Revealing the truth to Indigo would cause a whole other ripple effect.
“I’ll follow your lead,” Peyton said. “Just know that there’s never going to be a ‘right’ time for something like this. Once you let the truth out, God will provide the healing you need and everything all of you need to regroup and move forward together. I feel it in my bones.”
Reuben smiled. “I married Pollyanna. You have more optimism than anyone I know.”
Peyton chuckled. “I hear you trying to change the subject, Mr. Burns. I’ll back off. See you in a few.”
He ended the call and sighed.
Peyton was so great about letting him lead, even when they both knew she was right. But something wouldn’t let him give in on this issue.
He wasn’t ready to face more resentment from his sisters, no matter how badly he wanted those nightmares to end. He pulled into the parking lot of a drugstore and a few minutes later walked down an aisle featuring kids’ toys and Halloween paraphernalia.
He paused, marveling at the variety of costumes they had crammed into such a small section. One in particular caught his eye—a mask with a square cheese head—Sponge Bob.
Reuben laughed and held it up to his face. Impulsively, he picked up a toy-sized mirror to check out how he looked.
The mask was too small, but the reflection in the mirror rattled him. He looked like a cast member in his nightmares, like one of the hiding parents in his dreams. Their masks were always paper bags with cutouts for the eyes and mouths. This square, cheese-colored mask was similar in shape and design.
Reuben’s heart pounded.
Please, God, don’t let me have a panic attack in this store. Please.
He stood there shaking, gulping air, and praying, and within a few minutes, his racing pulse slowed. He felt himself returning to normal.
Drained and angry, he dropped the mask back into the bin where he’d found it and went in search of the greeting card aisle. He continued to breathe deeply and acknowledged the message flitting across his mind: Until he found the courage to tell some hard truths, he really wasn’t any different than the parents who haunted his dreams and tried to keep him trapped in their façade.
He couldn’t control his thoughts while he slept, but he’d be darned if he was going to let his nightmares haunt his days too.
16
Reuben, Peyton, and Charles David showed up at Mama and Daddy’s home ninety minutes later with their arms full of goodies.
Charles David insisted on lugging a gift-wrapped teddy bear nearly twice his size that he had picked out for Yasmin. He embraced the box and took one measured step at a time to keep from tumbling. Peyton held on to Reuben’s forearm with one hand and clutched the greeting card that contained Yasmin’s birthday gift with the other.
Reuben guided her and balanced a casserole dish of her vegetable lasagna. He had noticed a few frowns when Peyton announced what she’d be bringing to tonight’s dinner, and with her usual perceptiveness, Peyton had picked up on their reaction.
“I know you guys like your food fried and refried,” she’d said and laughed. “But give this a try. I bet you’ll love it.”
Reuben half hoped they didn’t; that would leave more for him to take home.
He pressed the bell and greeted Mama with a kiss when she swung open the door. She stooped and opened her arms wide to envelop Charles David and the big gift.
“Don’t crush it, Gramma!” Charles David said.
Mama raised an eyebrow and stood up. “Well excuse me, sir!”
She leaned over and kissed Peyton’s cheek, then Reuben’s before taking the lasagna from him.
“This smells good, Peyton,” she said. “When do you find time to cook? Especially something like lasagna, when you’re trying to keep up with Charles David?”
Reuben smirked. Mama wanted to add, “especially when you’re blind?” but she was learning to restrain herself as she got to know Peyton and realized how little the disability impaired her daughter-in-law. Peyton’s independence inspired Reuben but still caused him occasional anxiety. Not everyone was willing to be nice, just because someone was sight impaired.
Peyton was forever chiding him, though, along with anyone else who fretted on her behalf. “Second Corinthians 5:7, folks: I’m walking by faith and not by sight—literally,” she would say. “This is my daily reality, and I’m in good hands.”
She used her white cane when she needed it, and she had befriended the owner of a local taxi service, who had become a personal driver of sorts, picking her and Charles David up himself whenever she called the company to schedule transportation.
