The Sweet By and By (24 page)

Willow returned and tried to slide
up
the banister. She nearly toppled off twice but caught herself each time. Then, by some feat, she managed to fall backward and ended up hanging by her knees. “Help.”

Jade jogged past Beryl and grabbed Willow's hand, pulling her upright. “Goofy.”

“Woo, head rush.” Willow dismounted from the banister and balanced herself with a hand on Jade's arm. “I'm hungry. Anyone for Froggers?”

Max descended, looking serious. “We could eat in the living room on the old moving blankets.”

“An in-house picnic. I like it.” Willow headed for the door. “Max, are you buying?”

“Willow.” Beryl's rebuke carried no authority.

“What? I don't have any money.” She barged into the fading evening light on the veranda. “Max, let's go.”

“She's not shy about much,” Beryl said as Max passed.

“It's refreshing,” he said, smiling.

It was a solid smile, though a bit too much on the perfect side. Beryl preferred a little character in a man's teeth, if not his soul. Learned those lessons the hard way. However, Max she liked. Mostly because he appeared to adore Jade.

“Babe, the usual for you?” Max asked from the bottom of the stairs. “Beryl?”

“The usual,” Jade said.

“Nothing for me, Max, thank you.”

“Beryl, you haven't eaten all day.” Willow stuck her head in from outside. “How about a burger and a chocolate shake. Sent me and Linc for one about a half dozen times last month.”

“Jade's been drinking chocolate shakes lately too.” Max's fancy-shoe heels clapped against the foyer marble on his way out. Roscoe lifted his one-eyed head.

“I'm fine, Willow,” she said. “By the way, did you call Linc like I told you and make sure he's seeing to your passel of dogs?”

“He's on it, Beryl. A few weeks ago you were ready to cart them all off; now you're worried over them.”

Max escorted Willow down the walk. The clap of their car doors echoed in the air. Jade wandered into the living room. Beryl gripped the banister to pull herself up, easing down the stairs.

“The contractor is already dragging in dirt.” Jade picked leaves from the room's corners. Roscoe trailed along, his claws clicking.

“I like this room. Wide, long, open, and a stone fireplace,” Beryl said. “The built-in bookshelves in the back are lovely.”

“Reminds me of settings in old movies. I started looking for furniture this week.”

Beryl crossed her arms and moseyed to the window. Guess now was a good time. “I drove down three weeks early on purpose.”

Jade walked through the foyer and out the door. Beryl watched her dump the leaves from her cupped hand into the yard. When she returned, she folded her arms and leaned against the arched entry.

“Why did you come?”

“I came because—” Tears surprised Beryl, and she turned toward the light of the window. She'd rehearsed what she wanted to say. How she wanted to say it. She'd waited almost two weeks to be alone with Jade, for the right moment to deliver her speech with her practiced dramatic inflection. Beryl knew when to sigh. When to look into Jade's eyes.

Now it seemed morose and melodramatic.

“Because? What'd you do? Burn the house down? Rob a bank? Ooo, get married again?”

“Because I'm sick, Jade.” The direct approach worked when drama seemed a bit much.

Jade furrowed her brow, pinching her eyes into a squint. “What kind of sick?”

“Dr. Meadows diagnosed me with chronic leukemia four years ago. It's been mild and manageable until recently. The war is going to the other side.”

“So, what . . . you're dying?”

The idea seemed unreal. Beryl Hill, dying? She was too young.

“Nice and slow, like a pig over a spit.”

Jade moved from the wall, opening her arms then closing them again. “I don't know what to say.”

“I'm not dropping dead tomorrow, so you'll have time to think of something.”

“You act like this is no big deal.” Jade walked the length of the room, slowly, her back to Beryl.

“Oh, it's a big deal.” The news was out, and it drained her. Beryl walked back to the stairs, needing to sit. The floor was too far down.

Her bones ached. Her bottom hit the second step up with a thump.

“Are you okay?” Jade appeared on the other side of the banister but faced toward the open door.

The western-floating sun painted the sky just beyond the rectangle frame of the door. A watercolor scene of brilliant gold and orange: the side of a porch post, the tip of the walkway, a tuft of weeds surviving under the swing of the iron gate, all lined by a row of looming, dark tree sentries.

