Chapter Twenty
“Lavonne, please thank your grandson for getting this fire going for us tonight. It’s the perfect way to end the day,” Donna said. She jumped when a rogue ember landed on her cotton-covered thigh and quickly brushed it away. “But it’s a good thing I wore these old-lady shorts today. It was too hot for pants, but if these shorts weren’t this long, that spark would have burned me.”
“I’ll be sure to pass your thanks on to Robbie,” Lavonne assured her as she glanced at Donna’s leg.
Donna looked around their deserted surroundings. “Where do you suppose the others disappeared to?”
“Do you mean Patsy and Charlotte? They mustn’t be back from their evening stroll yet. They headed out while you were outside with your daughter. Charlotte invited us to walk with them, too, but my knee is in tough shape. I apologize if you’d have liked to go along. I thought it might be fun to spend some time around the fire enjoying this beautiful sunset. But that didn’t sound like any fun by myself!”
Donna laughed. “A relaxing sunset sounds like the perfect way to end a very busy day. I have one knee that gives me trouble once in a while, too. Why don’t we get to know each other a little better before they get back?”
“I’d like that,” Lavonne said. “I’ve spent countless evenings sitting right here through the years, and neither the view nor the conversation gets old.”
“Can you reach that poker? If we adjust this log a little, the fire could last us until bedtime. Unless you’re a real night owl.”
Lavonne had to stretch to reach the long metal rod. She handed it over to Donna. “If I’m having a good night, I can sometimes make it until midnight, but that’s about my limit.”
Donna stood and rearranged the logs to allow for more airflow. “That should do it, although I’m no fire expert.” She stood the poker up next to her chair and sat down again. “You are so lucky to have a place like this for your family. I’ve only been here for one day, and I already feel calmer inside.”
“That might have more to do with successfully pulling off this impromptu trip and your daughter’s birthday party,” Lavonne said. “But you’re right. People often comment that there’s just something a little magical about Whispering Pines. I worry it might be too much for Renee, though.”
Donna scanned the area again, this time taking in the cabins, lodge, and beach. Beyond her immediate view, there was also Renee’s new home and the duplex where the four mothers were staying. “It has to be an incredible amount of work to keep this place up.”
“Work and money,” Lavonne added. “Renee had a long-term career in a corporate job. She never loved it, but at least it was a steady income with benefits. In fact, she was still working at her job when Celia decided to leave this place to her. Renee got laid off from that job, but not until after Celia died. I often wonder what my sister-in-law was thinking when she decided Renee was the right person to leave this resort to. Plus, that was before Renee met Matt, so she was the single, widowed mother to two teenagers, too. She and Celia were so different.”
Donna couldn’t help but smile over her new friend’s concerns. “Oh, Lavonne, as mothers, we never stop worrying about our kids, do we? It took me a long time before I was comfortable with the risks my Lynette was taking in building her business. Well, I suppose that technically it was our business, but I played a more minor role. I always worried how she’d handle failure.”
“But I was under the impression that your company was very successful. Lynette didn’t fail.”
Donna had to whisk away another floating ember before it landed on her arm. “Right, she didn’t. And Renee won’t either. This Celia you all talk about. She never had a husband, right? Or kids of her own?”
“That’s right. She was only responsible for herself. Well, and her mother, I guess. Her mother and stepfather were in a terrible accident when my husband and their other brother were still young. The stepfather didn’t make it. Celia gave up on some of her big dreams to help raise the boys and nurse her mother back to health.”
It was fun for Donna to hear some of this Celia woman’s backstory. “Even if she wasn’t ever a mother, she was still a caregiver. Plus, I’d say that if she never married but still wound up owning a place like this, she found financial success.”
Lavonne nodded. “She was an amazing woman. I can’t even imagine the level of discrimination she would have faced in the business world, but she persisted and eventually flourished. Oh, and I almost forgot—her own father died in some kind of accident when Celia was only five or six. There was another girl in the family, too, but she died of a weak heart at eighteen. My George doesn’t like to talk about that. I can’t imagine how awful it would be for a child to lose a sibling.”
Donna shivered at Lavonne’s words, despite the toasty warmth of the fire and the warm air of the mid-August evening.
