This was how she’d slowly added more pieces to the puzzle about the money. Anna would sometimes talk to her friends about how Karla’s aunts and uncles and even her grandmother and grandfather Becker had taken Karla and her sisters in to live with them because of the money. But then not even the money was enough. Three girls were too much work.
Gleaning the bits of painful information by eavesdropping became a secret addiction. Every other Wednesday when the card club was there, Karla was in her room, sitting on the floor, her back to the wall beside the open door, her eyes closed in concentration. The four women had been friends for over twenty-five years and were as close, and at times as contentious, as Karla and her own sisters. They told each other everything, a lot of it embarrassing to a somewhat naive and innocent fifteen-year-old.
One particular summer afternoon was forever imprinted on Karla’s memory, however. It was one of those moments that remain as clear as yesterday, as piercing as sunlight after rain. Every word of Rachel Winslow’s gravely voiced sentences reached Karla as she sat with a book in her lap and listened. “You were right to step in when you did before all that money was gone, even if it did mean you had to take all three of them. Marie was your daughter. You deserved that money.”
Anna’s reply was lost in the sound of Karla’s heartbeat as it thundered deafeningly in her ears. That afternoon was the last time Karla sat at the top of the stairs to listen to Anna and her friends. She’d heard enough to last a lifetime. Not until Karla was older had she understood that “the money” she’d heard talked about at both her grandparents’ homes had to do with life insurance and lawsuits. Her parents’ car was hit by a man driving a Mercedes. He was drunk and undeniably at fault. She had no idea how much the settlement had been, only that it must have been a lot and that neither she nor her sisters had ever received a dime directly.
Anna greeted Karla with a forced cheerfulness as she appeared at the doorway. “Good morning. How did you sleep in your old bed?”
“Fine—until the birds started in. I forgot how noisy they could be.”
“I guess I’m just so used to them I don’t hear them anymore. Come sit down.” She motioned for Karla to come all the way into the kitchen. “Have a cup of coffee and talk to me while I finish making breakfast for us.”
“Don’t bother fixing anything for me. I haven’t eaten breakfast for years.” She stuffed her hands into the pockets of her terry cloth robe. “And I brought my own coffee.” Realizing how needlessly cruel she sounded, she added, “It’s a special blend I make up at the shop to get me going in the morning.” And then, as an afterthought, “Would you like to try some?”
Anna smiled. “This special blend of yours wouldn’t be called Self-Preservation, would it?”
Karla wasn’t sure how to respond. Considering the circumstances of the visit, she hadn’t expected Anna to put on a show of cheerfulness. But if Anna was going to make an effort, she could, too. “I’m sorry. I’ve become a bit of a snob when it comes to coffee. I tell myself it comes with the territory, but I was that way before I owned the shop.”
“Are you sure you won’t have some breakfast with me? I’ve already made it up, or at least the batter. It won’t take but a minute to heat up the griddle.”
“I told you, I never eat—” God, she was so inflexible. What possible difference would it make if she let Anna have her way about something as inconsequential as breakfast? “Sure. Why not?”
Anna opened the oven to take out the ancient cast-iron griddle she stored there, hesitating a fraction of a second too long for the chore to look as effortless as she tried to make it seem. “You still like French toast, don’t you?”
“I don’t know. It’s been years since I’ve had any.” Karla took the bread and batter out of the refrigerator and put it on the counter. “It’s Heather’s favorite.”
“I thought it was yours,” Anna said softly.
“Mine is pecan waffles.”
Anna thought for a minute. “I don’t remember ever making pecan waffles.”
“You never did. Mom used to make them for me.”
“You should have told me.”
“It wasn’t important.” Karla lit the burner, then adjusted the flame. “I figured when I got my own place I’d learn how to make them for myself.”
“And did you?”
“Never did. Sometimes when I’m eating breakfast out and see them on the menu I’ll give it a try, but I’m always disappointed.” Why this morning—after all this time—was she telling Anna about her mother’s pecan waffles?
“With me it’s peanut butter fudge.”
“I don’t remember Mom ever making peanut butter fudge.”
“My mother made it. Your great-grandmother. It was her own recipe. I spent years trying to duplicate it, but finally gave up.” She glanced up at Karla and smiled. “I’m looking forward to my mother meeting me at the pearly gates with a great big hug and a pan of fudge.”
“When did she die?”
“A week to the day before your mother was born. It broke my heart that she never got to know her granddaughter. They would have been such great friends—as I’m sure they are now. Frank and I had picked out the name Marie Lynne for your mother, but when Frank filled out the birth certificate, he changed it to Marie Karla after my mother.”
Karla felt a jolt of surprise followed by a peculiar, compelling connection to the woman who’d also carried her mother’s name. “No one ever told me.”
“Your mother knew she was named after her grandmother, but I never told her how it came to be. I didn’t want her to know how sad I was when she was born.”
Karla smelled something hot and remembered she’d turned the fire on under the pan. She reached over to turn off the burner.
