You Knew Me When (26 page)

My final wish is that you'll each find true happiness in your lives separately and together. Every woman needs a best friend or a sister. And you were both to each other. I hope you will be again.

Much love,
always and forever,
Luella

“M
ornin', Kitty Kat.” Katherine's father sat hunched over the kitchen table, the
New York Times
fanned out in front of him. “How'd you sleep?”

“Really well, thanks.” It wasn't strictly the truth. She'd nodded off easily and happily, having received a text message from Grant just before midnight, asking if they could meet at their spot for lunch the next day. But she'd awoken at three a.m. and had been unable to fall back asleep, tossing, turning, and agonizing about what she was going to say to Grant and what he was going to say to her. Did he have an agenda? She sure as hell didn't, except to finally deliver a lengthier apology for walking out on him all those years ago.

Their chemistry had been palpable at Carol's house on Thanksgiving Day. At least it had been to her. Since then she'd questioned herself over and over until she was no longer sure of anything, not even her own intuition. Was it absurd to think she could fall back in love with someone after ten minutes of conversation twelve years too late? Or had she never fallen out of love in the first place? Conversely—and possibly more realistically—were her heightened emotions conditional? Once she went back to New York permanently, would Grant become a distant memory all over again, leaving her acute longing in Vermont, where it belonged? These were the uncertainties that had kept her alert in the middle of the night, forcing both her eyes and heart to remain open. But open to what? Grant wasn't available. And Katherine wasn't a home wrecker. If the option even existed.

There was also the not-so-small matter of finally opening up to her dad. It was time to release the burden once and for all, and she'd finally found the strength within her to do it. Perhaps it was a result of mending things with Grant and Laney, or Luella's regret over her own lost friendship, but suddenly Katherine couldn't hold it in any longer. She had to come clean, consequences notwithstanding.

“There's coffee in the pot, if you'd like.” Her dad motioned toward the counter.

“Caffeinated?”

“Is there any other kind?”

“A man after my own heart.” Katherine walked toward the cabinet to retrieve a mug, kissing her father on the top of his head on her way.

“It's so good to have you here, Kitty Kat. No use in staying at a fancy hotel. Chez Hill is five stars all the way.”

“You've mentioned as much.” Katherine laughed. “At least, oh, a million times.”

“Has it been that many? I guess I'm becoming senile in my old age.” He folded one section of the paper and swapped it for another.

“Listen, Dad, I need to talk to you about something important.” Katherine poured herself a cup of coffee and joined her father at the table. She was wearing an old pair of pajamas from high school—festooned with pink and purple hearts—that she'd found in the bottom drawer of her bedroom dresser at four a.m. For whatever reason, Hazel liked to keep the house at 64 degrees, and Katherine had been freezing her ass off in a La Perla chemise.

“That sounds ominous.” He put the newspaper down and stacked his hands on the table in front of him. “What's on your mind, Kitty Kat?”

“I don't even know how to say this, Dad.” Katherine took a deep breath, preparing herself for the worst. He could be angry with her, she knew, and he had every right to be.

“Is everything okay with you? You're not sick, are you?”

“No, no. Nothing like that. It's . . .” Katherine shook her head, tilting it downward. How could she even look him in the eyes? “It's about Mom.”

“Okay, what about her?”

“The day she got hit by the car . . .” Her voiced cracked and her eyes flooded with tears.

“Yeah?”

“It was my fault.” Katherine lifted her head to gauge his reaction—a look of horror, no doubt—but his face was still soft and kind, albeit blanketed with concern.

“What do you mean?”

“We'd had a fight in the supermarket. She'd said I couldn't have a cookie because I was chubby, so I called her Mommy Dearest.” Katherine was crying now. “She hit me. In the face. In front of everyone. And then dragged me outside by the arm. So . . . I told her I hated her.”

“Kitty, calm down.” He reached across the table and took her hands in his.

