A Year on Ladybug Farm #1 (34 page)

“What was it?” Bridget cried.

“You check the front, I’ll check the back,” Ida Mae returned tersely.

They went their separate ways, opening doors, peering out windows. In a moment Ida Mae called, “Come look here! It’s a tree down! Took out half the conservatory!”

But when Bridget came racing across the house her face was pale and her eyes were wild and she barely noticed the tree limbs protruding three-quarters of the way into the sunroom. “Oh my God, it’s Cici!” she cried, snatching a blanket from the linen shelf. “Call 911!”

 

 

Shep said, “Obviously, I expect you to take your time thinking about it. It’s a huge move. And a huge investment for the school, too, so everyone has to be sure. It’s a five-year contract; I’d need to present the Board with a preliminary proposal for your department by the first of the year.”

“Wow.” Again Lindsay simply stared at him, and again he smiled.

“You’ve said that a lot.”

“Never meant it more.” She took a breath. “When do you need to know?”

“In two weeks.” And before she could speak, he raised his hand. “I know. Wow.”

It had been so long since her cell phone had rung that at first Lindsay thought the ring tone—Beethoven’s First—was part of the background music from the restaurant. It wasn’t until Shep raised an eyebrow and looked pointedly at her purse that she exclaimed, “Oh!” and fumbled for the phone.

As she listened, she felt her face grow cold and her lips become numb. She was already standing, her napkin fluttering to the floor, as she said, “What hospital?”

Shep stood, too, concern on his face. She snatched up her coat. “I’m on my way.”

“Lindsay, what is it?” Shep said. “Can I—?”

She was already out the door. She didn’t say good-bye, and she didn’t look back.

The three of them lounged on Cici’s four-poster king-size bed, fat pillows plumped under their heads, watching a delicate mist of snow drift down outside. A fire crackled in the marble fireplace, scenting the room faintly with warm hickory. Heavy-lined polished cotton draperies in a Victorian rose pattern were pulled back gracefully from the three casement windows, framing a view of frosted mountains against pale gray sky. A rose wool shawl was draped casually across the arm of a delicately carved rocking chair in front of the fireplace, and a skirted table near it held a vase of yellow roses. The scene was much as they had dreamed about all those months ago when they first walked through the big sunny rooms: cozy winter afternoons and cheery fires, stacks of books and a pot of tea nearby, afternoon naps with nothing to disturb them but the tinkling sound the snow made on the roof. Except, of course, that Cici’s arm was in a cast, her chest was tightly taped to stabilize three broken ribs, and two pins held together her broken collarbone. And the yellow roses had come to her hospital room with a card that read, “Get well soon. We love you, Bridge and Linds.”

“Is it just me,” Cici said, gazing bleakly out the window, “or is living here less fun than it used to be?”

Bridget laid her head lightly against Cici’s. “When I think of what might have happened to you. Do you realize how lucky you are?”

Cici winced. “Not feeling all that lucky right now.”

“I still don’t see why you won’t let us call Lori,” Lindsay said. “She has a right to know. She should have been with you in the hospital.”

“Don’t be silly. I was home before she could have gotten here. There’s nothing she can do, and besides, after that fight we had, it would just seem like a play for sympathy.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Probably. But you promised you wouldn’t call her.”

“Don’t worry. If that’s what you want, that’s what you’ve got.”

“It’s ironic,” Bridget said after a moment. “We cut down the hickory tree. We trimmed back the poplar tree. But it was an oak tree that went through the window.”

“Not the whole tree,” Lindsay pointed out. “Just a big branch.”

Farley had come over with his chain saw and removed the majority of the tree branch, and boarded up the hole with plywood. Cici hadn’t been able to make herself look at the wreck of her sunroom since she had been home.

“Well,” she sighed. “At least oak makes good firewood.”

“But who’s going to cut it?” Lindsay said.

“On the other hand,” Bridget said, trying to sound positive, “if the branch hadn’t crashed into the house I might not have come outside to look for you for hours.”

Cici gave her a dry look. “If the branch hadn’t crashed I might not have fallen.”

Bridget’s expression fell. “Mixed blessings,” she agreed.

Lindsay took a deep breath. “There’s something I have to tell the two of you.”

They looked at her curiously.

