Mackinnon 03 - The Bonus Mom

by Jennifer Greene

  “You haven’t slept with him, have you?”

  “Let’s tone that down,” Ike chided his brother, only then proceeded to attack from the same side of the fence. “Has he kissed you? Got to first base? Second? How far as this gone?”

  “I’ve only known him less than a week!”

  “She isn’t answering the question,” Ike said to Tucker. “You want me to go up there?”

  “We could both—”

  “No. No, no, no. Would you quit it? I don’t need babysitting or big brother advice. I’ll see all of you after the holiday. That’s a matter of days, not years. I need to be here. Would you try to believe me?”

  Neither spoke for a moment, which told Rosemary she was finally winning the argument.

  Tucker said finally, “Here’s the thing, Rosemary. The longer you won’t talk to the parents about George, the more they worry that something unforgettably traumatic happened to you. I only see one way that’s going to change, and that’s for you to spend some time with them, let them see that you’re okay and doing fine. The holiday’s the easiest time to do that, because the rest of us will all be there.”

  Rosemary pinched her nose. Man, she was sick of keeping the damned secret. If it was just for her sake, she’d have spilled the reason for the broken engagement eons ago. Unfortunately, it was for her parents’ sake that she’d kept quiet. They didn’t know she was protecting them. How could they?

  “Guys,” she said carefully. “I need you to trust me. I’d walk on water for you two. I already know you’d do the same for me. But I can’t participate in a regular holiday this year. Please just let it go.”

  They both said “sure,” but Rosemary knew perfectly well they didn’t mean it. She had to find a better answer than silence, but so far she couldn’t think of a way to explain what happened with George without embarrassing and troubling a whole lot of people.

  Once she’d severed the call, she put it out of her mind. She wasn’t the only one who had reasons to feel vulnerable this holiday. Pepper and Lilly mattered a whole lot more than her problems. Her trouble was just an “issue.” The girls had lost their mom.

  And Whit had lost his wife.

  With another quick glance at a clock, she charged into action. She grabbed a cheese sandwich while she chased down hiking boots, exchanged a sweatshirt for a blue alpaca sweater, brushed her hair, slapped on gloss, filled a thermos with coffee and grabbed her keys. Naturally she had to run back in the house to turn off the coffeepot. Then back again to grab some serious gloves.

  The drive to Whit’s place took less than five minutes...but it was enough time to give herself a stern mental talking-to. She’d been making too much over those kisses in the woods yesterday.

  Twice now, he’d taken her by surprise. Twice now—she admitted it—he’d taken her breath away. And twice now, she could have gone with those stupendous emotions and made love with him. It wouldn’t be that hard to put aside morals and hurts and life issues—even Pepper and Lilly, because they didn’t have to know. And yeah, there were other major things, like that he lived in Charleston—and she didn’t. For sure her life was more flexible than his; down the pike she could relocate to all kinds of places. But none of those were the most serious reason she needed to get a grip and behave herself.

  He was a wounded, grieving husband.

  She saw two heads in the window when she turned the knob, saw both girls bob around, as if yelling to their dad that “she’s here!”

  Next thing she knew, the three of them tumbled out with a chorus of greetings. She met Whit’s eyes over the kids—and yeah, she felt the whoop in her pulse. But sharing a smile with him was about more than that whoop factor. He loved it that his girls were so excited, so happy. He was on her team; she was on his. The look he gave her was a heartwarmer, not just a lustwarmer.

  He steered them toward the Gator. His jacket was eons old, a serious outside work jacket, well loved, and as brawny as he was. “Has anyone even asked Rosemary her plan on how to make our manger?”

  Since she’d thought up the idea on the spur of the moment, she wasn’t exactly prepared with a complex plan. She said, “Well, first, we should pick a site close to your house, so you can see it from the windows. And we need to be careful that the project isn’t too complex—we don’t want to have a nightmare to take apart after the holiday.”

  She got two thumbs up, then had to grapple for more plan ideas. “Well...I was just thinking that we’d start gathering twigs and sticks. We’d start building them in a crisscross pattern, the way Boy Scouts are taught to make a fire? Only in our case, we want to make the shape of a cradle.”

  Yup. Everybody agreed they could do that. Only the three of them were still looking at her, and she was fresh out of ideas. “And after that,” she said brightly, “your dad will figure out how to make the shelter around it.”

  She got her hair ruffled for that, which made the girls laugh. She pretended to slug Whit in retaliation, but that made them laugh even harder. There was something in Whit’s eyes that had nothing to do with horseplay and teasing...something hot enough to take the chill out of the brisk, windy day.

  But she didn’t trust her judgment about Whit, not anymore, and besides that the girls were happy. That’s what the whole outing was about, something fun for them, something about the holiday—and hopefully about doing something they’d never done before, so there was no chance the project would remind them of sad memories.

  And it worked so well. The temperature tried to warm up, and the winter sun valiantly tried to shine. Leaves crackled and squirrels scattered, shocked by all the human noise and silliness. Rosemary participated, but she watched, too, loving how Whit razzed the girls, how they teased him in return.

