Sweethearts Old

by Rachel A Andersen

  Cassie shrugged, though she didn’t look any less pleased with herself. “I knew what I wanted from a young age and studied to make it happen. What’s wrong with that?”

  “Nothing’s wrong with that, but Mom had a few words for you when you called Justin Bradley a stupidhead because he wrapped Barbie’s leg in a splint after that diagnosis instead of putting her arm in a sling.”

  Cassie snickered. “Oh, I forgot about that one. That was a good one.”

  Marissa’s mind went back to the dusty violin in the basement. Her sister had known from an early age what her purpose in life had been. Marissa had once been equally certain what her purpose would be, but here she was, an accountant. Doing the dishes. Nothing like what she’d planned on.

  “Put me to work.”

  Marissa blinked thoughts of the old violin out of her mind as she turned back to her sister, the petite strawberry blond who would undoubtedly do more to get this house into shape than any of Marissa’s attempts so far. “You just got off an airplane. The least I can do is feed you before I put you to work.”

  Aiden walked into the kitchen and glared up at Marissa. “That’s it? We’re not going to talk about what’s downstairs?”

  Cassie’s carefully manicured eyebrow shot up at least an inch higher than anything Marissa had ever thought possible. “What’s downstairs?”

  Marissa shook her head. “Nothing.”

  Aiden’s jaw dropped. “It is, too, something.” He turned to his aunt, his arms exaggerating his impassioned search for an ally. “I was downstairs looking around in all the stuff Mom wants to give away, and I found a violin.”

  Cassie’s eyes brightened. “You found your mom’s violin? I was wondering where that got to.”

  Aiden gasped before he turned back to Marissa. “It’s your violin? I thought maybe it was Grandma or Grandpa’s.”

  Marissa swallowed, walking to the refrigerator so she could peruse the half-dozen takeout menus she and Aiden had collected over the years. “I was thinking we’d get Chinese for dinner, but I could be persuaded to get Mexican. What do you guys think?”

  Aiden threw his hands in the air as he looked at his aunt. “See what I mean? She gives me nothing.”

  As Marissa opened her mouth to speak, Cassie cleared her throat. “Look, Aiden, why don’t you go into the car and grab my suitcase, hm?”

  Aiden hesitated a moment before he took Cassie’s proffered keys and walked out the front door, throwing one last dirty look at Marissa before he left.

  Marissa rubbed her forehead with a sigh. “I’m sorry about that. With the move, we’re both a little more on edge.”

  Cassie shook her head. “But that wasn’t just about the move. He found your violin.”

  Marissa eyed her sister, wary of what was coming next. “We’re going through the basement storage room to see what we need to take to the thrift store or what to save for you, Garrett, or Steven. He was excited about something he found, and I thought it was Garrett’s old remote control cars or something like that.”

  Cassie took a step toward her. “But it was your violin instead.”

  Marissa grabbed the first takeout menu from the magnet on the refrigerator. “Do you still like egg rolls? I thought I’d splurge and get some egg rolls.”

  “Marissa.”

  Marissa groaned as she looked at her sister. “What do you want me to say? That I wasn’t prepared to find my violin after all these years? Because I wasn’t. That my emotions right now have nothing to do with my son? They don’t.”

  Cassie put the cap back on her water bottle and set it deliberately on the counter like she was lining up her instruments for surgery. “I want you to get whatever this is off your chest. It’s just a violin. What’s the big deal?”

  Marissa swallowed, ashamed when she realized how close she was to crying. This was stupid. It was just an old instrument she’d forgotten she still owned. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s this house. Maybe it’s moving.”

  “Maybe you finally have time to process what happened when Mom and Dad died.”

  Marissa rolled her eyes as she grabbed a notepad and pen, settling in to order dinner at the kitchen table. “You know how stupid that sounds, right? They died almost twenty years ago. It’s not like I’m trying to wrap my head around some suddenly different life.”

