THE STARLIGHT HILL COMPLETE COLLECTION: 1-8

by Bell, Heatherly

  “Sorry to be such a witch. But I’m worried about germs. You know, with the baby coming we need to make sure everything is clean. Perfect.”

  “Right.” He finished wiping the counter and took a good look at his sister-in-law. She was tiny, and now with the added weight of the baby she looked a little like an old toy he’d once found at a garage sale. Weebles wobble but they don’t fall down.

  “Do I sound like a bitch?”

  Crap. He was the wrong person to ask. For a moment he didn’t answer, hoping something would come to him. Or maybe the phone would ring, a fire would start somewhere, or someone else would knock at the door. Time as he knew it stopped and he brilliantly said, “Uh—”

  “I do sound like a bitch! What’s wrong with me?” Brooke burst into tears.

  “Oh, hey. Hey, Brooke. No, don’t do that.” Yeah, that was all he had. The extent of his knowledge in Comforting Women 101.

  “I’ve seriously never cried this much in my life. It’s like I’m making up for lost time.” Shoulders shaking, Brooke grabbed a box of tissues and made her way to the family room. “I don’t know if I can be a good mom.”

  “Sure you can.” Had it really come to this? He was now going to give advice on parenthood to his brother’s wife? Because he had nothing.

  Brooke lowered her bulky body to the couch slowly, like she was a crane. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because, you know, it’s…in the DNA or something. You’re just wired that way.” You know what? That sounded pretty good if he did say so himself.

  “I don’t think so,” she sniffed into her tissue. “Not me.”

  He sat next to her. “Have you talked to Billy about this?”

  She stopped crying to give him an are-you-shitting-me look. “He’ll just give me a pep talk. Would you tell Billy that you don’t think you can do something?”

  No he wouldn’t. Billy didn’t like to hear the word ‘can’t’, and consequently he wasn’t too sympathetic. You were more likely to get a twenty minute pep talk than an ounce of sympathy from him. But with Brooke, the wife he was nuts about, it had seemed different. Right now, Scott guessed that Brooke might be feeling overly sensitive. “You should talk to him.”

  “I already have. I got a nice backrub out of it.” Brooke sniffed. “And a pep talk.”

  “You can’t miss out on his pep talks.” Scott laughed. “You’re going to make a great mom. Look at how you got after me to clean up my own mess instead of doing it for me.”

  She wiped her eyes. “I did do that. It’s only that I want everything to be perfect, for Billy. He deserves it.”

  “You do know that your kid is going to have half of Billy’s DNA? So there’s no way it’s going to be perfect.”

  “Don’t say that! Your brother is perfect.”

  He would love to be able to remove his eyes right now and just roll them all over the floor. “No. He’s not. Maybe to you, because you know, you love him.”

  She hit his shoulder. “You do, too.”

  “Yeah. But he’s not perfect so stop with that crap.”

  “He’s perfect for me.”

  “That’s it. He’s perfect for you.” Not for the first time, Scott wondered if there was such a thing. He wouldn’t have believed it before he’d seen both of his older brothers matched with what so far seemed to be the perfect woman for each of them. Was there anyone like that in the world for him? Not likely.

  It was true that there were happy couples all around him lately. He didn’t want to jinx anyone, but how long could it last? He’d never seen a relationship that didn’t end in loud jealous accusations and someone walking out the door for good. He figured in order to be in a committed long-term relationship, a person had to give up and give in a lot. Wallace called it ‘being right or being happy.’ Said you couldn’t have it both ways. Well, why the hell not?

  “I just love him so much.”

  He pulled Brooke into a sideways hug. “See that right there? That’s why you can’t help but do it right. You love him. Love’s all you need.”

  Right now he was talking out of his ass and making it up on the fly and damned if this didn’t sound pretty good to him. Better than that, he could see it in her eyes. She was buying it. Score!

  “Really?” Brooke gave him another hopeful look. “Because we have love. In spades.”

  “Oh yeah. You’re going to have a great kid. Not even a little bit spoiled.”

