Everywhere else in the world, normalcy ruled.
Here on the phone with her mother, Stevie was in the Twilight Zone.
“What else is there?”
“Haven’t you ever visited her?”
“Why would I? I pay people to look after her.”
“That’s it?” Stevie went on. “No concern? No curiosity about your own child?”
“If you’re going to wallow in hysterics, this conversation is at an end.”
“Hysterics?” Stevie pulled the phone away from her ear and stuck her tongue out at it. Slapping it back into place, she said, “You think this is hysterics?”
“Good night, Stephanie,” Joanna said just before the quiet click and soft dial tone told Stevie she was now talking to herself.
“Good night, Mom.” She hung up the phone and tried to ignore the cold settling over her. Jesus. Tarantulas made better parents. And she’d come from that woman. Stevie rubbed her hands up and down her arms, trying desperately to rub away the chills snaking through her body. She felt so damn … alone.
Tears stung her eyes, but Stevie deliberately blinked them back. She wouldn’t cry over Joanna. Not again. She’d wasted enough tears in her childhood. There weren’t any left.
She’d planned on staying overnight and going home in the morning. But being in the empty hotel room wasn’t what she needed at the moment. What she needed was to be surrounded by the familiar.
To be home.
To talk to someone who knew something about love. About parenting.
She needed Mama.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
MAMA’S KITCHEN SMELLED LIKE childhood.
Stevie stopped on the threshold of the open back door. Sunlight spilled into the room, and just for a second, she enjoyed all of the memories that came rushing to greet her. She and Carla, sitting at the breakfast booth, shelling peas. Mama, teaching the two girls how to make lasagna. Paul and Nick, crashing through the kitchen, snatching still-hot cookies from the cooling trays. Cold drinks and warm hugs and always, always, Mama.
“Come in! Come in!” Mama shouted, waving a dish towel at Stevie to get her attention. “You’re in time to help make sandwiches for tonight.”
“Tonight?” Stevie repeated, walking into the kitchen and dropping her purse on the green Naugahyde breakfast booth seat.
Mama shook her head. “You forgot? End-of-summer picnic on the beach?”
“That’s tonight?” How had she forgotten? It was a tradition. On the last Saturday in September, the Candellanos trooped to the beach, took over a couple of the fire pits, and gave summer a good send-off.
She looked forward to the late-night picnic every year. Until now. This year, though, she hadn’t even given it a thought. Not surprising really, considering her brain was just one or two thoughts away from exploding.
“Is tonight,” Mama said, and finally looked up from the mountain of cold cuts she was tossing onto loaves of Italian bread with the panache of a Vegas blackjack dealer. One look at Stevie, though, and she dropped what she was doing. “What is wrong?”
Now that she was here, standing in front of the woman she’d been waiting to talk to since last night, Stevie couldn’t think of a good way to start. Thoughts jumbled in her mind, each of them fighting for recognition. There was so much she wanted to say. And so much she couldn’t. So she settled for saying simply, “My mother.”
“Ah.… ” Mama nodded, came around the center island, and took Stevie’s elbow in a hard grip. Steering her toward the breakfast booth, she gave her a little nudge, and once she was seated, Mama sat down opposite her. “So,” she said patiently, folding her hands atop the scarred tabletop, “tell me.”
And just like that, she did. Like a balloon losing its air, Stevie talked, telling Mama all about Debbie and how great she was and how she’d only just found out about her. She talked about Joanna and shivered as she recounted last night’s conversation with the woman.
“Stevie,” Mama said when she finally ran out of steam, “you shouldn’t do this anymore.”
“Do what? Talk to my mother?” Stevie reached for a napkin and began to systematically shred it.
“No.” Mama reached across the table and snatched the napkin. Clucking her tongue, she muttered, “You and Carla. So much alike.” Then she took a breath and blew it out again, ruffling one stray lock of steel gray hair. “You must stop waiting for your mother to be who you want her to be.”
