Abby walked to the bed where her mother was sitting.
“An angel, huh? The kind with long brown hair?” When Grace smiled, Abby leaned down and put her arms around her mother—a gesture she couldn’t recall doing voluntarily beyond hello and goodbye. “Am I?” Abby asked. “Hopeless?”
“Hopeless?” Grace asked, her voice thick with emotion. “My daughter? Not on your life.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“HOW WILL Abby know where to find us, Daddy, now that she’s back from her trip?” Heather asked, looking up from her coloring. She was stretched out on Tom’s bed, using a hunk of cardboard as a base upon which to complete her art project. Homework, Tom assumed.
“Huh, Daddy? What if she thinks we’re lost?”
“I’ll call her later—after she gets home from work. This is her first day back in the office. I left a message on her machine yesterday but I couldn’t remember my damn…I mean, darned, cell-phone number and the telephone company’s not coming here until tomorrow.”
He decided to upgrade his service with a separate line for the computer, since, with a daughter hitting puberty, he’d never get to use the phone otherwise.
Heather looked up. “You said a bad word.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
She frowned, her face suddenly pensive. “Mommy said bad words, too. Sometimes.”
Tom lifted a wooden box the size of a large briefcase from the cardboard box he was unpacking. He kicked the empty packing box aside and lowered the weighty burden to his bed. Made of unvarnished pine, the rustic box with poorly mitered corners showed the wear and tear of years of use. His eighth-grade wood-shop project—a gun case for the antique pistol collection he intended to have one day. He raised the lid.
The scent of cleaning oil billowed out like embalming fluid. The royal-blue velvet lining his mother had sewn looked moth-eaten in spots. His father had helped him arrange the layout to accommodate four long-barrel pistols. Three spots were filled. The fourth—his 1847 Walker—had been sold to pay off Heather’s hospital bill. Best deal I ever made, Tom thought, smiling at the little girl coloring so industriously.
Tom wasn’t sure what to do with his collection. The guns were one of the few interests he had shared with his father. He remembered his father telling him, “The history of weapons makes a fascinating study in human nature. Man’s inhumanity to man, always looking for a faster, more deadly weapon, pretty much sums up the future, I fear.”
A born pessimist who often sought solace in a bottle, Walt Butler also possessed a gift for storytelling and a voice that charmed his listeners. Tom liked to remember the times the two of them shared at Walt’s workbench, assembling the pieces of a black-powder reproduction he’d ordered from some catalog.
Walt’s pride and joy was an 1851 Navy Model Yanks. “Wild Bill Hickok carried a pair of ’em with ivory grips when he was a lawman in Abilene,” he’d say, then burst into song about “the prettiest town he ever seen.”
After Tom’s mother died, Walt didn’t sing much. He told Tom, “Genevieve was my voice. My hope.” Walt soon developed a bad cough that resisted all cures.
“Mommy said a bad word at me,” Heather said in a small voice. “That night.”
Tom looked at his daughter, catching the sadness in her tone. Donna had warned him that as Heather’s memory of her mother returned, she’d become more comfortable talking about it. “Honey, sometimes people say things they don’t mean,” Tom said, closing the case and sliding it beneath his bed.
“But, Daddy, Mommy was mad at me. She said I was bad.”
A fist closed around Tom’s heart. “Baby, you’re not bad. Mommy loved you very much. Maybe she was upset about—”
Heather interrupted. “She was mad because I told her I didn’t want to go with her. I wanted to stay at Caitlin’s with Angel. I cried and kicked the door. Mommy said good little girls do what they’re told, bad little girls had to sit in the back seat until they could be nice.” Her bottom lip quivered.
Tom pulled her into his arms. “Oh, sweetness, you’re the nicest little girl in the whole wide world. Mommy was angry, she didn’t mean it like that.”
Tom brushed aside her crayons and sat down, scooting her into his lap. “Did I ever tell you about the time Mommy saved my life?”
Her mop of white-blond curls danced against his chest.
