Chapter Two
“That Halloween when you came to our house, everything changed. It was as if you’d always belonged with us.” Kathleen’s eyes were closed, as if she, indeed, were lost in that long-ago Halloween.
The van hit yet another pothole. Either the transport driver was aiming for every one on I-279 or the road that circled Pittsburgh was littered with them.
“Hey, take it easy,” Brian yelled up at the man.
The driver mumbled some apology.
“Thanks, Brian.” Hayden’s hand slid across the bench seat, until it was almost touching his.
For a moment, Brian thought she was going to bridge the small gap that remained, but she didn’t. And he didn’t. The months of watching his mother’s illness get worse had taken its toll on them both.
They’d each pulled away from the other, lost in their own misery. There didn’t seem to be any emotion left as they sat on the same seat across from Kathleen’s wheelchair.
Hayden kept to her own end of the bench and he kept to his. Those inches separating them seemed like miles and he didn’t know how to fix it.
“I think it’s going to snow,” Kathleen said.
“Do you remember the snow day that first winter after you moved to Briar Hill Road?”
Brian remembered that after Hayden came trick-or-treating with them, his mom had changed. She seemed happier. Almost like her old self.
“I went to catch the bus,” Hayden continued, “but Brian came out and got me. He said school was canceled and took me back to your house. You said it wasn’t fair we got a day off and you didn’t, so you called in sick to work.”
Kathleen nodded. “When you get older, you’ll have regrets, but I promise they won’t be for the days you play hooky.”
“It was a good day.” Hayden used his mom’s pet phrase. “You didn’t have any sleds, so we used garbage bags and the three of us spent the afternoon out on the hill.”
Hayden looked at him, waiting for him to join in. Needing him to help keep the conversation going.
“I refused to call it sledding. I called it bagging.” He shrugged. “It sounds stupid now, but to a twelve-year-old it was an important difference.”
His mom laughed.
“You called off work again that first winter Brian was at college when we got another big snow,” Hayden continued. “We didn’t go bagging, but we took that long walk down the road. Snowy days make me think of spending time with you.”
“It was such a comfort having you with me when Brian left for TSU. Tennessee seemed so far away.”
His mom had graduated from Tennessee State and she’d encouraged him to apply. They’d been so thrilled when he got in, until the realization hit them that he’d have to leave Pennsylvania. “It made it easier for me to leave, knowing you moved in with Mom.”
Hayden chuckled. “I never really moved in. One day, I just didn’t go home … No, I take that back. The house I grew up in, the house my mother still lived in then, had never been home. I left it without a backward glance and moved in with you. My mother didn’t even come looking for me. I’ve often wondered how long it took her to discover I was gone. She never said and I never asked. Before she went into the nursing home, we’d bump into each other on occasion, but we were strangers. That was fine with me. With you and Brian I’d found my home and my family.”
Brian listened to Hayden and his mom reminisce about Hayden moving in and missing him. He’d missed them both, as well. He remembered coming home after he graduated.…
May 1985
Brian pulled into the tar-and-chip driveway that led to the small white house he’d lived in since he was twelve.
He remembered leaving the big house in Upper St. Clair and moving to the much smaller one outside Bridgeville, just fifteen minutes southwest of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He’d hated leaving his friends, hated the house they’d moved into. But as he sat in the car today and studied the story and a half, Cape Cod-style house with its window boxes, he felt only a sense of coming home.
Time changed things. He laughed at the less than profound thought.
The house’s windows were framed by bright green shutters. They were just for show, just a decoration that couldn’t be used to save the windows during a storm. But southwestern Pennsylvania was known for its occasional snowstorms and those rarely broke windows, so it didn’t really matter.
He wasn’t sure why he was thinking about shutters. Maybe it was easier than reflecting on the fact that the house seemed to have grown smaller since he’d left for college four years ago.
It seemed smaller now than it had over the holiday break.
Is that how it worked? When he graduated from high school everything seemed to have changed, and now that he’d graduated from Tennessee State, would everything continue to change even more?
When would it stop?
