by Kelly Rimmer
tificate of marriage.
Bride: Maryanne Frances Gal agher.
Groom: Patrick Timothy Walsh.
We all sit in bewildered silence for a moment, then Jeremy
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stands. We all look at him, and he points toward the liquor cab-
inet. “I need a drink.”
“But what does this mean?” Ruth asks no one in particular.
“I had this feeling when she came in,” Tim admits. “I had
this feeling that…maybe once upon a time, we knew her well.”
“Do you think…” I start to say, but I can’t make myself con-
tinue.
Sweet girl.
“I think instead of speculating, we just need to get in touch
with Maryanne again,” Tim says.
“Because tonight went so well,” Jeremy snorts, but then he
gives us a bewildered look. “And speculating about what? What exactly are you two saying?”
Tim looks at me. His gaze is soft.
“Do you think you’d be up for meeting with her on your
own?”
“Why me?”
“Because I have this feeling that once upon a time,” Tim mur-
murs, his gaze sad, “you held a very special place in her heart.”
“I’ll get up to feed Noah tonight. But…maybe tonight’s one
of those nights when you should take something to help you
sleep,” Hunter suggests. We’re home now—I’m sitting on the
sofa, Noah sleeping in my arms. I have the TV on, but I’m star-
ing right through it, mentally reliving every second of that brief
encounter with Maryanne. Hunter has been winding down,
reading a novel beside me. He closes the book and yawns, and
then reaches to gently take the baby from me. “I’ll put this little
guy to bed. Are you joining me?”
“I’ll be in soon,” I promise him, “and yes, I’ll take the tab-
let first.” He gives me a surprised glance, so I offer him a wry
smile. “You were expecting me to resist, huh?”
“Yeah. I was,” Hunter chuckles quietly.
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“I just want to look through that photo album one more time,
then I’ll come right to bed.”
“You don’t want company?”
I shake my head but rise to kiss him gently before he leaves
the room with Noah. I take the damned medicine, knowing
I’ll never sleep otherwise, but while I wait for it to kick in, I sit
at my dining room table with the album.
I’ve carefully slipped the notes from Grace into the front
cover tonight, simply because I had no idea what else I should
do with them. Now I flick very slowly through the photos of
her wedding day to Dad. My gaze travels all over the page to
avoid looking into his eyes. My loss is still so raw—it hurts more
than I can bear too much to see his image right now. Instead,
I stare at Grace.
Is it you in my memories? Or is it her?
I skim forward to the photo of Dad and Maryanne. The defi-
ance in her gaze almost makes sense now that I’ve met her. Even
after a five-minute encounter, I’m certain that she’s always had
a headstrong, bold personality.
Sweet girl. My sweet girl.
The memories rise again, of me tucked up close against my
mother in her bed, of me curled up on her lap. I think of all the
good things I drew from those memories, and the way they’ve
shaped me over the years that have passed since.
And then, as clear as if she’s in the room with me, I hear her
voice in my mind.
I love you, sweet girl.
I flip back to Grace’s notes, searching for a phrase my mind
can only vaguely recall. When I find it, I close my eyes and
swallow a lump in my throat.
…and I called them “darlings,” because that’s what I always call
them…
The tablet is already working and sleep is tugging at me, so
I close the album and retreat to bed.
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Grace was my mom, and I know she wrote the notes I found
in Dad’s attic. I’m sure of those things—but I’m no longer sure
how to place her in my mind. That series of beautiful child-
hood memories I’ve cherished stars the woman I thought of as
my mother, but after tonight, I can’t help but wonder if I re-
member Grace at all.
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19
Maryanne
1959
I waited for Patrick on the front porch that night, despite the icy
wind. I wrapped myself in the blanket from my stretcher bed
and nursed a mug of tea to keep my hands warm.
Patrick was a little late, but when I saw him climbing out of
his car, I understood why. His footsteps dragged and his shoul-
ders were slumped—he looked just as Tim had when I sent him
away earlier that afternoon.
“I’m staying,” I blurted as soon as he was within earshot. Pat-
rick looked up at me in shock. “I still don’t know how we’ll
make this work, but I’m going to stay. Between the two of us
we at least have a chance of figuring it out.”
“But how…why…?” Patrick blinked at me. “Why would
you do that?”
