Letting Go (19 page)

The baby, Dani, was trying to tell her something about a nose, but Cass wasn’t quite sure what it was.

She was sure, however, that Anna had lost way too much weight lately. Her hipbones were jutting out above the waistline of her worn blue jeans. Her eyes were shadowed with dark smudges of sleeplessness and who knew what else.

Holding the baby in one arm and Delia’s hand with hers, Cass followed her sister in through the front hall, their mother’s doll collection staring down eerily from cabinets hanging on the walls.

And even though she couldn’t understand what Dani was trying to tell her about noses, Cass couldn’t help but hear Delia’s whispered words.

“Momma, I don’t think Auntie Cass is Wonder Woman. She’s wearing too many clothes.”

“Go on into the kitchen, Delia. Your sister’s got the plates ready.”

As Delia walked away, Anna turned to Cass and mouthed I’m sorry then took the baby back. Cass’s heart clenched as she watched her sister place a kiss on the little girl’s forehead.

Anna wasn’t sorry. Not really. Cass knew that. She could tell in the tiny lines of disapproval around her sister’s mouth.

“I hope you don’t mind macaroni and cheese. That’s supper tonight.”

Cass followed Anna into the kitchen and saw Justine spooning the creamy noodles onto plates. Her stomach rumbled as she took in the carb and fat laden foods. Hotdogs. Mac and Cheese. French fries. Oh Lord. She hadn’t had this much starch in years.

She should probably go unload the car.

But then she saw the look in her sister’s eyes and knew this was a test.

A test of the emergency sister system. This was her sister’s reality, and she would either blend in, or she could go on back to California and John and all the uncertainty there and leave Anna alone to figure this mess out on her own.

Cass put her purse on the floor in front of the couch and then sat down at the table Justine had readied.

“You did a great job, sweetie,” Cass said.

Justine shrugged. “Momma did it. She does everything,” she said pointedly as she plopped into the seat across from her little sister and narrowed her eyes at Cass making it clear she wasn’t exactly thrilled with her aunt’s visit.

Anna put Dani in the highchair and then sat a blue plastic Cookie Monster plate loaded with cheesy noodles in front of the baby.

Dani giggled gleefully and dug in with a pink plastic spoon and her fingers.

Cass looked to the back of the house, but Anna guessed her question. “Go ahead and eat. You can see Momma in a few minutes. She’s probably sleeping right now anyway.”

Anna poured her a tall cup of iced tea, and Cass sipped the sweet drink she hadn’t tasted in years.

“Gran sleeps all the time, Auntie. It’s like Sleeping Beauty, ‘cept Gran’s old sorta. She needs a Prince Charming like Uncle John.”

Somehow Cass kept the pain from showing. At least she thought she did until Anna’s eyes met hers, and Cass saw the questions, the surprise, and then the quick smack of silent sympathy.

“Don’t be dumb, Delia. Gran’s sick. She’s not Sleeping Beauty.” Justine shook her head in older sister aggravation.

“I’m not dumb. And Gran’s not either sick. She just needed Auntie Cass to come home, huh Momma?”

“Oh honey.” Anna looked like she wanted to say more. Instead she pointed her fork at the plate in front of Delia. “Eat your supper.”

But Delia wouldn’t be put off. “You said, Momma. You said Auntie….”

Cass wondered what exactly Anna’d said, but Anna didn’t let Delia finish. “Eat. Now.”

Delia huffed and started to eat but stopped after a few seconds, a triumphant look on her face.

“You were right, Momma. Auntie Cass is Wonder Woman.”

And before Cass could figure out that cryptic statement, Delia was out of her seat and running across the living room.

“Gran. Gran. You’re up. Killer missed you, and I did too. We’re having Mac’roni and Cheese, and Auntie Cass is here, and that’s a miracle just like in the Bible. Come eat, Gran. You can sit by me.”

*****

Anna’s breath caught when she looked, really looked, at her mother standing there stoop shouldered, arms around Delia.

Her skin was white, almost translucent. Dark shadows shaded the swollen skin under her eyes, eyes that used to sparkle with fun and excitement.

What on earth drove her mother to such dangerous lows? Was it the past two years? Was it her? The newspaper stories, the court battles, the therapy sessions, the loss of one job and then another and another because bosses didn’t understand.

