Drawing Home

by Jamie Brenner

  Kyle returned with two Styrofoam cups filled with weak coffee.

  “This waiting is impossible,” she said.

  “Do you want me to check and see what’s going on?”

  She shook her head. “I already asked.”

  “Ask again. The squeaky wheel gets the grease and all that.”

  Maybe he was right. Still, after years of working at the hotel front desk, Emma hated to hassle people while they were just doing their job. But this was about Penny, and she couldn’t waste time being polite.

  She went up to the nurses’ station and said, “I’m sorry, but I need to check in again. Penny Mapson? Any word on her?”

  The nurse looked up wearily and told her they were doing the best they could. “We’re treating over a half a dozen patients from this incident, so please, just be patient. The doctors will speak to everyone.”

  Emma told herself that maybe the waiting was a good sign—that Penny was basically fine and the doctors were busy with more serious issues. Not that she wished anyone else’s child harm. But she had to find some way to deal with the fact that her child was somewhere around here and she couldn’t see her.

  She returned to the waiting room. Time crawled by until a nurse finally called out, “Mrs. Mapson?”

  Emma nearly jumped out of her skin. Kyle stood up with her.

  “Please, just wait here,” she told him.

  In the hallway, she was met by a reed-thin man with dark olive skin and rimless glasses. His narrow face appeared young but his hair was threaded with gray.

  “I’m Dr. Saroyen,” he said, shaking her hand. “Your daughter is going to be fine. Her leg is broken, but luckily it’s not an open fracture.”

  “Okay,” Emma said, nodding. “A broken leg.”

  “A fractured tibia. She won’t require surgery, and the orthopedist is splinting her leg now.”

  “Emma!”

  She looked up. Mark was striding down the hallway, dressed in jeans and a sports jacket. Talk about things going from bad to worse.

  “Mark, this is Dr. Saroyen. Doctor, this is Penny’s father.”

  The doctor repeated the information to Mark. When he finished, Emma asked if she could see her.

  “Yes, but before you do, there is one more thing. It was clear that several of the teenagers on the boat were intoxicated at the time of the accident. I asked your daughter before I administered pain medication if she had been drinking or taken any drugs. She admitted she had taken a Percocet earlier in the evening.”

  “A what?” Emma said. It was a rhetorical question, but the doctor went on to explain that it was an opioid. As if she didn’t know—all too well. She pushed away thoughts of her mother.

  “Where the hell did she get that?” Mark said, looking at Emma.

  “Not in our house! You know how I feel about prescription drugs.”

  “Please,” the doctor said. “This is an important issue but one that should wait for another time. I know Penny is anxious to see you.”

  They followed him down the bright corridor.

  “You reek of alcohol,” Mark said.

  Oh, how she regretted calling him!

  Dr. Saroyen opened the door into a room divided by a curtain. Penny was on the far side, sitting on a table, while a woman, presumably the orthopedist, wrapped her leg with a wet, bright pink bandage. Penny’s hair was frizzy and wild, and she had a bruise on her cheek. Emma’s heart ached. She hugged Penny, apologizing to the doctor, although she didn’t care if she was interrupting the splinting. She began to cry.

  “I’m okay, Mom,” Penny said.

  The doctor asked Emma to step aside so she could get the splint finished.

  Mark paced in the room. Emma shot him a look, willing him not to get into the drug thing. Not now.

  After the doctor finished the splint, she told them she would be back to check on Penny in fifteen or thirty minutes.

  “And then I can go home?” Penny said.

  “Yes, then you can go,” the doctor said. “But you have to stop by the desk for the discharge paperwork. And, Mom, I’ll put the cast on when the swelling goes down, so I’ll need to see her again in a few days—this splint is temporary. Once she’s got the cast on, no powder and no lotion on the leg. No sticking anything inside the cast, even if it feels itchy. I’ll give you written instructions for showering.”

  “How long will she be wearing the cast?” Mark asked.

  “Six to eight weeks. Have you ever used crutches before?” she asked Penny. Penny shook her head. “You’ll get the hang of it.” The doctor turned to Emma and Mark. “The biggest adjustment will be inside the home. No stairs.”