Carlisle would bring out her paints if she were here. Of course, she'd want the marble floor to be her canvas.

“I've imagined you saying a lot of things to me someday, but ‘I'm sick and dying' wasn't one of them.” Jade looked around, her body stiff and still facing the door.

“That makes two of us.” Beryl leaned against the banister spindles. “One day I was seventeen, free, a part of a new generation. Then one forty-two-year-long day later, I'm my parents' generation, middle aged, my body killing itself.”

Beryl struggled against a new wash of sorrow.

“Are you in pain? Nauseous?”

“Tired mostly. My bones ache. I'm restless. Can't sleep some nights. Not much of an appetite. Can't work.”

“You've been through chemo, surgery? What?”

“Nothing so far, but in the last six months, my white blood cells have been doing a number on me. Dr. Meadows wants to start chemo and meds.” Her chin quivered and her voice wavered.

“What did Willow say? And Aiden?”

“They don't know yet.” Beryl peeked at Jade through the carved stair posts. “I've only told you.”

Jade snapped around, her eyes wide, her lips pressed into a line. “When are you going to tell them?”

“I don't know.” Beryl sighed. “Maybe at the funeral.”

Jade's laugh sparked her own low chuckle.

“I can see Willow saying, ‘Why wasn't I informed? Just because I'm the youngest, doesn't mean I should be left out.'” Jade sat next to Beryl on the step and hammered her fist against her palm like a gavel.

“You'll take care of her, please. For me.” Beryl covered Jade's gavel-fist with her hand. “She's a kite in the wind. Don't let her get caught in the trees.”

“I've always taken care of Willow, Mama.” Jade cupped her other hand over Beryl's, gazing out from the steps. Her tender motion stirred a warmth inside her. “This explains why you've been so different, kind of docile.”

“I suppose.” Was she docile? Beryl considered it fatigue.

“Are you scared?”

“I've tried not to think on it too much. What it means, death.” Beryl curled her hands in her lap. “So far, it means I can't work. Dr. Meadows took me off the truck, Jade. Rolf doesn't have a place for me in the office. Not that I'd want it. No one else in Prairie City knows except Sharon. I got tired of keeping it to myself. How much joy can one woman contain?”

“Does Bob Hill know? You two have been divorced—”

“Six years. He doesn't know, nor Mike. Nor your dad. Only you, Jade, besides Rolf and Sharon.”

“This is surreal, Mama.” Jade shook her head.

“I'd like you to be my executor.” Beryl drove easily in the practical, emotionless lanes. “Aiden's on the road so much, and Willow, well—”

“She's the kite in the breeze.”

For a while, they sat shoulder-to-shoulder on the step, silence a buffer between short bits of conversation.

“What's going on with Dustin? The annulment?” Beryl ventured onto sandy ground.

“Seems he's disappeared. Max contacted a lawyer in Des Moines who will handle the proceedings as soon as we find him. If we don't, Max and I won't be able to get married.”

“Max will find him.” Beryl patted Jade's knee. “Think Dustin will give you any fuss over the annulment?”

“He'd better not,” Jade scoffed. “After what he put me through . . .”

“I saw him around town a bit after his dad died, but then—”

“Rowdy died?” Jade's eyes were wide, her mouth in a surprised
O
.

“It's been eight years, I guess.”

“Wow, Dustin, that feels weird. I still see him as the calming force between you and Mrs. Colter, as the one who tried to defend me. Why didn't you tell me?”

“Probably thought you wouldn't want to know, Jade. We weren't speaking much in those days.”
In these days.

“June, Ward, we're home.” Willow held up brown bags of food, entering the foyer ahead of Max. The pink scarf around her neck matched the hue of her cheeks.

Jade met her in the middle, taking one of the bags with a glance back at Beryl. “Where's Max?” she asked Willow.

“On the phone again. Beryl, I brought you a burger and a shake. You need to eat, young lady.”

“I am a bit hungry after all.” Beryl pulled herself up by grabbing onto the banister and followed the girls into the living room.

Willow and Jade sorted out the orders, chatting about Froggers' good food. Roscoe stood between them, tail wagging. The aroma of grilled beef made Beryl's mouth tingle and her stomach contract.

