Days Like This (24 page)

Casey stepped away from the
monument, approached her, and crouched beside her.  “After Danny died,” she
said, one hand braced against the ground for balance, “it was six months before
I went to the cemetery.  Even then, I wouldn’t have gone if your father hadn’t
dragged me there.”

Paige hazarded a glance at her
stepmother, but Casey was looking at the gravestone instead of her.  “I’ll tell
you something about my mother,” Casey said, “if you’ll tell me something about
yours.” 

Their eyes met.  Paige shrugged. 
Casey nodded.  “Fine.  I’ll go first.  When my sister Colleen and I were little
girls, my mother used to dress us up in these stupid sailor dresses.  Navy blue
with big white collars and red bows.  She’d fix our hair in tight ringlets, and
then she’d drag us to church meetings and the Grange Hall and the county fair,
and make us sing for people. 
You Are my Sunshine.  The Old Rugged Cross.  How
Much is That Doggie in the Window?
  Everybody thought we were adorable. 
Coll and I hated it.”  Casey shifted position.  “Your turn.”

“We used to go to the beach
together.  In the winter, when nobody else was there, and we’d just walk.  It
was our special place.”  She wasn’t sure what had made her open up to this
woman she barely knew.  The beach had been something she shared only with her
mom, something she’d never told anybody.

Casey nodded solemnly.  “My
mother and I used to bake cookies together.  For Christmas.  Thanksgiving.  Halloween. 
Easter.  All the big holidays.  She’d put me in one of her aprons—which were
always miles too big for me—stand me up on a chair, and let me do the mixing.  Colleen
was always too much of a tomboy to care.  I was the one who loved to cook.”

“My mom used to put music on,
turn it up loud, and dance me around the living room.”  Paige closed her eyes
to savor the memory.  “I remember her holding me in her arms and dancing with
me when I was too young to even understand the words.  She bought every album
Danny Fiore ever recorded.  All the ones you and my father—”  She paused,
realized this was the first time she’d referred to him that way without a
second thought.  “—wrote and produced.”  She opened her eyes, looked straight
into Casey’s.  “I’m pretty sure she was still in love with him.”

“Really?  Well, he is pretty
special.  He’d be a hard act to follow.”

“I mean, she had boyfriends.  But
none of them lasted.  Every time she’d end things with the latest boyfriend,
she’d pull out a Danny Fiore album and listen to the music my father wrote.  I
think it was her version of crying in her beer.”

“You miss her.”

Paige’s lower lip trembled, and
she willed it to stop.  “Yeah.”

“I miss my mom, too.  It doesn’t
matter that it’s been twenty years.  Not a day goes by that I don’t think about
her and remember some little thing I thought I’d forgotten.  How she wore her
hair.  The goofy songs she used to sing to me.  The wise advice I generally
ignored.”  Casey paused.  “The way she played the piano.  She was an amazing
pianist.  That’s where I got my musical talent.  Dad doesn’t have a musical
bone in his body.”

“Neither did my mom.  She just
loved to listen to it.”

They were silent together for a
time.  Out on the water, a ship’s horn sounded.  “What was it like,” Paige asked,
“being married to Danny Fiore?”

Her stepmother’s face grew taut
with an emotion she couldn’t decipher.  Staring out over the harbor, Casey
said, “Have you ever been in love?”

Thinking of Mikey, she said, “I’ve
been in
like
a couple of times, but not love.”

“I was so in love with him.  I
was only three years older than you are now when I met him.  I was just eighteen,
and he was…magnificent.”  A soft smile lit her face, changing it completely.  “That
probably sounds silly, but it’s true.  He was the most beautiful creature I’d
ever seen, and there was this intensity about him that sucked me right in.  He
was smart, and edgy, and cynical.  So talented.  And absolutely certain of
where he was headed.  I’d never met anybody like that before.  He just swept me
off my feet.”  She grew pensive, a little wistful.  “I was engaged to another man. 
Four weeks away from my wedding day.  Danny and I eloped three days after we
met.  I walked away from everything, without a backward glance, to be with
him.  I was so in love, I would have gladly lain down on the ground and let him
walk all over me.”  She let out a soft laugh, but there was very little humor
in it.  “In retrospect, I can say that’s pretty much what I did.”  Her expression
changed, grew intense, almost angry.  “It was not a healthy relationship.”

