Trail Stop existed on a little spit of land that rose from the sloping valley floor like an anvil. To the right rushed the river, wide and icy and treacherous, with sharp, jagged rocks jutting above the spray. Even white-water rafters didn’t try the rapids here; they started their adventures about fifteen miles downriver. On both sides rose the Bitterroot mountains and the vertical expanses of rock that she and Derek had climbed, or attempted to climb and abandoned as too difficult for their level of expertise.
Trail Stop was basically in a box, with one gravel load linking it to the rest of the world. The peculiar geography protected them from snowslides, but sometimes during the winter she would hear the roar of snow collapsing and rushing down the steep slopes, and she would shiver in reaction. Life here was complicated, but the inconveniences and lack of cultural opportunities were offset by the breath taking natural beauty surrounding them. She missed being close to her family, but her money went much further here. Maybe she hadn’t made the best possible decision, but overall she was satisfied with her choice.
Her mother came yawning into Che kitchen and without a word, went to the cabinet to retrieve a cup then back out into the dining room to get some coffee. Cate glanced at the clock and sighed. Five forty-five; her two hours of solitude had been cut short this morning, but the payoff was she’d get to spend some time with her mother without the boys clamoring for their Mimi’s attention. Here, too, there was balance. She missed her mother, wished they could see each other more often.
Her face practically buried in the coffee cup, Sheila reentered the kitchen and, with a sigh, sat down at the table. She wasn’t a morning person, so Cate suspected she had set the alarm in order to have some mother-daughter time before the twins got up.
“What kind of muffins today?” Sheila finally asked in a hoarse tone.
“Apple butter,’” Cate said, smiling. “I found the recipe online.”
“Bet you didn’t find the apple butter at that dinky little store across the road.”
“No, I ordered it online from a place in Sevierville, Tennessee.” Cate ignored the dig because, first of all, it was true, and second, she knew that even if she’d moved to New York City, her mother would have found something wrong there, too, because her core problem was that she wanted her daughter and grandchildren nearby.
“Tanner’s talking more,” Sheila observed a moment later, pushing her blond hair out of her face. She was a very pretty woman, and Cate had often wished shed inherited her mothers looks instead of the mishmash of features she sported.
“When he wants. I’ve almost decided he hangs back so Tucker can be the one who gets in trouble.” Grinning, she related the tale of Mr. Harris’s tools, and how Tanner had somehow figured out the basics of simple math so he knew he had only eight minutes left in the naughty chair.
Her mother laughed, but her expression was full of pride. “I’ve read that Einstein didn’t talk until he was six, or something like that. Maybe I’m wrong on the age.”
“I don’t think he’s the next Einstein.” Cate would settle for healthy and happy. She had no ambitions for her sons; standards, yes, but not ambitions.
“You never can tell.” Sheila yawned. “My God, I couldn’t face getting up this early every day. It’s barbaric. Anyway, you can’t tell how a child will turn out. You were a total tomboy, always playing softball and climbing trees, plus you were in that climbing club, and now look at you: your entire career is domestic. You clean, you cook, you waitress.”
“I run a business,” Cate corrected. “And I like cooking. I’m good at it.” Cooking was, for the most part, a pleasure. Nor did she mind waiting tables for her customers, because the one-on-one contact helped bring them back. On the other hand, she hated cleaning, and had to force herself to do it every day.
“No argument there.” Sheila hesitated. “You didn’t cook much when Derek was alive.”
“No. We split it about evenly, plus we’d order in. And we ate out a lot, at least before the boys were born.” Carefully she poured milk into a large measuring cup, bending down to eye the level markers. “But after he died, I spent every night at home with them and I got bored with the fast food I’d pick up, so I bought some recipe books and started cooking.” It was difficult to remember that that was only three years ago; the processes of measuring and mixing were so second nature now she felt as if she’d been cooking forever. The early experiments, when she had tried all sorts of exotic dishes, had also been a way to occupy her mind. She had also thrown out a lot of those efforts, judging them inedible.
“When your dad and I first married and you kids were little, I used to cook every night. We didn’t have the money to eat out; a burger from a fast-food joint was a luxury. But I don’t do it much now, and I don’t miss it.”
Cate eyed her mother. “But you still make those huge meals for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and you always baked our birthday cakes.”
Sheila shrugged. “Tradition, family; you know the drill. I love everyone getting together, but to be honest, I’d just as soon skip the huge meals.”
“Then why don’t I do the cooking for our get-togethers? I like it, and you and Dad can play with the boys and keep them occupied.”
Sheila’s eyes lit up. “Are you sure you wouldn’t mind?”
“Mind?” Cate gave her a look that questioned her sanity. “I’m getting the best end of the deal. They find new ways every day to get into trouble.”
“They’re just being boys. You were adventurous, but Patrick’s first ten years came close to turning my hair white—like the time he set off that ‘bomb’ in his room.’
Cate laughed. Patrick had decided firecrackers weren’t loud enough, or powerful enough, so one Fourth of July he somehow collected over a hundred of them. With a knife filched from the kitchen he had carefully split open each firecracker and dumped the gunpowder contents onto a paper towel. When he had all the gunpowder in a pile, he asked for an empty tin can, which, thinking he intended to make a can-and-string “telephone,” Sheila had cheerfully provided.
He had read about the old muzzle-loading rifles, so he figured his bomb would follow the same premise, except he hadn’t been exactly certain what went where. He’d packed the tin can with toilet paper, tiny gravel, and the gunpowder, then twisted a length of thread together and soaked it with rubbing alcohol to make his fuse. To keep the floor from burning, he set his “bomb” on a cookie sheet—and as a finishing touch, he took his old fish bowl and turned it upside down over the can. with one side of the bowl propped up just a little bit so the thread could run under the rim and up to the can. His thinking had been that the bowl would contain everything and he’d get the noise and flash without having to clean up a mess.
Not.
The one good thing Patrick had done was to take cover behind his bed after lighting the fuse.
With a loud bang the fishbowl shattered, sending glass and gravel flying around the room. The wad of toilet paper, having caught on fire, disintegrated into small flaming pieces that floated down to cover the bed, the carpet, even getting inside the open door of Patrick’s closet. When his parents burst through the door, Patrick was busily stamping out sparks on the carpet and trying to put out the nice little flame spreading on his bedspread by spitting on it.
It hadn’t been funny at the time, but now Cate and Sheila looked at each other and burst into laughter.
“I’m afraid that’s what I have to look forward to,” Cate said, torn between amusement and horror. “Times two.”
“Maybe not,” Sheila said, a trifle dubiously. “If there’s any justice in the world, though, Patrick will have four kids who are just like him. My dearest wish is that he’ll call me in the middle of the night because his kids have done something horrendous and he’ll sob while he apologizes from the bottom of his heart.”