  Cassie sat beside her and squeezed one of her hands, and Marissa wondered if the doctor had done it to try to keep Marissa from avoiding her emotions or if it was just her way of showing support. “Not stupid. Just because it’s been your reality for the better part of twenty years doesn’t mean that you had time to really mourn the dreams you gave up for it.”

  Without warning, as Cassie’s hand held hers, Marissa thought of that day almost twenty years ago when Declan had begged her not to give up her dreams, to let him come and walk her path so he could help share her burden.

  Declan Pierce. She hadn’t thought of him in almost ten years. Not since his wedding announcement had shown up at the house.

  Marissa tugged her hand out of her sister’s as the front door slammed shut. Aiden was back, and from the muttering as the boy lugged the suitcase up the stairs, he was none too happy about it. “Look, I get what you’re trying to do, but I don’t have time for this right now. The realtor is coming on Monday with our first prospective buyers. I’d like to have the first load of thrift store donations ready to go before then so they can really see how big that storage room is.”

  Cassie heaved a sigh as Marissa put together a list of main dishes and sides she thought the group would enjoy. Anything to keep from thinking about how it all had slipped away. Mu shu pork. Vegetable lo mein. Chicken egg rolls. Sweet and sour chicken. Egg drop soup.

  “Marissa, you have two choices. Have a mini-meltdown now or have a full-scale midlife crisis later.”

  Marissa’s chuckle rumbled low in her throat. “I’m not having a midlife crisis, Cassandra. How old do you think I am?”

  “Two years younger than Mom was when she died.”

  The reality of that clenched in Marissa’s gut, and her fingers froze as she dialed the Chinese restaurant in town. That can’t be true, can it?

  Cassie came around and caught the apparent look of shock on Marissa’s face. “I’m just saying that maybe now’s the right time to ask yourself the hard questions.”

  “Like what?”

  Cassie shrugged. “Only you can answer that question.”

  MARISSA SET AN ENORMOUS bowl of popcorn on the coffee table as Aiden and Cassie leaned over one of the photo albums Cassie had found in the guest room. “Look at them, they look so young.”

  Marissa smiled as she sat beside her son. “Mom was only twenty when they got married. Dad was twenty-three.”

  Aiden peeked up over the pages. “That’s not young. That’s old.”

  Marissa tousled the boy’s hair as she sat beside him to look at the photos. How long had it been since she’d last taken the time to look through these pictures? Too long, it seemed. Long enough that she’d forgotten that life could be anything more than mundane. “Someday, it won’t seem so old.”

  Like how much younger forty seemed with every passing year.

  Was that why she was so eager to shed the trappings of her parents’ life? To prove to herself, even just subconsciously, that her parents’ tragedy wasn’t her future?

  She shuddered.

  They turned a few pages over as Cassie nudged Aiden’s shoulder. “That’s the first picture we have of your mom.”

  Aiden’s brow furrowed. “Where is she?”

  Marissa pointed at her mother’s swollen belly. “That was taken the Christmas before I was born.”

  Even as her finger pointed to the evidence of her own impending birth, Marissa’s eyes drew to her mother’s radiant joy as her arms cradled this new life inside her.

  Funny how she’d forgotten what it was like to be loved so unconditionally, that the hope in her mother’s eyes would feel as foreign as it did. Hope that the mer
e idea of Marissa’s birth had inspired in her mother.

  Tears wet Marissa’s eyes as they flipped through the rest of the album. When had that fire for life and all it offered her been snuffed out? Her parents’ death? Before?

  Was it too late to find it again?

  She glanced over at her sister who was explaining some family stories to Aiden, who watched her with rapt attention. Was Cassie right? Was she just one meltdown away from a full-blown midlife crisis?

  As Cassie set the wedding album aside, Aiden reached for another album. Marissa’s heart squeezed as he flipped open the cover.

  Graduation Day.

  Cassie leaned over the book with enthusiasm in her voice. “Oh, look at you, Marissa. And Declan. I forgot about Declan.”

  Sadness spread through Marissa like icy water. She wondered what he was up to now. He probably had kids. Was he an architectural engineer like he’d always hoped?

