by Delia Parr
Feeling self-conscious about her easier lifestyle and her own soft, freshly manicured hands Barbara rested them on her lap, folded together, and dropped her gaze. For all the differences in their lives and in their appearances, however, the two couples had both been clearly desperate when they had arrived at the meeting to know one thing: Were Angie Morgan Montgomery and Sharon Carr indeed one and the same woman?
How that apparent truth would affect each of their lives remained the last issue to be discussed. At this point, Barbara did not need to hear any more legal opinions to support the idea or to wait for the results of any DNA test. She knew, intuitively, that from this day forward, their lives would be forever entwined like the roots nourishing the branches of climbing roses, with Jessie and Melanie the blossoms that would beautify their existences. Denying either couple a place in the twins’ lives would be like chopping away at their roots. Ultimately, the girls would lose and wither away, their lives all the sadder because they had not been given the opportunity to receive the love and support each set of grandparents could give them.
“Is that right, Barbara?”
When she heard Carl say her name, she looked up at him and locked her gaze with his. When he cocked his head, as if waiting for an answer, her heart began to pound.
“I’m sorry. I missed your question.”
“The pictures of the girls. Did you bring them with you? Micah and Ruth would like to see them.”
“Yes, I have them,” she replied. She reached into an outside pocket on her oversize purse, pulled out a large brown envelope and laid it on the table. As she undid the clasp holding the envelope closed, her fingers shook, but she managed to pull out the five-by-seven photographs she had ordered from the school when the girls had had their pictures taken at the end of September. “Their school pictures are the most recent,” she explained when she handed them to Ruth.
Ruth’s hands shook, too, as she laid the photographs on the table close to her. Micah leaned forward to get a closer look and laid his hand on top of his wife’s. Ruth’s eyes filled with tears she wiped away with the back of her hand as she studied the images, for the very first time, of the little girls she believed were her granddaughters. “Oh, Micah. They’re such sweet little girls,” she murmured. As she caressed the photographs with her fingertips, her husband whispered words to her Barbara could not hear.
Barbara could not stop staring at the two of them, unable to turn away. When John reached out to hold her hand, she held on tight, as unprepared for the look of total amazement and love on Ruth’s and Micah’s faces as she was for the moment when Ruth took a picture out of the family album she had brought with her.
Micah slid the picture across the table to John. “Sharon’s first-grade picture. We walked her down to the bus stop. Bus driver took the picture for us.”
Barbara looked at the black-and-white photograph. When she studied the young man and woman standing on either side of the little girl and looked up at the couple sitting across from her for a moment, she had no doubt they were the same. The image of the little girl staring back at her from the photograph was not a duplicate of either Jessie or Melanie. Rather, Barbara saw dark curls like Jessie’s, the same slender build, and that achingly familiar stubborn chin. The girl’s eyes, however, held the same tenderness she found in Melanie’s smile. Like Melanie, the girl also had only one dimple—in her right cheek. “What do you think?” she whispered to John as the other couple talked quietly to one another.
He cleared his throat. “I think we’re in trouble. Double trouble.”
She squeezed his hand. “Let’s not jump to conclusions,” she urged. “We don’t know what they want yet.” Anxious to find out exactly what the Carrs wanted in terms of custody or visitation, assuming the DNA tests confirmed what everyone at the table already believed to be true, Barbara was relieved when Carl addressed the other lawyer.
“At this point, I think it might be best if we each had time to meet privately with our respective clients.”
When Keith nodded, Carl rose from his seat and looked at Barbara and John. “We can talk privately in my office.”
Barbara and John both attempted to get up, but Micah urged them all back into their seats. “Before you go, Ruth and I want to make something clear.”
Carl sat down again. Barbara and John stayed seated and held hands. Barbara caught her breath for a moment and braced herself by pressing both feet against the floor.
“Mr. Carr, I think it might be better if you waited to speak to me before you say anything more,” his lawyer suggested.
“I gather you would, son, but me and Ruth have heard enough from both you and Mr. Landon here to suit us, at least for now,” he said firmly before looking directly at Barbara and John. “You’re good people. Both of you. Ruth and me, well, we’d like to think we’re good people, too. At least we try to be.”
“Agreed,” John murmured.
“You both lost your son. That’s a heartache me and Ruth can understand because we lost our daughter a long time ago. Maybe you think it’s not the same for us, but we got no place to go to sit and mourn like you do because she isn’t dead, leastways not that we know for sure. But we’ve been grieving for that girl every day since she took off.” He turned and looked at his wife.
When she smiled, as if urging him to continue, he drew a deep breath. “Me and Ruth have heard enough and seen enough to know our girl is the same girl your son married. We can’t do nothing now to change the hurt she caused your family, but we’re right sorry for the way she ran off and left your son and her babies, just like she ran off from us. But these little girls, Jessie and Melanie, they’re our granddaughters, too.”
When Barbara nodded, her husband smiled. “Agreed.”
Barbara saw Ruth’s eyes glisten with fresh tears and blinked back her own.