Lavonne must have noticed her visceral reaction. She reached over and touched Donna’s hand. “Oh my. Is that something you’ve had to endure, too?”
This woman was certainly perceptive. Donna wasn’t used to anyone noticing her upset. But ever since she’d come home to find that darn statue standing in the middle of her rose garden, thoughts of her long-dead sister were never far from her mind. “It isn’t something I talk about. Ever. Lynette doesn’t even know.”
“Your own daughter doesn’t know you lost a sibling? Why in heaven’s name would you keep something like that from her?”
She shrugged. “It sounds kind of silly when you pose it that way. You said Celia’s sister died of a weak heart. That is certainly tragic. My little sister’s death was tragic, too, but it wasn’t unavoidable. Violence killed her.”
Lavonne gasped. “What happened, Donna? How old was she when she died?”
The old familiar panic rose in Donna’s chest, threatening to cut off her air supply.
“I could apologize for asking, Donna, and we could let this conversation turn to something much less painful, but something tells me we shouldn’t do that. I can see in your expression how hard this still is for you. But if you never talk about it, how can you heal?”
She snorted. “It all happened over fifty years ago. Everyone involved is dead now. Except for me.”
“All the more reason for you to talk about it,” Lavonne said, grabbing hold of Donna’s hand. “Secrets are like poison. Why would you do that to yourself?”
The words made Donna wonder. Had she been poisoning herself for years with the knowledge of how her father had caused her sister’s death?
“I never wanted Lynette to know the truth.”
Lavonne gave her fingers another squeeze, then relaxed back into her red chair. “I suppose I understand why you wouldn’t have wanted to go into detail with her about something so horrific when she was a child. If you don’t want to share the specifics of your sister’s death, Donna, I understand. You mentioned violence. Just tell me that whoever hurt your sister paid the price for whatever it was they did to her.”
Donna sighed. “As far as I know, he never did. Not in this world, at least. To be honest, the moment we turned away from Irene’s grave after her funeral, I ran. I ran and I never looked back. My parents insisted it was a terrible accident. That she fell down the stairs, hit her head, and never woke up.”
A door slammed nearby. Donna whipped around, but relaxed when she saw it was a man she didn’t know exiting the cabin next to Annie’s.
“He? You didn’t believe it was an accident? Do you think your father hurt your sister?”
Donna pressed a hand to one eye. She could feel a migraine coming on. “I know he did. My father was an angry man with a hair-trigger temper. I lost count of the number of black eyes my mother tried to explain away. To her credit, I know at least one or two of those happened when I’d misbehaved and she was trying to protect me. He only ever hit me once, but I stood up to him. I don’t think anyone else ever had, and it was the last time he laid a hand on me.”
“Do you think your mother was afraid to take you and your sister and leave him? Were there any other kids?”
She grabbed the poker again. This conversation was making her nervous, and she needed to stand. “No, it was just my sister and me. If Mother ever considered leaving him, she never told me. Her parents raised her to believe men had the right to treat women however they choose.”
Sparks flew as she took her latent frustration out on the burning logs.
“Did your father move on from you to your sister?”
She spoke the words so softly, Donna almost missed them.
“It wasn’t that straightforward. Maybe if it had been, I’d have found the courage to take my sister and leave. But she was always more forgiving of both of our parents than I was. We only talked about the abuse and our father’s anger a few times, and she insisted I was overreacting. I should have trusted my gut. It told me otherwise. But we stayed. Then, one night, Mother and Father were fighting again. I was so sick of their theatrics that I stayed in my room with a pillow over my head, doing my best to ignore them. I wish my sister would have done the same. But even the pillow couldn’t muffle their screaming. They were getting louder, and I was almost ready to run upstairs and tell them to be quiet before the neighbors heard everything. That probably would have shut them up because the only thing either of them really cared about was appearances.”
She took a hot breath. Even decades later, the scene was still vivid in her mind.
Lavonne gave her the space to collect herself.
“Then I heard my sister’s voice, begging Father to let go of Mother. There was a different type of scream then, and I couldn’t tell if it was Mother or Irene. I ran out of the room just in time to see my sister fall over the banister at the top of the stairs. I was too late to save her.”
