Chapter 13
[Taxi]
If I thought Aunt Trudy was going to let my strange interactions throughout the day with Stone slide, I was wrong.
Her keen motherly sense didn’t miss our continued glances and locked stares. Or the way he doted on me, checking that I had enough to eat or another drink or even that damn cupcake.
Sweet potato cupcake, an extraterrestrial favorite.
His brother Sebastian explained how Stone suddenly had a craving for the dessert after a trip to Knoxville in the spring, and the curmudgeon baker has been trying to perfect the cupcake as an alternative to pumpkin ones during the summer months.
“Want to tell me what’s going on with you and Stone Sylver?”
A while back, Trudy sold the larger home where she raised a handful of kids, opting for what she calls a cozy cottage with two bedrooms and a single bath. The house is actually a single-story ranch with a small kitchen she had refinished with white cabinets and blue accents.
“Now that I don’t have children buzzing around, making messes, I can have a white kitchen.”
There’s a strangeness in being here. As in, this is Trudy’s home, yet not home. Not the house I stayed in when Trudy took in me, Sedona, and Jolene. That house felt grand with a spacious yard and outbuildings. The rooms were crowded, but the house overflowed with love.
Trudy’s original farmhouse was large, almost rickety, and not to be confused with the Wallace Farmhouse, which was a dilapidated house off the highway outside of town and eventually purchased and restored a few years ago.
In Trudy and Carlton’s former home, the floorboards creaked, the back door needed an extra shove to close, and one bathroom or the other was always taken, yet the house was full of love.
Love for my two sisters and our younger cousin of sorts, and any other teen that filtered in and out of their place.
One of those teens was Simon’s father.
This new place is sweet but unfamiliar, causing that unsettled sensation again. The reminder I don’t belong here.
With Simon present, the second bedroom is his, so it will be sofa city for me. “Nothing to tell,” I lie, flinging a bedsheet over the cushions.
Aunt Trudy hums somewhere behind me, knowing when I don’t tell the truth.
While Trudy might not have been my mother, biologically or otherwise, her motherly instincts often surprise me.
Like how she knew when I was missing Mama as a child and didn’t fault me when she had much to find fault with my mother.
Trudy allowed me to grieve the loss, as if Mama had died, because that’s what it felt like.
The truth is, Mama abandoned me and my sisters, refusing to allow us visitation.
She didn’t want us to see her in her new adventure.
Reality eventually seeded inside me. I’d been left behind.
Trudy and Carlton made every attempt to make me feel welcome in their home, and I did. But I also didn’t. I kept myself guarded, afraid that one day they’d realize I came from someone who’d done a bad thing. Then, they’d turn me out.
I left before that could happen.
Headed off for art school and my own adventures. Real ones.
I’m quiet for a second while I tuck the sheet around the cushions and slip a pillow into a case. And all the while, Trudy waits behind me, giving me space that she’ll eventually invade with good intentions.
“I don’t want to talk about him.” I keep my head low and my voice even lower as I pause, hugging the pillow to my chest like a shield.
What do I even say about Stone Sylver? He kissed me. I’m confuddled by him.
When I turn in her direction, I don’t look up at my gracious aunt but plop onto the cushion, feeling the sudden dip in the worn stuffing.
Still holding the pillow tight to my chest, I whisper, “Did you know he was the sheriff?”
Of course she knew. She probably told me at one time, but I hadn’t connected the dots. Hadn’t known that Stone Sylver, small town sheriff, was Samson Superman, sweet talker, silent dancer, skilled kisser.
Aunt Trudy steps closer to me. Her spicy patchouli scent invades my nose, and I close my eyes. Funny how a scent can bring back a memory.
Aunt Trudy holding me as I silently cried as a child, some nights not even aware I’d had a nightmare.
Aunt Trudy fixing my hair in braids, a multitude of bow-shaped barrettes to keep them in place.
Aunt Trudy tapping the sharp-scented oil against my wrists before I graduated from high school, smiling in the mirror from behind me, telling me Mama would be proud, when I’d long forgotten my mother and was in a rebellious stage of unforgiveness.
“Baby,” Aunt Trudy says softly. No sass, just weight in the word. “I know what police can be like. Lord knows I’ve seen enough to last me a lifetime.” She moves closer and takes a seat beside me on the couch, forcing me to edge over to accommodate her.
“And I know why your hackles go up. You grew up learning cops meant trouble, and half the time they did.”
She reaches for my hand and tugs it into her lap while I continue to clutch the pillow against my belly.
“But don’t go taking all that pain and slapping it on one man just because he wears a badge.”
Trudy pauses, a classic move from her, letting the truth settle.
“That boy didn’t put your mama in jail. He didn’t leave you and your sisters lost. Don’t let hurt that you didn’t ask for decide who he is before you’ve even had a chance to know him.”
My own pause follows her words, reflecting that she’s right. She’s always right, and I’ve always strived to be as open and mindful as her. She sees it from both sides, and her wisdom calls out assumptions that stop being proactive and start being prejudices.
But I’m never quite as good as Trudy.
“My mother killed your brother,” I whisper, keeping my head bowed. Aunt Trudy doesn’t need the reminder of what Mama did . . . and yet . . . “How do you so easily forgive?”
Aunt Trudy pats the top of my hand in her lap, humming again.
“Forgiveness.” She pauses. “Such a burden to bear when it should set you free.”
I glance over my shoulder at her, but Aunt Trudy is staring at the wall on the opposite side of the room.
“My brother also beat your mother,” she says quietly, as if I need the reminder of the devil he’d been. Sadness lingers in her voice, exemplifying the difference in siblings.
