by Loree Lough
“What about music? My other mother said music is important for developing minds.”
“Yes, I’m sure the music department is very active. When I’ve passed Sentinal on my way to the grocery store, I’ve seen announcements on the marquee for choral recitals and stage plays. We’ll get more details when we meet with your principal and guidance counselor.”
“What are their names?”
“Mrs. Kingston and Ms. Gilmore.”
Rosie nodded. “Mrs. Kingston is the principal?”
Rena smiled. “Yes, honey.”
“I want to make a good first impression.”
She wondered what had inspired Rosie’s other mother to teach her that.
“Isn’t this Friday?” Rosie asked, seemingly changing the subject.
“Right up until midnight,” Grant said.
“Can we have movie night, like I had with my other mother?”
This was the third Friday she’d been back with them. Rena was torn between relief that Rosie felt comfortable enough to bring up the topic, and rancor toward Barbara for depriving them of dozens of Friday nights together.
“Tell you what,” she said, facing the back seat. “We’ll all get into our pajamas, and while you choose the movie, I’ll make popcorn and hot chocolate.”
“What will Dad do?”
“I’ll turn out the lights, so the family room will feel like a movie theater.”
Rosie clapped her hands. “Oh, goodie! I can hardly wait for it to get dark!”
Her behavior and word choices made it hard to believe Rosie had just turned nine. It did Rena’s heart good to witness this moment of little-girl glee.
“What is it, sweetie?”
“Does it hurt your feelings when I call Barbara my other mother?”
It hurt like crazy, but Rena couldn’t risk damaging the moment of rapport by admitting it.
“You spent a long time with Barbara,” she said carefully. “It’s going to take a long time to adjust to life without her.”
From the corner of her eye, Rena could see her nodding thoughtfully. Would it have been smarter to simply say yes? Maybe Rosie was testing her.
“What if I don’t want to get over losing her? What if I'm glad she's gone?”
The question took Rena by surprise. Grant, too, judging by the bulging muscles in his jaw.
“She liked to say ‘I’m strict but fair,’” Rosie said.
“Discipline is a good thing,” Grant mused. “When it’s rooted in love.”
Was it a good thing that Rosie had been referring to Barbara in the past tense? Did it mean she’d soon open up about the day her “other mother” had died? She’d been right beside the woman, after all, saw and heard everything. And her young life had been a dizzying whirlwind ever since.
Thoughts of Barbara and Rosie’s talk of school made Rena wonder if the woman had kept up with Rosie’s inoculations. The authorities hadn’t found any paperwork to indicate that she had. First thing Monday morning, Rena would call their pediatrician to make an appointment. Next, she’d call the school, too, and make arrangements for her and Rosie to meet the principal and guidance counselor.
Grant planned to go back to work on Monday. To this point, he’d been front and center with Rosie while Rena did laundry, ran the vacuum, prepared meals. Rena had come to rely on him—for time spent with their daughter and the countless other things he’d done to smooth Rosie’s transition—and was surprised to realize that she’d miss having him around.
It seemed Grant appreciated the way she’d shouldered the chores, giving him more time to spend with Rosie. What would he think if he knew that house and yardwork had provided convenient reasons to avoid watching their warm interactions?
Rena had one weekend to figure out another strategy. If not, come Monday, she’d be spending all day alone with a daughter who couldn’t even offer her a genuine smile.
Chapter Ten
“THAT MOVIE WAS so silly. Better than anything I watched with my other mother.”
Rena fluffed Rosie’s pillow and tried not to let her disappointment show. It made sense that Rosie would have the woman on her mind. Life with Barbara was the only reality Rosie had known for five years. But that didn’t stop the references from hurting Rena. “I’m glad you had fun,” she said, pressing a kiss to her forehead.
She tried to ignore the way Rosie turned her head and winced at the affectionate gesture.
Grant leaned in to kiss Rosie’s cheek. “Ready to say your bedtime prayers?”
She sat up and, eyes closed tight, folded her hands.
“Five little angels around my bed, one at the foot and one at the head, one to sing and one to pray, and one to take my fears away.”
She’d been two when Rena helped her memorize this one. It hadn’t been difficult, because Rosie liked the image of five pretty angels fluttering around her room. Before tonight, she’d recited the “Now I lay me down” prayer that Barbara had preferred. Reason to hope the wall between them was weakening?
“God bless Dad,” Rosie continued, “and Grandma. And if you see my other mother, tell her if she’s still afraid of the dark, she should talk to the angels. Amen.” She lay back on her pillow.
Grant’s sympathetic expression didn’t do a thing to ease the sting.
“And...” he coaxed.
“Oh. Right. I forgot.” She sat up again to add, “Bless Mom, too.”
Rena hoped Rosie really had forgotten. Yes, that would hurt, but not nearly as much as knowing she’d intentionally left her off the list.
Isn’t going to be easy, convincing her she can rely on me...
Did lack of trust explain the girl’s arm’s-length attitude, or was something more sinister at work? What exactly had Barbara told her?
