Double Wedding Ring

by Peg Sutherland

  “Is it something you and Addy are working on?”

  Susan shook her head.

  “Maybe I should ask Betsy.”

  Susan shook her head again, this time more adamantly. “No! She doesn’t know.”

  But when she said it, the words felt like a lie. Her mother might know, said the voice inside her head, but she wouldn’t tell. Just as she wouldn’t tell other things. For Susan was convinced now that Betsy could fill all the holes in her memory, if she wanted to.

  But her mother was hiding things. That made Susan angry.

  “Okay,” Sam said. “Tell you what. You keep working, and put the quilt out of your mind. Just let your body take over and soon it’ll pull that memory right out for you.”

  Looking at him skeptically, Susan dragged herself back to a standing position. “Honestly?”

  “I’m sure of it.” He went after the foam ball and tossed it toward her, resuming their routine. “The brain doesn’t like to be pushed. But you can trick it. If it thinks you don’t care, it’ll try to tease you into caring by giving you a little more information.”

  She caught the ball, fascinated by the idea of tricking her brain into cooperating. “Really? Even my brain?”

  When he nodded, she threw the ball back. And tried not to worry about the quilt.

  The next day, the quilt still occupied her mind, and her brain had not dished up another single fact about it. Growing slightly petulant, Susan once again badgered Sam about the quilt. Finally he called Addy, and she brought over every book of quilt patterns she had in the house.

  “How about this one?” she would say, holding up a picture that Susan would reject.

  Susan saw one or two that were almost like the one in her head. But none of them were quite right. They were different colors. Or the circles didn’t fit together exactly as they had in her head. She was even beginning to see the tiny pattern of stitches, including the place near the center where a whole series of stitches had frayed and been replaced.

  That was the quilt she wanted to find, not one from all these pictures.

  “It’s not any of these,” she insisted. “The one I want is mine.“

  Addy and Sam exchanged perplexed looks. Then Addy opened one of her books one more time. “But does it look a little bit like this one?”

  Grudgingly, Susan said, “Maybe. A little.”

  Addy and Sam sighed.

  “So it might be a—” Sam leaned over the book “—a Double Wedding Ring?”

  “What is going on here?”

  All three of them jumped at Betsy’s accusatory voice.

  “We’re trying to find out about a quilt Susan remembers,” Sam said.

  Betsy’s perpetually displeased face looked perceptibly more displeased. “All this—” she waved at the piles of books scattered on the dining room floor “—all this over a quilt? Land’s sakes! If Susan wants a quilt, all you have to do is say. I have plenty upstairs.”

  Susan was already shaking her head, but Sam stood. “Let’s bring ‘em down.”

  “Fine,” Betsy said. “I’ll go get one.”

  “Not one,” Sam said, following her toward the stairs. “All of them.”

  “All of them? Why, you must be—”

  “I’ll help, Mrs. Foster. Just show me where they are.”

  Susan heard her mother protesting all the way up the stairs, then all the way back down again a few minutes later. Sam came into the dining room loaded down with quilts, which he dropped onto the floor at Susan’s feet. Log Cabins in brown and yellow. A Texas Star in shades of blue. A Bicentennial sampler quilt in red, white and blue. A half-dozen quilts in all.

  None of them was the one Susan wanted.

  “She said it was one she made,” Addy pressed, looking up at Betsy. “In rose and green. Maybe a Double Wedding Ring. Does that ring a bell?”

  Betsy sighed sharply. “Am I now expected to remember every single project she ever worked on? This is ridiculous. If you want a quilt, take one of these and let it rest.”

  Frustrated, Susan said, “You could lie about this, too. I know you could.”

  “You are behaving like a spoiled child,” Betsy snapped, then turned with rigid dignity and left the room.

  Addy stayed after Sam left, clearing away the quilts and the books and wheeling Susan out to the side porch.

  “Let’s sit out here and watch the leaves fall while I tell you about Danny’s big promotion,” Addy said. “How about that?”

