A Mother's Homecoming (2 page)

Technically she shouldn't be splurging on dinner or she'd be broke by the end of the week. Then again, she was supposed to be taking life one day at a time. Besides, Annabel had admonished more than once that Pam was “damn near skeletal.” A gravy-laden meal from Granny K's while the car cooled down would be good for both Pam and the vehicle.

Granny K's was the type of establishment where you seated yourself. Within minutes, Pam had placed an order for chicken-fried steak and a side of mashed
potatoes. Although the menus had been redesigned, she was thrilled to see all her favorite dishes still remained.

The platinum-haired waitress—Helen, according to the unevenly spaced letters on a white plastic rectangle—bobbed her head in acknowledgment of Pam's order. “I'll be right back with your glass of water, hon.”

“Wait.” Pam surprised herself with a burst of curiosity. “The original owner, Kat McAdams? Does she still run the place?” Pam had no real sense of the proprietor's age. When Pam was a teenager, Kat had seemed ancient, but anyone over twenty-five had seemed that way. Now that Pam thought about it, she doubted Kat had been anywhere old enough for granny status back then.

Helen narrowed her hazel eyes, assessing. “You from around here?”

“A long time ago, yeah.”

“Then you don't know about the stroke? Kat recovered, but the doctors told her she had to slow down. She has a room over at Magnolia Hills Senior Community, but she's in here at least once a week to make sure everything's shipshape. She sold part ownership to Davy Lowe, but he didn't come in to oversee dinner shift tonight because his champion beagle is supposed to have her pups.”

“Thank you.” Pam had cut all ties with Mimosa the night she left; the relatively impersonal inquiry about Kat McAdams was a low-risk way of easing back into her past life. It was unexpectedly reassuring to know that Granny K was alive and kicking and still looking out for her diner.

Helen moved to the next table, greeting a young
couple and their boisterous toddler, and Pam surveyed the diner. The setup hadn't changed much over the years, although the color scheme—formerly red and white—had been altered to a deep green and softer ivory. Additional booths had been installed toward the back where there had once been a jukebox and a coin-operated air-hockey table. During her perusal of the surroundings, Pam noticed that a young woman—maybe early twenties—was staring at her. Pam couldn't understand why. The stranger seemed too young to be anyone from Pam's past.
And too old to be Faith.

Swallowing, Pam pushed away the thought. If she kept picking at emotional scabs, she would never heal.

Suddenly she realized that the other woman had stood and she looked as if she were coming this way. Crap, for all Pam knew, Mae had remarried and this girl was her stepsister. But before the stranger had taken two steps, another woman ducked into Pam's line of sight and the twentysomething altered course.

“Why, Pamela Jo, that
is
you,” a tiny redhead drawled.

Pam tensed, feeling ridiculously vulnerable without her baseball cap and no food yet to occupy her attention or make her look busy. Luckily the woman already cheerfully seating herself on the other side of the table seemed friendly. She wore a sleeveless floral dress and barely topped five feet—not exactly the intimidating type. If she managed to break a hundred pounds, it would be because the heavy cloud of auburn framing her face tipped her over the edge. Pam forced her expression into an answering smile.

“Yep. It's me. But I just go by Pam now.”

The woman winked, conspiratorial. “Now that we're
all grown up, hmm? Well, I'm still Violet, same as I ever was.”

Violet Keithley. Pam blinked, reacclimating to yet another piece of her past rising up to meet her. “Sure, I remember you.” They'd been in different grades, not close at all, but Violet had been a member of church choir with her. Backup soprano, not one of the frequent soloists like Pam.

“It's so nice to see you again.” Violet shook her head, setting the voluminous mass in motion. “I always expected I'd turn on the radio one day and hear your voice.”

“Yeah, well … So are you here tonight with your family? Husband, kids?” Pam was more than willing to coo appreciatively over wallet-sized pictures of Violet's children if it meant not having to talk about herself.

“Oh, no.” Violet tittered. “Haven't found the right guy to make an honest woman of me yet. My sister Cora got married last June and told me I should take up fishing to meet men. That's how she did it.”

At the image of ultrapetite Violet wrestling a bass out of the Yazoo River, Pam fought a grin.

“I was going to meet one of my friends for dinner,” Violet continued, “but she called when I was already halfway here to say her little boy is feeling funny. He doesn't usually mind staying with his daddy, but you know how it is. Everyone wants Mama when they're sick.”

