Home at Last

by Shirlee McCoy

  Matt hadn’t had a chance to give that a try.

  Or maybe he had.

  Maybe this had been a pattern with him, and maybe Sunday had been as tired of it as Matt seemed to be of farm life.

  Whatever the case, she was keeping her silence, pouring one pancake after another like she’d never forgotten how.

  He wasn’t going to ask, because Matt was gone. His mistakes were in the past, and Flynn was there to help Sunday find her way back from wherever the accident had taken her.

  Nothing more.

  That was another thing that would be good to keep in mind.

  Chapter Nine

  The horses were set to be delivered a week later.

  Work on the pasture and fencing and barn had been in high gear since Sunday and Heavenly had been introduced to the beautiful mares. Now the fields were quiet, the river lapping against the shore. The sun, just rising above the mountains, drifted in hazy clouds that might bring rain later in the day. The moon hung low above the river, a white-gold orb against the purple sky.

  Sunday could see both from her vantage point.

  Perched on the top railing of the new fence, her feet planted on a lower railing, she inhaled the crisp scent of late summer and the musty aroma of freshly plowed earth.

  “Do you think they’ll be here soon?” Twila asked, hip pressed against Sunday’s, arm wrapped firmly around her waist. She was afraid that Sunday would fall. So afraid, she’d tried to talk her out of sitting there.

  Moisey had been more eager, climbing up beside Sunday and snuggling in close, bubbling up with excitement because she’d been allowed to leave the house before dawn, walk across the footbridge, and sit in the fading moonlight.

  “You’ve asked that a million times, Twila,” Moisey said. Like her sister, she had her arm around Sunday. Her grip was lighter, though, her legs swinging happily.

  “I have not,” Twila responded mildly. “I’ve asked five times. I’ve counted, because I don’t want to be annoying.”

  “You aren’t ever annoying,” Moisey said, and Sunday smiled.

  She’d forgotten how close the girls were, how often they defended each other. Despite the three-year age difference, they were friends.

  “Heavenly thinks I am.”

  “Heavenly thinks everyone is annoying,” Moisey said, her legs still swinging, her fingers tapping Sunday’s side. “Doesn’t she, Mom?”

  “She’s a teenager,” Sunday replied. “That’s par for the course.”

  “I bet it wasn’t for you. I bet you were nice. I bet you never called people annoying,” Moisey exclaimed, jumping off the fence and walking to the hay bale that sat beside it. The twins were there, playing with green army men while they waited for the horses to arrive.

  Two mares. A filly. And a donkey.

  A pony?

  She knew that the owner of the two mares had offered the filly and something else for free after he’d met Heavenly. She could remember that. She remembered the way the gnarled ancient farmer had lit up when he’d seen Heavenly with his horses.

  But she couldn’t remember what he’d said.

  Something about the filly being a good horse for Heavenly in the future and . . .

  Another horse being retired and needing a home?

  No matter how hard she tried, Sunday couldn’t recall the conversation. She just knew she had four names written on her palm. She glanced at it. Just to remind herself.

  Whisper.

  Early.

  Lively.

  Chance.

  “Those are funny names,” Twila said, and Sunday dropped her hand, smiled at her second-oldest daughter.

  “They are, aren’t they?”

  “Do you think Heavenly will want to change them?”

  “It’s not just Heavenly’s decision, sweetheart.”

  “She’s the one waiting at the end of the road with Uncle Flynn to show the trailer driver where to turn. She’s the one who already met them.”

  “Does that upset you?” Sunday asked, trying to step into the role of mother, because she was tired of the role of invalid. She was tired of letting life pass by while she waited for her memory to improve, her movements to become more fluid, things to go back to what they’d been.

  It was possible she’d never make breakfast the way she had prior to the accident—with ease and efficiency, her brain only half-focused on the task, because her muscles knew exactly what to do.

