by SUE FINEMAN
“I think we have another week or two. Jenna, my mother wants you and Katie to come back to her house.”
“Tell her thanks, but I put a deposit on an apartment today. It’s not available until the middle of next month, though.”
“We’ll work it out.” Nick had already scheduled the demolition crew, but Al wasn’t sure what date they were scheduled to come.
Jenna finished packing the box, taped it shut, and wrote CRYSTAL on the top and sides. She glanced around the big old kitchen and sighed.
“Sorry to see it come down?” he asked.
“Yes, but maybe it’s better that it’s being torn down.”
She didn’t explain herself, but she didn’t have to. They both had a claim on this place. His was financial.
Hers was emotional.
<>
Al took a short trip to California with his mother the last week of August, and Jenna took Katie and Sophie and Max shopping for school clothes. Bridget and one of Cara’s guards came along on the shopping trip. The guards were never far when the kids were out and about, but no one recognized Cara’s kids, and no one bothered them.
Katie and Sophie wanted clothes that matched, so Jenna picked out a pink outfit for Katie and a matching yellow one for Sophie. They looked adorable together. Max was starting second grade, and he was a confident, happy little boy with dark curly hair and big brown eyes. The girls had one more year of pre-school before they started kindergarten. Sophie had Nick’s ornery streak, so she’d be a handful as she got older, but Katie was a mellow child, agreeable, and easy to handle most of the time.
Jenna hoped the baby would have Katie’s sweet disposition.
<>
Instead of riding the wheelchair to meals, Mattie walked, and it was a good distance from her room halfway around the building to the dining room. She stopped taking her morning pill, hiding it under her tongue until the nurse left the room. She hid them in the bottom of her underwear drawer, with the money she’d tucked away. The stupid aides would never find her stash, because they never opened the drawer. Mattie dressed herself in the mornings, and she insisted on putting her own laundry away.
She started walking more, out to the nurse’s desk and back to her room, into the little room they called their library and back. When the nurses and aides got accustomed to seeing her walking about, she started walking to the front door and looking out through the glass in the door. They had a fancy door lock, but the directions were written right there on the wall, along with the numbers to punch into the keypad. The keypad couldn’t be reached from a wheelchair, but Mattie no longer used a wheelchair.
It wouldn’t be hard to get out of the building, but how would she get out to the inn? They didn’t have taxi cabs out here, at least not that she knew of, and she didn’t dare call the kid who bought her car. If she did, he’d tell his mother, and everyone would know where she intended to go. They’d know anyway when they discovered her missing.
Did it matter if someone knew where she was going? Not if she had a few minutes to do what she had to do before they came to get her. But without those few minutes, she wouldn’t be able to accomplish her goal.
<>
Alessandro was in California over the weekend, so it was the perfect time for Jenna to take a trip across the mountains to see her mother’s best friend, Annie Finnegan. Jenna wanted to know more about her mother’s younger years and she wanted to know about Tom’s life. Knowing she had a brother that no one had bothered to tell her about, one who died before she had a chance to know him, left a heaviness in her heart.
Three hours later, Jenna pulled up in front of a modest older home in Ellensburg. A woman with bright red hair and glasses came out to the car to greet them. “Jenna, oh, you look so much like Kate, and who is this pretty little girl?”
“This is my daughter, Katie.”
Annie hugged them both and they went inside to talk. Jenna looked through several albums, one with pictures of Annie and her mother in college, one of Annie’s wedding to Jim Finnegan, and the others were mostly pictures of Tom. “Did you have other children?”
“No, we’d just found out I couldn’t have children of my own when Kate gave birth to Tom. I couldn’t look at him without crying, because my best friend had what I could never have. Kate understood, and she agonized over her decision to let us adopt her baby. She didn’t want her parents to know, and she had this wonderful scholarship for graduate school that she’d worked so hard to get.”
“It was an open adoption?”
“Oh, yes, of course it was. I would never dream of keeping her from Tommy. He knew he had two mothers, and he knew when you were born.”
He knew, but she didn’t. “Why didn’t someone tell me?”
“Her husband didn’t want her to tell you until you were in high school.” She shook her head sadly. “He was a strange man. He was an engineering student like your mother when I met him. They dated off and on through graduate school. He wasn’t the most affectionate man, and he drank too much, but Kate thought she loved him.
“After graduation, he went back to Russia for a time, and Kate found a job in Seattle. She and Charlie had spoken several times by phone, and he urged her to come to the inn for a visit, so she did. That was when she got pregnant with you.”
“Only this time she decided to keep her baby.”
Annie nodded. “That’s right. She would have taken Tommy back if we’d let her, but he was our son, and we couldn’t picture our lives without him. Peter returned from Russia after you were born. I always wondered if he married Kate so he could get American citizenship. Peter was gone a lot, and half the time Kate didn’t know where he was or who he was with.”
Jenna stared at her hands. “He wasn’t really involved in our lives. I can’t remember him ever attending one of my softball games or piano recitals. Even if he was home, he didn’t express any interest.”