“Grace had her troubles, Patrick, but the one thing I never
doubted was how much she loved her family. If I leave, the kids
lose you, and they need you now more than ever and you’ve
more than proven over the past two months that you’re the fa-
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ther they deserve. She would have wanted me to stay…and I
can’t see how you could possibly keep them if I go.”
Patrick was staring at me in disbelief. He dropped his lunch
pail to the ground and it clattered against the concrete, the sound
jarring and unexpected—but not nearly as much as his next
move. My heart was still racing when Patrick leaped over the
fence to sprint up to the porch to embrace me. I found myself
wrapped in the arms of my dead sister’s husband as he squeezed
me so tight I could barely breathe.
“Thank you,” he said against my hair.
“This doesn’t make everything better,” I hastened to remind
him.
“No, but it gives me a chance. Just a fighting chance, and
that’s all I really needed.”
Grace’s notes, for the first time in weeks, were the furthest
thing from my mind. My decision to stay was a pure one—and
for maybe the first time in my life, I’d made a decision to pri-
oritize someone else’s welfare above my own.
Patrick and I sat up that night and tried to brainstorm options
with the new parameters of our situation, now that I was staying.
“I need to get a job. Maybe I can find a position at one of the
colleges,” I said thoughtfully.
“But… I thought…”
“I can’t stay here and look after the house so you can work,” I
frowned. When Patrick hesitated, I shook my head fiercely. “My
job isn’t like yours. My days are shorter, and I won’t be travel-
ing all over the city to building sites—just to whichever cam-
pus hires me. I can be home in time to cook dinner and watch
the children. I mean, we’ll still need a babysitter, but between
your wages and mine, we should be able to pay for some help.”
“And where will you live?”
I blinked at him in disbelief, and Patrick’s eyes widened.
“Maryanne, my God. What would people say?”
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“I could not care less what people say,” I laughed softly.
He sighed and shook his head.
“Mrs. Hills was already scolding me about you staying here
even this long. She said it’s improper.”
“She said the same to me,” I said, shrugging. “I don’t care.”
“Look, it’s not that I’m not grateful, because believe me, I
am. But do you really think your parents are going to back off?
If anything, your presence only strengthens their claims about
my moral character.”
“That’s it, Patrick!” I exclaimed, leaping up from the table and
thumping my fist against it in triumph. “You genius.”
“I don’t follow…”
“That’s the answer. All we have to do is get married.”
“What?” He grew very pale all of a sudden, and I laughed.
“Don’t flatter yourself, Patrick, I have no designs on you. But
if we’re married, then they can hardly say we’re doing anything
wrong living in the same house, and it settles their claim that you
can’t raise the children as a single man.” He was still staring at
me, gobsmacked, so I tried to clarify, speaking very slowly this
time. “Because you won’t be a single man. You’ll be a married,
gainfully employed man. Head of a complete household, in the
eyes of the law and small-minded people like my parents. You
might not be wealthy, but even so, I can’t see a court ripping
the children out of a proper family like that.”
“But… Grace has only been gone a few months…” Patrick
was utterly aghast.
“I’m not proposing we become husband and wife in real
terms. Only in legal terms.”
“Maryanne, I don’t think you understand how much people
will talk if we marry—especially now . ”
I flashed him a wink.
“You should know by now that I don’t put much stock in
what people say about me. But in any case, you wouldn’t be the
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first widower to hastily remarry so his new wife could care for
his children.”
“Isn’t this shortsighted? What if you want to really get mar-
ried one day?”
“I told you, Patrick. I’m never getting married. And do you
really think you’ll remarry for love anytime soon?” He hesitated,
then sighed and shook his head. “Well, even if you do, we can
just tell everyone I was unfaithful and I’ll let you divorce me.
It’s all quite simple really.”
“Jesus Christ,” Patrick said, closing his eyes. “I need to think
about this.”
“Go right ahead,” I said cheerfully. “But do let me know
when you’re ready to save your family.”
The next morning I heard Patrick moving around the house
and I decided to get up to see if he’d thought about my pro-
posal. I rolled toward the edge of the bed, only to find a small
human asleep beside me.
