Kaleidoscope Summer (Samantha's Story) (22 page)

“He’s dropping off your SUV on his way to the station.”

“
L
ike hide-and-seek, he takes
it one place and I move
.”

“Hmm
.
” She
tilted
her head.
“
Maybe it’s time to let him find you?
”
She flashed me a smile.

“
I
want to finish here and move forward wit
h my life.” I glanced down at
Goldie and turned back.

“
God has a plan for you, you’ll see.
Are you sure you
’
r
e
okay?”
She laid her fingertips on my arm.

“
Positive.
I’ll come by later.
I
’ll grab sandwiches
for the three of us—Linda
’s working,
right?”

“U
ntil closing
. See you in a while.”
Maggie ruffle
d Goldie’s fur. “You’re Aunt Maggie’s cutie
.”
I couldn’t help but roll my eyes as
G
oldie
’s tail whipped against my leg—the affection clearly mutual
. Maggie
chuckled
and tossed me a wave.

“Let’s go inside, baby.
”
I
retrieved
the baske
ts of papers
.
Determined to get to the bottom of the pile,
I e
mptied the content
s on the kitchen table. The letters
and photos my mom
had
sent to
Anne
were stuffed into one basket to be read later.
I went in the other room
and came back with the ones
I brought
from Stone Valley, the notes
Anne had written to my mother
. I
added them to the stack.
Why avoid them
?
O
ne o
f them might mention
my
birth
father. Who
was he?
Why
had
he
left
?
Goldie demanded
my attention
and
pranced to the
door.
At home
,
a light blinked when the doorbell rang. Goldie had
easily adapted, filling
in the gap
.

I found
Logan
leaning
against the stair rail.
I
tried to recover
from
my
look of
surprise
once
I remembered he
was dropping off the SUV.

“
Y
ou might need these.”
He held up my keys with a butterfly fob.
He stepped inside
and placed a hand on
each of my shoulders. “You okay?
”

“All the mayhem
has me
jumping at my own ref
l
ection.”
I l
ed him to the kitchen. “
I’m
sort
ing
out
fragments of
Anne
’s life—hoping
to find pieces of
me in the mix
.”

“
Thelma
grew up with
Anne
. Let’s go
talk to her
.”
He pushed my hair back on one side, tucking it behind my ear
.

“
Good idea.
I
need to call Maggie first. I promised
to bring lunch for her and Linda.”

He
began punching buttons on his
phon
e. “
I text
ed
Maggie
and canceled
.
”

Logan’s take-charge attitude
wasn’t something I was used to, and there were moments it got on my
very
last nerv
e. But I bit my tongue and handed
him the keys.

At
the hospital
,
m
y breath caught for a second
.
I
quickly
released it
,
thankful
to be
a visitor
this time.
With Logan’s hand on the small of my back
,
we moved closer to Thelma’s desk.

Thelma tossed us a
hello and shifted her attention
to Goldie. “Welcome back
,
Miss Goldie.” She
opened a
desk
drawer
and with
drew a
snack for her
. “Good girl, you
remember
ed
to
come s
ay hi.” She came
around to the front of her station
and
fe
d Goldie
the treat
. “You have a
n
appointment with Doc?” She nodded toward
me.

“You have a break coming up?”
Logan
took charge in his usual manner
.
He and I seriously needed to have a talk.

“I’m off in an hour. L
et me find Evelyn—she can cover for me.”

“Meet us at the Rockin’ Robin?”
He gave her a quirky smile
. “I’m buying.” He
waved away her answer
, which I hadn’t caught,
and threw a wink in my direction.

We were waiting in the parking lot of the restaurant when
Thelma zoomed in
and parked next to us
.

“Wow.
What a
car. I
t’s
so
her.” I grinned
and pulled Goldie’s leash closer to me.

“Meet Shelby
, a classic 1965
Mustang Shelby Fastback. Candy apple red with silver racing stripes. A wedding present from he
r husb
and
.
”

Thelm
a
eased out of the car and joined us
. “Ain’t she a hoot?
Original everything, just like me.
” She
snickered
before continuing
. “
Shelby
went from used
, to old, to classic. Fred pai
d under five thousand for her
and we were offered $75,000 last summer. I’m
in trouble if the offer g
oes up—Fred wouldn’t
turn it down
. You ready?
”
She lifted her eyebrows. “
I skipped breakfast.
”

The door of the Rockin’ Robin Diner
ushered us into the fifties. We followed the black and white squares past t
he fountain stools and slid into
one of the red-vinyl padded booths.
Logan and I sa
t across from Thelma
.
A
forty-five record orbited inside the
jukebox
. According
to the sign
on
the old player
,
it
filled the diner
with
the sweet notes of
“
Only You
,
”
by the Platters
.

A waitress
, her poodle skirt swishing above her bobby socks, bopped to our table
. “What’ll yo
u have to drink?” A b
ubble
emerged between her lips
from the
glob
of
gum in her mouth—a bit too authentic for my taste.

Logan
flashed a look around the table
. “Cherry sodas, cheeseburgers and fries all
around?” Ponytail swaying
,
our server bounced behind the counter.

I’m supposed to talk to Thelma—here?
Hmm
.
How to lighten u
p a heavy conversation? Logan’s
kindness amazed
me, even though his take-charge
attitude could be annoying
.

He fired
the first question. “Thelma, weren’t you and
Anne
friends in high school?”

“
I had an inkling
you wanted to talk about
Anne
. On the first day of
kin
dergarten
,
we walked in arm in arm
, in our little dresses and brand new shoes
.” Thelma
’s eyes sparkled and her
smile tu
rned into what I perceived as
soft laughter.

Logan nudged my arm
.
“
I’ll take Goldie
for a stroll around the parking lot.”
He
picked
up
Goldie’s
leash.

I removed her vest.
“B
aby,
go with
Logan
.
” After they left
, I
re
turned my attention to Thelma. “
I’ve
never thought about
Anne
a
s a
child
.
You went to school together? A
ll the way through high school?”

“Inseparable. At least, until
we
both became aware of boys, first talking and gigg
ling about
the cute guys
.
I
n
our junior year
, I began dating Fred. By
our senior year
,
we drifted apart
.”
From the
expression
on her
face
the memories, while cherished, were also painful. L
ike Maggie and Julia,
she
apparently
miss
ed
Anne
,
too
.

“I understand
Anne
lived in
Serenity
Cove when she got pr
egnant, so
my birth
fa
ther
must have
lived here
,
too.”

“
Oh, h
on,
I think you should discuss this with
Anne
’s parents.
”
She
held her lips a littl
e stiffer
.

“The grandparents who refuse t
o acknowledge my existence?
”
T
he w
aitress
serve
d
our drinks
.
I sipped
the cherry soda
to cool the dryness in my throat.

Thelma toyed
with the wrapper from her straw
.
“
If there’s one thing I know about people, their actions aren’t required to make sense. Once when I dropped in at the bookshop
,
Anne
’s
mother was
just
leaving
.
Anne
gazed
forlorn
ly
out the window as her
parents drove away. She told me
John
had never forgiven her.
” She paused and pulled a drink through her straw
.
“
I watched that man at
Anne
’s services and he l
ooked to
be consumed by
a firestorm of
regrets.
John
and El
izabeth are not bad
people. T
hey’ve
been
hurt
, but the real tragedy
was the loss of
a fath
er-daughter relationship
.”

“
And now they’re rejecting me—their only granddaughter
.” I wadded up the pieces of the napkin I had shredded, thinking it represented the condition of my life.