by Nan Rossiter
Dedication
For Bruce
Epigraph
At least there is hope for a tree:
If it is cut down, it will sprout again,
and its new shoots will not fail.
JOB 14:7 (NIV)
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
With Heartfelt Gratitude . . .
P.S. Insights, Interviews & More . . .*
About the Book
About the Author
Read On
Praise
Also by Nan Rossiter
Copyright
About the Publisher
1
BALANCING A TRAY OF LEMONADE AND WARM SUGAR COOKIES, MAEVE Lindstrom stepped onto the wide front porch of the old farmhouse that had, in its heyday, been home to one of Savannah’s most prominent families. But when the last Atherton—a daughter of whispered ancestry—suffered an untimely death under questionable circumstances, the house, which was already in a steady decline, accelerated that decline into utter disrepair. It was years before the abandoned property was purchased by a wealthy anonymous buyer, but it continued to sit empty, and except for the sounds of squabbling raccoons running down the halls, and bullfrogs plucking on loose banjo strings, eerily silent. Finally, after several more years of neglect, a young company that specialized in designing alternative living spaces for seniors saw its potential, bought it at auction, and began the lengthy process of restoration and repurposing. Ben Samuelson and his crew, when they worked on it, jokingly called it “A Place for Dad,” but when the beautifully carved wooden sign was installed, its official name became known: WILLOW POND SENIOR CARE; and the advertising campaign that followed caught everyone’s attention. The hip, young marketing team—a group of tech-savvy millennials—knew just how to target their audience. After all, they’d been promoting state-of-the-art facilities up and down the East Coast for several years by then, and with the baby boomer generation only getting older, homes for seniors were becoming a booming market. They used words like private, bright, airy, family setting, plow-to-plate dining, on-site cafés, individualized professional care, and free Wi-Fi, and with high-resolution JPEGs to match, their campaigns resulted in long waiting lists, even before online applications were available.
“Here you go, ladies and gents,” Maeve announced, as she navigated the long line of walkers and canes. Willow Pond was one of the few facilities the group opened that didn’t have an on-site café, but it did have Maeve, who, with her friendly smile, sprinkle of cinnamon freckles, and copper-red hair, was a ray of sunshine and a blessing to everyone who met her. It also had Tallulah, an affectionate orange tiger cat who swished between chair legs, stretched out in sunny spots, and when she seemed to sense a lonely soul, curled up on the owner’s lap. Willow Pond had the slow, easy, low-country charm to which its residents were accustomed . . . and it had fresh-baked cookies every afternoon.
Ninety-three-year-old Adeline Hart, who preferred to be called “Addie,” was not a baby boomer but a proud member of the Greatest Generation—and parent of the two baby boomers who’d convinced her she’d be happy at Willow Pond. Addie looked up with a start, and then tried to hide the fact that she’d dozed off. “Well, bless your heart. We thought you got lost, dear,” she said in her soft Southern drawl.
Maeve held out her tray. “I didn’t get lost, Miss Addie.”
Gladys Warren, who was sitting next to her, cupped her gnarled hand behind her ear. “Who’s lost?” she asked, frowning.
Maeve looked over. “Where’re your hearing aids, Gladys?”
“I don’t know where the maid is. She probably ran off with that handsome beau of hers. Have you seen that boy?” she added with raised eyebrows. “He is a catch!”
Maeve bit her lip, trying not to laugh. “Gladys,” she said, more loudly this time, “I didn’t ask where the maid is. I asked where your hearing aids are.”
Gladys touched her ears and then scrunched her face into a scowl. “I don’t know where the damn things are. Somebody musta taken ’em . . . again!”
Maeve didn’t argue—she knew it was late in the day. The setting sun was making the old willow tree near the pond cast a long wispy shadow across the lawn, and it was making long confusing shadows cross the minds of some of the seniors. Maeve affectionately referred to her charges as “the Sundowners’ Club,” and lately, it seemed as if only Addie, Aristides, and the Olivetti twins didn’t suffer the memory-stealing effects of the setting sun.
Addie reached for a cookie. “How come you’re bringing our snack today, child?”
Maeve smiled, appreciating Addie’s moniker for her—it made her feel younger than her thirty-five years, and it softened the blow of her self-imposed status as old maid. “Pam had to leave early. Her kids are in a play.”
“Oooh, I loved being in school plays,” Addie mused, her mind taking a turn down memory lane. “Did I ever tell you that’s how I met my Theodore?”
“I don’t think so,” Maeve lied. She loved when the residents regaled her with their favorite old stories, even if she’d heard them before. It made them happy and it made her smile, and besides, she’d recently read an article touting the mental health benefits of sharing one’s past.
“Well,” Addie said, giddy to have fresh ears to which she could relay one of her fondest memories. “I was assigned the song ‘I’m Wishing’—you know that sweet melody from Snow White?”
She started to sing in case someone on the porch was unfamiliar with the famous Walt Disney song, but Gladys interrupted her. “Yes, yes, we know.”