One sweet and kind, forgiving and accepting. The other angry at the world, assuming he was owed everything, including obedience from Mama.
When he went for one of my sisters, so innocent and fragile, but crying, annoying him, Mama took the law that had failed her into her own hands.
“The law wasn’t on her side.” It’s more of a statement. More declaration than a necessary reminder neither of us needs.
“Didn’t give her the right to decide what was just.”
Trudy squeezes the hand she holds, triggering another memory. She was the first to show me true affection. Not that Mama didn’t occasionally offer a hug, but as I grew older, her attention grew more distant, sparing embraces only for my younger sisters.
“Good people can make bad decisions all the time,” Aunt Trudy states. “Just like bad people make wrong ones thinking they’re doing right.”
Aunt Trudy and I both remain quiet, and the current climate of the world flashes through my thoughts. I strive to be open-minded but I’m also mindful that the rules are not equal everywhere.
“Life can be difficult some days. Hard at times. Sometimes things don’t make any sense, but hate breeds hate, and you cannot let that happen. In between the crooked cracks is light, and that’s where I choose to focus.”
Aunt Trudy lets out a deep exhale.
“You and your sisters came to me during some of the darkest days for Carlton and me. And through some truly unsettling circumstances.” Her voice shifts as does her attention, eyes landing on my face and offering me a warm smile.
“And yet how blessed was I to have had the sheer pleasure of raising you. All three of you rascals. You were light in those dark times.”
The three of us, but I hadn’t really counted. I wasn’t one of them.
Sedona and Jolene.
Our mother killed their father. They’d lost two parents at once.
For some reason, I think of Stone. He’d lost both his parents when he was young as well. He’d stepped in to raise the younger set.
What a noble man. He’s not a superhero; he’s a goddamn saint.
I fixate on Trudy, finding a resemblance, not in physical appearance but in temperament, to Stone.
Quiet strength.
“And look how you turned out,” Aunt Trudy states, her voice a little louder, a little lighter, intruding on my thoughts of him. “Exactly as you are. Beautiful. Smart. Talented. Successful.”
She claps over my hand once. “Because you are loved.”
Rarely shed tears prickle my eyes. Trudy isn’t taking credit for who I am, but how I was raised. Her compassion and education kept my heart and mind open to differences in people, to acceptance of others. And her love saved me from making bad decisions.
I could have turned out like Mama, chasing after men because I didn’t see the value in myself.
I could have been lost like Mama, who thought she needed a man to anchor her, instead of being her own iron-steel.
She was an untethered boat, and she took Sedona, Jolene, and me on the ride. But I want to be on the shore.
I crave security despite my wandering soul. And I’ve had some sense of stability, because of me, and my talent, and Trudy and Carlton’s support.
“I don’t mean to be spilling beans, but what I’m about to tell you isn’t a secret. You remember how Judd used to come to the house, hanging out like he was one of you.” She smiles warmly, loving Judd like she loved all the rest of us. “Lost souls have a way of finding me.”
She bumps into my shoulder, teasingly.
“I’m no angel.” She laughs at herself. “But I recognize ones when I see them, and Stone is one of them. He could have turned out like his father. Mean, ornery, hateful. I don’t excuse Flint’s behavior, but that man was hurting.
Love of his life gone. Babies to feed. He didn’t know how to love without Violet. ”
Aunt Trudy sighs, recalling a woman I’d heard about often as a child. Her best friend, sadly taken from this earth too young and so tragically, although I can’t remember what happened to her.
And it strikes me again that Trudy’s friend is Judd’s mama, Stone’s mother.
He’s felt the pain of a mother’s absence.
Mama’s man?
Once upon a time.
Oh, Stone.
“But Stone’s nature is to protect, and he’s been a rock for his siblings, giving them a soft place to land when they each falter. He isn’t infallible. None of us are, but he’s damn near perfect.”
Her voice is fully restored to light and praising, almost wistful.
“And if a man kissed me well enough to curl my toes, I might want to cling a little.”
I chuckle, the sound watery. “He didn’t curl my toes.”
“Shame. He seems like he might know his way around a woman.”
“Aunt Trudy!” I laugh, the sound a bit choked with the unshed tears in my throat.
She pats my hand again, back to her teasing self.
I swallow the thickness in my throat and question, “How’d you know he kissed me?”
“Let’s see.” She taps her chin. “Was it the steamy stares? Or the way he tracked you around the yard?” She turns her head to face me. “Or the fact he couldn’t take his eyes off you in general?”
“Trudy,” I whisper, shaking my head like she’s making these things up.
“Might have been you reciprocated that stare. More like an angry glare.” She pauses. “Are you mad you kissed him? Didn’t like it?” She wrinkles her nose.
I shake my head again. “No. I liked it.” I liked it a little too much.
Suddenly, I straighten my shoulders and sit taller. “But it doesn’t matter. I have commissions to fulfill. More adventures to be had.” I hate how much I sound like Mama, and almost weak, as if I no longer believe in the thrill.
I love my art, and I’ve developed a newfound love of teaching, but I’m growing weary of hopping from one place to the next. Always chasing something that seems out of reach.
“Sometimes, adventure can be found right in your own backyard.”
“Bloom where I’m planted? How very Wizard of Oz of you,” I joke. “Plus, I don’t have a backyard.”
“Yes, but whose fault is that?” Aunt Trudy holds her dark, rich eyes on me, imparting wisdom I don’t have the bandwidth to read.
I’m tired. I’ve been drinking. It’s been a long day of information overload and puzzling reunions. And some heavy sexual tension.
But most of all, I’m questioning me.
What do I want?
And why don’t I have a backyard?