  “Well. Maybe a little bit spoiled.” Brooke gave him a watery smile.

  “Definitely.”

  Brooke reached for another tissue from the box. “Now let’s talk about what I almost interrupted in here earlier.”

  He winced. “There was no almost about it.”

  “Aha!”

  “And I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Fair enough. On a scale of one to ten with one being ‘I can tolerate her presence’ and ten being—”

  “Brooke…”

  “—the hottest thing you’ve ever seen, where does she rate?”

  A twelve. “Why is everyone so interested in my love life?”

  “So you admit there’s a love life to be interested in.”

  “I don’t admit to jack-shit.”

  Brooke laughed. “I’m worried about you. We all are. We love you and want to see you happy.”

  “I am happy.”

  “At the very least, you’re bored. Admit it.”

  “Rescuing kittens isn’t why I signed up for this gig.” He loved his family, he loved this little town, but it didn’t offer much in the way of stimulation. Not after where he’d been. He’d wanted to make a difference. Always had. Meanwhile, wildfires were burning out of control all over the state.

  “Hey, you rescued a damsel in distress.”

  Except that little jolt of adrenaline had turned out to be the biggest pain in his ass. “Yeah.”

  “I know you don’t like the attention you’re getting, but it comes with the territory.”

  “When someone has a camera handy.”

  “Don’t you realize nothing really happens unless it’s captured forever on a smart phone and then broadcasted all over social media?”

  He laughed. “I prefer the talking dog videos.”

  “Don’t worry, they’ll be another viral video coming along soon and soon enough everyone will forget about you and Diana.”

  True enough. Until then, he’d just have to grit his teeth.

  After KP duty and comforting Brooke duty, Scott finally hopped into his truck. He’d had a text from Sophia this morning, wanting him to meet her this afternoon. She’d asked him not to let anyone else know about it, not that he would have. He couldn’t let her down now when she was beginning to open up to him, so he’d agreed to call her when he was done with the dog and pony show.

  From his truck, he texted Sophia: Done here. Where to?

  Meet me @ Lone Hill, she texted back.

  Shit. He didn’t want to go to the damned cemetery. But he also knew that Sophia’s mother, Leah, had been buried at Lone Hill. Some people liked to visit their loved ones.

  When he arrived, Sophia stood at the garden entrance, a bouquet of red roses in her hands. Scott decided he could breathe again, and pulled into a parking space. He reminded himself that Sophia didn’t know why a text message like the one she sent him would have unnerved him the way it did. He didn’t talk about Jake anymore, to his family or anyone else.

  “Hey,” he said as he walked up to Sophia. “Visiting your mom today?”

  She gave him a tiny smile and turned and walked in the direction of the older area of the cemetery. He followed, his boots hitting the pavement of the narrow walkway, making him feel too large. Not far down the pathway, Sophia stopped at a marble headstone. Two angels sat on both sides, a photo of Leah in the center. “Beloved Daughter, Mother and Wife.” And the ever present-dash: date of birth and date of death. She’d been thirty-five, which would have made Sophia only ten at the time.

  He did a do
uble-take on the first date. Today was Leah’s birthday. He shoved his hands in his pants pockets. “I didn’t know.”

  “That’s okay.” She removed plastic flowers from the permanent vase and replaced them with the roses. “She loved red roses.”

  Where was Giancarlo and why wasn’t he here with his daughter? Scott had a lot of questions running through his mind right now.

  Sophia sat down on the grassy patch. “I think my dad forgot.”

  Crap. “I’m sure he …” What? Was he now supposed to make excuses for Giancarlo?

  “It’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not.” He crouched down next to her.

  “This is the first time he ever forgot. It’s because he’s happy. Happy makes you forget.”

  Scott bit his tongue. He wondered if he should remind Giancarlo, gently or maybe not so gently. But it wasn’t exactly Scott’s place. The current object of Sophia’s father’s affections and attentions would be Scott’s own mother. It was tough enough to think of that, let alone get in the middle of it.

  At least he could be here for Sophia. “Tell me about your mom.”

