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  "Nick understands that I've reached a point that..." Carrie paused, what did her husband understand, she wondered sadly and not for the first time. How she felt? Or the liability she could become? That, she knew, he would understand. And wouldn't her taking some time with her aging mother solve either possibility for him. He would use it, she knew that without a single doubt. But would he worry about her or worry about her next move and how it would impact him professionally? Somewhere between Illinois and Iowa she'd come to the sad conclusion that any worry he experienced would ultimately have little to do with any feelings he might still have for her. "I think he understands that I need some time away and that we both would benefit from it." She wasn't going to lie, not to her cousin, not to her mother, not to herself, not to anyone...at all...anymore.

  Mary understood there was more to her words than she was letting on. She knew courtesy of her brothers, who were much closer to Carrie's brothers than she, some of what Carrie had endured and accepted over the years. She set her empty coffee cup on the small stool she'd set out to serve a variety of uses, took Carrie's cup from her and did the same. "Let's take a walk." Given little choice Carrie followed her down to the street. As they walked past Court's house Mary finally answered her question. "You know you're welcome here for as long as I can keep you here." She laughed softly, "and undoubtedly as long as your mother can as well." She glanced at her cousin. "You should know it's a given. You didn't have to ask."

  "I know." She glanced over and shared a wry smile. "I'm also aware of how my mother works." And for the first time in a long time there was no irritation in that knowledge. Instead almost a sense of relief she wouldn't have to come up with explanations that would be painful for all of them at some point. Later would do. Later after some of the emotional trauma of the night before settled within them. But there was something, something unbearably painful to acknowledge she simply couldn't leave unsaid. "I almost didn't come to your mother's funeral." She caught the quick glance, the surprise on her cousin's face. She felt a hot burst of shame, an aching humiliation for the person she had come so close to becoming. "I wouldn't have if my mother hadn't pressed...shamed me into it. Even then, Nick didn't." She looked between the houses as they passed where backyards stood high above the city and entire neighborhoods could be seen spread out over the hills of Burlington. How could she have forgotten the simplicity of its beauty?

  "I remember." Mary thought back. It had all been a foggy blur. She mostly remembered the struggle just to get through it. But she had realized Nick hadn't been there. Looking back she wondered if she'd even expected him. Knew now as she had then his absence hadn't been felt. Noticed but little else. But couldn't for the life of her remember what had been said about it. She could sense without words Carrie's pain and didn't want to add to it by asking what she never had before about why he hadn't come. In the end she didn't have to.

  "He had a big campaign event," Carrie stated simply. Then she laughed. But it wasn't a sound that could never be deemed as joyful. "Every campaign event was big. And there was always a campaign related event. Sometimes if felt as if there was always a campaign. As soon as one ended the next began. And the next one was always bigger than the one before." She looked at her cousin, promised herself that this day and all the days to follow would be different. She would be different. "I listened when you read your Mom's letter last night. I remembered the woman who made cakes with me, listened to me when Mom was too busy or I just wanted someone else to care. Remembered the woman who included me when she took you to see Peter Pan when we were little." At Mary's slight nod, she swallowed hard, felt the little hitch in her breath. Some memories brought great joy and heartrending grief alike. "Then she taught me how to crow."

  "I remember." Mary took another turn down the next tree laden street, hoped her memory would take them where she wanted. "You always did it better than me."

  Carrie understood what she was being offered. Absolution. And understood too this was what she had missed all these years. The blind acceptance, the unquestioning forgiveness, of family. "As I listened to you last night and remembered all those things she was to me, all those things she did for me...I remembered how much she meant to me. God! I loved her so much! And I remembered how I was too busy to be bothered to come to her funeral." She looked right into Mary's eyes. "I wouldn't have if it hadn't been for Mom." She swallowed past the indignity of her thoughtlessness. "I really believed I had all the answers and..." she held her hands palm up in dismay. "I had nothing." She shuddered with the shame that raged through her. "I'm sorry, Mary. I can't tell you how sorry I am." Yet, even as she spoke, she knew her only condemnation would be her own.

  "I think," Mary began slowly, "that you’re way too hard on yourself, Carrie." She held up a hand, continued to speak softly, carefully. "I think, no…" she corrected herself. Then still speaking slowly and with care she continued, "I know that if you didn't want to come nothing your mother could have said would have changed your mind. I can think of a dozen times when we were kids when you would dig in and not change your mind no matter how more rational everyone else in the room was. In part because you simply had your own way and in part because you had dug your feet in and there was no way on this earth you were going to cave."

  "I wasn't a kid when..." she began only to be quietly interrupted.

  "No, but that wasn't my point." Mary stopped and waited for Carrie to do the same. "I'm sure Aunt Charlie was vocal about you coming, I can't say I remember one way or another because those days were and still are a blur to me." She took a breath, always surprised at the actual physical pain those memories could still bring. "Regardless, I believe that in the end you came because you needed to....wanted to. The reasons aren't really the issue, but that you did. And as far as I'm concerned even if it was because of your mother, which I don't believe for a moment, it wouldn't matter." She forged on despite her cousin's attempt to speak. "It doesn't matter what our intentions are, in the end it only matters what we do or what we don't do."

