by Lin Stepp
Hearing the timer, Lydia got up to pour two cups of tea. “Is Old Oak still standing?”
“It is, and my boys climb into its branches now, like we did when I was little.” She stirred a little sugar into her tea as Lydia sat down. “Daddy measured that oak last month, and it’s over eighteen feet around the base. Some of the limbs spreading out from it are huge now.”
Lydia sipped her tea, smiling at the memories.
Mary Beth leaned forward. “I have some things I want to tell you, but first I want to ask about my brothers. Catch me up on them. Please?”
Lydia finished swallowing a bite of Ela’s bread, and then went into the living room to retrieve a photo album to bring back with her. She opened it to the first page, turning it around for Mary Beth to see. “Here’s a photo of the boys and me that your aunt Martha Howard took this spring. There’s J. T. and there’s Parker and Billy Dale.” She pointed to each one. “Billy likes to be called Will now. All his friends and work colleagues call him that, but I often forget.”
“They’ve grown so much.” Mary Beth touched the picture lovingly. “But I’d still have known them.”
Lydia turned the page. “Here’s our little bungalow in Atlanta near the Botanical Garden. That’s your aunt Martha on the porch of her house that sits beside ours.” She put a finger on the next page. “These are pictures of Georgia Tech and the building where I worked at Career Services with Aunt Martha.” She laughed as Mary Beth studied a street photo. “That’s the multi-lane freeway I crossed every day to get to work—and to get practically anywhere. I certainly don’t miss that.”
Mary Beth studied the pictures, nibbling biscuits and drinking her tea.
“This is J. T. with his wife, Laura.” Lydia flipped to another page, filled with photos of her tall son and his trim, blond wife.
“She’s very beautiful and looks very sophisticated.”
Lydia smiled. “She’s both. She majored in visual merchandising and after graduating did window design for a large corporate retailer. When the babies came, she started her own business out of her home, Urban Visual Merchandising and Design. She does window dressing and design for small shops in the Atlanta area that don’t have their own in-house window dressers.”
Lydia touched a colorful photo of a towheaded little boy and a small toddler with a mass of fair curls. “These are J. T.’s and Laura’s two children—Jack, four, and Rachel, who just turned two.”
“I can’t believe J. T. is a father.” Mary Beth shook her head. “Look at him, he looks so mature and polished.”
“He works as an architect for Harrison Design. The company creates custom residences and town houses. J. T. started part-time with them as a gofer, running errands and doing low-level tasks while in school. He did his internship with them after graduation, and then moved into a full-time position. Two years ago, he took the Architect Registration Examination to become a licensed architect.” Lydia smiled. “He’s doing well. He and Laura lived in Aunt Martha’s garage apartment when they first married but later bought a small home.”
Mary Beth turned the page to pictures of Will. “And here’s Billy Dale.” She pointed. “I know he’s a civil engineer, like Grandfather Howard.”
“Yes.” Lydia smiled at the picture of Will in his construction hat. “Will works as a construction engineer and surveyor for Valentino and Associates in Smyrna. The company does boundary and topographical surveys, construction staking and layout, and design mapping. In two years, Will can get his license to be a professional engineer and surveyor in the state of Georgia.”
“He must love working outdoors.”
“Yes, J. T. can handle a lot of time inside drawing plans, but Will is never happier than when trekking over some wilderness area surveying.”
Mary Beth smiled. “Sounds like him.”
Lydia saw Mary Beth’s eyes drift to soft-faced Amelia, dressed in a lace blouse and period skirt. “That’s Will’s wife, Amelia, a lovely, sweet girl,” Lydia explained. She reached over to the kitchen counter to grab her purse. “She made this purse for me, did the lavish embroidery herself, created the design. She’s a very gifted girl—majored in textile design—and she clerks at a vintage clothing store right now. Like Laura, she’s developing her own business on the side, creating embroidered and decorative items. Several stores already carry her work, and she’s developing a Web site to show her designs.”
