Noah tilted his head to the side. “Technicality, but I’ll give it to you.” He let the wind clear the moment. “You ready for this? I didn’t know who my real grandfather was until I was eighteen and moving up to Mason as a freshman.”
“What?”
“You heard right. Grandpa Jack wasn’t my biological grandfather.”
“What? Your dad’s dad?”
“Uh-huh. Obviously Grandpa Jack raised my dad—and my aunt and uncle too—but he wasn’t Dad’s biological father.” Noah hesitated to finish; he hated saying the words aloud. “Grandma Laurel was attacked.”
Rachel’s mouth fell the rest of the way open.
After a period of processing Noah’s latest entry in the game, Rachel took his hand again and said, “Can we quit?”
“Are you OK?”
Rachel looked away.
“Rach?”
Without turning back, she said to the wind, “Let’s just quit for now, OK?”
Noah stood up from the swing and faced her. He took her hands and tugged her to the edge of the swing. “I’m an idiot. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to ruin a good thing.”
“You didn’t.” Rachel inched off the swing and hugged him. “You didn’t at all.”
The two walked arm-in-arm back through the yard toward the Inn. Masking a perplexed expression as best she could, Rachel wondered how she and her heart had traveled from a heap of broken bicycle pieces and a sprained ankle to this charming young man’s childhood home so quickly.
Noah wondered much the same thing, but his face featured a pleasant smile he didn’t bother hiding.
Chapter 6
“That was the best sandwich I think I’ve ever had.” Rachel wiped her mouth and placed the green cotton napkin on the matching place mat next to her plate.
“Thanks, sweetheart.”
“No, I’m serious, Mrs. Cooper, that was really delicious. Is it the bread?”
The I told you so look Rain launched at her husband couldn’t have been any louder if she’d screamed the words through a bullhorn. “Spot on, Rachel. It’s all about the bread. A ham and Swiss sandwich is a ham and Swiss sandwich. Not a great deal of mystery to that. And, of course, the vegetables are fresh and both the ham and cheese come from the valley, but the bread is what makes it a sandwich, and I make the bread right here.”
Malcolm snorted, but Rain continued, undeterred. “Our neighbor on that next hill, A&P, she taught me how to make bread twenty years ago, maybe longer, and we just get better and better with every loaf.”
Malcolm snorted again, much louder for effect, and Rachel raised her hands. “What am I missing here?”
“Not a thing, sweetheart. My husband here has no taste buds. None. Doesn’t matter how much I insist one loaf or one recipe is different from another, he can’t taste the difference between my homemade seven-grain and a loaf of Wonder Bread. My painstakingly honed baking skills are completely lost on him.”
“And you?” Rachel gave Noah a playful elbow in the seat next to her.
“Not me. I must have been born with an extra batch of good taste. I can seriously taste Mom’s bread before she’s even baked it. Sometimes she sends me pictures of a steaming hot loaf right out of the oven. Anything to persuade me to come home, right, Mom?”
“That’s my boy,” Rain said, blowing him a kiss across the table.
Malcolm stood and began clearing plates. “Oh, give me a break. I may not be able to taste like Julia Child over there, or what’s his name, Emeril the Chef Dog Whisperer, but I can smell like a hound dog, and it’s starting to smell like you-know-what in here.”
“Malcolm Cooper! We’ve got company.”
He reached down and took Rachel’s plate. “We are who we are, right, Rachel?”
“Wouldn’t want to meet you any other way.” She grinned.
After each enjoyed a caramel-walnut brownie and a scoop of vanilla ice cream, Malcolm again cleared the table, kissed Rain on the top of her head, and invited Noah to join him on a trip to town. “Be gone an hour. Hitting Tractor Supply, post office, Four-Star Printing.”
Rain and Rachel waved approving good-byes as the front door shut. The women chatted about food, place settings, and chocolate as they did the dishes side-by-side. Fifteen minutes later they settled into the living room. Rain sat in a small chair she used for reading and Rachel sat in the oversized black recliner.