  Carrie thought about it, knew Mary believed every word she said and desperately wanted to as well. Her thoughts must have been broadcasting.

  "Carrie, good intentions are just dandy but are a dime a dozen. Bad intentions are sad, but if we learn from them doesn't that in some way make us a better person because of them...or despite them." Mary decided it was time to change the subject to something she had planned on discussing at a later time but didn't think there'd be a better time or place. "Look," she drew her cousin back a few steps, splayed her hand out in a wide reaching arc. "Remember?"

  Carrie caught her breath. "Snake Alley."

  Mary stood with her, looking out over the city from the top of the winding street. She knew it had been built for completely practical reasons well over one hundred years ago, meant to provide a quick trip from the residential area into town. But in all the years since it had become so much more. She remembered her grandmother telling them more than once how her father, their Great-Grandfather, had been among those who had painstakingly laid the bricks that made up the steep sloped road that included five half curves and two quarter curves. She imagined even with those curves, the horses and carriages it was originally meant for had to exercise a tremendous amount of caution going up and especially down the steep and winding street. Even walking it was a challenge. She laughed at a sudden memory. "Remember when Jake went all the way down on his backside that winter when everything was covered with ice."

  "It wasn't intentional," Carrie reminded her with no little sarcasm in her voice.

  "No. But all the other boys followed him down and Nanno wouldn't let us."

  "We were the babies, besides I'm not all that certain just how much fun it was." She was remembering how a couple of her brothers walked slightly askance for several days after.

  "Remember how Aunt Leslie brought us here the next winter and took each of us down on her old sled?" Mary laughed quietly, a sad and somber sound for such a happy memory. "And told us no
t to tell our mothers," she added, slightly cheered at the remembered solidarity that had been shared in that forbidden adventure.

  "And how your mother brought us that one summer at the crack of dawn so we could skate down even after we were told not to." Carrie smiled, remembering how they had all fallen smack on their backsides at the bottom including her Aunt Miri. "And told us not to tell anyone about our early morning adventure." She shook her head. "I've never been more scared in my life. Skating on those bricks wasn't anything like I thought it would be."

  "And then there was your Mom," Mary reminded her.

  "God!" It was all Carrie could say as she remembered exactly what Mary was about to add to the mix.

  "Your mother," Mary continued, laughing despite every effort not to. "Remember when she decided we all needed to experience the joy of a drive down in her little VW Bug. Which was," she added tongue in cheek, "completely against the law then, not to mention all rational thought."

  "And she didn't just pledge us to a vow of silence she insisted that the cop who stopped us do the same." Carrie shook her head. "I thought we were all going to be arrested."

  "I don't think that was ever going to happen. I found out later they went to high school together. I think they may have even dated for a while. I have a feeling he just enjoyed giving her a ticket." Mary looped her arm though her cousin's. "They were good times Carrie...the best times." She took a breath. "And they were absolutely the best of moms."

  "Yeah." Carrie looked down over the narrow, winding brick covered street that were barely wide enough for the horse drawn buggies it was designed for let alone her mother's car. "It's amazing we're all still alive." She didn't mean it in any way other than dead serious but it must have struck her cousin's funny bone because once she started she couldn't seem to stop laughing. Before she knew it, thinking back over her own words sent her into uncontrolled laughter as well.

  "The Marshall Street house..." Mary began, catching her breath and her cousin's attention with the quick change in topics. "I'm going to deed a third of it to you." She couldn't help but laugh at the shock in her cousin's face. "A third to you and a third to Casey."

  "Mary," Carrie began, feeling like she was wading through thick pudding. "I....God....this is so like you. I don't know why I'm surprised." She laughed, and the joy that came with it surprised her almost more than Mary's announcement. "I think I even actually understand but I can't let you do it..." She held up her hand almost mimicking Mary's earlier motion. "I can't let you do it now," she elaborated with obvious emphasis on the timing. With her cousin's silence, her expression telling her that she might understand or at least begin to, she continued quietly. She spoke quietly not wanting her words to go beyond the two of them, not yet. "I don't know what's going to happen with my marriage. And I don't even want to think about it at this point. But I want you to know what you're offering is a life line that I don't want getting caught up into something as ugly as what I could be facing." She paused, took a breath at what she had thought of but never put into words. "If I decide I can't go back to the way my life has been and if Nick decides he can't leave that life...well...I just don't know." She watched her cousin, waited for her to comprehend what she was saying.

  Mary sighed, not terribly surprised by what she was hearing. She also understood what she was being told in regards to the ownership of their grandparent's house. The last thing Carrie would want, that anyone would want, would be to allow Nick to have influence over it somehow. "Okay, we'll let it sit until you decide what to do and work things out one way or the other." She took a breath. "But," she continued, "until then you are and will be a part of all that we're doing even if not formally on paper."

  "And what is that exactly?" She had some idea, had heard enough about their plans the night before to have a sense of what they were brewing but didn't know all the details.

