***
It was a long week. Grace had taken the kids to Great Falls on Thursday to go school clothes shopping. They had made a day of it like she had promised them and gone to the park and had lunch. Macy loved the duck pond just like Grace had known she would, and Lucy and Brock had a great time running around and playing on the swings and slides.
Friday came at last, and Grace was so tired from acting like everything was okay that she thought once it was all over she might sleep for two days. That was, if she had a place left to sleep. Maggie might not trust her to stay in her house any longer, and the more Grace thought about it, the more she thought her mother would have every right.
At work, Charlie did his best to reassure her. She hadn’t seen John since their lunch on Tuesday. When she allowed herself to think about him, she realized that she missed him. She also realized that when it came to talking to someone about what was going on in her life, she had chosen Charlie and not John. She would have to give some serious thought to what that was about later on, but not today.
Louise had agreed to stay at Maggie’s house with the kids until she got home. Grace thought that if things went badly, it might be embarrassing for Louise to be there. However, knowing this town, Louise might know everything before Grace and Maggie had even made it home.
Grace closed up the store for Charlie that night. He had seemed somewhat out of sorts all afternoon. Grace had been so wrapped up in her own thoughts that she hadn’t wondered about it too much. At six o’clock, when he told her he needed to go and asked her to close, she just assumed that he had a date. As she was locking up, a tan BMW drove up and parked in the front stall. The woman driving was probably in her sixties and she rolled down her passenger window and asked, “Is Charlie already gone?”
“Yes,” Grace answered. “Is there something I can help you with?”
“No. I was going to try and get here in time so that we could ride to the cemetery together. The traffic was a nightmare on the interstate. Anyway, thank you, I’ll find him there, I’m sure.”
“Wait, Miss!” Grace called as the woman began to roll her window back up. “Is this the anniversary of—?”
The woman sadly nodded her head. “Today is the anniversary of my daughter and granddaughter’s death—Celeste and Celia.”
The woman left, and Grace felt terrible. As she walked to the diner, she told herself what a terrible person and terrible friend she was. She hadn’t even asked Charlie about his mood, which seemed to start out all right, but darken as the day moved on. She promised herself that she would find him as soon as she finished talking with her mother and make sure he was okay.
Grace saw Matt and her mother’s back when she walked into the diner. Matt waved her over to their table, and Maggie looked surprised when she turned and saw Grace. She looked back at Matt, but before she could say anything, Grace was at the table.
“Grace, what are you doing here?” she asked. “Is everything okay?”
“Yes, Mother. Everything’s fine. I just need to talk to you, and I asked Matt to be here when I did.”
“You two know each other?” Maggie asked, confused.
“We just met this week,” Matt told her. “Please Grace, sit. Can I have the waitress bring you anything?”
“Just coffee, please,” she said.
“What’s going on?” Maggie asked, suspicious now.
Matt looked at Grace who was having a hard time knowing where to start. He came to her rescue. “Maggie, Grace found out some things since she’s been back in town and she has some questions for you about them.”
“Okay. . .” Maggie said, obviously not sure why Matt knew this.
Grace suddenly opened her mouth and blurted out, “I read some of your old journals.”
They were the only people in the diner except for the staff. It was excruciatingly quiet and it seemed to Grace like the whole world stood still for those few moments until Maggie said anything.
“Why?” Maggie finally asked. “Why would you invade my privacy like that?”
“I’m sorry, Mother. I’ve wanted for so long to know you. I came here, and all of the people in this town seemed to know you better than I do. I have a hard time talking to you. And when I was putting my things in the attic, one of your boxes fell apart and a journal was on top of the pile. I didn’t mean to read it, but I did, and I got more than I bargained for. I am truly sorry for going behind your back that way, but now I need answers, Mother, I really do.”
Maggie was still sitting quietly with her back straight and it seemed like she was using the long pauses to stay calm. At last she asked, “About what?”
“More like who, Mother. Sam was not my real father, I gathered that much from your writings. I want to know who my real father is, and why you lied to Sam.”
Maggie’s eyes filled with tears and she looked at Matt. He gave her a small nod of his head and reached across the table and took her hand. Maggie started talking, and as Grace listened, she wished that words could be unheard, and memories could be erased.
