Afterward, all three of us feeling better about everything, we went to a wonderful dinner at the most expensive restaurant in Lake Hurley, Très Mystique, where I had my first lobster fra diavolo and, thanks to Uncle Brett, a glass of expensive red wine. He paid for our dinner, but both Grandpa Prescott and I laughed at the thought of Grandmother Myra seeing the prices. I had chocolate soufflé for dessert.
“She’s spoiled now,” Uncle Brett told Grandpa Prescott. “You can’t take ’em back to the farm once they’ve seen Paris.”
“Then she’ll have to marry someone rich,” Grandpa said.
“What other choice is there?” Uncle Brett joked.
He stayed late into the following day and left promising to come back the first chance he got but only if Grandpa would agree to let me come to Vegas on one of my school vacations. He agreed.
The final weeks of summer seemed to have twelve hours per day and not twenty-four. I spent as much time as I could with Mason and Claudine and did have dinner at their house when their parents were up for what was their final weekend of the summer. Afterward, Mason and I went off alone. Claudine understood.
We rowed out to the little island and sat on the sand under the evening stars. I could already feel the air getting cooler. The coming fall was sending out feelers to find out where and how it would bring in the northern winds and begin to work on changing the colors of the leaves. The ducks and geese were already planning on leaving. One thing about the lake was that it revealed the onset of seasons faster than the land. The water was cooler, and even the color seemed to take on a subtle change.
When I told Mason that, he said, “Of course you would see that. You have an artist’s eyes now.”
Did I? I wondered. I hadn’t gotten back to my painting for some time.
We lay back, and I cuddled in his arms. He kissed my hair and my forehead and worked his lips over my nose to my lips. I wanted to do more, and so did he, but we didn’t. There was something precious about the moment that was more important. We could feel it solidifying into a wonderful lifelong memory.
“Wherever we go and whomever we’re with twenty years from now, we’ll always remember this night, Elle,” he said. “You’ve missed a lot of your childhood and youth, but you’ll make up for it.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“You have the hunger for it. Both Claudine and I agree about that.”
“Maybe I do.”
“After we’re gone, for a while, at least, feel free to use the rowboat. Just walk up to the house. It’ll be tied to the dock. We come up to winterize the house in November.”
“Nothing will be the same without you, Mason.”
“It won’t be the same, but it will be something, Elle. This whole thing was your first real art studio, don’t forget.”
I laughed and thought maybe he was right.
“I’m not saying good-bye tonight,” he told me when it was time to row back. “We’re leaving tomorrow, but I’ll be up the first weekend I can. Let’s just say à bientôt like the French do.”
I nodded but didn’t say anything. I was afraid of crying.
Claudine came out onto the dock as we approached. She wanted to assure me that she would be coming up with Mason whenever she could, too.
“After all, you’re going to need your social tutor and romance advisor,” she said.
“She’ll be too involved with someone to do that,” Mason assured me, and they went at it for a few minutes, before breaking into a laugh and this time, maybe for my benefit, a hug.
Mason decided to row me back to the shore by the woods just like the first times. He wanted to carry me over the rocks and then walk through the woods back to the house with me.
“It’s the way I always think of you,” he said.
Claudine hugged and kissed me and went back to the house.
We rowed to the shore, and he carried me, kissing me just like he used to. On our way back through the woods, we heard something nearby, and there, in the moonlight, was my doe. She stood there watching us.
“About time you came by to say hello,” Mason told her.
I laughed, and her ears went up. She nodded and trotted on through the darkness to disappear to wherever deer went to be safe and content.
At the back steps, we paused.
“Thank you, Mason,” I said. “You helped open the world to me.”
“Maybe I did, but you opened it up a lot for me, too. I’m not letting you get away so fast. I know I’ll be competing with a lot of guys soon.”
“As I will with a lot of girls.”
“The next girl I kiss will have your eyes and your hair whether she does or not,” he said. “And the girl after that, and after that.”
“Then kiss me now so you won’t forget.”
He did.
It was as if everything around us stopped to watch, especially the stars. I walked up the stairs to the back door.
“Keep a ribbon on the railing,” he whispered.
“Always,” I said.
He turned and walked into the shadows, disappearing like a dream to find its place where it could be safe and content.
Epilogue
It was a good six weeks before Grandmother Myra was released from the hospital. Just before that, Grandpa Prescott had the mechanical chair installed on the stairs. She had gotten to where she could stand and had begun to take steps. The hope was that she would be able to use the walker in perhaps six more weeks.
Grandpa had decided that it would be better if he told her before she left the hospital that he had moved me into my mother’s room. I was with him when he told her. She looked at me, but she didn’t have as bad a reaction to it as both of us had been anticipating. She just nodded, and he went on to talk about other small changes he had made in the house. Then he told her about the new car he had bought. It was an SUV with plenty of room for a folded wheelchair.