“Well…I’d been at a roping out of town and won the big prize—eight hundred dollars, cash. This was before Angel was born, and your mommy and me were renting a little place over near Chowchilla. Mommy was a waitress at a truck stop, and somebody who came through there told her about my big win.
“On the way home, my truck broke down. A buddy took my horse with him, so I just locked up the truck and started walking. It was real late by the time I got home. I tried to be quiet, but Rosie was tied up by the back door, barking like crazy.” Heather’s eyes grew wide with anticipation. “All of a sudden, there was this loud boom and something went flying over my head.
“I hit the ground, belly first. That’s when I heard your mom laughing. Seems she’d been waiting up with a shotgun full of buckshot because she figured I was out drinking up my winnings and she was gonna teach me a lesson.”
Heather frowned. “Mommy tried to shoot you?”
“She wasn’t trying to hurt me, only scare me. But you know what? She scared somebody else, too.
“Suddenly, there was this commotion by the garage. Somebody’d been hiding out, waiting to ambush me. That’s what Rosie was barking about. Mommy’s shotgun blast scared him away and probably saved my life.”
Heather’s smile lightened the weight on his chest. “Mommy was brave.”
“Very brave. Do you know what else she did that was very brave?” Heather shook her head. “Just to make sure her most special little girl was safe, she parked her car under a big light in the middle of the parking lot, even though it meant she had to walk farther to get to the bank. She made sure you were safe because she loved you very much.”
Heather tilted her head. “Really?”
He squeezed her tight. “Really.”
She wiggled back and looked up at him. “Daddy, when you call Abby, would you tell her I have a present for her?” she asked, leap-frogging to a new subject with the agility of a six-year-old. She reached behind him and picked up the drawing she’d been working on.
As Tom studied the picture his heart swelled in his chest.
“Did I get Abby’s hair the right color?”
Tom couldn’t say for sure, the tears in his eyes were making it hard to focus. Before he could regain his composure, Angel appeared in the doorway of the bedroom.
“Goddamn it,” Angel said, her voice heavy with disgust. “If it’s not one thing, it’s another. Where’s the cell phone?”
Tom pulled his attention from the paper in his hand to his daughter standing so belligerently, hands on her hips—a pose he’d seen many times in the past two weeks. She hadn’t been any more thrilled about the move than Heather, until he promised Angel her own room. She’d agreed with the stipulation Abby’s mother would be called upon to help decorate it.
“The phone?” he asked blankly. He wasn’t used to keeping track of dental floss–size telephones. “In my jacket pocket, I think. The denim one hanging on the back of the chair.” He nodded toward the small desk and chair in the far corner.
Janey had insisted on sending over nearly every spare piece of furniture in her house. The desk, a blond, square thing, reminded Tom of a kid’s desk, although the computer sitting atop it looked anything but childlike. In this matter there was no negotiating: the computer was a useful tool, but he wanted it where he could keep an eye on it.
Angel stalked to the desk. He could tell by the set of her shoulders that she was upset. “What’s wrong, kiddo? Tough homework assignment?” So far, their teachers had only glowing reports of the girls’ transition. He credited a great deal of that to their participation in Tomorrow’s Rainbows and the counseling Donna continued to
give, although they now only saw her for one hour every other Saturday.
Angel scowled at him. “I’m starting my period.”
Tom’s heart missed a beat. “Already? Aren’t you too young?”
She gave him a dry look. “Gee, thanks, Dad. Make me feel even better.”
He flinched. “Sorry. This is a little out of my league. Do you need to see a doctor?”
She rolled her eyes. “I need Abby.”
“SAY IT ISN’T SO, Joe,” Melina said, her eyes awash in tears. She plopped theatrically into Abby’s spare chair—the same chair Tom had used the first day he came to her for help. He’d looked so out of place, and yet he fit. Even from the first, he fit in her life.
“Did Daniel really fire you? The nerve. After all these years. After all you’ve done for VOCAP. The bastard. We can sue. He’s just doing this because you wouldn’t date him. We can prove—”
“I quit, Mel,” Abby said.