  “How am I going to get to my room?” Penny said.

  Maybe you should have thought of that before you took drugs and went joyriding, Emma thought, surprised at the flash of anger. Now that the immediate emergency was under control, she was flooded with conflicting emotions. “I’ll be back in a minute, sweetheart,” Emma said. “I’m just going to take care of the paperwork.”

  Mark followed her silently to the nurses’ station.

  Her mind turned to logistics. How was Penny going to get around all summer? What would she do all day? Angus would have to help her up and down the front steps of the historical society. She wouldn’t even be able to get in and out of BuddhaBerry by herself. Now, instead of Penny helping Angus, Angus would have to babysit Penny. It wasn’t right.

  Then Emma shifted the blame from Penny to herself. Maybe this was her own fault. From the way Mark was looking at her, she figured she wasn’t the only one thinking that.

  She ignored him, took a clipboard full of papers from the nurse, and signed everything. Kyle must have spotted her from the waiting room across the hall because he appeared holding the handbag she hadn’t even realized she’d left behind.

  “What’s he doing here?” Mark said.

  “He’s a friend,” Emma said.

  Mark gave Kyle the side-eye, then said, “Penny should come home with me. My rental is a single level. Penny won’t have to deal with stairs until she gets the hang of those crutches.”

  Emma’s breath caught in her chest. “Don’t be ridiculous. Penny is coming home with me. We’ll figure it out.”

  “There’s no need to be territorial here, Emma. I’m just trying to do what is best for Penny tonight.”

  “I think I know what’s best for Penny,” Emma said.

  “You’re hardly in any condition to make that call.”

  “Actually,” Kyle said, stepping closer to Emma, “Windsong has everything Penny needs on the first floor. So I’ll drive you there.”

  Emma smiled at him gratefully. “That’s a good idea.” She didn’t know if it was or it wasn’t—the last thing she needed tonight was to deal with Bea Winstead on top of everything else. But at least it shut down Mark’s case for taking Penny. And at that moment, all she wanted was to get her daughter out of the hospital and escape the judgmental glare of her ex-husband.

  What could Bea Winstead do to her, anyway?

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Bea awoke with a start to the sound of voices.

  At first, she thought she’d imagined it, the patter of a dream seeping into her waking moments. But the conversation grew more distinct, and she sat up. Was she hearing what she thought she was hearing?

  Kyle. And a woman.

  Was he out of his mind? This was no place for his lady friends.

  She put on her glasses, her silk robe, and her slippers and quietly slid open her bedroom door. From the top of the stairway landing, she heard the voices more clearly, and it was even worse than she’d thought. With her pulse racing in outrage, Bea rushed down the stairs to find Kyle and Emma Mapson in the kitchen. The woman seemed right at home and was making herself a pot of tea.

  “What is going on here?” Bea said. “It’s the middle of the night!”

  Emma calmly poured tea into one of Henry’s vintage mugs, glancing at Kyle. “I’m sorry we woke you. We’
re all going to sleep now.”

  “All going to sleep now? Why are you even here?”

  “Bea, come on,” Kyle said. “Don’t start.”

  “Penny had an accident. She broke her leg and we’re staying here because she can’t use the stairs at our other house. Again, I didn’t mean to wake you. But this is our house now, and you should be leaving.”

  She should be leaving?

  “I’m sorry to hear about your daughter’s misfortune,” Bea said. “But that does not give you license to barge in here at this hour.”

  “Emma, you’ve had a long night,” Kyle said after glaring at Bea. “Try to get some sleep. I’m just down the hall if you need anything.”

  “I’ll be fine. Thanks for everything.” Emma shuffled out of the kitchen.

  Bea watched the exchange incredulously. What was going on here?

  Kyle opened the refrigerator and pulled out a beer. “Bea, enough is enough.”

  “Whose side are you on? This is outrageous. Did you give me two weeks’ notice just so you could sabotage me? Is there no loyalty left in this world?”

