Angels All Over Town

by Luanne Rice

  “Did you ever think we’d be spending Christmas together in the turret room?” I asked.

  Sam hesitated. “I can’t honestly say I considered it impossible.”

  “Really?” I asked, thrown off guard. “Tell me why.”

  “I trust my instincts. I remember spending time with you last September, wanting to know everything about you right from the start. You talked about your sisters in a way that seemed fierce, and it made me jealous. To be loved that way—”

  “But I do love you that way,” I said, frowning at the way his eyes looked hard and worried. “In fact, I love you more than anything.”

  Sam relaxed his eyes and hugged me hard. I thought about what I had just said, about loving him more than anything. That meant more than Margo and Lily; until Sam, that concept had been impossible. I thought of my sisters and their changes, major changes like marrying and having a baby, and I loved them more than ever. Then I thought of my mother and of the tender way my father had spoken about her, and I felt overwhelmed. Thinking about love in quantities too great to measure or apportion seemed talismanic, a sign that I was right in thinking of the interlude as a moment of truth. I glanced around, to make sure time was holding steady. A tanker, or perhaps a freighter, was coming into view near Block Island. But it appeared stationary, far enough away to preserve the illusion.

  “Sam,” I said, looking straight at him. “Will you marry me?”

  He stared back without flinching, and I slowly turned ice-cold. I believe I felt drops of sweat spring from my forehead and instantly freeze. Then I saw him start to smile, a smile that changed to a grin: the best grin I have ever seen. He said nothing. Instead he kissed me.

  He wanted the kiss to go on; I could tell by the way his body pressed close to mine, the way his hand worked through my hair to squeeze my neck. I felt colder than ever, and I began to tremble. Was this kiss a way for him to gather his thoughts, to buy some time before declining? I pulled back.

  “Sam,” I said, trying to quell the panic. “Will you marry me?”

  “Yes, Una,” he said, grinning again. “I will marry you. This is great—you’re really proposing to me?” He looked delighted and amused.

  “I really am,” I said solemnly, quietly.

  “I’ve had this feeling that we were taking it for granted, the future and everything. I guess that stems from the fact that I can’t imagine being without you. Can’t imagine it.” Still beaming, he shook his head. Sun struck his wavy hair, turning parts of it golden.

  “Taking it for granted? You mean you didn’t consider a proposal necessary?” I asked.

  I must have been frowning because Sam’s finger traced my lips until I started to laugh. “Here I am,” I said, “feeling embarrassed about proposing to a man who has just accepted.”

  “You have a way of homing in on the worst parts,” he said fondly. “When I said I take our future for granted, you should have listened to the next part: I can’t imagine being without you.”

  I kissed Sam’s neck, to let him know I understood, but I was watching the ship steam closer. It was a freighter; I could see its rusty hull, its yellow derricks. Smoke twisted from its stacks and dissolved in the pure cold air. Its approach had started the clock, but our interlude, Sam’s and mine, held steady.

  About the Author

  LUANNE RICE is the author of twenty novels, most recently Summer of Roses, Summer's Child, Silver Bells, Beach Girls, Dance With Me, The Perfect Summer, and The Secret Hour. She lives in New York City and Old Lyme, Connecticut. Beach Girls was the basis for the Lifetime television network miniseries, and Silver Bells was a recent Hallmark Hall of Fame feature presentation.

  Visit the author's website at www.luannerice.com.

  ALSO BY LUANNE RICE

  Summer of Roses Firefly Beach

  Summer’s Child Dream Country

  Silver Bells Follow the Stars Home

  Beach Girls Cloud Nine

  Dance With Me Home Fires

  The Perfect Summer Blue Moon

  The Secret Hour Secrets of Paris

  True Blue Stone Heart

  Safe Harbor Crazy in Love

  Summer Light

  For every love,

  there is a season...