“She stalked off in front of me. She was so mad, Dad. And that's when it happened. It was all so fast. One minute I hated her so much. I did, Dad. I hated her. Then she was gone.” Katherine sobbed, trying to catch her breath. “I'm the reason Mom died. I never told you because I was so ashamed. If you don't want to speak to me ever again, I'll understand.”

Katherine's father took a long, deep breath; stood up; and walked around the table behind her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. “I love you, Kitty. What happened to your mother was not your fault. Do you hear me? You were a child. It was not your fault. I'm just sorry you've had to shoulder the weight of this burden for so long.”

“I'm so sorry, Dad.” Katherine inhaled and exhaled slowly, over and over, allowing the warmth of his embrace to soothe her.

“You have nothing to be sorry about. I only wish you'd come to me.”

“I couldn't. I'm sorry.”

“It's okay, Kitty Kat. It's okay.” He held her for another minute and then took his seat across from her again.

“You have no idea how happy I am that you don't hate me.” Katherine smiled faintly, wiping her blotchy red eyes with her hands.

“I could never hate you. And, as it happens, I also have a confession to make. I've been waiting for the right moment, but I've been a bit of a chicken about it.”

“Seems like a good time now.” Katherine laughed unsteadily. “You're not really a woman, are you?”

“Nope. Nothing that salacious.” He cleared his throat. “So, I never told you this, but I actually knew Luella before we moved to Manchester.”

“Okay.” It wasn't even remotely what Katherine had imagined he'd say, not that she'd had anything in particular in mind. “Knew her how?”

“Kitty, Luella was best friends with your mother's Aunt Mary.”

“What?” She'd only heard about her great-aunt Mary a few times in passing, and not since her mom had died.

“That's right. Mary lived in Iowa, in the town where your mom grew up, but she and Luella had been roommates at Mount Holyoke when they were girls and had remained best friends. When your mom moved to New York to pursue acting, Mary had asked Luella to keep an eye on her, you know, just kind of be available in case anything happened, since Luella spent so much time there.”

“Right.” Katherine nodded, intrigued by the wealth of unanticipated information.

“So, then your mom met me and moved to Bennington, which was even closer to Luella. As you can imagine, Mary was thrilled, because she worried about your mom. For good reason.”

“What does that mean?”

“Well, Kitty Kat, your mom was a complicated woman. I'm sure you've figured that much out. These days, they'd probably have a diagnosis for it. Depression? I don't know. She was always an enigma to me—still is. Some days she was happy and light—a pure pleasure to be around. But she also struggled. Nothing drastic. I think she saw leaving New York as a failure and never really wrapped her head around the fact that being a wife and mom could be as rewarding as having a successful acting career. So, you know, with that, her being so far from home and the fact that she was always a little unpredictable, I suppose Mary felt relieved to have a trusted friend nearby.”

“I see.” If anyone could understand the abandoned-career part, it was Katherine. Wouldn't she too have viewed leaving New York to become a wife and mother in Vermont a colossal failure?

“Your mother loved you, Kitty. Make no mistake about that. She didn't express it as much as she should have, and when she did it didn't always come out the right way, but she worried about you. For you. She told me often that she knew you'd make something of yourself one day. Maybe that's why she was hard on you. She wanted you to be everything she felt she wasn't.”

“Maybe.” Katherine sat quietly for a minute. “So did Mom and Luella ever meet in person?”

“No, we never saw Luella or anything like that. But when your mom died, Luella reached out to me and said the house next door was available. She knew about you and felt strongly that a fresh start was in order. Actually, she was pretty instrumental in our move to Manchester. I guess she figured you might need a woman to talk to from time to time. Neither of us had an expectation that you'd develop the bond you did. Believe me, the fact that she became like a second mother to you went way beyond her initial motivation of honoring a debt to an old friend.”

“Okay. But I don't understand why you didn't just tell me.”

“Honestly, we both thought it might make things more complex—explaining that there was this connection to your mom. In order to give you a fresh start, we felt there needed to be a totally clean slate. And the last thing I wanted was to turn you away from Luella.”

“Interesting theory.”