Not everyone.

Almost as soon as Pam formed the sardonic thought—born more of habit than heat—she reconsidered. Alcoholism was an illness and, as part of her attempted recovery, here she was seeking Mae.

The waitress returned with two glasses of water and
offered a menu to Violet, who glanced questioningly across the table. Pam shrugged. Violet was harmless enough and no doubt could fill in some of the blanks about life in Mimosa since Pam's departure.

“You mentioned mothers,” Pam said awkwardly once the waitress had gone with Violet's order. “Do you, um, remember mine?” Colorful at best and a drunken home-wrecker at worst, Mae was nothing if not memorable. Pam felt the best way to bring the woman into conversation was slowly. No telling how many townsfolk had legitimate axes to grind.

“Mae Wilson. Of course.” Surprisingly Violet's expression softened. “My condolences on her passing.”

“Passing?”
The clatter of the diner fell away, drowned out by the pounding in Pam's ears. Although she'd earlier allowed the snarky thought about Mae breaking her neck inside her house—which now struck her as in incredibly poor taste—she hadn't for a second believed it. Mae had once totaled a boyfriend's car and walked away without a scratch on her.

Besides, this was her mother. Wasn't there some sort of psychic umbilical cord? The woman who had brought her into this world and raised her had died. Ceased to exist. Wouldn't Pam have experienced at least a minor twinge?

Maybe you were too wasted to notice the twinge.

Violet pressed a hand to her heart, and Pam lip-read her words more than heard them. “You didn't know? My God. I'm so sorry. I thought …”

Blindly, Pam grabbed the glass in front of her and instinctively tossed some of its contents down her throat. Instead of the burn of whiskey she still half expected on some base, cellular level, there was only tepid water. It took her a moment to reorient.

Right, she didn't drink whiskey anymore.

And Mae Danvers Wilson wasn't alive anymore.

I'm too late.

Perhaps it was hypocritical to feel devastated by the loss of a mother she'd barely known even when they shared a house. Having not interacted with Mae in years, it was silly to think that not doing so now would truly affect her day-to-day life. But to drive all this way, to have rehearsed and rehashed and wondered for hundreds of miles how her olive branch would be received …

“Wh-what happened?” Pam's question seemed to echo from a distance.

“I heard liver failure.” Violet ducked her gaze. “I'm so sorry, Pam. I knew you didn't make it back in time for the funeral, but … Earlier this summer your aunt and uncle hired someone to find you. I thought maybe that's what brought you to town.”

“My aunt and uncle.” Pam swallowed. “They were going to be my next stop after dinner.”

“The Calberts?” Violet was practically trembling with discomfort, her gaze darting around as if she wished she could flee. “Oh, honey, they're not home. Your aunt was gone for a long weekend, one of those craft shows she does in the next county. I know because Cora's been watering all their outside plants while … Listen to me prattling on. I'm so—”

“No, it's fine,” Pam said. But of course it wasn't. What a horrible thing to say. Her mother was dead and she was blurting “it's fine”? She just hadn't wanted Violet to keep apologizing.

“I think they're getting back tomorrow sometime,” Violet offered.

Pam bit her lip. “Could you maybe recommend a
good place for me to stay the night?” Should she admit what kind of budget she was on? No doubt that would elicit more pity.

“A couple of those big hotel chains have places out by the highway.”

“I was thinking more … quaint.”

“Well, Trudy rents rooms, by the night or longer, in that faux mansion of hers on Meadowberry. She's probably got a couple of vacancies. Although …”

“Although what?” Pam prompted reluctantly. From the way Violet was squirming in her seat, it couldn't be good.

“Excuse me, ladies.” Helen reached between them to set down two steaming plates of food. Too bad Pam had entirely lost her appetite. “Can I get y'all anything else?”

Pam shook her head mutely, waiting for the other shoe to drop. She tried to take comfort in the fact that no matter what Violet's next words were, they could hardly compare to the shocking news of Mae's death.

When the waitress bustled off, Violet attempted an unconvincing smile. “Mmm. Nothing like Granny K's home cookin', is there?”

“Before we were interrupted, you were going to tell me something?”

