Now, to each of you individually.
Flynn, I’m sorry I didn’t offer to take you in and raise you when your mama died. Sometimes I felt as high as the clouds in the sky. Other times I was so low that I couldn’t lift my head off the bed. I couldn’t bring you into that world. It was tough enough on April to have to live in it. It wasn’t until April left home that Stella and Vivien made me go to the doctor, and I got medicine for my problem. I still got bouts of sadness when I thought about the wrong choices I’d made in life, but I did get better than I was.
Nessa stopped reading and focused on Flynn. He was blinking back tears, and his voice cracked when he spoke. “Maybe I did have it better with my dad than I would have if I’d stayed here.”
“You did,” April said. “At least you knew exactly where you stood with him. I never knew from one minute to the next what to expect out of Nanny Lucy. Go on, Nessa.”
Nessa found her place and read:
April, I apologize for everything. I tried to love you, but it just wasn’t in me. I could blame it on my bipolar disorder, but that would be a lie. I didn’t want a third child, and I sure didn’t want to raise another one when you came along. Your mother was such a disappointment, and then you came along right behind her. You deserved better than you got. I sincerely hope that I didn’t completely ruin your life. I won’t try to justify the way I treated you, because that’s not possible. You would have been much better off if I had given you out for adoption after Rachel died, but I felt so guilty about the way I treated Rachel that I felt like I owed it to her to keep you in the family.
Nessa looked up to see tears streaming down April’s face. “If she had given me up for adoption, I would have never known y’all or this moment. I forgive you, Nanny Lucy, and I hope you have found peace in eternity. Lord knows you sure didn’t have much here on this earth. I just wish you’d have talked more about my mother so I could have known her through what you could tell me. And I wish Mama and I hadn’t been such a huge disappointment to you.”
Flynn sucked in a lungful of air and let it out in a whoosh. “That’s a hell of a lot to forgive, April.”
“You don’t forgive someone just for them,” April told him. “You forgive to take away the hard spots in your own heart. You forgive for your own peace of mind.” She remembered what Maudie had said about the first little kitten that Callie adopted and about how forgiving animals were.
“Okay, I’ve only got one page left,” Nessa said.
Last, this is to Nessa. I’ve seen that you struggle with what is true service to God and what is your father’s version of what it should be. I was so proud of him for going into the ministry, so proud that he wasn’t like his father. But I’ve come to realize that he just hides his controlling nature behind a pulpit. Don’t let him taint your idea of religion. I’m probably confusing you, but what I want you to know is that I’m proud of you for standing up to him.
Now that I’ve tried to make amends for my misdeeds, I pray that none of you will make the same mistakes I did. I wish you all a happy, fruitful life.
Nessa expected to see it signed “Love, Nanny Lucy,” but it ended right there.
“And that’s all.” She could hear disappointment in her own voice and looked up to see the same thing in Flynn and April’s expressions.
“Well, now we know.” April tipped up her beer and took a sip. “I can’t help but wonder if she would have been a different person if she’d gotten help sooner. She must have held so much in when you and Flynn visited so that we could have a good time together.”
“What makes you say that?” Nessa folded the letter into the envelope and dropped it back in the hope chest.
“Because she was a nightmare for a few days after you left. I thought it was because she loved you and Flynn so much more than me. I figured out that she was going to be in a horrible mood when you were gone, and I’d stay away from her as much as possible.” April brought the quilt from across the room and laid it in the hope chest on top of the letter.
“Should I push it back in the corner? Or has one of you gotten married? In that case, you can take it home,” Jackson asked.
“Well, that lightened the mood, but hell, no!” Flynn chuckled. “We’re just now making progress in getting our lives in order. I’ll take care of putting it back.”
“I can understand that. As they say, been there, done that,” Jackson said, but his eyes were on Nessa. “This has been kind of anticlimactic, hasn’t it?”
“Little bit,” Flynn said.
“I’m just glad to still be breathing,” April joked.
Jackson laid the key on top of the quilt. “There’s no reason to lock it up, is there?”
“None that I can think of,” Nessa answered, feeling mixed emotions about the way Jackson was looking at her.
He returned the chest to the corner and sat down on the other end of the sofa from Flynn. Nessa didn’t budge from her place on the floor. She finished off her beer and set the bottle on the coffee table. She wondered if it would be rude to say that they needed to leave. No one was saying anything, and a gloom hung over the room like smoke in an old Western bar.
Flynn frowned. “Do you think what Nanny Lucy suffered with is hereditary? Do we have to worry about it?”
“I have no idea, but if I start showing symptoms, I’m going to go straight to the psychiatrist and get medicine for it,” Nessa answered. “There are a number of kids each year in my school who meet with our counselors. It makes a big difference.”
“I’m with Nessa and would treat it, but maybe it’s not something we have to worry about,” April said. “Talking about it is hard, though.”
“She wouldn’t want this to be a sad night,” Jackson said. “Y’all want to play a board game to get our minds off that letter? I’ve got Pictionary or Monopoly.”
“Yes!” April’s smile reached her eyes. “I choose Flynn for a partner. Nessa, you can have Jackson.”
“What if I wanted to play guys against gals?” Flynn asked.
“I remember us playing Pictionary when we were kids, and you were the best, so either it’s me and you against those two”—April swung her forefinger around to include both Nessa and Jackson—“or I’m going home to watch reruns of Criminal Minds on television.”
“She’s been hanging around you too much, Nessa,” Flynn said. “She’s almost as bossy as you are.”
“That’s a good thing,” Nessa said. “Don’t knock it. I’ll play Pictionary, but if you’d decided on Monopoly, I was going home.” She still wished that she had piped up and said that they should be going as soon as the hope chest was pushed back into the corner.
“I guess it’s me and you, doll, against the pros,” Jackson drawled like an old-time gangster. “Think we can whip them?”
Nessa shrugged. “Of course we can, but . . .” She gave him a long sideways look.
“But first we need to talk, right?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Our conversation might take a while,” he said. “Could we put it off until tomorrow morning when all the tension of opening the hope chest has passed?”