Glowering, Lizbeth sat back hard against the couch.
Arnett deliberately angled herself on the cushion to face Beebe and Lizbeth. The move placed Callie in her peripheral vision, outside the discussion circle. It pressed the point that she would be talked about as if she wasn’t there. Spine straight, Arnett began, addressing Beebe, providing background.
“There were two specific situations that demonstrated what I was up against. Keep in mind our family had been through hell. In April, I exposed John’s affair. In late June, he was diagnosed with cancer. In early July, part of his lung was removed. For three days, my sons, their wives, and I were all at the hospital in shifts, keeping watch. John lay in intensive care. I put up a good front. I did a wife’s duty, pushing aside his adultery. I took the lead in John’s care. Despite everything, I was expected to sit at his bedside, and I was there. Those first few days, he had extreme pain. His ribs were spread apart to get to the lung. An incision started under his arm. He was cut all the way around to his back. On the third evening, he showed improvement, but I was exhausted. He told me to go home and get some sleep. The boys had already left. But he wasn’t concerned about me. He was thinking about her.” She turned to face Callie. Lizbeth and Beebe followed suit. Arnett looked down her nose at cowardly Callie who kept her head tipped to the soda can she held, her thumb playing with the can’s condensation.
Arnett returned her attention to Beebe. “Before I even reached the elevator, he’d called the nurse’s station. By the time I pushed the button, the nurse was carrying a phone into his room. The hospital prohibited permanent phones in ICU patient rooms,” she explained. “Literally, only seconds passed since I left his bedside, and he wanted her. He had her on the phone before I even left the floor. I was angry. It felt like I’d been kicked in the stomach. Reality was right in front of me. I stewed about it, then later I called her.” Arnett sent Callie a challenging look. Her next words brought Callie’s chin up. She wore a defiant expression. “I told you, right? I knew he called. I told you I knew the two of you would never stop seeing each other. Never. It would never stop. I couldn’t make him stop.” Arnett hurled words until her chest hurt. She raised a hand to her heart. “God, every time I think of the two of you together, I can’t breathe.”
The room grew quiet. A window curtain fluttered.
“Arnett?” Beebe said coaxingly.
Arnett pushed hair around on her head. “Yes, there’s more. Two days later, John was moved out of intensive care. I went to the hospital without fail. The boys expected it. They came, family came, but I was his mainstay. I noticed one morning, the visitor’s chair was moved. I pushed it against the wall when I left the night before. But first thing the next morning, it was closer to the bed. Another bit of evidence: She’d been there. I knew it. I vacated the chair and—” Her cheeks flushed with heat, she twisted her head and shoulders to Callie. “How long did it take before you were sitting in it?” Facing the other two: “She even got around security. The hospital’s doors locked at nine. That’s when I left. Locked doors, security guards, nothing kept them apart.” She glared at Callie who only stared back impassively. “Did you scale the walls and come in the window? I called you again, didn’t I, at the club? You weren’t very talkative. I still don’t know how you got in. Passage into the main hospital was closed off, interior doors locked. I needed help getting out. But you and John, you got things worked out. That chair was never out of place any morning after that.”
Arnett swung her knees around for a dead-on question to Callie. “What about me? I want to know, at any point, did you ever think about me when you and John were sneaking around, keeping secrets, and telling lies?”
. . .
Secrets and lies, Lizbeth wanted to scream back at her mother-in-law. She knew those had been the very ingredients hardened into the mortar around Arnett’s own marriage. John had been the trowel. He worked them into the cracks for self-preservation, for some measure of happiness, but in his defense, he used them to combat her volatile mood swings and her freakish need for control. She brought an impressive amount of her present-day anguish directly on herself.
Lizbeth formulated a strategic plan for the week, but was dangerously close to tossing it to the curb in favor of immediate gratification. When she might have blurted out her oldest secret, the sound of booted footsteps on the porch prevented it.
“Yoohoo! Welcome wagon.”