Mary Beth studied the pictures of Amelia and Billy Dale. “They live in Aunt Martha’s apartment now, don’t they?”
“Yes. Like J. T. and Laura did, they’re saving for a house and hope to find one by next year. In the meantime, they’re close to Parker, who’s still in the bungalow where he and I lived before I returned to Maggie.”
“Can he afford to keep it on his own?” Mary Beth looked worried.
“He can now.” Lydia smiled. “He just got a nice raise at the Botanical Garden. You remember Parker always loved growing things, and he majored in landscape architecture. Through his last years of high school and all through college, he worked at the Atlanta Botanical Garden near the house. By the time he graduated, he’d developed a real love for the gardens there, and when they offered him the job as the exhibition coordinator, he took it. It’s not exactly in the field Parker studied for. As the coordinator, he develops, plans, and implements the exhibition program, and he organizes and manages any events, like the many community and educational activities held at the Garden all through the year.”
“And he likes it?”
“Actually, he loves it.” Lydia smiled. “We all love the Botanical Garden. It gave us a green sanctuary near our home in the big city. The boys and I walked, played, picnicked, and went to the parks and pool there whenever we hungered to see flowers, green grass, trees, or the lake. It’s a truly beautiful oasis right in the heart of the city.”
“Daddy said Parker is engaged now.”
“Her name is Marie Carroll.” Lydia pointed to a picture of a dark-haired, smiling girl. “She is a first grade teacher at Morningside Elementary, and she met Parker when she brought a class of students to the Garden. They plan to get married at the end of summer. Marie’s rental lease is up then, and she’ll move in with Parker now that I’m leaving. Before that, they planned the opposite, for Parker to move in with Marie.”
“You’ll go back for the wedding?”
“Absolutely! I can hardly wait. I’m very fond of Marie. She makes Parker laugh and keeps him from becoming too serious. They’re a nice match.”
Mary Beth dropped her eyes, fussing with her teacup.
“Bee, I think you and your boys, and your father, should go to the wedding with me. Maybe even Ela and Manu.”
Mary Beth’s eyes widened. “Do you think they’d want me to come?”
“Yes, I think they would.” She put a hand over Mary Beth’s. “The boys never meant for you to be hurt when they went to Atlanta with me.” She laughed. “Parker always hoped you’d come down and join us, maybe go to school at Tech, too.”
“I sort of cancelled my chances of going to college when I married Sonny.”
“Did you have any special career plans before that?” Lydia asked gently.
“Only foolish ones.” Mary Beth shook her head. “I didn’t have anyone to help me with sensible plans, to guide me on a career path, or to acquaint me with options based on my interests.” She laughed, a sad, hollow sound. “Of course, my mother was good at all those things, but I was too proud and angry to ask her for help. I thought I knew everything myself.” She blew out a long sigh. “In senior year I fell in love with Sonny Harper, and I got caught in his wake, dated him, sang with him and the Flat Ridge Boys. I felt special around school being a singer. I began to think I might make it big, go to Hollywood or something. That’s what Sonny and the band wanted, to take off and go after their big break in California after graduation.”
“Your father said he didn’t realize you and Sonny were growing serious.”
“Don’t blame
Daddy for anything I did. I hid from him, and Grandmother, that Sonny and I were even dating for a time. I told them I only sang occasionally with the band, and I lied about where we sang sometimes, too. They wouldn’t have approved of most of the places. Or of my thoughts or plans.” She frowned. “I knew I’d be doomed if Grandmother ever imagined I wished for anything beyond marrying locally and staying on or near the farm. She counted on me marrying a farmer to join Daddy in the orchard, you see, to have sons to work and carry on the Cunningham legacy. As she reminded me often enough, everyone else had abandoned their duty.”
Lydia winced.
“Don’t feel bad. I had started to understand more about my grandmother by then. In my own way, I’d grown angry and begun to see how she helped drive you all away.” She traced her hand across the photo book. “And look what my brothers have become. They got their chance to find their own dreams and had someone to encourage them.”
