Page 49 of The Christmas Lodge
Carrying the box into her living room, she sat down on the floor in front of the couch and lifted the dusty lid. Mounds of disorganized papers and various mementos were stuffed into the box at random, and Lacy began digging through the box to sort through its tumbled contents.
As she pulled out a stack of old tax documents, Lacy gasped as piles of unopened letters came into view. With trembling fingers, she set the tax papers aside, reaching for the top envelope. To her horror, it was addressed to her. The return address bore the name Nicholas Spielman.
Her breathing now coming in broken gasps, Lacy pawed through the box and discovered letter after unopened letter from her father and grandfather. Pain, grief, anger, and a myriad of other emotions crashed over her, stealing her breath and slicing through her heart. She dropped the letters, covering her eyes with her hands as huge, gasping sobs began to rack her body. She curled into herself tightly, rocking slightly as scalding hot tears welled in her eyes and squeezed between the fingers she still pressed to her face.
“All these years,” she moaned aloud. “All these years, and I never knew.”
Lacy lay curled up on the floor, unable to do anything but weep. An unexpected anger against her mother forced itself upon her and she began to cry even harder. How could her mother have lied to her for so many years? Have kept those letters from her own daughter? Lacy had been heartbroken when her father had left them—or at least, she had thought he had left them, but now she knew that was a lie. She had built her whole life around trying to distance herself from Harv and Nicholas, working herself to the brink of exhaustion and back, and all of it had been because of a lie. She had missed out on years of a relationship with a parent and a grandparent who loved her, and for what? For absolutely nothing, and now it was forever too late to rebuild the bridges her mother had burned from sheer pettiness.
She wasn’t sure how long she had been laying on the floor when the violence of her tears finally began to subside. With a hiccup, her eyes swollen and aching, she slowly pushed herself up to a sitting position and looked down at the stack of letters all addressed to her. Each of them a physical representation of love for a little girl who had not been abandoned, but had been forcibly kept from a relationship with those who cared for her. She knew that reading the letters would provoke another storm of emotions and, though she longed to read them, she knew that she needed to give herself some time to prepare.
Pulling herself to her feet, she walked to the foyer to grab her phone from her purse. She needed someone to talk to right that minute, and she knew that she couldn’t handle being alone any longer, not when the pain was still so fresh. Fishing the phone from an inner purse pocket, she dialed Madeline’s number. To her relief, her friend picked up on the second ring.
“Lacy! Calling to tell me some juicy gossip about your date with the hot lumberjack?”
In spite of herself, Madeline’s boisterous greeting brought a smile to her lips. It was the feeble ghost of a smile, but it was still something. “Not exactly… Madeline, I just found out that my mother lied to me about my dad and Nicholas. They didn’t abandon me.”
Madeline’s gasp crackled over the line. “What? Lacy, oh my gosh, are you serious?”
“I wish I was kidding. I was just looking through the box of papers I never sorted through after Mom passed. There are stacks on stacks of unopened letters they wrote to me.”
“Oh, Lacy…”
Lacy slumped onto the couch. “I know.”
“I can’t even imagine what you’re going through right now.”
“Believe me, I wish I wasn’t going through it.”
“If I could take it from you, I would.”
“I know, Mads. That’s why I love you.”
“Well, you shouldn’t be alone at a time like this. I’m dropping work and taking you out for a late lunch. Let’s meet at Basil & Sage in twenty minutes. Does that work for you?”
Lacy sat up straighter, brushing away fresh tears. She knew how busy Madeline was with work, and the fact that Madeline would just drop everything to spend time with her meant the world. Basil & Sage was their favorite bistro, and they’d spent countless hours chatting and catching up within its elegant and relaxing walls.
“Are you sure? I know you’ve got a lot on your plate,” Lacy hedged, although every part of her hoped Madeline wouldn’t back out.
“You’re more important than what I have going at work today. Don’t fight me on this, okay? Just get over to the bistro.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Lacy replied, giving a watery laugh. Love and gratitude for her friend washed over her. “Thanks, Madeline. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
Twenty minutes later, Lacy had freshened up and was walking through the giant double doors of the bistro. Madeline was waiting at their usual table and she stood as she saw Lacy enter, hurrying over to wrap her in a tight hug. Madeline’s signature perfume met Lacy as she hugged her friend back, and she felt some of the pain that had held her in a death grip easing up some now that she was in the presence of her best friend.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Madeline said as they settled themselves at their table, “but I ordered for us already. I thought you wouldn’t want to worry about picking through the menu.”
“Thanks.” Lacy rested against the back of her chair, exhausted to her very bones. “I don’t think I would’ve been capable of making one more decision today. What’d you pick?”
“Bacon-wrapped feta-stuffed figs, a Greek salad, and a flatbread with olives, hummus, and shaved lamb.”
“You know, I didn’t think I could eat when you mentioned lunch, but just hearing that I think I’m suddenly starving.”
It was a lame joke, but Madeline smiled at her anyway. “Okay, tell me everything.”
That was all it took. As the waiter brought out their food and refilled their glasses of water with lemon wedges, Lacy told Madeline all that was crowding her heart and mind, starting with the letters.
“I feel like my whole world has been tilted, Mads. Everything I thought I knew about them was a lie, and now I have to come to terms with that.”
