Loving Reese (Tremont Lodge Series Book 2) (12 page)

“I really think you should talk to Finn before you run away from the lodge,” says Bree.

“I am
not
running away from the lodge,” I say to Bree as she walks with me to my car. She carries my suitcase while I carry my laptop and a small laundry basket. Since I’m going home for a few days, I might as well be productive. “It’s not like I won’t come back to work. I just need a few days to clear my head away from the lodge.”

“I get that,” says Bree, “but Finn’s going to think you’re leaving because you’re pissed at him.”

“I
am
pissed. He lied to me.”

“It’s not exactly a conversation you lead with in a new relationship.
Oh, and, hey, by the way, I had a baby with an old girlfriend. Only I really didn’t because it died.
”

We arrive at my car in the employee parking lot. “Look, thanks for your help. The rational part of my brain knows you’re right, but it’s not just Finn that’s stressing me out.”

“I know,” says Bree. “But be careful.” She gives me a hug, and I get in my car to drive away to my hometown far away from the troubles of life…or maybe not.

I have a lot of time to think as Interstate 94 brings me closer to Bridgman. It’s amazing how much my life has changed in only a few months. Of course, I’d always hoped that Tremont Lodge would give me answers about my family. But now there are even more questions. Did my dad go to the lodge with my mother for the purpose of hurting her? Or was her death really an accident? Would Mr. Oakley have wanted me in his life if Mom hadn’t died? And, if so, would I be different from the person that I am now? What role did my grandparents play in keeping these secrets? Was the price worth it for them to keep Blake and me in the dark? And what about Blake? Does he need to know? Or deserve to know? And does any of it even matter?

As I pull into the winding driveway of my grandparents’ farm, the smell of grapes is ripe in the air. Nothing compares to its sweetness that is carried for miles with every gust of the wind. I let down the window to take in the moment—the moment before I confront my grandparents with the truth. I glance at the time on my dashboard—two hours before Blake gets home from school.

Because I’d called and talked with my grandfather about my visit, the fact that no one seems to be home is a bit surprising. It’s not like I expected a welcome party, but a friendly white flag would have been nice, not that I left on horrible terms. They didn’t understand why I cared so much about
opening that can of worms
as they’d called the closed chapter of my life. That book never ended for me. Why can’t they understand that? Maybe I could blame their silence on their own upbringing by immigrant parents whose time was spent working hard labor jobs just to stay afloat. Who could blame them for not having time to talk to their children about feelings?

I start a load of laundry and thumb through Grandma’s
Woman’s World
magazines that litter the coffee table. Headlines like “Seven Secrets to a Happier Life”
and “Turning Old Family Photos into Art” taunt me. The sound of the garage door lifting sends a new wave of panic pulsating through my veins, but it’s time for a little more clarity whether they like it or not.

Grandma comes in first. She’s lost a lot of weight which is quite a shock, considering her love of food and not all of the healthy things they grow on the farm, either. Now her sweater hangs perilously close to falling off her shoulders, and her pants are cinched with a drawstring that makes my usually tidy grandmother look like a stereotypical old person who is going senile and can’t dress herself properly anymore. Grandpa follows behind, keeping a steady hand inches from her waist as if offering invisible support. It’s really quite sweet despite being odd. Again, that whole
show no emotion
thing usually goes hand-in-hand with physical acts of love, too.

“Hi, Reese,” he says, giving me a shaky wave. “How was the drive?”

“Uh, it was good—not much traffic,” I say.

“That’s good,” he says.

“Are…are you guys okay?” I ask.

“We’re fine,” Grandpa says.

The silence in the room is deafening. “Were you at the senior center?” I ask.

“No,” he says.

“Umm…I’m doing a load of laundry. I hope that’s okay.”

“Fine, fine,” he says. Grandma walks down the hall toward the bathroom using a cane that sits against the way. She hasn’t even said
hello.

“Is she okay?” I whisper when Grandma is out of earshot.

“Yes, fine, fine. I’m going to go check on her.” He walks toward the hallway but turns back toward me as if he has more to say. “Help yourself to an apple in the fridge if you’re hungry. Good crop this year.” Then he, too, is gone. The story of my life—did I expect anything more?

I sit on the front porch, taking in the sweet aroma again and marveling at how pretty Michigan can look as fall nears. The mid-afternoon sun shines through the trees on the edge of the property. There are lots of workers’ vehicles at the end of the drive, seasonal employees picking apples or prepping the vineyards for the grape harvest. Sometimes in years past I’d watch the workers, many talking in Spanish, and imagine their life stories, giving them amusing, entertaining families with nothing but a happily-ever-after.

Grandpa pushes open the front door and joins me on the rickety wooden swing that withstands year after year of Michigan winter with only chipping paint to show as battle scars. “You going to stay long?” he asks.

“Maybe a few days—unless I’m putting you out,” I say.

“No. Stay as long as you like. The house has been kind of quiet as of late.”

“Oh, it can’t be that quiet with a teenage boy living in the house,” I say, laughing uncomfortably.

“Blake?” Grandpa shakes his head. “Nah, he’s never home. Got himself a new girlfriend, and between that and conditioning for basketball, it’s rare he’s home before 10:00, 10:30 every night. Can’t recall the last meal he ever sat down to eat.”

“Hmm,” I say, contemplating this news. Blake has definitely cut back on his texts to me in the last month or so, but I had no idea that he had a girlfriend. Maybe that’s the
change
he was referring to in one of his last texts. Anyway, it’s new information I need to explore. He’d better be home for dinner tonight. He did promise he’d make time for his big sister.

“You have a good summer?” Grandpa asks, shuffling his feet back and forth to make the swing move faster.

“It’s been…interesting,” I say, carefully choosing my words.