Short and simple. She repeated the speech she’d given Daniel this morning. “I’m burned out. Everybody saw it coming except me. I was in denial, but I realized the truth when I was on vacation. I’m ready for a change and so is VOCAP.”
Daniel then broke the news that he’d hired her replacement—a Ph.D. candidate who was looking for a position where she could really make a difference. According to Daniel, she was qualified, eager and married. Why the last made a difference, Abby didn’t know, but she wasn’t surprised to learn Daniel had already hired someone else. All in all, they parted amiably, her two-week notice a mere formality.
Rocking back in her chair, Abby pushed aside the box into which she’d been sorting the keepsakes and memorabilia that had accumulated over the years. A plaque from the County Community Action Association, a tea caddy from a family whose son had been killed by gang members, a beaded necklace Heather Butler made in Rainbows.
Melina took a tissue from the box on the desk and dabbed at her eyes. “Are you sure? What are you going to do now?”
“I’m going to finish my degree and start grad school. As soon as I have my master’s, I’ll probably hang out a shingle with Donna.”
She and Donna had had a long talk last night when Abby returned from her trip. “I’ll take the kids, you can handle their parents,” Donna had told her, not the least surprised by Abby’s decision.
“What about the Butlers?” Melina asked.
Abby fingered Heather’s tiny beads. Her grandmother wasn’t overly religious but she did put stock in the symbols of her faith. She’d always kept a strand of rosary beads hanging beside her bed. Abby never knew what kind of sign Agnes expected them to reveal, but now she could appreciate the soothing quality of the motion. She manipulated one bead and noticed for the first time an image on the opposite side of the small, smooth bead. She turned each bead over until she read the message it spelled out: I Luv You, Heather.
Abby missed them so much. She’d sent three postcards from the San Diego Zoo, but she hadn’t seen or talked to any member of the Butler family in more than two weeks. Tom’s message on her machine last night welcomed her home, but when she tried his number there was no answer. No one answered at the Hastingses’, either. Abby had already made up her mind to drive out to the ranch as soon as she finished cleaning out her desk. She had bridges to mend; she only hoped it wasn’t too late.
When the phone rang, she answered formally, “Abby Davis.”
Melina rose to leave, but Abby stopped her.
“Really?” she said, grinning. “That’s great. I’m happy for you. Truly, I am.” She had to stifle a giggle working its way up her throat. Finally, the person on the other end of the line said goodbye, and she could release the pent-up laughter.
“That was Landon,” she said, hurrying to explain. “He called to tell me he and Deirdre just got back from Tahoe. They got married.”
“What?” Melina sputtered. “I thought he was a confirmed free spirit, and she was some kind of psychotic nag.”
Abby lifted her shoulders and let them fall. “Who can predict the course of true love?”
Melina sat forward. “Speaking of which, what about Tom Butler?”
Abby thought a moment. How could she put into words all the feelings churning through her head and heart?
Before she could formulate an answer, the phone rang again. “Abby Davis.”
She sat up abruptly, causing the bead necklace to fall to the floor. “Angel? Slow down. What’s the matter? You what? I’ll be right there.” She started to hang up but caught Angel’s cry and put the receiver back to her ear. “You moved? When? Okay. I got it. I’ll stop at Wal-Mart and be there as soon as possible.”
Abby hung up. Her heart was beating double time. “She called me, Mel. Me. Angel started her period and she called me.” Suddenly, Abby gulped. “What if I blow it?”
“How can you blow it?”
Abby grimaced. “Do you know what my mother did when I called her at work and told her I’d started? She told everybody in the store—even complete strangers. I was so embarrassed I never went there again.”
Melina looked sympathetic. “My mother just told me to go talk to my older sister.”
“What do I buy?” Abby asked, grabbing her purse.
Melina waved off the question. “They make a zillion products for younger girls. It’s really big business. Don’t worry, you’ll do fine.” She stood up when Abby did and opened the door. “Did you say they moved?”