It was Beth. She was curled up in a little ball, her thumb in
her mouth. I brushed her hair back from her forehead, and felt
a rush of love so intense and unexpected it brought tears to my
eyes. Oh, she was my favorite, all right—with those sad blue
eyes and that complexion so like mine. I’d never understood the
appeal of children and babies, but Beth had more than carved
out a place in my heart. I relaxed back onto my pillows then,
and cuddled her close for a while, listening to her quiet breath,
inhaling the scent of her.
But after a long while, I still hadn’t heard Patrick leave for
work, and so I eventually pulled on my gown and walked out
to the kitchen. He was sitting at the kitchen table, a resigned
look on his face.
“Let’s do it,” he said without preamble.
“Excellent,” I said, making a beeline for the coffee. “Do you
want to tell my father, or can I?”
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“You want to tell him? He’s going to be livid.”
“Oh, Patrick. Believe me when I say this: Nothing, and I
mean this quite literally, would give me more pleasure.”
I called Father at work the minute the bank opened.
“Father, I have some news.”
“You won’t change my mind, Maryanne. Patrick cannot raise
those children on his own.”
“You’re absolutely right,” I agreed, grinning to myself as
I watched the children in question tear around the backyard.
“That’s why he’s remarrying right away.”
“What? But Grace is barely cold in the ground! Who is this
strumpet he’s supposedly marrying?”
“The strumpet is me.”
I had felt for some time that having a relationship with my
parents was a tenuous prospect at best. I had grown in the soil of
their family home and thrived even though I did not fit there.
But for some utterly bewildering reason, I did fit in Patrick’s
family now. Grief and heartache had forged a bond between me
and those children, and I couldn’t deny that their home now
felt like my home.
And as my father cursed and sputtered as if I’d committed
some heinous crime against him, I was certain that I’d finally
rebelled enough to break the last ties I had with him and Mother.
Even so, I had no regrets.
After all, they forced my hand.
We had to wait for Grace’s death certificate to be issued be-
fore we could marry. It was an anxious few weeks—Patrick and
I were both on tenterhooks, anxious that my parents might try
to take the children before we could be married. And for the
first time we squabbled a bit—including a few arguments that
ended up with one or both of us storming off.
I was also petrified of what the death certificate would say.
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The day it finally arrived, the postman brought it in the morn-
ing, and I couldn’t bring myself to open it for hours. Logically,
I knew that it wouldn’t say Grace died from an abortion gone wrong
that Mar
yanne arranged on her behalf—certainly if the police had
any idea that an abortion had been involved in her death, they’d
have come back to question us.
But that didn’t mean the death certificate wouldn’t give some
clue as to the real cause of her death. And so I just couldn’t open
that envelope, even as the afternoon disappeared and Patrick was
due to come home.
As I heard his car pull in, I finally picked up the envelope
and opened it with trembling hands. My eyes scanned the page
for any detail, and when I finally saw that it deemed her cause
of death inconclusive, my knees went weak.
“You okay?” Patrick greeted me, just seconds later. “You look
awfully pale.”
I shoved the death certificate at him, and he read it, his face
set in a grim mask.
“No wonder you look sickly,” he sighed, shaking his head.
“Jesus. It’s hard to read that, isn’t it?”
It was hard to read her death certificate. But it was also a re-
lief, and I was starting to really believe that my role in Grace’s
death might never come to light. I was still looking for her
notes in quiet moments, but my fervor had begun to die down.
It seemed unlikely that they’d ever surface, given I’d searched
the house high and low so many times.
Still, I was well aware that as I settled into this new life with
Patrick and his children, I’d always be looking for those new
notes. In coming to love those children, I’d only raised the stakes.
Now, if Patrick did stumble upon those notes, it wasn’t only my
career he’d take away from me… .it was a part of my heart, too.
Patrick and I married a few weeks later, at the King County
Courthouse on a sunny Friday morning. Ewan and his wife,
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Jean, were our witnesses. Patrick and I discussed it and decided
not to include the children in the ceremony—we didn’t want
to confuse them. But Mrs. Hills was pleased with this devel-
opment, and agreed to mind the children for the morning. I’d
once thought of Grace’s wedding as a disappointingly simple
affair, but my wedding day was entirely without pomp or cir-
cumstance. Patrick wore a collared shirt, and I wore a peach
dress. I did set my hair and did a careful job on my makeup—
but mostly because Ewan was bringing his camera.
There was no emotion in the ceremony. In fact, Patrick and
