Homecoming in November (The Calendar Girls Book 3)

by Gina Ardito

  Memories rushed around my brain, whipped into a frenzy at Iggy’s words. It’s just odd that she wouldn’t know what David planned. After all, she was his wife. She had to be in on it. She had to know something. My skin grew clammy. My heart pounded, and my pulse rate sped up.

  “I wondered if you might have noticed any changes in her condition,” Iggy said. “Something we could’ve missed? Did her color look off to you? Did she seem subdued or in pain at all? I just can’t figure it out. Dr. Humphrey thinks maybe it was an embolism or something. He says, often, there are no signs beforehand. I thought, maybe, you being a doctor, and like I said, you were alone with her…”

  Why didn’t she notice anything? A man is that desperate, there ought to be signs. Sleeplessness, bill collectors calling…something. She should’ve seen something. She had to be in on it.

  With my legs shaking so hard my knees buckled, I sank onto the couch, hugging myself to keep the shivers at bay. “Is that what you’re really asking me?”

  “Of course. What else would I be asking?”

  The words spilled from my lips, bitter and heated. “Are you sure you’re not wondering if I somehow tampered with her I.V., or slipped some poison into her water pitcher? After all, I was ‘alone with her for such a long time.’”

  “Jayne.” He knelt in front of me and clasped my hand. “Don’t. Don’t go back there. I’m not accusing you of anything. Please. Come on. Stay with me. I need you now.”

  His plea pulled me back to the present, reminding of my promise to his mother to take care of him. I shook myself, shedding the past the way a dog sheds water, and took a deep breath.

  But I’d made another promise to her, as well. That one, I would have to break. No secrets. After all David had put me through, I wouldn’t begin a relationship with Iggy while a secret hung between us. No matter how inconsequential that secret might be.

  “Your mom could speak English,” I blurted. “We talked yesterday. That’s why I was in her room for so long. She wanted to know my story. And I told her. I told her all of it. She listened and she believed me. I think…” I swallowed. “I think she wanted to make sure I would take care of you when she no longer could. She didn’t want you to be alone once she died.”

  He sat next to me, his eyes wide with shock. “Wait. Back up. What are you saying? That you and she talked? That my mom talked to you? You held a conversation? In English?”

  I nodded.

  “Why didn’t she ever tell me? Or Irenka?”

  “She said it served you right for thinking she was an idiot who couldn’t pick up a language after fifty years. And besides, English is an ugly language. She said she preferred Polish.”

  He smiled—a real, genuine Iggy smile that soon evolved into deep, satisfied chuckles. He turned his gaze to the ceiling again, “Oh, Mom, you must be having a real good laugh at my expense right now.”

  I waited until he’d composed himself again before I told him the rest. “She said she was ready, Iggy. She wanted to be with her husband again.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me this yesterday?”

  “I couldn’t.”

  “You should have!”

  “How? She didn’t want you to know we’d talked at all. How creepy would it have been…” My throat constricted, and tears filled my eyes. “…for me to walk out of her room and tell you and your sister I had a feeling your mother wouldn’t make it through the night? Like some kind of Grim Reaper representative? Or worse…”

  Unable to continue, I sobbed. I cried for Iggy, for his sister, for the love they’d lost upon the death of their mother. And I’m sorry to admit I was selfish enough to cry for myself, for all that I’d lost upon David’s death. Nowadays, I constantly worried people would suspect me of ulterior motives and name me as the number one suspect in any transgression.

  “Or worse, that you’d tampered with her I.V. or slipped poison into her water pitcher,” he repeated for me.

  I nodded.

  He wrapped an arm around me, pulled me up against him, shielding me, holding me. “I wish I could take those doubts from you. I realize why it’s where your mind goes. It’s your PTSD—just like when a car muffler backfires or sirens shriek behind me, I automatically reach for my weapon. If I happen to hear them in the middle of the night, I wake up screaming—a sound you’re familiar with. In your case, any death that occurs near you is going to make you think you’re somehow responsible. But, Jayne, I would never think you capable of murder. You’re someone I’ve come to admire for your compassion, your capacity for forgiveness, and the inordinate amount of love you have to offer.”

