“Betsy! There you are! I’m so glad you can be here to watch the house while we’re gone!”
Dorothy McClain, all five feet of her, a white-headed ball of enthusiasm as always, swept Betsy into a tight hug. As Betsy had neared Legend, Tennessee, her doubts about coming back for the house-sitting job increased. In some ways it seemed exactly what she needed right now. Would it be just a pleasant respite, allowing her to feel welcome and settled for a while before going back into the City to try—again—to make her way there? Or would there be a reason to stay?
She watched Dorothy’s eyes leave hers and look down at her side. The older woman knelt.
“And how are you, Miss LizBeth Ann? You are certainly looking all grown up.”
Dimples showed shyly, and LizBeth Ann’s big blue eyes grew even larger. Her chubby arm went around her mother’s jeans-clad leg. She wasn’t sure of the situation, was she? Wasn’t sure who this noisy lady was. Well, that was part of the problem Betsy had been coming to terms with. It needed to change, and change permanently. These two were family, after all. And there was lots more family in Legend…
“Honey, this is your Aunt Dorothy.” Betsy knelt, and LizBeth Ann immediately stepped into her mother’s arms, regarding Dorothy from a safe haven.
Dorothy’s enthusiastic smile never wavered as she stood slowly, touching a steadying hand to a white column of her front porch. She took a step toward the front door she’d flung wide open, and looked over her shoulder at the two-and-a-half year-old.
“LizBeth Ann, why don’t you bring your mommy on into the house? Let’s see if we can find some cookies you-all like. I baked chocolate chip this morning. Does your mommy like that kind?”
A smile lit the little face and the dimples showed again. With her head cocked slightly to one side, she gazed up at Dorothy. The quick intake of breath indicated Dorothy noticed it too. When LizBeth Ann cocked her head that way in concentration, she looked so much like Mike. The moment passed and LizBeth Ann took Betsy’s hand, tugging a bit, taking a step closer to the house.
“Mommy like choca chip.”
Half an hour later, some of the awkwardness was gone. The miraculous cookies-and-milk cure had worked again.
“Betsy, there are a few things I need to show you before we flit off.” Dorothy quickly cleared the table and put the dishes into the dishwasher. “LizBeth Ann, you might have to help Mommy remember some of these things. Okay?”
Hopping off the chair in the large cheery kitchen and smoothing her red-and-white gingham sundress down over her knees, the child gazed seriously up into Dorothy’s eyes.
“I help Mommy. Girls stick togevver.” It was a phrase Betsy used often to ease the awkwardness of LizBeth Ann having only one parent. The little girl cocked her head again. “Aunt Dorfy a girl Her stick togevver too.”
“All right, then.” Dorothy blinked a tear away, and wiped her hands on a dish towel. “We girls shall stick together. Come on and I’ll give you the low-down.”
Betsy and her daughter followed the white-haired lady as she wafted out of the kitchen, up the back stairs to tour the second story bedrooms and baths. A while later they came down the large front staircase and looked at the remainder of the first floor—formal dining area, Charles’ home office, family room, formal living room, four-season back porch, Dorothy’s sewing and sitting rooms. Betsy was introduced to circuit breakers, and plumbing cut-off valves. As many times as she’d been a guest in this house, she’d never needed to know their location. As they walked down the hallway toward the last room on the main floor, Betsy anticipated a quick peek into her favorite room, the library. She had spent many happy hours here, and looked forward to her daughter’s reaction to the large room full of beautiful books. Double walnut pocket doors at the end of the hall were closed, and squeaked a little when Dorothy pulled them open. Betsy stepped forward, then stopped and stared.
“What happened here?” she gasped.
“That’s what I wanted to tell you. I decided to have it redone simply ages ago, and you know how hard it is to get skilled craftsmen—they’re nearly extinct!—so I waited and waited, and of course wouldn’t you know it, Greg could only fit us into his schedule this month!” Dorothy paused for a quick breath. “So there you have it.”
“So there I have what?” Betsy shook her head as she viewed the devastation.
“Big mess! Who do this mess?” LizBeth Ann wrinkled her nose. “Mommy, we clean?” She looked suspiciously at Dorothy, as if suddenly the girls weren’t going to be so tight after all.
“No, honey, you don’t have to clean it up.” Dorothy stepped gingerly across the room which was littered with scraps of wood, dirt, sawdust, and miscellaneous wads of paper. “There is a man named Greg Andrews. He—he has a business of redoing people’s houses.” She picked up an empty soda can and retraced her steps to join them at the double walnut doors. “When there’s a big project, sometimes it makes a mess. Cleaning it up—that happens after.”
