The Wedding Pearls

by Carolyn Brown

  He popped open a royal-blue velvet box to reveal a round sapphire encircled with thirty small diamonds. “The sapphire is the color of your eyes and there are thirty diamonds surrounding it—one for each day in September. I knew it was the right one when I saw it at the jewelry store.”

  She sighed, squealed, and fell into his arms. “Yes, Branch. Yes, I love you. Yes, I will marry you, and yes, I will move in with you until Mama can plan our wedding. Frankie, will you stay awake until Thanksgiving? We can get married the Saturday after that in the church. If you don’t think you can, we can move the date up.”

  “I believe we can make it that long,” Ivy said. “The doctor came in today and said that we are holding our own with this new medicine.”

  Branch stood up and swept her into his arms like a bride. “We’ll see y’all tomorrow.”

  The applause followed them all the way down the hall and out the door, where he put her in the passenger’s seat of his truck and kissed her with so much passion that it brought tears to her eyes.

  “I love you,” he said simply. “I will always love you. When we have our first big argument, I will love you. When we are eighty years old and our hair has gone gray, I will love you.”

  “Me, too, Branch, on all of what you said. I will always love you, through the bad times, old age, and gray hair, the good times and everything.”

  EPILOGUE

  One year later

  Tessa sat down on the porch with a brand-new journal in her hand. This year she would again write something every day for the entire month of September. She picked up the pen and flipped the journal open to the first blank page. That’s what her life had looked like a year ago before the trip started. It was a blank page that morning when she crawled into the front seat of Mollybedamned and began the journey that would change everything.

  She rocked and enjoyed the lovely fall day, not so very different from the sunny day when they’d had the parade down Main Street the year before. September in the South is fickle. It can be hotter than the devil’s pitchfork, or it can be the beginnings of semicool weather. It’s never cold by any means, and certainly not chilly, but it can be a little cooler than the triple digits that August is capable of bringing.

  The Ranch was forty miles north of the Gulf waters, but that morning, Tessa could shut her eyes and imagine a little salty taste in the breeze blowing up from the south. She picked up the pen and started to write.

  It’s really still twenty-one days until summer is officially over, but today the weather gods blessed us with a drop in temperature and a cool day. Mama and Daddy are here for a long weekend, and they left to go to some little seafood restaurant down near Sabine Pass.

  When she and Daddy come to town, they stay with Lola and Hank, their new best friends, at the house in Boomtown. It would be awkward to most people, but I’m no stranger to that word and it works for us, so that’s all that matters. I’m waiting for Branch to come in from the feeding chores. After supper, we’re taking Mollybedamned out of the garage and driving to Beaumont for ice cream. I still keep a journal even though I don’t write in it every single day. But sometimes when emotions fill my heart to the brim, I simply have to write about them.

  The baby in the antique rocking cradle whimpered, and she touched the rocker with her foot to set it in motion. The dark-haired child snuggled down and made sucking noises.

  Tessa smiled and kept writing.

  The doctors were right about Ivy and Frankie. They made it long past that original diagnosis. And after Hank and Lola’s wedding they went with us to church a few Sundays. They never wanted to go back to their homes, but we did talk them into coming out to the ranch two times to have Sunday dinner with us. They saved their strength for us and I’d actually begun to think maybe they’d kick the whole illness.

  Branch and I were married in the church in Boomtown on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I begged God not to take them until after my wedding. I wanted Frankie to actually see Lola put those pearls around my neck and pass them down to me. And the Almighty granted my plea. Daddy walked me up the aisle with Mama and Lola right behind me, and the three of them gave me away together. I wore Frankie’s dress and the pearls and Mama’s garter for something old, blue, and borrowed all in one, and Daddy put a penny in my shoe. My something new was beautiful pearl earrings from Branch.

  When I started down the aisle, Branch smiled and met me halfway. The preacher wasn’t expecting that and neither was I, but he told me later he couldn’t wait for me to get to the front of the church. I loved it and hope someday when he walks his daughters down the aisle that their grooms love them that much.

  All my Louisiana relatives came for the wedding and the church was packed. That Maw-Maw left the state of Louisiana at all was a miracle. But she fell in love with Branch and declared that she’d be coming back with Mama and Daddy real often.