Did that diploma they’d handed him mere weeks ago alter things so drastically? He’d shifted from childhood to a quasimanhood while he was at college. He had to leave for California in three weeks, where he was starting a job working with troubled youths. He’d be the adult working with kids, which meant he’d jumped from quasi, to full-out manhood.
Grown.
Independent.
No longer relying on his mother’s money, or the sporadic child-support checks Adam had sent over the last decade. The old pain no longer stabbed at him when he thought about his father. They talked on occasion, but there was no connection. Adam’s focus was on his new family and he seemed eager to forget his past … forget Brian. That was okay with Brian.
He knew he should get out of the car, but he couldn’t seem to move quite yet. He wanted a few more quiet moments.
He noticed that the oak tree that sat on the far side of the house was even bigger. It canopied the roof, keeping the house shaded now that the leaves were open again.
May was a beautiful time of year in Pennsylvania. He’d missed the changing seasons while he was at college. Down south in Tennessee the weather alternated between warm and hot. Things got almost as hot here, but there was more of an ebb and flow; freezing, cold, cool, warm, hot, then back down again.
Damn, it was good to be home, if only for a little while. He thought again about getting out of the car. Before he could actually move, the front door of the house flew open and Hayden rushed out, saving him from his mental meanderings.
“Kathleen, he’s here,” she called before she started running toward him.
He got out of the car and simply took her in.
She had on a strappy sort of wispy dress that looked totally too grown-up for the kid who’d spent her childhood dogging his heels. Her dark brown hair flew loose at her shoulders. There wasn’t anything left of that girl in the young woman.
His axis tilted again with another unexpected reminder that things had changed.
But as she ran he noticed her feet were bare. And his world settled back into place. Some things might change, his perceptions might alter, but there were other things that would always be what they were.
Hayden was one of those things.
“Brian,” she cried, throwing herself full-force into his arms. “You made it. I’ve been worried beyond belief.”
“Worried about what, kid?”
She let go of him and pushed a thick piece of hair out of her eyes. “That you wouldn’t make it in time.”
“When have I ever let you down?”
“Never.” She laughed then. That sound—more than the house, the shutters that didn’t work or the tree that had grown—said home to him. It was the sound that had punctuated his teens.
When they were young, Hayden would follow him so stealthily he frequently forgot she was there. But then she’d laugh like that and everything else would fade.
At first the sound was sporadic, but as time went on, as their house became more and more her home, Hayden’s laughter was frequent.
His mom came out of the house with a little less speed, but not a bit less pleased to see him. She smiled as she hurried to join them.
God, he’d missed them both. It seemed like an eternity since he’d been here over Christmas. He’d spent the spring break with friends down in Florida. At the time it had seemed like a great idea, but now, seeing these two women who meant so much to him, he realized he’d have probably had more fun here than he’d had there.
His mom looked more the same than Hayden did. Her hair, which had once been flaming red, had faded over the years. She was what now? In her midforties? Her hair no longer shouted red, just whispered the color it used to be under the increasing amount of soft gray. Other women might try to deny their age. But not his mom.
Kathleen Conway remained proud of what she was—who she was. She’d tried to pass that self-assurance on to both Hayden and himself. He’d like to think she’d succeeded with both of them.
“Brian.” That’s all she said as she reached him and stood in front of him—just his name. But he could read so much into those two syllables.
Hayden moved aside and let his mother have a turn at hugging him.
“It’s good to have you home. Someone was nervous you’d be late.” She glanced sideways at Hayden and smiled.
There was something between his mom and Hayden. It had been there that first night when the ghost of a girl had come trick-or-treating with them, and the connection had grown over the years. It had seemed right, knowing his mother and Hayden were together while he was so far away, busy growing up.
“If she looked out the window once, she looked a couple dozen times,” his mom continued.
“You’re exaggerating,” Hayden said to Kathleen, before turning back to Brian. “It was only a dozen, max. And that was about eleven more times than you deserved. You’re hours late.”
