Nancy Pickard - The Scent of Rain and Lightning

A warm, oozing triangle of apple pie sat on the kitchen table in front of her.

Annabelle, who had accepted an offer of vanilla ice cream to go with the pie, also had to admit that Laurie made fine pies. This one had a lattice crust baked to a perfect golden brown. Sugar crystals sparkled on top, exactly as they should. With her free hand, she took up her fork, cut into the triangle, and gave the first fragrant, gooey bite to her granddaughter, who smiled at her around the fork, making Annabelle’s heart squeeze with love.

While Jody chewed noisily, Annabelle took a bite for herself.

“Mm, it’s wonderful, Laurie.”

“It’s good, Mommy.”

Inside, the filling was just tart enough to make it perfect.

Her gratitude for both the grandchild and the food made it easier for her to smile at her daughter-in-law, who sat across from her at the kitchen table. Laurie, who had an artistic streak, had painted the table sunflower yellow to match her gingham curtains, and pottery that she herself had painted-with big poppy blossoms of orange, yellow, red, and white-and fired in a kiln. They looked like spring bouquets around the circular table. In her yellow sundress, she added the final touch of beauty to the scene. Outside, the day was getting darker and darker by the minute; inside, there was sunshine. Laurie should have gone to an art school, Annabelle thought, instead of trying to make it through a university that expected her to pass freshman biology. When Annabelle had dreamed of having daughters-in-law, this wasn’t the one she thought she’d get, especially not from Hugh-Jay. She realized now that she should never have underestimated a young man’s-any young man’s-vulnerability to a pretty face and figure. And, oh well, she had two more sons and two more chances for the cozy female relationship she rarely had with her own Belle.

In the meantime she had a perfect granddaughter.

Annabelle hugged Jody to her as the child reached for more pie.

“I’ll stay here with Jody,” she offered, starting casually upon her agenda. “You go do anything you need to do.”

Laurie sighed. “I may just take a long leisurely bath.”

“It’s good to get a break,” Annabelle said with careful casualness. “When our kids were little, Hugh and I treasured the times we could get away, even though we missed the children.”

“That would be nice. To get away.”

This is too easy, Annabelle thought, suppressing a smile.

She observed the unhappy downward curve to Laurie’s pretty mouth.

“Are you ready for a little break, honey?”

“Oh, God, yes. A bath will feel great. I may even light candles.”

Annabelle smiled. “Actually, I meant a longer break than that, like a couple of days to go somewhere.”

“I’m ready for a break of about ten years.” Laurie said, and then she sighed. “In Tahiti.”

That made Annabelle laugh. Laurie laughed a little, too.

Laurie’s parents, who had catered to their beautiful daughter’s whims all of her life-had moved to Wichita following the wedding, as if they were turning the care and feeding of their high-maintenance daughter over to the larger, wealthier Linder family. Annabelle had watched them go with bemused understanding. Now, they seemed content to come for suspiciously quick visits to see their grandchild. It was’t Laurie’s fault, Annabelle reminded herself, that she was spoiled.

“Well, how about taking a weekend off, honey?”

“What?”

“A weekend vacation.” This was her big idea. “Just the two of you, you and Hugh-Jay.”

Laurie sat up. “A whole weekend! But who would-”

“We will, of course.” Annabelle dabbed ice cream off Jody’s chin. “We’d love to. I want you and Hugh-Jay to spend a weekend at the Broadmoor-”

“The what?”

“The Broadmoor. It’s a hotel in Colorado Springs.”

“The one with the spas and the golf, and the-” Laurie began to look excited. “Really? You mean it?”

“Yes, really.”

“Oh, my gosh! That’s incredible, Annabelle. Yes, yes, yes!”

Annabelle felt a little of her own tension melt away. Smiling, pleased, she stroked the yellow tabletop with one hand, admiring how perfectly Laurie had sanded it down to smoothness before painting it. When it came to making things look good, including herself, Laurie had the touch.

But then Laurie leaned forward and said, “Hugh-Jay will never go.”

Annabelle’s hand stopped moving on the tabletop. “Why not?”

“He just won’t,” Laurie said, in a tone that sounded both dismissive and a little bitter. “He won’t leave the ranch for pleasure, you know that, Annabelle, not if there’s a single cow to herd or a horse to ride. Now, if you sent him to a bull sale, he’d go for a week.”

“We’ll talk him into it.”

“What if I went by myself?”

Annabelle, flummoxed, said, “What? By yourself?”

Laurie nodded, looking suddenly overjoyed, the weariness vanishing from her eyes. In that instant, she looked stunningly beautiful and wildly alive, and Annabelle understood why her son looked so besotted and so sad. This would be a difficult girl for a plain and decent boy to lose, for any man to lose. In Annabelle’s lap, Jody stared at her mother as if she were a beautiful princess. “Oh, Mom,” said Laurie, “it would be so good for me… for both Jay and me, really!”

Annabelle hated when Laurie called her Mom.

“How would it be good for Hugh-Jay?” she asked, with a bite to her tone.

“I’d come back rested and happy to see him!”

“Lucky him.”

“Exactly.”

Annabelle felt so confused by the sudden turn that she couldn’t think of a way to say no that wouldn’t come out sounding mean and angry. What she wanted to exclaim was, You selfish girl! How can you take this generous offer for both of you and turn it into a treat solely for yourself?

Stalling, furiously thinking, she took another nibble of pie.

She was worried that Laurie had been flirting with Chase that very morning. The business with the barbed wire had shocked her. She hadn’t told Belle about that. She could hardly believe Hugh-Jay had done it, or that the expression on his face said he didn’t regret it. Chase could have been badly hurt. Hugh-Jay was apparently at some kind of breaking point. Even if nothing had happened between Laurie and Chase-yet-it had already reached the point where it set Hugh-Jay off, which meant it had gone too far.

It was Hugh-Jay and Laurie together to whom she wanted to give some time alone to rediscover each other, to work on their marriage, to have fun and pleasure without responsibilities for once.

The phone rang, and Annabelle was so tense she jumped.

Listening hard, she heard Laurie’s end of the conversation from the phone in the front hallway. “Hello.” That sounded normal, but the next words had a funny tone to them, an amused, secretive-sounding tone. “I thought you might be interested… Yeah, at Bailey’s… What?” Annabelle heard her daughter-in-law laugh, a low, seductive kind of laugh. “Oh, you.” Then she heard a stilted tone, the kind a person uses when they’re trying to get a secret message across to somebody, to let them know they aren’t free to say what they want to say. “Listen, my mother-in-law is here.” There was a little silence, followed by another low laugh, and then Laurie hung up the phone without saying goodbye.

“That was Belle,” Laurie said with a breezy air as she came back into the kitchen. “We’re meeting at Bailey’s for supper tonight.”

Annabelle thought, You refer to me as your mother-in-law? To my daughter?

Laurie leaned forward, looking as if she had mysteriously gained more self-confidence. “May I go for three days?”