“That day—the day of the accident,” Lindsay said, “I didn’t go to Charlottesville to Christmas shop. I went to Staunton to have lunch with Shep.” She held up a staying hand before either of them spoke. “And before you ask, the reason I didn’t tell you was because I was embarrassed.”

“Oh, we wouldn’t ask,” Bridget assured her.

“I’d be embarrassed, too,” Cici agreed, and they both watched her with carefully reserved judgment, waiting.

“He has a new job,” Lindsay said, “as administrator of a new charter school for the arts. He offered me a position.”

“In Baltimore?” Cici said.

Lindsay nodded.

Bridget said, “Wow.”

“That’s what I said,” replied Lindsay.

Again they waited, watching her, trying to read answers on her face. “And?” Cici prompted finally. “What did you tell him?”

Lindsay shrugged. “Nothing. I was hardly even listening.” A quick smile. “After all, I don’t see how I can teach school in Baltimore when I live in Virginia, right?”

It was meant to be reassuring, but they both noticed she didn’t quite meet their eyes when she said it.

There was a shuffling and a clattering at the top of the stairs, and Ida Mae edged the door open, her shoulders sagging under the weight of a laden tray. “Got your lunch,” she announced, and it sounded like a challenge. “Although why you think I should be hauling food up and down them stairs at my age . . .”

“That was sweet of you, Ida Mae,” Cici said as Lindsay and Bridget hurried to help.

And Bridget insisted, taking the tray, “You didn’t have to make lunch, Ida Mae. I was coming to do it.”

“Yours is on the stove,” she told Bridget. “Besides, I didn’t make it. Some of them women from the church brought by casseroles. Damn busybodies. Like we can’t do for ourselves.” She reached into the pocket of her apron and brought out some envelopes. “Some cards came in the mail, too.”

“Which church?” Bridget wanted to know, and Lindsay took the cards.

“Oh look, Cici, all these cards. Isn’t that nice?”

Cici smiled weakly but did not reach for the cards. “Maybe I’ll look at them later.”

Lindsay hesitated, then left the mail on the bedside table.

Bridget said, “Do you want me to set your lunch up on the table here by the fireplace? You know the doctor wants you to get up four or five times a day.”

Cici said, “It’s too cold to get out of bed. And it really hurts my back to sit in that chair. Do you mind?”

“Oh honey, of course not.” Bridget fussed with pouring her tea and arranging the legs of the bed tray across Cici’s lap, and Lindsay tucked a napkin into the top of her pajamas. Ida Mae stirred up the fire.

“It looks good,” Bridget said. “Are those pimentos?”

Lindsay said, “Do you want me to read the cards to you while you eat?”

“You two go down and get some lunch,” Cici said. “I’ll be fine.”

Bridget squeezed her hand and Lindsay kissed her hair. “Make sure she eats,” Bridget said to Ida Mae and Lindsay gave her a worried look before she closed the door.

“Well then,” said Ida Mae, straightening up from the fire and giving her a smug look. “Guess that’ll teach you. The roof ain’t no place for a lady.”

Cici picked up her fork, set it down again, and leaned back against the pillows. “Will you take this away, Ida Mae? I’m really not very hungry.”

“You’re feeling sorry for yourself, is what you are. And you’re not going to let that food go to waste—even if it ain’t as good as I could’ve made myself.”

And, since it was apparent that Ida Mae was going to stand there, glaring at Cici with her arms folded across her chest until Cici ate her lunch, Cici took a couple of bites of the chicken casserole and drank some tea.

“That’s my pie there,” Ida Mae said with a curt nod at the slice of pecan pie on the tray.

Cici tasted it, and tried to smile. “It’s really good.”

“Made it for Thanksgiving,” Ida Mae pointed out. “Of course, nobody was here to eat it, thanks to you falling off the roof.”

“It wasn’t my idea, Ida Mae.” Cici put down the fork, balled her napkin atop the tray, and leaned back against the pillows again.

Ida Mae took the tray and set it on the floor by the door. “I reckon you girls’ll be selling out, then.”

Cici, trying to get comfortable, grimaced as she shifted her weight against the pillows. “What makes you say that?”

“Plain as day, you bit off more than you can chew.” She shrugged. “A place like this, it’s way too much for a bunch of women to keep up with. Costs a lot, too. Sit up.”