“Angel said they moved into Miguel and Maria’s old house. It makes sense, I guess, but I got the impression Tom had some bad memories associated with it. Who knows? We all have ghosts, right?”
Melina looked at her curiously. “I don’t know about that. I think yours are gone, girl. What’d you do? See an exorcist while you were on vacation?”
Abby thought about her friend’s question as she drove to the house on Plainsborough Road. For the first time in her life, Abby had enjoyed every moment spent with her parents. She golfed with her father. She hiked to the top of a canyon one morning with her mother and a group of senior hikers. The three of them piled into Grace’s urban assault vehicle and drove to San Diego to visit Jarrod and his family.
The two weeks flew by and, despite missing Tom and the girls, Abby left the desert feeling rested and healed. Grace insisted she take Agnes’s hopeless chest, and Abby planned to go through it at her own pace, no longer afraid of the memories.
Who could say if Agnes had made a conscious choice to die or if the fear of being ravaged by illness was more than her heart could handle? Either way, while she was alive, she’d given Abby a precious gift: unconditional love. Only after Agnes’s death did Abby begin to put restrictions on the love she shared with others.
She’d withheld love from her mother because she was afraid of diminishing the love she’d felt for her grandmother. She’d dived blindly into a relationship with Billy, sure she could turn hero-worship into love. Poor Landon never had a chance because, by then, Abby was so fearful of losing she didn’t even ante up when the game started.
But Tom had demanded her complete participation, and, finally, she was ready to play. As the roofline of the little house came into view, Abby’s heart beat faster in anticipation. Such an exciting game, but the stakes had never been higher.
TOM WATCHED the Honda approach. His heart felt lighter knowing she was near, but at the same time weighty. Just because he’d made some changes didn’t mean Abby would welcome them. From his perch on the top step of the porch, he watched her get out of the car. She moved with such grace, her carriage proud but not haughty. Her black, double-breasted business suit with crisp white blouse looked too formal for her surroundings, but she corrected that by kicking off her high-heel shoes and tossing them into the car.
“Hi, cowboy,” she said, her voice light and welcoming. Heedless of her nylons, she hopped from grassy patch to grassy patch until she reached the concrete approach at the bottom of the steps. The image reminded Tom of the first day they met.
; “Hi, stranger. Long time no see. You’ve been missed.”
“Have I? That’s nice to know.” Her green eyes lit up. Lingering rays from the setting sun cast her hair in bronze. Her lips, shimmering with a recent application of lipstick, looked inviting.
“Where’s the rest of the greeting party?” She held out a plastic bag like a peace offering. “I brought stuff—female stuff.”
He’d been dreading this part. He didn’t want Abby to think Angel’s plea was a ruse to get her out here. This wasn’t the way he’d planned it, but he wasn’t one to pass up an opportunity when it fell in his lap.
“Janey dropped by right after Angel called you. Ed took Peter and Maureen up to the city to catch a plane and isn’t due back till nine or so.”
“Are they still thinking about moving out here?”
He nodded. “Yep. They’re putting their house on the market as soon as they can.”
“I bet Janey’s ecstatic.”
“She’s happy. Ed was a little nervous—he thought my nose would be out of joint about having to work with Peter. I told him it was about time I had some help around there.” He paused, not anxious to break the news that he’d abandoned the building in which she’d invested so much time. “Since they’d need a place to live and the bunkhouse was looking so good thanks to you and your mother, I decided I should be the one to move out. This house was sitting empty…so we moved.”
Abby eyed the building with a thoughtful look, then said, “I’m so glad. It needs a family.”
Pivoting on one heel, she pointed toward the ancient oak tree a hundred yards to the right. “I had a dream about that tree while I was gone. Isn’t that crazy? Of course, it’s understandable—there are no real trees in the desert,” she told him with mock seriousness. Her features took on a dreamy quality when she went on. “One night, I saw that tree with a rope swing, and I was swinging higher and higher until my toes touched the lower branches. I felt so free and happy.”
With a girlish look, she added, “You were pushing me.”
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