“Get all that information you were looking for?” He stops swinging and looks at me. A nice smile would have helped to prep the conversation we are going to have, but none crosses his face.

“I know I wasn’t abandoned at the lodge by my mom,” I say quietly. He bites his bottom lip but doesn’t speak. “And I know that your son did something that intentionally—or not—caused her to die. And then
he
abandoned me after taking a bunch of money which I assume he shared with you to relieve the burden that Blake and I presented.” I raise my voice the longer I speak and don’t hear that the screen door has opened again. Grandma is staring at me, holding herself upright with a different cane than the one she used to walk down the hall.

“Don’t raise your voice in this house, young lady,” she says, her eyes wrinkling with anger. “We didn’t take a cent from Johnny. We raised you kids because you’re family and that’s what families do. Johnny went out by Detroit and got himself a job. He did what was best for you kids by giving you to us to raise. He was in no shape to raise two kids when his charlatan wife ran out on him and got herself pregnant with somebody else’s baby.” She looks me squarely in the eyes, her own the steely gray color that matches the coldness of her heart.

“That’s not true,” I say. “Mom didn’t date dad then. She didn’t cheat on him like he did with her….”

Grandpa puts his hand on my knee and squeezes as hard as he can. I stop talking. “Enough,” he says.

“Why do you hate me so much?” I ask. “None of this is my fault.”

“We don’t hate you, Reese,” says Grandpa.

“You’re stubborn like your mother,” says my grandmother, spitting the words in anger. “Always have been.”

“I wouldn’t know,” I spit back. “Nobody talked about her much. I think I learned more about my mother in the last three months than I did my whole life.”

“That’s because you met your real father, I imagine,” she says.

“You knew?” I ask.

“I knew when Johnny came back after your last trip to the lodge to tell us,” she says, coughing.

I wait until her coughing spell has passed before speaking again because I want them both to hear the question I have to ask. “What did he say to you about why he decided to dump his children like a ton of bricks?”

Grandpa takes a slow breath and lets it out in a deep sigh, more like a groan. “He said there was an accident, Reese, something he didn’t do intentionally, but something that might look otherwise in the eyes of the court, and that he took some money as part of a promise to…to leave. It wasn’t fair to you to lose your mother and then see your dad possibly sent to jail—or worse—for the rest of his life.”

“And it was
better
to tell us
nothing
and lead us to believe that we were abandoned because no one wanted us?” I am yelling again, but this time Grandpa doesn’t try to stop me.

“We wanted you,” he says quietly.

“She didn’t,” I say, pointing toward my grandmother who uses the wall to support her frail weight. She doesn’t speak.

“If I’d known how ungrateful you’d become, I’d have said
no
,” she says, turning back toward the house and letting the door slam behind her.

“Why?” I ask Grandpa, tears filling my eyes.

He puts his hand on my knee and squeezes again. “Because when we agreed to raise the two of you, your grandmother lost her beloved Johnny. He was too afraid to come around anymore for fear that the tragedy at Tremont Lodge would catch up to him even after all these years, and he’d be sent to jail. And Johnny, well, he has always been her one true love.”

“But Blake and I didn’t sign up for any of this. It’s a shame she hasn’t learned to let go of grudges. She’s just going to die a bitter, old lady.”

The slap across my face is beyond startling as every nerve in my body fires shock and pain. “Don’t talk about your grandmother that way. You owe her your life. Without her, you’d have been put in the foster system. Would that have been better, Reese?”

I grab my cheek, imagining the red imprint of his hand still upon my face. “Maybe it would have been,” I whisper, getting up from the swing and walking down the long driveway to the country road that leads to forever and nowhere all at the same time.

If Blake hadn’t been in town, I would have gotten into my car and driven back to the lodge, but I couldn’t come home without talking to him.
Home.
What an odd word, since I feel more like a nomad wandering the earth with nowhere to permanently land, as if no one wants to claim me for his own. I sip my iced tea as I wait for Blake to arrive at the local greasy spoon restaurant, and I think about Finn and our stupid fight. I wonder if he is thinking about me, too.

“Earth to Reese,” says Blake, sliding into the booth across from me.

“Hey! It’s about time you got here,” I say, reaching over the table to hug my little brother who isn’t so little anymore.

“Other than the frown on your face, you look great,” he says, a large smile filling his face, his light gray eyes blazing with merriment and mischief. I suppose we both got our hair color from our mother. The realization that we are only half-brother and sister hits me hard, and I feel a new wave of emotion rolling through my heart. “Hey, I was only kidding,” says Blake, squeezing my hand. “I’m really glad you’re here.”

I blink back my tears and spend the next hour listening to Blake tell me about his new girlfriend Hannah—redhead, cute as a button, sweet as pie, smartest girl in school, and rockin’ body—and how he took a new job working at the state park cleaning litter off the beach now that the vacation crowd has gone back to Chicago.

“So you’re not working on the fruit farm anymore?” I ask.

“Some, but they have a fleet of seasonal workers. And, truthfully, I don’t have much time with all my school work and basketball and the park job—and Hannah.” He smiles again at just the mention of her name. “Plus, with Grandma being sick she prefers I stay in the house with her when I’m home rather than
run off in those fields
as she likes to say.”

“Sick?” I ask, confused.

“Yeah, the cancer treatments are a bitch.”

I suck in my breath and blow it out slowly, feeling light-headed as I do so. “She has cancer?” I ask, surprised.

“Didn’t they tell you? I mean, I didn’t want to tell you in a text message or anything like that, but I figured they’d have told you today. That’s kind of why I stayed away as long as I could—to give you guys a good time to talk.”

“Yeah, that didn’t quite happen,” I say under my breath, but Blake hears me.