Cici eased herself forward and Ida Mae snatched a pillow from behind her head, pounding it with her fists. “And none of you’ve got jobs. Couldn’t help noticing. Sit up.” She replaced the pillow. “You got insurance?”

“Why?” asked Cici warily. “Are you going to sue me for ruining your fruitcakes?”

Ida Mae sniffed. “Your friend, Miss Priss, she don’t have none.”

Cici stared at her. “Bridget?” Ida Mae refused to call any of them by their proper names. Lindsay was Red, Cici was Miz C, and Bridget Miss Priss. None of them had yet determined whether this familiarity was a sign of contempt or respect.

“Can’t afford it,” Ida Mae informed her with a nod, “and her kids won’t help her out. Shoulda thought about that, I say, before you come out here and start climbing up on roofs.”

Cici didn’t even bother to correct the non sequitur. She was too stunned, and worried.

Ida Mae picked up the lunch tray. “You better go through your mail, too,” she advised over her shoulder, just before she opened the door. “There’s more in there than get well cards.”

When she was gone, Cici reached for the stack of envelopes on the table, wincing a little with the effort, and thumbed through them until she found the particular piece that Ida Mae must have been referring to.

“Oh, crap,” she said wearily, when she had read it.

It was a notice from the bank, reminding them that their loan was coming due and payable in full in less than three weeks.

 

 

In another couple of days, Cici was up and around, and feeling strong enough to face the damage in the sunroom. The three of them had to bundle up in coats and scarves to venture into the room, which, due to the many gaps and leaks around the plywood patches, was almost as cold as it was outside.

For a long time Cici just looked around. An entire wall of windows was either missing or shattered. The paint was scarred. Bark, sticks, and debris littered the floor, along with a dusting of snow that had blown in or drifted in through the six foot, plywood-patched hole in the roof. When Cici brushed the snow away with her foot, she saw jagged cracks running through the painstakingly restored tile.

“All that work,” Bridget said softly, and the compassion of regret was rich in her voice.

“One step forward, two steps back,” Lindsay agreed sadly. “It’s always something.”

And Cici said, “It’s going to cost a freaking fortune to replace those windows.”

Bridget touched her shoulder lightly. “Let’s get out of here. I’m freezing.”

But Cici didn’t move. She looked around, her face filled with disappointment and her posture defeated. “Look,” she said quietly at last, “I know you guys didn’t sign up for this.” A plume of frost wisped in the air as she blew out a breath. “I’m the one who said we could whip this place into shape in a year, I’m the one who did all the figuring, I’m the one who got your hopes up. Well, the year is almost over, we’re in so much debt I don’t know how we’re ever going to get out, and this place isn’t much closer to being fixed up than it was when we started. We’ve got a hole in the roof and a loan coming due, and it looks like I figured wrong. I’m sorry.”

“Cici, come on—”

“Cici, it’s not your fault—”

Cici shook her head, eyes squeezed tightly and briefly closed as though to block out their words. “No. Listen, just the other day I was telling Lori how, when we’re away from home and we get all caught up in the excitement of a new lifestyle, we sometimes forget who we are, and we make bad decisions.” She looked at each of them somberly. “Well, we all have a really big decision coming up, and I think it’s important that we take some time to remember who we are, and what we really want, before we make it. This last year—well, it’s been kind of a whirlwind, dealing with one thing right after the other, and we’ve been so caught up in all the new things that have been happening to us that, well, I’m not sure we’ve ever really stepped back to see the big picture. And the first thing we probably should take a long, hard look at is money. Things could get a lot worse, financially, and judging from what we’ve seen so far they probably will.”

Again, there were quick murmurs of protest, and Cici held up a firm hand for silence. “Now, don’t you see that’s just exactly what women do, and exactly why we’re in this mess today.” Her voice was tight, bordering on harsh, and every word was clipped with frustration. “We just don’t face the facts. We say money doesn’t matter as long as we’re happy, money doesn’t matter as long as we’re together, we’re not going to let money affect our friendship, there are more important things in life than money . . . well, maybe there’s some truth to all of that but I’m here to tell you if I’d been a little more practical about the money part of this—if we all had—we’d probably all be sitting at home on Huntington Lane right now, surfing the Internet and watching
Oprah
, and turning up the thermostat whenever we liked. And if we don’t take a good, hard look at what we’re doing now, this time next year we might all be doing hair in a trailer park somewhere, and I’m not kidding.”