For the past hour, Tracy had squirmed through meaningless dialogue, embarrassingly bad poetry, and swirls of color and sound that assaulted the senses and said nothing.
She had glanced at David once or twice, catching him hunched down in his seat, arms crossed over his chest. His angry glower had made her laugh.
"Even a chick flick would have been preferable to that . . . whatever it was." David shuddered.
"Movies we can do in Holmes Crossing." Tracy shivered lightly. "It's not every day I get to watch women throwing colored water at men for the sake of art." She shivered.
"You look like you caught some of the water," David said, glancing down at her. "Are you cold?"
"I'm an optimist. I don't wear my fall jacket until after Thanksgiving in October. It's not supposed to be this cool this early in the year."
Then, to her surprise and pleasure, she felt David slip his arm over her shoulder. "Well, your foolishness is my gain," he said lightly. "I can't be a gentleman and offer you my coat, so my arm will have to do."
It does just fine, Tracy thought, letting him pull her to his side even as she kept her arms folded over her stomach. To her surprise, she felt protected. Something she hadn't experienced in a long time.
"Do you know any coffee places around here?"
Tracy looked around the busy downtown avenue, getting her bearings. "There's a little coffee bar not far from here."
David tilted her a grin. "Sounds good to me."
A few minutes later, they were perched on stools at a table so small, it was impossible to avoid elbow and eye contact.
"So whatever brought you to Holmes Crossing?" Tracy asked, carefully sipping her hot chocolate as her arm inadvertently brushed David's. "It's not what I'd call a happening town."
David shrugged, playing with the foam of his latte. "It was a chance to get into a partnership, which is rare for someone my age, and I knew people in Freeman, so it wasn't completely unfamiliar."
"That would be Emily and Jack," she said.
"Yeah. Her family used to live next door to my family when I was growing up in Grande Prairie." He gave her a quick smile. "I went out with Emily's sister for a few years."
"I notice a past tense to that. Which, considering the fact that you asked me out on a date, is probably a good thing." Tracy looked down at her mug, knowing it wasn't really her business but curious nonetheless. "So did you break up with her or was it the other way around?"
David's smile turned melancholy. "Actually, Heather died of cancer."
Tracy felt her heart clench. A grieving boyfriend. This was not a good situation. "I'm sorry to hear that," she said, concentrating on a particularly large bubble in her hot chocolate that was proving difficult to pop.
David caught her hand, twined his fingers around hers, and the bubble was forgotten. "It was sad, but not what you think it was. I was going to break up with her before she was diagnosed."
Tracy looked up into his soft hazel eyes as he tightened his grip.
"I didn't, because it would seem callous," he continued. "So I stayed with her until she died. It was sad, but it was the sadness of losing a friend more than a girlfriend."
Tracy mentally scrambled trying to find something comforting to say. Not a grieving boyfriend, then. And while part of her wondered why it mattered, the other part of her was relieved.
"How long ago did that happen?"
David shrugged. "Long enough that the sadness is kind of comfortable. Long enough that I've been ready to move on for some time now."
The promise in his words hung between them as Tracy fought a mental tug of war. She had thought she could be casual around this man, but as he held her gaze, she knew she was playing a dangerous game.
"Moving on is good," she said, looking down.
"So tell me about your life."
To her surprise and, if she were honest, dismay, he tucked his fingers around hers, toying with them as if trying to draw out her secrets. "I understand you've lived in Holmes Crossing a long time."
She knew she should pull her hand back. Keep her distance.
But a small, lonely part of her heart was suddenly weary of the constant vigilance. "I did go to college here in Edmonton, so I'm not a complete hick."
"Ah. An incomplete one, then," David teased. "What made you come back to Holmes Crossing? Parents? Family?"
"Friends. Danielle mostly. And the fact that I like it. It's my home."
"Do you have family in town?"