Anna shook her head. Who was she kidding? She couldn’t understand, so how could they?

Momma took a step forward, embraced first Cass and then her. Just like always. Strangely, after all this time, it still hurt.

“Hey Momma.” Anna wanted to touch her mother’s pale cheek gently. Beg her to stay up. To play Chutes and Ladders with the kids and throw a ball or two at the dog going crazy around her feet. To go to that uptight church of hers for prayer meeting. Anything. “Sure looks like Killer missed you.”

“Here, Momma.” Cass jumped up from her seat and pointed. “You sit. I’ll get you a plate.”

And there she went, taking charge just like always. As if she hadn’t checked out on them the day she left without a backwards glance. Cass walked right to the cabinet plates had always been in and took down one of the pretty tea rose dishes she’d sent for Christmas a few years back.

Justine’d used all the plain old white ones to prove she didn’t care about Cass’s presents, so the pretty ones were all that were left.

Cass carried the plate and a glass to the table and Momma reached out and grabbed her wrist like it was some sort of link to a long forgotten life.

“Oh baby, I’m so glad you’re here. We miss you.”

Cass reached down and kissed Momma on the top of her head as if she were a guardian angel come to make everything better, and bitterness welled in Anna’s stomach. She’d made the call, now she needed to deal with the reality. In a world with Cass, Anna would always be second best.

“I don’t miss her none. Not really. I don’t even know her.” Justine’s angry accusation slammed through the room. Even Killer quit barking his head off.

Mortification ripped through Anna at her daughter’s rudeness. At the thought that Justine was projecting what she herself had been thinking. She couldn’t just let it go, though.

“Go to your room, Justine.”
 

Momma didn’t need conflict. Not now. And she hadn’t raised her daughters to go fighting anyone else’s battles.

Justine narrowed her eyes and threw her napkin down on her plate with a huff. “What-ever,” she said, and she started to stomp out of the room, but Cass held out her hand.

“Wait.”

Momentary silence echoed through the kitchen, and Anna clamped down on her tongue to keep from telling her sister to butt out of something that wasn’t her business. Tension sliced through the room.

Finally, Cass continued. “Justine’s right. I don’t know her. Not really. I haven’t been home, but I’m here now. I’m sorry.”

Anna caught the sparkle of tears in her sister’s eyes and wished she could let the hurt and anger go. But it was a lifetime in the making. One I’m sorry wasn’t going to make it go away.

Instead, she settled for playing pretend. She was good at acting. Plus Momma needed them all.

“That’s right, Cass. You are here now.” Anna looked across the room where her oldest daughter stood waiting for judgment, her light tan arms across her tiny chest, chin up in defiance, chocolate eyes burning bright.

Their eyes met, and Anna knew her daughter was only responding to what she’d heard and felt smoldering under the surface ever since the phone call asking Cass to come home. Anna wasn’t going to punish her daughter. Not for the first offense anyway.

“You can stay and eat, but not another word.”

Justine squinched up her nose holding back tears and anger as she came back to the table.

When she passed by, Momma grabbed her wrist in her hand and smiled up at her. It wasn’t that far of a stretch. At seven, Justine stood tall and proud, at eye level with her sitting grandmother. “You’re a good girl, Justine. Don’t let that temper get you in trouble.”

Justine looked down where those soft older fingers held her wrist, and then her little face collapsed, and she threw her arms around her grandmother’s shoulders.

“Oh, Gran. I’m sorry. I just….” And the words dissolved into tears.

Anna’s heart broke as she watched her daughter hold her grandmother tight. Momma would probably go back to bed, and Justine’s tears would just be wasted.

Across the table Delia rolled her eyes in perfect imitation of Justine. “Such a drama queen. Can we eat? I’m funnished.”

“It’s famished, Delia, not funnished.” Justine settled into her chair with a long-suffering sigh. “Funnished isn’t even a word.”
 

Delia ate a noodle and talked at the same time. “Is so ‘cause I’m it.”

The tension of the moment was broken with a laugh.

Anna knew it would be back. She just wasn’t sure when.

*****

The answer came soon enough.

The girls and Momma were all in bed. Anna sat in Momma’s rocking chair flipping through the channels, and Cass was on her laptop checking e-mail.