  I shook my head. “You know it’s gonna come up,” I murmured against his chest. “Someone’s going to make the connection that I was the last person to see her before she died and say, ‘Hey, isn’t she the woman whose husband died and they suspected she had something to do with it? I bet she did something to kill the old lady, too.’”

  “No, they won’t. Because it’s not true. I was in with her after you left. So was Irenka. And her doctor, several nurses, our neighbors, the priest. You were hardly the last person to see her or have contact with her. She was in no distress, and she passed quietly in the night. I guess she wanted to be sure she went on her own terms. That was Mom, stubborn right to the end.”

  “I really didn’t think she’d pass away overnight. Her doctor said she was going home. You all thought she was going home. Just because she said she was ready to move on didn’t mean she was right.”

  “Hmmph. Nobody disagreed with my mother. Not even her doctors.”

  The tears slipped from my eyes to roll down my cheeks. “I’m sorry, Iggy. I’m so sorry.”

  He placed my head on his shoulder and ran his hand over my hair. “Don’t be. Knowing she wanted to go makes it easier to bear somehow. What exactly did she tell you?”

  I sat up and gave him the rundown on our conversation, taking special care to mention all the good she had to say about him and how much she’d loved him. When I finished, I squeezed his hand. “I’m here for you, Iggy. For as long as you need me.”

  “I’ll always need you.”

  To confirm his declaration, he captured my lips with his. His kiss was fierce, demanding. I demanded right back, as if we’d both concluded the time for subtlety and timidity had long gone. He sought affirmation of life, having just lost someone dear to him. I sought affirmation life could still have passion, and all the mess of emotions that went along with it. We clung to each other, our bodies fused in a connection of need and desire.

  I broke the kiss and stared at this man who’d rescued me from a half-life of hiding and nursing old wounds. “Let’s go upstairs,” I murmured against his cheek.

  This time, it was his turn to say, “Okay.”

  Chapter 20

  Terri

  The hideous flyers I’d found a few weeks ago returned the next day—with a vengeance. I’d come in early to get a jump on the morning routine and first noticed the dumpster in the back lot, wallpapered with them. My stomach pitched on the first wave of nausea. I’d have to peel them off before the rest of the staff arrived.

  Averting my gaze from the multiple images and ugly black words, I hurried inside the shop through the back door that led to the kitchen. The sunny mood I’d started out with plummeted to morose and resentful.

  Just when I thought the town had forgiven me for my past, a harsh reminder slapped me in the face. No, Terri. You’re still the village drunken idiot. I dreaded what I’d see when I opened the shop’s front entrance.

  The stainless gleamed as I flipped on the light, hurting my eyes. Tears stung, but I wiped them away with my fists. I would not cry. No matter what happened. No crying, no drinks, no calling for help. I would face this problem head-on. I foraged around in the toolbox in the utility room until I found one of those retractable thingies with a razor blade. That would take care of the dumpster.

  I left the kitchen, and on leaden feet, trudged toward the sitting area. No li
ght greeted my eyes. Strange. While not a warm day, the sun was out. Maybe a big truck on Main Street blocked the rays from hitting my windows?

  I knew the truth, but couldn’t face it. Not yet.

  Not until the very last minute.

  The flyers covered my storefront windows and the entrance door. Outside, they wrapped around the lampposts from my shop to the corner. Hundreds of copies of one of my worst drunken moments, with me face down in the azalea bushes, littered Main Street under the bold black headline, Is This The Kind of Business Owner We Want in Snug Harbor?

  “You’re not going to scare me away,” I told the invisible fiend who’d created this mess and set to work removing all of them.