She raised her eyes to Lydia’s. “I know you wrote and asked me to come to Atlanta. You told me I could stay with you and go to college, with free tuition like the boys. I did read the letters that you sent me through Rebecca.” She bit her lip. “I guess you know Grandmother tore up a lot of your earlier letters before I could ever read them. Didn’t you?”
Lydia nodded.
“I figured that’s why you started sending letters through Rebecca later.” She crossed her arms. “Rebecca has been a good friend to me.”
“I’m glad.” Lydia got up to pour two more cups of tea from the Chatsford teapot. Then she sat down and showed Mary Beth the last of the pictures in the album before closing it at last.
“Bee, tell me why you married Sonny and what happened.”
“It’s embarrassing.” She twisted her hands.
“Then you don’t have to tell me about it.” Lydia smiled at her, reaching over to cut another small slice of the poppy seed bread to nibble on. “I’m just happy you’re here, to have us talking.”
“No, I want you to know.” Her eyes shifted in memory. “It’s not a long story. I went to the senior prom with Sonny. We went to a party afterward, drank a little too much, got silly, ran off, and got married.” She put her fingers over her eyes for a moment. “I was so young, and it was prom night. Sonny looked so mature and handsome in his tux, talked about all the wonderful things we could do together after graduation. His plans sounded so exciting—traveling with the Flat Ridge Boys, singing in other cities.”
She shifted in her seat. “I had no real plans, no ideas about what I would do after graduation. All my friends had plans for college or starting jobs. And I was in limbo—working around the farm, knowing I didn’t have a ghost of a chance to leave to try anything else.” She paused, remembering. “Holly worked in the bookstore in Asheville then. She said she’d get me a job over there and that I could come and live with her and Wade until I saved enough for my own place. Grandmother went totally ballistic when I brought up the idea. She freaked out and screamed at me, then practically snubbed me for a week, withdrawing her affection, making cutting comments at the table.” She shrugged. “You know how she could be.”
“I do.” Lydia remembered all too well how Estelle had made her pay when she stepped outside prescribed expectations.
“I felt trapped. Sonny seemed to understand. He called Grandmother ‘the old bat,’ said I needed to get away from her. He told me he’d take care of me, love me. I believed him. At first, we were happy. We moved into the basement apartment below his parents, and we had fun fixing it up. His mother started letting me help her do hair and nails in her salon, and I started to think, for a while, that maybe I’d become a beautician like her.”
“But?” Lydia sipped at her tea.
“It sort of bored me after a while.” Mary Beth shrugged. “Wilma is wonderful at her job. You know that. Everybody likes her, and she does good hair and is terrific with people.”
Lydia smiled at her. “Often we learn the work that’s happiest for us by trying different jobs. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“I suppose not, but I felt guilty that I didn’t love it like she did.” She paused. “Then it started making me throw up every time I came into the shop and we realized I was pregnant. I swear, I couldn’t even go in that shop the whole time I carried the twins without the salon smell making me simply green.”
Lydia laughed. “For me, it was the smell of gasoline. I had to practically hold my breath every time I got the car filled up.”
“Anyway, because I felt bored, I started walking down to the highway from the house to help out at the Harpers’ upholstery store.” Her eyes fired with enthusiasm. “Sonny’s father, Ray Harper, acted so sweet to me. He knew Sonny was traveling a lot with the band and that I felt at loose ends. At first he contrived little things for me to do just to be nice, but I quickly made a place for myself at the store. I organized the office, refurnished the reception room, sorted out all the files, brought order to the shop. You should have seen how awful it looked before I did.”
“I remember.” Lydia grinned. “Ray and his son Eric did exquisite upholstery work, but their store was a pit.”
“Not anymore. I got it clean and organized, started answering the phones, handling the incoming customers. Everybody began to notice, and business picked up for them. Ray started paying me. I worked for him full-time until the twins were born and part-time after, sometimes taking the babies down to the shop or getting Eric’s wife, Faye, to watch them.”