  Sophia reached out to touch the photo. “This isn’t how I think of her. Even if it’s hard for me to remember exactly what she looked like? I remember her hair always stuck in a ponytail. And she baked the best chocolate chip cookies on earth.”

  “Is this why you’ve been depressed lately? Her birthday was coming up?”

  “Not really. The weird thing is Eileen makes me think of my mom. She’s a lot like her, in some ways. She cares a lot. She’s a good mother. Just not my mother, you know?”

  “Yep.” If there was anything he understood and understood down to his core, it was loyalty. Family loyalty.

  “I hope I don’t sound like a bitch.”

  “You don’t. Not to me. Tell me more about Leah.”

  Sophia pulled up her legs and rested her chin on her knees. “She loved the restaurant. Loved cooking, and even after we hired a cook she could still be heard in the kitchen giving advice. ‘That sauce needs more garlic, Carlos.’ That kind of thing. She used to say it was like having a party every night with good friends and good food. It wasn’t even like work to her.”

  “She sounds great.”

  “She was. And the thing is? I’m just like her. Even more than my sisters are. The only time I’m happy, really stupid happy is at the restaurant.” She sat up straighter. “That’s what I want for the rest of my life. I want to run my dad’s restaurant.”

  And yet Sophia was at Berkeley in her second year, studying business. According to Giancarlo she would someday be at the head of a Fortune 500 company.

  Scott wasn’t going to sit here and psycho-analyze whether Sophia really wanted to run the restaurant because it made her feel closer to her mother or if this was actually what she wanted to do for the rest of her life. He’d had enough people with plenty of letters following their last names throw psycho-babble in his direction. Even if half of it was true, what difference did it make? He couldn’t change the fact that he liked helping people, yeah okay, maybe a little bit of rescuing them thrown in for good measure, any more than someone could change the position of the sun. What’s more, he didn’t want to change it.

  He’d recently come to accept that helping people often meant letting them rescue themselves. Sophia needed to figure this one out on her own.

  “Hey, thanks for meeting me here. For listening.” She smiled.

  “Of course.”

  At that moment, a memory of Jake hit him hard as it sometimes did straight out of the blue. Even when he was in the middle of doing his best to help someone. To make a difference. Sometimes listening could be enough.

  Even so, he wasn’t sure if he’d ever listened enough to Jake.

  9

  “B-10,” Mr. Taylor said from the front of the room. “B-10, ladies and gents.”

  “Did he say D as in dog or B as in boy?” Gran asked from next to Diana.

  “That’s what I want to know!” Mrs. Anderson asked.

  “B as in boy.” On Saturday, Diana was seated between the two women, making it easier to help them. She pointed to the place on the board where Gran did indeed have a B-10. No such luck for Mrs. Anderson.

  Diana next consulted her three boards for a B-10. As soon as she’d found out that the jackpot was two hundred dollars, bingo became an activity to get Gran socialized and a possibility for a windfall for Diana. She’d need to dip into her savings to get the studio apartment in town so she needed all the help she could get.

  “Oh, this is fun.” Gran clapped her hands. “I almost have ‘bingo’.”

  “You won’t beat Stella. She wins every time,” Mrs. Anderson said.

  “How can she win every time?” Gran asked. “Diana, I’m afraid this game is rigged. No one can win every time.”

  “B-3,” Mr. Taylor said.

  “Would it kill him to enunciate?” Gran asked. “B as in boy or D as in dog?”

  “B as in brother,” Diana said, and then helped both Gran and Mrs. Anderson checked their boards, and consulted hers. No one had it.

  So far, Diana’s boards looked like a jigsaw puzzle. But no straight lines anywhere. Just her luck. She was striking out at bingo among the senior citizen crowd at St. Catherine’s.

  “Agnes,” Gran said, “Please tell my granddaughter that she shouldn’t be hanging out with a bunch of senior citizens like us. She won’t listen to me.”

  “Gran, I told you. I want to be here.” Diana heard Mr. Taylor announce the next number, and found the marker for Gran. Gran was obscenely close to ‘bingo’.

  “It’s not right. Not healthy.”

