by Rae Walsh
A Jar Full of Light
Aveline Book Two
Rae Walsh
Small Seed Press
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Reviews
Acknowledgments
Untitled
About the Author
Also by Rae Walsh
Prologue
“Mom?”
Theresa held her phone with trembling fingers, closing her eyes at the sound of her daughter’s voice. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes to look at the sky outside her kitchen window. It was showing off again with deep, luscious sunset colors—fuchsia, purple and tangerine. Theresa tapped her fingers on the side of the sink and prayed that her voice would hold.
“Hi, Little,” she said. Her voice was quiet but steady, a relief after a few long days of not saying a word out loud to anyone. “How are things?”
There was a pause. “Pretty good,” Maddie told her. Her voice sounded the way Theresa’s heart felt, full of ragged edges and question marks. Lack of sleep. Theresa’s heart wanted to burst out of her ribcage and fling itself across the country to her baby. Maddie’s shoplifting and Theresa’s subsequent meltdown had led to Theresa sending her daughter to live with her grandmother, across the country in Aveline, Theresa’s hometown in California.
“I finished writing my apology letters,” Maddie went on.
Theresa let her eyes drift shut as guilt washed over her in a hot wave. “That’s good,” she said. “That must have been hard to do.”
“It was. It feels good to have it over with. But Mom? I miss you.”
“I miss you too. Are you ready to come home?”
“I was wondering…” There was a long pause. Theresa readied herself for whatever Maddie was going to say. The last months had been good and hard. With Maddie gone, Theresa had dug deep into counseling, scheduling herself with two different therapists. She had made some breakthroughs and spent hours journaling, painting, and throwing pots. The months had been good for Theresa. But she was worried that she had given up too much when she sent Maddie away. Theresa’s mother hadn’t even allowed Maddie to come and live with her, sending her to Theresa’s little brother Sam, instead. Living with Sam had gone okay for Maddie, except for another shoplifting incident, something Maddie assured Theresa she would never do again. She was done with stealing for good.
But would Maddie ever want to come home, now that she knew what it was like to have a normal life? With normal people? Theresa steeled herself as Maddie went on talking.
“I don’t want to come back to Minnesota,” she said. “I don’t think it’s good for me.”
Pain bloomed somewhere near Theresa’s sternum, and she breathed, the way she had learned, trying to allow it to flow over her, rather than pulling her under its current. But Maddie wasn’t finished.
“I don’t think it’s good for you either, Mom. I miss you so much. Will you please move here? Then we can all live here together.”
Theresa’s eyes snapped open. She stared at the sky—now half swept over by the indigo night. She pushed away from the sink and walked to stand at the fridge, staring at the wedding invitation she had taped to the door.
Move back to Aveline?
Aveline still beat hard in her heart. Some part of it traveled with Theresa everywhere she ever went. She had never really become accustomed to the winters in Minnesota, though she appreciated the numbing of the cold.
“Mom?”
Theresa shook herself. “I don’t know, honey,” she said.
“You’re coming, next month, though, right?”
“To the wedding?” Theresa traced the edges of the gold invitation with her fingertips. Sammy was finally getting married, and she was happy for her little brother. “I was thinking about it. Maddie, there were a lot of hard things in Aveline…”
“I think you need to believe that you can move past those hard things,” Theresa’s fourteen-year-old told her definitively.
Theresa snorted out a little laugh. “Oh, I’ve missed you so much, feisty girl.”
She left the kitchen and opened the screen door to walk outside in the late summer evening. The air smelled of fields, of cut grass and sunshine.
Maddie didn’t yet know that some hard things never let you go. Theresa shivered.
“I’ll come to the wedding,” she said. “And we can talk there. We need to live together, you and I.”
Maddie broke in. “And we can do that in Aveline. It’s so good here, Mom.”
Theresa didn’t need her daughter to tell her how good Aveline was. If she closed her eyes, she could see it, smell it, taste it. Home. The jewel of a lake. The smell of redwood needles underfoot. Sleepy afternoons, star-filled nights. Dancing on the shores of the lake. And… danger. Her arms prickled as she remembered. But she would do anything in the world to keep Maddie happy and safe.
“I’ll see you at the wedding, Little,” she said. “Do you have a dress yet?”
Maddie took a breath and launched into a long ramble about how she was a bridesmaid, and the dress was amazing, and the food was amazing, and everything was amazing.
Theresa paced her backyard, listening to the change in her daughter, growing more and more sure that she was going to have to move back to a place she had thought she left forever.
