by Terri Thayer
If the state troopers came in right now, they’d see an old man with a gun pointed at a police officer. April was afraid that they would shoot Dr. Wysocki. She had to get him to put down the gun.
“Dr. Wysocki, he broke the gas connection at the intake pipe. You might not know this, but the house is filled with flammable gas. If you fire, we will all die in a fireball. Just like the Campbells,” April said. “Don’t shoot, Dr. Wysocki. Give me the gun.”
Dr. Wysocki was not listening. “You got my girl involved with drugs again. I thought you were keeping her sober.”
He pushed the gun to Yost’s chest. “You deserve to die like a dog.”
Yost’s eyes widened. He hadn’t heard the car. Now he could hear the low voices of the troopers outside. He grabbed the gun from the doctor’s hand. The doctor was weakened by his grief and age, and Yost easily disarmed him. He took hold of the doctor and spun him around.
Yost gestured at April. “Come on, we’re going out together. I’m not going to jail. You two are my ticket out of here.”
The doctor was squirming in Yost’s left-handed bear hug, but the policeman was restraining him easily. Dr. Wysocki bit his hand. Yost hung on, yelling.
He was distracted long enough for April to knock over a paint can. The white cupboard paint spilled, a long slippery trail insinuating itself around Yost’s feet. The doctor released his grip on Yost’s hand, elbowing him. Both men lost their balance and slipped, the doctor falling hard onto Yost. April pulled the doctor up and ran out of the house.
A trooper was waiting for them on the porch. He hustled both of them into the car where Kit was already huddled. Two other troopers stormed the house. Through the open door, they could see Yost wrestled to the ground. April let out a huge sigh. Her throat burned from the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.
“You okay?” Kit asked.
April checked with the doctor who was breathing hard but seemed to be fine.
“We’re all good,” she said. “All good.”
CHAPTER 21
Unpacking didn’t take long.
Even less time than when she’d arrived in Aldenville seven months ago. Then, she had pulled a small trailer of belongings behind her precious car. Now she had a box of hand-me-down kitchen stuff from Bonnie and a towel. And no car.
She was starting over. Again.
Mitch had dropped her off and gone to pick up the paint she’d ordered. She was wearing a sweatshirt of Deana’s—of Mark’s, actually—and a hand-me-down pair of jeans from Rocky.
April felt the tears welling up. She’d been lucky, she knew that. She could have been blown up in the barn as Yost had intended. Like poor Charlotte and Grizz. Vince would take a long time to recover from those unfair deaths.
Looking around and not seeing one familiar thing reminded her of what they’d lost.
A knock on the door broke through her pity party. She wiped at her face with a paper towel and called out she’d be right there.
Violet, tiny, enveloped in her down coat, stood on the porch. She was out on bail, hoping to get into a drug program rather than jail. She’d promised to testify against Yost.
Her father was in the car. April waved to him. Violet held out a plastic tub. “My mother made cookies.”
“Thanks,” April said, taking the box from her. “Come in.”
Violet took two tentative steps inside. “Nice,” she said, her eyes traveling around the living room. The air was so cold April could see her breath.
April accepted the compliment without comment. “What are you going to do next?”
Violet shrugged. “I’m going to Scranton for treatment.”
“Paula?”
“Gone. She disappeared the day after your barn . . .” She let the sentence end without her.
“Good.” April nodded. Violet’s eyes were black, hard to read “You’ll come stamp with us again?”
Violet shrugged. “I’d like to, once I’m home from rehab.”
A pounding on the back door startled Violet, and she was at the front door before April could stop her. April looked out the side window and saw the Jeep. “It’s only Mitch.”
“Hurry up, it’s heavy,” she heard Mitch say.
Violet said, “My father’s waiting for me. We’re going to rehab right now.”
April hugged her quickly and opened the door. Violet passed through like a wraith. On the porch, Mitch was struggling with a big item. Instead of the paint cans she was expecting, he was carrying her drafting table.
“Mitch!” April said. She’d completely forgotten that her drafting table was at his house. She’d had the table since art school. It was ugly and heavy, being made of pressed board, but it was hers. The one Grizz had made her had been destroyed in the fire.
“Where do you want it?” he said, looking around. This was the first time he was seeing her new place. He did his best to keep his face neutral, but she saw the shock registering. This house was not going to be featured in the real estate section of the Sunday paper anytime soon.
“Um, anywhere?” she said, flinging her arm around the empty space. “How about in front of the window?”
He set it down, grunting.
“Do you mind? I need it facing the other way,” she said. “So the light is at my back.”
