Vintage Ladybug Farm (33 page)

Ida Mae just looked at him with those fierce eyes of hers, and then she grabbed his shoulders and gave him a hearty slap on the back. “Your grandma would be real proud of you,” she said simply and let him go.

And then there was nothing to do but to walk up to Lindsay. She just looked at him for a moment, smiling through those wet eyes. “We’re coming to South Carolina for your graduation,” she told him. “All of us.”

“Good,” he said. “That’ll be good.”

“You be sure to send us your graduation packet, because they said on the website that sometimes recruits forget.”

“I won’t forget,” he promised her.

“And write,” she said, “or e-mail. Because we’ll be checking every day.”

“I will,” he said, “whenever I can get to a computer.”

He glanced around, not knowing what else to say and feeling a little uncomfortable. “I never did get to that grass.”

Her eyes were brimming now. “Don’t worry about it.”

He stepped forward and hugged her, and what he wanted to do was thank her for everything she’d done, but somehow that didn’t seem like enough. It didn’t seem like anything he could say would be enough, so in the end all he could whisper was, “I love you, Mom.”

It turned out that was enough, after all.

Dominic took his duffle and stowed it in the back of the cab. Noah didn’t trust himself to look back at the ladies, so he said instead to Dominic, in a quiet voice, “You’re going to be around, right? To kind of keep an eye on things?”

Dominic replied, “That’s my plan.”

“That’s good. Because all these women … they need a man around, you know?”

Dominic nodded soberly. “I couldn’t agree more.”

He took a breath and paused for a minute to survey his surroundings, to take it in one more time, to memorize it. The house had a new metal roof on the porch now. The barn had a fresh coat of paint. The goat was standing on top of its house, bleating. The sheep looked like puffs of cloud in the meadow, with that black-and-white dog crouched down in the grass watching them. He’d have to remember that and paint the picture someday.

Dominic said beside him, “Regrets, son?”

Noah looked at him, and straightened his shoulders. “No, sir,” he said. “I want to be a Marine.” And in a moment he added, because he had seen them do it on TV, “
Sir
.”

Dominic smiled and clapped him on the shoulder. “Okay, soldier, let’s hit the road.”

Noah got into the truck with everybody calling good-bye to him, and even when the truck was halfway down the driveway, he looked in the mirror and they were still there, waving.

~*~

Bridget, seeing the dejected look on Lindsay’s face as she watched her two men drive away, suggested they clean up the party mess tomorrow, but Ida Mae was having none of it. “Idle hands are the devil’s workshop,” she declared predictably and handed everyone a trash bag.

“She’s right, you know,” said Lori, plucking sticky paper plates and frosting-coated plastic utensils off the tables and dropping them into her trash bag. “Physical activity increases endorphins, and when endorphin levels get high enough, it’s impossible for the mind to focus on being sad. That’s how the whole thing about women getting together to clean house after somebody dies got started.”

“Ain’t got nothing to do with it,” Ida Mae declared with a grunt, placing plastic wrap over a tray of leftovers. “You clean house after a death to get rid of the bad spirits; everybody knows that.”

Bridget suggested tactfully, “Perhaps the less said about people dying at the moment?”

Lori looked guiltily at Lindsay, who was determinedly placing glasses in the plastic dish tub and pretending to pay no attention to the conversation. “Really, Aunt Lindsay, I wouldn’t worry if I were you. The president is pulling another 50,000 troops out of Afghanistan this year alone and hey,” she added, on a sudden thought, “who knows? Noah might not even graduate basic! I hear it’s really hard.”

“Thank you, Miss Sunshine,” her mother murmured and swatted her behind with a roll of bunting as she passed.

Lori looked offended, but Lindsay smiled at her. The smile was probably meant to be reassuring, but it looked a little wan. Just a little. “That’s okay, honey. I’m not really sad. It’s just that everywhere I look, I see him.” Now she was gazing at the mural and at his signature in the bottom right corner beside hers. “The place won’t be the same without him.”

“Well, it looks like I just missed the party,” said a male voice from the doorway, and everyone turned.

“Mark!” exclaimed Cici in surprise. “We didn’t expect you until the weekend!”

“I got away early,” he answered with a grin. His eyes were on Lori but broke away for an instant to sweep across the remains of the feast. “But not early enough, from the looks of it.”

Lori recovered from her shock and cried, “Mark!”

She dropped the trash bag and launched herself into his arms. He caught her and whirled her around, laughing.

“Mark! Oh, Mark!” He set her on her feet and she caught his face between her hands and kissed him hard. “I love you so much!”

Then, still holding his face like a precious work of art, she leaned back and gazed up at him, her face filled with adoration and regret and longing. “I love you so much,” she repeated, her voice quavering a bit. “And … I can’t marry you.”

She burst into tears and pushed away from him, running toward the house.

Mark stood there for one stunned moment, staring after her. Then called, “Lori!” and followed, stumbling a little, in her wake.

For a moment, no one spoke. Then Ida Mae slammed down the dish she was wrapping, placed her hands firmly on her hips, and looked from one to the other of them. “Now you tell me,” she demanded, with only the slightest note of grim satisfaction in her tone, “who didn’t see
that
coming?”

~*~

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

The Angel of Ladybug Farm

Dear Mom,

I’m so sorry I disappointed you, and everyone, and especially Mark. Please don’t think I don’t know how badly I’ve screwed up. I thought I could do it. I really did. I thought it was what I wanted. But in the end, you were right—you can’t live someone else’s dream. If I had gone through with the wedding, I would’ve spent the rest of my life wondering what I’d missed out on. And I guess, in the end, I’m just not the marrying kind of girl.

I’m sorry I left so abruptly, but I just couldn’t talk about it. I still can’t. I’ll call you when I’m able, but right now, I just need to be alone for a while to think about things. Please don’t worry about me. You know I’ll always come home to Ladybug Farm.