This time, Lavonne’s gasp was exactly what Donna had expected.
“And yes, before you even ask, it was as awful as you might expect. Everything after that was a blur.”
The two women sat in silence, both trying to process the long-ago tragedy.
“What does Lynette know?” Lavonne eventually asked.
Donna dropped the poker and collapsed back into her chair. “She thinks I ran away from home because I was pregnant with her and my parents cut me out of their lives.”
“Were you pregnant when you left?”
“No. I was a virgin when I left. But I was such a mess, and had no way to support myself, that I suppose I confused sex for love. It was the end of the 1960s and I was only eighteen years old when I left home. I knew the trauma over my father’s abuse and my sister’s death had me all screwed up, and for two years I left a string of losers in my wake. When I realized I’d ended up pregnant, I knew I couldn’t go back home. I’d slammed that door and locked it tight. There were some tough years ahead, but things got better when we ended up in Ruby Shores.”
Approaching footsteps cut off Donna’s next words.
“Sorry we took so long!” Patsy said.
Both Patsy and Charlotte stepped into the firelight. That was when Donna noticed that night had fallen while they’d talked. “We were about to send out a search party for you,” she lied. Everything except her own painful history had faded from her mind once she began sharing her secrets with Lavonne.
Instead of calling her a liar, Lavonne played along. “Yes. If you hadn’t gotten back in the next five minutes, I was going to call my son-in-law to bring in the reinforcements to find you.”
The women laughed, and Donna was thankful the mood had lightened.
Charlotte handed her a light jacket. “I saw this on your bed and remembered you were in shorts. I thought you might get chilly.”
The small, kind gesture brought a tear to Donna’s eye. She was constantly being reminded why her daughter cherished the friendships with her four friends so dearly.
“See, I was right. You’re so chilled your eyes are watering,” Charlotte said with a quick wink before taking a seat.
Charlotte understood, too.
Once the other two women joined them, the conversation floated between a variety of lighter topics. When the topic of grandchildren came up, Patsy mentioned how much fun it was to be a great-grandmother, too.
“And don’t forget your promise when we were all together for that fun Thanksgiving dinner at Annie’s house,” Donna said. “I get to act as an honorary great-grandmother to little Nora, too!”
Patsy laughed. “That is perfectly fine. I think Nora will be very accepting of the wide variety of grandparents she’s inherited. My daughter’s complicated love life makes for quite the blended family.”
“At least she has a love life,” Donna said. “I always liked her first husband, but I understand that not all marriages will last. I hadn’t met Henry until that Thanksgiving. He seems fine, too. And Henry was certainly helpful last week when we had water in our basement.”
“Way back when all that started between Annie, Micheal, and Henry, I warned her that she was playing with fire. Moving in with two male roommates,” Patsy said, shaking her head as if she’d known the arrangement was doomed from the start. “Of course, she insisted they were just friends and she’d never let it go beyond that.”
Charlotte laughed. “As they say, live and learn. I had my doubts, too, when my Jackie married Todd. Turned out I was also right to question my daughter’s judgment, but we wouldn’t have Hailey and Mackenzie if they wouldn’t have married.”
“Jackie has twin girls, right?” Lavonne asked.
“Right. I’m sorry, Lavonne, I forget you might not know as much about the girls’ lives as the rest of us.”
Lavonne made a dismissive gesture. “Don’t worry about it. To be honest, sometimes Renee feels a little left out, too. It bothers her, but I understand. This has just been so fun. I hope I have the chance to get to know all of you, and your families, a little better in the future. So, Jackie divorced. Does she date?”
The question pulled a groan from Charlotte. “She does not. But I wish she would. Maybe she wouldn’t spend so much of her time worrying about me, now that my Glen is in a facility because of his dementia.”
Donna’s thoughts drifted to Owen. He was always so helpful when either she or her daughter needed anything in their new roles as homeowners. “Why don’t Jackie and Owen take a chance on a real relationship? Lynette insists they should try.”
Charlotte nodded enthusiastically. “I used to wonder the same thing. But my daughter is pig-headed.”