Mitch grumbled, although she knew he was mostly kidding. “Your chair’s in the truck,” he said. She raced out to get it, pushing it up the porch steps on its wheels.
She sat at her table, pulling herself close and rubbing the top. It was covered with the detritus of old projects: ink stains, doodles, even some ground-in glitter.
Mitch leaned against the door frame that led into the tiny kitchen. He crossed his arms and watched as she hugged her table.
“Happy now?” he said.
She looked up at him, his tone of voice unclear to her. Was he truly okay with her being in her own place?
One look and she knew he was. He was smiling at her, a smile that warmed her insides.
“I am. Very.”
She got up from the table and walked over to him. He watched her, and she felt his love for her as he watched her move toward him.
“So happy to have my table. Even happier to have you in my life,” she said. When she got close enough, she kissed his cheek and smoothed his hair. He smelled of wood shavings. She leaned into his neck and inhaled, filling her lungs with his unique scent.
He wrapped his arms around her. “Glad I could be of service,” he said into her hair.
“Yoo-hoo, anyone home?”
She turned to see Rocky coming in the door. She had on hot pink leopard-spotted oven mitts and was carrying a big pan of something steaming hot.
“Is that lasagna?” April said, trying to snag a corner of the foil and turn it back.
Rocky moved it over her head. “Get away. You’ll make me drop it. Again.”
April went slack-jawed. Rocky just smiled.
“Don’t listen to her, she didn’t drop it,” Deana said as she came in with a big bowl of salad. And then, as if it weren’t obvious, she added, “We brought dinner.” She looked for a place to set things down, settling on the small counter space in the kitchen. Rocky followed her, putting her dish on top of the stove. Mark waggled two bottles of wine as he came in the door.
“Brought my own corkscrew,” he said. “And cups.”
April leaned into Mitch’s chest, watching her friends turn her place into a home. The windows steamed from their collective heat.
She was so lucky. To have this man and these friends in her life. She filled up with joy, her chest expanding. They would have a good bottle of wine, Rocky’s famous vegetarian lasagna. They would laugh and play cards and get tipsy.
Someday, Mary Lou would talk to her, and she looked forward to being friends with her again. April would have to build her business back up, without any supplies. The stamp she’d made for Mirabella was at the job site, so she had work there for the next month or so. She would save u
p and buy more inks, more rubber. It would take years to rebuild the vast collection she’d had before, but she knew she could do it. Her career path would be a lot slower than she’d hoped.
Deana produced paper plates and cups. The house, the little river cottage, had come partially furnished, with an old kitchen table, metal with yellow pleather seats. There were only four kitchen chairs, but April pulled up her desk chair, and the five of them dug in. The lasagna was hot and cheesy, and Deana had managed to turn bag salad into something special with cranberries and Sonoma County goat cheese. Mark quizzed Mitch about ice sculpting. They all laughed at his account of April’s horror when she saw the giant diamond ring.
There was a tentative knock on the door. April barely heard it over the giggling coming from Deana at Rocky’s imitation of Mitch’s proposal.
She listened. Again came the knock.
“Come in,” she hollered, but when the door didn’t open, she peered out the window. Night had fallen, and she couldn’t see a thing. She flipped on the outside light and answered the door.
Mary Lou and Kit stood on the small porch. Suzi was behind them.
“Hello,” April said as she moved inward so that they could get inside out of the cold.
Kit was pulling a black rolling cart. She looked at her mother and kissed April’s cheek.
“Mom?” Kit prompted, looking at her mother, who had stopped in her tracks and was taking in the small space, which could have fit easily in one small corner of her four-thousand-square-foot home.
Mary Lou cleared her throat. “I want you to have this. I know you lost everything at the barn. Here are some supplies to get you started stamping again.”
April knelt down and unbuckled the front of the case. It was fitted with a heat gun, rubber, carving tools, acrylic blocks, and stamp pads. Dozens of inks and pens had their own designated space. The back of the case had clear plastic dividers and was filled with stamps.
Everything she needed to start stamping again.
Kit dove into a shopping bag and came up with an armful of sketchbooks that she shoved at April. “We bought the store out, can you tell?”
Suzi was smiling at them, but April’s eyes were on Mary Lou. She tried to stand up but stumbled, slightly off-kilter with the addition of Kit’s gifts. Mary Lou reached down and pulled her up.
“I want to thank you. You saved my daughter, my grand-babies . . .” Mary Lou’s voice caught.
“Okay,” April said, her tears clogging her throat.
“No, let me finish. I was wrong about you. I said hurtful things. I apologize from the bottom of my heart.”
