Chapter 25
Noah
Students will be able to rebel without apology.
I groaned out loud when my mother’s name flashed across my phone Tuesday afternoon. I loved my mother. I cared about her very much. I wanted the best for her. But there were times when she was an almighty pain in my ass and I knew this would be one of them.
Letting it go to voicemail wasn’t a real option. I’d have to call her back one way or another. At best, I’d delay this conversation by a day. At worst, she’d call the farm stand and ask them to track me down.
I didn’t need that kind of drama in my life. Not today. It had been hours but I still hadn’t recovered from running into Shay while she was dressed in nothing but a towel this morning.
Living with my wife was much more treacherous than I’d originally imagined. There couldn’t be anything worse than knowing my wife was all alone down at Thomas House, right? Wrong. Knowing my wife was all alone on the other side of the wall was far worse.
She’d insisted on staying in the spare bedroom the past two nights. Something about a strict school-night routine and not being able to teach the next day if I kept her up all hours. No debate allowed. Instead, I kept myself up all hours listening for any sign she’d changed her mind.
That, of course, led to an increasingly vivid series of half-awake dreams where Shay climbed into bed with me and I found her naked beneath a silky robe.
She sank down over my cock and I held those plush hips while I drove up into her.
In some variations, she sucked my fingers.
In others, I fisted her hair in one hand and covered her mouth with the other.
I woke up with my blood pounding hot and fast in my veins. I was needy in the most dreadful, ugly ways. Shay could barely walk by without my cock thickening in response. I’d wheezed my way through breakfast this morning, my skin too tight and my thoughts barely more than complete filth.
So, yeah, I was having a rough day.
“Hey, Mom.” I pushed to my feet and stalked across my office. “How are you?”
“Noah, did you get married ?”
I jogged down the back stairs and out the door. This would go down better for everyone if I stayed in motion, and I believed enough of that lie to march down a long, bumpy row of Cortland apple trees. “Yeah, I did.”
Complete silence greeted me. I made it halfway down the row before she said, “But why?”
“Same reason everyone gets married, Mom.” An unenforceable will. Access to premium land. Loving a high school crush so hard I couldn’t help but throw myself on her problems.
Again, my mother was speechless. I’d expected this. She loved and accepted everyone though she couldn’t comprehend anything out of me or Eva that didn’t align with her inflexible vision of what was right and appropriate.
Eventually, she said, “This is the first I’m hearing of it.”
“That’s true.” I reached the end of the Cortlands and looped back up another row.
This was good. I hadn’t put eyes on these trees for weeks.
It was good. Time well spent. “Sorry about that. It never came up.” Because I was exhausted and wrung-out from the endless circus that was well-intentioned people asking me questions about my marriage that I wasn’t prepared to answer.
Are we going on a honeymoon? No, she barely wanted to go to the Harvest Festival with me. Interstate travel was a bridge too far.
Are we thinking about starting a family any time soon? Strictly rehearsals.
Are we so thrilled and over the moon to be together? Yeah, it was awesome to get everything I’d ever wanted only for my wife to remind me on a daily basis that it wasn’t real and wouldn’t last. Fucking awesome.
Wheatie and Bones were the worst by far.
After that shitshow on Sunday morning, I assumed they’d suss out the holes in this story.
Especially after previously swearing up and down that nothing was happening between me and Shay.
But they skimmed right over those issues and into more meaningful topics such as the future of the Thomas land.
To say they were relentless would be an understatement.
If they sensed anything about this union was amiss, they ignored it to focus on the untapped potential down at Twin Tulip.
“I’ve had my hands full,” I added when the silence stretched too thin. “We finished work on the new bottling center and Gennie just started school.”
“Are you taking that girl to church on Sundays? She needs spiritual guidance, Noah.”
A quiet laugh shook my chest. A lot of good that guidance did me and my sister. “Thank you for the reminder.”
“It’s the least you can do for her,” my mother went on.
Sure. It wasn’t like Gennie’s therapist bumped up into a new tax bracket after taking her on as a client or I turned my life upside down or anything.