  But she had made dinner twice since the bacon fiasco, because the kids had been so pleased when they’d come into the kitchen and seen her at the stove. They’d been happy to eat burned bacon and less-than-fluffy pancakes and eggs that had had to be strained through a sieve.

  She’d written about it in the journal. The one whose last entry had been the day before the accident. There were more entries in it now. Written in her messy writing, in whatever color pen she happened to find.

  She hadn’t bothered taping together the pages Rembrandt had torn. She’d simply decided to move on, writing details of her new life as best she could remember them.

  And she’d remembered the moment the kids had walked into the kitchen.

  She’d remembered their smiles.

  She’d wanted to replay that moment a dozen times every day, just so that she could remember what it felt like to make them happy.

  “Why would I be upset?” Twila asked.

  “Because your sister got to do something that you didn’t.”

  “It would be silly to be upset about that. Heavenly is the oldest.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “And her going to see the horses is just a matter of fact. She wanted a horse. I did not.”

  “You don’t like horses?”

  “I never thought about horses.”

  “And now?”

  “It might be fun to ride a horse. Lots of characters in the books I read do,” Twila responded, her gaze on the distant mountains and the steel-gray clouds that were beginning to form.

  “Do horses like rain?” she asked.

  “I’m sure they do.”

  “Mom, really.” Twila shifted, moving her hand from Sunday’s waist to her shoulder, looking into her eyes, as serious and as focused as any adult. “Do they? Most animals find shelter when it storms. What will the horses do? They’re fenced in.”

  “They can escape, if they really want to. They can jump fences pretty easily,” Sunday assured her. “But if it’s storming, they’ll go into the barn. Your uncle has the pasture fenced in sections. There are gates that can be opened to allow the horses through. Some on this side of the river, and some on the other. We can open and close gates and bring them closer to home when we want them there.”

  “Uncle Flynn showed me the way it works,” Twila said. “But how will they ever know to do it? This is a new place, and they might not know the way.”

  “Uncle Flynn will show them. Tonight, he’ll bring them across the river and stable them. After that, they’ll always know the way back home.”

  “That’s a nice thought, but I’m not like Moisey. I don’t believe in fairy tales. I believe in reality. Like the sun coming up, and the moon. Like the tide flowing in. Like the boys getting into trouble, and Heavenly complaining and you . . .”

  “What? You can say it. Whatever it is.”

  “Making eggs with shells in them.”

  That surprised a laugh out of Sunday. “I’m sorry, honey. I’ll try to do better. I know they’re not as good as before the accident.”

  “They’re better,” Twila said. “Before the accident, there were a lot more shells.”

  “There were?”

  “Sure. But it wasn’t your fault. You were busy. Talking on the phone planning things for church or for school or for Dad. Or you were making lists or helping us with homework or trying to get the twins to clean up their messes. Or worrying about the bills. Or paying them. Or wiping down the counter or the table or washing the floor. Now you don’t have as much to distract you.”


  “But . . . you and your siblings talk about my cooking all the time. You’re always telling me how wonderful it was and how much you miss it.”

  “Because it is wonderful, and we do miss it.”

  “Shells and all?”

  “No one cares if there are shells in the eggs. Not when you’re the one making them. Look”—she pointed at lights moving toward them—“I bet that’s the trailer.”

  The other kids had noticed too. They were on their feet, watching as the lights drew closer.

  “Horses!” Moisey squealed, darting to the fence and climbing up beside Sunday again. “I can’t believe the day has finally arrived. All my hopes and dreams are being fulfilled.”

  “Nah,” Maddox said, climbing up beside her and slinging his arm around her neck. “This is Heavenly’s dream. Your dreams are all about being a princess.”

  “Every princess needs a horse,” Moisey huffed, but she was smiling.

  “She has a point,” Milo agreed, climbing onto the lowest rail, his arms dangling over the top of the fence. “A princess needs a horse. So does a hero. How many are coming, Mom?”

  Sunday glanced at her palm. Quickly. Just to be certain. “Four, but no one will be riding them today. Probably not tomorrow, either, and definitely not when there isn’t an adult around.”