Her mother wasn't a topic she wanted to bring up with David. Not in this quiet place with his hand wrapped around hers and the promise of more to come in his voice and eyes. A promise she felt ready to deal with. "My mother wasn't around much. Still isn't." She stopped there.
David waited a moment, as if giving her a chance for further confidences, but her family stories were exhausted. "So that's it? Just a mother who wasn't around much?"
Tracy nodded, giving him a quick, tight smile. "That's it."
"Sounds mysterious."
"That's me. Miss Mysterious," she quipped.
"You are. A bit. Kind of intriguing. In a beguiling, puzzling sort of way."
"You make me sound way more complicated than I am," she said, smiling.
You're flirting with him. Be careful.
That scolding voice again. Tracy pushed it aside. She and David were just doing this tonight. That was all. Just a date.
He laughed. "I just know that I see different sides to you every time I'm with you. Now you're a dark femme fatale who drinks hot chocolate and is kind of flirting with me, but not quite."
"I don't flirt." She tried to pull her hand back, but he wouldn't let her.
"Not on purpose," he said with a quick grin. "But then I see you with Kent and you're all soft and motherly, and I get to see another facet of the amazingly interesting Miss Mysterious."
She wasn't going to blush at his teasing. But in spite of her resolve, a faint flush warmed her shoulders, and she looked up at him, surprised to see the serious expression on his face. She held his gaze, and something unfurled in a part of her she thought could never be touched again.
"I'm pretty ordinary." She swallowed, struggling to stay in charge. In control of her emotions.
"Tell me what ordinary is for you these days."
Ordinary was good. That she could do.
She discovered that he had a brother. That his father still lived in Grande Prairie. That his mother had died three years ago. That he still missed her.
She gave him what little she could afford to, couching her youth in vague terms, mostly dwelling on the happy times she'd spent at Danielle's place.
And through all the casual conversation, he kept holding her hand, toying with her fingers, his gaze holding hers as they both retreated and advanced in an age-old dance of getting to know each other She knew it couldn't go further than this night, but at the same time, for the first time in a long while, she was having a good time with a man.
Tracy's cell phone buzzed in her pocket, and she pulled it out, sighing when she saw Danielle's number. She should leave it, but she knew if she ignored her friend, Danielle would come marching to the clinic and demand a date post mortem face to face.
That couldn't happen.
"Hey there," she said, getting up and pouring herself a cup of coffee.
"So. Date. David. You tell him you love him yet?" Nothing like getting right to the point.
Tracy tucked the phone under her ear as she dumped some sugar into her coffee. "Busy now," she said in shorthand as she glanced around the break room. David was reading the newspaper, and Dr. Harvey and Crystal were playing a game of crib. Monday morning and they were catching a few moments of peace before the day started.
"I need to find out now. I can't come over tonight to get all the goods."
"Learn to live with disappointment."
This weekend had been a turning point with her and David. A sense of a deepening relationship swirled unspoken around both of them. S
he sensed he wanted more, but she wasn't there yet herself.
Tracy glanced over at David at the same time he looked up at her. And winked. Which made her blush.
"Was it fun? Enlightening? Romantic? Smoochalicious?" Danielle pressed.
"Two out of four isn't bad." Her neck was growing warmer. She had to end this conversation soon or David would figure out what she was talking about.
"Which two?"
"Impossible to translate."
"Keep me in suspense much? Did you sit in church together on Sunday?"
"No." David had been on call, and even if he was in church, she wouldn't have sat with him on purpose. "Look, Dani, I should get going."
"Why? Your day doesn't begin for at least another ten minutes."
"I'm a responsible employee, not a government worker like some people I know."
Danielle chuckled. "Tomorrow night you have to give me all the gory details. Promise?"
"Promise."
"And don't let this chance slip out of your hands. He's a great guy and worth taking a risk on. I've told you before and I'll keep telling you until you follow my advice." And with a click, her friend was gone.
Tracy hung up the phone but couldn't face David yet. Her conversation with Danielle had resurrected all the emotions of the weekend, the hovering expectation that she knew would bring them to the next step.