  The girls kept running back to the house, because they “needed things.” And Whit had the toughest job, creating a “shed” with boughs draped over long sticks. Eventually Rosemary and the girls finished the crèche. Sort of. The cradle looked like a cradle, as Lilly put it, if you were standing upside down and were really nearsighted. They’d made the baby from rags and twine, a doll that fit exactly in the twig manger. A kitchen towel worked as a blanket.

  But then Lilly fretted that they didn’t have a Mary and Joseph or any wise men. She and Pepper charged back in the house, brought back billowing bed sheets, and then more twine and rubber bands, to make them into human characters. Whit said, “Did you guys really bring all the sheets off the bed? What on earth are we going to sleep on tonight?”

  But Whit was overruled. The female team already had a new quest. How could you put together a Nativity scene without gifts? Because the wise men—or wise guys, as Pepper put it—had brought “stuff” like frankincense and myrrh.

  A long debate ensued over what on earth “myrrh” was. No one was sure—but they were all dead positive they didn’t have any, so they had to come up with other gift ideas.

  Lilly remembered there were fresh cranberries in the house. Lots of cranberries. More cranberries than they wanted to string for the tree—ever. Pepper had glitter shoes that didn’t fit her anymore, even though they were almost new. Both girls had hairpins that sparkled. And they both had glow sticks that lit up when you cracked them. The heap of “gifts” kept building, until they were all tired. Whit called a halt, and they all stood back to assess their masterpiece.

  “Magnificent,” Rosemary pronounced. “For sure, the most original manger ever created.”

  “I’m afraid our wise men look a lot more like Halloween ghosts than people. Except for the baby. We did pretty good with the baby.”

  “Dad, you did the best with the shed. That really looks like a shelter. And now that the sun’s going down, our glow lights look really awesome.” Lilly said nothing more for a minute, but then from nowhere she came up with, “Man. Mom would really have hated this.”

  “What?” Rose
mary’s head whipped around. “Honey, why do you think so?”

  Pepper did her classic shrug. “Mom liked things to look just so. And ‘just so’ pretty much meant like from Nordstrom’s or Saks, you know? Tasteful. That was one of Mom’s favorite words. Tasteful. Expensive. Perfect.”

  Rosemary’s heart sank. She’d hoped they were doing something they’d never done before...but the last thing she’d wanted was to do something “wrong” on their mom’s terms. “But this was a different project than a traditional Christmas thing, don’t you think? We weren’t trying to do anything perfect. We didn’t want to buy anything. We were trying to create something...well, personal...something we did with our own hands, our own effort.”

  Lilly patted her hand. “Rosemary, chill. It’s awesome. We had a great time doing it. We’re just saying that Mom wouldn’t have liked it, that’s all.”

  Whit came from behind, hooked an arm loosely around her shoulder. “Come on, team. Sun’s going down, and the temperature’s dropping like a stone. Not even counting that, I’ll bet we’re all starved.”

  She glanced up, but he didn’t look back at her. His expression was distant, distracted. Perhaps he hadn’t heard the girls’ comments about their mom. She felt the warmth and weight of his arm around her shoulders, thinking that it felt so darned right to be snugged close to him. To be in touch with him. To feel his warmth, his protectiveness. And yeah, to feel enough sizzle to start a bonfire.

  How crazy was that? And when the girls started talking, she felt the glow disappear from the afternoon completely.

  They weren’t far from the house, but the girls jogged just a bit ahead, bumping shoulders the way they often did when they walked together. Apparently the earlier remark about their mom brought on some memories.

  Lilly started it. “Remember that fancy crystal vase thing Dad gave her a couple years ago?”

  “I remember you dropping it.”

  “Yeah, well, when we were in the hospital last year, waiting to see her, waiting to hear if she was all right, I kept thinking about that vase. How upset she was when I broke it. She really loved that thing. And I kept thinking how I’d have given anything not to have dropped it. Because she was so hurt and I was so scared.”

  “Yeah, well...I keep thinking about Easter dinner. The one where we had an Easter egg hunt in the morning?”

  “We had an egg hunt every Easter, doofus.”

  “But I meant the dinner where she had the yellow tablecloth. And the yellow flowers. And the little yellow bunnies holding the napkins. Everything was just so. Until I threw up.”

  Lilly nodded. “Oh, I remember that one. You were so gross.”

  “Everybody jumped up and left the table. Even Grandpa was gagging. And Mom started crying.”

  Lilly punched her sister in the shoulder. Not hard. “Yeah, it was gross. But you were sick, for Pete’s sake. Not like you could help it.”

  “I know that. But when Mom was in the hospital, I kept thinking about that dinner. I didn’t want that Easter to be a memory in her head, not when she was so hurt.”

  Rosemary glanced up at Whit. A quiet frown pleated his forehead, a sign that he was also listening.

  And it was Lilly’s turn to come through with some memories. “Pep, it’s not like you’re the only one who did stuff. Remember when we got our two-wheelers? And I fell and skinned my knee and there was blood all over the place and I ran home as fast as I could.”

  “And Mom had that white cloth all over the living room carpet. She was measuring something. I can’t remember what.”

  “I don’t remember, either. I just remember running toward her and blood getting all over that white material and her being so mad.”