  Susan barely listened to Addy’s news about her husband’s promotion to production manager at the paper plant. But she was grateful for her friend’s presence.

  That night, before she went to bed, Malorie came in to say good-night. No one had told Malorie about the incident that afternoon, but Susan wanted to. She remembered how much she and her daughter once talked. She wanted that back, but she wasn’t sure right now how to go about it.

  All she could think to say was, “Am I a spoiled child?”

  Malorie immediately sat on the edge of her bed. “Oh, Mother, why ever would you think that?”

  “Am I?”

  “Of course not. You’re brave and strong, and I don’t see how I could ever fight as hard as you have.”

  “Then why doesn’t anyone like me?” Betsy wasn’t the only one who glared at her with that cold look in her eyes. Susan remembered the look in Tag’s eyes, too.

  “Oh, Mother, people love you. I love you. Cody loves you. And Grandmother loves you, too. I know she does.”

  Even in the darkness, Susan could see the glimmer in her daughter’s eyes. “Are you crying?”

  “Maybe just a little.”

  “I wish you were happy.”

  “I’m happy.”

  “You could be happy with Sam. Sam likes you.”

  Malorie was silent and looked away for a moment. “Sam isn’t... It wouldn’t be a good idea for Sam to like me.”

  “Yes, it would.”

  “Mother? Do you...do you remember...when Cody was born?”

  Susan sighed. “I don’t think so. Was I very happy?”

  Again, there was a long silence. When she spoke, Malorie’s voice had a choked sound. “I...I think so. Of course you were. Very happy.”

  * * *

  MALORIE WORKED HARD the next morning to get the four-pack trays of pansies lined up perfectly on the shelves in the front of the store. If the rest of her life was in chaos, the things under her control at Hutchins’ Lawn & Garden would be in perfect order.

  Some days she prayed that her mother would hurry up and remember. Everything. Because carrying the secret had been easier when she shared it with her mother. Then it had seemed to Malorie like a difficult but wise decision. Better for everyone involved.

  Now it just seemed like an ugly lie, lurking in the darkness and growing uglier by the day. Waiting to burst into the light and destroy everyone it touched.

  You watched too many soap operas while Mother was in the hospital, she told herself, pulling down the torn sign below the bin of ornamental cabbages and taking it to the front to letter another one.

  Other days, she prayed Susan never remembered. Because Susan was too unpredictable. If she remembered in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner just weeks from now, she’d likely blurt it right out there for everyone to scoop up with their sweet potato casserole and corn bread dressing.

  Malorie’s stomach was in a knot from worrying about it. But the person she’d always confided in, always trusted to know what to do, had been taken from her.

  If there was anything she prayed for every day, it was Susan’s recovery. Is a twenty-one-year-old supposed to want her mother this badly? she wondered.

  She studied the sign. Buy One, Second Half-Price. Tag had been skeptical when she’d suggested trying a number of different special offers to see which one sparked the most sales. But he’d given her the go-ahead.

  She’d tried, these past few days, not to be angry at her boss. But it wasn’t easy after the way he’d treated
her mother. He’d been almost mean, it had seemed to her. But then, she kept remembering the things he’d said, and the way he’d asked if Betsy Foster was still running the show. And the way Susan, in her confusion, had answered in the affirmative.

  Something kept telling Susan to set him straight. But she was worried stirring things up would only hurt her mother. Might anger her grandmother or her boss. She was tired of having things stirred up.

  She was tacking the new sign to the shelf when she heard the jingle of the bell over the front door. Grateful for the distraction, she dredged up her best store-manager smile and walked toward the front.

  Sam stood beside the colorful display of gourds and pumpkins she’d spilled out onto a table, hoping to capture the fancy of anyone ready to decorate for Thanksgiving. Malorie’s heart gave a leap. For a moment, she toyed with the coincidence that Sam had showed up just when she was wishing for someone to confide in. The crazy notion came into her head that his arrival in the store was no coincidence at all.