“The girls have been through enough, losing both their mama and their papa,” Micah continued. “The last thing they need is to have a couple of folks like us causing more upset, which is what would happen if we turned this situation into a battlefield. The lawyers might be richer for it if we did, but we’d be a whole lot prouder of ourselves if we could work this out between the four of us.”
He paused, took one last look at his wife and squared his shoulders. “We’d be obliged if you’d think about letting us see the girls from time to time so we’d get to know them and they’d get to know us. That’s pretty much what we want.”
John tightened his hold on Barbara’s hand. “A little time with them? That’s all?”
He nodded.
“We’d keep full custody of the girls,” John said firmly, clarifying Micah’s request.
“You’re the only grandparents the girls have ever known,” Ruth murmured. “We don’t think it would be fair to them to even consider forcing ourselves into their lives by asking for custody, too, but we would like to spend some time with them. Or with all of you, at first, if you can find it in your hearts to let us into the girls’ lives.”
Filled with relief, Barbara smiled. How soon they might introduce the girls to their new grandparents or explain why they had not met before or determine how the visits between them would happen were all matters that could be left for later. Right now, all that mattered, beyond being forever grateful for keeping full custody of the girls, was recognizing the need to share the love and laughter Jessie and Melanie had brought into their lives with Ruth and Micah. “I think there’s always room for more love in the girls’ hearts and in our hearts. Nothing will ever fill the void left by losing Steve or the loss of your daughter, but being able to love Jessie and Melanie and to watch them grow up is a blessing that will help you, too,” she murmured.
“After the DNA tests,” Carl interjected, obviously anxious to rein in his clients before they let emotions cloud their judgment.
“I would concur,” Keith added.
While the two lawyers retook command of the meeting and made arrangements for the DNA tests, which would yield re
sults by mid-December at the earliest, Barbara offered the rest of the pictures she had brought with her to Ruth and Micah to review. She and John, in turn, studied the pictures in the album. They saw the child in the first grade picture grow into an adolescent of fifteen who undeniably looked like the woman Steve had later married. How the woman who had given birth to Jessie and Melanie had abandoned them or why her life had intersected with theirs was a mystery. But there was nothing mysterious about how or why Ruth and Micah had come into their lives. Miraculous, perhaps, but no longer mysterious.
After the lawyers concluded the meeting, John and Barbara stayed in the conference room while Carl escorted the others into the outer office and to the door. To her surprise, Ruth came back and stood just outside the door to the conference room. “I was wondering if…if after the tests come back, maybe I could write and you could tell me if you remember anything more about my Sharon while she was living here.”
“Yes, of course,” Barbara assured her.
“Thank you,” she replied, turned and walked away.
With her heart and mind still reeling, Barbara stored the pictures she had brought to the meeting in her purse again while John walked over to the window. “They didn’t even press to see the girls today while they were here,” he noted.
“They said they needed to get back to the farm,” she countered. “Besides, I thought we agreed it was better to wait until the test results were back before we let them see the girls. Didn’t we? Didn’t Carl argue that point, as well?”
“Yes, but still…” He turned away from the window and faced her again. “But if they really are the girls’ grandparents, wouldn’t they have asked to see them today?”
“Maybe they’re just as overwhelmed as we are,” she suggested.
“Maybe.”
Barbara got up, edged around the table and joined him at the window. “They seem too good to be true, is that it?”
He shrugged, but turned to gaze out the window. “Maybe they are,” he admitted and raked his fingers through his hair. “Maybe I’m not sure what I think at all. It’s hard for me to tell the real from the unreal any more.”
“What does your heart tell you about Micah and Ruth?”
“That they’re real.”
“Mine, too,” she whispered and slipped her hand into his. “But I’m glad Carl insisted on the DNA tests, and I’m just as glad the Carrs left without seeing the girls. While we’re waiting for the test results—”
“We’re not going to have any results until they run the tests, which means we need to get the girls’ samples taken as soon as possible,” he said firmly, as if he was far more comfortable with organizing and scheduling tasks than he was with handling more emotional issues.
“Carl explained that,” she reminded him. “I’m just as anxious as you are. I’ll take the girls after school today.”
“I could go with you.”
“And we’d like the company. Promise me something?”
He looked down at her and smiled.
“Promise me you won’t ever keep something like this from me again.”
His gaze grew troubled. “I was just trying to protect you and the girls.”
“I know you were, and I love you for protecting the children, but I’m not a child, John. I’m your wife. If we can’t rely on one another and trust one another, then we have a bigger problem on our hands than waiting for the results of the DNA tests.”
He kissed her forehead. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“Me, too,” she whispered. “I should have known you weren’t working so many hours at night to avoid us or because you couldn’t deal with Steve’s death.”
His eyes widened. “Is that what you thought?”
She swallowed the lump in her throat. “Yes. I’m sorry.”
He put his arm around her shoulders. “You don’t need to apologize. I didn’t give you much reason to think otherwise.” He paused and pointed toward the window. “Look. There they are.”
She watched with him as Ruth and Micah crossed the street. Hand in hand, the couple walked down the avenue together, just an ordinary couple who quickly blended into the shoppers milling along the avenue. “I wonder what they’re thinking,” he murmured.