This evening, Reuben watched Peyton unzip her floppy leather purse and reach for her folded white cane when they entered Mama’s foyer. Her fingers grazed it, but rather than grabbing it, Peyton pushed it deeper into the bag. Reuben grinned and read her thoughts: it wouldn’t take her much longer to know how to navigate through this house without assistance. Today she would try maneuvering without the stick.
Peyton reached for Mama’s elbow and let Mama lead her and Reuben into the kitchen. Charles David had already dropped his gift and run ahead of them.
Rachelle, Gabe, and Taryn greeted Reuben and Peyton with hugs and hellos. Taryn, who had left Everson College’s campus to spend the evening with the family celebrating Yasmin’s birthday, grabbed Charles David by the waist and peppered him with kisses.
“Yuck!” the pudgy-faced carbon copy of Reuben said and wiped his cheeks. He wiggled free from Taryn’s embrace and ran toward the family room, where Mama kept his chest full of toys.
“Go on!” Taryn called after him. “We’ll see how you feel about kisses a decade from now.”
Daddy strolled in and waved hello to everyone. He approached Taryn and gave her a hug. “Thanks for gracing us old folks with your presence, Miss Taryn,” he said. “You’re here, but the guest of honor is not. Where’s Yasmin?”
Mama turned away from the spaghetti she had just placed on a platter and rubbed her hands on her apron.
“She was in her room, on the phone and watching a movie on her iPod the last time I poked my head in there. I should probably go and get her, now that Reuben and the gang are here,” she said. “Melba had a walk-in client at the hair salon, so she’s going to be late, and Taryn’s visit is a pleasant surprise. We hadn’t planned for the college girl to give us some of her time!”
Taryn laughed and pushed her chair away from the table. She stood and headed toward the hallway. “I’m honored that you guys are honored by me!” she said and laughed again. “Let me go get Yasmin.”
“Why is she holed up in her bedroom on her birthday, anyway?” Reuben asked. “She’s eighteen; none of her girlfriends have offered to take her out?”
Mama and Daddy exchanged glances.
“That’s a long story, one we’ll save for another day,” Mama said.
She began putting the food on the kitchen table and Peyton rose to help her.
“Sit down, Miss Peyton,” Mama said. “I appreciate your manners, but this is easy. I’m just serving up the dishes everyone brought, including your lasagna.”
“Where’s the cake?” Rachelle asked. “And what kind did you make?”
Mama tilted her head toward the dining room. “Chocolate icing, chocolate cake,” she said. “It was like pulling teeth to get out of her what she wanted, but she finally settled on her usual favorite.”
“Good!” Peyton said and rubbed her hands together.
Mama placed a basket of French bread and two glass bowls filled with salad on the table. She motioned for Indigo to grab the salad dressing off the island, but Taryn appeared in the doorway, wide-eyed and breathless, before she could speak.
“What’s wrong? Where’s Yasmin?” Rachelle left her seat and walked over to her daughter.
“She’s gone, Mom.”
Fear coursed through Reuben and he saw Daddy’s face fall.
“What are you talking about, Taryn?” Reuben asked.
“There’s a note on her bed, on top of her pillow.” Taryn’s voice was trembling. “I read it, but I didn’t touch it. Yasmin said goodbye. She wants to model again, and she says she’s old enough now to legally do what she wants. I ran outside to see if I could catch her or see her leaving, but she’s just gone.”
“Oh.” The simple, painful utterance escaped Mama’s lips as more of a sigh than a word, before she collapsed in the chair Rachelle had occupied.
“Wasn’t she in her room when we arrived?” Reuben asked. “She couldn’t have gone far in twenty minutes.”
Gabe shrugged. “I don’t know, man,” he said. “We’ve been here an hour. She said hello when we arrived and told us then that she’d come back out when dinner was ready.”