“When Kate said they were selling their home and moving to the inn, I knew their marriage was over. Charlie was a lot older, but he was the man she really loved. From what little Kate told me about the situation, Peter intended to take his half of the equity in the house and move to New York City or somewhere. He had his American citizenship, so he didn’t have to stay married. She said she was buying a half-interest in the inn, so you could grow up knowing Charlie, and I know she intended to tell you about Tom after you got settled at the inn.”
Jenna sighed. Hearing about this saddened her. “We were only at the inn a few days when they were killed.”
“I know, dear. I know. Charlie was devastated at losing Kate, but he still had you.”
“And I had him, but I also had his wife, who hated my very existence. Did you know that she killed him?”
A gasp told Jenna that Annie hadn’t suspected this. Jenna explained what happened and why. “She knew I was Charlie’s, and she didn’t want me to have her inn. I know people have died for less, but knowing I was the cause of his death is hard to live with.”
“No, Jenna, you didn’t cause it. If she really wanted him gone, she would have found another reason.”
Maybe, but Jenna didn’t think so. If her mother hadn’t taken her to live at the inn, Charlie might not have died the way he had. But she wouldn’t have gotten to know him and love him.
Annie fixed them sandwiches for lunch. Jenna liked her mother’s friend very much, and hoped they’d see her again someday, but Katie was getting sleepy, and Jenna wanted to get home before traffic got too heavy, so they said goodbye.
As she pulled onto the highway and headed for Snoqualmie Pass, Jenna thought about what Annie had said about her parents’ marriage. Dad had always been distant and uninvolved, but she thought that was just the way he was. Mom was a wonderful mother. She must have loved her son or she wouldn’t have sent Annie the money for his cancer treatments.
Jenna knew her mother loved her, and Charlie loved her, too, but it was a strange kind of family for a kid to have – a mother with an engineering degr
ee who played classical music on the piano, a Russian father who wasn’t really her father and who was gone most of the time, a brother she didn’t know existed, an uncle who was really her father, and an aunt who wasn’t really an aunt and who hated her.
No wonder she was a mixed up kid.
<>
Al’s trip to California went well. He took his mother to Tony and Catherine’s house to spend the day with Catherine and the kids while he and Tony went out to the retirement development. This time, aside from a few little things, everything was being built according to plan. They had three couples living there already, three units set up as model homes, and six more homes nearly ready for occupancy.
Al walked through the nearly completed homes with Tony. “Looking good, Tony. If I was retired, I could live here.”
“Yeah, me, too, but I’m a long way from retirement and so are you. I hear you and Jenna are back together and you have a little bun in the oven.”
Al whipped around to ask, “Who told you?”
“Catherine told me about the baby. She talked with Cara the other day, and then I talked with Nick yesterday, and he said you two were back together.”
“No wonder you live in California,” Al muttered mostly to himself.
Tony shrugged. “It’s family. If they didn’t care, they wouldn’t talk about you.”
“Yeah, I know. In this family, no one gets any privacy. I suppose the women knew Catherine was pregnant before you did.”
“Cara did. She and Catherine have been friends since college.”
The women told each other things, but they didn’t share their insight and knowledge with the men in the family until they were good and ready.
Tony slapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll get used to it.”
“I don’t know if I want to get used to it, Tony. It’s a little spooky sometimes, knowing the women are the ones pulling the strings.”
“Come on, Al. It’s been like that since the beginning of time. Who gave Adam the apple in the Garden of Eden? A woman. God is the only male who knows more about things than women.”
“Are you sure God isn’t a woman?”
Tony laughed. “Don’t let Ma hear you say that. If the priest doesn’t have you on your knees, she will. Now, tell me all about this new man in her life.”
<>
Al and his mother stayed at Cara’s house overnight and flew back to Gig Harbor Sunday afternoon. Ma went on and on about Tony’s little boys on the flight back, but all he could think about was getting back to the inn, back to Jenna and Katie.
After the plane delivered them to the Tacoma Narrows Airport in Gig Harbor, Al drove his mother home. He carried in her suitcase and made sure everything was all right before he left for the inn.
Jenna and Katie met him at the door. Katie yelled, “‘Sandro,” and jumped into his arms. He kissed her and swung her around before facing Jenna.
“Hi.”
“Hi yourself,” she said.
“Miss me?”
“More than you can imagine.”
“Oh, I can imagine.” He pulled her close and whispered, “I love you, Jenna.”
She stiffened, but she didn’t pull away. And she didn’t say she loved him. His ego was a little bruised, but Tony told him to say the words first, so she’d know how he felt. ‘Give her a chance to think about it for a couple days before you make plans for happily-ever-after,’ Tony had told him.
Katie pushed between them, and Al said, “I brought presents.”
The kid’s big blue eyes grew bigger. “My daddy never brings me presents.”
“Maybe you need to teach him how to be a daddy, Katie Bug. Tell him to give you horsy rides and bring you presents and take you out for tacos and green stuff.”
“Okay,” she said so seriously he wanted to laugh.
He lugged his suitcase upstairs and opened it while Katie and Jenna watched. He found the package wrapped in pink paper and handed it to Katie. “This is for you. Go ahead and rip the paper off.”
She plunked her little behind on the floor and shredded the paper. He’d gotten her some new story books and a doll with blond hair and blue eyes.