  Tessa laid the pen down. Maw-Maw had come back to bring the cradle in early summer, and then when the baby was born she’d clapped her hands when she saw a full head of dark hair and declared that this baby had a good healthy dose of Cajun blood. She promised she’d visit again at Christmas and bring along the rocking horse that all the great-grandchildren had played with and by then she’d take the cradle back for the next baby in the family to use. Tessa checked the sleeping child and kept writing.

  It was a lovely day but it wore Frankie and Ivy out so much that I was afraid neither of them would be there the next day. But after a couple of days, they were back to their old sarcastic barbs. I didn’t realize it at the time of the wedding, but two weeks afterward the doctor told me that I was six weeks pregnant. No morning sickness and I figured all the stress was what had stopped my periods. I mean, after all, the pill is only ninety-eight percent effective, right? But surprise, surprise!

  Our mantel is filling with pictures these days. There’s the one of all six of us in the old-time picture shop, one of the family at Hank and Lola’s wedding and again at mine and Branch’s wedding, our wedding shot with him sitting down and me standing behind him (Frankie got such a kick out of that one) when we were at the stockyards, and too many to count of the baby.

  She was born the first day of August and her name is Frances Ivy Thomas. Branch and I argued about the name because of her initials, but I won the battle. We call her Frannie and she’s having a nap right now so she’ll be ready to take her first ride in Mollybedamned. She has her daddy’s dark hair and my blue eyes. She’s not the little blonde-haired girl I dreamed about that night so I know there will be more children and one of them will definitely be my little Martha Elizabeth, named after my amazing mother-in-law and my maw-maw.

  She looked out over the roses, still blooming profusely, and nodded. Branch had been right about her motherly instincts. Maybe she really had gotten the parental part of her DNA from her birth father.

  “Wherever I got it, I’m almighty grateful to have it,” she mumbled and kept writing.

  Just before our wedding we had our Thanksgiving together out here at the ranch. Maw-Maw brought fresh shrimp and Mama made Southern-style cornbread dressing and it was a big feast. Frankie and Ivy and Maw-Maw got along from the first and watching them in the kitchen was an experience. They tried to teach me how to make pecan pie but I swear all I could see was Avery’s face so I made Mama make it. Maw-Maw and I made a lovely gumbo but they wouldn’t let me eat as much as I wanted because I was getting married in two days and Maw-Maw said it would bloat me up like a roadkill possum. Try taking that picture to the wedding with you!

  We had a quiet Christmas with Frankie and Ivy and Lola and Hank. And two days later they called us to come in a hurry. We got there and they were both sleeping peacefully, but the doctors said it wouldn’t be long. I crawled up in bed with Frankie and she put her arm around me. Lola got on the other side and when Frankie roused up enough to open her eyes, Branch took a picture of us all piled up together in her fancy bed. Her last words were, “Four generations of Laveau women right here togethe
r.” We didn’t know the sex of the baby at that time but I believed her and wasn’t a bit surprised when they told me that I was having a daughter.

  Frannie whimpered again and Tessa rubbed her chubby little cheek. The baby settled right back down to sleep. “That’s a good girl. If you can wait for your supper until Daddy gets home, you’ll enjoy your first trip in Mollybedamned so much more than if you are hungry and gnawing on your fists.”

  Tessa read the last paragraph she had written and started writing again.

  Melody was lying beside Ivy and when we tried to wake Ivy to tell her that Frankie was gone, she’d slipped into a coma. She passed a few minutes after midnight with all of us on the bed with her, holding her hand and kissing her on the forehead. It wasn’t sad but a sweet release. Still, when I look at the pictures on the mantel of us with each of them, tears flow down my cheeks and I have no control over them. Cradle to grave. Only it went beyond the grave for Frankie and Ivy. They made it to the pearly gates within minutes of each other.

  Even after Ivy and Frankie were gone, Melody and Jill stayed on as weekend help. They tell us that they’ve never seen two young girls so good with the elderly ladies and that everyone loves them. Who would have thought it the way she whined that first day about having to go on the trip? She called me early this morning and her voice cracked as she said, “Remember this day a year ago?”

  Lola stopped by with a gorgeous antique cream pitcher to remember this day. It looks beautiful on the mantel with the two that I bought on the trip. She says she’ll add one a year on the first day of September and someday Frannie can inherit the whole lot of them along with my journals. I may have to buy a curio cabinet in a few years just to hold them all. The fancy little bowl I bought on the trip is in the nursery and holds Frannie’s tiny little hair bows.