Reuben pushed past Taryn, who was hugging her mother, and headed for Yasmin’s room. The door was ajar, and sure enough there was a note on top of Yasmin’s yellow butterfly pillowcase. Daddy came up alongside him and each of them read it silently.
Mama and Daddy, I’m 18 today so that makes me an adult, capable of making my own decisions and following my heart. Happy Birthday to Me! I’ve wanted to return to modeling forever, and I guess now’s that time.
I’m leaving to see if I still have what it takes to make it in the business. I believe I do. Please don’t try to find me. I need to do this on my own, without being sheltered or treated like a baby. I’ll be fine, and when I’m ready I’ll be in touch. Love You Always, Yas
Daddy sat on the bed, bowed his head, and covered his face with one of his hands. “This is going to kill your mother. Just when we get you back, we lose another child. My God.”
Reuben felt broken too, but for a more selfish reason. How could he keep his promise if Yasmin were gone? He had come home to get to know her, to take care of her, and she had decided to leave?
He sat next to Daddy on the bed and put his arm around him. He was at a loss for words. Fear for Yasmin’s safety competed with anger at her arrogant foolishness and despair over his inability to fix this.
He looked up and found himself unexpectedly peering into Indigo’s eyes. She stood in the doorway clutching a gift bag and biting her lip.
“Tell me that girl didn’t run away,” she said.
Reuben rose from the bed but didn’t move toward her. He wasn’t sure what to say, so he beat himself up more. If he had kept the promise he made to his mother nearly twenty years ago, he, Yas-min, and Indigo might be in very different places. They still would have been closely connected to their grandparents, but maybe, just maybe, their sibling bond would have filled any void.
Now, Yasmin was out there on her own, trying to be Miss Independent, instead of trusting in and relying on the people who loved her most, including him.
Reuben couldn’t recall whether Indigo had ever seen him cry, even when they were kids, but suddenly it didn’t matter. He couldn’t play the strong big brother right now. Tears coursed down his cheeks, dripped from his chin and disappeared. He let them.
“I’m sorry,” he told Indigo.
She approached him and sighed. “I am too, Reuben, I am too.”
Indigo opened her arms and hugged him, and his silent weeping threatened to become sobs. She did still love him, after all.
17
The rest of the evening was a blur of cell phone calls and frantic conversations from just about every room in the house. The family contacted anyone they could think of who might be able to help find Yasmin. Indigo went from room to room, trying to contain her nervous energy.
She stood nearby as Gabe called a golfing buddy who was a cell phone executive, and asked if Mama and Daddy could trace Yasmin’s whereabouts through her mobile phone.
“Only if she uses the phone to make some calls,” Gabe said. A quick online check of the bill indicated that she hadn’t done so yet.
Rachelle and Taryn called teenagers from the church youth group who attended school with Yasmin, hoping they might know the names and neighborhoods of her current friends.
Indigo flushed with shame as she listened to them pepper the girls and guys with questions. If she’d been a better sister in recent months, she would know the answers to some of these questions herself.
An hour into their efforts, Indigo saw Rachelle’s optimism fading. Her youth group members couldn’t give her anything more than nicknames and promises to look through their yearbooks for pictures of Yasmin’s friends that would provide their legal names.
“Who knows if this is even worth researching, though?” Taryn asked Indigo. “We don’t know for sure that she left with someone else. She might have taken off on her own, or someone who isn’t even from this area could have helped her. Who knows who that girl has been hitting up online.”
Indigo nodded. “Whatever the case, I know she’s headed for Dallas, where she’s modeled before, or maybe even New York, which would be absolutely crazy with no place to stay.”
Indigo’s eyes widened with a revelation. “Where’s Mama? Maybe she can track down some information on Yasmin’s old modeling buddies. I bet she’ll try to look one of them up and see if she can crash at their place in New York.”
When she couldn’t find Mama in any of the other rooms in the house, Indigo trotted down the hall to her parents’ bedroom, but paused outside their closed door. After a few seconds, she knocked and waited, but neither of them answered. She stepped back and flipped the hallway light switch off.