Rachel eyed a large, leather-bound binder on the coffee table. “Pictures?” she asked.
“Letters actually. Help yourself.”
Rachel leaned forward, picked up the heavy book and slid back into her soft chair. “Are these the Wednesday Letters?”
“Oh.” Rain didn’t mean to sound as startled as she did. “He told you?”
“About the weekly letters, yes, ma’am. He said his grandfather wrote his grandmother every Wednesday while they were married.”
“That he did. Quite a romantic, don’t you think?”
“And then some,” Rachel said, holding the book on her lap with the cover half-opened.
“Guess who else writes letters like that,” Rain said.
“Mr. Cooper?”
“The very same. He’s not quite as precise now. They don’t always come on the same day, and he’s missed weeks now and again. But I’ve got boxes of letters from that nutty husband of mine.”
Rachel couldn’t wait. “And these?” she asked as she flipped the cover over and looked at the first page. It was a letter slid into a thick plastic sheet protector.
“Those are something different. Those are my Wedding Letters.”
Rachel looked up. “Wedding Letters?”
“It’s a tradition that started with my wedding. Did I mention A&P, our friend next door?”
“You did.”
“When Noah’s dad and I finally became engaged—and that’s a long story for another day—A&P contacted just about everyone we’d ever known. Friends from town, old neighbors, people who’d stayed at the Inn, a few politicians, even some celebrities, and had them write a letter to us. She was very secretive about it. She had a lot of the letters mailed to her place. Others she drove all around the valley to pick up. And if someone even breathed the word letter in our presence, she’d get all paranoid and change the subject.”
“What a nice woman,” Rachel said.
“The nicest. She’s as much family as my own sister and brother-in-law.”
“So when did you get the letters?”
“At our reception. Right here at the Inn. A&P said she bought the nicest binder she could find and then apologized that it was just a binder. The book was wrapped like any other gift.”
Rachel looked back down at the first letter in the book. “So what are they? Letters of advice?”
“Some of them, yes. Some were just congratulatory notes. Some were funny, or clever. Definitely some advice to follow and, quite honestly, some to ignore.” She laughed out the final words.
“How many did you get?”
“I never counted, believe it or not. It felt like every time I opened the book, there was another gem. There must be more than a hundred in there. Even today, when I open the binder, I swear I see letters I’ve never read before.”
“May I?” Rachel asked as she flipped to a random letter in the middle of the book.
“Of course.”
• • •
Dear Rain and Malcolm,
I am so happy for you!!! I am so happy you’re finally doing what we all knew was going to happen one day!!!
A&P asked for a few words of advice. Mine is really simple, kids: Find out what matters to the other, what’s really important, and make it important to you.
Before Randy and I got married, I didn’t know the difference between a racecar and taxicab. When Randy told me he was addicted to NASCAR, I thought it was some kind of drug or something. The first time he dragged me to a race down in North Carolina I thought I’d found evidence of aliens on this planet. I mean have you been to a NASCAR race b
efore? WOW!!!
But listen when I say this: I learned to love racing. I love it because Randy loves it. I love it because it makes him happy. We have been married over forty years, and I know in my heart it’s because I learned to love what he loved and he learned to love what I love.
We have been to races, we have been to beauty supply shows, we have hunted ducks together, we have made quilts every Christmas for each of our grandkids. We have done it together, side by side, sitting in front of some TV show I don’t like or some TV show he doesn’t like. But we’ve done it all together.
I love him. He loves me. I know it. He knows it. And people all around this valley know it!
I wish I had some advice more important sounding or better written down. But that’s it.
Congrats, kids!
Love,
Nancy Nightbell
• • •
To Malcolm, my second favorite brother, and to Rain, my very best friend in the world,
Is it real? After so many years and so many disasters, are you two really tying the knot? There are mornings I wake up and feel such excitement for you two that I have to remind myself it’s not my wedding. Insane, I know.
