“Have you heard from Clarissa?” Trudi asked.
Madeline had heard from her mother only once, and then it was to ask when Madeline would be getting the back child support. Madeline just let her think someone was looking into it—it was easier than arguing. “Not really. I’m a little worried about her. The last couple of times I spoke to her, she’s been talking about people I’ve never heard of, and she sounds drunk half the time.”
“So what else is new?”
“I’m not there to keep an eye on her, that’s what.”
“Mad, you’ve been gone a couple of weeks, that’s all. Do you hear how crazy that sounds? You’re a grown woman—you should be able to be away from your mother for a couple of weeks.”
Tension began to stiffen Madeline. She was very familiar with Trudi’s opinion of her mother, but that was her mother Trudi was dismissing, a woman who had no one but Madeline. “My mom isn’t like yours, Trudi,” she said quietly. “She needs constant—”
“Attention,” Trudi interrupted. “Don’t kid yourself, Mad—it’s all about her.”
Madeline’s belly twisted dully. She didn’t know who she was supposed to be anymore. “Listen, I have to go.”
“Come on, don’t be upset with me.”
“I’m not upset with you, Trudi. Really, I’m not.” That was true. Madeline was upset with herself, with the universe. She was upset that she’d lived so long by so many rules that when they began to snap like twigs around her, she didn’t know what to do. “I really have a lot to do.”
“Okay,” Trudi said. “Well… call me.”
Of course Madeline would call her. But not for a few days. She loved Trudi, but Madeline was beginning to think that maybe she didn’t need Trudi’s constant approval and advice.
But she wasn’t going to think about that. Right now, she was going to think about the dinner party at Luke’s house tonight.
Frankly, Madeline was a little nervous about the dinner. She didn’t want to discover anything about Luke or his family that would ruin the luster of this thing between them. She didn’t want to call this “thing” a fling, because it seemed so much more than that when she was with him: exciting, thrilling, perfect. But when she was alone, her head overtook her heart. She second-guessed herself and the things she was feeling and began to fear it was superficial.
Yet she couldn’t let it go.
She decided on the yellow dress with blue cornflowers because it skimmed her body. Her hair was another issue. The air was so dry here that it wouldn’t hold the least bit of curl. She’d taken to wearing it loose and long, and tonight, she tied a scarf around her head as she’d seen Libby do, to hold all but her bangs away from her face.
The one thing she didn’t have was shoes. She was pulling on her hiking boots when Libby walked past her room.
“Cute!” Libby said.
“Thanks.” Madeline smiled sheepishly and stood up. “I don’t have the right shoes.”
“I have some sandals that would go perfectly with that,” Libby suggested, and Madeline was aware that it was the most Libby had said to her in a few days. “I’ll get them.”
“No, Libby, thanks, but—”
“I’ll be right back,” Libby said, and disappeared into the room she had been using. She returned a moment later with some fabulous sandals the same shade of blue as the cornflowers in Madeline’s dress. “Oh, wow, they’re perfect,” Madeline said, “but I shouldn’t.”
“Why not?” Libby asked, looking at the shoes.
“I would feel funny wearing your shoes.”
Libby sighed. “Man, you are tough, you know that? I can’t figure you out.”
Madeline sighed. “Honestly? I can’t figure me out, either.”
“Look, I know you don’t want sisters, or this ranch, or… anything. But Madeline, we are sisters whether you like it or not, and borrowing my shoes is not a big deal. It’s what sisters do,” she said, thrusting the shoes at Madeline.
Is that what Libby truly thought? If only she knew how ironic that was, because Madeline had wanted sisters all her life. But the words, like so many other words in the last two weeks, stuck in her throat. Libby was right. She acted as if she couldn’t wait to get out of here. But was that really what she wanted? Could a person change so fundamentally in two weeks? She looked at Libby and smiled ruefully. “I’m sorry, Libby. I know I’m not very good at letting people in. You probably won’t believe this, but I’m trying.”
Libby looked at the shoes in her hand, then at Madeline. Her expression had softened. “Take the shoes,” she said. “Please.”
Madeline took the shoes. “Thank you,” she said, and smiled.
It seemed that with every day that passed, Madeline was drifting farther and farther away from all the things she thought she’d known about herself.
She wondered, as she tried on Libby’s shoes, if she could drift so far away that she might not find her way back to her safe harbor.
TWENTY-SIX