Letterman started his Top 10 list, and Anna tried to listen, but it was something stupid about taxicabs and pedestrians, so she really didn’t care. The only cabs she’d ever seen were on TV, and who called people walking pedestrians anyway?

She flipped over to another station, but it was just the news. She tried another, but it was boring, too. PBS was a mix of static and voices.

She flipped back to Dave’s countdown. Number Five. Yawn. PBS. Static. Flip. Commercial. Flip. Number Three.

“Good grief already, Anna. You’ve just got four stations. How many times are you going to flip through them?”

Anna looked across the room where her sister sat, her face illuminated by the computer screen making her look like some sort of perturbed avenging angel. “I don’t know. How long you going to use the information superhighway to avoid talking to me?”

Cass rolled her eyes looking an awful lot like Justine. “I’m not avoiding you, Anna. I’ve just got a lot of work to do.”

Oh she just loved throwing that around didn’t she? Work. Work. Work.

“It’s your summer, Cass. You’re off. Nothing earth shattering’s on that email that can’t wait until tomorrow. No new math equations. No calculator functions you can’t live without.”

Cass sighed, but she closed the computer. “Fine.”

As Cass walked into the living room, Anna noticed she still wore her expensive brown leather slingback high-heeled shoes that matched her creamy linen pants.

Man, she missed high heels. She missed looking good, feeling good, feeling sexy. Feeling like something more than a mother.

She looked down at her mismatched used to be white but now pink—after Justine’d washed them with the free red t-shirt she’d gotten for reading the most books in her class-socks and grinned. Nah. She wouldn’t trade her girls for high heels, that was for sure.

She stuck her middle toe through the hole and waved it at her sister. “My toe says hello to you.”

Cass sighed again, but she smiled. She hadn’t done a whole lot of that since she’d walked through the door.

“Did you get me off the computer to wag your toe at me?” She almost laughed, but didn’t quite make it. “Those socks need to find the trashcan yesterday.”

Anna put her foot back down on the wood floor and asked the question she’d been thinking half the night. “You mad at me?”

Cass didn’t answer right away, and Anna wondered why her sister always had to think things through for so long.

“Why would I be mad at you?”

Anna heard the words, but she saw the face delivering them and knew Cass’s feelings were hurt. “Oh, I don’t know. Justine’s whole I don’t even know her bit and Delia’s Wonder Woman.”

Cass sat forward, wrapped her arms around her knees, picked at the perfect soft pink polish on her thumbnails. “They’re just little girls, Anna. I’m not mad at you, and I’m certainly not mad at them.”

A breath Anna didn’t even realize she’d been holding came whooshing out, and she wondered why she even cared. It didn’t really matter, did it? “Good. That’s good. I just….”

A few seconds ticked by, and she wondered what to finish off with. She just what?

She didn’t even know. She certainly wasn’t going to sit there and say what she was thinking. What she was feeling. “I’m glad you came.” An almost truth. That would do.

Cass nodded, her face a jumble of somethings and nothings all at once. “I needed to.”

“And look. Momma’s already out of bed. You really are a miracle worker.”

”I’m no miracle worker.” Cass kicked one of Killer’s bouncy balls across the living room floor, and the dog whined from his bed behind the couch.

“It’s a start.” A commercial for toilet paper came on just then, the sound ten times louder than the show. Anna flipped the volume down. “I don’t know why they do that. Geez.”

Cass ran her hand through her straight hair. Its highlights sparkled in the light of the television. She probably spent hours every morning getting her hair to lay flat like that.

“So….”

“So….” Cass echoed her.

Man, this was uncomfortable. Painful, really.

“If you’d said well, I could at least say that’s a deep subject.” Cass tried for a little humor.

Anna pretended to laugh. But the sound was weak. Fake.

Finally, she couldn’t stand it anymore. “Okay. Enough. We’re not going to sit here looking at each other saying so and listening to freakin’ toilet paper commercials and countdowns.” One of Delia’s favorite songs ran through her brain. “You’re my sister. I love you. You love me. We’re a great big family.”

Cass just looked at her like she’d totally lost her mind.

Anna laughed. Of course Cass had no idea. She pointed to the DVD sitting on the television. “Barney.”

Cass raised her eyebrows. “Oh. I thought he was just a dancing dinosaur.”

“Nah. He sings too.”

Cass smiled. “Now that’s interesting. Sings and dances. A multi-talented dinosaur.”