Page 65 of Butterfly Sisters
“Yep,” Leigh said, reaching into the fridge to get a stick of butter. They’d made this pie so many times that all of them could bake it with their eyes closed, but this time was different. This could be the last time they made anything there.
A phone camera click pulled Leigh’s attention toward it. Meredith had taken a picture of the two of them. She directed the phone toward Mama and snapped another.
“These will be amazing pictures to blow up and frame after the remodel,” she said, peering down at her screen and widening the view with her two fingers. “I saw Mama in that apron and I knew I had to have a shot of it. You look like Nan, Mom.”
Mama turned around and smiled uneasily. “When you’re done, wash your hands so you can help.” She pulled a large bowl down from the cabinet and filled it with sugar, flour, and sour cream, stirring the ingredients with a wooden spoon, the bowl pressed against her bosom just like Nan had done. Meredith took a few more shots, smiling down at her phone screen.
After the butter was melted, Leigh added it to a bowl of dry ingredients on the counter and stirred them for the crumble while Mama folded in fresh blueberries from the market into the mixture. The more Leigh worked the mixture, the calmer it made her.
When the timer went off, Meredith had washed her hands and was ready to pull the pie crust from the oven. The warm, buttery smell of it filled the air. With mitted hands, Meredith set the pie crust on the trivet and Mama poured the blueberry mixture into it, sending a whiff of vanilla under Leigh’s nose as she topped it with the crumble mixture of butter, brown sugar, flour, and oats.
“It looks divine,” Mama said.
Leigh leaned over it and breathed in the sugary smells. “Yes, it certainly does.”
“Let’s pop it in the oven.” Mama wiped her hands on the kitchen towel, and Leigh couldn’t help but think about all the holidays and summers they wouldn’t have here once Meredith renovated. Just when Leigh was starting to feel like she couldn’t live without it.
The water washed up onto the sand, the birds chirping in the trees. While Mama took a slice of pie next door to Luella Wilson, Leigh sat outside on the sofa, wondering if she’d get the chance to find out what was in Nan’s letter. She’d been thinking about Nan ever since she’d seen her mother baking that pie. What she’d realized was that there was a bit of Nan in all of them. Leigh’s letter had been so brief that she’d felt shortchanged until hearing about the second one, but now she had no idea how to reach an agreement with Meredith, so it looked like she may never know what Nan had to say.
“Whatcha doing?” Meredith asked, holding two of Nan’s willow plates with steaming slices of blueberry crumble cream pie on top and a silver fork on the side. She handed one to Leigh.
“Thinking,” Leigh said, taking the pie.
“What about?” Meredith lowered herself next to Leigh and sank her fork into her slice of pie.
“Nan left me a second letter that I can’t have until you and I agree on what to do with the cabin.”
“Yeah… Mama told me,” her sister said, before taking a bite.
“That means that Nan not only wants us to be in agreement, but she thinks we will be.”
“If she’d have wanted us to be in agreement on it, wouldn’t Nan have told me that inmyletter?”
“Meredith, she knew we’d talk about this.”
“Then she could’ve said, ‘Meredith, ask your sister what to do with the cabin,’ but she didn’t. And now, because I want to do something with it that you don’t like, I have to hear about it every second until you wear me down and make me do something else. Well, I’m not going round and round with this. I’m stopping it right here.”
“But don’t you wonder what’s in Nan’s letter?” Leigh set her uneaten pie down on the table. “Ido. And I don’t have any control over whether I get to read it or not.”
“Yes, you do,” Meredith said, taking a bite of her pie.
“How do you figure?”
“Because all you have to do is agree with me that we should make this an Airbnb, and then you can read your letter.”
Leigh stared at her sister, wondering if she had a point. Was it really Leigh who was in charge of whether she got to read the letter or not? All she had to do was be okay with strangers staying in the cabin…
“But that’s not what I came out to talk about. I came out to tell you that I’m flying home tomorrow.”
Leigh snapped out of her contemplations. “What?”
“Well, I’ve been here way longer than I’d expected and I’ve been totally absent from the gallery the entire time. Joss, the girl I’ve got covering for me, has only worked there for three weeks, so she keeps putting things to the side for me to deal with when I get back. It’s all piling up. I’ve also got the trip to Paris planned in a few weeks that I haven’t finished preparing for.”
A smile spread across Leigh’s face, despite herself.
“What’s that look?” Meredith asked.
“You sound like me.” She wrinkled her nose at her sister. “Maybe being driven isn’t so bad after all.”