“He’s a handsome guy,” Donna added, though Charlotte didn’t seem to be the one who needed convincing. “But I’m one to talk. Poor Lynette. I don’t think she’s gone out on a single date since we moved back to Ruby Shores. I sometimes blame myself and my horrendous dating history for her apparent aversion to any kind of long-term relationship.”
Lavonne tapped the arm of her chair. “We can’t blame ourselves for our children’s misadventures in romance. At least that’s what I keep telling myself. Our son is divorced and is the primary parent to his three kids. Renee’s first husband died, and until Matt came along I never thought she’d make the time to find someone new. Our youngest is still married to the father of her four sons, but it isn’t easy. And don’t even get me started on Jess.”
“Lavonne is right,” Patsy chimed in. “Annie never listened to my dating advice. Our other daughter was a wild one, and then she did an about-face and married an uptight preacher. The man is difficult to tolerate.”
Donna laughed. “He wasn’t the most pleasant person at Annie’s Thanksgiving table.”
Patsy gave her a thumbs-up.
“Maybe Kit was the smartest one of the group,” Charlotte said. “She held out until a couple years ago in the marriage department, and as far as I know, she’s quite happy with Dean. But Lavonne, if you knew more about Kit’s parents’ story, even you would lay the blame for her hesitancy at their feet. I guess the bottom line is that we never finish being mothers.”
Donna had to agree with that sentiment. “That was something Lavonne and I talked about while you two were walking. She worries about Renee and the pressures of keeping this beautiful resort running. My Lynette gives me plenty to worry about, including whether our move back to Ruby Shores was really right for her. Charlotte, you seem at least marginally concerned about Jackie, too.”
“And I worry about my Annie’s ability to keep everyone in her blended family happy—and on speaking terms,” Patsy added.
Heads nodded around the fire, then the conversation died off for a moment. Donna shivered as the fire burned lower. Since no one was yawning yet, she pulled another log off the pile and added it to the firepit while the other three women seemed lost in their thoughts. Once she’d stoked the fire again, Donna sat and looked at each of them, wondering how much they’d all given up over the course of their lives for their loved ones.
“Do you ever get sick of only thinking about the wellbeing of our families?” she asked. “Our grown kids? Your grandkids?”
All three women looked her way, and she could see each was considering her question.
“I’m not ashamed to admit that I still have dreams I’d love to pursue,” she continued. “Are we too old to do that now? We’re all in our seventies, right?”
“That’s an interesting set of questions, Donna,” Lavonne said. “Whether or not we’re too old . . . I don’t think so. By now you’ve all heard of Celia, right? Well, she lived to be in her nineties, and she was still working and doing fun things with the resources she’d built for herself, right until the end.”
Donna liked the sound of that. “That’s great. Okay, keep going, Lavonne. What’s one dream you still want to chase? I hope you have more than one, but we might run out of wood if we stay up all night talking.”
Everyone laughed, then turned expectant eyes back to Lavonne.
“I guess the thing that pops into my mind relates to Celia,” she said. “On the one hand, even though I loved Celia and respected her for all her accomplishments, I did feel like I lived in her shadow. I’m not sure I ever made a difference in anything—at least not the way Celia did.”
They countered her statement with one “No way,” a “Boo!” and even a couple of hisses.
“Why do we sell ourselves so short?” Charlotte asked. “Lavonne, you just finished telling me you have four grown children, and if they are all as amazing as Renee, I’d say you’ve accomplished plenty. And then there are all your grandchildren. I’ve always felt that raising kids is the most important work anyone can do. Nothing affects the world more. I think that’s why I fell in love with my husband, too. He had plenty of flaws, but the one thing we always agreed on was providing a stable environment for our children. But . . . and we need to remember this . . . we’ve raised our kids and done what we can for them. I think Donna is on to something. If we still have unrealized dreams inside us, we better get to it. Time’s a-wasting!”
“Fine,” Lavonne conceded. “I won’t argue with any of that, but my dream is still somewhat related to Celia. She left an incredible legacy. Money can’t buy happiness and all of that, but it can really help those in need. I want to use the resources we still have—including our inheritance from Celia—to keep helping others. To keep Celia’s legacy alive.”
