“No, I don’t think that’s it. Everyone gets along with Vance. Come sit down.” Julia put her arm around Emily’s shoulder and led her out of the kitchen bedroom and into the living room bedroom. This room contained the only nice thing in her apartment—a royal blue love seat Stella’s mother had given her from her decorator’s showroom. There was also a television on an old coffee table and a rickety bookcase full of pots and pans—overflow from the kitchen. Julia had put most of her stuff in Baltimore in storage when she’d moved here, and brought only her clothes and her cooking supplies, so there wasn’t much to the apartment. It was shabby and sparse, which was fine with her. There was no sense in getting comfortable. When they sat down, Julia said, “All I can tell you is that your mother was the most beautiful, popular girl in school. She made it seem effortless. Perfect clothes. Perfect hair. Supremely confident. She was in a group that called themselves Sassafras, made up of girls in school whose families had money. I wasn’t one of them.”
Emily looked astonished. “My mom was popular? Grandpa Vance had money?”
There was a knock at her door. “Excuse me,” Julia said as she got up. She assumed it was Stella, which was why her whole body gave a start when she opened the door, felt a gust of air that smelled like freshly cut grass, and saw Sawyer standing at the top of the staircase.
“I brought pizza,” he said with a smile. “Come down.”
Something was definitely afoot. A year and a half of Thursday night get-togethers, and Sawyer had never asked her to come down to have pizza with him and Stella before. “Thanks, but I can’t.” She took a step back to close the door.
He tilted his head at her. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were embarrassed.”
That got her. “Embarrassed? By what?”
“By the fact that I now know you’ve been baking cakes for me.”
She snorted. “I never said I baked them for you. I said I baked them because of you.”
“So you did say it,” he said.
She met his eyes. Yes, she’d said it. And as much as she wished it weren’t true, it was. The one night they’d had together, they’d lain side by side on the high school football field, staring up at a starry night she’d never seen the likes of before or since, and he’d told her a story of how his mother used to bake cakes on summer afternoons and, no matter where he’d been, it had sent him to her, a beacon of powdered sugar flowing like pollen in the wind. He’d sensed it, he’d said. He’d seen it.
Cakes had the power to call. She’d learned that from him.
“Actually, what I think I said was I baked cakes because of people like you,” she finally said. “You’re my target customer, after all.”
He looked like he didn’t believe her. But he smiled anyway. “That’s a nice save.”
“Thank you.”
His eyes went over her shoulder. He’d never been in her apartment before, and she wasn’t going to ask him in now. Sawyer had grown up with money, and she hadn’t. But her things in Baltimore were nice—a little edgy, a little bohemian. That’s who she was now. Not this. She didn’t want him to see this. “It smells good up here,” he said. “I want to live in your kitchen.”
“There’s not enough room. And I only bake here on Thursdays.”
“I know. Stella told me when you first moved in. Why do you think I always come by on Thursdays?”
She’d never even suspected. He was that good. “I can’t come down, because I have company. You and Stella have fun.” She closed the door and leaned against it, letting out a deep breath. After a moment, she realized that she hadn’t heard Sawyer walk back down. She turned her head and put her ear to the door. Was he still there? Finally there was a whisper of movement and she heard him walk away.
She pushed herself from the door and went back to the living room. “Sorry about that.”
“I can come back later if you’re busy,” Emily said.
“Don’t be silly.”
“So, everyone must have liked my mom, if she was so popular.”
Julia hesitated. But before she could speak, there was another knock at the door. “Excuse me again.”
“Who do you have up here?” Stella demanded when Julia opened the door. Stella had a wide, exotic face, with almond-shaped eyes and straight dark brows. She was wearing a kimono-style robe and her dark hair was pulled up into a bun. Some tendrils, still wet from her bath, were sticking to her neck. “Sawyer said you had company. Are you seeing someone? Why didn’t you tell me? Who is it?”
