The House on Sugar Plum Lane (6 page)

Brandon drove his black late-model Mercedes through the traffic on his way to Chuck E. Cheese's, a place he'd only been to once and hadn't appreciated as much as everyone else seemed to. He preferred to eat at restaurants that didn't cater to kids.

As he stopped at the intersection of Canyon and Main, he noticed a man in blue coveralls sweeping the sidewalk in front of a café. He didn't give it much thought until he caught sight of the guy's profile. From the side, he looked familiar.

Brandon tried to check him out, but he pushed his broom around the corner, disappearing from view.

His dad?

No, it couldn't be. His old man had probably drunk himself to death by now. Besides, what would he be doing in Fairbrook? He didn't have any family or friends here.

“Daddy?”

Brandon glanced in the rearview mirror at Callie, who sat in her car seat in back. “Yes, honey?”

“How come the light is green and you're not going?”

Oh, for Pete's sake. Brandon glanced at the traffic light, saw that it wasn't going to get any greener, and started across the street.

“I can't wait to go to Chuck E. Cheese's,” Callie said. “It's the funnest place in the world.”

Ever since leaving Sugar Plum Lane, the little girl had been chattering up a storm. But it wasn't the child he wanted to talk to right now; it was her mother, who was clearly up to something.

The divorce had been an unexpected blow, but he'd gone along with it, thinking that a fight wasn't in anyone's best interest. Then Amy had insisted upon moving back to the townhome in Del Mar, which left him living alone in a sprawling four-bedroom executive house in La Jolla with a killer view, where he only returned at night to sleep.

Of course, he'd been sleeping like crap ever since Amy and Callie moved out. What had gotten into the woman who'd once been so levelheaded and predictable? She'd morphed into a woman he no longer knew.

“I'll call and explain,” she'd told him.

But when? Next week?

He slipped on the Bluetooth, then called her cell instead. The phone rang several times before Amy finally answered.

“Hello?”

“Did you lose your phone? You were supposed to call me.”

“No, I…”

Brandon meant to be patient. He really did. But he couldn't help pressing for an answer. “What's going on, Amy?”

She blew out a sigh, as though that simple explanation wasn't so simple after all. “Remember how I told you that my mother had been searching for her biological family?”

Vaguely, but he'd been pretty busy and hadn't paid a lot of attention to things that hadn't concerned him. He couldn't admit that, though, so he said, “Yes, I remember.”

“Well, I decided to pick up the search where she left off as a tribute to her.”

Brandon furrowed his brow. “I still don't get it, Amy. What are you doing? Looking for ghosts in a haunted house?”

She laughed, the lilt of her voice more of a balm on his raw and ragged emotions than anything else had been since she'd moved out, which included having more than his share of stiff drinks, slamming a fist through the wall once, and burying himself in more work.

“In a way,” she admitted, “that's exactly what I'm doing.”

Okay, she'd really gone off the deep end. He again glanced in the rearview mirror, making eye contact with the little girl they'd created, a beautiful child with her mommy's blond hair and expressive blue eyes.

A daughter that still bound them together, whether Amy liked it or not.

So he said, “I'm still waiting for that simple explanation you promised.”

She inhaled, then let out a slow and steady breath. “I followed the trail to a woman named Barbara Rucker, who grew up in the house where you found me today.”

“What'd you do? Break in?”

“No, I'm there legally.”

That was a relief, although his wife was so honest that her mom used to say she wouldn't take a shortcut home. But after all they'd been through the past few months? Who knew what she'd do next.

“Who lives in the house now?” he asked.

“Actually, the neighbors think that I do.”

“Excuse me?”

“I leased the place,” she explained. “It's furnished and still holds Mrs. Rucker's personal belongings, so it gives me an opportunity to…look around.”

What happened to the sensible woman he'd married, the loving mother who was a gourmet cook and had an eye for décor?

Brandon slowly shook his head. His wife—no way was he ready to throw in the towel and refer to her as his ex yet—had surely flipped. He couldn't believe what he was hearing.

“You signed a lease?” he asked. Of course she had; she'd just told him that. But for some reason, he'd thought he'd missed something. “For how long?”

“Six months. It's the least amount of time they'd agree to.”

It wasn't about the money, but it still seemed like a big waste to him. “How much did that cost?”

“I can afford it.”

“That's not the point.”

“I wouldn't expect you to understand.”

Quite frankly, once upon a time, right after a fairy-tale courtship and wedding, he'd thought Amy had been the easiest woman in the world to understand, to love and trust, to come home to. But she'd thrown him for a loop about six months ago, right about the time her mother passed away.