Violet toyed with the lacy collar on her dress. “Now, I don't want to speak out of turn—Cora always scolds about me being a gossip—but it's no secret that you and Nick Shepard used to—”

“Nick?” The world tilted with nauseating speed, the way it had on mornings she'd tried to stand up too fast with a hangover. “What about him?”

“He lives on Meadowberry, too. Kind of across the street from Trudy. With his daughter.”

“F-Faith is in town?” Nothing was right in the universe. Her mother was suddenly unexpectedly gone, and her daughter—who had supposedly relocated to North Carolina—was here?
I have no right to be within ten counties of that poor kid.
If you looked up
unfit
in the dictionary, there'd be a picture of Pam. It seemed to be a female family legacy, one she had vowed would stop with her.

Belatedly, the other half of what Violet said clicked. Tiny black spots obscured Pam's vision as the blood drained from her face.

Nick was in Mimosa.

If this evening was a sign of what the teenage years were going to be like, Nick Shepard should go out right now and buy up the pharmacy's aspirin supply. Maybe he could get some kind of bulk discount. He'd have to drag his mutinous twelve-and-a-half-year-old daughter along with him to the store rather than leave her here because apparently she couldn't be trusted.

He and Faith were currently having dinner, seated side by side on high-backed stools at the breakfast bar—a habit that drove his mother crazy. “You have a perfectly nice kitchen table, Nicholas,” his mother would say. “I don't understand why you insist on eating at the counter as if this were some low-budget diner.” For once, he found himself wishing that they were at the table. If Faith were sitting across from him, it might be easier to read what was going on in that tween brain of hers.

As it was, she kept her head bent over the plate. She scraped her fork across the ceramic at discordant intervals but didn't actually eat anything. Her dark hair—the only visible trait she'd inherited from him—hung down, obscuring her features and shutting him out.

They'd always been so close, but lately …

He sighed, determined to try again. “Can you explain to me, rationally, why you're the one who's angry? You're a good kid, so you know what you did was wrong and that grounding you for the upcoming weekend is probably less than you deserve. Your grandmom and aunt Leigh already think I'm too soft on you.”

From behind the curtain of Faith's wavy hair, he could swear he actually
heard
her eyes roll.

“Why can't they just butt out?” she grumbled.

He occasionally had that same thought. But then he remembered that, technically, he'd blown two marriages and his daughter needed some female influence in her life to counterbalance the rough-edged construction workers Nick employed. “If you want them to interfere less,” he suggested, “stop proving them right!”

“You act like I got caught running a meth lab. I missed one lousy class.”

“A math class! I thought you wanted to take advanced math courses when you get to high school.” He would like to claim that her skill with arithmetic came from him, but truthfully, it dovetailed with her innate gift for music—rhythm and frequency and pattern. When she sang, it was as if he were being haunted by her mother.

Pamela Jo might not be dead, but she was definitely the ghost of his past.

“It's only the second week of school, Dad. Everything's review right now. I didn't miss anything important.” Suddenly Faith flipped her hair back, meeting his eyes and changing strategy. “Besides, you've always taught me the importance of loyalty and being a good friend. Morgan really needed to talk. She was so upset, that's why I bailed.”

At the mention of Faith's boy-crazy best friend, Nick
fought the urge to gnash his teeth. The girls weren't even in high school yet and Morgan was already dating. At the Fourth of July cookout, he'd caught Morgan in his backyard making out with some teenage punk who should have been old enough to know better. God knew what kind of trouble Morgan would get into by graduation.

Hypocrite.
He knew what kind of trouble he'd been into at that age. Which was all the more reason why he wanted Faith to expand her circle of friends.

“There's a difference between wanting to help someone and letting them drag you down with them,” he said. “If you skipped class every time Morgan was upset over a boy, you'd flunk out by Christmas.”

“What a jerky thing to say!”

Jerky, perhaps, but not untrue. “That's not an appropriate way to talk to your father. If—”

When the phone rang, he wasn't sure exactly which of them was being saved by the bell. He pointed to her plate while he stood to check caller ID. “Eat. We'll discuss this later. After your homework and a written apology to your math teacher.”

If that was Morgan on the other end of that phone, she was in for a rude awakening. But no. Ashford, Leigh. It was his sister calling. Had she heard about Faith's trip to the principal's office today? Possibly. Leigh's husband taught eighth grade science at the middle school.

