Authors: Tracie Puckett
But it was okay. It
had
to be okay. I’d catch up with her eventually. And once my plan was in motion, then I’d finally win this thing once and for all.
Chapter Eight
It was one of the longest days of my life.
I started the morning with Georgia in the newsroom, focusing all of my time and attention on the layout of the
Herald’s
next issue. As a writer, it wasn’t typically my job to worry about the layout issues, but the paper had been seriously understaffed in recent weeks. Most of the newsroom workers were either involved with the cast or crew of the fall production, and seeing as the show opened in only a matter of hours, their busy schedules cut right into valuable newspaper time.
Morning classes were a bore, and I managed to keep a low profile at lunch. Most of Georgia’s friends had gotten used to my quiet nature, so nothing seemed out of the ordinary when I didn’t have anything particularly interesting to contribute to the conversation. Even Georgia hadn’t noticed that I was feeling a little off-kilter. After another string of long classes, the day ended like any other—a final bell, a rush to the parking lot, and a quick ride home. I said goodbye to Georgia as she dropped me off outside the house, and I thought that would be the last I heard
from her until Monday.
But then my phone rang three hours later, and I got a sinking feeling that something was wrong.
“Hey, Georgia, what’s up?”
“Mandy?” she said, her voice winded.
“What’s going on?” I set my homework aside and readjusted the phone against my ear. “Is everything okay?”
“No
,” she said. “Everything’s
not
okay.”
“Okay, talk to me, what’s wrong?”
“I busted my butt this week to make sure Grandma’s surprise party went off without a hitch, but my idiot dad forgot to pick up the cake! We’re already in Desden, and the party starts in a half-hour.”
“Okay, no big deal. I’m right down the road from the bakery.” I checked the clock above the sink. “I can get there with the cake in a half-hour, drop it off, and then you guys can party down. Is that okay?”
“
Are you serious
?” she asked. “I was only calling to let you know that we weren’t picking it up. You’d really bring it all the way out here?”
“Of course I would,” I said. “What are friends for?”
“Not this. Not for going completely out of their way for a birthday cake.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” After the amazing friendship she’d given me, I owed Georgia the world. “I won’t be able to stick around, though. I’ll swing by, drop it off, and leave
you to it. I have Fletcher’s show tonight, so I have to make sure I’m back at the school before seven.”
“Mandy, oh
my gosh,” she said, struggling to catch her breath, “thank you.”
She gave me the address
, and I scrawled the details onto the palm of my hand. We ended the call, and I snatched my purse from the kitchen counter. Just in case I didn’t get back to Sugar Creek in time to swing home before the show, I collected my book bag, too. If there was even a small opportunity that I could catch Lashell before or after Fletcher’s show, I needed to try. It was a desperate attempt, and probably the last possible place I should do it, but I was itching for approval.
“Tell Bailey I’m taking the car,” I called back to Dad. As far as I knew, he was holed up in his bedroom. My sister, I knew for certain, was locked in hers—I just wasn’t talking to her yet. “I have to drive out to Desden to deliver a cake for the bakery, and then I have the show at the school. I’ll be home late.”
He never said anything, just grunted. I heard that much.
I stopped by work to pick up the cake. I barely made it through the front door before Jones started spouting off a dozen reasons why I needed to get over myself and cut my sister some slack.
Just talk to her and you’ll understand!
Great.
So they’d made up, and she obviously had no qualms about making me the bad guy. But one thing they both needed to grasp was that it wasn’t a matter of not understanding. I understood. Gabe didn’t trust me with his secrets. Bailey didn’t trust me with the truth. End of story.
I thought to argue with him, and if hadn’t been for the fact that Georgia was waiting for me all the way over in Desden, I probably would have.
Julia brought the cake from the back refrigerator and deposited it on the counter. I opened the box to make sure it fit the order as I’d taken it—
no frills or thrills or flowery accents
! It was perfect. Not that I’d had any doubt.
The drive out to Desden was a fairly quick one. It was usually my luck that the half-hour trip
turned into an hour-long journey, but traffic was at an all-time low. I traveled from one town to the next in just under thirty minutes. It was almost as if the universe knew I had somewhere important to be.
In Desden, I pulled off the highway and onto one of the main roads in the affluent part of town. Driving for a mile down a tree-lined street, I finally turned into the parking lot of the Evergreen Nursing Home. The building was a tad upscale for a medical, assisted living facility. The brick-faced walls were white and gray, contrasted beautifully by the fall foliage framing the building. The blacktopped parking lot ran the length of the front of the home, and a long, spacious lawn surrounded the building on the remaining three sides. A giant, marble water fountain greeted visitors just outside the front doors. It was
gorgeous—almost a tiny glimpse of Heaven on Earth. It didn’t look anything at all like a nursing home, but more like a five-star hotel to the elderly.
The automatic, glass doors bounced open at my arrival. I was greeted at the front desk by a chipper receptionist
: Sara, according to the tag pinned at the breast pocket of her blue, button-down shirt. The moment the woman noticed the boxed cake in my hand, she slid a clipboard over the high desk and in my direction.
“Mandy, right?
You’re here for Georgia St. James?”
“Yes.”
“She came by to drop your name on the visitor’s list a while ago.” I signed my name just below Georgia’s. “The St. James family is at the far end of the west wing, Room 130. Here’s your pass.” She handed me a white, rectangular sticker with my name scrawled across the front. I pressed the sticker to the front of my jacket and nodded in thanks.
I turned down the west wing, half expecting to read every single one of the name plates and room numbers before I came across Room 130. Thankfully, though, (and not so surprisingly) Georgia was pacing at the end of the corridor in front of a closed door. She started jogging down the hallway the moment she watched me turn the corner, and we met directly in the center of the long hall.
