like always, he shrugged off the memories, the self-pity and anger and—even after all this time—the disbelief as he slowly descended the stairs, his palm lightly raking the dark wood banister’s numerous dings and gouges that long preceded his and Merri’s buying the house four blocks from the high school, right after the twins were born. At the bottom he flexed his knee, willing the ache to subside: coaching peewee football was a lot more physical than high school varsity.
He’d no sooner reached the kitchen than the three remaining kids accosted him about a dozen things needing his immediate attention—hell, even the dog whined to go outside. But Ethan found the bombardment comforting, even reassuring, in its life-as-usual normalcy. So, as he let out the dog and returned the kids’ verbal volleys and poured more milk for Bella and double-checked the schedule on the fridge so they wouldn’t be late for the twins’ game, he gave silent thanks for the day-to-day craziness that kept him sane.
That kept him focused, not on what he’d lost, but on what he still had.
Even when his gaze caught, prominently displayed on the family room wall twenty feet beyond the kitchen, the wedding portrait of those two crazy-in-love twenty-two-year-olds, grinning like they had all the time in the world to figure life out.
Happy anniversary, babe, he silently wished the only woman he’d ever loved.
* * *
Ancient floorboards creaked underfoot in the overheated Queen Anne as Claire Jacobs methodically assessed the leavings from someone’s life. She yanked off her heavy knit hat, shaking her curls free. Poodle hair, her mother had called it. Smiling, Claire lifted a lovely cut-glass bowl to check the price. Only to nearly drop it. This was an estate sale, for cripes’ sake. Not Sotheby’s.
As if reading her mind, some prissy old dude in a tweed jacket squinted at her from several feet away. Ignoring him, Claire replaced the bowl and glanced around at the jumble of furniture and accessories and tchotchkes, all moping like rejected props from Mad Men. And for this she’d dragged her butt out of bed on one of the few mornings she could actually sleep in—?
Wait... She scurried across the room to practically snatch the leaded-glass lamp off the table. Okay, it was hardly Tiffany, not for twenty bucks, but it would look terrific on that little table by her front door—
“Miss Jacobs?”
Clutching her prize, Claire twisted around...and grinned. “Juliette! What are you doing here?”
Sporting a denim jacket, a blinged-out hoodie and preppy shorts worn over patterned tights, Claire’s student flashed a mouthful of metal punctuated by hot pink ties. “We live a few houses down,” she said, and Claire’s stomach pinched. Since “we” included Hoover High’s ridiculously good-looking, widowed football coach, the object of probably most of Maple River’s postpubescent female fantasies. Except Claire, of course, who was above such folderol. Stomach pinching aside. “So I figured I’d check it out,” the teen said, “see what was good.”
“Not sure there’s much that would appeal to a teenager,” Claire said even as Juliette zeroed in on a demitasse collection, carefully picking up one of the cups and holding it to the light.
“Oh, I’m not looking for myself.” She scrutinized another cup. “It’s for my business.”
“Your...business?”
“Used to be my mom’s. She’d buy stuff at estate sales and flea markets, then sell it on eBay. She was pretty good at it, too.” This said matter-of-factly as the girl sidled over to a stash of old books. “She taught me what to look for, how to price things and stuff. So a few months ago I decided to try selling some pieces myself.”
“And is it working?”
“It is.” Juliette selected a couple of the books, tucking them to her side. “Which is great, since it’ll help pay for college. Depending on where I go, of course.” Another sparkling grin accompanied her words. “I’d have to sell a boatload of stuff to afford Yale.”
Claire’s heart twisted. Although she’d only been teaching a few months—a fork in her life path she could have never predicted—she knew it was wrong to have favorites. And truthfully she loved all “her” kids. Not only her drama students, but even the less-than-motivated ones in her English classes who groaned every time she made them dredge correctly spelled words from their iPodded/Padded/Phoned brains and write them down. By hand. On paper.
But this one was special, for many reasons, not the least of which was her plucky, wide-eyed determination to not only succeed at something at which few did, but also her refusal to feel sorry for herself. Or let anyone else feel sorry for her either, despite losing her mother so young. A stroke, she’d heard. At thirty-five. No prior symptoms, no warning... How scary must that have been? For all of them. Claire had been a little younger than Juliette when her dad died—suddenly, like Juliette’s mom—and she’d been stunned by how tenaciously the pain had clung. And yet, if Juliette was suffering from bitterness or resentment, Claire sure as hell couldn’t see it.
“There are plenty of drama programs besides Yale’s, you know,” she said as Juliette carted two of the delicate cups and saucers to the table. “And it would definitely be cheaper to go to school in-state.” Claire’s sole option, when her mother had barely made enough to keep them housed and fed, let alone fund her only child’s college education.
“Yeah, I know.” Juliette meticulously stacked books, a few old toys, other odds and ends that Claire wouldn’t have thought worth squat next to the cups. Mr. Tweed frowned, but Juliette seemed unfazed, returning to poke through the offerings on another table. “But not a lot of schools that people will actually take your theater degree seriously.”
Except—as Claire knew only too well—when you’re one of a gazillion actresses auditioning for the same part, the invisible director sitting in the dark theater doesn’t give a damn where you got your degree. Or even if you have one. However, she was hardly going to burst a fifteen-year-old’s bubble.
Juliette carted over a few more cups. “And, yeah, I know I’ll have to keep my grades up like crazy, and that’s not even counting the audition. But it’s dumb to admit defeat before you’ve even tried, right? At least that’s what Mom always said.”
Claire paid for her lamp, which seemed to slightly mollify old Tweedledee. “Very true. And...your dad? Is he on board with your plans?”
“Sure,” Juliette said quickly, poking her hair behind an ear only slightly less studded than Claire’s. “And anyway, I’ve got a couple years to figure it out, so...” She stopped, frowning at her growing collection. Tweedy glowered.
“Problem, young lady?”
“Yeah. My eyes are bigger than my arms. Um...if I pay for everything now, would you mind if I take it in several trips? Since I walked over here—”
“I could give you a lift,” Claire said.
Big blue eyes met hers. “You sure?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay, then. Thanks!” Juliette dug her wallet out of the worn Peruvian-style shoulder bag she always carried as the guy added up her purchases. “Guess this is what you’d call...serendipity. See—I remembered from that vocab list last week. I am so gonna rock my SATs.” Then she sighed. “The language part, anyway. Because I totally suck at math. Like Mom did. It’s like a genetic curse.”
Claire smiled. “What about your father?”
Rolling her eyes, the girl handed over a wad of cash to Tweedsie as a woman wearing a matching scowl wrapped the breakables in tissue paper, placing them in a cardboard box that had once housed cans of little Friskies. “He did his best when I was in middle school, and I didn’t flunk, so that’s something. But there’s a reason he teaches PE.”
And clearly the girl had also inherited her mother’s sense of humor, since from what little interaction Claire’d