  Celebrate sandcastles, sun, sea, and sky—

  A Summer

  of Reading

  WITH

  LUANNE RICE

  "Few writers evoke summer's translucent days so effortlessly, or better capture the bittersweet ties of family love.... Gorgeous descriptions...sensitive characterizations...a seaside essential. Those who can't get to the beach will feel transported there."

  —Publishers Weekly

  Please read on for details!

  Summer

  of Roses

  LUANNE RICE

  Revisiting the remarkable characters introduced in her bestselling Summer's Child, Luanne Rice brings full circle one of her most compelling explorations of the human heart...all the many ways it can be broken...and the magic that can make it whole again.

  "Rice masterfully weaves together a batch of sympathetic characters into a rich and vivid tapestry, all while exploring complex human emotions and the healing power of love."—Flint Journal

  Summer of Roses

  My wedding was like a dream. It was almost everything a wedding should be, and when I think of it, even now, I see it unfolding like the kind of beautiful story that always has a happy ending.

  I got married in my grandmother's garden, by the sea, on a brilliant early July morning at Hubbard's Point. The daylilies were in bloom. That's what I remember, almost as much as the roses: orange, cream, lemon, golden daylilies on tall green stalks, tossed by the summer breeze, trumpeting exultation up to the wild blue sky. But the roses were my grandmother's specialty, her pride and joy, and that year, for my wedding, they were all blooming.

  Scarlet Dublin Bay roses climbed the trellis beside the front door of the weathered-shingle cottage, while Garnet-and-Golds and pale pink New Dawns meandered up the stone chimney. The beds by the iron bench bloomed with red, yellow, peach, and pink classic English varieties, while those along the stone wall, by the old wishing well and the steps up to the road, were low shrubs of white and cream roses. A six-foot hedge of Rosa rugosa—white and pink beach roses—lined the seawall, along with deep blue delphiniums and hydrangeas.

  It was a perfect setting for a perfect wedding—something that most people, including me, never imagined would happen. I guess I thought I wasn't the marrying kind. Let's just say that I was a little on the guarded side. I had lost my parents very young. As a child I had been in love with our family. I know how dramatic that sounds, but it's true. We were so happy, and my parents had loved each other with wild, reckless, ends-of-the-earth abandon. I had watched them together, and taken it in, and decided, even at four, that nothing less would ever do for me. When they were killed in a ferry accident during a trip to Ireland, although I wasn't there, but home in Connecticut with my grandmother, I think I died with them.

  So my wedding—and everything that had led up to it—the miracle of meeting Edward Hunter, and falling so madly in love with him, and being swept off my feet in a way I'd never expected or believed could happen—was a resurrection of sorts. A rising from the dead, of a little girl who went down to the bottom of the Irish Sea with her parents, twenty-seven years earlier.

  Edward. He seemed to love me with everything he had, not wanting to let me out of his sight. His expression, his embrace, his presence—all had the intensity of a hurricane lamp turned up high. And when he poured that light on me, I was transfixed.

  He was just over five-eight, but since I'm just under five-two, I had to stand on tiptoes to kiss him. A rugby player at Harvard, he was broad-shouldered and muscular. His red Saab bore three stickers: Harvard University, Columbia Business School, and a bumper sticker that said Rugby Players Eat Their Dead. The joke was, Edward was so gentle, I couldn't even imagine him playing such a rough sport.

 
When I go back to our wedding day, I see his red car parked in the road up at the top of the stone steps, behind the rose-and-ivy-covered wishing well. I can see the graceful arch curving over the well—with Sea Garden, the name of my grandmother's cottage, forged in wrought iron back when my great-grandfather was still alive—the black letters rusting away in the salt air even back then, twelve years ago. I remember the moment so well: standing there in my grandmother's yard, knowing that soon I would drive away with Edward in that red car—that I would be his wife, and we would be off on our honeymoon.

