Sunset on Moonlight Beach - Sheila Roberts Page 0,9

hearing less and less from her old friends. It was the nature of things. She liked to think it would be different with these women.

But if it wasn’t...

“Zelda might have someone interested if you decide to sell your house,” said Caroline. Caroline’s daughter, Zelda, was a real estate agent.

They were already moving her out of their lives. Mel tried to smile and look appreciative.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she said.

That night she dreamed Jenna was in her old Toyota, parked in Mel’s driveway, the window on the driver’s side down. She was crying. Mel stood next to the car, patting her daughter’s shoulder, trying to console her.

“It’ll be okay,” she kept saying to Jenna.

“It’ll never be okay again,” Jenna sobbed.

“Yes, it will,” Mel insisted. “Look how much you’ve gotten through already.”

“I can’t this time, not without you.”

“I can’t leave your father,” Melody said. She looked to where John stood on the front porch.

“But I need you,” Jenna protested.

“But I need him.”

John was big and solid, filling the doorway. He had such broad shoulders. He used to love to ride Jenna around on them when she was a toddler. He began waving. Waving goodbye to Jenna, of course.

Then he began to fade. No! Mel turned and ran back to the house, but by the time she reached the front porch he was gone. There was only the front door, shut.

She walked back down the driveway and got into the Toyota’s passenger seat. “Okay, let’s go,” she said to her daughter, and they sped down the driveway. They turned onto the street and Mel didn’t look back.

She awoke feeling both unsettled and determined. She hadn’t dreamed about John in over thirty years. And the part her daughter played in that dream was disturbing. But the message was clear.

She took a deep breath. “All right. I’m going.”

* * *

“Owww,” protested Nora from the massage table as Jenna worked another knot out of her right calf.

“Sorry,” Jenna said, and eased up.

“Don’t be. I need this,” Nora said. “I have got to retire.”

How many times had Nora said that in the last few years?

“What would you do with yourself?” Jenna teased, stretching the muscles.

“I’d sit for a month. Watch TV, read. Then I’d finally start on all those craft projects I’ve been talking about. The boys are capable of running the ice cream parlor and the funplex. What am I waiting for, anyway?”

“Good question,” Jenna said.

“I mean, am I going to keep talking about all the things I want to do or am I going to do them? Life’s too short.”

“You have plenty of life left in you.”

“I do, and I want to do something with it other than scoop out ice cream. Not that I haven’t loved owning the parlor. But it’s time to move on.”

“Once you really do decide to make it official, we’ll have a party to celebrate,” Jenna promised. “A wine night at Crafty Just Cuz. I bet K.J. and Elizabeth can come up with a perfect party project.”

“That sounds like a great idea,” Nora said. “I love those MacDowell sisters. Of course, we don’t have to wait until I retire to get together there.”

They shouldn’t. No matter how much she talked about retiring, Nora never got around to setting a date for it. She and Good Times Ice Cream Parlor were like pumpkin pie and whipped cream, a matched set.

“Okay, I think you’re good to go,” Jenna said as their hour session came to an end.

“Good for another week, anyway. You are a massage genius. I’m so glad you moved here.”

“Me, too,” Jenna said.

Another year of working as a massage therapist and then her five-year sentence of spousal support would come to an end and she’d be done forking over money to her ex the leech. Much as she liked her work, she was ready to cut back. The Driftwood Inn was doing well, and now that she was on the city council, she was busier than ever. She was ready to cut back her work schedule and spend more time on the other aspects of life. Including love.

Her thoughts were interrupted by howls of agony coming from the front hall.

Jenna tore out of the spare downstairs room she used for her massage business to find her daughter bursting through the door, tears streaming down her face. Oh, no.

“Sabrina, what’s wrong?”

It was as far as she got. Her daughter hurled herself into Jenna’s arms. “He broke up with me.”

Well, crap.

Still, Jenna wasn’t surprised. Sabrina had been a freshman in high