“The traffic getting out of Nashville was horrible. It put me behind the entire trip. There was an accident on I-70 that left me standing pretty much still for an hour. But I made it.” Hayden started toward the back of the car, as if she were going to help him unload. He shook his head. “Just leave it. I’ll unpack what I need later.”
Four years’ worth of college life was stowed in his car and the trailer he’d rented. Most of his belongings were going to stay in the trailer for the few weeks he had here before driving out to California.
Tonight was Hayden’s night.
With her on one side, his mother on the other, Brian headed into the house. Stepping over the threshold, he felt the last remains of tightness loosen in his chest.
Home.
“Nothing’s changed.” The sentence was at odds with the thoughts that had plagued him as he sat in his car and studied the house. But as he walked into the place, he couldn’t remember what those differences were. All he saw was home. The hardwood floor, the light tan walls. Maybe the curtains were new, but they fit and didn’t change the feel of the house. And it was that feel that he remembered most.
“Everything’s changed,” Hayden corrected. “I graduate from high school in just an hour and a half. That means it’s all different. And I don’t want to be late, so go get your shower. Your suit’s hanging in the closet. I went with your mom to pick out the tie.” One hand was on her hip—when did she get hips? In his mind she was still board straight from top to bottom, but somewhere along the line she’d grown hips. Hips and other new curves he didn’t remember noticing at Christmas.
Her free hand was waving in front of his face. “You’re in a fog, Bri. Maybe you should have some coffee before you go get that shower.”
“She’s bossy. Was she always this bossy?” he asked his mother with deliberate mock seriousness.
“I think she learned from the best. It was always so amusing watching the two of you trying to direct the other. There was never a definitive leader. King of the Mountain was always up for grabs.”
“Well, since I’m graduating today, I’m grabbing. I win. I’m the boss. The top dog. The King of the Mountain. The queen of all I survey. You—” she pointed at him, wagging a finger at his chest “—coffee, shower, change.”
He smiled. “Fine. I’ll let you have tonight, but I don’t guarantee anything for the rest of my visit.”
“I’ll take tonight then and we’ll debate who’s boss for the rest of your visit later.” She glanced at her watch. “Oh, I’ve got to run.”
Without another word, she turned and sprinted up the stairs, her bare feet slapping on the wooden treads. She stopped at the top. “I’m glad you’re home. We missed you.”
“Me, too, kid.” he said. He watched as she turned the twist in the stairs and disappeared from sight, though they could still hear her thumping down the hall. Her bedroom door slammed and her music came on. Brian recognized REO Speedwagon.
“She never slows down,” his mom said, a smile playing on her lips. “She only has one speed—mach one.”
“She’s all grown up now. I didn’t notice that at Christmas, though there must have been some signs then. But in the last five months … Well, she ran out to the car, and there it was. The kid who spent years tormenting me is no longer a kid. It feels weird.”
“It amazes me, as well, but not only her. You, too. Sometimes I look at you and can hardly remember the small, gap-toothed boy with his messy black hair who thought I hung the moon.”
“He still thinks you hung the moon.”
“Oh. Bri, that was an unbelievably cheesy thing to say, but it was just what I needed. Thanks.”
His mom studied him a moment, as if she were truly looking for that gap-toothed boy he once was. She sighed. He wondered if that meant she’d found what she was looking for, or hadn’t.
She reached out and lightly touched his cheek. “I’ve spent my day thinking about the past. Feeling old. The last of my kids—and she is mine, there’s no mistaking that—is officially grown. Do you remember that day she decided to climb the oak tree and hang a rope swing?”
“I still have nightmares about spotting our old ladder, the one that was missing all those rungs, up against the oak, then looking up and seeing her feet dangling below the branch.” He paused, remembering how scared he’d been as he held the ladder and watched her climb down. “I was doing the same kind of thing, remembering, on the drive here. The very, very long drive here.”
“What sort of things were you remembering, specifically?”
“Oh, different things in different cities. I was outside Columbus and remembered her father’s funeral. No one but us and her mom came. Hayden never cried. I don’t know why I remembered that, but I got this mental image of her standing there in front of the casket, not shedding a tear, unlike her mother who put on a huge show for a man she hadn’t seen in years. And speak of the devil, is her mom coming tonight?”