Surprised, Paige asked, “Why?”

“Because he always held the upper
hand.  Don’t ever let a man do that to you, Paige.  Don’t ever let a man’s ego
crush yours.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Danny wasn’t always a good
husband.  I’m not saying he deliberately hurt me, or that he didn’t love
me—because he did—but he had his failings.  His career always came first.  He
had tunnel vision.  He could see only one thing, and that one thing wasn’t me. 
It’s not like he didn’t warn me.  I was simply too naïve and too dazzled to
listen.  Don’t get me wrong.  It wasn’t always bad.  We had some very good
years, especially after Katie came along.  And some very bad ones.  He lied to
me.  He cheated on me.  Sometimes he withdrew, and I couldn’t get through to
him.  But I just kept on loving him, no matter what.  It wasn’t until after Katie
died, and he did something unforgivable, that I began to understand what I’d
let him do to me.  We separated, for almost a year.  I grew so much in that
year!  But in the end, I took him back.  I don’t really understand why.  Not
fully.  Because by that time, your father and I—”  She stopped abruptly.  “I
had to make a choice.  I’m still not sure I made the right one.”

“What did he do?” Paige said.  “The
unforgivable thing?”

Mixed emotions flitted across
Casey’s face as she appeared to debate whether or not to respond.  “He had a
vasectomy,” she finally said.  “Behind my back.  It was an out-and-out
betrayal, because he knew how much it meant to me to be a mother.”

“Jesus.  That had to suck.”

“Yes.  It did suck.”  Casey hesitated,
lost in thought.  “It was a pain I really didn’t need on top of what I already
had.  I’d just lost my only child, and here he was, making sure that I’d never
have another.  Not that I could’ve replaced Katie—”

“Of course not!”

“But I wanted more children.  I
needed to be a mother.  And he took that possibility away from me.  I wanted to
kill him.”

“Wow.”  She tried to imagine what
it would feel like.  How hard it must be to lose your kid.  Even worse than
losing your mother, and that was the hardest thing she’d ever known.  She felt
a twinge of something that felt remarkably like empathy for this woman she’d
been so determined to hate.

“Maybe now you’ll have a clearer understanding
of the relationship I have with your father.  It’s genuine and open, based on
love and mutual respect.  We deliberately avoid doing hurtful things to each
other.  I know you have issues with him, but for me, life with your father is
like the sunshine after the clouds.”

Paige didn’t say anything.  She
wasn’t sure what to say.  Her father was the villain in this piece, and she
didn’t want to even consider any other view of him.  Her mom had died of a
broken heart, and it was all his fault.  If he hadn’t left, she would have been
strong enough to fight the cancer.  But he had left, and Sandy had died.  How
could she ever forgive him for that?

Casey rubbed her hands against
her thighs and cleared her throat.  “So,” she said briskly.  “You ready to
leave?”

Paige nodded, and they got up and
began walking back toward the car.  Even from this distance, she could see
Leroy jumping at the window and barking.  “Are we going home now?” she asked,
and realized that for the first time, the word
home
meant Maine, and not
South Boston.

“Not yet.  We have somewhere else
to go first.”

***

The house was big and rambling, a
little past its prime, and sat on its own postage-stamp-sized lot on a quiet
street on the outskirts of Southie.  The driveway was full, so Casey parked on
the street in front.  “Whose house is this?” Paige said. 

“This,” Casey said, taking the
keys from the ignition, “is Mary and Patrick’s place.  Your grandparents.  This
is the house where your father grew up.”

As they approached the side door,
she could hear a small dog making a big racket inside.  Casey knocked once,
then opened the door and stepped inside the house.  “Hello!” she called.  “Anybody
home?”

A black pug raced into the room,
yapping and jumping with excitement.  Casey leaned to pat him, and the look of
rapture on his face was comical.  “Hello, Pugsley,” she said, rubbing his
ears.  “Where’s your mother?”

The dog rolled his huge eyes,
panting and dancing around Casey’s feet.  Beside Paige, Leroy whined.  The pug
approached him, and they sniffed each other warily.  Mary MacKenzie came into
the room, wearing a flowered apron, her reddish-gray hair a mess, her face
aglow.

“Well, well!  If it isn’t my
favorite daughter-in-law!”