“Oh.” LizBeth Ann tiptoed to a wooden sawhorse and studied it. “What’s that?”
“It’s called a sawhorse, honey,” her mother said. “Carpenters use those—”
“I ride?”
“It’s not that kind of a horse, sweetie. It’s to put wood on, when the carpenter is going to saw the wood.”
The quizzical look again. “Oh.”
Betsy looked at Dorothy. “So. Greg Andrews. I don’t know that name.”
“He moved here just a year or so ago,” Dorothy answered. “He does beautiful work, and got so busy he had to hire help.”
“That sounds good.” Betsy looked around.
“Uh-huh. Deluxe Home Improvements is the company name. You’ll see his little signs in people’s yards after he’s done renovation for them. You know Legend. Word of mouth is enough, really. But Greg’s still got some city in him.”
“Hm. So he hired local people?”
Just then Charles McClain arrived, loudly. “Dorothy!” His booming voice resounded throughout the large house. McClain men were notoriously loud, Betsy remembered. Loud and handsome. And some other things, too… A flash of Mike’s face flitted across her memory before she could stop it. She quickly blinked her eyes, willing it to be gone.
“Dorothy!” he called again, evidently standing just inside the door he had entered instead of looking for his wife. Men. Come and wait on me, honey. Come fix my dinner, honey. Put everything else aside because the man of the house has arrived. Honey.
Dorothy was already on her way toward the sound. Betsy sighed deeply and took LizBeth Ann’s hand, leading her that way too.
“Charles, of all things. Don’t walk in here and start hollering like you don’t have a bit of manners.” Dorothy chastised him gently as they approached him in the entryway. “Sweetheart, we have visitors. Remember?” The couple hugged for long moments, and Charles leaned down and placed a kiss atop his wife’s head.
“Whoops. My bad.” His blue eyes twinkled as he uttered the youthful comment. He winked at Betsy. “Sorry, Betsy. Really glad to see you. Just feeling a little rushed here. Say! Who is this fair princess?”
LizBeth Ann had pulled her hand out of her mother’s grasp and was hiding behind her, plastered to Betsy’s denim backside. Betsy felt her shake her head no, trying to avoid an introduction.
But Charles had closed the space between them and pulled Betsy into a big, warm embrace.
“Honey, it’s good to have you home. We’ve all missed you.” The little girl came around to her mother’s side, and he reached down and gently tousled LizBeth Ann’s hair. “And we’ve missed you too, little one. Why, you were just a tiny thing last time I saw you. And now look.”
He moved a step away, and with surprising agility bent his long legs and knelt in front of her. “You’re half grown up! I can see we’re leaving the place in capable hands.”
LizBeth Ann lifted her hands and looked at them.
“Exactly,” said Charles. “You have good, strong hands, Princess, and I know you’ll take special care of our house while we’re gone.”
She put her hands into the strawberry-shaped patch pockets of her dress. “I LizBeff Ann.” She shifted her weight to one white sandal, leaning slightly against Betsy’s leg. “I Princess? Okay.”
Everyone laughed at that, even LizBeth Ann, who had managed to rid the air of any remaining tension and make everyone feel comfortable.
Then there was a flurry of activity as Charles explained that their son Joe, mechanic extraordinaire, had pronounced their car ready for the trip to Knoxville. They would spend the night in the city with their other son, David, and his wife Rebecca. In the morning, Rebecca would drive them to the airport to catch their flight. The three adults grabbed the luggage standing neatly beside the door and hauled it out to the sedan. Charles painstakingly loaded it just so as Dorothy rolled her eyes and looked at her watch.
They’re just the same. Even though I’ve been gone a while, even though my life has been a mess, these dear people haven’t changed. And they still want me in their family. Thank goodness for that.
All the rest of the family, including daughters Maureen and Janelle, had said their good-byes at last night’s going away dinner. So it was only Betsy and LizBeth Ann who stood in the driveway of the big white colonial and waved good-bye.
“Bye-bye!” LizBeth Ann spoke quietly as she waved, still smiling. Charles honked the horn repeatedly as they turned out of the drive and headed up the road, away from Legend.
And it was suddenly very quiet.
“They nice.”
“Yes, honey. They’re about the nicest people I know.”
“Mommy nicest.”
Betsy looked down and smiled, brushing a stray curl from her daughter’s forehead. “Sorry. No more cookies ’til after supper.”
“Aw!”
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