  "Let's go back and get breakfast going and I'll tell you all about it." She turned to head back the way they came, changed her mind and instead started down the steep hill to take the long way back to the house. "Did you know they hold a yearly race here now? Can you imagine running up and down this over and over again?" Her expression illustrated her own doubt. "I think there's also a bike race that either begins or ends here. I'm not sure."

  "I can't imagine doing either." Carrie automatically walked along the outer edge, following the huge curved limestone rocks for balance. "I don't suppose you'd consider taking the sidewalk down." She glanced over to the sidewalks that ran along the houses clustered close together on each side of the street. "Oh." She slowed to read the sign as they walked by. "I didn't know the old Phelps house had been sold." It amazed her how much of the city's history came back to her without any effort.

  "I think it's somehow connected to the historical society." Mary looked at the huge architectural wonder that seemed to span almost half of the street. She knew from her childhood and her more recent research into the city's history that it was five stories altogether and seemed to stretch out forever along the tightly curving street. Could any other city possibly claim such?

  Carrie sighed inwardly. It was good to know some things didn't change. She said the same to her cousin as they approached the bottom of the hill. The look she got spoke volumes and brought her a step closer to understanding her cousin's longing to be here, her desire to reacquire the homes that held the history of their family. A history that spanned the city's history all the way to when it was first settled. Looking around as they walked along the edge of Burlington's downtown streets she felt a calm that had long been long missing from her life. And wondered how long it could last.

  

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  Several hours later the three cousins along with Charlie, Mallie, and Grace gathered again in Mary's small kitchen. Breakfast had already been a loud and boisterous affair. At one point the table had been crowded with not only them but also Court, Brian, and Pastor Jackson Henry.

  Jackson had come by to visit with Charlie and was more than pleased to join them for breakfast. Little by little as he and their aunt reminisced about shared memories and events the weariness of the night before that had hung over Charlie like a heavy cloak began to ease...so much so that it became obvious to all those around the table who loved her and worried about her. Seeing her laugh with the Pastor over memories only the two of them shared brought a sense of calm to the rest of them.

  Not long after the Pastor arrived Court stopped by with his nephew Brian and more room was made around the small able for them. Even while enjoying the huge breakfast Court spent much of the meal going over plans for both an exterior stairway into the small "garrett room" which they had aptly named it as well as finalizing the plans for the Carriage House with both Mary and Charlie. Mallie had spent the time getting to know his nephew Brian. By the time Court left with the promise of having both the stairs and the Carriage House completed within the next two weeks, Mallie had a date with Brian for later that night.

  Grace stayed after the departure of Court, Brian, and the Pastor. She was beginning to feel more comfortable with her place in what had become a tight knit unit. As her thoughts wandered she listened in to the lesson in marketing and public relations Mary was on the receiving end of from her cousins.

  Mary had admitted she wanted to spend more time getting back to some of her interests of years ago before she began writing full time again. Casey had jumped right on it with Carrie providing backup. "I simply don't understand why the two of you are so interested in anything I make regardless of how good or bad it turns out. Who wants a badly done piece of anything?" Mary addressed the group still gathered at the table even as she watched Mallie out of the corner of her eye. After seeing Brian to the door with his uncle the teenager had strayed behind the others as they returned to the kitchen. She was now poking around through the stacks of old books retrieved from the attic and set up on one of the tables in the middle of the dining room.

  Casey struggled with her patie
nce wondering if her cousin was being intentionally obtuse or really didn't get it. At the same time she tried to figure out another way to explain the basics of demand and supply to a woman who didn't...couldn't possibly understand the value of anything with her name attached to it that came from years of best-selling titles. She was saved from having to do so from an unexpected place.

  "Mary, honey," Charlie began almost as if she was trying to understand the concept herself. Across the room where she was pouring herself another cup of coffee, Carrie's eyebrows raised, she'd been on the receiving end of that tone and knew it for what it was. "We all know you for who you are sweetie. You drink far too much coffee, you look as charming as can be every time you walk out the door." She remembered the night before when her niece had walked out the back door beside her in her robe. "Well, most the time but let's face it, when you're here in your own home you prefer to be comfortable in those ragtag sweats that your mother would never have allowed worn in her home let alone worn at all. But we're your family and we know you." She paused to take a breath and pressed on. "All those folks out there," she waved her hand in the air as if to designate the unnamed masses. "They only know you as sweet Mary Lane who walks like a princess and talks like Audrey Hepburn...my goodness they probably think you're as perfect as one of your precious characters." She paused again, trying to decide whether going any further would be too obvious. A quick glance had her reevaluating. Her daughter was studying her nails, a sure sign she needed to tidy things up. "I think Casey understands that anything that comes from your very capable hands would be marketable not so much for its literal value as much as its sentimental value." She shrugged as if she didn't have a clue in the world. "I don't understand it myself but then I've known you since your first squall so who am I to say what has value or not." She looked at her other niece who was also studying her nails. "Is that somewhere along the lines of what you were trying to say Casey, dear?"