Page 88 of Secret Nights and Northern Lights
She holds the box out to me with no explanation. Taking it from her, I glance down at a stack of old newspaper clippings yellowed with age. I place the fabric box on my father’s desk, scooping up the first few clippings from the top of the pile. The headlines cover an assortment of topics.Hudson Springs Citizen Sets Record with Six-Pound Tomato,String of Car Thefts Ends after Suspect Arrested, andQuadruplets Born at Hudson Springs Memorial the First in City History.
“I don’t understand what I’m looking at here.”
She reaches over the current clipping I hold and points her index finger at the byline. That’s when I see it.
Mary Ellen Miller.
“Youwrotethese?” I ask, thrown for the umpteenth time tonight. “You worked for the newspaper?”
She laughs, but it comes out as more of a sigh. “I did. For acouple years when your father and I were first married anyway. I stopped during my pregnancy with the twins. Tried to return once you all started kindergarten, but they didn’t hire me back. They didn’t say it explicitly, but I don’t think they wanted to hire a mother with three kids to take care of.”
I swear it’s as if everything I ever thought I knew about my mother was wrong. “Is that why you wanted me to start kindergarten early with Marcus and Mason? So you could go back to work?”
Her expression takes on a guilty grimace. “Not that it ended up mattering in the end. Sorry about that.”
My mind rewinds back to my first day of school when she looked so relieved to drop us off, not sticking around for tearful goodbyes like the other parents. She had her own dreams she wanted to get back to, but it never worked out for her. “Why didn’t you make Dad work less so you had more time for yourself?” I ask, livid on her behalf. “You could have insisted the newspaper take you back. Or found a job writing for someone else.”
She smiles and shakes her head, collects the articles and returns them to the box. “Believe it or not,” she says wryly, “a local newspaper writer doesn’t make quite the same income as an ER physician. And these are mostly just fluff pieces, it’s not like I was up for a Pulitzer or anything.”
“Fluff pieces still matter!” I protest. “Theyreally matterto people. That mom of the Hudson Springs quadruplets probably still has that article you wrote tucked away in a baby book somewhere, and I bet that tomato person had that clipping hanging on their fridge for months so they could brag to anyone who cameover, and—okay maybe the carjacker didn’t keep your piece, but you get what I’m saying. It’s like the festivals I cover, they bring a lot of happiness and joy to people, and that’s really hard to find these days—”
I stop, suddenly reexamining my career as well. I was so dismissive of the pieces I’d written forAround the Globebecause they weren’t the pieces I’d always envisioned writing. But that doesn’t mean they weren’t equally worthy and important in their own way.
Mom returns the box to the top of the closet and closes the door, shutting away her own past, then walks back to me and smoothes a hand over my hair. “I didn’t tell you this for you to feel bad for me. I love being a mother to all three of you, and I wouldn’t change a day of it for anything in the world. I just wanted you to know that you and Iarea lot alike. Mother to daughter. Writer to writer. You do have an ally in this family, Mona. You always have.”
The tears I thought I’d run out of return with a vengeance, and I throw my arms around her and hug her tight for the second time tonight.
She returns my embrace for a moment, then pulls back and firmly tells me, “Now, go find Ben and make things right. You two owe that to each other after all this time.”
She’s right. I can’t wait another second. I make my way to the door but hesitate and turn back. “Thanks, Mom.”
Smiling, she wipes away a tear of her own. “You’re welcome, sweetheart. Now go already!”
Chapter 26
My footsteps pound the sidewalk pavement as heavy rain drenches my ivory cardigan and soaks through my denim jeans. Nerves churn in my stomach, and due to the myriad of questions swirling through my mind (What if I messed this up by ignoring him for two entire weeks? What if he won’t talk to me? Worst of all, what if he already left for South Africa?), it’s not until I’m halfway between our houses that I realize my crucial mistake.
It’s dark.
I have no flashlight.
Not even my phone.
I freeze in my tracks, fear working its way through my body like a toxin. My breaths turn shallow, and my hands—cold moments ago—become clammy with sweat. The sleeves of my cardigan squeeze my arms too tightly. And the weight of the wet denim on my legs makes it impossible to take another step. Fearfully blossoms into panic, a poisonous oleander with debilitating effects.
I close my eyes, concentrating on taking deeper, steadier breaths. The rise and fall of my chest. The cool air and raindrops on my face. The bursts of wind that rattle through the leaves of the old maples lining the street. I think about Iceland. About Ben’s soothing voice on the other side of my door when the power went out. How he talked me through it one step at a time. It’s what I’m going to have to do for myself right now.
I open my eyes.
I focus all my attention on one spot in the distance.
Ben’s house.
All I can see from here is the highest point of the angled roof, but it’s enough. I force one foot from the pavement and put it in front of the other. Then I do it again. And again. My hands tremble, so I twist the ends of my sleeves in my fists to keep them occupied. Each time a thought attempts to creep into my head about being alone in the dark, I concentrate harder on taking step after step with laser focus on getting to Ben. If he’s not home, well…I can’t think about that right now.
Then the greatest thing happens.
As more of the little white house comes into view, an interior light flicks on and illuminates one of the windows. Ben is home, and I still have a chance at making this right. Tension unspools from my shoulders, and the fear encasing my chest eases the slightest bit. My steps increase in speed. Then I’m running. Not walking fast. Not jogging. I’m full-out sprinting with tunnel vision on that window.