“Mandy, you’re a lifesaver! I love you,” she said, hugging me around the giant box. She bounced back quickly and took it from my hands.
“I already checked it out,” I promised. “It’s in perfect shape, just what you wanted.”
“Thank you,” she said, and I could see the sweet relief slowly cross her hardened face. “I wanted to kill Dad when he showed up here without the box. I reminded him a
hundred
times this week not to forget.”
“It’s no big deal,” I said. “Accidents happen, you have your cake, and now there’s nothing keeping you from giving your grandmother the best surprise party of her life. Is the rest of your family already in the room?”
“Yeah,” she said, looking back. “Grandma’s still in the middle of a heated chess match in the cafeteria. She doesn’t even know we’re here yet. I should probably go, though, before she heads back this way.”
“Yeah, absolutely,” I said, checking my watch. “I have to get back to the school, anyway.”
“I owe you, Mandy.”
“You don’t owe me a thing,” I said, winking. “Now go on, and take lots of pictures. I want to see her reaction.”
“I will, I promise.”
She turned on her heel and headed back down the hall, bouncing all the way to her grandmother’s room before disappearing inside the door. I stood there for a moment, allowing myself to stop long enough and appreciate how wonderful that moment felt.
Why on earth had I waited so long to make friends in Sugar Creek?
With a goofy smile plastered across my face, I finally started down the hall, just in time to hear a familiar voice say
, “Come on, Mom. Let me take you. You need to get out of this place once in a while.”
I stopped just outside of Room 115. The door barely cracked, I leaned into the frame to peek inside,
confirming that the voice I’d heard was Gabe’s.
Inside the room, a graying woman sat inside a wheelchair facing her window against the far wall. It was a gorgeous view of the west side garden, overlooking a large pond with a wraparound walking trail. She didn’t move a muscle as she studied the view, and Gabe paced back and forth, slowly crossing in front of her window.
“Listen,” he said, stopping in front of her. He took another step closer, squatted down, and rested his hands on her knees. Drawing in a breath, he squared his shoulders and watched her. The woman didn’t move a muscle, not even to trail a look down to her son. She just kept staring forward, acting as though no other person had ever stepped foot in her room. Gabe’s lips pulled together, pursing into a wrinkled bulge. “I am so tired of watching you waste away in this place. I wish you would come with me. It’s two hours over in Sugar Creek; that’s all I’m asking for.”
Still, she said nothing.
“It’s a big deal,” he continued. “The whole district team is going out to watch the show, and . . . Shelly’s going to be there.” He said it with a raised inflection, like Lashell’s presence was somehow a really huge selling point. “You want to see her, don’t you? It’s been months.”
No answer. Long, drawn silence was the only response he got.
“And I could introduce you to some of the kids we’re working with. We have an excellent and enthusiastic group out there. Plus, one of our top contenders is starring in the show. I really think you’d have a good time, Mom.”
From his squatted position on the floor, Gabe stared up at her, studying her sullen expression. His eyes were wide and hopeful, but she would never know that. She still hadn’t granted him a single glance.
“Mom,” he said, and frustration faded to sadness. “You haven’t left this building in six years. What do I have to do?” The slow seconds turned into a full minute of stillness, and Gabe just kept waiting. “Please, just say something;
talk to me
.” Another beat of silence. “Let’s get out of this room. Go outside. Breathe fresh air. You’re missing out on so much.”
I stood at the doorway and watched as Gabe pleaded with his mother, a mother who didn’t seem at all fazed by the fact that her son was down on his knees, begging for something he clearly and desperately needed.
She wouldn’t even acknowledge him.
He finally dropped his forehead on her knee, resting it there for a few, long breaths.
“Okay. I’m going to go, then,” he said, finally lifting his head to look at her again. He waited another minute before he stood up, leaned down, and pressed a long kiss to her forehead. “I love you. I’ll see you in the morning for breakfast, okay?”
Still, nothing.
He headed for the door, so I quickly ducked away. But I didn’t get far enough before he walked out and closed it behind him.
“Mandy,” he said, his eyes widening as our gazes met. His blue eyes moved rapidly, studying the guilt-ridden expression on my face. “Hi.”
And there it was. The first, cordial word he’d said to me in two weeks.
Backed up against the door, his hands still held the knob behind his back. Gabe stood a little taller and squared his shoulders. “What are you…?” His eyes darted down the hallway before falling back to me. “
What are you doing here
?”
My heart pounded. It was a simple question with a simple answer:
my friend needed me
. So why couldn’t I open my mouth? Why couldn’t I find the words? I’d spent days fretting over this moment, and the time had finally come. There was no one else around, no one else to ruin the moment. I could talk to him, reach out. I could tell him everything I’d been dying to—
Wait a minute
. No.
No.
What was I thinking? Gabe and I weren’t in that place anymore. He’d run away from me; he’d turned his back. He’d chosen to confide in my sister when he couldn’t even muster the energy to look in my direction. This wasn’t the same guy I’d known and lost. This was some rude, twisted version of him—one who didn’t trust me!
He wasn’t my friend, and I had no obligation to pretend he was. And as soon as I realized that, the words came out a lot easier.
“I’m on bakery delivery duty,” I said, pointing at my name tag. There. That was short, simple, and direct. So now the polite thing to do would be to ask him,
Are you visiting someone?
And even though I already knew the answer to the question, and it would’ve been reasonable to ask, I was no longer in any position to pry.
“Can
I. . . ” He swallowed hard, finally peeling his hands away from the door knob and letting them fall to his sides. He massaged his temples before dropping his head back on the door, looking up to the ceiling. “Can I walk you to your car?”