  For a second, she wondered what her life would be like if she hadn’t refused Declan’s clumsy but sweet proposal the day after her parents’ funeral. Would it have eased the burden she carried over the years? Would she instead be contemplating divorce after years of disillusionment, not just a big move?

  You wouldn’t have Aiden.

  She looked down at the boy, who chatted away, pointing at the photos with gusto. Their earlier tiff was now forgotten, forgiven. She couldn’t imagine life without him. Being single and childless had given her the urge to adopt out of foster care. She might not have been in the right position to make that same position if her life had turned out any other way.

  “Hey, Mom, you graduated from high school twenty years ago, right?”

  Marissa’s thoughts vanished to the back of her mind as she nodded down at her son. “Yes, sweetheart. Why?”

  Cassie cast a sidelong glance at her sister. “So, isn’t there usually a reunion for such milestones?”

  Marissa pasted a fake smile on her lips. She should have paid more attention to the two of them. They were plotting something. “As a matter of fact, there is. I just got the invitation last week.”

  “And?” Both Aiden and Cassie turned bright, hopeful smiles to her.

  As she looked down at them, she caught sight of the picture her mother had taken when Declan had lifted Marissa into the air, her arms around his neck for balance as they celebrated their greatest achievement to date.

  Though it had been twenty years almost to the day, Marissa could remember what it had felt like to look down at Declan from such a height, all the love and pride she had for him radiating between them. Even in the picture, Marissa’s eyes were bright with hope and promise. Just like her mother’s had been in the photo where she caressed the yet unborn baby Marissa.

  Before the sadness could ambush her in front of anyone, Marissa closed the photo album and set it on top of the others on the coffee table. She couldn’t have it stirring up any more memories. Not if she was going to keep hold of her composure.

  Then, she turned back to her bewildered family members. “And I’m not going. End of discussion.”

  MARISSA CREPT OUT OF Aiden’s room and down the hall to the guest room where Cassie unpacked her suitcase. She knocked on the door frame, catching her sister’s eye. “I didn’t properly thank you for coming. Even if you’re not buying the house, I appreciate the help.”

  Cassie turned a smile to her. “Hey, I owe you. You always come and help me move, and I think I may have had more apartments in the last ten years than anyone else I know.”

  Marissa crossed her arms as she walked into the room and sat on the bed. “You don’t owe me anything.”

  Cassie’s blue eyes seemed to darken with some strange emotion before she brightened, removing another shirt from the suitcase which she set in one open drawer of the dresser in the corner of the room. “Well, whether or not that’s true, I’m here.”

  Marissa grinned. “Yes, you are.”

  “Can we talk about why you’re not going to your high school reunion?”

  Marissa grimaced. “I’d rather not. You’re just here for the three-day weekend, and I don’t want to spoil it by remembering high school.”

  “Is that why you’re not going? Because you hated high school?”

  Marissa raised a shoulder, unsure if that was true. “Well, let’s just say that if someone asked me if I wanted to rewind things and go back to high school, I’d probably say no.”

  “Probably?”

  Marissa groaned. “Is this about that whole midlife crisis thing you were spouting off earlier?”

  Cassie chuckled, throwing her hands up in surrender. “That wasn’t my intention, I promise.”

  “I’d be lying if there weren’t things I miss about being a kid, but everyone has those. That doesn’t somehow set me apart from anyone else my age. I just have the good sense not to try to reclaim my youth.”

  Cassie’s head waffled from side to side as if she didn’t quite agree with her sister but was too polite to say it. “What you call good sense, others might call stubbornness.”

  “You want me to go to the reunion, is that it?”

  Her sister sat beside her on the bed. “I’m just saying that it wouldn’t hurt to tap into the girl you were once in a while. Like the violin. It was a part of you. As much a part of you as your leg or your arm, and you act like you’ve cut it out of your life. But it’s still there. I think the pain of seeing it again is proof of that.”

  Marissa stared at her sister. “You sound just like a doctor, little sister.”