Rena put aside her concerns and sat beside Rosie. Sliding an arm across her shoulders, she fought tears and said, “Your dad and I are so lucky to have such a sweet and thoughtful daughter.”
“Mmm-hmm,” she responded and plopped onto the pillow again before reaching for Grant’s hand. “’Night, Daddy.”
He kissed her forehead. “’Night, sweet girl.”
After turning out the light, Rena lingered in the doorway while Grant headed downstairs. “Would you like your door open or closed, sweetie?”
Rosie rolled over and said, “Whatever you want.”
Rena pulled the door shut and, sitting on the top step, held her head in her hands. She needed to get control of herself. Find some way to—how did her dad put it?—take it on the chin. Time to grow a spine, Ree... Besides, she couldn’t just fall apart and put Grant in the untenable position of comforting her. Things would get better in time, with patience. They had to.
She puttered in the kitchen for a few minutes before joining Grant in the family room. He’d stretched out on the couch, one long leg slung over the seatback, one arm crooked under his neck.
“We can watch something else,” he said without looking away from the screen.
She held up a book. “No, I like watching the O’s.”
“You okay?”
“Yes, of course.”
“She was pretty rough on you up there.”
“Not really. She’s going through a lot. I just need to be patient. Prove to her that I’ll never—”
He sat up, raised his right hand. “You’re right. Time and patience is what the doctor ordered.”
Please, she thought, don’t start quoting Dr. Danes already.
“You were right, you know,” he said, muting the TV, “that what we need from that Danes is solid, workable advice, not a bunch of psychological double-speak.”
Closing the book, she met his gaze. She hadn’t done anything right in his eyes since before the kidnapping. Rena waited for an explanation.
“It felt kinda good when you put him on
the spot.” He shook a fist in the air. “Couple of times, I wanted to slug him.”
She could relate. The doctor’s methods hadn’t provided much help or hope. Time and patience, Rena reminded herself.
“I’m glad you didn’t.”
He raised an eyebrow, and before he had a chance to claim he was kidding, she said, “I forgot to a tuck a packet of tissues into my purse. How would we explain it if he bled all over Rosie’s file?”
The eyebrow lowered.
Long before she’d left him for Fenwick Island, Rena had suggested marriage counseling. Grant refused, saying he didn’t believe in throwing good money away on some high-priced speculator. It was reason enough not to tell him about her sessions with Martha. She hadn’t told Tina, either; why put her in the position of keeping secrets from her son?
“Admittedly,” she said carefully, “my experience with therapists is limited, but something tells me his methods are a tad unorthodox.”
“I’d hardly call doing nothing unorthodox. Drives me nuts the way these guys string things out just to get that whopping hourly fee.”
She couldn’t argue with that. Danes wasn’t exactly cheap.
“So what were you two talking about right before we left?”
Rena shook her head. “Oh, he was reassuring me that Rosie is going to be fine, thanks in large part to our united front. And that it’s okay for me to resent Barbara...provided I keep in mind that she could have done far worse.”
Grant leaned forward. “You’ve gotta be joking.”
“That’s the gist of it.”
“He really expects us to feel gratitude toward that witch because, after she kidnapped our kid, she didn’t beat or torture her?” He drove his fingers through his hair. “I think he needs a shrink.”
A small voice filtered down the stairs, putting a halt to their conversation.
“Daddy? I’m thirsty.”
Grant looked at Rena.
She answered in his stead. “Be right up, sweetie.”
“No, I’ll go,” Grant told her.
By the time she got to her feet to challenge him on it, he’d disappeared around the corner. Things would never improve if he kept doing things like this. True, Rosie had asked for him, but...maybe if he’d give her the chance to answer their daughter’s calls, Rena could make some headway. But how to tell him without widening the gap that separated them?
“A bit of a schemer, that kid of ours.” Grant said when he returned. He flopped back down on the couch, crossed one dark-socked ankle over the other and went back to channel surfing. “Would you believe she almost talked me into another story and a song?”
He’d always had trouble saying no to her. But he hadn’t been gone long enough to do both. “Which did she get?”
“I sang the first verse of ‘You Are My Sunshine.’ Figured it was quicker.” He buffed his fingernails on his shirt. “I was right, too. She was droopy-eyed before I finished.”
“Self-preservation?”
He lifted a shoulder in response, but he gave no indication that he remembered the good-natured debates they used to have about which of them had the most trouble staying in-tune.
“You know I’m teasing, right?” Rena probed.
“Yeah, I guess.”
An hour later, after he turned off the TV, Rena got to her feet. Standing beside the couch, she said, “G’night, Grant.”
They'd shared some warm and wonderful moments tonight, so warm and wonderful that, without even thinking about it, Rena bent at the waist and kissed him. Just a light brush of her lips against his.
His stiff, wide-eyed reaction told her the kiss had surprised him. She braced herself for what might come next: a small step forward in their relationship...or a big step back.
“Rena... I, ah...”
What made her reach out and lay a hand against his cheek? Fear? Or hope?
Eyes closed, he leaned into her palm, the bristle of his five o’clock shadow warming her palm.