“I don’t know. Hayden went down to their house last week. She wasn’t gone long and didn’t say a word about what happened between them.”
“And you didn’t press.” That was the beauty of his mom. Maybe it came from being a nurse for so many years, but he suspected it was simply part of her. She had such deep patience. He knew she hadn’t pushed, wouldn’t push. She’d simply wait until Hayden was ready to talk. And when that time came, she’d listen, then offer whatever was needed, hugs, advice or just being there. “So, we’ll see.”
He was torn, part of him knowing that Hayden would want her mother there, and the bigger part knowing that if her mother came, it wouldn’t turn out like Hayden wanted.
It never did.
Briar Hill Road had once been a true country road. More houses had been built between their home and Hayden’s mother’s over the years. The quarter mile down the street wasn’t that far by county standards, but it was miles away as far as Mrs. MacNulty was concerned. She hadn’t really been a part of Hayden’s life in a long time. Sometimes he wondered if she ever had been at all.
“Yes, we’ll see.” His mom leaned over and gave him another quick hug. “Have I mentioned how glad I am you’re home?”
“I don’t think so. But Hayden did. And speaking of Hayden, if I don’t hit the shower soon, she’s likely to march down here and throw me in.”
“Before you go, can I say something?”
“Anything. Anytime.”
“I hate to meddle, but this once, I need to. I want you to remember that Hayden’s not a little girl anymore. Although, I’m not sure if she ever had a true childhood. Sometimes life forces people to mature too fast, too soon.”
He must have looked as confused as he felt over her cryptic warning, because his mom continued, “Hayden’s a woman, with a woman’s feelings. And she loves you. Always has.”
“Like a brother.”
His mom just tilted her head to one side and stared at him. Waiting in that quiet way of hers for him to think things through.
And when he did he unthought it immediately. “No, no way.”
“She’s dated, but she’s never lit up about any of the boys the way she lights up when you call. Every comment you make, every small gesture, she holds on to and treasures. She loves you.” His mom smiled. “Maybe I’m wrong. But in case I’m not, be careful. You two haven’t spent much time together in the last few years. I don’t want her to be hurt. She’s already lived through more heartache at eighteen than most do in a lifetime.”
“I’ll be careful, but I think you’re wrong. She’s a kid. A pain in the butt, climbing broken ladders and generally making me crazy.”
At that moment, Hayden called, “Brian, if you don’t get up here …” from the top of the stairs, leaving an unspoken threat hanging.
“I’m on my way.” He kissed his mom’s cheek. “I’ll be careful.”
“That’s all I ask.”
“Our true home isn’t just a place, it’s a feeling. It’s knowing that this is where you belong. That these are the people you belong to. That the door will always be open to you.”
Hayden had searched the rows of students and their families when she reached the podium. She felt nervous until she found Brian and Kathleen, then she calmed down.
They were sitting just behind the rows of seniors, watching her, practically radiating their pride. She’d written her valedictorian speech more for them than for her senior class. She needed them to know, wanted the world to know, how much they meant to her. But saying so in the normal course of things was too hard. This speech was her opportunity.
“Sometimes you’re born into your family, into your home. But if you’re not that lucky, you have to search. I didn’t even know I was looking for mine until I knocked on their door when I was eight and they let me in. I never left after that, even if I spent a few more years sleeping at a different house. I’d found them and they were mine, I was theirs. Now, it’s time for us all to leave home, to leave our families and our friends here at school behind. We’re about to venture out into the world and spread our wings. There’s so much waiting for us to discover—new ideas, new friends, new challenges.”
The door at the back of the auditorium flew open and Hayden’s heart sank when she saw who walked in. She wasn’t sure why she’d walked down Briar Hill Road to that ramshackle house that had never been home. She wasn’t sure why she’d felt the need to tell the woman who’d never really been her mother about the graduation and leave her a ticket. She’d felt it was the right thing to do at the time.…
Hayden tried to find her place in the speech and ignore her mother, ignore the fact that she hadn’t even bothered to brush her black hair that had about three inches of light brown roots peppered with gray streaks showing.
