Aspen Gold (10 page)

"They've been crawling out of the woodwork, haven't they?" Maggie said sympathetically. "Do you have any idea how popular Nikki has become in school lately? Girls who wouldn't even speak to her before are coming over to the house, hoping to get a glimpse of you--or better yet, John Travis." There was a slight pause.

"Not that I blame them. The guy is better looking in person than on the screen."

Kit readily agreed with that. "Speaking of John T., let me give you the phone number of his place here in Aspen in case there's an emergency and you need to reach me. Do you have a pencil and paper handy?"

"Got it."

She read the number off the phone to her, then added, "I'll be here through the weekend, then at the ranch."

"No problem," Maggie replied.

"Just relax and have fun. Don't worry about anything on this end. I'll look in on Elaine from time to time."

"Thanks, Maggie," Kit said and meant it.

"What are neighbors for?" Maggie's poodle started yapping in the background.

"Someone's at the door. I better go."

"Talk to you soon."

"Right. Have fun, Kit. Do what I would do if I was in Aspen with John Travis--

enjoy," she said in a throaty growl, then laughed and hung up.

Smiling, Kit placed the receiver back in its cradle. But the smile faded as her thoughts turned from Maggie to her mother. So many feelings came rushing up--guilt, sadness, anger, love, resentment, but most of all, regret.

Regret that they hadn't been closer, that they hadn't bridged their differences. Now they couldn't.

Now they'd never even have the chance to try. Because of some stupid, horrible disease.

If only she'd known when she first moved out to L.a. nine years ago that the fatigue her mother complained about--the blurred vision and tingling in her left leg--if only she'd known those were early symptoms of multiple sclerosis, she could have made more of an effort to get to know her mother, to make peace with her. But it hadn't seemed serious, no cause for alarm, and she was busy building a new life of her own, working, going to auditions, landing a part now and then.

If only she'd known when her mother began having trouble walking over three years ago, requiring first a cane, then a walker, then a wheelchair and a live-in aide, that when the doctor said her mother was suffering from a viral infection of the brain, he meant multiple sclerosis. But she'd always thought her mother would get better, that there was time, that time would heal both her mother's sickness and their own strained relationship.

If only. Such a haunting phrase.

Words that had echoed over and over again in her mind during her last visit to the hospital. ...

It was relatively quiet on the floor, no wheelchairs or cane-driven gurneys wheeling down the corridors. The supper hour was over; most of the patients were back in their beds.

Television sets played in the background, competing with each other; voices murmured in hushed tones; someone shouted the answer to the Wheel of Fortune puzzle; and from other beds came low moans. After nearly eight months, the sights, sounds, and smells of antiseptic, medicine, and sickness had become familiar to Kit. Enough, at least, that she had stopped being uncomfortable in the environment.

A privacy curtain separated her mother's bed from the other three patients who shared her room--a stroke victim, a quadriplegic, and another MS sufferer. The curtain was drawn when Kit entered.

She lifted it aside and paused, her glance running to the young nurse with short, dark hair by the bed. After a split second of hesitation, she recognized the woman. "Dottie. You cut your hair. I like it."

"Thanks." The nurse self-consciously touched a hand to her short locks. "Bobby insists he liked it better long."

"Most men do," Kit admitted with a small, dismissive lift of her shoulders.

"But they don't have to take care of it." She smoothed a final hand over the sheet, then turned from the bed, moving toward Kit.

Kit smiled an agreement, then asked, "How is she?"

The nurse paused beside her, then cast a glance over her shoulder toward the bed. "She's having one of her bad days, I'm afraid." Which meant her mother wasn't talking, or was responding only in monosyllables. On good days, she talked almost normally, but even then her mental deterioration was apparent in her vagueness about time, place, or circumstance.

Kit acknowledged the information with a nod and turned to the bed as the dark-haired nurse left. For a long moment, she simply looked at the figure in the bed, the sheets pulled up to the neck, the head canted at an angle and bobbing at a regular rhythm, the sightless, staring eyes fixed on nothing, the short cropped hair heavily salted with gray, the wisps of facial hair on the chin and upper-lip area, and the gaunt body beneath the sheets, straight now after three operations to sever tendons in the legs and free them from a permanent fetal curl.