  I could confide in Sam. He could be my friend.

  Then he turned, saw her, and his face lit up with a smile that sent a tingle from the top of her head all the way to the tips of her toes. Her heart sank, for she knew right then that Sam could never be her friend. Other things, maybe, but never a friend. And she couldn’t handle other things.

  “Isn’t it time to start closing up?” he asked, taking a step in her direction.

  Malorie glanced over his shoulder at the old-fashioned clock. “In ten minutes.”

  “So close up early. I carry a little weight with the owner.”

  Malorie smiled. “I can’t do that. What if someone is a block away right now, headed this way to spend a thousand dollars on gourds and pumpkins?”

  Sam glanced at the display. “Then I think you’re understocked.” He took another couple of steps in her direction. “I’m here on a mission.”

  “Oh?”

  He nodded. “Maxine called me today. Said she’d heard the Christmas trees were in.”

  Malorie pointed toward the rear of the store, where the glass door opened onto the fenced back lot. “The live ones are in.”

  “Good. Help me pick one out.” He took her by the hand and started toward the back. “For the church. We want the best tree you’ve got for our angel tree.”

  With Sam’s big hand closed around hers, Malorie could barely remember the discussion about the pink and blue paper angels that would be used to decorate the tree, each printed with information about a needy child in the county. Members of the congregation would be urged to select an angel—or several angels—and buy appropriate gifts to place under the tree. Being part of the project had excited Malorie. But not as much as being touched by Sam.

  They stood in the back lot, where the sun had already dipped below the roof of the building, leaving them in dusky shadows. Sam had draped his arm around Malorie’s shoulder. Casually.

  She wondered if he felt casual. Or did he feel the way she felt? As if she’d been struck by a sudden power surge.

  “Which one do you like best?” he asked.

  Malorie wished she could trust her voice. She cleared her throat and said, “I’m always partial to the little scraggly ones. The ones with the bare spots and the lopsided tops.”

  Even in the shadows, she could see the sparkle of interest in his eyes when he looked down at her. She wished he weren’t so close. She wished she had the courage to move away herself.

  “Now why is that, Malorie Hovis?”

  “I figure they’re the ones that need the decorations most.”

  She grew warm inside as the slow smile spread across his face.

  “Ah, a redemptive bent. I like that in a woman. Especially in a woman with freckles on her nose.”

  “When you have freckles on your nose, you can’t afford to be too frivolous.”

  “I noticed that about you right away.”

  “You did?”

  He nodded. “I think it was the day I came to the house and found you lying in the front yard letting Cody’s puppy lick your nose while Cody tickled your feet. Bare feet, at that. In November.”

  Malorie ducked her head. “Shoes are for the timid, the stodgy, the unimaginative.”

  “A redeemer and an adventuress.” Sam lifted her chin and looked into her eyes. “Are you adventurous, Malorie?”

  His eyes challenged her, promised imminent adventure. Suddenly unable to breathe, Malorie backed away.

  “Not really,” she said. “I’m probably not at all who you think I am.”

  “Then, who are you?”

  Again the urge to tell him swept over her, set her heart racing even faster than his touch. She called herself a fool and gestured toward the rows of evergreens. “I’ll turn on the light. I think I know the perfect tree.”

  Twenty minutes later, Malorie had locked up the store, helped Sam load a ten-foot Scotch pine into his van and was helping him haul it into the church vestibule. Working quietly in the hushed emptiness of the church, they set the burlap-bound root ball of the tree in the galvanized washtub Maxine had left out for them, then draped the tub in the red-and-green flounces Addy Mayfield had made.

  “It looks better already,” Sam said, stepping back to regard the tree.

  Malorie was careful to keep an arm’s length away from him. “Wait until we lavish a little attention on it,” she said.

  “That’s all it takes for most of us. A little TLC.”

  He took another step in her direction and Malorie sought a diversion. “Like Mother,” she said. “Is that part of your prescription for your patients?”