Rationally she knew that was good advice. Emotionally was a different story. No matter how often she told herself that Joanna was no Leave It to Beaver mom, there was a small corner of Stevie’s heart that just never stopped hoping. Of course, that was the same corner of her heart that never stopped bleeding, too. Shaking her head, Stevie said, “I keep thinking that one day, she’ll change. Maybe when she’s older. She’ll realize she wants to be a mother.”
Exasperated, Mama snorted. “She wanted to be a mother or she would have found a way to not be.”
“Trust me, Mama,” Stevie said, “she was no mother.”
“Not the one you wanted, yes,” Mama agreed. “But your mother anyway.”
“Great. Born of Spiderwoman. What does that make me?”
Mama chuckled. “Makes you Stevie.”
She smiled in spite of everything. Fine. Having Joanna for a mother had made her the woman she was today. But let’s look at that woman for a minute, she thought but didn’t say, since she didn’t want Mama jumping up to slap her on the back of the head.
Yes, Stevie was independent and, generally speaking, pretty happy. But she was also alone. She’d never wanted to be married because she was so damn afraid of starting up another marital merry-go-round—just like the one she’d seen growing up. She was damn near terrified to have kids, for fear mothering instincts were inherited.
Oh, yeah. Joanna had done a helluva job on her older child. Heck, Debbie, if you thought about it, had really gotten the sunshine end of the deal.
“You’re a good girl, Stevie.”
“Thanks, Mama.” She smiled and swallowed the sigh crouched at the base of her throat.
“But a foolish one.”
Stevie blinked. “Huh?”
Mama scooted out of her seat, walked to Stevie, and bent down to kiss the top of her head. Then came the loving little slap, just to make sure Stevie knew she belonged.
“Stop trying to make your mother something she is not.”
“But—”
“And stop thinking you’re like her.” She wagged a finger in Stevie’s face to make her point. “Who loves every stray like a new baby? Who is sitting here in my kitchen not helping me make sandwiches and worried about her sister? Be thankful for your sister—don’t waste time thinking about lost years.” She used her fingertips to tilt Stevie’s chin up until they were looking at each other. “Enjoy now.”
The icy, hard shell around Stevie’s heart cracked and the break was almost painful. Tears stung her eyes again and she tried desperately to fight them back. She was willing to bet she’d cried more in the last few weeks than she had in her whole life.
“No tears, Stevie,” Mama said, patting her cheek. “You must learn to trust yourself—and those who love you.”
Trust.
If she could do that, she could tell Mama the whole truth. About how she was pretty sure she was dangerously close to being in love with another one of Mama’s sons. And that she didn’t have a clue what to do about it.
Oh, no.
Couldn’t be love.
If it was, then what would she do?
“Oh God.” She dropped her head into her hands and prayed for a stroke.
“No time to bother God now,” Mama announced, tugging Stevie to her feet. “Now time to make sandwiches.”
* * *
Paul cleaned his glasses on the hem of his dark blue sweatshirt and turned his face into the howling wind. Standing on the cliffs above the beach, he had a bird’seye view of the sand and the ocean. Moonlight shone down from a
starry sky and touched the edge of far-flung whitecaps, making the sea foam glow with a weird green phosphorescence that looked almost ghostly in the darkness. It was low tide and the small rippling waves seemed to sneak toward shore, sending out cold, wet fingers, reaching for the people already gathered around the fire pits.
Sliding his glasses back on, he let his gaze drift across the family, smiling as he saw little Tina and Reese chasing Carla’s dog Abbey along the water’s edge. Then he saw Stevie. She and Carla were standing together, keeping an eye on the kids. Paul’s gaze locked on Stevie and he let himself enjoy the moment of being able to watch her without being seen.
A tight knot formed in his guts and his heart thudded painfully in his chest. She threw her head back and laughed at something Carla was saying. Stevie’s blond hair flew wild and free in the wind, and in the moonlight it looked almost silver. Her long legs looked great in faded denim jeans, and the oversize sweatshirt she wore did nothing to hide the figure he knew was beneath. As she bent down to scoop up Tina and throw her high in the air, his niece’s giggles bubbled in the air.