Eight months and the reaction in her heart was still the same--this was not her mother; this was a grotesque imitation of her, a horribly cruel one. But her mind told her differently and Kit walked forward.

"Hello, Momma. It's me. Kit."

Leaning over the side guard, she brushed a kiss over a pale cheek, careful to avoid the nasal tube that now fed her mother. "You missed a beautiful day today. Hardly any smog. In fact, you could actually tell the sky was blue."

No response. Nothing. She hadn't really expected any, yet ...

Lightly she combed her fingers through the ends of her mother's coarse hair, the gray and dark all mixed together. Once it had been a shiny mink brown, always worn in a tidy French twist--with emphasis on the "tidy."

"Daddy always said you had the most beautiful hair. I always wanted to touch your hair and see if it was as soft as it looked. But we didn't touch each other very much, did we, Momma? I was always crawling onto Daddy's lap, always sitting on the arm of his chair, wasn't I? But his arms were always open." Just for an instant, her fingers stilled their petting of the short hair. "I was Daddy's girl. I was .his daughter, that's what you said."

The phrase, the scene was indelibly etched in her memory, all the edges razor sharp. She could still see that moment when her mother had stood by the staircase of their ranch home outside Aspen and looked at her sixteen-year-old daughter.

Kit had just informed her that she was going to stay with her father, that she wasn't going to move to Los Angeles with her mother after the divorce. It was one of the rare times when her mother had shown any strong emotion.

"I'm not surprised." Her voice had been cold and bitter and cutting. "You aren't my child.

You've never been my daughter. You were always his."

Remembering it, Kit sighed and smiled sadly. "We never had a chance after that, did we?

I hurt you a lot by staying with Dad. But he needed me, and you never seemed to need anyone. And I wanted to hurt you because you were hurting us."

She touched the smooth forehead, gazing into the sightless eyes that once had been so calm and direct. "But you were right. We never had much in common. It was always hard for us to talk, to find something to talk about. And after the divorce, we became such careful strangers. Always choosing safe subjects, talking about the weather, plays, television shows, restaurants, neighbors. But who were you? What did you feel?

What did you want? You must have had dreams, but I don't know what they were. You're my mother.

I've known you all my life, yet I don't know you at all." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Worst of all, I never asked."

If only. That was what haunted her. What would always haunt her.

"Flowers." Paula strolled into the guest bedroom, crossing to the elegant free-form glass table and touching a scarlet nail to the petal of a white tulip, one of a dozen artfully arranged in a cobalt blue vase. "I'd ask how you rate a bouquet in your room when I don't have one. But I already know the answer to that."

Kit looked at her blankly for an instant, then pushed off the bed, shaking off the memories as she went over to admire the hothouse blooms, wondering how she hadn't noticed them before.

"This is obviously John's doing." She cupped a hand around a white tulip and bent down, breathing in its faint, almost negligible fragrance.

"He knows I have a weakness for flowers."

"And he's obviously developed a weakness for you," Paula observed with a knowing look.

Kit smiled. "I know it's getting harder to keep both feet on the ground when I'm around him--especially when he keeps trying to sweep me off them."

"So let him."

"If I'm not mistaken"--Kit tipped her head to one side, arching an eyebrow--"you're the one who warned about John's reputation for having affairs with his leading ladies, then dumping them when the film's finished."

"I only wanted to make sure you knew the score going in." Paula lifted one shoulder in an idle shrug.

"I think I always knew it." Suddenly restless, Kit circled the room, pausing to touch objects along the way. "I learned a long time ago that just because you love somebody, it doesn't mean he'll love you back." She stopped at the terrace doors, remembering Bannon and how much it had hurt when he'd jilted her ten years ago.

"My God, Kit, you make it sound as though you've had a whole string of lovers."

Paula's amused tones came from the opposite side of the room. Turning, Kit saw the redhead lounging amid the blue satin pillows on the ivory chaise. "How many have you had in your life?