“Lucius!” Callie said, jumping up to let him in. He carried an oblong container by its handles. It was padded and sized for a large baking dish. Once he kissed Callie’s cheek, he turned to study the three women still planted on the couches.
“You are all visions, just visions.” He held up the container. “Willie, my beloved, reminded me of my manners. I brought coffeecake. It’s still warm. I thought about muffins, but this seemed more civilized for a Sunday.”
Meeting adjourned, Lizbeth thought. She would have said he pranced to the kitchen table where he deposited the carrier.
“Let me see if I’ve got these names right.” He stood at the foot of the coffee table. Arnett’s expression of supreme irritation at the interruption, or perhaps his persuasion, didn’t faze him.
“Arnett and Lizbeth Sebring. You’re sisters, right?” he said, pointing. His eyes glanced to Lizbeth’s for a millisecond, then devotedly returned to Arnett’s. “No, no, my bad. Mother- and daughter-in-law. You both look wonderful today.” He shifted his focus. “And Miss Beebe. I’m honored. Lucius Dameron here. At your service.” He added a courteous bow. When his stunned audience only mumbled responses, he straightened, wary. “Oh, no. I’ve intruded on a caucus, haven’t I?”
“A little bit, Lucius,” Beebe said.
“This really is my bad.”
“No. You’re here. Was it coffeecake you brought?” Beebe began rocking herself off the couch. “We’ll take a break. Might do us all good.”
Lucius helped pull Beebe to her feet. Once up, she motioned Arnett and Lizbeth to follow.
Callie left her soda can on the counter. She carried plates and utensils to Lucius, then linked her arm through his. “Can I have a rain check, Lucius?”
“Sure, gumball.” Then Lucius added, “You angry with me?”
“No, no, just need a little air.” Callie’s gaze glanced off the others, then she slipped out the door, not letting it slap against the frame. A concerned Lucius watched her go.
Laying fingertips on Lucius’s arm, Lizbeth said, “I’ll go check on her.”
Lucius nodded. Lizbeth ducked out the door. Back at the kitchen table, he must have unzipped the container. “Lordy, smell that cinnamon,” Beebe said.
Callie strolled toward the quiet river, and Lizbeth traipsed after her. Callie heard. She turned and waited.
“That Lucius, he’s about this much on the feminine side,” Lizbeth said, measuring several inches of air between my thumb and forefinger.
“He’s putting on. Don’t get me wrong, he’s gay, but he plays it up with the right crowd.”
They moved with a sauntering pace. “How long have you known him?”
“Since high school. He’s a good friend. No coffeecake?”
“Not much of an appetite these days.”
“Me neither.”
Lizbeth knew grief picked at one’s taste for food, but she found Callie’s admission worrisome. “It’s been well over a year since Dad’s death, I would have thought your appetite had returned. I guess that’s what I can look forward to.”
As they neared the weathered dock, their presence hustled a soft gray bunny, nibbling on a dandelion breakfast, back into a copse of trees. In the grass, Lizbeth saw a vine snaking through. Spaced along its length were several green raspberries that never ripened.
<
br /> Lizbeth and Callie stepped up to the solid six-foot-by-ten dock. They stood there a minute. Only the river’s drifting whispers kept an uncomfortable silence at bay.
“Come on,” Callie said with an arm gesture. “Let’s sit down.”
Their footsteps on the planks sounded like hollow echoes. Lizbeth mimicked Callie’s actions once they traversed the span: Her sandals came off.
“Jack and I called this the dangling dock because it’s just high enough to dangle our feet,” Callie said, lowering herself to the platform.
The water was cold when Lizbeth’s toes tested it. “You have a lot of memories here, and we’re stomping all over them. I’m sorry.”
Callie waved Lizbeth’s apology away. “My memories will survive.”
“I have every confidence they will.” Lizbeth’s feet swished the water. “My guess is, you went to Lucius’s house last night after you bolted out of here. I thought we’d see you or your car in town. You know, it’s a small enough place. We all drove back to make calls. It’s crazy how the mountains play havoc with the cell phones.”