And Paul’s hands fisted at his sides.
Stevie looked perfect like that. With a laughing child in her arms and the wind in her hair. He etched the picture she made into his brain so that even fifty years from now he’d be able to look at this one snapshot in time and see her as she was now.
As he would always see her.
Scowling to himself, he started down the rocky slope toward the beach. His running shoes skidded on the loose gravel and sand, but he could have made the walk blindfolded. He knew every step, every niche in the ground. He and Nick used to take this same trail down to the beach when they were kids. They’d played pirate in the coves and later, they’d tried their hand at surfing, until the board cut loose one day and banged into the back of Nick’s head.
Paul frowned again as he reached the bottom. If he hadn’t been with Nick that long-ago day, his twin would have drowned. And realizing that had him looking for Nick in the crowd. Standing beside one of the fire pits, he was talking to Tony and, for the first time in days, actually looked happy.
Good sign? Bad sign?
Hell, who knew?
“Paul!” Mama shouted. “You’re almost late.”
He grinned and kissed her as soon as he was close enough. “‘Almost late’ actually means ‘on time’ in most cultures, Mama.”
“Funny. Everybody’s funny.” She handed him a can of lighter fluid. “You make the other fire; Tony made this one.”
Paul tore his gaze from Stevie to take the can being thrust at him. “We don’t really need two, do we?”
Mama sniffed. “Always have two.”
“Fine. Tradition must be upheld.”
They had too many damn traditions. Like the tradition that said “Nick and Stevie” forever. Like the tradition of him looking out for his twin no matter what. Like Nick expecting life to keep handing him gifts, despite the fact that he clearly didn’t appreciate them.
Mind racing, Paul set off for the second cement ring, not twenty yards from where the family had already set up camp. He only half-listened to the sounds of his family, rushing toward him and receding like the waves, sliding toward shore before easing back out to sea.
He shoved twists of newspaper between the stacked logs, then squirted the mess with the lighter fluid. Striking a match, he cupped it in his palm to protect it from the wind, then touched the wavering flame to the edges of the papers. The fire caught quickly, snatching at the fuel, feeding on itself with quickening snaps and crackles, dancing along the logs, flickering in the wind.
“Nice job, Boy Scout,” Nick said, coming up behind him.
“I wasn’t a Boy Scout,” Paul reminded him. “You were.”
“Oh. Right.” He laughed shortly and took a long sip of beer. “Damn, that was a long time ago.”
“Yeah.” Paul eyed the beer bottle, then looked at his twin. “How you doin’?”
“Fine, Mom. This is my first beer.”
“Good. When’s the interview?” Paul asked, shoving his hands into his jeans pockets.
“Tomorrow.” He stared off at the ocean, squinting into the wind, and said, more to himself than his brother, “I’ve gotta get this. It’d be perfect.”
Old loyalties rose up inside Paul as he watched his brother and, for the first time in weeks, didn’t feel that stab of irritation that had become such a familiar thing. He and Nick shared something that very few people would ever understand. That twin thing—scientists could call it what they wanted—was so bone-deep, so ingrained in nearly every damn cell, it was a hard thing to hold out against for very long.
He slapped Nick on the back and waited for his brother to look at him. “You’ll get it,” he said. “It’s your turn, right?”
Nick met his gaze and held it for a long minute. Then shrugging, he tried to brush it all off with a smile. “Right. My turn. Why shouldn’t I get it?”
“Exactly.”
“Come on, you guys,” Carla said, coming up behind them and threading her arms through theirs. “Food’s on, and you know how cranky Mama gets when people aren’t eating.”
And as they had been as kids, the three youngest Candellanos walked, locked together. An indivisible wall against outsiders.
* * *
“You don’t tell ghost stories?” Jackson asked, surprise in his voice. “What the hell kind of campfire is this?”
Carla grinned and leaned into him. “It’s not a ‘camp’ fire at all, dummy. It’s an end-of-summer fire. Completely different.”
