Safe With Me (33 page)

“I do that for my mom,” I say.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” she says fondly. She moves her gaze from the pictures to the bay window behind me. “She talked back a little . . . she always thought she knew more or better than I did. Sometimes she was right about that, but as her mom, I had a hard time admitting it. She loved old movies—the black-and-white ones, with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers?” I nod, and she goes on. “She wanted to be an actress, I think. Or a veterinarian. She loved animals so much and was never happier than when we were visiting her grandparents’ farm.” She smiled and looked back to me. “She was funny, too. Oh my god, she could make me laugh until I cried.” Her eyes fill then, and I feel bad for making her talk about all of this.

“Do you think . . .” I say, unsure if I really want to know the answer to the question floating around in my head, but going ahead and asking it anyway. “Do you think she would have liked me? Would she be glad that it’s me she saved?” My bottom lip trembles and I bite the inside of my cheek to get it to stop.

“Yes,” Hannah says without hesitation, staring right at me. “I know she would.” She takes a deep breath. “
I’m
happy it was you that she saved, too. I think you’re an amazing girl.”

“Thank you,” I say, and a tingle of relief rushes through me. I hadn’t realized just how much hearing that would mean. I glance at the clock on the wall. “Oh crap. I’m sorry, but my mom’s meeting me back at the school. I should go.”

“I can drive you if you want,” Hannah offers, but I shake my head.

“It’s probably better if I take the bus. Just in case she might see you.”

“She’s still mad?” she asks, and I feel a little sorry for her, seeing the sadness in her eyes.

“I don’t know,” I say, trying to be gentle. “She isn’t talking to me much.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” She pushes her hair back from her face, then walks over to her purse, which is lying on the couch. “Just one second,” she says as she roots around inside it, eventually coming up with a small picture removed from her wallet. She hands it to me, and I don’t even have to look to know it’s the same school picture as the one on the mantel.

“I can’t take this,” I say, holding it back out toward her, wanting nothing more than to take it home with me.

“Of course you can. I have plenty, and I want you to have it. Please?”

I hesitate a moment, and then nod, carefully slipping it inside my bag before letting her lead me back downstairs and out to the front porch. I feel the other stylists’ curious eyes on us both and do my best to ignore them. I imagine she hasn’t told them who I am or about the fact that she lied to my mom and me.

“Well,” I say, “good luck with everything.” I cough, even though I don’t really have to. “With your move and everything.”

“Thank you,” she says, and it feels like her eyes see right through me. “I want you to know, Maddie . . . if you ever need anything. If something happens with your dad or your mom and you don’t have anyone to talk with? I’m here, okay? I might not be your first thought, but I want you to know that you’re not alone.”

“Okay,” I say, and then before she can say anything more, I turn my back to her and go.

A few days after Maddie visited the salon, Hannah has a conversation with the couple who are renting her house. She calls them after work, when she’s finished with her last client.

“I’ve been giving it a lot of thought,” she tells the husband, an older man named Thomas. She remembers feeling comfortable with him and his wife as tenants because he reminded her a little of her father. “And it’s time for me to put the house on the market.” There is a twinge of regret in Hannah’s chest as she thinks about letting go of where she lived with Emily, but she knows in her heart it’s the right thing for her to do.

“Really?” Thomas says. “That’s wonderful!”

Hannah feels a little confused, considering this news means he and his wife, Tara, will have to move out. She says as much, and he chuckles. “We won’t have to move out if we buy it,” he says, and a moment later, Tara has joined them in a conference call so Thomas can tell her Hannah is planning to sell.

“We’ve just fallen in
love
with the house and the neighborhood,” Tara says. “Let us talk with our Realtor and we’ll make you an offer, okay?”

Hannah nods, still feeling a little hesitant about her decision, but since visiting the storage unit and seeing Maddie again—feeling like she finally has taken a few steps toward closure—Hannah believes she’s ready to make some changes.

A couple of days later, Hannah meets with John, the real estate agent Isaac referred her to, at his office. He reviews the offer Thomas and Tara’s agent made her and confirms that it’s a fair amount for the property. After they write up the paperwork to accept the offer and set a date to close escrow, they discuss where she might want to live.