Was she ready?
Did she dare open herself up to potential pain and loss?
She went to the bathroom. Caught her bearings again. Splashed cold water on her cheeks. Looked at her flushed face in the mirror. Thought again of David's tenderness with her. His openness.
Worth taking a risk on. Danielle's words rang in her ears. In time with the phone.
She heard David's deep voice answer it. Then he was calling her name. She checked her watch. They weren't supposed to go on their call to the Devlin place for half an hour. She wondered what he wanted.
She came into the coffee room, and he was holding the phone out to her, a curious expression on his face.
"It's your mother," he said, holding the phone out to her.
Chapter 7
Tracy held the phone a little too tightly as she turned her back on David, unease flaring up in her. Why had her mother called her here? Now?
"Hello, this is Tracy."
"Hello, my little girl. Sorry I had to call you here, but I don't have your cell number."
The smoky, achingly familiar voice with its note of reprimand created a storm of feelings in her chest. Feelings of abandonment, of sorrow, neglect, yearning. Anger.
Ever since Danielle had told her Velma had called her, a part of Tracy had been waiting for this moment. She should have been prepared, but her trembling hands betrayed the shock she felt.
"Just a moment, Velma." Tracy set the phone down and glanced at Dr. Harvey. "May I take this in your office?" she asked.
He nodded, his glasses glinting in the overhead lights as he pushed himself away from the table. "When you connect, I'll hang this phone up."
Without a second glance at David, she left.
"I've got it," she said as she settled into Dr. Harvey's cracked leather chair. She heard a reassuring click, and then she and her mother were alone.
"Hello, Velma," Tracy said, unable to keep the chill out of her voice. Part of her wanted to hang up the phone, to deny her mother even the most minimal of contact. "How are you?"
"I'm okay."
Even after all this time, just the sound of Velma's voice could still send her into an emotional tailspin. She drew in a long, slow breath and willed her pounding heart to still.
"Danielle told me you're living in Freeman now?" Tracy dropped into a chair, resting her elbows on the desk. Please, Lord, help me get through this.
"I moved here a few weeks ago. I'm not working yet," Velma continued. "But I'm gonna go for an interview on Friday." Another pause.
Tracy pressed her elbows harder against the desk, squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for the inevitable plea for money.
Don't do it. You've given her enough. You can't buy her love.
"I wanna see you, Tracy. I've missed you."
A cold wave of anger coursed through Tracy at the yearning note in her mother's voice. This was worse than money. No communication for almost three years and now Velma wanted to have a cozy visit. Just like a real mother and daughter. Which they weren't.
"I don't know," she hedged. "I'm really busy."
"I want you to come visit me someday."
I want.
Not one question about Tracy's wants. Not one question about her daughter's life.
Tracy massaged her forehead with her fingertips, as if trying to draw out an answer that showed her mother she had regained some control over her life. That made her sound mature and in charge.
"I'm not sure. This is kind of sudden." Okay, maybe not so in charge. Or firm. How easily Tracy slipped back into a defensive role around her mother.
"You gotta ask Art?"
And wasn't that the best example of why Tracy shouldn't go to visit Velma?
"Art and I haven't been going out since your visit to his parents' store."
Silence after that remark.
"I wanna see you, Tracy," Velma said, her voice growing unexpectedly softer. "I have lots to tell you."
"Like what?"
"Mistakes. Things I did wrong."
The unexpected admission brought an abrupt and unwelcome onrush of expectation. Her mother never admitted to making mistakes. She just made them.
"I want to make things right with you, Tracy. Can you come?"
"Will you be around if I make plans?" Tracy resented the longing she heard in her own voice. Resented the old need her mother easily resurrected. Whatever happened to putting the past behind her? Getting on with her life? How could she do that when it kept sneaking up on her like this?
"I promise."
"Don't promise, Velma. Do."
"I will. I want you to come. Can you come next Sunday?"