  “Don’t worry. We’re not allowed on this side of the river by ourselves,” Maddox said as if she didn’t know the rule.

  “She knows that, silly,” Moisey said. “She made the rule.”

  “No. She didn’t. Uncle Sullivan did, remember? Right after we tried to catch Twila a goldfish for her birthday.”

  “There aren’t goldfish in the river,” Sunday said as the words sank in.

  The boys. Trying to catch fish near the river.

  “You weren’t at the river alone, were you?” she asked.

  “Yes, they were,” Moisey answered. “But don’t worry, they got in severe trouble for it. Uncle Sullivan and Rumer weren’t happy at all. Look! They’re here!” she squealed as the trailer pulled into view.

  Flynn had borrowed his brother’s truck, and it led the way, the paint gleaming in the early morning light.

  Sunday knew Heavenly was in the front seat, Rembrandt beside her. And she knew Flynn was driving, his hands loose on the steering wheel.

  She could picture him easily, the perpetual five-o’clock shadow, the tan skin. The dark hair, a little scruffy and a little too long. The fine lines at the corner of his eyes, the tiny white scars on his knuckles and hands from years of hard labor.

  In her mind, he was as clear as the sun in the sky, the moon sinking below the horizon. As clear as the distant clouds and the mountains rising from the landscape.

  It was Matt she had trouble remembering. The color of his hair and his eyes, the way his mouth curved when he smiled. Every night, she closed her eyes and tried to picture him the way he’d been. On their wedding day. Their first anniversary. On their trip to China to meet Twila or their trip to Haiti for Moisey. She tried to remember the way he’d looked at the courthouse when their adoption of the boys had been finalized. The look in his eyes when Oya had been placed in his arms minutes after she’d been born.

  She’d written about all those things. She’d read about them dozens of times.

  But Matt’s face had still faded from her mind.

  His voice.

  His laughter.

  She wanted to hold on to those things. She did, but they were slipping away, and it seemed like there was nothing she could do about it. No amount of reading journal entries or staring at old photos could bring her the clear, sharp image she wanted.

  “Let’s go see them,” Moisey said enthusiastically, jumping off the fence and sprinting through tender stalks of new field grass.

  “Moisey! Wait,” Sunday cried, jumping after her.

  But, of course, she had a bad leg.

  It gave out as she landed, her ankle twisting, her knee caving. She flew forward, landing hard and skidding across grass and dirt.

  “Mom!” Twila cried, rushing to her side.

  The boys were there too. And Moisey. Thank God.

  Horses were beautiful animals, but they could be finicky during moves, nipping, biting, and kicking.

  Funny how she remembered that, but she couldn’t remember how Matt’s voice had sounded when he’d said, “I do.”

  “Are you crying, Mom?” Moisey asked, her palms pressed to Sunday’s cheeks. “Does it hurt so much your tears can’t be held back?”

  “I’m not crying,” she replied. “And it doesn’t hurt.”

  Much.

  “How about your pride? Is that hurt?” Twila asked solemnly.

  “As a matter of fact, it is. Help your old mom up, will you?” She held out her hand, and all four kids tugged her to her feet.

  Brown hands and tan hands and ivory hands.

  Dirty fingernails and painted ones.

  Scuffed sneakers and shiny patent leather.

  Her children. The way they were today. Not the way they’d been in some distant memory.

  And this was what she’d wanted all those years ago. When she’d stood in front of most of the town, holding Matt’s hands and looking into his eyes. Wearing the dress that had been passed down in her family for three generations. Speaking vows she couldn’t remember.

  She’d tried to find them, hoping she’d saved them in the box of wedding memorabilia or glued them into the scrapbook that contained pressed flowers from her bouquet. The only thing she’d found was a poem Matt had written. Cheesy and long, filled with rhyming words and metaphors, it had made her smile, but it hadn’t said one word about what they had promised each other the day they married.