  The girl had had an accident, and that was unfortunate. But children got into all sorts of messes—again, she’d chosen not to deal with that in her life. And she wasn’t about to start now. The bottom line was that broken bones would heal in a matter of weeks. If she lost Henry’s legacy, it would be gone forever.

  “I am not trying to sabotage you,” Kyle said. “I was all for helping you recover the estate of Henry Wyatt. But come on. How long are you going to play this game? These are decent people. Emma barely has the energy to deal with her job and her kid. You think she masterminded some swindle? I can’t believe you really think that.”

  “I showed you his will from 2000. That was a major breakthrough on this.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t agree. The guy had a different will in 2017 than he did in 2000. He changed his mind. It happens all the time.”

  She expected this from strangers—from people in this myopic town who cared more about a burned-down movie theater than about the fate of a priceless estate. But she’d thought she could count on Kyle, if for no other reason than he was on her payroll! Oh, the betrayal.

  “I want you out of here tomorrow!”

  The surprised expression on his face gave her a bit of satisfaction. But not enough. Not nearly enough.

  She whirled around and headed up the stairs, wired with so much adrenaline she felt ten years younger. She’d never fall back to sleep.

  Back in her room, with her door closed against the invasion, she paced with impotent rage. This fight was not over. But what more could she do?

  And then, with a glance at her phone on her nightstand, she recognized her next move. She rummaged through her handbag and found the business card that he had handed her earlier that day.

  Then she texted Mark Mapson that she would gladly write him a check for his legal fees.

  The pain in her leg woke her up. Ow, that hurt!

  It was still dark. Penny reached for the Advil and water her mother had left by the bed and swallowed two of the pills. Her mother said if she needed her during the night she should text her, but Penny didn’t want to do that. It made her feel like a baby, and it would compound her already heaping pile of guilt.

  Now she’d really done it. Why, oh, why hadn’t she just stayed home last night? Or why, when Robin said to come on the boat, didn’t she just say no?

  She reached for the light and was startled to find herself in the strange room. She’d completely forgotten she was at Windsong. The details of the night came rushing back to her: The hospital. Her dad being there. How strange to have him around after all this time.

  The room was big and there was so much distance between her bed and the bathroom that she was afraid to attempt the trip on her own. She’d have to text her mother after all. She turned on her phone and it chirped with a flood of texts, all from Jess. Mindy had a concussion. Robin had a broken wrist and a fractured collarbone. Jess wasn’t injured, but she was grounded for the rest of the summer.

  Penny was going to be grounded for the rest of her life, probably. And she deserved it. In any case, she had to be on crutches for six to eight weeks. That took her to the middle of August, at least. The summer was over.

  Penny shook her head. What a friggin’ disaster. And then, feeling like the biggest loser in the world, she texted her mom for help going to the bathroom.

  Emma appeared, still dressed in the clothes she’d worn the night before. Had she fallen asleep in them? Penny felt a flash of shame for giving her mom such a hard time lately.

  “Are you in pain?” Emma asked, serving as a human crutch to help her hobble to the bathroom.

  “Yeah,” Penny said. “How long does it take for the Advil to work?”

  “Maybe twenty minutes.”

  When Penny was settled back in bed, Emma eased next to her and sat down on the edge.

  “I’m sorry, Mom,” Penny said, her eyes filling with tears.

  Emma hugged her. “Okay. It’s going to be okay.” When she pulled back, she took a deep breath and said, “Penny, where did you get the drugs? And how long have you been taking them?”

  Penny hesitated at first but then it all spilled out in a rush, as if she’d been dying to confess all along. It had started Memorial Day weekend; Mindy said the pills were harmless, that her mother took them “like Tic Tacs.” And Penny didn’t even feel that weird on them, just happier, and she didn’t get caught in any of her OCD loops. “It was just a few times,” she said.

  “Maybe Dr. Wang is right,” her mother said.

  “No! This has nothing to do with Dr. Wang. Honestly, I don’t even see the point of therapy. It doesn’t really help. I keep telling myself I’ll get back into drawing soon. When I was really busy with that, I felt a lot better.”