First, my advice for Rain: Be patient, dear. I know my brother better than anyone alive and I know there will be days when you want to break multiple laws and many of his bones. He will drive you mad. He has a short fuse, which you already know. But I can promise you that you will never be on the wrong end of it. The same may not be said for Ping-Pong paddles, pool cues, or cereal bowls. (Ask him about those stories sometime.)
Malcolm is a good man. A great man. He loves this town, the Inn, his family, his writing, and Brazilian food.
But there is nothing in this world or any other that he loves more than you. I’ve seen it in his eyes since you first met. I’ve heard it in his voice.
I believe with all my heart he is meant for you.
And now a few pearls of wisdom for my knuckle-chops brother:
Read what I’ve written for your new bride. If anything I said doesn’t come true, if you say an unkind word, raise a hand, stray from her, or break her heart with even the tiniest little crack, I will come down on you with the full force of the law. There will not be a country far enough away for you to hide in. Got it, bro?
I love you, Malcolm. Thank you for being the only man I ever believed could make Rain happy. Thank you for being a son that Mom and Dad could love unconditionally.
I am proud of a lot in my makeshift, make-the-best-of-it life. But nothing makes me prouder than to call you my brother.
I love you both.
Sam
Chapter 7
Rachel would have said something if she could speak at all.
“So?” Rain said.
Rachel hadn’t realized that while she had been reading the letters aloud, Rain had changed chairs and now sat right next to her on a wooden stool topped with a heavy slice of polished tree trunk.
“Are you all right?” Rain put her hand on Rachel’s forearm.
Rachel sniffled and closed the book, gingerly setting it back on the table in front of her. Then she swiped under her eyes with the tips of her index fingers and sniffled a second time. “Huh,” she said, looking to her left and making eye contact with Rain. “I didn’t see that coming.”
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. Do you want to talk about something?”
Rachel smiled. “Seriously—you Coopers do like to talk, don’t you?”
Rain smiled back. “It’s the only way.”
With both hands Rachel covered her face briefly, massaging her forehead with her fingertips. “I’m so embarrassed,” she blurted and the volume surprised them both.
“Don’t be. Many of the letters are quite touching. I cry all the time, too, and I’ve been married twenty-five years.”
Rachel looked back down at the book. “So much honesty. I don’t think my family has ever known that kind of truth. Good, bad, ugly—it doesn’t matter.” She took a long breath. “I hope I get letters like that some day.”
When Rain was sure Rachel was done, she added with all the confidence of a mother: “You will.”
The two women talked about the Shenandoah Valley, A&P, the challenges of running a B&B, local restaurants, shopping in nearby Harrisonburg, and Rachel’s master’s degree and future—she hoped—at the Department of Justice working on a first-year grant. “It’s about encouraging corporations to invest in solutions to violence in the nation’s capital. Getting government and business to work together, you know?”
Rain raised her head as if complimenting her own daughter. “I love that passion.”
“I just really believe in this,” Rachel said in one of her most genuine, revealing moments of the day.
They chatted about Samantha, Samantha’s daughter, Angela, and Angela’s new baby, Taylor. Rain told stories about Uncle Matthew, his wife Monica, and their adopted son, Jack. “Most of us call him LJ, short for Little Jack. He was named after his grandfather before the adoption was even final.” Rain added proudly that he’d become an all-American track-and-field star at Arkansas.
Rain shared anecdotes about Laurel’s eccentric and thoroughly adorable sister, Allyson. “Believe it or not, Allyson wrote a New York Times bestselling book at the age of seventy-one. It’s an autobiography, or a memoir as they are calling them now. It’s hilarious and very, very Allyson.”
“She lives nearby?”
“She lives—I should say runs—a very hoity-toity retirement facility out west in Las Vegas.”
“Oh, so she’s a manager?”
“No,” Rain chuckled. “Just a resident, but she runs it anyway. Think of it like this. Allyson is the kind of woman that if she were, say, a junior chef at the White House, she’d be the one actually running the country and pushing all the buttons.”