Anna waved her off. “You go on up and get your coffee. I’ll take care of this.”
“It can wait until tomorrow. I suppose one cup of the stuff you’ve been drinking all these years won’t leave too many permanent scars on my palate.”
Anna yielded the stove and instead set the table. “Have I ever told you I take credit for your going into the coffee business?”
“Oh?” Karla stopped dipping bread to glance at Anna. “And why is that?”
“I was the one who taught you to appreciate a really good cup of coffee.”
Karla was no more prepared for humor from Anna than she had been for the family history, and it took a minute for her to understand she was being teased. She didn’t know how to respond, and emotion came before words. She was angry. “It’s too late for us to become friends, Anna. You might as well save your time and energy for something that matters.”
“It’s my time and my energy,” she snapped back. “I’ll spend it and use it as I see fit.”
“You never have listened to me about anything. I don’t know why it should be any different now.” She shoved the spatula under a piece of toast and flipped it over. If she had anywhere else to go, she would leave that day. It didn’t matter to Anna whether or not her estate was in order; why should Karla care?
“How long did you say you were going to be here?”
“A month. Heather said you were only up to working a couple of hours a day, so I figured it would take at least that long to get everything done.” Her answer rang true, but lacked logic. Most of what had to be done, Karla could do alone.
“Oh, at least.”
She’d agreed too easily. Karla grew suspicious. “There are some things I want to get settled between us first. I was going to wait until later to bring them up, but since we’re headed in that direction now, we might as well get them out of the way.”
Karla stopped to finish the French toast and put it on plates before she went on. Facing Anna, looking her directly in the eye, she said, “Just so you know—I haven’t come here to make sure I get ‘my share.’ I don’t want to be included in your will. As a matter of fact, there isn’t one thing you have that I want.”
“Then you can give it away for
all I care,” Anna said. She took the syrup and butter out of the refrigerator and dropped them on the table. “There is no way I’m going to take you out of my will. I’m not saying there’s anything I’m leaving that’s worth having, but what’s here is one-third yours. Now, if the real reason you came was to badger me until you got your way, you might as well pack up right now and head back to that fancy little town of yours.”
By the time she’d finished, Anna was holding onto the side of the table and fighting for every breath. For the first time Karla saw real evidence of Anna’s crippled heart, and it scared the hell out of her.
“Sit down,” Karla said, her fear making it sound like a command rather than a request. “I’ll get what we need.”
Anna lowered herself into the chair. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have yelled at you.”
“You’re supposed to stay calm? Is that what the doctor told you?”
It was a moment before Anna answered. “My God, Karla, is that what you really think?” Several seconds passed before she quietly added, “Have we always been like this with each other?”
“I don’t understand what you mean.”
“That’s exactly what I mean. It’s as if we’re having two completely different conversations. The doctor had nothing to do with why I shouldn’t have yelled at you. I can’t even come up with a reason you would think that except you believe I’m so caught up in myself I can’t see you standing in front of me.” Anna paused to catch her breath. “We have this one month left to us. Why would I want you to go the rest of your life remembering me yelling at you?”
Karla could feel herself being pulled into the drama of Anna’s dying, something she’d thought about long and hard before leaving home and had sworn she would not let happen. To do so was the worst kind of hypocrisy. For all of her faults, for all of the things she would change about herself if she could, there was one she wouldn’t. She was not, and never had been, a hypocrite. “How we are now is the way we have always been, Anna. Sad, maybe, but honest.”
Anna reached across the table to touch Karla’s hand. “I can’t leave it like this between us. Your mother will never forgive me.”
It was everything Karla could do to leave her hand under Anna’s. “My mother has nothing to do with how we feel about each other. And she doesn’t care. If there is a heaven, and you do get there, the two of you will be so busy talking about Heather and Grace, you’ll forget all about me.”
“Oh, my dear, sweet Karla, don’t you know you’ll be the first person we talk about?”
Now she did take her hand back. “Don’t play those games with me. All I’m saying is that people talk about the people who are important to them. If you think it bothers me that I’m not your favorite, you couldn’t be more wrong. You’re not my favorite person either, Anna. Being related doesn’t mean you have to like someone. All we owe each other is loyalty. That’s why I’m here.”
Anna couldn’t tell whether her heart was failing or breaking. She only knew that the pain in her chest was worse than it had ever been. How could she not have known how Karla felt? When the three of them had come to her, Heather and Grace had been so easy to love, so needy after two years of being emotionally ignored. Karla had only been angry.
“I owe you so much more than loyalty,” Anna said. “If I could I would give you your childhood to live all over again.”
“Why? Are you saying there’s something wrong with the way I turned out?”
Anna put her hand to her heart and pressed, an automatic, futile gesture she’d adopted months ago to try to help her struggling heart. Responding to the alarmed look in Karla’s eyes, she dropped her hand and said, “It’s nothing, just a catch in the muscle or some such thing, happens all the time.”