  Disappointment briefly flickered across his face. “I’m glad you brought her up. I’d almost forgotten, but that’s one of the reasons I came by this afternoon.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing, really.” He frowned, and paced a few steps into the sanctuary. “She’s asking for a quilt. More than asking, really. She’s starting to obsess over it. Sometimes people with this kind of injury can’t let go of an idea as easily as you or I can.”

  “The Double Wedding Ring?”

  Sam’s face brightened. “You know the one she’s talking about?”

  Malorie leaned against the back of the last row of pews. “I know the one. It was always her favorite. But it’s gone. Lost in the accident, I guess. We’d just had a picnic. It was in the car.”

  Now another kind of disappointment settled onto Sam’s face. “That’s too bad.”

  “Should I tell her?”

  “If she asks about it again, I think we’ll have to tell her.”

  Anxiety clutched at Malorie’s stomach. “It’s going to upset her, isn’t it?”

  “Probably.”

  “I don’t want to set her back again. She’s just getting her fight back.”

  “I know. What happened? Do you know?”

  Malorie shook her head. “No, unless it was her outing with Addy.” She told him about the afternoon the two women spent going up and down Main Street. She hesitated, remembering how the afternoon had ended. “Do you know—how well Mr. Hutchins knew Mother?”

  “Tag? They grew up across the street from each other. He was friends with your Uncle Steve. He and Susan dated when they were kids. Why?”

  Malorie told him then, both about the Sunday morning Tag had argued with Betsy and the afternoon Susan came into the store. Sam frowned.

  “I’ll find out,” he said. “Tag doesn’t need to be running around making Susan’s life more difficult right now.”

  “Thanks, Sam. I know I probably worry too much.”

  “It’s understandable. She’s your mother. You want her to be better.”

  “She was... I miss talking to her, you know? We were close. It’s like losing my mother and my best friend.”

  Sam stepped close again, but this time Malorie was trapped against the pew. “You shouldn’t isolate yourself, Malorie.”

  “I know. But—” She shrugged.

  “You need
some substitutes for what Susan can’t give you right now. I can’t be a mother-figure. But I could be a friend.”

  “Sam, I—”

  “Give me one good reason why I couldn’t be a friend.”

  “You don’t know me, Sam.”

  “You won’t give me a chance.”

  She looked up at him, wishing she knew how to explain. But sometimes it didn’t make sense, even to her. People make mistakes. They do what they can to fix them. Why was it the thing she’d done to fix her mistake seemed to have left her more trapped than the mistake itself?

  “I like you, Malorie,” he said softly. “I don’t put the rush on the daughters of all my patients, you know. Just give it a chance.”

  She wanted to tell him she liked him, too. But then what defense did she have? How, then, to explain that she could be neither friend nor lover?

  “Susan trusts me,” he said, moving closer and putting one hand on her shoulder. With the other, he touched her hair. “Why can’t you?”

  “It isn’t that.”

  “Then, what?”

  His fingers brushed against her temple, lightly feathering her curls away from her face. A tickle of sensation curled low in her belly. She closed her eyes, afraid for him to see her weakness. Afraid to feel it, even.

  The touch of his lips on hers didn’t surprise her. For a moment, she allowed herself the pleasure of that warmth, that softness. She didn’t lean into the kiss but she didn’t, for the moment, retreat, either. She let her lips soften against Sam’s, felt the heat sinking deeper into her, sending sensations rippling through her.

  How sweet it would be...

  And how impossible.

  The instant she felt his lips part, she drew away. “I’d better go.”

  He stepped back, shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his white slacks. “If that’s the way you want it.”

  She couldn’t even answer. She only nodded and walked past him as quickly as she could, afraid that if he tried to stop her she wouldn’t have the courage to keep going.

  * * *

  HOW MANY TIMES, Tag asked himself, had he sat beneath this very tree staring at the Foster house, waiting?

  Too many times to be doing it again, he told himself.