“We just don’t know—” She cleared her throat several times. It took a moment for her to get the next words out. “We don’t know what that child has endured.”
Leaving the office was the right approach. Fresh air, sun, apples as far as the eye could see. And plenty of room to scream without anyone hearing.
“She’s doing all right.”
“I appreciate that you’re giving her a proper family structure now,” she said, “though I worry you might’ve gotten carried away with this marriage. And isn’t she—your new bride—the troubled girl that Lollie Thomas took in, the one you tutored in math and science?”
This was the great paradox of my mother.
If Shay had been a member of the congregation, she would’ve embraced every one of her rough edges and abrupt endings.
She would’ve admired Shay’s willingness to try again—and again and again.
And she’d marvel in the woman my wife had become. She’d celebrate Shay.
But my mother couldn’t extend that grace when it came to anyone who passed beyond the arm’s length of the congregation and into the circle of her family. And that circle was rife with judgment and straitjacket structure and expectations that had never made a whole hell of a lot of sense.
“Shay is a teacher,” I said as calmly as I could manage. “She’s teaching at Hope Elementary this year. Second grade. They love her there.”
I love her here.
And for fuck’s sake, my wife wasn’t a stray pup from the wrong side of the tracks.
It’d always bothered me when my mother eyed Shay like she was a cautionary tale on legs.
Aside from the fact Shay’s mother was a household name, the only portion of Shay’s life not spent in a cashmere bubble was the time spent in this town.
“That’s good to hear.” She cleared her throat again. Talking for this long was difficult for her. We’d need to wrap this up soon. She couldn’t spend all her energy for the day on a phone call. “I would’ve traveled there for a wedding, you know.”
“I know.” If I kept walking, I’d hit the old stone wall separating the orchard from Twin Tulip.
Maybe I could throw rocks for an hour or two.
That was a highly reliable way to process emotions.
I wouldn’t be able to feel my arm tomorrow but I didn’t need both of them every day. “We wanted something small.”
“I’m just one person, Noah. You can have a small wedding and still invite your only living parent.”
I was in no mood to point out that she never went anywhere without my aunt and at least a half dozen people who fell into the mixed bag of friends, distant relatives, and people she met along the way and swept into her de facto flock.
“We did what felt right for us,” I said.
She sniffed. “I’ll have to live with that.”
That comment brought a rueful smile to my face.
Unlike my sister, rebellion wasn’t my drug of choice.
I found that subversive compliance worked much better for me.
I was going to do whatever the hell I wanted but I’d make it look like I was toeing the line.
Or better yet, I’d toe the line so hard I’d prove why the line was a fucked-up notion to begin with.
But this—marrying the troubled girl and refusing to apologize for doing it our way—went down with the salty satisfaction of pure, clear-eyed rebellion.
“Well. I have a team preparing Eva’s appeal,” I said, rounding a short row of Pink Lady apples. “I’ll take Gennie to visit her next month. Any interest in traveling for that?”
I didn’t have to ask to know the answer.
“That’s too much for me,” she replied. “It would take me a month to recover from a trip to a penitentiary , Noah.”
There was no grace for Eva. None whatsoever.
There were moments when I debated whether she was deserving of grace.
She’d pulled that trigger. She’d killed that agent and wounded others.
But she was still my sister. She was my mother’s daughter.
If we couldn’t be the ones to love her through the worst, most impossible moments, what was the point of family?
What was the point of any of it if we stopped giving a shit the minute those people fucked up?
“Right,” I murmured. “I’ll let you know when I get any news on the appeal.”
“It’s enough to know you’re working on it. The details stress me too much.” After a round of coughing, she added, “Look after my granddaughter. That’s all I need.”
“I hear you, Mom. That’s what I’m doing.”
“And extend my congratulations to your new wife. Let’s hope she’s a good influence for Imogen.” She sniffed. “Maybe you could bring her for a visit for the holiday season.”
I bent to grab an egg-shaped rock from under a Gala apple tree. I tossed it in the air once and let it thunk down into my palm. It was going to sound great splashing into the cove. “We’ll see about that.”