  “I am a doctor.” Cassie stood again and went back to unpacking. “An excellent one, too.”

  Marissa leaned against the headboard as she watched her sister. “You really think I should revisit some of the old parts of myself I left behind when Mom and Dad died?”

  Cassie’s blue eyes grew serious again. “Medically speaking, you can only ignore a problem for so long before it becomes critical. You’ve put an emotional tourniquet on some key parts of your soul for so long you’ve lost feeling in those limbs, and while that might be appropriate in the short-term, it’s not a long-term solution. Carrying dead weight around for twenty years is long enough, don’t you think?”

  Marissa bit the inside of her cheek. “And you think I can address this by going to the reunion?”

  “I think it’s definitely one symptom of this emotional dead weight. I’ll even come visit so I can be your cheerleader.”

  “And so you can watch Aiden?”

  Cassie grinned. “That goes without saying.”

  Marissa stared into space, almost certain she would regret this. No matter how logical her sister made it sound. “Okay, fine. If it means that much to you, I’ll go.”

  Chapter Two

  Declan

  Declan dragged himself into the living room. The room was strewn with discarded toys and unfolded laundry, but he didn’t stop to address any of it. Instead, he sank onto the couch and grabbed the remote.

  Some part of him nagged that there was something else to do, something more worthwhile than mindless channel surfing. At one time, his conscious mind would have agreed. He would have wanted nothing more than to chase his wife up the stairs or dance with her by candlelight. Frankly, he would give his left arm for her to walk into the living room and ask if he was blind before she bent down to pick up the toys left behind by the children just one last time.

  That wouldn’t happen. Couldn’t happen. Angela was gone. She was never coming back.

  The stairs creaked, and a few moments later Helen poked her head into the den. “Declan?”

  He didn’t answer, only inclined his head a fraction of an inch.

  “I’ve got the kids in bed. It took a while. Luke’s still chattering about how excited he is to start preschool tomorrow. Tabitha was trying to give him some pointers, but I got them calmed down enough to get some sleep.”

  He muted the TV. “Thanks.”

  His mother-in-law hesitated before she sat in the glider near him. “Declan, I
know it’s awful timing, but I won’t be able to take care of the kids in the morning. I have to take the car into the shop, and Miles has to go into the office for a few hours.”

  Declan didn’t look away from a commercial about dish soap playing noiselessly on the television. “No problem. I’ll get them up and out the door.”

  “Are you sure? I told Miles that I could change the appointment, but he insisted ...”

  Declan sighed as he turned toward Helen. “I said it was no problem. Miles called me yesterday, and I already cleared my schedule.”

  “Well, I have the children’s lunches in the refrigerator ready to go. I’ll be back before Tabitha comes home from school, but you’ll have to pick Luke up at noon. I have frozen waffles for breakfast. Remember, Tabitha only eats her waffles with peanut butter, Luke only eats the blueberry waffles, and Laney—”

  “Helen.”

  The word came out with a tad more exasperation than he intended, but it was enough to get his mother-in-law to stop talking.

  He tried to give her a smile, but the look in Helen’s eyes told him she caught how phony it was. “They’re my kids. I know how they like their breakfast.”

  Helen’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to suggest—”

  Declan waved off her apology. “Listen, I don’t know what I would have done this last year without you and Miles. It just doesn’t mean that I can’t hold down the fort for an hour or two.”

  “It was as much for us as it was for you.”

  Declan turned the television off and looked over at her. “Angie left quite a hole here, didn’t she?”

  Helen’s eyes moistened with tears as she nodded. “As much a hole in time as it was in space. We spent so much time taking care of her those last few weeks that I don’t know what to do with myself when the kids are at school. Little Laney isn’t nearly demanding enough to fill all my time.”

  Declan let his eyes drift closed for a moment, the pain of loss too much to bear. Even as he did so, he could see Angie in the hospice bed a few feet from where he now sat. Her pain had been eased with enough morphine to make her perpetually drowsy, though she fought hard to stay awake every moment she could.