  Can I say now, for certain, that I looked at that iron arch and saw the corroding letters as a reminder that even that which is most beautiful, intended to endure forever, can be corrupted or destroyed? No, I can't. But I do remember that the sight of it gave me my first cold feeling of the day.

  My grandmother and Clara Littlefield—her next-door neighbor and best friend from childhood—had gone all out to make my wedding a dream come true. The yellow-and-white-striped tent stood in the side yard between their houses, on the very tip of Hubbard's Point, jutting proudly into Long Island Sound. Tables with long golden-cream tablecloths were scattered around, all decorated with flowers from the garden. A string quartet from the Hartt School of Music, in Hartford, played Vivaldi. My friends were in their summer best—bright sundresses, straw hats, blue blazers.

  Granny stood before me, looking into my eyes. We were the same height, and we laughed, because we were both so happy. I wore a white wedding gown; she wore a pale yellow chiffon dress. My veil blew in the sea breeze; my bouquet was white roses, off-white lace hydrangeas, and ivy from the wishing well. Granny wore a yellow straw hat with a band of blue flowers.

  "I wish Edward's family had been able to come," she said as we stood by the wishing well, ready to begin the procession.

  "I know," I said. "He's trying to make the best of it."

  "Well," she said. "Things happen...you'll see them soon, I'm sure. One thing I know, Mara—your parents are with you today."

  "Granny, don't get me started."

  "I won't," my grandmother said, wriggling her shoulders with resolve. "We're staying strong as I walk you down the aisle, or I'm not Maeve Jameson."

  "My parents would be proud of you," I said, because I knew she was thinking of them every bit as much as I was trying not to—and I gave her a big smile, just to prove I wasn't going to cry.

  "Of us both," she said, linking arms with me as the quartet started playing Bach.

  So much time has passed, but certain memories are still clear and sharp. The pressure of Granny's hand on mine, holding steady, as we walked across the grass; my beach friends Bay and Tara beaming at me; the smell of roses and salt air; Edward's short dark hair, his golden tan set off by a pale blue shirt and wheat linen blazer; his wide-eyed gaze.

  I remember thinking his eyes looked like a little boy's. Hazel eyes. He had been so helpful all morning—taking charge of where the tables went, which direction the quartet should face. It was sort of odd, having a man "in charge," here on this point of land filled with strong women. Granny and I had exchanged an amused glance—letting him do his thing. But here he was, standing at our makeshift altar in the side yard, looking for all the world like a lost little boy as I approached him. But then I caught that blank stare—blank, yet somehow charged—and it made me hesitate, holding tight to my grandmother's hand.

  Yes, I remember that stare, the look in his hazel eyes. It was fear—standing there under the striped tent, watching me approach, my betrothed was afraid of something. The years have gone by and told me all I need to know about his fear—but let's go back to my wedding day and pretend we don't have all this knowledge. Back then, in quick succession, I thought one thing and felt another. No—that's backwards. I felt first, thought second.

  I felt cold—the same chilly primal shiver I'd experienced looking up at his car, seeing that salt-pitted, rusty metal arch. But I chased the unwanted, ugly chill with this thought: Edward—hey, honey, Edward! Don't be afraid...please don't worry that it's too soon, or my grandmother doubts you. I love you....I love you.

  I love you.

  Words I had said so rarely up until that time—but since meeting Edward, I had used almost constantly. The old Mara Jameson had been too closed off and guarded to let them slip off her tongue; but the new Mara Jameson couldn't say them enough.

  This was my home, my side yard, my family and friends—Edward was far from everything comfortable and familiar to him. His family hadn't been able to make it. These thoughts were flying through my mind as my grandmother passed my hand into his with the whispered words "Take care of her, Edward." Edward nodded, but the expression in his eyes didn't ease.

  Memo to self and brides everywhere: if you're standing in front of a justice of the peace, about to get married, and all you can think about is why your husband-to-be looks very uncomfortable, it's a red flag worth paying attention to.