“How’s Chad?” Callie asked.
“He’s a trooper. Thank God I have him.” A laugh bubbled up, and she related a story about her brother and sister-in-law. “Patrick and Debbie don’t have any kids, but they keep fish. I had to pack Chad’s Finding Nemo video, a hand-me-down from Geoff. They’ll certainly be tired of that before I get back. So anyway, I’m sure Arnett called Gary and Stella.” Lizbeth rolled her eyes, conveying her adversities with the two Sebrings. She thought that might lead to common ground and a spurt of conversation, but when Callie chose not to bite, Lizbeth moved on to another subject of importance. “Patrick posted some pictures of Chad on Facebook. I have my iPad, but I need a connection. Does Baron have wireless anywhere? If you don’t know, maybe Lucius will. I miss Chad pretty badly already. I really want to see the pictures. And I want to get Sarah’s office number to Pat and Deb.” Earlier, Callie supplied Lizbeth with the emergency number.
“I haven’t needed connections myself, but I think the library’s wired.”
“Good. I’ll show you the photos once they’re downloaded. Patrick says they’re a hoot. Chad can be a real ham, just like his father. Are you on Facebook?”
“No. Not me.”
“Really. It’s great for my family, especially the Florida crowd. Is your family in Cassel?”
Callie’s answer saddened Lizbeth. Her feet fell still. Callie had no family. Both parents and one older brother Mark were deceased. They’d died before John. Her family members all moved to Macon while she attended Duke University. In Macon, each in turn died and was buried. Lizbeth tried to conceive such a fate. Callie had half her life yet to live and no family. What loneliness!
“Since we’ve got a minute,” Callie said, “I’d like to weigh in with Beebe.”
Lizbeth surmised the subject. “If you’re talking about Beebe’s one-leader speech from yesterday, I got my comeuppance in the car after we left the depot.”
“No, I’m talking about your decision to move to Florida so closely after Dan’s death. I’m in full agreement with all the grief handbooks on the subject. It’s your decision, and I do give you credit for your courage, but I honestly feel it’s too soon. No matter what happens with Arnett and the quilt—and that’s clearly your decision, too—I’d like to see you allow more time to pass between this week and a future move.”
Lizbeth managed to hold her tongue inside the cabin. She accomplished the same now. She could ill afford to let Callie or Beebe learn that she’d already decided to accept their advice, but was feigning an obstinate approach in order to solidify a power shift. Arnett would step down from the throne.
Back in Cassel, when Arnett refused the quilt a second time, the Florida threat just sprang from Lizbeth’s mouth. Now, her fingers tightened around the edge of the dock. A move of that proportion felt too daunting to undertake without Dan. While she wouldn’t back down on the requirement that Arnett accept and display the quilt, the Florida threat gave her wiggle room. With the chirp of a passing wren, Lizbeth thought how pleased Beebe would be with her nod toward compromise.
“Every time I think about you pondering this decision,” Callie continued, “I remember going to the drugstore a week or two after Jack’s death. I literally felt like I was living inside some kind of hazy bubble. I could only see about three feet ahead. I felt isolated from a world operating normally around me.”
Lizbeth nodded her understanding. The same description illustrated how she stumbled around after Dan died.
“I went in for another jar of Noxzema,” Callie said. “I simply wanted a one-for-one replacement. I wanted the small size, exactly what I’d emptied. But instead of something a little larger than a golf ball, all the store stocked was a jar the size of a softball. I stood there for twenty minutes, trying to decide what to do. I needed the product, but I didn’t want a jar that large. I just wanted the smaller size. That’s what I came in for. Around and around it went in my head,” she said, raising her eyes to Lizbeth. “That larger jar represented months and months of living and washing my face without Jack in my life. I didn’t want to perceive that far into the future. In reality, I didn’t want to think about living as long as it would take to use up that jar.”