“After high school, I worked at a clothing outlet here in town. Sam came to town often. He was a buyer for his dad’s ranch. We met, and we fell in love. My daddy hated him. I’m not sure why, but he did. When he read my journal and found out that Sam and I had been intimate, he came to the store and called me some terrible names in front of everyone. Matt took me home that day. He worked there, too. The next night, though, our creepy boss, Mr. Sykes, made me stay and work late. He told Matt to go on and he’d take me on home afterwards.”
Maggie paused. The tears were flowing freely, and suddenly realizing with horror where this was all going, Grace interrupted her story. “It’s okay, Mama. You don’t have to tell me anymore.”
“No, I should have told you a long time ago. Sykes didn’t take me straight home that night. We stopped at his place and he made me come in. He told me he had to pick something up. He offered me a drink and I said no, I just wanted to go home. He opened a beer anyway and sat down in a chair. He looked at me ] and I knew what he had in mind. He licked his lips and asked me how I’d like to get a big raise at work. I told him again I just wanted to go home. I was getting scared. He kept talking; it was getting dirtier by the minute, so I ran for the door. I got as far as the porch and he caught me around the waist and pulled me inside.” Maggie had been looking at the table up until that part. She took a deep breath and continued. “He raped me, Grace. That’s why I lied to Sam. I was so ashamed. Daddy already thought I was a whore for being with Sam. If I told him about Sykes, I don’t think he would have believed it was rape. I was so afraid that I’d have to go back to that store and see that man again, everyday. I had to get out of this town. Away from him, and Sam was my ticket. He deserved better.”
Grace was shocked. She was experiencing so many emotions at once that she didn’t know what to feel first. She was disgusted by the thought of that man forcing himself on her mother. She was in pain for the young woman her mother had been and the pain and loneliness she had endured afterward, keeping this all to herself. She understood, now, why Maggie had been so unhappy, why she had drank, and why it was so hard for her to love Grace.
“I’m sorry, Mama,” she said with tears of her own flowing down her cheeks.
Maggie reached across and took Grace’s hand in her own. “I’m the one who’s sorry. I gave you a wonderful father, and then I took him away from you. Sam left us because I finally told him the truth. I couldn’t live with it anymore. It was eating me up. He loved you more than anything in this world, you know.”
“Then why did he leave? Surely he could understand what you had been through, how hard that was on you. And then there was me. I was eight years old. He knew none of it was my fault. I spent my life believing my dad abandoned me, and I was right. I refuse to think of that filth that hurt you as my father. Sam was—and always will be—my father, and if he was here right now, I’d punch him in the mouth for leaving you. I’m sorry, Mama. I’m sorr
y you had to look at me for so long and see him. I always wondered why you couldn’t love me, what I was doing wrong. I understand now.”
“Oh Gracie, I never had a hard time loving you. I loved you from the day I laid eyes on you. I was just a miserable person and all of the lies were turning my soul black. Sam always asked me why I was never happy anymore, and finally, one day I just blurted it out. You’re right, it was not your fault and he should not have abandoned you. If I’ve learned anything in life, though, it’s that you don’t really know what you’ll do until you’re in a new situation yourself.”
Grace and Maggie both stood. Grace hugged her mother, and for the first time since Grace was eight years old, her mother really hugged her back. Grace remembered suddenly that Matt was still there. Looking down at him sitting in the booth she asked him, “You knew all of this?”
He nodded. “Matt knew that night. He was the one I went to. I couldn’t tell anyone else, Matt and I could always talk. I didn’t know it then, but it was what I should have been looking for in a man all along.”
They both looked at Matt and he smiled. “The right one is usually right under your nose.” Grace followed where Matt was looking, and sitting in the front booth of the diner, all alone and looking miserable, was Charlie.
Grace hugged Maggie again and said something to her that she hadn’t said in many years. “I love you.”
Maggie didn’t even hesitate when she returned the sentiment. “I love you too, Gracie.”
“Matt,” Grace said. “Would you mind seeing Mama home. I think I see a friend in need.”
Matt held out his arm and Maggie took it, “It’ll be my pleasure.”
Grace went over and sat in the booth across from Charlie. She reached across the table and covered his hand with hers. “I’m here for you tonight, Charlie. Whatever you need.”
About the Author
Linda lives in Wyoming with her husband and three horses. Her western romance books are perfect for a quick read on the bus to work or for that final time alone before falling asleep. When not writing western romance novels, she can be found out on the trail with her rescue horse—Sunday—or working in her garden that feeds her family nearly all year.
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