Some Bright Someday (Maple Valley #2) - Melissa Tagg Page 0,32
sure you and your siblings are as comfortable as possible, okay?” She paused. “Maybe you can help me with that. You’re clearly a great big sister and I think you might know more about what Violet and Cade need than I do. Maybe we can work together?”
The tense, dogged silence that seemed to accompany Colie no matter where she went clogged the space between them now. But finally, she nodded and crawled into bed, face still turned away.
“Well, goodnight, then.”
Jenessa stepped into the hallway, gently closed the door. It hadn’t necessarily been a success of a conversation. But it was a start.
7
Jenessa had been convinced that getting all three kids out the door this morning would be the most difficult part of her day.
She hadn’t counted on the ambush awaiting her at the Maple Valley News office.
Four or five voices all pecked at her at once, filling the pressroom with more noise than it had ever had since she’d made the decision to outsource the printing of each weekly issue and sold off the old, barely functioning press. This room served little purpose now other than to house shelves of oversized bound black books, each one holding a year’s worth of old newspapers and decade’s worth of dust.
And today, apparently, the space played host to an impromptu gathering with the mayor, half the city council, the president of the Chamber of Commerce, and several others.
“Mayor Milt, everyone, please. It’s production day and I’ve got a paper to finish laying out.” And then several rounds of proofing before sending it on to the print vendor.
Not to mention she had three kids currently hunkered down in her tiny office at the corner of the newsroom, visible through the pressroom window. That cartoon on Netflix might keep them occupied for another half an hour or so, but she couldn’t expect poor Paige to play babysitter much longer.
“I know you’re all concerned about my plans for my parents’ house—”
“Not just your parents’ house,” the mayor interjected from his perch on a metal stool near an old counter with a backlit tabletop, useful back in the days of literally cutting and pasting the paper together but long since abandoned. How did Mayor Milt manage to look so friendly and stern at the same time? “Belville Park was your grandparents’ and your great-grandparents’ before them and all the way back to Jessup Belville, who—”
“Founded Maple Valley in the fall of 1869 and was our first mayor and went on to serve in the state senate. I know my family history.” She attempted a sip from the travel mug she’d stuffed in the overflowing diaper bag she’d lugged to the office today. But she’d already finished off the coffee.
Would’ve brought a second mug if she’d known what was in store.
The mayor dipped his head. “Well, you left out the part about how Jessup Belville built Belville Park with his own two hands. How can you think of selling it? What if an outsider comes in and tears the whole place down? Just like that, we lose an historic landmark.”
“But—”
Belinda, the president of the Chamber of Commerce, cut in now. “And it’s not just the house. It’s those gorgeous gardens your mother spent over forty years cultivating.”
She hadn’t done it alone. Aunt Lauren had helped her nurture the flower beds and pick out new varieties of plants every summer that she’d lived in the cottage out back. Those were the only times Jenessa remembered Mom and her sister getting along, actually.
Most of the time, Mom was endlessly frustrated with Aunt Lauren. She’d complained about her sister’s flightiness, described her as artsy—not a compliment in the tone Mom used—and overly emotional. As a child, Jenessa had often wondered if that was why Aunt Lauren had been relegated to living in the cottage—because Mom simply hadn’t the patience to have her any closer.
But oh, how Jenessa had loved spending time at the cottage with Aunt Lauren. That little home with its mismatched furniture and splashes of color, thanks to the very artistic bent Mom didn’t appreciate, had held more life and happiness than any one of the twenty-four rooms back at the main house.
And Jenessa—she’d somehow always felt more . . . well, herself in Aunt Lauren’s cottage.
But Mom and Dad tried. In their own way, they’d loved her, hadn’t they?
“Ms. Belville, are you even listening?”
Should she answer that honestly or . . . ?
“Mayor Milt, perhaps we should tell her the real reason we’re all here.”