Chapter 16
sixteen
Georgia
I wait for recognition to hit as Cash steers the car onto the highway exit and a sign comes into view: Bridgewater welcomes you!
This was my home for two of the most significant weeks of my life.
Surely the landscape made an impression on my brain.
We ride past two strip malls, a forest preserve, an impressive red brick church with white columns, then through the charming downtown with its boutiques, coffee shops, salons, and gift stores in Tudor-style buildings. But it all looks brand new to me.
A shock of nerves hits me as we roll up the driveway, and I rest my hand on Mr. Jangles’s little crate buckled into the seat next to me, hoping to absorb the energy of the kitten who’s ridden silently all the way from Shafer.
Mr. and Mrs. Hartnell know me only from the most dramatic, life-changing period of my life, when who knows how I behaved or what opinion they formed of me.
When I was a child, adults who knew my story were always well-meaning but had a stubborn habit of treating me as a specimen, an orphan child to be pitied, a delicate doll who might shatter at the wrong word.
I never held it against them, but I hated it.
I don’t remember the Hartnells being anything but warm and kind, Mrs. Hartnell often gathering me close to her and speaking in the same tone she used with Cash and Maisy, though the memories are vague.
I don’t know whether to treat them like family, friends, or strangers.
Maisy’s closing the front door behind us when Mrs. Hartnell trots in from a hallway off the cozy little foyer. “You made it!”
Maisy and Cash step up, accepting hugs and greetings from their mother, before Maisy pulls me to her side like she’s presenting me.
“Well, look at you!” Mrs. Hartnell puts her hands on her cheeks and smiles, taking me in.
“You’ve grown right up, haven’t you? Still with those showstopper eyes, though.
” She opens her arms and takes me in a gentle hug, patting my back in practiced motherly fashion.
My body recognizes it—she must have hugged me like this all those years ago. And like that, my nerves evaporate.
“It’s nice to see you, Mrs. Hartnell,” I say.
Cash sucks in a breath. “Whoops, better call her Amy before you get whipped with a wooden spoon.”
Mrs. Hartnell—Amy, that is—swats her son. “Oh, you’re trouble. Now, where’s your dad?” She turns to call down the hallway, “John? Jonathan?” She turns back to us. “Probably still in his workshop. Let’s go into the kitchen, sweethearts, I have snacks. Oh, and I need to meet my little grandcat!”
Another memory hits me the moment we step into the kitchen: the black-and-white checkerboard tile and the snacks.
The Hartnells’ pantry was the stuff of dreams for a kid like me, whose mother was a lifelong vegetarian, professional chef, and early adopter of the organic food trend.
Pudding cups, individual bags of chips in every variety imaginable, buckets of leftover Halloween candy for the taking, and actual cookie jars on the counters.
Looking back, I’m surprised I had an appetite during the time I was a guest here, but the snacks are a visceral memory.
And by the looks of it, nothing has changed since my last visit.
The island is so cluttered I can barely make out the black granite countertop.
Messy stacks of paper threatening to fuse into a single mass cover one-third, and grocery bags dot the rest, each brimming with colorful packaging: Doritos, pretzels, jars of salsa and cheese dip, peanut butter crackers, and Oreos in three flavors.
“Nice,” Cash remarks with a nod at his mom. “Your doctor wants you and dad on that healthy, low-fiber diet, huh?”
“Oh, stop,” Amy teases. “I didn’t know what Georgia liked, and I wanted you kids to have options. Usually I can’t keep this junk in the house or Dad polishes it off in a day.”
“Oh, sure, because I’m the one who ate an entire sleeve of Oreos this morning before y’all walked in.
” John appears behind his wife. “Don’t believe everything you hear,” he says, smiling at me, and then walks right over, limping so slightly I might be imagining it.
“Georgia, how are you? What a pleasure to have you this weekend.” He greets me with a quick, warm hug, and then he and his wife are off and running, their playful banter not unlike that of their twins.
They pepper me with questions about college and my studies, though their kids get as many questions, so I’m never in the spotlight too long, and it’s easy to feel like their third child home for a quick visit.
Maisy stays close to me, but Cash stays closer, both of them quick to absorb the attention directed at me.
Before long, Cash introduces the kitten, passing her into his mom’s arms like she’s a newborn baby, and everyone’s happy to have Mr. Jangles in the spotlight.