He'd told himself it was grief messing with her mind. But now? He didn't know what to think.

“Are you planning to move again?” he asked.

“No. I wouldn't do that to Callie.”

He was glad to hear that. She'd done enough to the poor kid already—moved out of the only home she'd ever known, filed for divorce from her father. A man who'd do anything to provide for his family, by the way, but she'd thrown it all in his face.

He again glanced in the mirror, saw his daughter smiling at him, oblivious to the grown-up problems around her. “I realize you miss your mom, Amy. But to take on a search like that—”

“I didn't expect you to understand. You hardly even knew my mother. In fact, I think you were still calling her Mrs. Barnes when she died.”

He wasn't sure what she meant by that, so he spoke up in his own defense. “I used to call her Susan.”

For some reason, he could imagine Amy rolling her eyes about now. She'd been doing that a lot in the past few months.

Where had they gone wrong? When had they gotten off track?

“For Pete's sake, Brandon. You even arrived late to the funeral.”

He'd had to work that morning, and an important call had come in. He hadn't meant to be late. And then he'd run into traffic on Interstate 5—a fatal accident that had blocked all four lanes.

“I can't explain why this matters,” Amy said. “Not so you would understand. But I have to do it. I've got this big, huge hole in my heart now that my mom's gone.”

Brandon understood about holes in one's heart, gaps in one's life. He'd been dealing with that ever since Amy had dropped the bomb on him and moved out.

“What about me?” he asked. “What about
us?
”

“I'm sorry that our marriage wasn't strong enough, that we don't love each other like we once did. If it had been, if we did, we might have made it through anything.”

She was probably right, but the trouble was, Brandon still loved Amy. And he feared he always would.

“What's done is done,” she said.

Was it?

“Besides, I've always been in this alone.”

Not by his choice, he wanted to say. But he kept his mouth shut. Things had changed; Amy had changed.

And even though he'd give anything to go back to the way things once were, she'd made it clear that she wasn't up for the trek.

Barbara Davila walked along the tree-shaded sidewalk to Pacifica General Hospital with slow, deliberate steps. She'd hoped that the trips to visit her son would get easier, but they hadn't. Each day was still a struggle, and she suspected they would be until his discharge.

For almost two weeks now, Joey had been in the cardiac unit, and each time she pushed through the revolving doors into the lobby, she was swept back to a time in her life she'd tried to forget.

But maybe today would be different. There was talk of a heart bypass once his blood sugar level was acceptable, and she hoped that one day soon they'd announce he'd been stabilized, surgery had been scheduled, and he was finally on the road to recovery.

She was eager to get him home, where she could oversee his care and help him get back on his feet again.

She hadn't told him or his wife yet, although she was sure they'd be delighted, but she'd decided it would be best if he recovered at her house in Rancho Santa Fe. It was so much more spacious and comfortable than the small condo in Fairbrook where he and his wife lived. Barbara could also afford round-the-clock help and would spare no expense at making him comfortable. She just needed to get him home.

Who would have believed that something like this could have happened?

At forty-eight, Joseph Davila Jr. had appeared to be the picture of health, with a ready smile, a booming laugh, and a robust complexion. He ran every day—and worked out, too—but on the inside, where no one could see, he was a mess. And to make matters worse, his pancreas had been acting up and his heart had been a ticking bomb.

She entered the lobby, walked past the pink-frocked volunteers, made her way to the elevator, and rode it up to the third floor. While awaiting the doors to open, she wondered if she should have chosen to use the stairway for the exercise. After all, she had no idea what shape her own heart was in. But she'd worry about that later. She'd never liked hospitals and had managed to avoid them ever since her husband's recuperation at the military hospital in Honolulu, so she was in a hurry to get in and out.

Had it been anyone else, she'd have sent an expensive floral arrangement and come up with some plausible reason why she couldn't stop by for a visit. But this was Joseph Jr., her only son.

Her only child. She wouldn't—she
couldn't
—be anywhere other than here. So she pressed on and continued the forward momentum.

Whenever she found herself stressed, she'd learned to inhale deeply and blow it out, but she couldn't do that here. The medicinal smell was enough to send her running and gagging.

Besides the odor, everything about the hospital—the irritating squeak of rubber-soled shoes upon the polished linoleum, the hollow clunk of a plastic lunch tray on a cart, the blips and beeps of the machines keeping people alive—seemed to send her back in time to the mid-sixties. But she'd fought the mental spiral by forcing her thoughts on the present.