“It’s none of your business,” she said because she knew it would drive Stella crazy. She still hadn’t forgiven her for telling Sawyer about the cakes. And Julia thought it was rich for Stella to demand to know if Julia was seeing someone, when Stella had slept with Sawyer three years ago and had never told her.
She closed the door, but as soon as she walked back into the living room, the knocking started again. Incessantly. Stella had a wild hair now. “She’s not going to stop until she meets you,” Julia said to Emily. “Do you mind?”
Emily seemed game, and followed her into the hallway.
As soon as Julia opened the door again, Stella said, “I’m not leaving until …” She stopped when Julia opened the door farther, revealing Emily standing beside her.
“This is Vance Shelby’s granddaughter,” Julia said. “Emily, this is Stella Ferris.”
Stella seemed incapable of speech.
“Emily came by wanting to know what her mother was like when she lived here.”
Stella recovered quickly. “Well, it’s so lovely to meet you, Emily! Sawyer and I were friends with your mother. Come downstairs and have pizza with us. I’ll pull out my yearbooks.”
When Stella stepped to the side, Emily didn’t hesitate and bounded down the stairs. With the elegant lines of her face and her tall, willowy body, it was easy to forget how young she was, until she did something like that.
Before Stella could follow, Julia grabbed the sleeve of her robe. “Don’t talk about what her mother did.”
Stella looked insulted. “What’s the matter with you? I’m not an ogre.”
Emily waited eagerly for them to come down. Once they did, Stella led the way to her kitchen, her robe billowing dramatically behind her.
Sawyer had his back to them and was staring out the kitchen window, his hands in his pockets. He turned when he heard them enter. His brows shot up when he saw Emily.
“Hello, who is this very lovely young lady?” He pronounced the word “very” Vera, like it was a proper noun, the name of a pretty woman who wore white gloves. There was something inherent in Stella’s and Sawyer’s manners around strangers, something that always gave away their breeding.
“This is who Julia was entertaining, Sawyer, so you can stop pouting. This is Emily, Dulcie Shelby’s daughter,” Stella said significantly.
Sawyer didn’t miss a beat. “A pleasure.” Sawyer held out his hand and Emily shook it. She actually giggled a little, and Emily didn’t strike Julia as a giggler. “Let’s eat the pizza while it’s hot. Julia?” Sawyer walked over to the kitchen table and pulled out a chair for her, not giving her much of a choice.
Stella set out drinks and paper napkins, then they unceremoniously ate the vegetarian pizza out of the box. Julia tried to eat a slice quickly so she could leave. Sawyer was casual and relaxed, smiling at her like he knew what she was doing. Stella was as comfortable wearing a robe at the dinner table as she would have been in a Dior suit. And Emily was watching the three of them like they were unopened presents.
“So, you two knew my mom?” Emily finally asked, as if she couldn’t wait any longer.
“We knew her well,” Stella said. “Dulcie and I were in a close-knit group of friends.”
“Sassafras?” Emily said.
“Right. Sawyer dated a girl named Holly who was in the group, so he was one of our honorary boys.”
“You weren’t friends with Julia?”
“I wasn’t friends with an
yone back then,” Julia said.
Emily turned to her, curious. She had pizza sauce on her upper lip. Julia smiled and handed her a napkin. “Why not?” Emily said, wiping her mouth.
“Being a teenager is tough. We all know that. Sassafras made it look easy. I looked like the truth.”
“What did Sassafras do?” Emily asked. “Community service? Fundraising?”
Stella laughed. “We weren’t that kind of group. Let me get the yearbooks.” She tossed her pizza crust into the box, then left the kitchen. She swished back in minutes, possibly the only person in the world who knew where to find her high school yearbooks without digging through closets or calling her parents. “Here we are.” She set a green and silver book emblazoned with the words HOME OF THE FIGHTING CATS! on the table in front of Emily, then opened it. “That’s Sassafras, with your mother in the middle, of course. We held court on the front steps of the school every morning before classes. There’s your mother at homecoming. There she is as our prom queen. There’s Sawyer on the soccer team.”