“What areas are you interested in?” John asks as they sit at a large table in the office conference room. He is a short, brawny man, who with his bald head and small but matching gold hoop earrings, looks oddly like Mr. Clean clad in a navy blue suit.

“Not too far from Bellevue,” Hannah says. “I’d like to be by the water, if I can.” One of Emily’s favorite things to do was go to the beach, and Hannah hopes that being near the water—or at least being able to see it from her home—will make her feel near to her daughter, too.

“Kirkland, maybe?” John says, typing rapidly on the keyboard of his laptop. “There are some beautiful cottages around the edge of Lake Washington. Waterfront might be a little out of your price range, but we could get you close. And it wouldn’t be a terrible commute to the salon.”

Hannah nods, and an hour later, Isaac meets them at one of the properties John pulled off the MLS as something Hannah might like. They visit five houses Hannah isn’t thrilled with before pulling up to the last one on their list.

“It’s tiny,” Isaac says after he gets out of his car. He stands next to Hannah, his lanky arms hanging loose at his sides as he cocks his head and squints his brown eyes at the property.

“We prefer to say ‘cozy,’ ” John says, but Hannah stays quiet, letting her eyes roam over the pale yellow house, immediately charmed by the white shutters and wraparound porch. There is a postage-stamp-size yard, filled to the brim with lush plant life—a single, delicate Japanese maple graces each side of the stairs, and the flower beds are thick with sea grasses and several tall rosebushes. Hannah glances over to the narrow driveway and wonders if her car could fit inside the small garage.

“When was it built?” she asks.

John glances at his smart phone, using his finger to scroll down the screen. “Nineteen fifty-two,” he says, then removes the key from the lockbox on the front door. “But it has been fully renovated.”

They enter directly into the living room, and Hannah immediately notes the shiny blond hardwood floor and the calming sage-green walls. Like John told her, the property isn’t waterfront, but it is on a hill, and from the picture window Hannah can see the bright blue waters of Lake Washington. She wanders into the dining room, which really is only an alcove with enough space for a table for two, and then into the galley kitchen, which is updated with gleaming stainless-steel appliances and a mosaic backsplash made out of what look like random bits of turquoise sea glass. There are two bedrooms with bay windows and tiny closets; between those, a bathroom with white tiles and a claw-foot tub.

“I love it,” Hannah says, taking in the built-in bookshelves
in the hallway. She suddenly envisions placing Emily’s pictures and art projects there and suspects a Christmas tree will look just perfect in the corner of the front room.

“You’ve barely looked around yet,” says Isaac, ever the practical sibling. When they were kids, Hannah would be scaling a western white pine tree in the back woods of their parents’ property while Isaac watched from the safety of the ground. While she leapt from heights far above the reservoir of the Boise River, Isaac cautioned against the possibility of sharp rocks below.

“It feels right,” Hannah says, smiling up at her brother. “Can we make an offer, John?”

“Of course,” John says, walking past her to set his briefcase down on the dining room table. “We can fill out the paperwork online and email it to the listing agent right now.”

“Hold on, Hannah-banana,” Isaac says. “Don’t you think you should look at a few more options before you decide?”

“No, I don’t,” Hannah says, stepping over to give her brother a kiss on the cheek. “Life is short, Isaac. This is where I want to live it.”

•  •  •

That night, Hannah goes over to Isaac’s for dinner to celebrate finding the house. She sits at the island in his sleek black kitchen, sipping a glass of wine as she watches him sauté vegetables and check the temperature of the chicken breasts roasting in the oven. When they arrived at his house, he changed out of the slacks and blue button-down shirt he’d worn to look at properties into a pair of Levi’s and a black T-shirt. Hannah notes that he moves with decided ease around the room, his
long limbs reaching for a pan in the cupboard or into the fridge for fresh herbs.

“You’d make some woman a lovely wife,” she says, teasing him. “Do you do windows, too?”

