“Violet, how long are you going to make me suffer? I can’t sleep. I don’t eat. Your grandmother thinks you’ve put a hex on me and I don’t care if you did, I just need you to either lift the hex or marry me. Love, your future husband (hopefully).”
He bites his lip.
“My beloved Violet, I saw you at the skating rink with James and my spirit has faded away to almost nothing. Remember that being good at tennis doesn’t translate to being superior in other pursuits in the real world and I’m going to be a millionaire someday. Yours most sadly, Victor.”
I stop cold at the curious noise that punctuates Victor’s plea. “Was that a chuckle?”
Wesley’s eyebrows slam together. He doesn’t respond.
“Oh, c’mon,” I tease. “You’re so serious.” That was definitely a chuckle. Or a mouse.
I don’t think he’s going to reply. At least a minute passes in silence. But then he ventures, almost reluctantly, “What made her say yes to marrying him?”
“He broke his ankle on a skiing trip, but Violet was told by their scheming mothers that he was dying. She made another boy she was dating drive her up to say her last goodbyes. She took one look at Victor in his hospital bed, right as rain aside from the busted ankle, and said, ‘You can propose now.’ He tried to get down on one knee, with the cast on. Aunt Violet could never finish telling the story because she’d be laughing so hard.” I grin. “It was her favorite story to tell. Uncle Victor loved hearing it.” I think he loved hearing it because it made his wife laugh. He was always just so gone for her.
I reach for another stack but snatch my hand away. My heart beats fast.
The Lisa Frank stationery. The diligent cursive with hearts dotting the i’s.
From: Maybell Parrish
309 Ownby Street
Gatlinburg, TN 37738
There are twelve letters with twelve different return addresses, which, in retrospect, explains why I never got a letter back. I can’t believe Mom posted them. She said she did, but I didn’t believe her. Not when she hated Violet so much and hated how attached I got to her in such a short period of time. She wouldn’t let me call or visit.
I begin to open one of the envelopes but can’t complete the process. I stare at the off-yellow strip on the inside flap that a young Maybell licked and sealed, the stickiness long gone. I’m floored she got my letters. When did I send the last one? In my mind, I posted them all the way through my teenage years, but I only see twelve here and they’re all from the Lisa Frank set. I rack my memory trying to recall when I stopped writing. All I can recall is that I didn’t think it mattered anymore, that she probably never received a single one. I was careful not to say anything negative about Mom or anything negative about my life in general, since Mom was prone to snooping and I’d get in trouble over what she found if she didn’t like it.
As I scoop up the letters to return them to their box, the sharp corner of a Polaroid scratches my palm. It’s a picture of the manor, with a little girl in front. She’s in corduroy skort overalls and a bucket hat, face rosy with sunshine, front teeth a little too big. I want to reach into the picture and give that little girl a hug, because I know why she’s smiling so hard. She thinks she’s there to stay. She wants her wonderful aunt to adopt her, so she’ll never have to leave.
The house behind her is gray.
“I don’t understand,” I murmur, turning it over to the other side. There’s a cursive inscription, but the soft pencil has worn away all but the letter M. “It was pink. Why do I remember it being pink?”
Wesley isn’t looking at the photo. His attention is locked on another piece of paper that’s tipped out of the stack: an old clipping from the Daily Times, dated 1934.
Fall in Love with Falling Stars Hotel!
By Elizabeth Robin
THE DAILY TIMES
WE HERE AT the Daily Times covered the construction of Falling Stars Boarding House in 1884, when the newspaper was only a year old. It’s fitting that on the fifty-year anniversary of that article, we’re back with the first peek into the mansion’s fresh revamp as a luxury hotel. Goodbye, outhouses and candlesticks, hello, twentieth century! The new proprietor has gone modern with an elevator and all-electric
The clipping cuts off after that. To the right, no bigger than two inches, is a black-and-white smudge of a house that I’d know anywhere. A glamorous woman with finger waves and dark lipstick twists her hand in hello under a wrought-iron archway that spells falling stars hotel.
“I didn’t know it wasn’t always just a house,” I tell Wesley, stupefied.
“I didn’t know there was an elevator. When did it get taken out?”
“No clue.” That’s so fascinating to envision—an elevator here, in my house. “I wonder if it was still a hotel when Victor and Violet bought it. I think they’ve had this place since the seventies.” I keep using the present tense. “Or, they did have it.”
He doesn’t find this as fascinating as I do, evidently. “Weird location for a hotel. Who’d want to come all the way out here?”
“We did.”
He glances at me briefly, then scratches his jaw and lines up his screwdrivers in a neat row.
“It’s pretty here,” I point out. “Lots of hiking trails. Mountains to explore. I haven’t checked out all the nearby towns yet, since I’ve been so busy. Any good restaurants or shopping malls within thirty miles?”
“I hate restaurants and shopping malls,” he grumbles.
Jeez. “What do you like?”
If his scowl is any hint, Wesley doesn’t like that question. It takes him two seconds to disassemble the rest of the table, and after he hauls it outside, he doesn’t return.
* * *
• • • • • • •
BY EARLY EVENING, I can’t take being in the house by myself anymore. I have to get out. A painful lump that’s been rising up my throat since I found my old letters to Violet intensifies when I try to seek refuge in the cabin—her memory lingers there, too. Everywhere I go, a fresh wave of confusion or guilt or heartache follows, or a funny remembrance that sets me off-kilter because how can I laugh when it’s all so terribly sad, so I decide to pour all of my attention into her dying wishes.
Wish 2. Victor thought there was buried treasure out here but I never did find any. For the intrepid explorer, Finders Keepers rules apply.
“I’m going to go digging,” I call out to Wesley, who’s sitting in his truck bed with a bowl of macaroni and cheese. I can only assume that the reason he’s not eating in the cabin’s kitchen is that I was just in there. He’s been avoiding me all week. Any time I walk into a room, he finds a reason to leave that room. When I try to make chitchat, I get crickets.