“Scary,” Rachel said.
Rain laughed. “You have no idea.”
Rain pulled a photo album from a shelf and described the night the family found Jack and Laurel’s stash of letters. She shared some of the more entertaining stories and even excused herself to retrieve the Tennessee license plate still hanging on one of the bedroom walls upstairs.
She handed it to Rachel. “Read it.”
Rachel turned it over and read the message on the back, written in black Sharpie that had faded little in forty-one years. “‘To Laurel and Jack,’” Rachel read. “‘Enjoy your last days. Elvis and Priscilla, 1970.’”
She flipped the license plate back over. “Are you kidding me with this?”
“Not. An. Ounce.” Rain punched each word for effect.
Rachel handed it back to her. “That’s crazy cool.”
They chatted on until they heard Malcolm and Noah’s voices outside and growing louder as they raced toward the house. Their arms and legs tumbled in a tangled heap as they fell through the front door.
“Bam!” Noah shouted. “My foot hit the inside first!”
“Cheater,” Malcolm mumbled as he regained his balance and followed Noah down the hallway.
“My boys getting along?” Rain said when they arrived in the living room.
They took turns rattling off their self-described impressive list of accomplishments during their trip into Woodstock.
“Isn’t that so like men?” Rain said, turning to Rachel. “They run a few errands all by themselves and suddenly they think they’ve solved gridlock in DC.”
Rachel agreed with an exaggerated nod, and Noah reached down for her hand. “Shh. Don’t say anything,” he whispered loud enough for all three to hear. “It’s a trap. Next she’ll ask for your voter registration card to see if you have chosen a political party.”
“Watch it, kid. I still bake the bread,” Rain said.
The good-byes took longer than usual and Rain threw a thousand options at the couple to occupy more time in the valley, one of which involved taking advantage of another evening without guests and staying the night in separate rooms. “You can go home in
the morning.”
“We need to head back, Mom. I promised Rachel we’d get home at a decent hour, and I still want to take the Skyline Drive.”
Even though Noah didn’t need them, Malcolm gave his son detailed directions for entering the scenic byway off Route 33 east of Harrisonburg and exiting in Front Royal.
“Thanks, Corn Pops.” Noah wrapped his arms around his father’s lower back and with a grunt lifted him off the ground. Then he hugged his mother, told her he loved her and waited for Rachel to say her good-byes as well.
“I won’t try to lift you,” she said to Malcolm, shaking his hand firmly and flashing her broad smile and model-white teeth.
“She’s a smart kid.” He yanked playfully on Noah’s ear. “See what a master’s degree would get you?”
Rachel instinctively extended her hand to Rain as well, but Rain stepped toward her and hugged her tight. “You are a gem of a woman, Rachel. I just loved having you here today.” Then she whispered in her ear, “Come back anytime. You don’t even have to bring Noah.”
Malcolm and Rain trailed the young couple down the hallway and outside. They called another round of good-byes from the porch as Noah beat Rachel to the door and waited for her to offer her own final wave. She stepped up and into the truck.
As he circled around to the driver’s side, his mother called out once again. “Wait,” she said and bounded down the porch stairs. She wrapped her thin arms around Noah’s shoulders and said, “Drive safe, son.”
“I always do, Mom. Love you.”
Then his mother glanced at Rachel fiddling with her seatbelt and said softly in his ear, “Don’t let this one go.”
Chapter 8
Even in his deepest of daydreams, Noah couldn’t have imagined how well Rachel’s first trip to Woodstock would go. It had unlocked something inside her, perhaps even inspired her.
“You need to get out of the city more often,” Noah joked.
Rachel raved about Noah’s parents on the drive home, the next day on the tennis court, and over dinner with a group of friends the next night at a Brazilian restaurant at the crowded Fair Oaks Mall. The more time passed, the more enamored she seemed with the Coopers’ warmth and sincerity.
The Wedding Letters Page 4