He stifled a sigh. “Hello?”

“Hey, Nicky.”

Nicky?
It was a childhood nickname, used now only when she was deeply concerned. He'd heard it a lot after the divorce.
How you hanging in there, Nicky? You're doing the right thing by moving back home, Nicky.
Granted, he was having a difficult afternoon, but Faith had missed class—it wasn't as if she'd set the school on fire.

“Hey, sis.” He carried the cordless phone toward the living room. Call it male pride, but if his kid sister was about to lecture him on his parenting deficiencies, he didn't want to chance Faith overhearing. Halfway out of the kitchen, he circled back to collect Faith's cell phone off the island, throwing her a pointed look as he did so. Somehow the phone that had originally been purchased “for emergencies” sent and received an awful lot of texts.

“I thought you might need to talk,” Leigh said hesitantly.

He frowned. It was highly unlike Leigh to be tentative, especially where Faith was concerned. Normally the women in his family lobbed their unsolicited opinions at him with all the subtlety of grenades.

“To tell the truth,” he said, “I'm not much of a conversationalist right now. It's been a rough day, and I've got a pounding headache.” Amazing how half an hour with a twelve-year-old girl could be more skull-crushing than a six-hour shift surrounded by jackhammers and other power tools.

“I understand,” Leigh agreed. “But Nick …? However much it's against the manly men code to talk about your feelings, you're gonna need an adult to vent to. I remember how badly wrecked you were before, and Faith was just a baby then. This time, she—”

“Wait.” Nick paced the living room, trying to process his sister's words. What
before
and
this time?
“You're not talking about Faith getting detention, are you?”

“She got detention!” For a second Leigh's voice rose in outrage. But then she regrouped. “Not why I phoned,
one problem at a time. I assumed you'd heard because I've already got three calls from Granny K's, but … Your rough day's about to get worse, bro.”

He stopped by a row of shelves where younger, sweeter Faiths grinned at him from myriad frames. “Just say it quick, Leigh. Like ripping off a bandage.”

“Pamela Jo Wilson is back.”

No.
After almost thirteen years, he'd come to believe he'd never have to hear those words. Squeezing his eyes shut, he leaned his head against the top shelf. Pamela Jo? Visions of handbaskets danced in his head—all plummeting straight downward and taking him along for the ride.

P
AM TURNED THE KEY
in the ignition. While she wasn't one-hundred-percent enthusiastic about driving over to Meadowberry, she was definitely ready to leave the diner. The meal had been a dismal failure. Although Violet was too well-bred to simply bolt when the conversation had grown horribly awkward, it was as if she'd become too afraid to say anything else. She'd abruptly stopped talking, shutting the barn door after the horse had already escaped.
At which point, it broke its leg and had to be shot.

Honestly, how could Violet have worried about making it any worse?

The two women had endured the rest of dinner in virtual silence. When Pam couldn't take any more, she'd asked for a to-go box and brought the painful evening to a close. Until her aunt and uncle returned tomorrow, her options seemed limited to renting a room at Trudy's or sleeping in her car. That's all her day needed, to be arrested for illegal loitering.

Although Pam drove by several subdivisions with
stately brick entrances and cookie-cutter houses, Meadowberry Street had been established long before any newfangled neighborhood zoning. The winding lane was dotted with an odd assortment of residences, from modest ranch houses to a rare cottage to a grandiose three-story house to a rust-sided trailer that looked like it would blow away in a strong gulf breeze.

There was no telling where Nick lived—she slouched low in her seat and steadfastly avoided reading the names on mailboxes—but Trudy's plantation-style “mansion” was unmistakable. It wasn't necessarily the biggest home, but it was far and away the most ornate with its columns and decorative arches. In the golden summer dusk, it was easy to see the place needed some paint and repair. Still, Pam would bet it was picturesque in the moonlight.

She felt a moment of kinship with the old house.
I don't look my best in direct sun anymore, either.
There were two driveways—one that curved into a horseshoe in front and a gravel drive that ran alongside the house and disappeared in the back. Maybe it had once been a servant's entrance. It took Pam safely out of sight of anyone who might be watching from across the street.

Where the driveway met the backyard, a barefoot woman in a denim housedress and wide-brimmed straw hat stood watering plants. She spun around at the sound of Pam's car, splattering the driver's side window with water. Pam waited until the hose had been safely lowered before opening her door.