Charlotte raised her eyebrows. “I think that is a wonderful dream. Before you even decide who to point to next, Donna, I’ll volunteer. My dream was always to escape the terrible winters in Minnesota. We’d planned to go south for a few months each winter after Glen retired, but we never got around to it. Then he got sick. Part of me would feel guilty for leaving him now, but I could remind myself that I’m not getting any younger, either. Sadly, he wouldn’t miss me at this stage, and it would only be for a month or two to start. Maybe when I get home tomorrow I’ll start doing some research. You ladies have inspired me!”
Patsy clapped her hands. “I can help you out with that dream, Charlotte. We have a second home in Arizona. You probably know that, since Jackie stayed there with Annie and the other girls for their fiftieth birthday celebration. The neighbor to our south down there called last week and is looking for a renter for next winter. It’s small, so it wouldn’t be too expensive, but it’s cute. If that interests you at all, I can get you his phone number.”
“Please!” Charlotte said. Her face glowed in the fire’s light.
Donna steepled her fingers and rested her chin on top of them. “I’d move away.”
Her simple statement had all heads swerving in her direction.
“Do you mean, like . . . just for the winter?” Patsy stammered. “It is a nice break to get away for a few months.”
“No. I mean that my dream for many years has been to live in Europe during the summer months and then somewhere with pure white beaches and bright blue ocean waves in the winter.” Donna could hardly believe she’d said the words out loud, but knew she had based on the stunned expressions of the other women.
“Why did you move to Ruby Shores with Lynette, then?” Charlotte asked. “And why did you buy such a big house? I mean, it’s beautiful, but it’s also old and huge. None of that jives with what you just said your dream was.”
Donna didn’t have a good answer. “I’m not really sure. Escaping New York was our immediate focus. Ruby Shores felt like the safe bet. The pandemic was still picking up speed and there were so many unknowns. But for the past few months, I’ve been worried that it might have been a mistake. Not that I can do anything about it now. I made a commitment to Lynette, and I need to stick with it.”
“But you’re the one who wanted to talk about dreams. Why would you do that if you thought yours was unattainable?” Patsy said.
A chill passed through Donna, so she pulled on the jacket that Charlotte had brought her. “I guess I’m either a glutton for punishment or I want to live vicariously through you.”
Patsy made a sound of disgust. “That’s not good enough, Donna. I haven’t gone yet. My dream is to get back to traveling, and not just with my husband. I love him, but getting out of town with a bunch of girlfriends is so different. I used to do that many years ago. In fact, Annie told me once that my trips were her inspiration behind these annual trips they take now. But my old group is all gone. My friend Betsy was my last hope, but she passed when I was on an anniversary cruise with my husband. So I have a proposition for you three—and Kit’s mom, too, if she’s interested.”
Donna had a good guess what Patsy was about to suggest.
“I think this quick little getaway to Whispering Pines should be the first of many trips we take together! But given that we have at least twenty years on those privileged little Kaleidoscope Girls, I think we probably want to go more often than once a year. Donna, we could consider somewhere tropical or even Europe for you. It isn’t the same as actually living there, but it might be the next best thing. And it would get you out of Minnesota, Charlotte. This doesn’t tie quite as nicely with the dream you mentioned, Lavonne, but maybe we could do one volunteer trip a year or something, in addition to traveling for fun.”
Excited chatter erupted among the four following Patsy’s suggestion. Donna felt her own spirits lift in a way they hadn’t for a long time.
“Where could we go first? And when?” Charlotte finally asked, loudly enough to cut through their twittering.
Donna raised a hand. “If the weather is as tough this winter as last year, maybe we could get away for the holidays. Or at least right before, so we can still be with our families for Christmas. I have this friend, his name is Chester, and he loves to travel. He told me once that the Biltmore home, just outside of Ashville, North Carolina, is magical at Christmas. Would something like that interest anyone?”
The other women all raised their hands high in the air.
“But let’s not tell our daughters about this yet,” Patsy said. “I’d hate for them to crash our fun!”
“You are brilliant, Patsy,” Charlotte said, giving the other woman a high five. Then she swung around and pinned Donna with an inquiring gaze. “Now, Donna . . . let’s talk about this Chester fellow.”