Page 43 of Mornings By the Linden Tree
Liar. You’re not sorrowful at all. You’re elated.
Yes, yes, I was happy. There. I owned it. I was overjoyed that I’d not have to hand my niece over to some stranger. Valeria would never again be jostled about from home to home. She would live with me until she went to college, and then she could return to Boston for the summer while she worked as a law clerk with me here at—
“Excellent. We’ll be in touch with more paperwork.”
“Thank you. We’ll find out what we need on our end. Death certificates and such. My paralegal will research it.” Rissa placed a cup of dark roast in front of me, her head nodding briskly. I mouthed a thanks to her before ending the call with Ms. Markes. Rissa sat patiently on the edge of her chair, eyes wide, waiting for me to speak.
“Good news? Bad news?” she asked.
“A bit of both.” I sighed as I rode out the final wave of a madcap tsunami of emotional ups and downs. “Valeria’s father is dead.”
“I picked that out of the conversation. Prisoner?” I nodded, then took a calming sip of coffee. “That’s a shame.” I concurred with a grunt. It would seem rude not to do so, even though I was pleased not to have to face what could have been. “And the bad?”
“Working out how one tells a child their father was an evil man.”
That was a question even my brilliant paralegal had no answer for.
***
“I would have been happy to make you some soup if you’d have texted,” Mrs. Polkowski chided me as I removed ingredients for making some chowder. Nothing helped me clear my head like making soup, and my clam chowder was my claim to soup fame.
“I’m aware, and while you make a lovely minestrone, I was hankering for my chowder.” She paused in wiping down the counter with a bright pink sponge to study me as I placed some russet potatoes into the sink for a scrub.
“Oh, so you’re having that gentleman caller over for the weekend?” Condemnation dripped from her question. I had to snicker. She never did care for Percy. I’d not seen why before, but now he had made Lennon feel so little—as did I, but I was trying to forget what a cretin I had been—I saw why she had never favored him. “I thought you and Mr. Lennon were getting on quite well.”
“We are,” I said as I reached into the tote to extract some thick bacon and a clump of fresh thyme.
“Well, far be it from me to comment on who you wish to have visit—”
“But you will,” I teased the ginger. She gave me a biting look.
“I will, yes. Mr. Lennon is a sweet man who adores you. If you’re going to bring in another man behind his back, I may just have to hand in my resignation as that shows a lack of character and morals I never would have imagined you—”
“Mrs. Polkowski, please, there is no need to tender your resignation. I am making chowder for me and Mr. Lennon,” I rushed to say. She pushed a tendril of hair back from her eye. “Truly. Mr. Percy and I have ended our friendship. I am now exclusively seeing Mr. Lennon.”
“Good then.” I gave her a smile. “Is there some reason you’re making chowder?”
“I like it?”
“Is there bad news about the little one I’m not aware of?” She was now genuinely upset. She adored Valeria, and Valeria adored her. I’ve had to explain several times that even though Mrs. Polkowski was here often, she was not her grandmother, no matter how badly she wished it were so.
“No, not bad news. Good news, actually, but I’m just feeling odd about it.” She stared at me with her arms folded over a gingham apron. Her laundry apron. She enjoyed having a different apron for each day’s tasks. I turned on the tap to rinse the herbs and spuds, then leaned to the left. She placed her red head close to mine. “Valeria’s father was a rather violent criminal who was killed in prison several months ago.”
Her eyes flared as she rushed to cover a gasp with her hand. “Exactly so. And while I know that I will not, hopefully, have to explain this to Valeria anytime soon, I am stymied as to what to say when she does ask.”
“Well, I’ve always believed the truth tempered with kindness is always best.” Valeria suddenly let loose a shout, which meant Lennon had arrived. He no longer knocked. Why should he as he was welcome at any time? Perhaps I should contemplate giving him a key sometime. That spoke of a large commitment, though, and I had yet to tell the man how deeply my feelings ran. “Here, let me wash the potatoes for you. Go spend time with the family.”
I thought to bicker. “Very well, thank you. Then I insist you finish up and go home. I might venture to the cottage for the weekend if Lennon is free. I’ll let you know.”
She smiled up at me, then got to work scrubbing the hell out of the taters. Grabbing a paper towel, I dried my hands and walked out to find Valeria and Lennon engaged in a cartoon on the big screen. His eyes lit up when he saw me. I dropped down onto the sofa with them. Lennon was freshly dressed in his finest job-seeking attire. I’d loaned him one of my blue ties. I prayed he would find another place to work as his current party company was not treating him fairly, I felt. I had thought to mention, again, that he could open his own business, but the last time I had broached it, he had shot it down like a famous beagle atop a doghouse would have dropped that notorious World War I German pilot.
Good grief. I had been spending far too much time watching thatPeanutsDVD collection I bought for her.
“Any luck?” I asked as I draped an arm over his shoulder and pressed a chaste kiss to his cheek. Valeria snuggled into his side and tucked her sock-covered feet under her backside. Lennon, I noted, also had left his shoes somewhere.
“Not much. Nowhere is hiring, and if they are, they don’t want to deal with musicians coming in to talk to someone face-to-face with some cheap local studio CD in hand.” He removed the tie and handed it to me. “I knew it was a long shot doing things the old-fashioned way, but man, I hate the void that filling out online resumes and applications shoves you into. No one ever replies to you, not even to say ‘sorry, we’re not interested in you right now,’ and so you just keep doing the same bleak thing over and over.”
I rubbed his shoulder. “I think you have a very good demo CD, and any party company that refuses to even listen to it is cutting their nose off to spite their face,” I announced and got a hearty nod from Valeria.
