by Davis Bunn
There were moments when it all became too much for him to bear. Buddy had never known such weakness, or perhaps never allowed himself to feel it before. He had to struggle at times with futile rage. He became angry with Carey for not having insisted on telling him about Beth’s illness the moment she learned. He was furious with his mother for dying. He was maddest of all at himself for not having delved further into the changes he had noticed, and been there, and done something.
But he was also learning to grow through the pain, thanks mostly to Kimberly. He had listened to her patient explanations, time and again, and heard beyond the words that here was a woman he could trust to help him reknit his world. Once the passage was endured, and the tragedy borne, and the future again became something other than a container for bleakness.
And then there was the most remarkable turning of all. Five times he asked Carey to relive the confrontation with their father. The words she and their mother spoke. The reaction of their father. How Jack had wept there in the front foyer with his wife and daughter. And apologized. And begged their forgiveness. And then called the shadow folk in Hamlin. And expressed to them what Beth said was necessary. Word for word.
On the eleventh day Buddy arrived for what had become his regular evening vigil. There was a great deal he shared with his inert father during these hours. How the Helms Group’s board of directors had named him acting CEO, the only way possible to salvage the Lexington account. How Cliff Hazzard’s company was in the process of absorbing the Helms Group. How the merger documents had been finalized and approved by both boards. How the Helms Group would become Hazzard’s new marketing powerhouse. How Buddy was to become the group’s managing director, answering directly to Cliff Hazzard and the board. How Buddy was seeing Kimberly on a regular basis. How he was learning a new meaning to the word “love.” Almost every day.
And how Jack’s wife of thirty-seven years was in the next room. Lying in a bed from which she would never emerge. Not in this life.
Sometimes Carey joined him. When she did, they talked together, trying to restore a fragment of the family that had almost been destroyed. Buddy almost always wept in those moments. But he had come to understand that there was nothing in the world wrong with a few tears.
Tonight he was in there alone, for Kimberly and Carey had gone out to the airport to greet Sylvie and bring her back. Buddy did not mention his sister’s arrival. Sylvie had claimed she was only back to see her mother. He and Carey had spent hours on the phone, urging Sylvie to reconsider her stand regarding Jack.
Buddy seated himself by the bed and began relating the news about his day. The nurse came and checked Jack’s vitals and smiled down at Buddy as she departed. Showing approval for the son who sought to strengthen the familial bond. While he still had time.
* * *
Beth lay comforted by far more than the drugs they fed steadily into her arm. Her room was situated next to Jack’s, at her request. The people here were very discreet, which was hardly remarkable for a place that dealt in closure. They were also utterly unflappable. Beth had accepted the news that the hospice only had one double room, and it was occupied. She responded by asking if she might have just the one wall separating her from her husband. The staff responded with placid geniality. It was her departure, to shape as she wished. Beth could not have found a more agreeable setting if she had designed it herself.
She heard Buddy’s voice through both the wall and her open door. She did not need to understand the words. Days back, he and Carey had told her what they intended. She had responded that she was proud of them, and they were doing the right thing, and for the right reason. Drawing a healing peace into their relationship with Jack. At long last.
Beth listened to her son’s steady drone, and felt a sudden shift inside herself, as though some binding cord had just been loosed, a link so potent it managed to cut through the drug’s constant veil. She blinked slowly, the only motion she could permit herself just then, and decided that hearing her son discuss his day with her beloved husband made for a fitting end.
The pain eased, at least for an instant. She knew the unseen portal loomed just beyond her vision, and regretted that she had no choice but to pass through. The remaining moments were too precious, too few. She counted out her small, slight breaths like a miser. She wished for a hundred thousand more.
Josiah dozed in the corner chair. She tilted her head a fraction, not far enough to sharpen her discomfort, just enough to glance his way. The light through her window penetrated his dark skin and revealed a broad swath of freckles that covered both cheeks. His strong features were turned to melted tallow by time’s careless hand. But the potency was still there, and the goodness. He slumbered until she called upon him again. The gift of a silent friend. She settled back, grateful for that final opportunity to cherish the remarkable souvenir of a welcoming heart.
Kimberly and Carey and Sylvie sat together at the room’s other side. They chatted with the ease of lifelong friends. Even Sylvie was softened by the caring natures shown to her by Beth’s youngest and Buddy’s newfound love. Beth found an utter contentment in watching them sit there and giggle like children.
Beth’s attention returned to the man laid out on the other side of the wall. She was so grateful for Jack’s willingness to bend, to break, to redefine his heart’s direction. She loved Jack more, now, than she ever had before. Her feelings remained undimmed, even by this constant wash of drugs. Now, when each breath was a soft triumph, when Jack was lost beyond reach, he still held her. He always would.
“Momma?”
She smiled, but did not speak. The three of them looked at her, the daughter who had sung the melody needed to bring her father back to his senses. The woman who held her son’s heart with such fierce passion she shunned safety to aid him. And the older daughter whose own heart might just be touched by the light shining in those two faces.
And still, Buddy’s voice resonated through the wall behind her head.
“Momma, do you need something?”
Beth tried to shake her head, but the effort was too much. It didn’t matter. The truth was, these precious young people were all the affirmation one heart would ever need. Despite all the imperfections and errors her life could possibly hold, she had still achieved what was most important. She breathed, she released, and she almost heard a voice declare, Well done.
A READING GROUP GUIDE
MOONDUST LAKE
Davis Bunn
ABOUT THIS GUIDE
The suggested questions are included to enhance
your group’s reading of Davis Bunn’s
MOONDUST LAKE
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Buddy decides to leave his father’s company at a critical moment. The timing of his move threatens the company’s future. Was he right to act as he did? How would you have handled this if you were in his shoes?
2. Often in moving from the story’s creation to packaging, the publisher’s sales and marketing team will revise a title so that it better suits the overall scope and feel of a series. The working title of this novel was ‘Prodigal Father’. Which do you prefer? Or would you have chosen a different title altogether?
3. Why do you think Beth Helms leaves her husband? Do you think she made the right move? Did she accomplish what she hoped to?
4. The crux of this story comes down to six people all facing a need to leave their past behind. Discuss this issue from the following five perspectives: a. Buddy Helms, needing to develop his identity free from his father’s influence;
b. Jack Helms, needing to retreat from his earlier dark actions;
c. Carey Helms, whose fractured relationship with her father influences her choice of men;
d. Kimberly Sturgiss, who remains burdened by the actions of a man who did not deserve her love;
e. Your own situation, the present versus the past.
5. Jack Helms is vehemently opposed to the establishment of a counseling center. How do feel about this
? Is there room in your community for such a place? Would it draw the community together, or force it further apart?
6. How does Beth Helms’ ill health affect her fractured family?
7. Throughout the Miramar Bay novels—Miramar Bay, Firefly Cove, and Moondust Lake—many different aspects of California have come to light, from Hollywood glamor to the drought-stricken Central Valley, from a lovely coastal resort town to the hills ringing San Luis Obispo. Wine regions, mountains, floods, mudslides . . . Did any of this surprise you?
8. What do you think of the idea that Miramar Bay is a town of second chances? What is it about this town that inspires this concept? Do you agree with it? If Miramar Bay were a real town instead of a fictional one, would you be tempted to visit?