“Beryl.” Willow handed her a wrapped burger and a tall shake. “Roscoe, we didn't forget you either.”

Trying to lower herself to the carpet, Beryl almost toppled forward, then Jade's hand reached under her arm, helping Beryl ease down to the floor. A white napkin appeared over her shoulder. “Do you want salt or ketchup?”

“Now you're talking.” Beryl peeled away the burger's paper. “Any fries over there, Willow?”

“Hot ones, coming up.”

Beryl couldn't chew fast enough. Willow was on target. She'd needed to eat. Willow laughed at something, sounding altogether like her Granny. Rolling and merry. Jade was more like, well, Jade. Steady and even, as if merriment from her must be earned.

Tears rose again, causing Beryl's heart to thump. She tossed Roscoe a fry. She'd miss them, her girls and Aiden, even in death. Though she hadn't earned the privilege.

“So what's up with the whole Dustin thing?” Willow dropped to the blanket, legs crossed, food arranged in front of her. “Here comes Max.” She held up his burger. “It's getting cold, dude.”

“Jade.” Max stood at the edge of the room, an intensity in his eyes. “We found Dustin.”

It was raining again. In the Blue Umbrella's office, Jade worked through the bank statement, listening to the water drops smack the window every few seconds—
thump, thump-thump
—to the lullaby of Roscoe's snore.

In the nighttime quiet, memories surfaced. Jade propped her chin in her hand and stared at the black window. Mama's confession remained on the outside of her soul like an
oh-by-the-way
, finding no ledge on which to land.

Eating her burger before Max came into the room and dropped his own bomb, she thought about talking to him. Should it bother her that Mama's news didn't bother her?

Jade would have time to deal with Mama after the wedding. She was used to boxing up her feelings about her. But Dustin? She had to deal with him now.

Jade slid open the top right desk drawer. The Froggers napkin scrawled with Dustin's cell number sat on top of her sticky notes.

Seven working days left to get the annulment. Max said the Iowa attorney he contacted was set to move the moment Dustin signed the papers.

Set to move. Jade slapped the drawer shut. Max made it sound like a business merger. But it was the ending of a marriage that once encompassed her heart. Did the fact that it was a dead, ultimately painful marriage change that reality? Or the excitement of his touch, the swing in her heart when he'd glanced at her down the high school halls?

Jade scraped her hair away from her face. She wanted a hot shower and her warm bed. She hated Prairie City showing up in Whisper Hollow. And why did Willow get to be the kite in the breeze?

“Are the answers out there, in the alley?” Max fell against the doorframe, his phone in his hand.

“Maybe?”

Moaning, he reached his hand around to his back and took the rickety metal chair. “Long day.”

“Is your back bothering you again?” Jade twisted to face him.

“Feels like it might catch.”

Jade's gaze landed on the wildflower poster. “I'm trying to imagine what I'll say to him.”

“Don't overthink it, Jade. It's a phone call. ‘How are you? Can you sign the annulment papers? Have a nice life.'”

Jade's fingers spun the pen sitting in the middle of her desk. “Sounds rude.”

“Babe, seven days. If we can't get to the judge by the thirteenth, the fourteenth isn't happening.”

“You're mad. You're blaming me for this.”

“Did I say I was? It's just frustrating.” He angled forward with his elbows on his knees, arching his back. “Shouldn't have gone to the gym the other day.”

“Because it's a detail. A bump in Max Benson's smooth road. Something you can't control.” Jade swallowed the emotion stinging her eyes and nose. “It's not about me or what happened thirteen years ago, but about you getting what you want.”

Max was silent, and Jade's heartbeat picked up the rhythm of the rain.
Thump, thump-thump.

“Maybe.”

“Maybe what?”

“I don't like my future with you being out of my control.” His voice wavered. “When I met you, Jade, you were like . . . like this fragile bird. I could tell one of your wings had been wounded, but you fought so hard to fly, high and straight. I wanted to make life easy for you, to help you.”

Jade rolled her chair over to him and slipped her hand into his.

“The more I knew you, the more I wanted to be like you,” he said. “Fly with my own wounded wing.” He twisted her diamond around her finger.