“It’s been a long, weird day,” he whispered. And as she stepped back, he got to his feet. “I’m beat.”
“Yeah, me, too.” Her voice was shaking and she hoped he hadn’t noticed.
“Need anything before we turn in?”
Want was the better word choice. She wanted him to treat her the way he once had. To take her in his arms and hold her close, and tell her things would get back to normal soon. More than anything, she wanted him to forgive her.
“No, I’m good.”
Rena held her breath, waiting for the words she so longed to hear. Instead, she heard the quiet hum of the ceiling fan.
“Well, g’night then,” Grant said finally.
She stood, arms limp at her sides, and watched him walk toward the stairs. Cupping her elbows, Rena fought tears, remembering one of her dad’s favorite bits of advice: Only a fool takes unnecessary chances. She’d taken a big one, reaching out that way.
“Grant?”
He paused on the landing.
“Are you ever sorry that we... Do you wish we hadn’t split—”
“I know we need to talk about that, eventually, but not tonight, okay?”
“Sure,” she said tentatively.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Of course. Anything.”
“While you were gone, did you...did you see other men?”
“No.”
“Never?”
“Never.”
“Why not?”
Because I never stopped loving you, that's why!
The silent answer raised a question of her own: Had Grant seen other women? Her dad’s advice reverberated in her head, and she kept her mouth shut.
“Good,” he said, and climbed the rest of the stairs.
What had he read into her silence? And was there a chance he felt the same way?
Yet another of her dad’s sayings popped into her head: When things seem too good to be true, they usually are.
* * *
“WHAT’S THIS?” ROSIE ASKED, peering into the package.
“The Fenwick Island lighthouse. Your Grandma Cleary sent it to me.”
“Is it your birthday?”
Rena laughed. “Not for a few months.”
“Then what’s it for?”
“She’s my mom, and she misses me.” Rena placed the lighthouse on the mantel. “I guess she hopes that seeing it will remind me to call her.”
“Why not now?”
“Good question.” She grabbed the portable phone and started to dial her parents’ number. It had been a week since she’d last spoken to them; her mom was dying to see Rosie. “On second thought,” she said, returning the handset to its charger, “I’ll call later, maybe invite them for the weekend. But I want to talk to your dad first to see if he’s okay with it.”
“Why? Doesn’t he like them anymore?”
Anymore...meaning since the kidnapping? “Of course he likes them, and they like him, too.” Not the whole truth; her parents had called Grant everything but her husband for the way he’d treated her. But Rosie didn’t need to know that. And neither did he.
“This is our house—Dad’s and yours and mine—and we need to be in agreement about things like that because...”
“I know, I know. It’s what families do,” Rosie said with a hint of impatience. “I remember Grandma Cleary. She always made the best chocolate cake. Didn’t she used to get on the floor to help me put my puzzles together?”
Why the emphasis on family? Rena wondered, even as it lifted her spirits to learn that Rosie’s memories of her parents were good ones. “Yes, I do. She’s more limber than me!”
“Well, I want to see them, so two against one.”
Rena tried not to make too much of the thrill she felt, hearing Rosie side with her for once. It didn’
t mean Rosie saw the two of them as a team, or that she’d stopped blaming Rena for the kidnapping. For all Rena knew, it was a test to see if she’d go against Grant. The psychologist had alerted them to the possibility that Rosie might attempt to pit her parents against one another to get her own way.
“Things don’t work that way in a family.”
A tiny smile lifted the corners of Rosie’s mouth. Rena didn’t know how to read that, either.
“Are you going to call Dad or not?”
While living on Fenwick Island, she’d seen her folks several times a week; since moving home three weeks ago she hadn’t seen them at all. And she missed them.
Grabbing the phone again, Rena said, “Why don’t you call your dad then, and after you’ve brightened his day, you can pass him to me.”
Rosie dialed, her smile brightening when he picked up. She told Grant about the package from Grandma Cleary, and mentioned the possibility of a weekend visit, then handed the phone to Rena.
“So a lighthouse, huh? How big is it?”
“Oh, just fourteen, fifteen inches tall. It’s pretty. I think I might start a collection. Lighthouses are legendary, after all. Beacons of hope to the lost and weary.”
Just like you.
What would she have done without him to help run interference between her and Rosie?
“Sounds good.”
“You don’t mind if they spend the weekend, then?”
“Not at all. I’ve always liked your folks. It’ll be good seeing them again. Hey, here’s an idea... Maybe on Sunday we’ll have a good old-fashioned family barbecue. See if your brothers can come, and I’ll call my sisters. I’ll throw some burgers and dogs on the grill, and maybe our moms will whip up some of their best side dishes and desserts.”
“Like Tina’s apple pie...”
“And your mom’s potato salad.” He paused. “And maybe you can make your famous baked beans.”
If she remembered the recipe after all this time. “Sounds really nice,” she told him. “I’ll start making calls.” The invitation would be the perfect excuse to explain to everyone that she and Grant had decided to reconcile. But could she count on them to help keep up the pretense...for Rosie’s sake?