The two women embraced.  “Don’t
let her kid you,” Casey said to Paige.  “I’m one of four, and she says that to
every one of us.  We all just play along.”

“Oh, you,” Mary said good-naturedly. 
“And Paige, darling of my heart, it’s so nice to see you.  Come give your old Grandma
a hug.”

Since there was no way to
graciously escape, Paige stepped forward and let the matronly woman wrap her in
a bear hug.  It wasn’t so awful.  Actually, it felt kind of nice.  Her
grandmother was soft and pillowy, and she smelled like vanilla.  It wasn’t Mary’s
fault that her son had ruined Paige’s life.  Mary released her, reached out and
brushed a strand of hair out of her face.  “You’re a lovely girl,” she said.  “Just
like your mother was.  You certainly didn’t get it from your father.  Speaking
of which.”  She turned back to Casey.  “Where is that hard-headed husband of yours?”

“He’s away.  On tour.”

Mary raised her eyebrows.  “He
didn’t tell me he had a tour scheduled.”

“He didn’t.  He’s helping out an
old friend who was in a bind.  It wasn’t planned.  You know how he is.”

“Just getting to know his little
girl, and already he’s gone off and left her?”  She gave Paige another hug.  “You
poor thing!”

“He’s a musician,” Casey said.  “Musicians
spend a lot of time on the road.  But we’re a family, and he knew Paige and I
would be fine together.  Right, Paige?”

She shrugged, not knowing what to
say, because to side with either of them would seem disloyal to the other.  Her
grandmother was right; her father shouldn’t have gone off and left her.  But
Casey had bailed her out of some pretty hot water this morning, and she
probably owed the woman something.  Paige was starting to warm up to her
stepmother, something she never would have imagined when she first arrived in
Maine.  On the other hand, Casey had married Rob MacKenzie, so her judgment was
clearly flawed.

“Don’t put the poor girl on the
spot.  Although it warms my heart to see you defending my son.  Well, never
mind him.  You’ll stay for dinner?”

“I don’t want to impose.”

Mary snorted.  “As if either of
you could ever be an imposition.  I have enough food to feed an army.  I think
we can get by.  Patrick!  Michael!  Get out here and say hello to Casey and
Paige!”

Her grandfather was a tall, lean
man, with a quiet demeanor and a twinkle in his eye.  Michael, her father’s
younger brother, kissed Casey’s cheek and shook Paige’s hand.  The family
resemblance was strong.  Michael wasn’t quite as tall as her father, or quite
as slender.  But he had the MacKenzie green eyes, and the same wavy blond hair,
except that his was neatly trimmed in a conventional cut. 

While the men focused on eating,
the two women kept the dinner conversation going.  Paige remained quiet,
following their conversation but not taking part.  While Leroy lay on the mat
by the door, Pugsley spent the entire meal sitting next to her grandfather, who
kept sneaking him bites of food under the table.  The meal was amazing:  a
perfectly-seasoned beef stew, accompanied by fresh-baked biscuits.  Paige ate until
she feared she would burst, and then her grandmother brought out the
pièce
de résistance
:  a six-inch-tall chocolate cake, smothered in chocolate
frosting.  Nobody turned it down, although by the time she’d finished the
gargantuan piece her grandmother cut for her, she was certain she’d be rolling
out the door like an overinflated beach ball.

When the meal was over, her uncle
threw on a jacket, kissed his mother good-bye, said, “Paige, it was nice to
meet you,” and left.  Her grandfather spirited Casey off to some other part of
the house, intent on showing her the latest acquisitions to his stamp
collection. 

“Looks like it’s just you and me
left to clean up,” her grandmother said.  “That’s fine, we can talk while we
wash dishes.”

While Mary put the leftovers in
storage containers, Paige cleared the table and ran hot, soapy water in the
sink.  There was no dishwasher, so she rinsed the dishes, slid them into the
sink, and washed them by hand.  “So,” Mary said, picking up a plate and drying
it with a fluffy dish towel, “are you getting settled in up there?”

“I guess.”

“It’s very different, isn’t it? 
I trust there’s a little culture shock going on right now.  How’s school?  Have
you made any friends?”

She thought about Lissa Norton,
about this morning’s escapade, and felt her cheeks burn.  “One or two.  Mostly,
I hang out with Luke.”

“Well, then, that’s a good thing,
to have cousins nearby who are about your age.  How are things at home?”