Love,

Lori

Cici
let the screen door squeak closed behind her as she came out onto the porch. The two women looked up at her from their rocking chairs, a mixture of anxiety and reassurance on their faces. Silently, Cici passed the printed e-mail to Bridget, who read it and passed it to Lindsay. Lindsay read it and looked across at Cici. “Are you okay?”

Cici nodded and sank into her chair. “It just hurts to see your child in pain.”

It had all happened so fast and mostly in silence. Mark left without speaking to, or even looking at, any of them. A few minutes later, Lori came downstairs with her rolling suitcase in hand, her eyes swollen from crying, and no ring on her finger. When Cici tried to talk to her, she just shook her head, choked out a few mostly incoherent words of reassurance—“I’m okay. It’s fine. Don’t worry”— and got into her car. She hadn’t answered her phone for the past four hours, so getting the e-mail had been an enormous relief.

Bridget said, “I read a story one time about how, when the gods finished creating woman, they stood back and looked at what they’d done. They had given her a body strong enough to run a marathon, a mind fast enough to do six things at once, a heart big enough to love even while it was breaking, hands that could paint a masterpiece or feed a family or write a symphony. And they were afraid, because they saw that what they had made was stronger than they were. They knew they had to create a secret weapon, one thing they could use to destroy her. So they gave her children.”

The silence that embraced them was sweet and melancholy, and no one spoke for a time. Then Cici glanced at Lindsay. “How are you holding up?” she inquired gently.

Lindsay said, “I’m okay. To tell the truth, all the drama with Lori kind of took my mind off missing Noah. Who knew the poor kid was going through all that?”

“I knew she was a little ambivalent about the wedding,” Bridget confessed, “but I never expected her to call it off completely.”

Cici sighed. “Well, the good news is that she found out what she wanted before it was too late. The bad news is …” She glanced at the other two ruefully. “Jonathon and Diane are not going to be my in-laws.”

The other two nodded regretfully, appreciating this.

Late afternoon had come and gone and the shadows on the lawn lay dark and still. A pale sky outlined the silvery mountains, and starlings looked like silhouette cutouts as they darted between the house and the barn. The chickens had gone in to roost. The sheep were huddled in the far pasture, awaiting the night, and Rebel, with his job done for the day, had gone in search of evening recreation. It seemed odd not to see a deer picking his way across the lawn, helping himself to the hydrangeas that nodded in the evening breeze, but no one said so.

Bridget absently flipped through the
History of Blackwell Farms
book, pausing now and then to read a paragraph or look at a picture, but mostly sipping wine and gazing out over the quiet scene. Lindsay munched on cookies left over from the party and rocked.

“It’s so quiet,” Cici said as she wearily stretched out her legs and leaned back her head. “I’d forgotten how quiet it can be here.”

“The house feels empty,” agreed Lindsay. “Almost haunted.”

Bridget said after a moment, “It’s funny isn’t it? Here we are again, just the three of us. Just like we were when we started out.”

“Well, not entirely,” Lindsay said, and the ghost of a smile touched her lips as she glanced at the empty chair next to hers.

They sat and rocked in silence for a while, too physically exhausted and emotionally drained to even talk. Bridget absently turned a page of the book, barely glancing at it.

“Remember when all I was planning to do this year was read that book?” Cici murmured. “I never even got past the first chapter.”

“Well, the year isn’t over yet,” Bridget said encouragingly, and Cici smothered a weary chuckle.

Lindsay helped herself to another cookie, and Cici raised an eyebrow. “The all-cookie diet?”

Lindsay shook her head and bit into the cookie defiantly. “I’m done with dieting. I’ll never be a size six again, and who wants to be, anyway? I’d rather be happy. And …” She took another bite of cookie. “Since I stopped dieting, I’ve lost four pounds.”

Cici kept her expression perfectly innocent. “That’s probably just because you’re getting more exercise.”

Lindsay didn’t bother to hide her smugness as she agreed. “Probably.”

Cici reached for the decanter of wine on the table between them, then hesitated. “Is that the new wine? I need real wine.”

“It is real wine,” Lindsay insisted, pouring her a glass. “It’s just not finished.”

Cici took the glass and tasted. “Not bad,” she admitted. “A little sweet.”

“Dominic says that’s the good thing about summer wine,” said Lindsay. “It’s like an unfinished story. The best is yet to come.”

Cici smiled a little and took another sip. “I like that,” she said. “An unfinished story.”

They were quiet for a time, rocking, sipping wine, gazing out over the fading day. Then Lindsay said, “I’m going to marry Dominic.”

Bridget looked at her. So did Cici. Neither woman said anything for so long that an uneasy anxiety crept into Lindsay’s eyes. Then Cici grinned.

“Now I ask you,” she declared, lifting her glass, “who didn’t see
that
coming?”

Bridget sprang from her chair, letting the book tumble to the floor, and hugged Lindsay, laughing. So did Cici.

“Oh, Lindsay, I’m so happy for you!”

“Congratulations, sweetie, you know we’re crazy about him!”

“This is the best news ever, the best!”

And Cici added, “If I don’t get to have Diane and Jonathon for in-laws, at least I get to have Dominic for a brother.” She thought about that for a moment and added, “More or less.” And Lindsay laughed.

But when they were all settled again, and glasses were refilled to replace the wine that had spilled, Bridget looked at Lindsay with a mixture of affection and resigned regret and said, “Oh, Lindsay—does that mean you’re leaving us?”

Lindsay smiled contentedly and leaned back in her chair. “Nope.”

Her friends didn’t attempt to disguise their relief. “Then Dominic will be moving in here?” Cici said, and her expression was a mixture of delight and uncertainty.