“What do you say, Katie?” Jenna prompted.
“Thank you, ’Sandro.”
“You’re welcome. I’ll read you a story from one of those books tonight. You pick out which one you want.”
“Okay.”
Katie ran off with her loot, and Al turned to Jenna. “Now it’s Mommy’s turn.” He handed her a jewelers box with a diamond tennis bracelet inside. It was the prettiest one in the store.
“Oh, it’s beautiful, Alessandro, but you didn’t have to—”
“Next time it’ll be a ring, and we’ll pick it out together.”
She opened her mouth as if to say something and then closed it. She stared at the bracelet and then looked up into his eyes. “Alessandro, I don’t know about—”
“Then I’ll wait until you do know.” He held her close, wishing she could let herself love him as much as he loved her and knowing it would take time for her to learn to trust him again.
<>
On Monday, Blade helped Al remove the gate from the driveway and take it out to the property near Nick’s house. When he returned home, Al ripped out the buzzer assembly in the inn and the call box on the post and put it in a box. It was nearly new, and there was no reason it couldn’t be salvaged and used somewhere else.
He took the plans for the studio in to the county to be approved. The site had already had a couple of perk tests for septic systems, one in the front and one in the back, and there was a community well that served all the Donatelli properties along Beach Road.
Al’s property was right next door to the place the family called Staff House, where Cara’s staff lived, but there would be an acre or so between that house and Al’s. Angelo’s house was on the other side of Staff House, and Ma’s cottage would be put directly across the street from Angelo’s. They already had a pavilion on the lower part of the property with an outdoor kitchen for family picnics on the beach, but there was plenty of room for Ma’s cottage on the upper part. Maria and Blade lived on the other side, on the waterfront, so Ma would have four of her kids right here on the same road.
She’d like that.
On his way back to the inn, Al stopped at the Max and Company office in downtown Gig Harbor to talk with Nick about the closing on the property and the demolition schedule.
“The closing is scheduled for this Friday, and they postponed the demolition until the second week in September.”
“What about the garage? Could they wait another week on that, maybe do it last? Jenna’s apartment won’t be ready until the fifteenth, and she has all her stuff stored in there.”
Nick made some notes. “I’ll see what we can do.” He put his pen down. “I thought you were going to live with Aunt Sophia.”
“I am, but Jenna wants her own place.”
Nick slapped the table. “What in the hell is going on with you two?”
“Why don’t you ask your wife or my mother or one of the other women in the family? When you find out, would you let me know?” Al walked out the door and let it slam behind him. He’d tried being patient, but where did it get him? The woman he loved was moving into an apartment, and he was going to live with his mother.
There had to be a better way.
<>
Mattie kept her pills and her money stuffed down deep in her pockets, pills on the left and money on the right. She wandered out to the lobby and sat down. Clara Smith, an empty-headed woman who lived down the hall from Mattie, sat in her wheelchair by the front door. “Where is he?” she said to herself. “He was supposed to come a half-hour ago, and I have to go to the bathroom.”
Mattie walked over and asked, “Who are you waiting for, Clara?”
“The shuttle driver. He’s late again.”
“Probably a new driver. Go back to your room and go to the bathroom, and if he comes, I’ll come and ge
t you.”
“Okay.” Clara rolled away, and Mattie stood by the door, watching through the window for the shuttle driver.
Clara had just been gone a minute when the shuttle pulled up. Mattie had been watching the shuttles come and go long enough to know that it was a new driver. Unfolding the wheelchair by the door, Mattie sat down and waited. A young woman with a bright smile opened the door and asked if she was Clara. “Yes, I am,” said Mattie, “and you’re late.”
“Sorry about that. I had to pick up a man in Tacoma, and you wouldn’t believe the traffic on the bridge today.”
She put the lift down on the side of the van, and Mattie was lifted up and into the van, where the young woman secured the wheelchair so it wouldn’t roll. Seconds later, the driver pulled out onto the street.
Mattie could already smell the freedom.
The driver said, “I forgot to get directions. We’ll have to go back.”
“Nonsense,” Mattie said calmly. “I may be old, but I’ve lived in this area long enough to know my way around.” She gave the young woman directions and minutes later, the van pulled through the open gate and up to the front of the inn.
“Oh, what a beautiful view.”
“Yes, it is nice,” said Mattie. There were no cars parked by the inn, which meant no one was home. She’d have to wait until later to put her plan into action.
The front doorknob was locked, but someone hadn’t pulled the door all the way closed, so Mattie pushed it open. She thanked her driver and gave her a twenty dollar bill, and then rolled through the door.
Once inside, Mattie folded the wheelchair and put it in the office behind the door where no one would see it. She used the bathroom, helped herself to a glass of water and a handful of cookies from the jar on the counter, and found the stash of fireplace matches they’d always kept in the drawer by the refrigerator. They went in the pocket with her pills.
She put the cat food and their water outside and then picked them up one at a time, hugged them and told them goodbye, and put them outside.
She thought she could accomplish her goal within a few minutes of arriving at the inn, but she’d have to wait for Charlie’s bastard and the young man who’d thrown her out.