She didn’t look displeased when she saw it. She watched me carefully fold up her wheelchair and get it into the rear of the vehicle, while Grandpa and the nurse helped her into the rear seat. The nurse strapped her in, and then Grandpa and I got in, and we drove home. He talked most of the way, telling her about some people who had called. He didn’t think she was ready to greet visitors yet but promised he would let them know when she thought she was ready.
Arrangements had been made for a private-duty nurse to be at the house most of the day. Her therapy at home would occur five days a week in the afternoon. When we arrived at the house, I went around and unfolded the wheelchair. Then Grandpa and I got her into it, and he wheeled her while I went ahead to open the door. A wooden track had been built and attached to the stairway so she could easily be wheeled in and out.
Inside, Grandpa proudly showed her the mechanical chair. He even went up and down in it himself to demonstrate. I thought she was smiling, but it was still hard to interpret her expressions. The private-duty nurse was there to help get her situated once she was brought to her bedroom. I went into the kitchen and prepared lunch for her and brought it up. Grandpa Prescott took his lunch with her. I sat and had lunch with the nurse. It was decided that Grandmother Myra would get the day off from any therapy, assuming the trip from the hospital would be tiring enough. She didn’t seem all that tired to me. She was interested in everything Grandpa told her about the house and my preparations for beginning school.
We both thought the transition had gone well. When she expressed something she didn’t like now, she would make a very harsh, long, guttural sound. Because it was so disturbing, that alone made us both move quickly to please her. Her nurse took her vitals, and then she slept until it was time for dinner. Again, I brought the tray up to her. She looked over everything carefully and seemed to be pleased, even impressed. Grandpa Prescott praised everything, of course.
After dinner, the nurse washed and brushed her hair and got her ready for the night before leaving us. Grandpa Prescott stayed with her until she fell asleep and came down to watch
some television before going to bed himself. I was with him for a while, and then I went upstairs, expecting only to go to my room to sleep, but I looked in on her and saw that she was sitting up, her eyes wide open. With her good hand, she beckoned to me. I listened for Grandpa Prescott and then entered the bedroom. She patted the bed, and I walked over and sat.
It was always going to be difficult to understand her, I thought, but she had made enough progress for me to figure out some of her words, especially when they were short sentences. I listened hard. I believed she asked, “What have you done?”
I knew she wasn’t talking about the house or my moving into the bedroom. I knew that Grandpa Prescott had told her about Mason and Claudine and how much he liked them. I was present when he told her some of it, but he told me that he had told her I had gone to their house for dinner. He said she was fine with it now. I wondered if he was mistaken.
“You mean making friends with our neighbors?”
She shook her head and repeated her question, but I did pick up the added words, “With them.”
All sorts of possibilities ran through my mind. I knew Grandpa Prescott wouldn’t want to tell her about my trip to Albany, but she seemed to know something more. It was always my belief that she could read thoughts and sense things going on. Perhaps it was my imagination, my fears, or perhaps she knew me better than I thought.
I shook my head again, and she closed her eyes and almost clearly managed the word “Albany.”
I stared with disbelief. Grandpa surely had lied to me. He had told her.
“Grandpa told you?”
She shook her head.
This was something she had obviously been waiting impatiently to know. I nodded and then began. I told her first about my mother revealing my father’s name and then how Claudine, Mason, and I had located him and confronted him. She listened intently, not wanting to miss a word. When I told her what I believed, she nodded.
The information seemed not so much to please her as to bring her some closure, to answer the same questions I had, perhaps. She closed her eyes, and then, when she opened them, I thought she had managed a good, full smile. She took my hand and held it.
We sat there like that for a while, neither of us trying to speak. Then she closed her eyes again and lowered her head to the pillow. I fixed her blanket and said good night. She moved her lips but didn’t open her eyes.
She wouldn’t be with us much longer, I thought. Whatever journey she had begun was coming to an end. She surely had many regrets, but when I left her that night, I thought she had found some comfort, some satisfaction. I was confident that her mind was full of her own memories, recalling her own youth, her parents, her difficulties, maybe the hope her marriage promised and my mother’s birth seemed to bring. All those disappointments dwindled until they were so tiny they couldn’t be resurrected.
The following day, while she had her therapy, I went for a walk and turned into the driveway to Mason and Claudine’s summerhouse. I went out back to the dock and untied the rowboat. I rowed smoothly and comfortably to our small island, took off my shoes and socks, rolled up my jeans, and pulled the boat onto the shore the way Mason always did.
Then I just sat there looking out at the lake, watching the boats and hearing the shouts and laughter. In many ways, I was born on this island. I felt myself move into my womanhood and my independence. For most of my life, I had felt I was unwanted. I was someone’s mistake. I had no reason to be here, but surely no one who could enjoy and understand the beauty in the world could possibly be unwanted.
We were needed.
We were needed because we understood how to bring happiness and how to bring love back to those who needed happiness and love.