Stevie and Paul sat opposite the newlyweds, and between the heat of the fire and the desire humming in the cold, damp air, she felt like she was sitting on a stove top. She cast a sidelong glance at Paul, leaning forward to jab a long stick at the burning logs. Wavering shadows danced across his face, and a reflection of the fire sparkled in his dark brown eyes, giving them an almost hypnotic magic. But then, that wasn’t surprising, was it? She’d been mesmerized by him for three weeks now.
He scowled at the flames as red-hot cinders lifted into the air, dazzled in the wind, then winked out of existence. Stevie thought she saw tension etched into his features. But maybe that was just wishful thinking.
It had been days since they were together. Days since he’d held her. Long, lonely nights since the last time he’d touched her. And the fires inside her were burning a hell of a lot hotter than these little bitty bonfires.
“Okay,” Jackson said, laughing, “an explanation is required for non-Candellanos.” He cradled his new wife against his chest and looked at Paul.
One corner of his amazing mouth quirked in a half-smile. “End of summer is a celebration,” Paul said. “And I’m pretty sure it started with our folks celebrating the fact that we’d all be going back to school and getting out of their hair.”
Carla laughed. “Probably.”
Paul smiled at her, then turned his head so he could see Stevie, too. She was a part of his memories. She’d always been there. From the time they were kids. She’d had a piece of his heart for years. “But however it started, it ended up being just a big excuse for the family to get together and eat outside.”
“As opposed to all the eating you usually do inside,” Jackson said, laughing.
“Exactly.” Paul looked at his brother-in-law. “And then of course, Papa liked the idea of making fires. Which is why it’s ‘tradition’ to have two rings.” He chuckled and glanced to the other fire, where the rest of the family sat in a wide circle, toasting marshmallows on straightened-out wire hangers. “I think Papa was a closet pyromaniac.”
Stevie laughed shortly and gave him a shove. “He was not!”
Paul grinned at her. “Okay, maybe not. But I do know one thing for sure,” he said, and looked deep into Stevie’s eyes. “With two fires, Mama and Papa could let us kids toast marshmallows at one fire while they did a little snuggling at the other.”
Something in her eyes flashed and he knew sh
e was feeling the same damn thing that had a grip on him. And knowing that didn’t make him feel any better.
“Well,” Jackson said, splintering the tension-filled moment, “snuggling sounds pretty good to me.” He stood up and then reached down to pull Carla to her feet. “But I think we’ll take a little walk, first.”
Carla smiled up at him, and the pleasure on her face would have been evident to a blind man. Paul’s back teeth ground together. Though he was happy for his little sister, he couldn’t help resenting the fact that while she was free to hold her husband, if he so much as hugged Stevie, it’d set off a Candellano civil war.
Carla and her new husband, arms wrapped around each other, moved out of the circle of firelight and into the deeper shadows closer to the water’s edge.
Stevie sighed as she watched them. “They’re good together, aren’t they?”
“Yeah,” he said, but he wasn’t watching his sister as she moved farther into the shadows. Instead, his gaze was locked on Stevie. In the firelight, she looked almost impossibly beautiful. Dancing shadows played on her features. Flames danced in her eyes.
Then slowly, as if she sensed his gaze on her, she swiveled her head to look at him. And the fire he saw in her eyes had nothing to do with the reflection of the flames shimmering in those wide blue depths.
“God, I miss you,” he whispered, and his voice was nearly swallowed by the rush of the ocean and the hiss of the fire.
“I miss you, too.” Stevie wrapped her arms around her up-drawn knees, then rested her chin atop them. “It would be so much easier—better—if I didn’t.”
An icy wind shot in off the ocean and breathed into the fire, sweeping brightly lit cinders and sparks along with it as it raced off again into the darkness.
Stevie shivered.
“Cold?” Paul asked, then gave a self-conscious laugh. “Stupid question.” He shifted, moving close to her.
Knowing You Page 21