After catching up, Amy heads into town for a few errands, John and Cash descend into the basement to inspect some plumbing issue, and Maisy shows me to the guest room at the end of the second-floor hallway where I’ll be sleeping.
“Dinner!” Amy announces several hours later as she strides through the living room where we’re lounging, the savory scents of oregano and melty cheese trailing in her wake.
Cash hops up to take the pizza boxes from her hands, while Maisy and I pull a string of shopping bags from her outstretched arm and carry them to the kitchen.
There, we start pulling out plates and cups and fixing an impromptu salad.
“Putting you to work, aren’t we?” Cash watches me crumble a block of feta cheese over the salad bowl, his big hand gripping the bottle of soda he was pouring from.
“I don’t mind.” My face heats at the overt way he’s staring at me. I can feel it without even looking.
Snaking his hand between my arm and my side, he grabs a pepper slice from the salad.
As he withdraws, he brushes my hip enough to awaken my nerves and set off an avalanche of sensory memories of his fingers heating my body.
I’m helpless to do anything but turn and stare at him.
Even in a sweater, his biceps swell tantalizingly as his arm curls.
And those fingers? Devastating. Thick, strong, and expertly gripping the poor green pepper that’s merely an innocent bystander as fantasy and memory collide around me, hijacking my brain.
What can’t he make sexy? He pops the pepper into his mouth, his jaw inches from my ear, and drops a cocky, self-satisfied smirk on me before turning away.
Certain my face is flaming, I glance around the room.
But everyone else is occupied, and by then Cash is already busying himself setting the table, his back to me as though I imagined it all.
I swallow hard and scrape vegetable scraps into the sink, my flustered nerves solidifying into resolve. I’m telling Maisy the truth as soon as this weekend is over.
“So, kids,” John says as we settle at the table and pull slices from the pizza boxes. “What’s the consensus on the birthday trip this year?”
“Lake Geneva,” Maisy and Cash say in unison.
“Really?” Amy puts down her drink, ice clinking in her glass. “We haven’t been there in years.”
“Good memories,” Cash says.
“Does Georgia know about the annual birthday trip?”
“No, but I’m sure she’ll be fascinated, Mom.” Cash shoots me a private smile as he reaches for another slice.
“When they were small,” Amy starts, “we always did one party to celebrate them both. Then came third grade, and suddenly they couldn’t for the life of them agree on how to plan a party they could both enjoy.
Cash wanted a sports theme and to do something wild, like go to a trampoline park, and Maisy wanted to make glittery slime with a few girlfriends.
And if you know anything about me, you know I’m not the party-planner type, so to throw two in the span of a week was more than I could take.
Finally, I tossed up my hands and said we’d go out of town to celebrate, and the rest is history.
They choose the destination, with the only rules being it’s safe and within driving distance. ”
“I love that you keep up the tradition.”
Amy beams. “What about you, Georgia, any fun birthday traditions?”
“I’m not big on birthdays. Usually I buy myself a new lipstick or nail polish and call it a day.”
“Georgia,” Maisy scolds. “That’s it?”
“It’s enough,” I insist. “I don’t need a big celebration.”
“Need and deserve are two different things,” Amy says. “How did you celebrate when you were little? Any family traditions?”
Maisy shoots her mom a look that could kill, but I smile. “Actually, my parents always made a big deal of my birthday. I remember I’d always wake up to my bedroom full of balloons in whatever color was my favorite that year. And then I’d get cake for breakfast.”
“Cake for breakfast.” Cash nods, impressed. “What kind?”
“Dark chocolate inside and out. Always decorated with stars and moons to match the theme. My family was big on stargazing, especially on birthdays. We’d pack a picnic dinner and head to this state park near our house and eat under the stars, then lie back and, well, stare at stars.”
“That explains your passion for planetariums,” Maisy says with a smile.
“So you’re an amateur astronomer, are you?” John asks.
“Oh, not even close,” I say. “I only remember a few constellations, but I used to be a little walking encyclopedia when it came to stars. My dad taught science at the high school, and astronomy was his thing, so of course, as a little kid, it became my thing.”
“What a sweet memory that is,” Amy says warmly.
“It is.” A brief, uncomfortable silence takes hold as reality hangs in the air until Cash pipes up.
“When’s your birthday?” he asks.
“March 8th.”
“Good,” Maisy says. “We’re certainly doing more than buying a new lipstick.”
I push back against the urge to tell her that’s not necessary because the idea of celebrating feels, for the first time in years, exciting.