Chapter Ten
Ten
A Pearl of Wisdom
from Maeve Hearnshaw
“When you’re married, you have to grow together or you grow apart. It’s that simple and that hard.”
Tallulah
It was a beautiful morning to walk to work.
The kind of morning in my old life that I would’ve spent puttering around the flower garden I’d lovingly planted, snipping and trimming and admiring.
I would’ve cleaned the birdbaths—all three—and refilled them.
Made sure the bird feeders were topped off.
I would’ve skimmed any leaves or debris from the pool.
Checked to see if there were any critters in the water, needing to be rescued.
Katy and I would’ve eaten breakfast on the patio, then visited the park to soak up the morning sun before it grew too hot.
We’d have stopped at the library on the way home to load up on books. An armful for her. One or two for me.
In my current life, I didn’t have much free time.
There was no puttering around the garden.
No breakfast on the patio, but sometimes on the back porch.
The birdbaths and feeders were Papaw’s, and he cared for them in his own way.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d read for pleasure.
And I could hardly recall when I’d last taken a trip with Katy to the library.
These days, it was Papaw or Aunt Maeve who brought her in.
So much had changed in the last year and a half.
I glanced down at Mary Joy, who was snapped into her stroller, her eyelids heavy as she fought sleep.
We were on our way to Miss Edie’s house.
Right now it was in the low seventies, but temperatures were supposed to soar into the upper eighties later on with stifling humidity, which was par for the course this time of year.
It would’ve been the perfect day to go canoeing.
As I walked along the sidewalk, shaded under outstretched tree limbs, I tried telling myself that it wasn’t Scott’s fault Katy now considered canoeing something that should only be done with her father. But I couldn’t quite bring myself to believe it.
Partly because blaming Scott for the messy state of our lives had become second nature.
Right up there with breathing. Also because he could’ve called and encouraged her to go without him.
Only when I texted him earlier, letting him know of the situation, he’d responded with She’s sweet.
I don’t see any harm in letting her skip a day of camp.
Just thinking about it set my teeth on edge.
Because the text hadn’t been about her missing camp.
It had been about her putting him on some sort of pedestal. One he most certainly didn’t deserve, not that I could say that to her.
My grip tightened on the stroller, and I forced myself to think about something else. Anything else.
From the stroller, Mary Joy gurgled and thrust her hands in the air. She yawned, her small mouth forming a perfect pink oval. Then she caught sight of me watching her, gave me a drooly smile, and let her eyes drift closed.
My heart filled right up, fit to bust with how much I loved her.
I slowed my pace as I walked in front of Mr. Daniels’s house. He was standing on his front lawn, watering patches of sparse grass that grew over the scarred earth where two majestic trees had once stood. Rainbows glittered in the mist.
“Mornin’,” he said with a two-finger salute. He had rectangular black eyeglasses and a shock of white hair he always wore combed back, away from his face.
“Good morning!” I didn’t stop to have a full conversation, even though I had a little extra time this morning. Katy might not forgive me if I did. She was harboring a grudge against him for taking down those oak trees.
I couldn’t rightly blame her.
She’d inherited her grudge-holding tendencies from me.
I powered on, the stroller bumping along. It was only because of Juliet helping out that I was running early this morning. I even planned to stop and get a fancy coffee on my way to work.
I could hardly believe that we’d only known Juliet a couple of days. How easily she fit into our lives had taken me by surprise.
With how kind, giving, and nurturing she was, it was impossible not to care for her, and even more impossible not to hurt for her after hearing about her grandfather.
I’d wanted to ask her more questions about what had happened with him, but I hadn’t wanted to push too hard.
I truly shouldn’t have said anything at all about the town and its ways, but sadness had been radiating from her this morning.
I’d felt the melancholy the moment I stepped into the kitchen and knew I had to somehow get her to open up.
Katy staying with her today had provided the perfect opening, and I’d grabbed it.
The stroller dipped into a divot, but the jostling didn’t seem to bother Mary Joy in the slightest. She kept sleeping, looking like a veritable angel, completely at peace.
A bird chirped in the branches above my head, and I once again thought of the birds I’d left behind when I moved here.
Were the new owners of our old house feeding the birds?
We’d had two cardinals, a mated pair, who’d come by every day and eat their fill of black sunflower seeds.
I’d purposely left the feeder behind, hoping that whoever bought the house would pick up where I left off.
And it hurt, like a thorn deep in my soul, that I didn’t know if those birds were being taken care of.
Or who was now living in my house.