He smiles and halfheartedly flips her off. “No, but my housekeeper does. Cooking just happens to relax me, okay? When you travel as much as I do, the last thing you want is to eat out when you’re at home.” He starts to mash the boiled potatoes he just took off the stove with butter and milk. Hannah sees the sinewy muscles of his forearm work beneath his tan skin. “So what inspired the move, little sis?” he asks. “I’ve been out of the loop.”

Hannah takes a deep breath and proceeds to tell him everything that has happened over the last six weeks, starting with Olivia and Maddie’s first appearance at the salon and ending with Maddie’s visit there just a few days before. “I screwed up,” she confesses. “But all of it made me realize that I’d been existing in a sort of suspended state, you know? I was working, remodeling the salon, dealing with clients, running my ass off trying to pretend that everything was fine when inside I was crumbling.”

Isaac stops mashing and looks right at his sister. “I think we all do that, to some extent. We put on a face that things are fine when they’re not, or pretend to be something other than what we really are.” He pauses to give the potatoes a quick stir. “What’s dangerous is when we lose sight of who we are behind the mask, you know? It sounds like you showed Olivia and Maddie who you
really
are when you told them the truth. And Maddie coming to see you? That’s pretty huge. Maybe Olivia will come around.”

Hannah sighs. “I know, I’m just still so worried about them. I hate that there’s nothing I can do to help.”

“I know that feeling well,” Isaac says, giving her a pointed look.

Hannah sets her wineglass down, then walks over to her brother and gives him a hug. He smells like lemon thyme and garlic. “I’m sorry.”

He kisses the top of her head. “No need. I’m just happy to see you coming back to your old self a bit.” She pulls away, and he feeds her a bite of potato, looking at her expectantly. “More salt?” She nods and leans her hips against the edge of the counter, crossing her arms over her chest.

“I’m going home for the week of Thanksgiving,” she tells him. “We need to help Dad figure out what to do about managing the farm.”

“I know,” Isaac says. He looks at her with his big brown eyes. “I’m quitting my job, Hannah. I’m moving back there.”

“What?” she exclaims. “All of a sudden you want to live on a farm?”

“It’s not all of a sudden. I’ve been giving it some thought for a while now. More so since Emily died.” His eyes shine with tears and he blinks rapidly to erase them. “Losing her really shook me up. Made me reexamine my priorities. My whole life has been my career, and all that just feels meaningless to me now. I’ve made more money than I know what to do with and I’m burned out on traveling. I just want to go home.”

“Home?” she repeats, trying not to look as shocked as she feels. “But you live
here
.”

He shrugs. “I know . . . but I miss the country. I miss the
quiet and the slower pace.” He waits a beat. “I’ve also reconnected with Annie Mitchell.”

“Annie?”
Hannah says, picturing her brother’s high school girlfriend—a bouncy, curvy brunette with huge dimples and personality to spare. “I thought she married Brett Richardson?”

Her brother blushes. “They divorced about five years ago. We found each other on Facebook in June, and it got serious again between us pretty quickly, like no time had passed at all. I’ve been back to visit her, and she’s come here, too, but not with her kids.”

“You said you went home this summer to see Mom and Dad,” Hannah says, trying to keep the accusation out of her tone. She cannot believe she has been so deep in her own grief that her brother didn’t feel he could share all of this with her.

“I did go home to see them.” He smiles. “And Annie, too. I just didn’t want to say anything to you in case it didn’t work out.”

Hannah takes a couple of breaths and looks at her brother with wide eyes. “She has
kids
?”

“Twin boys, Grayson and Liam.”

“How old are they?”

“Ten. They’re really great, Hannah, and actually seem to be okay with me dating their mom, so I started thinking about moving back . . . just to see where it all might lead.”

“How could you not have
told
me about this?” Hannah demands, playfully smacking her brother’s arm. “Especially at the party for the salon opening when Mom was giving me such a hard time about
me
moving back home!”

Isaac looks a little guilty. “You already had a lot going on. I didn’t want to make it worse. And honestly, I hadn’t decided
for absolute sure I was moving back at that point. Now, I’m sure.”

Something dawns on Hannah, thinking back to her last conversation with her mother, when she didn’t mention Hannah moving home for the first time in a year. “So that’s why Mom backed off pushing me to move home? You’re doing it instead.”