“Or how they’re feeling,” she added. “I can’t imagine what it would be like to have your only child run away from home and spend years looking for her in vain, only to discover you’d become grandparents without even knowing it.”
“I don’t think I want to know.”
“I’m glad we had more than one child. With Steve gone now, having Rick is even more of a blessing…even if he isn’t married,” she teased, hoping to lighten the mood.
He chuckled. “I guess I deserved that.”
“Yes, you did.”
“I guess I was being a little…controlling,”
She grinned. “A lot controlling.”
“Maybe even a little paranoid.”
“That, too.”
“You could cut me a little slack here, any time you’re ready.”
She laughed out loud. “Don’t count on it. Not unless you take me to lunch.”
“Lunch? That’s all it’s going to take?”
“A very expensive lunch. That will be a good start,” she teased, but her heart told her that they had taken the first steps on the long journey back to the loving relationship they had always shared.
If that had been the only blessing this day, it would have been blessing enough, but she had the distinct impression that the meeting today held the promise of even greater blessings for them all.
Chapter Twenty-One
Two heavy snowfalls in early December blanketed everyone’s dreams for ideal conditions for Christmas, at least for this year.
Owners of businesses along the avenue wailed about losing holiday sales. Working parents scrambled for day care when the schools closed down and used up all the snow days budgeted in the calendar before winter had even officially arrived. Other residents sat trapped in their homes, unable to prepare for the holidays. Swamped by heated complaints about inefficient snow removal, town officials offered proof of their efforts: the mountain of collected snow along the river quickly dubbed Mount Miserable by discontents.
Ten days before Christmas, nature relented, at least temporarily. Under sparkling sunshine and clear blue skies, the last of the snow finally melted before a cold snap returned, bringing frigid air back to town, but no forecast of more snow. Shoppers once again hustled along the avenue and children were back in school, while parents tried to get ready for the fast-approaching holiday. Town officials quickly turned the town meeting for that month into an event to honor all the township employees who had worked so hard during the snow emergencies.
But not everyone looked forward to Christmas this year.
Exhausted by the extended hours she had been working at Sweet Stuff, Ginger lay awake at night and worried about how she and Tyler would mark their first Christmas with Vincent. After another troubled, sleepless night, she struggled out of bed that Monday morning, got Tyler off to work and Vincent off to school. She sat at her kitchen table, stirred her coffee and tried to give herself a little mental pep talk, but failed.
True, there were a whole host of reasons why she was feeling so anxious and conflicted. Their daughter, Denise, had recently been reassigned to overseas flights in the Eastern Hemisphere. She would be spending Christmas in Japan. Mark was on tour as the opening, opening, opening act for some aging country music singer who had taken Ginger and Tyler’s son under his wing. With his dreams still alive, Mark would celebrate Christmas somewhere in the Bible Belt.
But maybe it was better that neither Denise nor Mark were coming home, or that keeping contact these days meant occasional messages on the answering machine as they played telephone tag. Lily, her wayward, lost child, had done exactly as she had promised and had virtually severed all contact with her son, save for sending a monthly check that Ginger and Tyler deposited in a special account
for him. Apparently, the notes Ginger had written to Mark and Denise had not softened their anger and disappointment with their sister, and they would have no doubt spent much of the holiday denouncing Lily, hardly the mood Ginger wanted to pervade her home over the holidays.
That left Ginger, Tyler and Vincent to fend for themselves here in Welleswood for Christmas—hopefully, a peaceful Christmas.
With few physical and emotional resources left, she felt so overwhelmed, she had to grab hold of herself before she slid from worry into depression. She took a good, long sip of coffee, made two telephone calls before work and set up a meeting for seven that night at her house. She called Tyler on his cell phone, and he agreed to take Vincent to his art lessons at six-thirty and out afterward for a treat, so she crossed that obstacle off her mental list.
Feeling rather satisfied with herself, she showered, dressed and headed out the door to get to work by nine o’clock. She did not quite have a bounce to her walk, but her steps were lighter, her heart was hopeful, and she mustered up all the Christmas spirit she could manage to make it through the day.
At two-thirty that afternoon, the amount of Christmas spirit Ginger had left would not have filled half a thimble. She had used up all her good cheer satisfying rude, demanding and snippy customers who either had crawled out from their homes on Mount Miserable or had no inkling of the real meaning of Christmas.
She checked the clock. Two-thirty. Finally, it was almost time to leave and pick up Vincent from school. Kristen Smith, one of the college students Charlene had hired as extra holiday help, was waiting on the last customer who had a long shopping list to fill while Charlene was busy loading up gift baskets for late-after-noon deliveries.
Grateful for the first lull in business that day, Ginger started to untie her soiled apron. When the door opened and she recognized Miss Grumley, one of the seniors from the Towers, she quickly retied her apron. Not this customer. Not now. Miss Grumley was sweet enough, but she rarely bought anything and usually just stopped in for a little conversation that might last for the better part of an hour, and Ginger reminded herself that Charlene had opened her shop precisely for women like Miss Grumley.