My real estate agent only said it was a young couple, just married.
I hadn’t wanted to know more. Or to meet them.
I simply hoped they’d have the happily-ever-after I once imagined I’d have there.
As I neared Vera’s beautiful old bungalow, my gaze went immediately to what had formerly been a one-car garage, connected to the house by a breezeway.
At some point in the distant past, the garage had been transformed into a two-chair hair salon, where Vera had worked for thirty-plus years.
When she finally retired, her husband repurposed the salon into a man cave, essentially turning it into a studio apartment.
After he passed away, the area had become a storage catchall.
For holiday decorations and knickknacks and dust bunnies and cobwebs.
According to Vera, the space hadn’t seen a good cleaning in years.
Right up until last night, when most of the neighbors pitched in to help move Vera’s belongings out and Jake Kilburn and his puppy in. I’d only stayed an hour or so before taking the girls home for baths and bedtime and a return to some semblance of a routine, even if it was later than usual.
I had to admit, though, that it had been worth our schedules going up in flames to see Jake being interrogated by the neighbors, who were so relentless with their questioning that I almost felt bad for him. Almost. Because I wanted to know the answers, too.
He was thirty-eight. An only child. He was, in fact, Evanthe’s nephew by marriage—her late husband had been his mom’s brother. Jake worked from home but had avoided questions about what he did for a living. He’d never been married and had no children.
Being nosy, I slowed my pace, grateful to be wearing sunglasses so I could blatantly stare at the converted garage without anyone being the wiser. It had a blue Dutch door and two tall windows adorned with wide planter boxes filled with pink petunias and orange geraniums.
Vera’s front door flew open, and she came hurrying out, a coffee cup in hand.
“Morning, sweetie!” Her curly white-blond hair was damp, her lipstick fresh, and her sleeveless maxi dress loose and flowy.
She peeked in the stroller and awwed. “What a little darlin’.
I can’t remember the last time I slept that soundly. ”
I felt the same. I’d only managed three or four restless hours last night.
“How’s Tenn feeling this morning?” she asked.
Pushing my sunglasses to the top of my head, I said, “Still sore but getting around a bit better.”
She cast a glance down the street. “Good to hear.”
There was something wistful in her gaze that made me wonder if Papaw had been right about Vera’s romantic intentions all along.
I nodded toward the garage. Parked in the driveway alongside Vera’s car was an unfamiliar black truck, one with a Florida license plate. “How’re things here with your new houseguest?”
“I’m about to bust from excitement! It’s good seeing the garage getting used again. And that Jake? Under that tough exterior he’s a softie.” She sniffed. “I can tell. I can pick out a good man a mile away. It’s a gift.”
It was the first I’d heard of this particular gift. “But why do you think we never heard of him before? And what do you think he does for a living that he doesn’t want to tell us about?”
I’d Googled him last night and had no luck whatsoever in finding anything.
Then, like the proverbial lightbulb going off, I realized why.
I’d been looking up Jake Kilburn, but Evanthe’s husband had been his maternal uncle. Jake wouldn’t have the same last name.
Vera laughed. “Give me time, Lu. It hasn’t even been a full day yet. I do know that last night he brought in not one, not two, but three computer monitors. Maybe he’s an online gambler?”
I smiled at her enthusiasm. “Are you going to ask?”
She pressed a hand to her heart. “Not outright! He went out for a jog about twenty minutes ago, and I’ve been keeping an eye out for him since. Thought I’d offer breakfast and see what I can learn. I’m making waffles.”
“I don’t know about him, but I’d tell you anything you wanted to know for waffles.”
She laughed. “I’ll remember that.”
Smiling, I glanced at my watch. “I should get going. Don’t want to be late for work.”
“No, no, definitely not.” She started for her front porch, then stopped and turned back. “Is Evanthe working today?”
“Most likely.” It felt as though the woman never took a day off, though I knew she’d once taken a seven-month-long leave of absence.
It was hard to imagine the library without her.
Or her without the library. My heart hurt for the pain she must’ve been in when Dale died.
Then Mamaw. For the pain that likely still lingered. After all, grief never truly went away.
She said, “Then perhaps you can get her side of what happened with Jake?”
I shook my head. “Nope. No way. I’m not treading into those waters. I don’t want to be anywhere near Evanthe’s bad side.”
She laughed. “I have to admire a good sense of self-preservation.”
With a wave, she headed up the porch steps, and I carried on, wondering why I was so curious about Jake. I told myself it was just because I had a nosy nature.
Deep within, though, I knew it was a lie.