  To my relief, I discovered the flyers were all attached to their various sites with adhesive tape, removable with a bit of effort. For the next hour and a half, I scraped and peeled until I had most of them in a stack too big to hold in my fist. In fact, as I worked on the ones on the lampposts, I had to place the pile of previously removed pages on the sidewalk and weight them down with a rock. It was monotonous work, and the entire time I was forced to look at the pathetic mess I’d been that day. Over and over and over…

  Thank you, whoever you are. In your attempt to be malicious, you became inspirational instead. Because with that image now firmly branded in my brain, never to be forgotten, I can promise you I won’t ever take another sip of alcohol as long as I live. There is no problem, no bad memory, no pain that can be healed by winding up with my too-curvy butt waving in the air like a flag billowing in the wind while my face lies smushed in a hedgerow of pretty pink flowers and scratchy branches. Years from now, I would still taste the dirt in my mouth, feel the mulch in my hair, from that day.

  Satisfied I’d retrieved all the flyers from the front of the building, I proceeded to the rear lot, in time to see Gary climbing out of his car, his gaze fixed on the papers covering the dumpster. “Terri? What the heck is this?”

  I shrugged. “I think it’s pretty obvious. Our mad flyer fiend is back and wants everyone to know it.” I hefted the stack of pages in my hands. “I just took all of these off Main Street.”

  He took the stack from me and deposited them in the dumpster, then pulled me into his embrace. “Aw, ma puce, I’m sorry about this.”

  “I’m not.” I told him my thoughts on the flyers, and he squeezed me tight. “I see it as incentive to make sure I don’t wind up in that situation ever again. It’s become my inspiration.”

  “It’s a nuisance. I’ll call Sam Dillon. See if he can find out who’s behind it and put a stop to it.”

  “I don’t think ‘nuisance’ constitutes a police matter.”

  “It is when it restricts our ability to conduct business.”

  I shook my head. “I’d prefer you let it go, if that’s okay with you. Whoever did this is looking for some kind of reaction from me. I’d rather not give it to him or her.”

  “You sure you’re okay?”

  “Uh-huh. Oh, don’t get me wrong. I’m mortified about who might have seen them. And I’d love to find out who put them up all over town and why they have this vendetta against me. Maybe it’s the owner of the azaleas I killed that day? Mrs. O’Reilly?” Mrs. O’Reilly was eighty-three years old and confined to a wheelchair. Somehow, I doubt she hired a “flyer hit man.” I waved off my own speculation. “Whatever. Come on. Let’s get to work.”

  The day went off without a hitch, and I totally forgot about the flyers. Until the next morning, when I saw them again. This time, they numbered in the thousands. They were on every storefront, every lamppost, on both sides of Main Street, for at least half a mile. I stood on the sidewalk, staring at the long line of flyers, my mind reeling. Who hated me this much? What on earth had I done, and how could I possibly make amends?

  “We’ll take them down,” Gary said from behind me. I turned and found him an inch away, glaring at that same even row of images, his mouth twisted in disgust. He wrapped an arm around my waist. “Come inside. Get warmed up. Meanwhile, I’ll call a few friends for reinforcement, and we’ll get to work. We can have that crap off the street within a few hours.”

  And then what? Tomorrow, I’d find a million of them? What good would that serve? I had to find another way to deal with this issue. Skulking away wasn’t an option. Neither was hiding from one basic fact: that was who I used to be. I had to own it and show I wasn’t that same person anymore. Publicly. “No, don’t do that. I have a better idea. If you’re willing to go along.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  “First, let’s call in those reinforcements you spoke about. We’ll need them.”

  “So we’re gonna take the flyers down?”

  “No. We’re gonna let the townspeople take the flyers down.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “You will,” I replied with a smile.

  And he did, along with everyone else.

  For the rest of the week, I advertised a special at the shop: Bring in one of the flyers from Main Street and receive a free pastry with your tea. People came in droves. When the flyers ran out within the first two days, I sent Rachel and Chelsea out to tape more of them up. The shop crowded with customers from open to close.

  I owned the image with humor. And the town noticed.

  “You,” Evan Rugerman purred when he came into the shop for his third Darjeeling and free mille-feuille, “are a class act, Miss O’Mara. Talk about turning bad publicity into good!”

