“My baby!” Mom said, as Tilley lilted, “Liabelle!”
Even their joy couldn’t keep me from noticing the two broken spindles on the front porch and that the house, which would look stately to anyone else, seemed to sag a little. If I’d had time to think about it, it would have scared me. But I didn’t have time to be afraid because I had barely gotten over the threshold, the expansive water view beyond the porch nearly blinding, before “You are much too thin” and “Darlin’, you look exhausted” began. Tilley was dragging me inside, toward the kitchen. Stepping over the threshold felt so good. I loved the worn Persian rugs and the English antiques that had been inside this house for generations. I loved that I could see the soothing water from almost every room. Tilley was cutting me a slice of fresh pecan pie on the familiar blue-and-white tile counter when the doorbell rang and Mom went out to answer it.
I had just swallowed the first sweet, delicious bite when I heard Mom say, “Why, Parker Thaysden! To what do we owe the pleasure?” On her lips, the words sounded like “Parkah” and “pleashah.”
Aunt Tilley gasped and pointed her fork at me. “You are seeing Parker Thaysden, aren’t you? Admit it!”
“Aunt Tilley, I’m married to”—I cleared my throat—“to Thad.”
She was saying, “You can take the girl out of Cape Carolina—” but stopped herself when Mom and Parker walked into the kitchen, Mom saying, “Liabelle, you have a visitor.”
“A gentleman caller!” Tilley trilled.
I rolled my eyes and whispered, “He is not a gentleman caller.”
“Well, he’s a gentleman, and he’s not calling on us old ladies,” Tilley said, kissing Parker on both cheeks.
Parker looked terribly amused, while I was hoping the floor would open up and swallow me. I grabbed his wrist and said, “I am so sorry, Parker. Let’s go out on the porch.”
“But I want some of Aunt Tilley’s pie,” he whined.
“Oh, I’ll bring you some, sugah,” she said.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I whisper-shouted as we made our way to the door.
I had grown up with Parker, thinking of him as that annoying younger boy who wouldn’t leave me alone at church. I mean, he had always been cute, obviously. But I wasn’t a member of his fan club, one of the hordes of girls that swooned over him.
No one had been more shocked when one of my idols had chosen to marry him. I wanted to call Greer up and say, Parker Thaysden? Do you realize that this kid used to hang worms out of his nostrils?
But I had gained a new respect for Parker when Greer had died. He had loved her in the way that every woman dreams of being loved. He honored her every day during and since, some might say too much. But I thought people were too cynical. They had forgotten that true love never dies. I guessed I would never know what that was like.
“Amelia, you can’t tell a man that you have something really important to talk to him about and then leave him hanging like that,” he said as Aunt Tilley wordlessly delivered a piece of pie to him and slipped away as best one could in a five-foot hoopskirt.
I rolled my eyes. “This is a little bit insane.”
He shrugged. “I tried to tell you yesterday that I was on my way here, but you hung up too quickly.”
“Ohhhh…” Well, that made more sense.
We both sat down, and he looked at me expectantly. I hadn’t planned what I would say yet, how I would deliver this earthshaking news. I had other earthshaking news I’d been preoccupied with delivering.
“Hey,” he whispered between bites. “I’m really sorry about Thad.”
“Parker!” I hissed, looking around.
“I know, I know. I figured you came home to tell them. But it’s a small town. Word gets around.”
I rolled my eyes. “It’s been, like, a day.”
He shrugged. “Chase does my copy editor’s hair.” He added, behind his hand, conspiratorially, “And if it makes you feel better, word around the salon is that he had no idea that Thad was married, and he is pissed. They are done. Chase isn’t anyone’s side piece.” He looked at me very seriously.
While he worked hard to hold a straight face, I had my first good laugh since yesterday morning. That maybe Thad wasn’t going to get his happily ever after made me feel the tiniest bit better.
“Thank you,” I said. “That helps. Even though there is no way in the world he didn’t know Thad and I were married.”
“Okay,” Parker said impatiently. “We’ve done you. What about me?”
I took both his hands in mine and looked him in the eyes. Something like panic crossed his face, and I dropped them. “Oh my God. This isn’t like a confession of love or something. You wish.”
He smirked. “Okay, well, I mean, I don’t know. It wouldn’t be the first one I’ve gotten in the past few years. I’m not totally unlovable.”
I shook my head, but he was right. He wasn’t. Sometimes when you’ve known someone his whole life, you forget that his blue eyes are incredibly soulful and his tousled hair is both boyish and manly at the same time. “I found out something that I shouldn’t know, and I shouldn’t tell you, but I feel like I have to.” I paused. “There’s an off chance that you don’t want to know or that you already know, and that I’m sticking my nose in where it isn’t—”
“For God’s sake, Amelia, spit it out,” Parker said.
“Wanted,” I whispered. I bit my lip. I wanted to stall, to rewind and figure out how to deliver this news tactfully, with grace. But he was right in front of me, so that seemed more than a little out of the question now. For half a beat, I wondered if, when the dust settled, Parker would let me interview him for my story. But I scolded myself. This was more important than any story.
“Look, I was reporting on what people do when they don’t use their embryos, and I sort of accidentally saw that your embryos are on the abandoned list. And maybe you’re ignoring them and quit paying for storage on purpose, and that’s fine…”
I rambled while he looked at me blankly.
“You know,” I added, “the embryos that you and Greer froze—”
“I know which embryos,” he practically spat.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
He pulled out his phone, which I thought was an odd reaction. I thought maybe I should leave. But then he said, “Yes. This is Parker Thaysden, and I want to check on my embryos. I wasn’t sure if there was an invoice I missed or something.” He paused. “They are not abandoned,” he said, venom in his voice. “Uh-huh. Well, yeah. It would be hard for Mrs. Thaysden to return your calls from that number, since she has been dead for three years.” He rolled his eyes.
He pulled out his wallet, removed his credit card, read off the numbers, and then hung up the phone. He looked at me, but I could tell he wasn’t seeing me. “What now?” he asked.
It was not the response I was imagining. “What do you mean, what now? I have absolutely no idea.”
“I can’t destroy them,” he said. “They’re all I have left of her.”