“Who the hell are you?” the woman demanded in a thick accent. “You look worse than some of the halfmangled critters my cat brings into the house.”

Pam was so startled she almost grinned. Apparently
this little old lady hadn't received the memo about Southern hospitality. “Pam Wilson, ma'am.”

The woman jerked a thumb toward herself. “Trudy. And this is my place.”

“I heard in town that you sometimes rent to boarders,” Pam began.

A white brow hitched in the air. “Awfully late to be dropping by unannounced in search of a room.”

It was barely twilight, but since Pam didn't relish the idea of sleeping in her car, she nodded contritely. “I apologize for the hour.”

Trudy sniffed. “There are four rooms upstairs, twenty-five dollars cash each. Tonight, all of them happen to be available. Ladies and married couples only. I don't house any single men traveling alone, even with Cappy for protection. And no gentleman callers!”

“Absolutely not.” Pam wondered absently whether Cappy was a hound dog, husband or sawed-off shotgun.

“The bedrooms each have small private bathrooms with a shower stall, but I don't guarantee hot water.” The woman tossed this comment out belligerently as if she doubted Pam were tough enough to weather a cold shower. “There's one TV, downstairs in the common area. You're free to use the microwave, but other than that, my kitchen is off-limits. I'll need to see some ID. Is there a Mimosa citizen who can vouch for you?”

“Violet Keithley is the one who recommended you,” Pam said as she reached into her car for an old driver's license. Technically it hadn't expired yet, but the address was hopelessly out of date. “I just need a place to stay the night until my aunt Julia gets back tomorrow.”

Trudy nodded sharply. “Well, come on then, if you're coming. In another few minutes, I'll be missing my program.”

After grabbing her duffel bag and leftover chicken-fried steak from the car, Pam followed Trudy—no last name; Mimosa, Mississippi's answer to Cher and Madonna—into the house. The air-conditioning rattled through the vents in a feeble attempt to ward off the day's heat. It wasn't the cool bliss of this afternoon's gas station, but it was a vast improvement over Pam's car. In her tired, grungy state, a shower sounded like heaven, no matter what the temperature of the water.

It was a humbling commentary on her life that the cranky septuagenarian and her run-down house were easily the best things to happen to Pam today.

N
ICK YAWNED
, wishing that the day's forecast called for rain. The cheery morning sunlight that filled his kitchen was doing nothing to help his headache. He estimated that between turning off the late-night sports show before bed and getting up to fix Faith eggs a couple of hours ago, he'd slept a total of … about four minutes. Thoughts of Pamela Jo Wilson had kept him awake all night.

No,
he corrected himself as he chugged a third cup of coffee in the now-empty house. He hadn't been thinking about Pamela Jo, the person. He'd been over her for years. His mind had only been occupied with the possible repercussions of her visit.

Last night had been like learning a Category 3 hurricane was headed in his direction. It stood to reason that he'd spend a little time battling denial and being angry, then start planning for how best to cope. It was a damn shame he couldn't protect his daughter from
Pamela Jo's presence with sandbags and an emergency supply of bottled water.

In fact, he was kicking himself even now for letting Faith go off to school unprepared. He'd wanted to learn more about Pamela Jo's intentions before he said anything to his daughter—who was barely speaking to him right now anyway. But what if she found out from a schoolmate that her mother was in town? None of her peers had ever known Pamela Jo, of course, but eventually adult gossip trickled down to the younger citizens of Mimosa.

Then you'd better deal with this immediately.
Leigh had suggested he meet with a lawyer today, which he'd initially rejected as overkill.

“She left us with no more than a note,” he'd pointed out bitterly, “in which she granted me full undisputed custody of our daughter. And all this time later you think she's had a change of heart and came back to Mimosa to fight me for Faith?” He couldn't picture that. In the short time Pamela Jo had lived with them, she'd had to be bullied into even holding the baby.

“She was a scared kid,” Leigh had replied. It was the single most empathetic statement she'd ever uttered about his ex. “I mean, so were you, that's no excuse, and she was horrible and selfish, but one assumes she might have regretted her actions since then. We don't know anything about what her last couple of years have been like. What if she's settled down and tried to have kids, but can't? What if she thinks Faith is her last chance at motherhood?”