Sawyer shook his head. “I rarely played.”
Stella cut her eyes at him. “That’s because you didn’t want to risk hurting that face.”
“A valid excuse.”
Stella turned the next page. “And there’s Julia.”
It was a photo of her eating lunch by herself on the top row of the bleachers on the football field. That was Julia’s domain. Before school, at lunch, when she skipped classes, sometimes even at night, that was her safe place.
“Look how long your hair was! And it was all pink!” Emily said, then looked closer. “Are you wearing black lipstick?”
“Yes.”
“No one knew what to think of Julia back then,” Stella said.
Julia smiled and shook her head. “I was harmless.”
“To other people, maybe,” Sawyer murmured, and Julia automatically pulled her long sleeves farther down her arms.
“Julia’s father sent her to boarding school after our sophomore year,” Stella told Emily, and Julia turned back to them. “She didn’t come back for a long time. And when she did, no one recognized her.”
“I did,” Sawyer said.
Stella rolled her eyes. “Of course you did.”
Emily was poring over the yearbook now, flipping through pages, stopping every time she came across a photo of her mother. “Look!” she said. “Mom is wearing her charm bracelet! This one!” Emily held up her wrist.
Julia found herself staring at Emily’s profile, a familiar yearning in her heart. Without thinking, she reached over and pushed some of Emily’s hair out of her eyes. Emily didn’t seem to notice, but when Julia looked across the table, Sawyer and Stella were staring at her like she’d just grown another head.
“Who is this with my mom?” Emily asked, pointing to an elegant dark-haired boy in a suit and bow tie. “He’s in a lot of pictures with her.”
“That’s Logan Coffey,” Julia said.
“That’s who he was talking about.” Emily sat back and smiled. “I met a boy named Win Coffey today. He mentioned that his uncle was Logan Coffey. He seemed surprised that I didn’t know who he was.”
Oh, hell, Julia thought. That can’t be good.
“Was Logan Coffey her boyfriend?” Emily asked.
“We all wondered. He and Dulcie denied it,” Julia said cautiously. “Basically, he was just a shy, mysterious boy your mother tried to coax out of his shell.”
“Does he still live here? Do you think I could talk to him about my mom?”
There was a conspicuous silence. No one wanted to tell her. Julia finally said, “Logan Coffey died a long time ago, sweetheart.”
“Oh.” As if sensing the change in atmosphere, Emily reluctantly closed the book. “I guess I should get back home. Thank you for letting me look through the yearbook.”
Stella waved her hand. “Take it with you. That was twenty pounds ago. I don’t need to be reminded.”
“Really? Thank you!” When Emily stood, so did Julia. Julia walked her to the door and said good night, watching until Emily evaporated into the darkness under the canopy of trees next door.
When Julia walked back in, Stella was standing there, her hands on her hips. “Okay, what’s going on?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why are you acting that way around her?”
“I’m not acting any way around her.” Julia frowned. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“I’m just surprised, that’s all. I mean, come on. You’re the least maternal person on the planet.” Stella laughed, but stopped when she saw the look on Julia’s face. Julia had gotten used to people saying that to her, but it didn’t make it any easier to hear. It was the price you paid when you were thirty-six and had no apparent interest in sharing your life with anyone. “Oh, I didn’t mean it in a bad way.” And Julia knew Stella didn’t. Neither did Julia’s friends in Baltimore when they said, You love your independence too much. Or You couldn’t be a mom because you’d be cooler than your teenager. “Let’s go out on the back porch and have wine.”
“No, thanks.”
“Julia …”
“I know you have something sweet in here,” Sawyer called from the kitchen, followed by the banging of cabinet doors.
Stella rolled her eyes. “That man can find my stash of Hershey’s Miniatures no matter where I hide them.”
“Let him have them before he tries to raid my kitchen,” Julia said as she headed for the staircase. “I have work to do.”