  Emma sighed. “Well, you can’t be drawing every minute of the day.”

  “Now I can,” Penny said with a smile.

  Her mom gave a little laugh. “Yeah, well, can’t argue with that.” Emma tucked the comforter around her and kissed her forehead. She turned off the light. “Try to get a few more hours of sleep.”

  “Mom,” Penny said in the darkness before Emma reached the door.

  “Yes?”

  “I love you.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  The hospital bill would be astronomical. Not a great time to be unemployed.

  Emma stood in front of the glass wall overlooking the infinity pool. The irony of being surrounded by opulence at a time when she felt financially vulnerable was not lost on her. Now she really had no money to waste on lawyers to fight Bea Winstead. It crossed her mind that she could simply call Jim at the station and see if he could make Bea leave on the grounds that she was trespassing. Of course, if Bea was trespassing, then so was Kyle. And, really, he had been a lifesaver last night.

  The doorbell sounded, a delicate, melodic ping that was as unique and pleasant as the rest of the house. Henry Wyatt had overlooked no detail. Again, the question nagged at her: Why had he chosen Penny as his beneficiary?

  Angus stood on the front stoop.

  “I come bearing gifts,” he said, handing her a straw basket full of treats from Schiavoni’s Market and two graphic novels Emma recognized from Penny’s bookshelf. “I brought these just in case she needed something to read. How’s she doing?”

  “She’s sleeping, thankfully. Oh, Angus. Can you believe this?”

  “It’s going to be fine,” he said in his deep, commanding voice.

  “I know. But I’m caught between relief that her injuries weren’t more serious and fury that she acted so recklessly. She’s going to be on crutches all summer.”

  “She’ll do anything to get out of working at the historical society.” He smiled.

  Emma unwrapped the basket in the kitchen. Penny wouldn’t mind her taking off the cellophane and bow—easier access to the brownies and chocolate chip cookies. Emma opened a tin. “
You really shouldn’t have bought all of this,” she said. “But Penny will love it. And I’m starving. There’s no food here. From what I can tell by looking in the fridge, Bea Winstead lives on sparkling water and organic blueberries.”

  “Is the grande dame here?”

  “No, she flew off on her broom earlier this morning.”

  “Emma, you don’t need this aggravation. We can make up the couch for Penny at home. And you’ve been saying for months you have to get the first-floor bathroom fixed anyway.”

  Emma pulled out a few Bosc pears and rinsed them in the sink. “Angus, I can’t have the bathroom fixed right now. I’m in a bit of a bind. I lost my job. And if I don’t find a new one soon, I’m going to have to give up the Mount Misery house to save the rent money. At least we can live here for free. And ‘we’ includes you.”

  Angus pulled out one of the stools next to the island and sat down. “It’s true, there’s no need to pay rent on Mount Misery when you have this place. But as I told you when we first started discussing this, I’m not comfortable in this big, strange house. It doesn’t feel right.”

  “Angus—”

  “Don’t worry about me! Whatever you decide to do, I’ll be fine.”

  Emma wanted to say that she wouldn’t be fine. But she didn’t want to push him for her own selfish needs. But what about—

  “And I’ll always be here for Penny,” Angus added. He knew her too well.

  “I don’t want you to make a rushed decision on this,” she said, her hands gripping the tin of baked goods like it was the steering wheel of an out-of-control car.

  Angus reached for one of the brownies, announced that he absolutely shouldn’t be eating it, then popped the whole thing into his mouth.

  “Angus,” she said. “I’m really hoping you’ll reconsider.”

  He looked up at the ceiling, steepling his fingers. “Emma, when I was faced with losing Celia, I was more than happy to promise her that I’d move in with you and Penny, that I wouldn’t be alone. Because the truth was, I was afraid of it myself. She was the one dying, but I felt like my life was over too. I realize now she didn’t just want me to have company. She wanted me to go on with my life. I wasn’t ready five years ago, and I’m not sure I’m ready now. But I can’t be afraid of change. And neither can you.”