“Maybe I was wrong. Who knows? I was a man who'd just lost his wife and become a single dad. I had no idea what I was doing. All I cared about was making sure you were going to be okay.”

“You did, Dad. And I am. I may not have had a mother in the traditional sense, but I had more people who loved me than most kids do—between you and Luella and the Drakes.” Katherine reached across the table and took his hands this time. “You made the right decision.”

“I did the best I could.”

“So, what happened to Aunt Mary? Is she still alive?”

“Sadly, no. She ended up passing away a few years later. Brain tumor. Luella was real broken up about it.”

“Oh, my God. This all makes sense now.”

“What makes sense?”

“Luella mentioned Mary in the letter she left me and Laney. She just didn't say who she was exactly.”

“That's our Luella. Always a little mysterious.”

“You said it.”

“Actually your mom and Mary are buried next to each other, with your maternal grandparents.”

“In Iowa.” Katherine knew that much.

“Right. Mary felt strongly about it, and I wasn't really in a place to argue at the time. I even thought it might be easier for you as a kid, not having to feel like you needed to visit her grave all the time.”

“Sure.” Katherine exhaled. “Though it would be nice to be able to go there now.”

“I see that.”

“I mean, you absolutely did the right thing, Dad. It's not that. I guess it just would have been liberating to tell her . . .” Katherine trailed off.

“Tell her what?”

“That I understand.” Katherine thought for a moment. “That I finally get why she left New York.”

“Why's that?”

“For love. The dream is kind of empty without that. Don't you think?”

“Yes. Yes, I do.” Her father stood up and walked toward her.

“Thank you, Dad.” Katherine stood too and he folded her into his arms again.

“For what?”

“For everything.”

“My pleasure, Kitty Kat.” He squeezed her tightly. “Now, you just need to promise me you'll come visit more often.”

“I promise.”

•   •   •

Four
hours later, Katherine was perched on a cement wall at Adams Park, the spot where she and Grant had made out for the sixth time. She'd counted up until the twentieth, assuming that at some point Grant would get tired of dating her and that she'd want to remember exactly how many times he'd kissed her. After breakfast with her dad, predictably the best egg-white omelet she'd ever had, courtesy of Hazel, Katherine had showered in her old bathroom, which was roughly one-third the size of her bathroom in New York and half the size of the one at the Equinox. She'd taken extra care straightening her hair and applying her makeup in a magnifying mirror she'd borrowed from Hazel, just enough to highlight her best features but not enough to appear as though she'd tried too hard. Next she'd dressed in a pair of dark skinny jeans that made her butt look extra firm and a shamrock green cashmere sweater to complement her emerald-colored eyes, not that Grant would notice or even see it under her hefty shearling coat. Still, this would be the first time in more than a decade that she and Grant would be sitting face-to-face in broad daylight for an undetermined amount of time. And even if they couldn't be together, even if she couldn't reach out and touch him as she so desperately wanted to, was it so awful to want to look her best?

“Hey, you.” Grant appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, punctuating Katherine's daydreams—same place, same players, another lifetime. She looked up, slightly startled, though not as anxious as she'd expected to be. Somehow he still had a calming effect on her.

“Hey, you.” She beamed and stood to kiss him, but he pulled her into a bear hug instead.

“I think we're past the formalities. Don't you?” He smiled, revealing the dimples that had once made every girl at Manchester High School swoon—a fact that had secretly delighted Katherine, especially after they'd become an item. He sat down on the wall, and Katherine joined him. “So?”

“I think I made some headway with Laney yesterday.” It was hard not to stare at him, to recall the way his nose angled slightly to the left or the way his lips were always marginally parted even when his mouth was closed; or to check to see if the three freckles next to his right ear were still there and, if so, whether or not one of them remained moon shaped.

“She told me.” He ran his fingers through his auburn hair, and Katherine had to prevent herself from doing the same. “I'm glad. She's carried around a lot of angst for a long time. Some of it justified; most of it not. But you know Laney. She doesn't exactly get over things quickly.”