EMILY SAT on her balcony when she got home, the yearbook on her lap. Earlier that day, she’d gone through the closet and all the drawers in her bedroom, in search of … something. Some clue to her mother’s time here. She’d begun to feel strangely suspicious, like there was something she needed to know that no one was telling her. But there was only her mother’s name on the dusty trunk at the foot of the bed to give any indication that Dulcie had ever even lived there. There was nothing personal. There were no photos, no old letters, not even a scarf or an earring left behind. That’s why Emily had gone over to Julia’s. She’d felt awkward about it at first, but now she was glad she’d done it. The yearbook was such a treasure, if a little confusing. One of the tenets of Roxley School for Girls was that there was no caste system, no superlatives, no elections. How could her mother have been prom queen?
Emily remembered her mother never let her go to the mall because of the open competition there to have something as good as or better than the next person. She always said that fashion should never be a factor in determining someone’s self-worth. So of course Roxley School had uniforms. Yet, here in the yearbook, her mother was in the trendiest clothes of the time, and she had mall hair.
Maybe she’d been embarrassed by who she’d been as a youth. Maybe she thought her grassroots reputation might have been hurt by her tiara-laden past.
Still, that seemed like such a peculiar reason never to come back.
Emily looked up from the yearbook when she heard voices gliding through the still night, coming from the back porch next door. A woman’s laughter. A tinkling of glasses.
Sitting at the old patio table she’d cleared of leaves, she smiled and leaned back. The stars looked twisted in the limbs of the trees, like Christmas lights. She felt like part of the hollow around her was filling. She’d come here with too many expectations. Things weren’t perfect, but they were getting better. She’d even made friends next door.
She took a deep breath of the sweet evening heat, and began to get sleepy.
She only meant to close her eyes for a moment. But she dozed off almost immediately.
WHEN SHE woke up, it was still dark. She blinked a few times, trying to figure out what time it was and how long she’d been asleep.
She looked down and saw the yearbook had fallen from her lap to the leaves on the balcony floor. Her back stiff, she leaned down to retrieve it. When she sat back up, her skin prickled.
The light was back! The light
Julia said people thought was a ghost.
Frozen, she watched it in the woodline beyond the old gazebo in Grandpa Vance’s backyard. It didn’t disappear like it had last night. It lingered instead, darting from tree to tree, hesitating in between.
Was it … was it watching her?
She quickly looked next door. There were no lights on. No one to see this but her.
She turned back to the light. What was that?
She made herself stand and slowly walk into her room. She set the yearbook on the bed and paused for a moment. She didn’t know what came over her, but suddenly she took off in a run, her bare feet slapping against the hardwood floors. She slowed down so that she’d be more quiet as she went down the stairs and past Grandpa Vance’s room, but then she took off again. She was briefly foiled by the locked kitchen door, but after fumbling with the lock, she finally opened the door and ran out.
The light was still there! She ran after it, into the wooded area behind the gazebo. The light quickly retreated and she heard footsteps in the leaves.
Footsteps?
Ghosts don’t have footsteps.
After about five minutes of chasing it through the gloomy, moonlit woods, her hands up to swat away the low-hanging branches, it began to occur to her that she had no idea where she was going, or where this patch of trees ended. When the light suddenly disappeared, she felt the first twinge of real worry. What was she doing? But a few more steps and she unexpectedly broke through the trees. She stood there for a moment, out of breath and painfully aware that she was barefoot. She lifted her foot and saw a fine trickle of blood. She’d cut her heel.
Out of the quiet came the distinct sound of a door being closed.
She jerked her head up and looked around and realized she was on the residential end of Main Street, standing in the middle of the park facing the old brick mansions. The woods behind Grandpa Vance’s house must zigzag through other neighborhoods in a crazy labyrinth, ending here, by the bandstand with the crescent moon weathervane. She looked up and down the street, then she looked back into the woods. Surely she saw the light end here?