“Isn’t there something they can give you?” Her anger had turned to concern.
“I’m sure there is. It’s just that I’m taking so many pills now I lose track of what they’re all for. I’d just as soon not add another one if I can get along without it.”
“You shouldn’t be living here alone.”
“I’m not. You’re here with me.”
“Only for a month.”
“Susan—”
“I know. Susan has been terrific, but you’re going to need someone full-time eventually. Or you’re going to have to take Heather up on her offer to have you move in with her.”
“I have other friends, too. Since I sold my car, there’s always someone calling to see if I need anything or want to go somewhere.”
“I thought most of your friends were gone. At least that’s what Heather told me.”
Anna had expected the subject to come up, just not so soon. She struggled for an answer, knowing how easily the wrong words could thrust them into the middle of yet another argument.
“I know it’s something I’ll have to consider one of these days, but I’m not ready yet. This isn’t just a house to me, Karla, it’s my home.” It was suddenly deeply important that Karla understand what Anna was trying to tell her. “Your grandfather planted every tree in the yard and painted and papered every room in the house. When I leave here it will be like leaving him. I’m well aware that when I’m gone, this place will be torn down and something big and beautiful and impressive built in its place—just like all the other houses on this street. No one wants a house like this anymore. I don’t blame them. I just don’t want to be around when it happens.”
“Then we’ll look for someone to hire to stay with you when it’s time.”
The statement brought a dichotomy of feelings. Anna had expected to have to put up a fight to be allowed to die at home. She was relieved at how easily Karla had conceded the point, yet a little sad, too. She didn’t want the last face she saw to belong to a stranger. “I’m not sure who you would call for something like that, but there must be an agency. There is for everything else.”
“You’re going to have to let Heather know you won’t be staying with her. She’s expecting you.”
“I know, and I love her for caring so much.” Heather was Anna’s bright spot, her success story, the child she’d managed to bring through the crisis of childhood with the fewest scars. She knew Karla would take her words as criticism, but Anna would not hold back from one granddaughter to save the feelings of another.
Not now. She’d tried for twenty years to put her words and thoughts for her granddaughters on a mental justice scale, trying to give to each equally. It hadn’t worked.
Anna reached for the syrup and poured a thin layer over her French toast. “Can you imagine Heather trying to take care of me and Jamie and Jason and the new baby all at the same time?”
“I’ll talk to Grace,” Karla said. “Maybe she can arrange her schedule to come up to stay awhile.”
That was as likely to happen as a permanent truce at the bird feeder. Anna had no illusions about Grace. She’d been taken care of so long and by so many people she’d never learned to take care of herself, let alone anyone else. “I haven’t heard from her in a month or so.” It had been more like three. “How is she doing?”
“She told me she talked to you just last week.”
Even knowing it was a mistake, as usual, Anna covered for Grace. “Oh, did she? I must have forgotten.”
They finished their breakfast in silence.
When it was obvious Anna would eat no more, Karla got up to clear the dishes. At the sink, her back to Anna, she asked in the breezy, impersonal tone they usually used with each other, “Do you have anything on your schedule for today?”
“A doctor’s appointment. Susan said she would take me.”
“What time?”
“Eleven-thirty.”
“Give her a call and tell her that I’ll take you. I assume you’re still going to that guy in Granite Bay?”
“I haven’t seen him in months. He referred me to a cardiologist in Sacramento.”
“He couldn’t come up with one a little closer?”
“If it’s going to be a problem f
or you to take me, Susan—”
Karla turned around to face Anna. “Look, I think if we both give a little and don’t jump on everything the other one says, we might make it through the month without constantly being at each other’s throats. Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“Now, how long does it take you to get ready?”
“A half hour.” No, that was how long it used to take. “Better make that an hour.”
“It doesn’t take me near that long, so why don’t you get started while I finish the kitchen?”
Anna nodded. She placed her hands on the table, leaned forward and slowly stood. “After what’s happened this morning, I know it might be hard for you to believe this, but I’m glad you’re here.”
“You knew I’d show up sooner or later. I’m the controlling one, the one with the compulsive need to put things in order. That’s what you meant last night when you said you’d been waiting for me.”
“There are things left unsettled between us, Karla. You may not know that here . . .” She touched her forehead with her finger. “But you do here. . . .” She put her hand over her heart. “You don’t want me to leave before we take care of them any more than I do.”
“I’m sorry, Anna, but you’re wrong. I came here because I knew it would be easier to do what has to be done now than to have to do it later.”
“I never gave you your answer last night,” Anna said.
“About what?”
“Whether I wanted you to go or stay.”
“I didn’t expect an answer. I don’t need one.”
“Some things need to be said out loud anyway. I want you to stay, Karla—through the fights, through it all. I’ve never asked anything from you before. I’m asking now.”
“I’ll be here as long as I can, but I can’t stay away from the shop forever.”
“That’s okay. I don’t have forever.”
Chapter
5
Things Remembered Page 4