  So in a few minutes, Branch will come home from the barn and I’ll nurse Miss Frannie, then we’ll get Mollybedamned out of the garage and take Frannie out for her first ride in the car. I’m thinking maybe we’ll go to the ice cream store and then drive through the cemetery to put fresh fall flowers on the two graves.

  September. It was a time for new beginnings, for fate to play out a hand, for me to find my birth family, and to fall in love with Branch. Right now I’m thinking of the song that was playing when I walked into the church. It was an old song by Anne Murray called “Can I Have This Dance.” When the lady from the church sang it I had her change up the first few lyrics that said she would always remember the song that was playing and slip in the words that she would always remember a day in September.

  Tessa laid her pen down, closed the journal, and went out to the gate to meet Branch. He slung an arm around her and kissed her on the forehead. His eyes were still dreamy and soft when they looked at her, even after a year, and although they’d had their arguments, they’d followed Maw-Maw’s advice when she told them to never take an argument to bed with them.

  “How are my girls doing this first day of September?” he asked.

  “Frannie is getting fussy. She has your appetite and I’ve started my new journal. Someday there will be fifty or more lined up in the bookcase.”

  “Yes, there will, and we’ll take them down often and read them so we don’t forget,” he said. “But right now I believe we have a baby to feed and a ride to take. How about a hamburger at your favorite café to start off this September?”

  She slipped her hand in his. “That sounds absolutely wonderful.”

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Dear readers,

  From the time the characters in The Wedding Pearls entered my world, I loved them. They shared their hearts and, more importantly, their souls with me. They told me their innermost fears and joys and allowed me to put their stories on paper. When I finished The Wedding Pearls, I felt as if I’d been on the trip around the perimeter of Texas with these strong characters, and my heart was heavy as I told them all good-bye. But it was necessary for me to say good-bye to them, even if it was with tears, so that you could meet them and tell them hello.

  I hope you enjoyed taking this trip with Tessa, Branch, and the rest of the family, including, of course, Mollybedamned and Blister. They became so real to me that I expected to see Mollybedamned parked beside our local drugstore and to find Tessa, Branch, Melody, Frankie, Ivy, and Lola inside having a pimento cheese sandwich and a fountain drink for lunch one day on their journey. I could sit on the bench outside the drugstore and imagine Mollybedamned right there in front of me. I could hear Frankie’s laughter inside the store as she and Ivy bantered back and forth. And I swear I caught a glimpse of Branch in his tight-fitting jeans and cowboy boots ushering the ladies back to the Caddy.

  It’s summertime here in southern Oklahoma as I finish this story, but you’ll be reading it in December. Merry Christmas to all of you—my family, my fans, my friends, all of you amazing people who support me by buying my books and sharing them with your neighbors and friends.

  Cuddle up under that brand-new fluffy throw that your great-aunt gave you for Christmas, get a glass of wine or maybe a whole bottle, and relax as you crawl into Mollybedamned, the ’59 Caddy that takes them on the journey, and set out on the road trip of a lifetime.

  I’d like to thank my editor, Kelli Martin, for her absolutely amazing help with this book. From helping find the perfect title to all her suggestions to make this a stronger story, she’s been there for me. I’m so privileged to have her in my corner! Thanks also go to the whole Montlake crew, from the publicity team to the folks who made the fabulous cover and to all those folks who work so hard behind the scenes—you are all appreciated more than words could ever express. And thank you to my agent, Erin Niumata, who took me under her wing when I was barely getting a start in this writing business and who has stuck with me through thick and thin. Once again, big hugs to my husband, Mr. B, who continues to support me even when he has to eat takeout five days in a row so I can write “just one more chapter.”

  And thank you to all my readers who buy my books, read them, talk about them, share them, write reviews, and send notes to me. I’m grateful for each and every one of you.

  Until next time,

  Carolyn Brown

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Photo © 2015 Charles Brown

  Carolyn Brown is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author and a RITA finalist. Her books include contemporary romance and cowboy romance, with a penchant for country music, and historical romance. She and her husband have three grown children and enough grandchildren to keep them young. When she’s not writing, she likes to sit in her gorgeous backyard with her cats and watch them protect their territory from crickets, locusts, and spiders. She resides in Davis, Oklahoma.