Lizbeth tried to read her eyes. Was Callie telling her she considered suicide? Were those desperate thoughts what caused her to search out Beebe?
“Florida. Noxzema. Florida. Noxzema,” Callie said, hands operating like a balance scale. “You’re truly not applying the tenets Beebe preaches about grief if you’re able to make that decision at the end of this week, so soon into the process.”
A tiny splinter of guilt pierced Lizbeth’s heart. Callie was baring her soul, but Lizbeth knew her game plan had to take precedence.
Seated beside Callie on Heatherwood’s dock, Lizbeth avoided a direct response, but the words she spoke were truthful. “You and I sitting like this and sharing stories is probably the best medicine. I hope there’s time to do more of this, and I will take your thoughts under advisement. But you have to realize, I’ve had years to understand Arnett. She’s not going to change. She is who she is.”
“You should wait. Dan’s death coupled with the reality that she might lose Chad could be enough,” Callie argued. “I think she’s scared. She knows you’re serious. You’re right, I don’t know Arnett like you do, but I’ve pieced things together over the years. Jack didn’t say a lot, but I know her sons and grandsons are very precious to her. Give her a chance, give her an opening, and enough time to show you.”
Dumbfounded, Lizbeth blinked at Callie. Her father-in-law was more fortunate than she realized. He had this understanding woman in his life. She bore no comparison to Arnett. “You’re amazing.” She hooked a thumb toward the cabin. “Arnett was ready to trash you if Lucius hadn’t turned up. And she will yet, mark my words. But out here, you’re taking her side.”
Lizbeth watched Callie’s mind engage, but she didn’t share her thoughts. Instead, her gaze followed a damselfly’s jagged flight into shadow. That day, avoidance was the game between them.
“So tell me,” Callie said, looking across the river, “what else was said about me last night?”
Lizbeth grinned. When she wasn’t avoiding it, she was a devoted fan of honesty week. “You have to know your life with Dad is fascinating to the rest of us. Beebe and me especially. I suppose it’s different for Arnett. Anyone who’s heard part of the story would naturally want to know the rest. There’s no way not to be curious. Beebe and I did throw out some speculation while we waited for Arnett to get off the phone. It centered around divorce. Why Dad didn’t divorce Arnett. Why you didn’t force him. Why you stayed in the relationship without a divorce. After he mov
ed in with you, why didn’t you force a divorce then? I know Arnett thought you would insist on it. How could you accept your relationship with Dad when he didn’t, wouldn’t, or wasn’t forced to get a divorce?”
A car door closed, and they turned. Sarah Prosser walked into view.
Callie returned her wave. “I wonder why Sarah’s here? It’s Sunday.”
“Probably looking for Beebe.” That was Lizbeth’s educated guess since Sarah didn’t head their way. “Beebe left a note on the office door when we went into town.”
Callie frowned. “Really.”
Family Connections
Lucius sat around the dining room table with Beebe and Arnett. Their coffee cups were half empty. Lucius considered the infinitesimal crumbs remaining on three small plates a tribute to his baking prowess. Beebe cut herself off midsentence when she saw Sarah Prosser appear at the door. Giving the property manager a quick flick of her hand, Beebe scraped her chair back and got to her feet.
Lucius leaned forward to be seen. “Hey, Sarah P.”
“Hey, Lucius. Don’t leave until I talk with you.”
“You got it, honeybunch.”
Beebe ushered Sarah away, and Lucius wondered why those two had their heads together. It took every molecule of willpower to keep his backside plastered to the chair. It did squirm some while he debated whether he could get a read on their discussion from the kitchen window. He heard their footsteps lead down the porch steps toward the drive.
It was then he realized Arnett’s dark eyes were, in fact, watching his squirming backside. A bird in the hand, he thought. He ditched Sarah and Beebe to concentrate on Arnett. Her finger traced the lip of her coffee cup. He smiled inquiringly at her.
Smiling back, she dropped her hands to her lap. “So,” she said, “you knew John.”
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