I stabbed my trowel into the mulch like I was trying to kill the earth itself. Just where the hell did Ford get off, anyway? How could he even think that stuff, let alone say it? He didn't know the first goddamn thing about my family. He had no idea what Dad's death had put us through. How it had almost destroyed Mom, in more ways than one.
Their relationship had been like something out of Leave It To Beaver: high-school sweethearts, married young, working dad and stay-at-home mom. One day, I'd come home from middle school to find her crying her eyes out on the couch, the phone still in her hand. Dad had just … dropped dead. Right in front of his desk at work, they said. Some kind of brain aneurysm. In a single call, we’d lost the only man Mom had ever loved and our only source of income.
Her whole life had revolved around us. She had never had a job, never even went to college. But what little money my parents had saved wasn’t nearly enough, so Mom sucked it up as best she could and looked for work. Without any skills or experience, though, she didn't have much success—and when she did get a job, she got fired because she was too emotionally destroyed to concentrate.
Her longest job was as a receptionist for a private law firm. The senior partner was a widower, so he sympathized with what she was going through and didn't get too upset over her minor mistakes. He was a sweet man, a little old and a lot lonely, and when he proposed … Mom was realistic about her options. She didn't know how else to provide for me, so she accepted. Unsurprisingly, their marriage lasted only a few years since they had both married for the wrong reasons. Mom went through another husband after that—not because she needed the money, since the first divorce had left her with enough for a modest life, but because she just couldn't stand being alone. But living in a man's house wasn't the same as being in love with him. She couldn't recapture what she'd had with Dad.
Not until she met Russ, anyway. And I came so close to rotting their relationship from the inside.
Slowly I emptied the flowerbed of everything except what belonged there: red yucca, blue larkspur, butter-yellow columbines, pale pink waxflowers, and the violet-blooming bushes of hyssop and English lavender. Next to me lay a large, fluffy mound of torn weeds, their leaves limp and their roots heavy with dry dirt. My legs ached from kneeling too long, my hands felt raw, and my shoulders were sunburned. And my mood was even worse than when I'd started; brooding about my family's history had been the exact wrong thing to do. I wish I could clean out my mind as easily as this garden.
Maybe a lunch break would help. Judging by the sun, I had been working for hours. A little food would raise my blood sugar and distract me while I decided how to spend the rest of my day. Without any better ideas, I headed inside to the kitchen.
The house's air conditioning raised goose bumps on my arms. I hadn't noticed just how overheated I was until my sweat started to cool. I opened the fridge, letting the greater chill wash over me as I pondered what to eat. Some whole-grain bread, sliced ham, watermelon salad, leftovers from last night's chicken dinner … nothing really spoke to me. I hadn't had much of an appetite for the past two days. But I knew my stomach wasn't going to get any less touchy if I let it stay empty.
“You hungry for something?”
I almost cracked my head on the ceiling of the fridge. I backed up, shutting the door, to see Celeste leaning with one hand on the kitchen island. Why does she always have to appear out of nowhere like that? I sighed in frustration. “You startled me.”
“Sorry,” she said, not sounding sorry at all. She pulled out a barstool and sat. “You know, it's good that we ran into each other. I've been meaning to talk to you.”
I rummaged around in the cupboard for peanut butter and jelly. If she wanted to be cryptic at me, she could do it while I ate. “About what?”
“You and Ford.”
My guts froze. I forced myself to go on making my sandwich—open the silverware drawer, take down a plate, one step after another—as if Celeste hadn't just dropped a potentially life-ruining bomb. “T-that doesn't really answer my question. Could you be more specific?” I inquired, keeping my voice as calm as possible.
“Oh, come on, Emma. You know exactly what I'm talking about.” Her lip curled like I was a dead rat she had to clean up. “With those big gooey eyes you give him, I'm surprised your parents haven't already noticed. How could you do that to them? Messing around with your own brother … just the thought's enough to make me puke.”
Okay. I was panicking a little. But so far, she hadn't said anything that I hadn't already beaten myself up over a hundred times. And when the guilt-trip came from her lips, instead of my deepest, most shameful fears, it just plain pissed me off. I’d been worried the entire time that Mom or Russ would find out, but it never occurred to me that Celeste would be snooping around. I didn’t like being blindsided, especially not by someone like her.