She dropped her eyes. “It really helped me. Sonny started traveling more and more with the Flat Ridge Boys.” Mary Beth twisted her hands. “He wasn’t happy I got pregnant, and he hated how I looked when I started showing. When the babies came, he complained when they cried at night or demanded so much of my time during the day. He began drinking and came home really drunk some nights. He didn’t act sweet to me at those times.”
Lydia leaned over in concern. “Did he hit you, Bee? Hurt you?”
“He never hit me, but he hollered at me. Seemed angry at me all the time, like it was all my fault I’d gotten pregnant. He really freaked out when he learned I was carrying twins. And, of course, I got huge.”
She sighed deeply. “Sonny took every opportunity to go on longer and longer trips after that. And he changed more and more. His brother, Eric, told me once that he thought Sonny and some of the boys in the band had started using drugs. Sonny often asked me for what little money I made working for his father.” She frowned. “Other times he just stole it. Sonny worked doing deliveries and pickups of furniture for the store, when he wasn’t on gigs with the band, but he started getting unreliable with everything. He acted so different, Mother. It scared me sometimes.”
“Why didn’t you go to your father?”
She hung her head. “I couldn’t. Grandmother was already mad at me for marrying Sonny. He wasn’t a farmer and he’d ruined her plans. When I tried to talk to her once—troubled about things with Sonny—she told me I’d ‘made my bed and had better learn to lie in it.’ ” Tears formed in her eyes. “She called me a disappointment, said all her grandchildren had failed in their responsibility to the farm and to the family, turned their backs on their legacy. Those words felt so harsh right then when my life was falling apart.”
Lydia’s heart hurt over her daughter’s words. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t have helped you more.”
“You tried. Your letters meant a lot to me in that period. Even if I didn’t answer them, I appreciated them. If only because you said you loved me.”
“I never stopped, not even for a minute.” Lydia reached across to touch her daughter’s cheek again.
“Mother, I thought so many times of our teas and how we talked and talked over the lovely Yorkshire or Earl Grey teas that your mother sent us. How we shared our hearts while nibbling homemade scones, pastries, or English biscuits—like these.”
Lydia smiled. “I order my tea and biscuits through a little import company online now. They have nice things. I’ll make you h
omemade scones again soon, the ones you like with the raisins.”
“I can almost taste them.”
Lydia leaned back in her chair. “Did Sonny stay in touch with you and the boys after he left? Does he come to see them or help you financially?”
“No to all. And when Daddy learned he deserted me, he came and brought me and the boys home. Billy Ray and Bucky weren’t even two yet, and Sonny simply took off to California and left us.”
She twisted her hands. “It was awful in some ways coming home to Main House and Grandmother, but it would have been worse to stay with the Harpers. They acted sweet to me, of course, but the whole situation grew terribly embarrassing. Sometimes I worried that they blamed me because Sonny had changed so much and took off from his home and family.”
“Oh, surely they didn’t.” Lydia rewrapped the loaf of poppy seed bread to keep it fresh. “I remember the Harpers being a nice family. It must grieve them that Sonny treated you as he did.”
“Yes,” she admitted. “But having me and the boys in their home proved to be a constant reminder. A constant hurt.”
“I was very proud to learn your father came to get you.”
Mary Beth rolled her eyes. “Yes, but you should have heard Grandmother rant and rave. But Daddy was clever. He told her the Cunninghams would get a bad name in the valley if they didn’t take care of their own in a crisis. That it might hurt the family business and our reputation.”
Lydia raised an eyebrow as Mary Beth continued.
“He pointed to the boys, sitting at the table in their high chairs, and told her, ‘Don’t be foolish, Mother—here are your heirs for the orchard. Surely you want these boys growing up on the farm. They’re our legacy.’ ” Mary Beth laughed. “That gave Grandmother a totally new perspective, and she quieted down. She started working to charm her way into the affections of those twins like she’d done to me once. Like she did with my brothers before they started talking about careers beyond farming—wanting to explore something different with their lives.”