  The local television news station even sent a reporter to cover the whole episode, which, let’s face it, I could’ve done without, except the feature added more customers to the shop. You would’ve thought it was Labor Day weekend in our seaside town. And the merchants in our general area of Main Street benefitted the most, thanks to the overflow of guests who hung around, shopped and bought from the other stores while waiting to get their hands on one of Gary’s delicate delectables.

  My mood was so high nothing could be bring me down.

  Except…

  Chelsea ushered Max Trayham, with a slender, icy blonde on his arm, to a table in the west corner. He offered me a slight wave as he settled in his seat and placed his copy of the flyer, face up on the corner of the table.

  Okay, he wanted to play. He thought he could hurt me. He couldn’t.

  I forced myself to stay fluid, an oxymoron if I ever heard one, dug up a cheery smile for the cretin and his date, and sauntered over to their table. “Max!” I greeted him as if we were old pals. “It’s so good to see you again.”

  “Terri, congrats on the spontaneous publicity. You must be really proud of yourself.”

  Did I detect an undercurrent in his words? Probably. No, on second thought, definitely. What I didn’t know was what caused the snark. Was he just bitter because I told him to get lost? Or was there something more sinister to his appearance here?

  “Terri, I’d like you to meet Nina Willows. Nina, this is Terri O’Mara. You know? The woman in the picture?”

  “Oh, right!” Nina Willows held out her bony hand. The diamond on her finger was bigger than the head of my toothbrush. “Tell me the truth. You staged that photo, didn’t you? I think it’s hysterical. What a clever way to drum up business.”

  “Well, thanks, but no. I didn’t stage the photo. It’s legit. I don’t know how clever it is. I’m just relieved people responded to the humor, rather than to whatever malice the original perpetrator intended.”

  “Oh, right!” she said again. Clearly, the woman had exhausted her vocabulary already. Poor dear. That was probably common for those who subsisted on air and water with lime slices. I bet she hadn’t seen a steak in over a decade. “I saw that on the news. Someone posted all those flyers on the street here.” She pouted at Max. “That’s so mean. Don’t you think so, Maxie?”

  Maxie?! I bit my tongue to keep from snorting.

  Max shrugged, saying nothing, but a guilty flush crept into his cheeks and he looked out the window.

  That was
the moment I knew. Max had plastered those flyers all over the street. Oh, sure, he wasn’t the original culprit. He hadn’t known me when they first appeared. I’d probably never know who first started the fire. But the recent resurgence? That was all Max.

  “As you can see,” I replied, “mean or not, I’ve had the last laugh.”

  His girlfriend clapped. “I guess you have. Good for you!”

  “Let’s order, sweetheart,” Max said. “We’re taking up Terri’s time.”

  “Oh, right!” She picked up her menu. “I’ll have…green tea with honey.”

  “Great. I’ll tell your server.”

  “Oh, right!” Nina’s trilling giggle raised the hackles on my nape. “Sorry. I should have realized.”

  “No problem,” I said. “I’ll send Rachel right over. Enjoy your afternoon. Lovely to meet you, Nina. Max, take care of yourself. Don’t get into any more trouble.”

  “Who, me?” He feigned outrage. “Never. I’m one of the good guys. You know that.”

  “Oh, right,” I imitated his companion right down to the helium-induced soprano she spoke. “And you know I can bring the wrath of demons on someone who messes with me. One quick phone call to the right gossipmonger…” I let the threat lie there before signaling Rachel over. “Enjoy your meal.”

  Leaving Max flapping his gums, I headed for the kitchen to tell Gary I’d discovered who was behind the flyer fiasco, and we could breathe a sigh of relief. Now that I’d let Max know I was on to him, and that I’d bested him at his own game, there’d be no repeats. Max and I were through.

  I’d finally taken control of who I’d been and who I’d become.

  ♥♥♥♥

  Jayne

  The next few days were filled with moments of heartache, interspersed with the occasional whimsical memory of a woman much loved in her town. At his insistence, I stayed at Iggy’s side throughout the wake and funeral, awkward and out of place at first. Before long, though, I realized these people embraced me and welcomed me into their community. Whether or not Iggy’s presence had anything to do with their ready acceptance remained to be seen.