Addie nodded and continued, “Well, my Theo—who was two grades above me—was assigned the prince’s part, ‘One Song.’ You know that one?” Again, she started to sing but, worried that she wasn’t doing the melody justice, stopped. “Oh, what a lovely tenor voice he had . . . and such a gentle timbre. It was no wonder I fell in lo—”
“I can drink a full glass,” Gladys interrupted, eyeing the half-filled glasses on the tray.
“I know you can,” Maeve said, “but why don’t you start with half? You can always have more.”
Gladys rolled her eyes and mumbled something inaudible, but then took a glass from the tray. “When’s dinner?” she huffed.
“In an hour, so don’t spoil your
appetite,” Maeve warned, as she made her way around the porch.
“Thank you, miss,” Aristides Lincoln said, nodding politely, his dark eyes sparkling.
Maeve spied Tallulah curled up in his lap. “I see you’re the chosen one today, Aristides.”
“I am,” he said, grinning as he stroked the cat’s soft fur with one hand and took a cookie with the other. “Did you make these?”
Maeve shook her head. “No, I’m afraid I can’t take credit. Sal made them.”
He took a bite. “Well, tell him thank you.”
“You can tell him at dinner tonight.”
“What is for dinner?” Gladys asked, holding her glass out for a refill. Maeve started to pour more lemonade, but when the liquid reached the halfway mark, Gladys clucked. “All the way up, missy!”
Maeve filled the glass and wondered if Gladys was truly hard of hearing. She certainly seemed able to follow a conversation when she wanted to. “Well, it’s Friday, so some form of fish, I imagine. Probably sole.”
“Sole again?” Gladys sputtered, spraying lemonade. “I’m Protestant, you know. I don’t have to eat fish every Friday. And, my word! I’d like to know why Catholics get to dictate the Friday menu for all eternity! I’m tired of sole. How come we never have catfish or trout? My daddy and I used to catch rainbows and brownies off Ossabaw Island . . . and big ole catfish from the Savannah River. My mama used to fry them up in cornmeal and butter . . . mmm! My mouth waters just thinkin’ ’bout it. When in heaven’s name are we gonna have us some catfish?”
“You’ll have to ask Sal, Gladys. I’m sure he’d be happy to make catfish for you.”
Gladys took a bite of her cookie and closed her eyes. “Mmm, he makes the best sugar cookies, though. Better’n sex . . .”
“Gladys!” Maeve said.
“What?” the old woman asked, feigning innocence. She looked to Addie for support. “Am I right or am I right?”
Addie shook her head. “I guess you never made love to my Theo,” she said dreamily, still lost in the memory of her beloved belated husband.
Maeve sighed and continued to the gazebo-like space at the far end of the porch and offered Ivy Lee Byrd a cookie, but the tiny woman, crowned with snow-white hair, only eyed the tray suspiciously. “They’re sugar,” Maeve said, setting a glass of lemonade on the table next to her. Ivy took a cookie, but then just held it in her lap.
The screen door squeaked opened and a stout, bald, rosy-cheeked man wearing baggy black-and-white checked pants and a starched white chef’s coat peered out.
“Sal!” Gladys cried. “When are you going to make us some catfish?”
“Catfish!” he exclaimed. “I guess when you catch us some, Miss Gladys.”
“Pshaw! You can get some right down at Warren’s Fish Market—my nephew Hollis runs the place and he always has the freshest fish.”
Sal chuckled. “This is plow-to-plate, here,” he teased, “not river-to-plate.”
Gladys rolled her eyes. “This is B.S.,” she said with a huff. “That’s what it is!”
Sal raised his eyebrows, surprised by the old woman’s inferred language. “We’ll see what we can do, Miss Gladys.” Then he looked to Maeve. “Do you know where Pammy is? She has a phone call.”
“She left early to go to her kids’ play. Is it her husband?”
“No, it’s her son.”
“I’ll come talk to him,” Maeve said, maneuvering between the walkers and canes again and setting her tray next to Gladys. “I’ll be right back.”
She went into the foyer, picked up the phone, and clicked the line to talk to Pam’s ten-year-old son, Pete, who’d forgotten his costume. “Don’t worry. I’ll text your mom,” she assured him, and after reaching Pam—who’d already been home and found the costume—stepped back onto the porch just in time to see Gladys unsteadily lifting the pitcher. Hearing the squeak of the door, though, the old woman looked up, sloshing lemonade all over the tray.
“I’m still thirsty,” she said defensively, giving Maeve an accusing look, “and you startled me.”
“No worries,” Maeve said good-naturedly, soaking up the spill, “but if you drink too much,” she added softly, trying to remind the old woman of the incontinence issues she’d been having lately, “you might end up having to hurry to the ladies’ room.”
“Don’t be silly,” Gladys whispered indignantly. “I know when I need to use the ladies’ room.”
“Okay,” Maeve said with a sigh. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
Gladys rolled her eyes and folded her hands in her lap. “Humph!”
Maeve knew, now, Gladys—who could be as stubborn and ornery as a mule in mud—wouldn’t take another sip, even if she offered her money.
“Would anybody like another cookie?” she asked as she picked up empty glasses and napkins.