Chapter One
Sheldon stood on the sidewalk in front of his shop and looked down the street. Any minute now, Lucy would arrive, and then they could walk to the church together. But Lucy was always late. He huffed a sigh, looking down at his suit and smoothing the embroidery on the cuffs, reliving the night before in excruciating detail.
Sam and Katie’s wedding rehearsal had gone smoothly—or at least Sheldon thought it had. He had been a little preoccupied, hardly able to think straight. Theresa was coming to the rehearsal dinner. It was all Sheldon had thought about for days. Theresa was returning to Aveline after ten years.
Sheldon had fumbled through the ceremony rehearsal, staring blankly at Francisco when the reverend asked him for the vows. After Francisco asked for the copy of the vows for the third time, Sheldon pulled them out of his pocket with a start, only to find that he had carefully folded and carried the menu for the rehearsal dinner, not the vows.
Sam shook his head, but the rest of the wedding party burst out laughing. Needless to say, Sam and Katie had practiced with made-up vows. Despite Sheldon’s jumpiness, Theresa hadn’t shown up when t
hey were at the church.
The wedding party and family walked to the Aveline café, Katie’s restaurant, where the rehearsal dinner was held. Sheldon thought it was strange to have a rehearsal dinner at the home and restaurant of the bride-to-be, but Katie wouldn’t have it any other way.
“Control freak,” he muttered at her, passing her in the doorway. She elbowed him playfully.
Inside the café, Sheldon couldn’t settle down. He tried to enjoy the hors d’oeurves and wine Katie’s employees had served, but finally, he jumped up and walked back and forth in the second dining room, which was blissfully empty. Why wasn’t Theresa here yet? How long was a man supposed to have such crazy anticipation before his head exploded?
After a while, Sam came and stood in the doorway, leaning on the doorjamb with his arms crossed.
“You’re pacing,” he said.
Sheldon flashed his best friend an irritated look.
“You’re not,” he retorted. “What’s wrong with you? Aren’t you nervous?”
“To marry Katie? Are you kidding? Of course not.”
“Fine then, never mind.” Sheldon continued to pace, now just the tiniest bit irritated that his friend was so levelheaded.
“Do you have a plan?” Sam asked after a few minutes.
Sheldon looked up. “A plan?”
“For when you see her?”
Sheldon stared. How could you plan a thing like that? While he tried to formulate an answer, he noticed that of all things, Sam had grown a short beard. He had even trimmed it, rather than shaving it off like he usually did when he was too lazy for grooming for a short while and then realized his mistake.
“Are you going to shave that off before the wedding?” Sheldon asked.
Sam shook his head, leaning forward and fixing Sheldon with a look. “Shel. Don’t try to distract me. Do you know what you will do when you see Theresa for the first time in ten years? Don’t forget how many times I had to hear you talk about how you were waiting for her and were never going to stop waiting. What were you planning to do when you saw her again?”
Sheldon was opening his mouth to reply, but just then, Maddie skidded breathlessly into the room.
“Mom’s here!” she said. “She’s pulling onto the street.” She was gone before the words finished echoing off the vaulted ceilings.
Sam raised an eyebrow at Sheldon.
“Better come up with something quick,” he said. And he straightened and motioned with one hand. “Let’s go welcome my big sister.”
“I still don’t know what you mean,” Sheldon muttered as they walked to the front door. “What good is a plan? Isn’t human decency enough?”
“If you say so,” Sam said, and then his face broke open in a smile and he hurried forward. Sheldon breathed to try to ease the knot in his stomach, and his eyes landed on someone coming in the front door, and all thoughts… well... he reached for thoughts, for one single thought, but his head had emptied itself.
Theresa. Vaguely, Sheldon saw Maddie throw her arms around her mom, and blurrily, he saw Sam bend to give her a hug. Fuzzily, Sheldon sensed Katie come to stand beside him. Then Katie was moving closer to Sam, greeting Theresa. Sheldon came out of his fog to see Katie staring with her mouth open. Staring and staring at Theresa, who shuffled her feet and turned a bit red.
“You’re taller than I expected,” Theresa said bluntly, and suddenly Sheldon could breathe again. This was the Theresa he had always known. Hearing her blunt words took the edge off the sharp pain Sheldon felt when he looked at her face—her absolutely…
“You’re more beautiful than I expected,” Katie said in reply. She was still staring at Theresa. Again Theresa shifted her weight from foot to foot, looking up at the ceiling.
“Beauty is only a construct,” she said. “You might not think I was beautiful if I had a giant plate in my lip, but some people would think I was very, very beautiful.”
Katie laughed a little under her breath. “Yes, but, Sam, Sheldon, you didn’t warn me. You could have told me that Theresa looks like a painting.”
