia studied him, trying to see a way to tell him from Bucky, clad in a similar dark gree
n shirt.

  “Yes. The sign is still there,” she answered him, deciding his longer eyelashes and that faint brown birthmark near his ear would be her clues to tell him from his identical brother.

  Billy Ray pulled on her hand. “Will you sit by me?”

  “I’d love to.” She let herself be led to a seat by two chattering boys and then over to the sideboard to fill her plate.

  “Honest, Mom, we really did see a ghost.” Billy Ray climbed into a ladder-back chair beside Lydia’s at the table. “No foolin’. You can ask Davy Crowe.”

  “And what does Davy Crowe have to do with this?” Mary Beth asked.

  “We were playing with him up near the lodge. Davy and his family don’t live far away, just across Indian Creek below Sheepback Knob.”

  Bucky butted in between bites. “Did you know Davy’s grandparents, his grandfather’s sister, his mom and dad, his older sister, Izabelle, and his brother, Nalin, all live together in that one little house?” He grinned, obviously pleased at his recitation. “Davy said sometimes Cherokee families do that—all live together.”

  Mary Beth leaned forward across the table. “And how do you suddenly know so much about how the Crowe and Youngblood families live? Were you and Billy Ray over there today? That’s across the creek and you’re supposed to get permission to leave our property or to visit anyone’s house before you go.”

  He dropped his head. “I guess we forgot.”

  Billy Ray diverted the subject. “Davy’s mother told us she saw the ghost one day, Mom. She thinks it’s the spirit of that Indian named Red Hawk who got killed at Drop Off Ridge a long time ago.”

  “Pah. That old legend.” Manu snorted. “No one even knows what ridge that really happened on.”

  “What’s the story?” Lydia asked, curious.

  He scowled. “In some Indian tribes a long time ago, one punishment for a bad crime was to be bound and pushed off a high cliff to one’s death. Cherokee once lived in these hills. Many hid out in this area after the government started moving the people west. Legends say an execution happened in this actual area, but it’s only speculation that it occurred at Drop Off Ridge or on our property. I’ve heard other places mentioned.”