“I love the network too,” said the second woman, dressed in various shades of pink from head to toe, including a mauve beret, a blush-colored blouse, a Barbie DreamHouse–pink miniskirt, and bubble-gum-colored pumps. “Especially your show. The program on year-round door wreaths literally changed my life.” Pinky clasped her hands together in front of her heart. “I mean totally changed . . . My. Life.”
“Um . . . you’re so welcome. I’m glad you enjoyed it.”
Pinky twirled her finger at the notebook May June had given Madison. “Could you just tear a page out of her book and sign it for me, too?”
Madison almost wrote to “Pinky” but stopped herself in the nick of time. “What’s your name?”
“Blenda.”
“My goodness. What another brilliantly creative name. It’s no wonder you two are such good friends,” Madison flattered.
“Blenda’s not as creative as May June. My dad’s named Brent and my mom is Glenda. Mash ’em together and you get Blenda. Like in a blender.” She giggled.
“Imagine if your dad’s name had been Spike,” Madison said.
May June’s eyes got wide, and she poked Blenda in the ribs with her elbow with a loud laugh. “Oh, oh, you’d be Splenda!”
“Aren’t you just the wittiest thing!” Pinky . . . Blenda . . . enthused, clutching the autographed paper to her chest.
“I’m glad you ladies got to meet Madison,” Darynda intervened. “But we have a family member upstairs we need to check on. If you’ll excuse us . . .”
“Are you her manager?” May June stepped across the threshold of the elevator to keep the door from closing as Madison and Darynda got in.
“No,” Darynda said. “Just a family friend. I’m sure you ladies understand that Madison needs her—”
“Who’s sick?” Blenda asked. “Is it one of your sisters?”
May June splayed her hand over her chest. “Is it Shelley? Is she back? Did you guys make up? Does she have some terrible disease?”
“Don’t tell me it’s Gia!” Blenda did the prayer hands again. “I’d planned to hire her to teach kiteflying for my son’s fifth birthday party next month.”
Startled, Madison tossed Darynda a how-do-they-know-this-stuff expression.
Darynda shrugged. “Small-town gossip.”
“We’re not gossips,” May June said, as the elevator door bumped her in the butt and then retracted. “We won’t tell a soul. Promise.”
“It’s my grandmother,” Madison said. “She’s got brain cancer, and she’s dying. Happy now?”
That wiped the salacious look right off their faces; they mumbled apologies and words of sympathy and May June got out of the way fast, and Blenda did prayer hands and bowed as the elevator door shut tight.
Madison sank against the wall, closed her eyes.
“I don’t think the snark earned you any brownie points with your number one fans.” Darynda punched the elevator button for the third floor.
“Not even sympathy points for a dying grandmother?” Madison pried one eye open.
“You embarrassed them.”
“If the shoe fits . . .”
Darynda shook her head and murmured in a disappointed voice, “You know, Madison, sometimes you remind me exactly of your mother.”
Chapter Four
Gia
UNBALANCED BORDERS: Borders of different widths resulting in an asymmetrical look.
IN THE PACKED waiting room, Gia sat in a corner chair mindlessly playing Candy Crush on her cell phone. Her vision blurred by tears and memories, she didn’t really see the vivid candies dropping in columns.
After sitting in silence for hours like some noble monk, Darynda had gone to stretch her legs, leaving Gia alone to fret.
Grammy’s letter, spelling out Gia’s monumental task, was still tucked into the cover-up that she’d tossed over the loose, sleeveless, white cotton shift dress printed with flower bouquets she’d changed into at the inn. Not having enough room in her small apartment, she still kept the clothes she had before college stuffed into the dresser in the bedroom that she and her sisters had once shared.
Finish the quilt. Repair the rift.
Gia scratched her cheek as she one-handed the on-screen jelly beans. Dear Grammy, thanks so much for Mission: Impossible. Immediately, she felt ashamed for thinking that way.
Her fingers flew over the tiny keyboard, manipulating the falling candies and feeling like a female David facing two Goliaths. Flying pigs. How would she get her sisters to finish the quilt, much less mend the family?
“I’m not Wonder Woman,” she mumbled, wishing she had some candy right now. Pure junk. Laffy Taffy or Skittles or Starburst. She needed a sugar rush.
Gia lost the game, tossed her phone in her tote, and looked up.
Madison, with Darynda trailing behind her like a ghost, looked chic and smart in her white designer suit and contrasting black silk blouse. She marched right across the waiting room. As always, tough, smart, and in control; her spine touch-me-not straight.
Joy eclipsed fear. Forgiveness brushed aside hurt. Love crowded out anger.
“Maddie!” Gia squealed, launching herself off the chair and running to her big sister with her arms outstretched.
Madison’s hug was perfunctory, an obligation, like Memorial Day visits to the cemetery of long-dead relatives whose faces you couldn’t recall. She took a moment to melt into Gia’s embrace. But the stubborn little sister she was, Gia held on, until she felt Maddie’s stiff limbs loosen and heard her sigh against Gia’s hair.
“Maddie.”
“Shh, s’okay.”
She squeezed her sister like the scared three-year-old she’d been their first night at Moonglow Inn when she crawled into Maddie’s bed for comfort.
“I can’t believe—”
“I’m here. I’ll fix this.”
Those words that had once reassured her now sounded arthritic and impotent. Madison was not stronger than cancer.
Gia pulled back and peered into her sister’s face. “You look wiped out.”
Madison kneaded her temple. “And you’re wearing my dress.”
“Oops, sorry; I didn’t know it was yours. I’d dropped by the inn for my Monday morning breakfast with Grammy when Darynda called and told me what was happening. I was wearing a bikini and grabbed the first thing in the dresser. Should I go home and change?”
“No, of course not.”
“But you brought it up, so it must be eating at you.”
“I shouldn’t have brought it up. Petty of me, I know, but you and Shelley were always ransacking my closet.”
“That’s because you had the best stuff.” Gia fished out her most cajoling grin. “You have such good taste.”
Madison snorted.
Flattery would not work.
Her sister moved her hand from her temple to her chin, the gold bracelet at her wrist catching the sunlight filtering through the blinds. Twenty-four karat, no doubt. No more gold-plated for Madison. Not since she hit the big time.
Can you blame her? She worked her butt off to get to the top.
Gia pulled the corner of her bottom lip up between her teeth and fingered the woven bracelet at her wrist. It was made from strands of colored strings braided together. Years ago, she and Madison and Shelley had made matching bracelets from a kit—a celebration of their sisterhood—and they’d vowed never to take them off.