“But thanks to our years here at CV High, we’re prepared for whatever is waiting around this next bend. And we know that even as we leave this school, leave our houses, we’ll never really leave home. We’ll take those we love with us—”
“That’s her,” her mother cried. She was swaying as if she were on a boat and the waves were high. The left shoulder of her skimpy top slid down, revealing a stick-thin arm and a boney shoulder. “That’s my girl.” She waved a finger toward Hayden. “She ain’t talking about me, though. Why, I don’t even know—”
And no one would ever know because suddenly Brian was there at her mother’s side, leading her out of the auditorium.
“But that’s my daughter,” her mother yelled as he hurried her through the door.
“Uh, thanks to our years at CV High we’re prepared …” Hayden went on, finishing her speech, but the words which had sounded so right and rare only an hour before when she’d read through them one last time now rang hollow.
She might be valedictorian, might be heading off to college on an academic scholarship, might have shaken the dirt of her mother’s house off her feet, but inside she was still Cootie MacNulty, the same girl who’d watched her parents crawl into a bottle. She’d hoped her mother would crawl out of it, if only for this one night. Her mom had sworn she would.
Though Hayden shouldn’t have been surprised that her mother didn’t keep that promise. Her mother had never kept any of them. But like a fool, Hayden couldn’t let go, hoping that this time her mother would change.
Kathleen always said that it was only right to give her mother another chance. But tonight was the final straw. Hayden was done trying.
What Kathleen didn’t realize—couldn’t see because her great big heart obscured her view—was that some people would never change because they didn’t really want to.
Her mother had always chosen liquor over Hayden.
“I wish you all a safe journey as you set out on this new adventure. But remember, you always have a home to come back to.”
She found Brian, who’d slipped into his seat again, and Kathleen. Hayden knew that those words were so true. Her parents weren’t what she’d have wished for, but she’d found her real family that Halloween so long ago. As long as she had them, she’d always be home.
A week later, Hayden pulled into the driveway and got out of her ancient Pinto with a small paper bag in her hand. She never quite knew how to express her feelings to Brian. She wanted so desperately to thank him for getting her mother out of the school last week, wanted to tell him so many deeper, more important things, but she couldn’t find the words. Her simple, “Thanks,” after the ceremony last week, followed by his quick nod, was as close to the subject as they’d come.
So she brought him milkshakes.
It was lame. She knew it was, but she couldn’t stop herself. It was the best she could do.
She was putting in forty hours a week at Sears, then working as many hours as she could at the ice cream store, saving for college. The academic scholarship covered tuition and the cost of most of her classes, but she still had living expenses to pay for.
Kathleen had generously offered to help her with this, but Hayden was bound and determined to do it on her own. Kathleen had already given her so much and she couldn’t take any more.
“Oh, Hay-den,” Brian called in a sing-songy voice from the porch. His hands were hidden behind his back. He looked very happy with himself, suspiciously so.
“Brian Conway, what are you up to?”
“I’ve been waiting for you. Remember last night?”
“Oh, come on, it was a joke. A harmless joke.”
He shook his head, smiling. “You cheated at Monopoly. You always cheat.”
“It was a loan.”
Slowly, he brought his hands forward. A bright red balloon sat solidly in his right one.
Not just any balloon. She could tell by the particular way it rolled on his palm that it was a water balloon. A water balloon that had been filled to its capacity. Brian had always been a pro at filling balloons until they almost reached their breaking point so that his always popped upon impact.
And Hayden knew just where he wanted to impact this one.
“Do you recall years ago when you were the one with the balloon and I promised I’d bide my time and get my revenge?”
Hayden couldn’t believe he remembered her water-balloon assault four years earlier. “Bri, if you do it …”
“If I do, you’ll what?” He tossed the water balloon from one hand to the other. Back and forth, back and forth, wearing that grin she knew so well.
“If you do, I’ll tell Kathleen.”
He just laughed.