  “Are you looking to fix her up?” Mrs. Anderson leaned in. “Because the Turlock boy is still single. He’s apparently not interested in my niece Peggy.”

  “Peggy is forty-five!” Gran said.

  “So?”

  “Scott is twenty-eight if he’s a day. Good Lord, Agnes. Anyway, Diana agreed to go out with him as soon as she’s ready to date again.” Gran beamed and patted Diana’s hand.

  It was getting difficult to hear the numbers being called with the ladies’ constant chatter. “What did he just call out?”

  “Now you can’t hear either?” Gran asked.

  “Bingo!” An older man shouted from the front of the room. “Hot diggity dog!”

  “Oh, great.” Diana sighed. She and Gran both could have used that money.

  “At least it’s not Stella again.” Mrs. Anderson cleared her board.

  The man seemed ecstatic to win. His fists were lifted high as if he’d won a race and not a bingo game. Such enthusiasm for life. It made Diana smile despite her current Loser status.

  “Patrick McCarthy.” Gran said.

  “Who’s that?” Diana asked.

  “It’s Scott’s grandfather. They all call him Pop.” Gran put her hands on the table. “And it’s not like he needs the money. Well all right, let’s go.”

  “Wait. Why? They’re having cookies and refreshments after.” Diana put her hand on Gran’s, keeping her in place.

  Gran stared from above her bifocals. “Now you’re worrying me. How can you be excited about cookies after bingo?”

  “I’m not. I want you to be.”

  “Fine, dear. Fine. I’ll stay for cookies. But you have to do one little thing for me.”

  At last, progress. “Anything, Gran.”

  “Get out of here.” She pointed towards the door.

  “Get out?”

  “Do you see any other young people in here?” Gran cast her gaze around the hall. “No, you don’t. I want you to step outside into our fresh wine country air and have a little walk about. Come and pick me back up after I’ve had my cookies and milk or whatever they have for me.”

  Diana took only a moment to recover from being kicked out by Gran. She was right, after all. How could Gran reconnect with old friends if Diana always hung around, acting like her cruise director? Gran was right, and Diana wo
uld have to make friends her own age in town. It would be nice to come back here again next summer and spend more time with Gran. Making friends and connections here was the smart thing to do. Scott’s handsome face immediately sprung to mind, with all its inherently male angles, but how could they be friends when they kept kissing every chance they had to be alone? No, friends didn’t kiss like that. It was in the rule book somewhere, filed under ‘what was I thinking?’ She’d need to work on that. What she wanted most right now was a real friend, and Scott was clearly a friend to everyone.

  Diana walked all the way around the block and then turned left and walked towards town. She passed by the Curl Up and Dye, where a blonde with a pink streak in her hair and a half sleeve of tattoos on one arm waved as if they were old friends. Probably saw the video. Diana gave her a half-hearted wave and walked a little faster. She passed the diner, the bookstore slash ice cream store combo, Giancarlo’s Ristorante, and somehow wound up in a residential neighborhood she didn’t recognize. Her heart froze when she saw the fire truck in the front of someone’s home.

  Back in her suburban neighborhood, this meant either a drug overdose or an elderly person being carried out on a stretcher. With the elderly shut-ins, it had sometimes been weeks before anyone found them. A sudden image of Gran being carried out on a stretcher someday flashed in her mind. No way would that ever happen on Diana’s watch. Gran wouldn’t die alone. Ever. Diana would make sure of it.

  She walked closer, and a couple of firefighters were gathered around the truck laughing. Strange sense of humor. “What’s so funny?” Diana stopped in front of the truck and threw the men a death stare.

  One of them gazed at her with a hint of male appreciation in his eyes, despite the fact that she’d gone back to wearing the most matronly clothes she could find. Her ‘mom jeans’ and a loose prairie top. She was going to reinvent the way these men thought of her or die trying. Sooner or later they’d all figure out that the Victoria Secret lingerie was a fluke. They’d all caught her on a bad day.

  “Oh please Scott, tell me my baby’s going to be fine. Talk to me!” A woman said.