When she reached the nurses' desk, she waited for the woman on duty to glance up. When she did, Barbara said, “Good morning, Simone. How's Joey doing today?”

The dark-haired Florence Nightingale managed a smile. “About the same. His minister is with him now.”

Barbara nodded, then proceeded to her son's private room. She'd never understood how Joey had come to be so religious, since he hadn't been raised in the church. Her mother had carted her off to Sunday school for as long as she could remember, and she'd refused to do that to her son.

So needless to say, Joey's faith had surprised her.

She could understand why it would flare up now, when his health and recovery were questionable, when he was facing his own mortality. But he'd held those same beliefs for years.

It probably had something to do with his grandmother's influence, which was one reason Barbara hadn't encouraged much of a relationship between her mother and her son while he was growing up. But once Joey had gotten a driver's license, there'd been no stopping him. He'd visited his grandma regularly, a practice that had continued even after he married.

In fact, as her mother slipped deeper into a fog of dementia, Joey had volunteered to take her in and let her live with him and his wife, rather than place her in a home.

Barbara had tried to talk him out of it, insisting that there were plenty of quality convalescent hospitals that were better equipped, better trained to handle Alzheimer's patients.

“If we put her there,” Joey had said, “you'd never visit her.”

Barbara hadn't argued that point. Everyone knew she hated medical facilities, even if they didn't have any idea why. But her mother didn't even recognize her these days anyway, so what would it hurt?

As Barbara entered Joey's private room, she spotted Craig Houston, the associate pastor of Joey's church, seated in the blue vinyl chair next to the hospital bed. When the fair-haired young man in his mid-twenties looked her way, she returned his smile.

There wasn't even the slightest resemblance between the men, since Joey had inherited his brown hair—now silver-laced at the temples—and olive complexion from his father's side of the family. Yet for a moment, seeing the two together, Barbara couldn't help wondering what her son's children might have grown up to look like had Cynthia, Joey's wife, been able to carry a pregnancy to term.

“Good morning,” the pastor said. “How are you, Mrs. Davila?”

She supposed she should tell him he didn't need to be so formal, but she hated to get too chummy with a man of the cloth. The next thing you knew, he'd be pressing her to attend Sunday services.

“You can call her Barbara,” Joey said, his voice softer than it had been yesterday.

Weaker?

Oh, please, don't let him be failing,
Barbara silently pleaded to no one in particular.

“Is that all right with you?” the pastor asked, his grin warm and friendly.

To call her Barbara? Not really, but she managed to revitalize her smile. “Of course.” She broke eye contact with the minister and focused on her son. “I'm not going to stay long, honey. I just wanted to check on you and say hello. Any news on the surgery? Have they scheduled it?”

“Not yet.”

An ache settled in her chest and fear clogged her throat, yet she tried to keep the optimism in her voice. “I'm sure we'll hear something soon.”

A nurse popped into Joey's room to check his IV and take his vitals, and Barbara turned her head away. Distancing herself further, she walked to the window, where several plants and floral arrangements sat along the sill to brighten up the room. There was a basket of various plants that had been sent by one of Joey's neighbors, a vase of drooping carnations from someone at his office.

In the center of the display was a new arrival, a black ceramic vase holding a single red anthurium, an exotic, tropical flower with waxy leaves that reminded her of the many unique and colorful plants of Hawaii.

She felt herself hurtling back to 1966 all over again, and this time she couldn't stop it.

The Beatles, Bob Dylan.

Walter Cronkite, Vietnam.

The phone call that turned her life on end.

Is this Barbara Davila?

Yes.

Is Captain Joseph Davila your husband?

She'd wanted to hang up, to pretend the call hadn't come in, but she'd responded truthfully, her fingers clutched so tightly to the receiver that she'd thought her flesh would meld to plastic.
Yes.

Your husband's plane went down.

Somehow, she'd managed to get through the heartbreaking, blood-pounding call—maybe because the caller had offered her hope by saying her husband had been seriously injured but had survived.

She'd left Joey in her mother's care that very day and had flown to Honolulu to be at Joseph's side. She supposed she should be happy that he'd returned from Vietnam, even though he'd been scarred on the right side of his face and still had to use a cane to walk. Many other soldiers and their families hadn't been so lucky.

Her mother had implied that Joseph's injury had been some sort of punishment for Barbara's rebellion.

Okay, so she hadn't actually come out and pointed her finger or said those very words, but Barbara knew her mother better than she knew anyone else in the world. And the accusation had been in her eyes.

Admittedly, for a while, Barbara's guilt had nearly consumed her, but she'd rallied; she'd had no choice.