Two? Three? It couldn't have been more than that,"

she said with certainty. "What working actress has time for a love life? We're up at four and five in the mornings so we can be at the studio by six. Fourteen hours of rehearsals and tapings, then back home to memorize ten to thirty pages of dialogue for the next day and off to bed early so you don't have bags under your eyes. Becoming involved with someone on the set is infinitely practical."

"It may be practical," Kit conceded. "But I'm not emotionally equipped to handle a casual affair. And I'm not sure John is offering more than that."

"Casual affairs are often best--especially in our business."

"Maybe for some, but not for me." Moving away from the terrace doors, Kit crossed to the set of soft-sided luggage lined up in a neat row inside the door. "Have you unpacked already?"

"Carla offered to do it and I accepted ...

readily." Paula rose from the chaise with unhurried grace. "I think I'll pamper myself with a long, luscious soak. Let me know when the manicurist arrives."

"I will." Kit hauled the garment bag to the bed.

"Tell me something, Kit," Paula said from the doorway, her tone unusually thoughtful and serious,

"do you think Chip is good enough to direct this picture?"

She was stunned that such a question would be asked by her.

It was almost traitorous. "I think Chip is the best person to direct it. John couldn't have made a better choice. Why would you ask that?"

"Curious." She made to leave.

"Paula." It was her turn to be curious.

"Are you serious about Chip?"

Paula thrust a half-amused glance at Kit. It was a complete answer that didn't need any added definition. But in the hall, she paused and swung her shoulders slantingly at Kit.

"How can you discourage a schnauzer?"

"That's cruel. Chip is nice."

Paula's face was utterly smooth, but her green eyes held a reluctant

sadness. "The day will come when you'll be just as cruel, Kit. More cruel than I am now--because you're going higher than I can ever go."

Twilight flowed across the mountain valley as sunset's rosy hues gave way to indigo ripples, deepening the shadows of the ranch buildings. Somewhere from the depths of the mountains, a coyote's howl floated across the gathering stillness.

Leaving the barn and pole corral, Bannon headed across the ranch yard, traveling in the slow, swivel-hipped walk of a man who'd spent a lot of time in the saddle. The herd was scattered over the winter pasture, settling down for the night to browse on the rich, dry grass. The evening chores were done, the horses turned loose in the corral, enjoying a good roll in the dust. The satisfaction of a day's work done and another autumn drive complete eased his tiredness.

"It doesn't seem the same without Clint being here," Old Tom said. "About now he'd be slapping one of us on the back, giving us a big grin, and demanding to know when we were going to break out the beer." He paused and expelled a fragment of a chuckle. "Remember that time--what was it?

Fifteen years ago, I think--we'd just started bringing the cattle down and the skies opened up.

Poured, it rained so hard you couldn't hardly see the cattle. By the time we got back here to the house I was so full of water I was afraid to go near the fire for fear I'd warp clean out of shape. But there was that Clint--that big laugh of his just booming out, and Kit right along with him. It didn't faze either of them one bit." He shook his head. "Those were good times."

"They were that," Bannon nodded.

"Growing old isn't a simple thing, Bannon," Old Tom declared. "This contemporary scene is for the young. It's your world, not mine. Old men like me live in the bright past when we cut a high, wide trail. We're nothing but spectators now, pushed aside by fellows like you. It's lonesome business to see old friends die.

I guess a little bit of me gets burned out with each one--and pushes my world farther back in the mist."

"You're gloomy as hell,"

Bannon joshed with a good-natured smile.

"Comes from getting old. The men and women of my time were big-hearted and wide-handed people. We had a lot of fun out of living." Old Tom turned a searching, sideways glance on him. "More, I think, than your generation does. We were never afraid of our emotions and never troubled ourselves greatly over our sins."

His smile faded just a little. "Must have been nice."

Laura broke into their conversation. "I wish we had a swimming pool."

"We've got one," Old Tom asserted.

"The best kind--"

"Not that hole down in the creek, Gramps,"