How I Came to Sparkle Again (36 page)

chapter thirty-seven

JUNE 3: NO SNOW REPORT AVAILABLE

Mike poured some blueberry batter onto the waffle iron. “Hey, there’s something I want to talk to you about,” he said to Cassie.

“Yeah?” she asked. She wondered if she was in trouble.

“Yeah,” Mike said, and turned to look at her. He wasn’t sure how to begin, so he took a big breath and then just said it. “I’m falling in love with Jill.”

“I kind of thought so,” Cassie said.

“It’s confusing for me because I loved your mother and I still do, and sometimes that makes me feel like what I’m feeling is wrong. I mean, I know she would want me to have a good life … a good life with love in it.”

“She wrote about that.”

“What did she say?” he asked.

“She said to keep living.”

“Your mom was incredible. She was strong and beautiful and smart and no one could ever replace her. I will love her always.” He paused. “And now Jill is in our lives and she is a gift, too. She’s kind and funny and it feels good to be around her. I think we’re happier when she’s around.”

Cassie thought for a moment and then nodded.

“And she loves you.” He turned back to the waffle iron for a moment and put the waffle on Cassie’s plate. Then he poured a little more batter onto the griddle. “It’s kind of awkward, because I want to date her but I also know that you two have a special relationship and I don’t want you to feel like I’m taking her away from you. I wouldn’t be. And I don’t want you to feel like I’m betraying your mother, either. Or like I’m going to forget about her, because I couldn’t. I’ll always love her.”

“Yeah, I know,” Cassie said.

“We’ve been through a lot of changes this year and I didn’t really want any more of them. But then Jill showed up and I don’t want her to leave us or for some other guy to get her. She belongs with us.”

“Well then, I think you should go get her,” Cassie said.

Mike smiled. “Thanks.”

*   *   *

Jill put extra clothes, dog food, a toothbrush, water, oatmeal, and some ramen into her backpack, and then she and Amber hiked all the way up to Uncle Howard’s place. He was still in Argentina.

It took half the day to get there, and once she did, she spent the other half reading
Snowboarding to Nirvana
. As the sun began to set, she noticed someone walking to the summit, and as he neared, she realized it was Mike.

“It’s my birthday,” he said. “I thought you’d be interested to know.”

“Oh, is it?” Jill replied.

“I wanted to spend it on a mountaintop with you. Is that okay? Hans said you were up here.”

“It’s more than okay,” Jill said, jumping into his arms. “Happy birthday. Can I offer you anything?”

A mischievous smile crossed Mike’s face before he said, “Definitely,” and kissed her. “But I’m going to need to eat first.” He smiled as if he were joking, but she suspected he was not. “I brought some things to eat and drink.”

Jill smiled. “What did you bring?”

Mike unpacked a bottle of Syrah, his camp stove, and a Tupperware container full of tortellini with marinara sauce that just needed to be heated up. “Cassie made it, so you know it’s good,” he said.

“Mm!” Jill replied.

Then he pulled out a chocolate torte.

“Oh…” she sighed.

He stuck a birthday candle into the torte. “So I can wish,” he said, and gave her a desirous look.

She blushed.

He opened the wine and passed the bottle to Jill. Then he poured the pasta into the pan, fired up his stove, and put the food on.

“This smells so much better than the ramen I was going to eat tonight,” Jill said, grinning.

“Ramen is nasty,” Mike agreed. He stirred the pasta for a few minutes and then handed Jill a fork. They ate it right out of the pan, their faces close. From time to time, the magnetism was too much, and they kissed between bites.

“Cassie is a culinary genius,” Jill said.

“Yeah, I’m so lucky.”

“Who’s with her now?”

“Barb,” he said. “Pete’s on duty. Barb knew it was my birthday and volunteered.”

“That’s sweet,” Jill said.

“That’s Barb.”

She set down her fork and reached for the wine.

Mike set down his fork, too, so Jill passed him the bottle. He took a few drinks and then pretended to yawn and dropped his arm behind Jill.

She turned to him and laughed.

“What?” he asked innocently.

She managed to put on a straight face to play along.

He passed the bottle back to her. “Here,” he said. “Drink some more.”

“Candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker?”

He laughed. “Oh, I see your plan now,” he said.

She took a generous drink and handed the bottle back to him. They passed it back and forth while watching the sun drop behind endless peaks until at last they were left sitting in the dark.

He set the stove on the ground and put the dirty pan and forks in a plastic bag to wash later. Then he climbed up on the picnic table and lay on his back to look at the stars.

“Join me,” he said.

Jill lay down next to him. He reached for her hand and laced his fingers in hers. He gently ran his thumb back and forth across her palm. She breathed in his smell—warm, spicy, and a little salty from his sweaty hike up. She found it insanely sexy. She fought her sense of urgency, though, aware that Mike might be having conflicting feelings about being with someone other than Kate. That was big. She wanted to let him set the pace.