Sheldon flinched. He knew how much Theresa hated this. She hated it when people stared at her. Hated being called beautiful. She looked as though she was holding her breath, and her hands were tightening into fists.
“You should have asked Katie if she had a plan,” he murmured to Sam, lurching forward toward Theresa. Sheldon knew she was on the verge of running, and he had to keep her here. He had a feeling that if she ran, she would never come back.
“Picasso,” he said. “Right, Reesey? Maybe you look like that woman in the Picasso painting with three chins and four noses?”
Theresa looked at him then, color coming back into her face, and Sheldon saw her eyes light up with relief. She wouldn’t run. But oh, she was looking at him, and he was going to freeze again. Theresa was shorter than any of them, even shorter than Maddie. She was average height really, or maybe a little under average, but nothing else about her was ordinary. She had grown her hair out, he saw. It brushed her waist. That was new. But her hazel eyes, so startling, her cheekbones, her perfect face… they were all the same.
“I do have a lot of noses,” she told him. “I left some at home.”
And she held her arm out to him so they could walk into the dining room together.
“Purple,” a voice said in a wry tone, and Sheldon jumped, bringing himself back to the present. He was not at the rehearsal dinner with Theresa. He was standing on the sidewalk, waiting for Lucy, so the two of them could attend Sam and Katie’s wedding. Lucy stood in front of him now, eyes wide as she stared at his suit.
“There you are,” he said. “Shall we?” He held his arm out to the older woman. Lucy, his short, spirited friend, was Thai-American and wore her hair spiked with some kind of product. Her lipstick was the red of fire halls. She narrowed her eyes at him but took his arm without further comment. They began to walk in the direction of the church.
“To answer your question,” he said, “if it was a question: Yes. Purple. This is a wedding, after all. Most people have forgotten how to dress for weddings.” He looked down at her. Lucy wore a brilliant yellow dress, covered in large roses. “Present company excepted, of course,” he added.
Lucy reached her free hand out to pat at the embroidery on the cuff. “This is exceptional, even for you, Sheldon. Any reason you’re pulling out all the stops?”
He frowned at her. “My best friend is getting married. That’s not enough for exceptional?”
It was true that his suit was divine. Rich, old purple velvet, embroidered at the cuffs and collar. Part of the reason Sheldon had been excited about a wedding, was that it gave him a chance to wear this suit.
Lucy changed tactics.
“How was the rehearsal dinner last night?” she asked. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it. I was getting Larry settled in his new dorm.”
Sheldon blinked. He opened his mouth to say it was fine, just fine, but he couldn’t say a thing. He started to cough, choking on God knew what, and bent down to tie his shoe and recover, remembering. Blast Lucy.
He straightened and took the water bottle Lucy held out to him, trying to regain composure.
“The dinner was fine,” he told Lucy after he had his breath back. “Katie’s menu was delicious. Even her parents were impressed. And I think they’re warming up to Sam.”
He thought of how he had pulled Katie aside after dessert.
“She hates being called beautiful,” he told his friend. “She hates being beautiful.”
Katie’s mouth drew into a miserable line, and she crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I wish Sam had told me. But how could anyone hate looking like that? It’s impossible. She’s perfect.”
“I don’t know,” Sheldon had said, sighing. “But she has always hated it. She told me once that her outsides don’t match her insides.”
Lucy looked at him but didn’t comment, and they reached the church without anymore coughing fits.
Chapter Two
Before they reached the church, Sheldon saw Francisco, his reverend friend, standing at the church door greeting people as they arrived.
“Bride or groom?” he asked them as Sheldon and Lucy reached him. Lucy snorted.
“Nice try, Frankie,” she said.
There was no way to choose between the bride and groom. Though both Sheldon and Lucy had known Sam longer, they had come to love Katie with a fierce, protective love. Sheldon knew he would kick Sam in the kneecaps if he ever broke his vows to Katie.
Frankie laughed at Lucy’s response. She sniffed and walked past him, turning briefly to Sheldon. “I’m off to find Katie,” she said. “Let me know if you need me.”
Francisco grabbed Sheldon in a hug, then stepped back and looked at him, raising his eyebrows.
“Nice suit!” he said. “I didn’t think you could still shock me, but this is magnificent.”
“I’m so glad Sam didn’t make us all wear the same thing,” Sheldon said. “I hate it when wedding parties look like clones. Whose idea was that, and why do we let it continue in the enlightened age?”
Francisco stepped back and regarded Sheldon with crossed arms. He was taller than Sheldon, which was saying a lot. Sheldon was very tall. “It’s interesting, the term ‘enlightened age,’” Frankie said, “but we can save that conversation for another time.” He paused, looking at Sheldon.