  Pepper punched her sister in the shoulder. Not hard. “She never stayed mad at you for long. Remember how mad she was at me when I skipped school in kindergarten?”

  “You were such a dolt. How could you think nobody would notice you were gone?”

  “You didn’t have to tell.”

  “I wasn’t telling. Like tattletale. But I didn’t know what happened to you!”

  “You told. And when I got home I sneaked in the back door because I could see a police car out front. The police were there about me.”

  “How was I supposed to know that? You could have been sick or in an accident or something. When you do something dumb, you’re supposed to tell me first, remember?”

  “All I remember was that Mom wouldn’t let me watch television for a whole year.”

  Lilly rolled her eyes. “It was maybe for a week. Not a year. Besides, remember the first time we went to the dentist. And you didn’t want to go. And you ran out as soon as Mom opened the car door and ran right in the street and Mom had to run after you and there were cars honking all over the place—”

  “I thought it was funny,” Pepper insisted.

  “Me, too. It was funny. Except to Mom.”

  They’d almost reached the house. The girls had slowed their pace, and Rosemary not only slowed down, but didn’t want to breathe. Everything they said gave her pictures of their mom, of how their family behaved together—at least how Zoe was with her daughters.

  Pepper hesitated before they got to the back door. “Mom always said I was a lot of trouble.”

  “Yeah, well. I wish sometimes that we could have had some do-overs.”

  “Me, too.”

  “But you didn’t have to worry like I did. You were the good kid. I was the troublemaker. If anything happened, everyone looked at me first, like Mom knew I’d been behind it somehow.”

  Lilly struggled for a second before responding. “When she died, though, Pep, remember how you hit the wall? That’s what I wanted to do. Hit things. Hit things hard. The way you did. I wanted to be like you lots of times. In the hospital, I was so sad I was sick. But I couldn’t do anything.”

  “Hey.”

  Whit’s quiet voice interrupted the two. Maybe he believed it was a good idea for the girls to talk, get some of those things off their chests. But when he suddenly stepped forward, Rosemary realized what had changed.

  The girls had gone from talking to crying. Their faces turned toward their dad, and it got worse. Both of them erupted with tears. Snuffling, nose-dripping tears. And when Whit lifted his arms, both girls hurtled toward him, burying their faces in his chest.

  Rosemary sucked in a breath. They’d reached the back door, and he motioned for her to come in with them—and that’s what she’d initially planned to do. But not then. Not when the girls were upset, when the three of them were obviously having a private, fragile family moment together.

  The girls and Whit had so easily made her feel part of their family group.

  But at a time like this, Rosemary thought she needed to remember that she was an outsider, an interloper.

  Whit protested about her leaving, but she made hearty noises about seeing them tomorrow, that she had some work she needed to do.... Aw, hell’s bells, she had no idea what excuses she came up with. She just got out of there as fast as she could, with a fast kiss for each girl and a squeeze on Whit’s arm for a goodbye.

  Right then, that was the best she could do.

  Unfortunately she was close to crying herself.

  Chapter Eight

  Whit put together cheese and bacon sandwiches for the girls, which had always been one of their favorites. The best he could do for a vegetable was to plaster some cream cheese in celery, which they usually liked, too. Both only picked at their food.

  Truthfully, he didn’t immediately notice how quiet they were at first, because he’d felt pensive ever since Rosemary left. On the walk home, when the twins started talking, he’d been startled at the words coming out of their mouths.

  Whit knew his marriage to Zoe wasn’t the happiest. He remembered, too well, how difficu
lt it was to live in the pristine house she valued so much. And Zoe had been so sure that marrying a landscape architect would add up to a good life, as defined by money and status.

  Whit never had a problem bringing in good money, but Zoe hadn’t counted on him coming home with muddy feet and dirt under his fingernails. But the girls had seemed devoted to Zoe, and she’d been a very good mother. They’d always been dressed to the nines. They had salon haircuts. She’d made sure they had riding and dancing lessons. That was her version of being a good mom, and Whit had never been sure she was wrong.

  But it hurt, this afternoon, listening to his daughters’ stories. He hadn’t known they experienced some of the same guilt that he had. He could never guess what wrong thing was going to offend her next. Zoe had the textbook on the “right way to live” and he’d never known the rules until he broke them. During most of the marriage, he’d simply shut up and tried to keep the peace. But he never realized that Zoe had made their daughters feel badly—for doing nothing more than being kids.

  Rosemary must have formed impressions from hearing Lilly and Pepper—but he wasn’t sure what she’d thought...much less why she’d taken off so abruptly.

  And temporarily his concerns were tabled because the girls jumped up from the table and carried their dishes to the counter. Every alarm bell in his nerve system went off. They cleared the table, often did dishes—but only after a lot of badgering and bargaining and stalling. Their volunteering to do the chore without any prompt at all warned him that something was going on.

  It got worse. After the dishes were stashed in the dishwasher, they wiped down the counters and swept the floor.

  Whit wanted to search for antacids in the first aid kit, but he was afraid to leave them.

  He first wanted to have an inkling of what was going on. So he stoked the fire. Picked up a book from the floor.