The bedroom light was on. Why weren’t they responding? Indigo knocked again and this time called them.
“Mama? Daddy? You in there?”
Daddy opened the door a few seconds later, and stepped aside so Indigo could enter. Mama was on her knees, with her elbows perched on the edge of her bed and her hands clasped for prayer. Her eyes were red and she looked stricken.
Indigo wanted to tell her it would be okay; no one had died. But she knew that’s exactly what Mama feared, so she didn’t go there.
“You find out anything yet?” Daddy asked.
Indigo shook her head. “No. I wanted to talk with you two to see if you still have contact information for her model friends in New York. I’m guessing she may have tried to reconnect with one of them, if she’s planning on resuming her career.”
Mama nodded. “I had the same thought, Indie. She took her address book with her, which must have that information, along with the wad of cash she’s been saving from babysitting jobs for a good five years. I called the bank and checked her account balance. It’s down to $10.”
Mama sighed. “All that money. I guess she may have gone to New York. She has more than enough to cover a plane ticket and expenses for a month.”
Indigo raised an eyebrow. “Just how much does she have? Remember the cost of living in New York, from my grad school days, Mama. A month’s worth of living expenses in Jubilant equals about two weeks’ worth in the Big Apple.”
“She had about $3,500, according to the last bank statement I reviewed with her.”
Indigo plopped on the chaise lounge near the window and shook her head. “And she had easy access to all that money? Why?”
As soon as she uttered the question, Indigo wished she could retrieve it. Mama and Daddy’s faces fell. She saw guilt pool in both their eyes. She slid off the seat, walked over to Daddy, and hugged his neck.
God, please don’t let all of this drama make his blood pressure skyrocket. Keep him on track.
“You and Mama are the best,” she said softly in his ear. “Yasmin has made a choice out of youthful pride. She’ll wake up and come around. I’m going to keep trying to reach her, okay?”
Daddy stepped back and kissed her cheek. He took both of Indigo’s hands in his. “We spoiled both of you rotten, but we couldn’t help it,” he said thickly, fighting off tears. “You were our princesses—the daughters we never had. Your father was a great son, but he was our only child. When he died . . . something in me died. You two girls and your brother gave me some hope . . . a reason to want to keep living.�
��
Daddy’s voice trailed off, but Indigo was stunned. These were the most sentences she’d heard him string together, outside of prayers. Ever. He was scared.
She stared at him, unable to speak, but hoped he saw the love in her eyes. None of them could control this. Yasmin had put herself in a foolish and dangerous situation, even if she were eighteen. Being a green, eager model wannabe in any cosmopolitan city in this country could lure the attention of all kinds of scam artists . . . and criminals.
Prayer—and each other—was all they had right now.
Daddy obviously agreed. “Even good things come out of storms.” He squeezed Indigo’s hands, which were still resting in his. “I saw what happened between you and Reuben today. After all these years, you’re finally brother and sister again. Now we’ve just got to get the baby of the family home.”
Indigo gave him a reassuring smile, but she wished her heart were smiling too. She had put aside her anger and resentment because this unfolding drama was more important. Still, nothing had been resolved. She wanted and needed answers from Reuben to be at peace with his return and his newfound commitment to the family. She hadn’t been able to shake that desire.
For the time being, though, she needed Reuben as much as he apparently needed her, and if this temporary truce gave Daddy some peace of mind, all the better.
18
Reuben ended the call and turned to face his family.
“Mayor Henning says legally there’s nothing we can do. Like Chief Richardson told Aunt Melba, the police’s hands are tied too, unless we suspect foul play. Looks like Yasmin is grown and gone, for the time being.”
His news settled heavily in the gloomy silence. It was just about midnight, and everyone had gathered in the family room to update each other on what was turning out to be their lack of progress and to discuss what the next step should be.
“I don’t know that there’s anything we can do, but pray that she’ll come to her senses and at least have the decency to call us and tell us she’s okay,”
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