I knelt on the floor opposite her and began to do the same thing. Without looking at me, she said, “Were you making warm milk to help you sleep? My mama always said that an herbal tea and a warm bath—”
I didn’t let her finish. “You know, Loralee, I don’t really care what your mama used to tell you. None of it pertains to me or how I want to live my life. And right now, I’ve chosen to move to South Carolina to live by myself while I figure out what I’m supposed to do next. Forgive me if I’m not overjoyed with your sudden visit. And regardless of what you might have told Owen, this is a visit. A short one. I have no idea what you were thinking, just showing up on my doorstep expecting to stay with me.”
She blinked her eyes at me several times, her long black lashes fanning her cheeks. I couldn’t help but wonder whether those had been artificially implanted, too. Sitting back on her legs, she said, “When I called your office to find you, they told me that you’d inherited your husband’s family home in Beaufort and that’s why you were moving here. I kind of put two and two together and figured out your husband must have died. With us being widows, I thought maybe we had something in common besides your father. It’s a hard thing to deal with, and I thought we could help each other. I thought we could be friends.”
“How can we be friends, Loralee? You were married to my father for eleven years, and I saw you maybe three times before you got engaged and not once after the wedding. There’s a reason for that. So, no, I don’t think we can be friends. We’re practically strangers, and I’m happy to leave it at that.”
Her smile dimmed. “My mama used to say that strangers are only friends we haven’t yet met.” She put her hand over her mouth. “Sorry. That just popped out.”
I sighed. “I’m not good at relationships—family or otherwise. I’m glad you brought Owen—I am. He seems like a great kid. I’ll make sure that I send him a birthday and Christmas present every year. But I can’t pretend that I want either one of you in my life—there’s no room.”
“What are you talking about? This house is huge. You’ve got plenty of room—and you’ll need help taking care of all this space.” She held up her long, slender hands, my father’s huge engagement ring sparkling on her finger, nestled against a simple gold wedding band. “And you’ve got an extra pair of hands to help right here.”
She smiled again, but there was a brightness missing, as if she was aware that we both knew that my having no room had nothing to do with the size of the house.
The strong breezes of the afternoon and evening had given way to a full-blown storm, and a gust of wind and rain struck the house, making the wind chimes shriek.
“Did you hear that?” Loralee asked, her voice full of expectation.
“I’ve been hearing it all night—I think you’d have to be dead or a ten-year-old boy not to. As soon as I can find a ladder, they’re coming down.”
Loralee looked stricken. “Oh, no. Don’t do that—they’re so beautiful. When I was a little girl, I really believed they were mermaid’s tears. I think I still do. Maybe that’s why I like them so much—because they remind me of what it was like to be a child and believe in magic.”
I had another memory, of my mother planting the lima bean I’d brought home from school. I told her that it was a magic bean that would grow to be huge and I could climb all the way up to the clouds on it. She hadn’t said anything as we’d planted it together, and I had watered it religiously, staking it with a Popsicle stick. But it had never gotten any bigger than a lima bean plant no matter how much care I gave it. In a fit of anger and frustration, I’d ripped it out by the roots and run to my mother, who’d comforted me with her arms around me and a gentle pat on the back. As the years passed, I began to understand that as a mother she’d just been trying to ease me into the reality of what life was, to help me understand that magic wasn’t real no matter how we wished differently.
“It’s just broken glass, Loralee.”
She tilted her head. “I know that, Merritt. But I think sometimes even adults—especially adults—need to believe in magic. Do you know the legend of the mermaid’s tears?”
“No, and I really—”
As if I hadn’t spoken, she continued. “The story goes way, way back, and is about a beautiful mermaid who fell in love with a sailor. To save his life she calmed a storm, which was forbidden. As her punishment, she was banned to the bottom of the ocean, where she is to this day, crying her heart out for her lost love, and we’re reminded of her every time we find a bit of sea glass on the shore.”
I wanted to tell her she was being ridiculous, that mermaids weren’t real. But the softness in her face, and what she’d said about us needing to believe in a little bit of magic, stopped me.