“You twisted my arm,” Loren Olivetti said, setting his glass on the tray and taking another cookie. He looked up at her. “Did I ever tell you, you have the prettiest hair?”
Maeve laughed. “You have told me, but I don’t mind hearing it again. It’s probably going to start turning gray soon, and I’ll be an old maid.”
“It won’t turn gray,” Loren assured her. “Redheads always keep their color. My Frances,” he added, “bless her soul, had beautiful red hair and it just got lighter as she aged. She looked like she had a golden halo—which she did, of course,” he added with a wink.
“You’re not going to be an old maid,” Aristides chimed in, taking a cookie, too. “Especially with those captivating blue-green eyes of yours.”
Maeve laughed. “Well, thank you. I hope you’re right.” She continued to the far end of the porch and noticed the seat where Ivy had been sitting was empty. She frowned. “Where’d Ivy go?” she asked, glancing back at the men.
Loren shook his head, and his twin brother, Landon, frowned.
“She was there just a minute ago,” Aristides said, looking around.
Maeve felt her heart pound. In the time Ivy had been there, she’d already wandered off twice. The staff all knew she should have been placed in a home more suited to someone with Alzheimer’s, but Ivy’s son had begged the powers that be to let her stay at Willow Pond until a bed became available at the new memory care facility opening in Savannah, and everyone suspected that a little extra money had changed hands to make it happen.
Now, Maeve turned to see if the old woman had moved to a different seat, but all she saw were seventeen crooked backs straightening up as seventeen pairs of eyes peered over the railing, and then all she heard were seventeen voices starting to whisper.
Maeve hurried down the steps. “Ivy?” she called, scanning the wide front lawn and gardens. “Ivy!” she shouted, feeling the icy fingers of worry grip her heart.
“She’s right there,” a deep voice behind her called.
Maeve turned and saw Aristides Lincoln standing at his full height—six feet two instead of his hunched-over five feet ten—pointing. Maeve turned, and through the sun-dappled curtain of willow branches and wispy Spanish moss, she spied a tiny figure standing on the edge of the pond with two trumpeter swans and several ducks circling in front of her. Maeve hurried toward her, and Ivy looked up, revealing a gentle smile on her face, but as soon as she saw Maeve, her countenance became shadowed with fear and distrust.
“Ivy?” Maeve said softly. The woman gripped the last piece of her cookie and stared. Then she turned back to the pond, broke the cookie in half, and tossed it into the water. The swans glided along the golden surface, gracefully bending their long necks, and skimmed the placid water, scooping up the sinking pieces with their beaks.
“C’mon,” Maeve said gently, holding out her hand. “It’s almost time for supper.”
Ivy pulled her sweater around her humped shoulders, pushed her bony hands into her pockets, and began walking toward the house, but as she crossed the lawn, she began to veer toward the driveway. “This way,” Maeve corrected, putting her arm around her, but Ivy
shrugged her off.
In the fading light of the golden afternoon, Maeve watched the tiny wisp of a woman make her way toward the house and thought of the photo her son had placed on her bureau. It was one of two; the first—which was more recent—was of Ivy with her son, Will. The second was a faded black-and-white photo of a slender girl in her late teens standing between two young men holding fiddles, and the year 1941 was scrawled in white waxed pencil in the bottom corner. Both men were wearing pressed white shirts with their sleeves rolled up and narrow suspenders, but the girl rested her hand on the arm of the boy who wore a fedora tipped jauntily forward on his head. The boys were laughing, their eyes sparkling with mischief, which raised the question: which—if either—had won the girl’s heart? Maeve watched her climb the steps and wondered what heartaches and joys, passions and intimacies Ivy Lee had known. Who were those boys . . . and what had they meant to her? Oh, Ivy, she thought, what stories are locked behind those frightened eyes?
Just then, an old Chevy pickup pulled into the driveway, stirring a cloud of dust, and now, eighteen crooked backs straightened up again as eighteen sets of eyes peered over the railing. Maeve turned, too, and watched as a young man wearing a light blue T-shirt and a tattered John Deere hat climbed out.
Gladys raised her eyebrows in surprise and then put her hand on Maeve’s arm. “That’s him,” she whispered conspiratorially. “That’s the maid’s beau!”
Maeve laughed. “Gladys, that’s not the maid’s beau. That’s my beau.”
“It is?”
“Yes, and you’ve met him before.”
“I have? What’s his name?”
“Gage.”
“Gage what?”
“Gage Tennyson.”
“That’s a nice name!”
“That’s what you said last time.”
“I did?!”
The man held the door of the truck cab open and a happy-go-lucky yellow Lab rocketed out and raced up the path. “Easy, Gus,” the man called, but the Lab, who was a regular visitor to the home, could barely contain his excitement.
“Hullo, Gussie,” Maeve said, bracing herself so the lanky puppy wouldn’t knock her over. “You have to take it easy up here,” she admonished gently, and he seemed to understand because every part of him, except for his whip of a tail, slowed down as he wiggled down the porch, greeting all the seniors.