“Fine.” She stood, holding the paper bag in front of her, not that it would provide much protection. “Do your worst, but do it quick, I have a date. And be forewarned. I’ll get even. Very, very even. Plus, you’ll ruin this lovely chocolate shake I brought you from work.”
He walked toward her and she got ready to be whacked, but he was almost up to her and the balloon still sat quietly in his hand.
“Who’s the lucky fellow?” He took the bag and pulled out the shake.
“Tad. I know,” she said before he could start teasing her. “His name sounds like he should be in a Gidget movie. But, despite that, he’s a nice guy. More of a friend than anything, really. We’re going to see a movie. You can come if you want.”
“Thanks, but no.” He took a long sip of his milkshake. “You do make a mean chocolate shake, kid. Thanks. You’d better go get ready.”
She started toward the house, and hadn’t even made the porch when he called, “Hey, Hayden?”
She turned.
Splat. The water balloon hit her chest dead center.
“You …” She didn’t bother searching for the appropriate word, she immediately kicked off her shoes and took off across the lawn. He’d started to run, but he was no match for her speed. She’d lettered in track at school, even gone to States.
She knocked against him, sending them both sprawling on the lawn. He managed to hang on to his shake.
“Say uncle,” she cried.
She might be faster than he was, but he had sheer bulk on his side. He set his shake down and flipped her with far more ease than he had in the past. “No, you say uncle.”
“Never.” And then—Hayden was never quite sure how it happened, but she was pretty sure she made the initial move—she was kissing him. Not like a friend. But kissing him as if she meant it. Hoping her touch told him without words all the things she felt and couldn’t voice.
For a moment, a brief moment, she was more to him than a kid. She was pretty sure he was kissing her back. But she couldn’t be positive because the next moment, he was standing and she was still damp on the grass looking up at him.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
Not I’ve been waiting for you to grow up enough to do that.
Not Wow.
Not Let’s do that again.
Just I’m sorry.
“For what? For getting me wet?” She smiled, as if nothing had happened. She was good at that, at pretending there was nothing wrong.
For as long as she could remember she’d loved Brian Conway. For years, it had been like a little girl who loved her hero. A devoted, puppy dog sort of love.
But when he’d come home last Christmas, there was suddenly more. She loved him in a totally new and unexpected way. She wasn’t sure why or how. Maybe it was when they’d gone to the movie, and he’d slipped his arm over the back of her chair. It had almost felt as if he’d been holding her, and she’d realized how much she wished he had been. She’d just known she loved him and had hoped someday he’d realize he loved her, too.
And now she’d ruined it all by making an ass of herself.
Well, she wasn’t going to let her slip of the lips change things between them. He might not feel the same way about her that she did for him, but they’d always been close. She wouldn’t let their kiss change that.
“Hayden,” he started in that we-should-talk-about-this sort of tone she had no problem recognizing.
But she didn’t want to talk. And in fourteen days, he was heading to his new job, his new life, in California. She could not talk about what had happened for that long, she was sure. She was even more positive she could avoid letting him know how she really felt about him.
She glanced at her watch, then looked right at him and forced a smile. “Hey, I’ve got to run now. Tad will be here soon and I’m soaked.”
She sprinted toward the door, then turned around and called, “Don’t forget your milkshake.”
She ran in the house, up the stairs and locked herself in the bathroom, knowing that something big had, indeed, happened.
She’d crushed her schoolgirl fantasies with one kiss.
That was probably a good thing, she assured herself. He was leaving to begin his career, and she was leaving for college.
It was time she grew up.
It was time to set aside the girl she had once been. It was time to become the woman she wanted to be. Strong. Independent. Capable.
She wanted to be a woman like Kathleen. A woman who could make her own way in the world.
When Kathleen’s husband had left her, she’d moved to Briar Hill Road and started a life for herself on her own terms.
Hayden had made a good start. Because she’d worked hard through high school, she had her scholarship to Temple in Philadelphia. She’d been working like a maniac to save enough money to pay whatever costs were left over. It was a good start.
Yes, she’d get over this crush on Brian Conway in no time. She was ready to stand on her own two feet.