April went over to a box in the corner. She took out the small cassette tape that she’d found in Mary Lou’s shed. She handed it to Mary Lou. “This belongs to your family. I shouldn’t have kept it from you.”
Mary Lou turned it over in her palm with her index finger. “Have you heard it?”
“No. I got Bonnie’s tape player, but I haven’t had the heart . . .”
“Can we do it now?” Kit said. “I want to hear my uncle.”
Mary Lou blanched, but she nodded. The rest of the Stamping Sisters were looking at them. Mitch and Mark stood, offering Mary Lou and Kit their seats. Deana and Rocky cleared the table. Mitch poured them all a glass of wine. Rocky shared her chair with Suzi.
April set the tape player in the middle of the table and pushed play.
J.B.’s voice filled the small space. Mary Lou grabbed Kit’s hand and squeezed.
This is to set the record straight. Tina has just told me she’s pregnant. I’m about to have my own child, and I suddenly realize how precious that is. I’m sorry, Mary Lou. You were right. I didn’t belong around your daughter or your son. I was a danger to them. I hadn’t earned the right to be with them.
After you threw me out, I was living rough. In my car, out on the street. I was driving through Aldenville, mad at the world as usual. Winter was coming, and I didn’t know how I was going to survive. Of course, that was all my fault. I rolled through the stop sign on Main. I had a forty in my lap and five more rolling around the backseat. I didn’t see Yost until he was pulled up next to me.
I had so many traffic tickets, I knew I was going to jail for a long time. But Yost had another plan.
“You’re coming to work for me,” he said with that smug smirk of his. He knew he had me. I’m ashamed to admit this, but all I could think about was drinking. In jail meant no alcohol. Out of jail meant all the booze I could scrounge up.
You know now what the job was. Buying over-the-counter meds for his meth-making operation. He gave me a variety of IDs and an assortment of cars and told me to hit the road.
At first, I stayed drunk. Then I met Tina. And she saw beyond the drink, beyond the stupid guy buying OTC meds. She saw someone inside me. Someone I hadn’t been for a long, long time.
I told Yost I wanted out. I told him I’d disappear, move away. He’d never see me again.
He called for a powwow at the house. I’d been there earlier in the day, dropped off my truck. Ransom was in a mood. He was using, getting more and more paranoid and delusional. I knew he wasn’t to be trusted, and if I knew it, Yost knew it, too. He would find a way to get rid of us both. All he had to do was re-arrest me and throw me in jail.
I picked up a car and did some drugstore runs. Yost generally showed up about three each day to collect the day’s output. I drove back to confront him.
Instead, the house was burning. I could see the smoke and the fire trucks from a mile away. I never even went close. I just turned around and ran.
But I got lucky. I ran straight into the arms of the woman who loved me.
The tape came to an end. The room was silent. Mary Lou and Kit hugged each other. April mopped her eyes.
J.B. had found a new family for himself. A new life. Literally, with the baby coming. It was too late for Mary Lou and her brother, but there was still a chance for her to welcome Tina into her life.
April dished up lasagna for Kit, Mary Lou and Suzi. Deana sat on Mark’s lap, and April stood with Mitch, leaning against the wall, watching them dig in. Soon the kitchen was filled with laughter as the friends found their way past awkwardness and hard feelings.
April knew family didn’t always come as advertised. The packaging varied, and sometimes it was hard to recognize. She’d learned to accept love in whatever form it took.
Stamping Project
SUPPLIES
• Light-colored stamp pad
• “Snowman parts” stamps
• Cardstock (five pieces)
• Snowman stamp
• Colored markers
• Scissors
• “Some Assembly Required” stamp
• Fancy paper (optional)
DIRECTIONS
1. To create background, use a light-colored stamp pad to ink “snowman parts” stamps and press stamps all over the front of a piece of cardstock.
2. Use the same stamp pad to ink the snowman stamp and then press stamp firmly on a second piece of cardstock. Using markers, color in the snowman, and then trim the cardstock to rectangle shape.
3. Take a third piece of cardstock, cut a slightly larger rectangle. Mount snowman rectangle on top.
4. Ink the “Some Assembly Required” stamp and then press stamp firmly on a small fourth piece of cardstock. Trim the cardstock to rectangle shape.
5. Finally, use a fifth piece of cardstock or fancy paper and cut a strip to measure ½ inch by the width of the card. Mount this strip of cardstock on top of the first piece of cardstock with the “snowman parts” background. Mount the snowman rectangle on top of the strip. Finish by mounting the “Some Assembly Required” rectangle on top of the entire card.
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