"I don't know. I don't have a car that works." The excuse was a flimsy defense. If Danielle caught even a whiff of this conversation, she would offer her car before Tracy could find a reason to deny it.
"Someone can drive you, can't they? One of your friends? Danielle's brothers?"
Tracy was surprised that her mother even remembered Danielle. Or that she had brothers.
"Can't someone bring you?" Velma asked. "I really need to see you."
It was the pleading note in her mother's voice that sideslipped Tracy to a place she'd pledged she'd never go again.
"I'm not making any promises." She left herself open, unwilling, unable to make more than a cursory plan. "Give me your number and I'll let you know if I can come." She scribbled the number Velma gave her down and looked at it as if by writing it she had already made a commitment.
"Call me," Velma said. "I'll be waiting."
Tracy waited a moment, and then hung up. She closed her eyes, resting her head on her hands.
I'll be waiting.
That was her line, not her mother's.
Tracy had spent most of her childhood waiting. Waiting for her mother to come home from her job at the bar. Waiting for her mother to wake up. Waiting for her mother to fulfill any one of the many promises she threw at Tracy whenever guilt overtook her.
Unbidden came memories of herself at age twelve, sitting on a couch in an empty apartment. She and her mother had just moved to Holmes Crossing. Her mother had been full of promises that this place would be good. That things would be different. It was already amazing. They lived close to the country. Maybe they could buy an acreage. Get the horse Tracy always wanted or some chickens. Wouldn't that be wonderful?
And for the first few weeks, things were. Velma got a job at the Sheiling Boutique on Main Street. They went to the café for supper on paydays. Tracy started a new school, and she had decent clothes. She made a friend. Danielle.
It lasted six months. Then slowly, her mot
her started coming home from work later and later. Tracy learned to cook for her and her mother and then, eventually, herself as her mother didn't bother coming home until after supper. She always had some excuse, some vague reason.
Tracy started spending most of her evenings alone.
One such evening, Tracy was watching television, eating her usual toast with scrambled eggs. After doing her homework, she had fallen asleep on the couch. At two o'clock, Tracy had woken up in a panic. Afraid and alone, she had rushed to her mother's bedroom. The bed was empty. Tracy crawled into her own bed, anxious and afraid, and twenty minutes later, her mother came stumbling in.
The next morning, her mother acted as if nothing had happened. When Tracy asked her where she'd been, Velma merely shrugged. Just out again. Phoning was an inconvenience.
An inconvenience that happened before and would happen many times after. No explanations, no communication to tell a frightened young girl where her mother was.
Those were the bad times.
The good times were when her mother cheered up. Put on makeup. Took Tracy out shopping and out for supper. Her mother would be a laughing companion, and Tracy would forget the dark hard times, thinking that this time they had turned a corner. That her mother would make the changes she promised.
But the good times grew further apart, the dark times became more frequent. Sometimes Tracy couldn't stand it anymore, and she would leave the empty apartment, walk the streets.
On one such night, a year after Velma and Tracy had moved to Holmes Crossing, Tracy, alone and bored, had wandered farther than usual. She'd ended up in front of a brightly lit church six blocks from their apartment. As the people spilled out, she recognized a girl from school. Danielle.
Luckily for Tracy, the message that evening had been about befriending strangers. Right then and there, Danielle decided to apply the sermon, and Tracy was her target. Danielle invited her over to her home. It was Alice, Danielle's mother, who had encouraged Tracy to come as often as she wanted. When she was older, Tracy had often wondered if Alice knew what Tracy's home life really was like.
Not that anyone found out from Tracy herself. Shame and fear kept the truth locked away. In the town where they had lived before, Tracy had tried to tell her teacher about her mother's drinking spells, but the teacher hadn't believed her. Nor had the neighbor lady who asked why Tracy was so often alone. So, in this new place, she said nothing, hiding her shame, treasuring Danielle's friendship and the times she could spend at her place.
A Silence in the Heart (Holmes Crossing Book 4) Page 8