“It’s been a long time since I just stared at stars,” he said.

“There are so many tonight,” Jill said. “They’re almost blinding.”

After a long pause, Mike said, “This is a really nice moment.”

“I was wondering what you were thinking,” she said.

“Oh, that’s not what I was thinking. I was wondering when you were going to crawl on top of me and kiss me.”

Jill laughed. “Oh, I was very close. That thing you were doing to my hand was totally working.”

“You liked that, huh?” he asked.

“Mm,” she said with a big smile and a nervous giggle.

Mike rolled over on his side and kissed her for a long while. She caressed the nape of his neck. He paused and gently touched her face. “So, I can hike back down tonight, or I can stay with you.”

“You’re welcome to stay with me,” she said.

He wrapped his arm around her, and they looked at the stars a little longer, taking time to get used to lying next to each other, taking time to absorb what was happening. And when the temperature dropped to the point where Jill began to get chilly, she sat up, took his hand, and led him inside.

*   *   *

Cassie looked at her notes and transcribed to the best of her memory the things Coach Ernie had shared with her over the winter.

My mother was the fastest ski racer here in Sparkle from 1988 to 1991. Racing against her challenged other people to be their best. She had good sportsmanship when she won. The people who raced against her were shooting for silver. Coach Ernie said she had what it took to be an Olympic champion.

She put her own memory book away and brought out the book her mother had written for her. She randomly opened a page near the end and read:

God, wherever you are and whatever you are, this prayer is for my family. When I go, there will be a hole left behind in their lives. When it’s time, and a good person comes along, help my family welcome her. If Mike never loved again, I would think it was because being married to me had been such a horrible experience. It would be a tribute to me if he wanted more of what we had. Similarly, I hope Cassie’s experience with me as a mother made her more loving to all women and able to see maternal energy in all the places it’s found—teachers, neighbors, friends … all the kind people we come in contact with every day. May there be enough maternal energy floating around this world to fill that hole until the right person completes this family again. And when that person comes along, may she see all the beauty in my Cassie that I do. And may she see that Mike’s heart is bigger than the sky and treat it like the precious thing it is. May she have strengths that were my weaknesses. I am humble enough to know I wasn’t perfect. No one is. But maybe this new woman and I together will have created something more whole than one person ever could have. My prayer is that my family doesn’t shut down, but that they go on and continue to love. I don’t want them to be broken. I want them to be whole. I don’t want them to be lonely. I want them to be loved. So please, God, whatever you are, please send them a deeply kind and deeply loving person when it’s time, and please let them embrace her.

Cassie shut the book, picked up the heart-shaped rock Jill had found, and held both to her heart.

How I Came to Sparkle Again

K
AYA
M
C
L
AREN

  1. At the beginning of the book, Jill returns to her hometown of Sparkle, Colorado, after suffering a devastating loss and heartbreak. Returning to the location of one’s childhood can have a powerful impact on a person—for better or for worse. How does returning to your hometown affect you? Is it true what they say, that “you can never go home”?

  2. How is the ski town setting important to the characters’ journeys? Do you think the story would have been dramatically different if the setting were the beach or a large city?

  3. Each chapter begins with a snow report. Why do you think the author includes these? How do you think they add to the mood of each chapter, given the importance of snow and weather in a ski town such as Sparkle?

  4. Why do you think that the men from The Kennel played a significant role in Jill’s transformation? What is it about their personalities that made them effective friends for Jill at that moment?

  5. Like Kaya McLaren’s other books, this story is filled with second chances. List a few. Who do you think should have received a second chance but didn’t?

  6. Why do you think Uncle Howard prescribed Hope for the Flowers to his young pupils—and how do you think the book would have resonated differently with Cassie than with a young Jill? What things did their childhoods have in common?

  7. In the book, Cassie believes her mother is communicating with her through the heart-shaped rocks and other heart-shaped things she finds. Have you ever felt that or wondered whether a loved one who had passed away was trying to communicate with you?

  8. Throughout the book, Cassie searches for heart-shaped rocks as a way to feel connected to her late mother. In what rituals have you partaken to honor or remember someone? What is the significance of Cassie sharing this ritual with Jill at the end of the book?

  9. Jill and Mike begin to fall in love even as he and Cassie are still learning to live without Kate. What do you think of their choices and would you have made the same—or different—choices in their shoes?

10. Would cassie be the same person at the end of the book if she had not met Mauricio? Why or why not?

11. Discuss the ways in which characters bond and develop over food. Did any of those moments remind you of something from your own life?

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How I Came to Sparkle Again
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St. Martin’s Press

ALSO BY KAYA M
C
LAREN

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About the Author