  She knew, of course. She’d been to other weddings, and she’d heard enough vows to know they were all pretty much the same—to love until death, to honor always, to stay faithful.

  Tires rolled across grass, the quiet purr of an engine growing louder as the truck approached. White exhaust floated into the purple-gray morning, puffing out into the chilly air. Fall was approaching rapidly. Soon the mountains would be tipped with snow, and the air would be cold with winter. The kids would be back in school, and she’d be puttering around the house trying to help Rosie keep order.

  It would be a good life without Matt in it. Just as it had been good while he was there. Despite his infidelity, despite their financial problems, despite all the things that should have been right and weren’t, she’d been content with what she’d had.

  And that had been enough.

  The kids had been enough.

  The farm and the blue sky and the predictable way the days had unfolded—one after another in perfect order in time—had been enough.

  That she knew, because she still felt it.

  When she lay in bed, wide awake, trying to grasp memories that shouldn’t matter so much, when she listened to the puppy snoring or the girls giggling when they should be sleeping, or nodded her head to Heavenly’s music as it drifted through the walls. When she crept through the hall to peek in on Oya, to make certain the twins were sound asleep. To just run her hand along framed photos of her parents and her grandparents and think about the lives that had played out before hers, she felt the peace of the place, the connection to the past that had always held her there. She felt the opposite of the thing that she’d written in one of her notebooks, the word she scrawled on the inside of her forearm every morning, because as soon as she’d heard Flynn say it, she’d known she didn’t want to forget.

  Discontentment.

  She didn’t need to roll up her sleeve and check her memory the way she had a few dozen times before. She remembered the word, but she still wrote it every day, whispered it during her prayers at night, because it was the great destroyer of life and of love. It was the thing that stole people away from homes and families and jobs they were meant to have.

  It had taken Matt, years before he’d died.

  It had taken Flynn’s wife.

 
; And Sunday knew if she wasn’t careful, it could take her, too.

  The truck parked a hundred yards away, the trailer right behind it, pulled by a large pickup that glowed silver in the rising sun.

  Sunday grabbed the back of Moisey’s shirt before she could dart toward the vehicles. Somehow managed to snag Milo at the same time.

  “You’ll wait on the fence, or you’ll have to go home,” she announced, and the kids dutifully returned to their spots, climbing onto the railing and waiting expectantly as Flynn jumped out of the truck, jogged around the side of it, and opened the door for Heavenly.

  She climbed out, all arms and legs and gangly body. Not as graceful as she’d be, but getting there, her long legs covered in denim, a plaid shirt buttoned and hanging down to her hips. No flesh peeking out anywhere. She had a cowboy hat in one hand and Rembrandt in the other, and Sunday’s heart stopped at the picture she made—confident and lovely.

  Instead of running to the back of the trailer, Heavenly set the puppy down and sprinted toward Sunday, her smile broad and bright. No hint of the taciturn teen she usually presented to the world.

  “Come on, Sunday!” she called. “We’re going to get the ramp and let them out of the trailer.”

  “Go ahead, sweetheart,” Sunday replied, not wanting to slow things down or put a crimp in the joyful morning.

  But Heavenly had already reached her side, slowed her pace, and taken Sunday’s hand.

  “I still can’t believe you let me get a horse,” the teen said, walking beside Sunday, still holding her hand. They were nearly the same height now, Heavenly sprouting like a well-tended field of wheat.

  She’d have hated the comparison.

  “You’ve earned the right to have a horse,” Sunday explained.

  “By what? Having a bad attitude and picking on the little kids?”

  “Things have been tough since the accident, and you’ve stepped up and helped out. I know you’ve given up a lot of time to be here when I couldn’t. I appreciate that, Heavenly. I hope you know it. Plus, you don’t pick on your siblings. Much.”

  Heavenly grinned. “Well, I try not to be as much of a bi—witch as I used to be. Sometimes, it’s hard.”

  “And sometimes we get the prize. Just for trying.”