  The ceremony occurred. That's how I think of it now: words and music. What did they all mean? It's hard to say, harder still to not be cynical. The ceremony disguised one basic truth: marriage is a contract. Let's put romance aside. First and foremost, marriage is a legal, binding contract, where two people are joined in partnership, their assets merged, their fates legally entwined through powers vested by no less than the state.

  When I think back to the look in Edward's eyes, I believe that he was afraid that I might not follow through on the deal, might not sign on the dotted line. What would have happened if I hadn't? If I had listened to that tiny voice inside, if I had felt the cold chill and known that it meant something worth paying attention to?

  But I didn't listen. I pushed my feelings aside and pulled other things out of the summer air: love, hope, faith, resolve. I held Edward's hand. "I do," I said. "I do," he said. He kissed the bride. People cheered, and when I looked out at my friends, I saw more than one of them crying and grinning at the same time. They were so very happy for me.

  We stood there, husband and wife. Our brilliant summer wedding day, blue sky and sparkles on the calm water, Bach giving way to Mozart and the sound of leaves fluttering in the breeze—everything was so beautiful, so spectacular, it had to be a harbinger of a joyful life to come.

  I turned to look at him. It's true, my own eyes were moist, and my voice was thin with wild and rising emotion. "Edward," I said, trailing off into all the hopes and dreams and possibilities of our future together. He stared at me—the fear gone from his eyes, replaced by something else. It was the first time I saw—well, you'll hear about what I saw as my story goes on. All I can say is, I felt the earth—the thin layer of grass on granite ledge—tilt beneath my feet.

  He touched the flowers in my bouquet and said, "You're so delicate, Mara. Like a white rose. And white roses bruise so easily. Is that what your grandmother meant when she said I should take care of you?"

  His words took my breath away. Don't they imply great tenderness? Show true depth of caring, of understanding? Of course they do. He could be so tender. I'll never deny that. But do you also see, as I do now, that his words implied a threat?

  It was as if he'd been focused on Granny's gentle direction—just an offhand comment was how I'd taken it, a rather protective grandmother giving away the bride. Had Edward even heard the ceremony? Had he even been there? His hazel eyes flashed black as he mentioned Granny's words.

  Just recently, I dreamed of a woman who lived under veils. Black, gray, white, silver, slate, dark blue—layers of veils covering her face. Take one off, there's another underneath. The woman lived in darkness, even when the sun was shining. She existed under cover. She could barely see out, and others could not see in. The question was: who put those veils on her? Did she do it to herself? In the dream, she took them off one by one—and at the very bottom, the very last, or first, was a white wedding veil. In my life, I had them torn from me. I wanted to keep them on—you have no idea how much I needed those veils.

  Women learn how to hide the w
orst. We love the best, and show it to all who want to see. Our accomplishments, our careers, our awards, our homes, our gardens, our happy marriages, our beautiful children. We learn, by tacit agreement, to look away from—and hide—the hurt, the blight, the dark, the monster in the closet, the darkness in our new husband's eyes.

  But in some lives, there comes a time when the monster comes out of the closet and won't go back in. That happened to me. He began to show himself. My grandmother was the first to see. Only the wisest people can observe a woman in such a relationship and not sit in judgment. Judgment is easy: it is black and white, as brutal as a gavel strike. It keeps a person from having to ask the hard questions: what can I do to help? Could that be me?

  My grandmother didn't judge. She tried to understand—and if anyone could understand, it would be her, the woman who had raised me in her rose-covered cottage by Long Island Sound. A woman patient enough to coax red, pink, peach, yellow, and white roses from the stony Connecticut soil, to ease her brokenhearted orphan granddaughter back into life, could sit still long enough to see through the lies, see past the veils—and instead of judging, try to help, really help.

  People said, "How could you have stayed with him so long?" The true answer, of course, is that I had the veils. But the answer I gave was "I loved him." In its way, that answer was true too. My grandmother understood that.