From that moment on, she'd done everything she could to make things right, to be the best wife she could be, even though her husband had been left partially disabled.

And she'd succeeded. Hadn't she been the one to push Joseph to return to college and attend graduate school? To be all that he could be?

She'd been a devoted mother, too. The fact that she was here now was proof of that, wasn't it?

“Before I go,” the minister said, drawing Barbara back to the present, “let's have a word of prayer.”

She bristled, not wanting to be drawn to Joey's bedside and forced to pray. “I'm sorry. I don't have time for that. I really need to go, honey. I have an appointment and don't want to be late.”

Pastor Craig looked at her as if he knew she was uneasy with the religious talk, but it wasn't as though she was a non-believer. She knew there was a creator, someone at the helm of fate. But it wasn't anyone she wanted to connect with. At least, not in a group setting.

“Okay, Mom.” Joey cast her a knowing smile. “Thanks for coming by. We'll pray that you have a good day while we're at it.”

“You're the one who needs strength and healing,” she said.

Again, the young pastor nailed her with an expression that suggested he could see right through her, which was another reason she hated church and religious people. They seemed to think they had it all figured out, and they didn't.

No one did.

She made her way to her son's bedside and bent to give him a kiss on the cheek. “Take care of yourself, honey. And give me a call if there's any news. Or if you need anything at all.”

Then she turned and walked out of the room as if one of the fallen angels were giving chase.

 

The next time Amy drove out to the house on Sugar Plum Lane, she took Callie with her. It was easier that way, she'd told herself.

Who knew when Brandon would show up again and throw off her plans?

And, quite frankly, she didn't appreciate his surprise visits.

“You're going to that old house again?” Callie asked as Amy secured her in her car seat.

“Yes, for a little while. I'm supposed to help the owners pack some things in boxes.” Amy shut the rear door, then climbed behind the wheel and started the ignition.

She glanced into the rearview mirror before adjusting it and saw Callie fingering the straps of a pink Hello Kitty backpack that rested beside her car seat. The canvas pouch had been carefully packed with a coloring book, crayons, a couple of cartoon movies, and enough small toys to keep a child busy for hours.

Callie didn't appear to be eager for the adventure, though.

“It'll be fun,” Amy told her. “You'll see. And on the way home, we'll stop by Roy's Burger Roundup for dinner.”

“Can I get chicken sticks and fries?”

“You bet.”

Ten minutes later, after parking in the driveway, Amy took Callie and several more empty boxes into the house.

As the child surveyed the living room, she frowned and scrunched up her nose. “It's all dark in here. And it smells yucky.”

“There's a definite odor, but the house has been closed up for a long time. It just needs to be aired out.” Amy strode toward the nearest window. “Give it a moment or two. It'll get better.”

Callie dropped her backpack in the center of the floor, then plopped down beside it. “Will you turn on the lights?”

“Once I get things opened up, we won't need to do that.” Amy pulled on the cord and drew back the drapes, letting in the sunlight. Then she unhooked the latch and slid open the window. There was a refreshing salt-laced breeze blowing in from the Pacific today, so that would help.

“Do you want me to put on a movie?” she asked the child.

“Okay.
The Little Mermaid.
”

Amy had brought along a DVD player, as well as some of her daughter's favorite movie cartoons. So she went out to the car to get it, then hooked it up to Ellie's television, put in the disk, and pushed Play.

While Callie settled in front of the TV screen, Amy carried a box to Ellie's bedroom so she could pack the woman's clothing and personal items.

As she progressed upstairs, the steps creaked in protest. She pressed on, using her free hand to grip the banister, which was made out of dark wood in a solid, bold style, the kind that tempted some children to use it as a slide. At least, that's what Amy might have tried to do, if she'd lived here as a girl. But something told her there hadn't been too many children in this house.

Maybe Ellie hadn't liked having little ones about.

At the top of the landing, a picture of two cherubs hung on the wall, which was the closest hint of children she'd yet to see.

Just below the angels sat an antique table, the top of which bore what had once been a lush, green pothos. But the plant, its leaves and vines now withered from lack of water, was nearly dead. It was as if Ellie had developed dementia overnight, and the family had just let the house go.

Yesterday, while cleaning out the pantry, she'd found a bag of cat food. She'd looked all over the house and yard for any other signs of a pet, but didn't see any. Hopefully, the plants were the only living things that had been abandoned.

Amy carried the pothos to the bathroom and turned on the faucet. After drenching the soil, she left the ceramic pot in the sink to drain and returned to the task at hand.