I would return to my painting, to many more paintings, and through them, I would continue the long journey to discover who I was and who I was meant to be.
Pocket Books
proudly presents
Bittersweet Dreams
V.C. Andrews®
Available November 2014 from Pocket Books
Turn the page for a preview of Bittersweet Dreams . . .
Prologue
Beverly Royal School System
18 Crown Jewel Road
Beverly Hills, California
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Cummings:
As you know, the school has been conducting IQ tests to better address the needs and placement of our students. We always suspected that we were going to get extraordinary results when Mayfair was tested, but no one fully understood or anticipated just how extraordinary these results would be.
To put it into perspective, this is a general scale by which most educational institutions judge these results.
IQ scores of 115 to 129 indicate a bright student who should do well with his or her educational pursuits.
We consider those with scores of 130 to 144 moderately gifted and those with 145 to 159 highly gifted. Anyone with scores between 160 and 179 is recognized as exceptionally gifted.
Rare are those whose scores reach 180. We consider such an individual profoundly gifted. To put it into even better perspective for you, statistically, these students are one in a million; so, for example, in the state of California, with a population of approximately 36 million, there are only eleven others who belong in this classification with Mayfair.
Needless to say, we’re all very excited about this, and I would like to invite you in to discuss Mayfair’s future, what to anticipate, and what to do to ensure her needs are fully addressed.
Sincerely yours,
Gloria Fishman, Psychologist
1
“For what you did, you belong in a juvenile home, maybe a mental clinic, but certainly not a new school where you’ll undoubtedly be coddled and further spoiled, an even more expensive private high school than Beverly Royal,” my father’s new wife, Julie, muttered bitterly.
Even though they had been married for years, I didn’t want to use the word stepmother, because it implied that she filled some motherly role in my life.
Her lips trembled as anger radiated through her face, tightening her cheeks. If she knew how much older it made her look, she would contain her rage. I did scare her once by telling her that grimacing too much hastened the coming of wrinkles.
It was the morning of what I thought would be my banishment from whatever family life I once could have claimed, something that had become a distant memory even before all this. I knew that few, least of all Julie, would think that mattered much to me. They saw me as someone who lived entirely within herself, like some creature who moved about in an impenetrable bubble, emerging only when it was absolutely necessary to say anything to anyone or do anything with anyone. But family did matter to me. It always did, and it always would.
I didn’t have to go on the Internet and look it up to know that a family wasn’t just something that brought you comfort and security. It provided some warmth in an otherwise cold and often harsh and cruel world. It gave you hope, especially when events or actions of others weighed you down with depression and defeat. All the rainbows in our lives originated with something from our families.
In fact, all I was thinking about this morning was my mother, the softness in her face, the love in her eyes, and the gentleness in her touch whenever she had wanted to soothe me, comfort me, or encourage me, and how my father glowed whenever we were with him. How I longed for that warmth to be in my life again. Yes, family mattered.
True friends mattered, too, even though I had few, if any, up to now. Just because I was good at making it seem as if I was indifferent and uncaring about relationships didn’t mean I actually was. Students in the schools I had attended thought I was weird because of what I could do and what I had done, most of it so far above and beyond them that they didn’t even want to think about it. I didn’t need to give them any more reasons to avoid me, especially adding something like being a social misfit, which in the minds of most teenagers was akin to a fatal infectious disease.
I knew most avoided me because they believed I was too arrogant to care about anyone else but myself. I mean, who could warm up to someone who seemed to need no one else? From what they saw, I didn’t even require teachers when it came to learning and passing exams. I was a phenomenon, an educational force unto myself.
Maybe I didn’t need a doctor or a dentist or a parent, either. I already knew as much as, if not more than, all of them put together. It wasn’t much of a leap to think I didn’t need friends. I’m sure most wondered what they could possibly offer someone like me anyway. Besides, being around me surely made them feel somewhat inferior. They were afraid they would say something incorrect, and who likes to worry about that, especially when you’re with friends? I would have to confess that I didn’t do all that much to get them to think or feel otherwise. Perhaps it really was arrogance, or maybe I simply didn’t know how to do it. I didn’t know how to smile and be warm just for the sake of a friendship. One thing I couldn’t get myself to do was be a phony. I was too bogged down in truth and reality.
Julie moved farther into my room, inching forward carefully, poised to retreat instantly, like someone approaching a wild animal, even though the wild animal was in a cage. Thinking that was where I was made sense. If anyone should feel trapped and in a cage right now, it was me.
In fact, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that wasn’t much of an exaggeration. That was what I felt I was, and not just because of what I had done and what was happening today. I’ve always felt this way. Deep down inside, despite my superior intellect, I sensed that people, especially educators and parents of other students, believed I was like some new kind of beast that needed to be kept apart from the rest of humanity, a mistake in evolution or the final result of it, and because of that, I was chained to something I’d rather not be, especially at this moment: myself.
The Unwelcomed Child Page 28
