Page 34 of Through the Dark Night
“Mom, there’s a blue tarp covering half of it, the half that doesn’t look like it’s completely crumbling to the ground. And… Is that a broken window?”
They hadn’t been able to get the window fixed. It was something that had to be special ordered and wasn’t going to be in for a couple of weeks. They’d put clear plastic over it in the meantime.
“And the porch is a mess.” Emma turned to face her and put a hand on both of her shoulders. “Please tell me the inside looks a lot different. Like it’s not decrepit and doesn’t look like it belongs in a 1980s horror movie.”
Shannon bit her tongue. The inside was worse. “But can’t you see the potential? Can’t you see happy families going up and down the stairs, smiling and laughing and enjoying the lake view? Can’t you see them having vacations the way we did? Making memories that will last a lifetime? I mean, don’t you remember the vacations that we took when you were little?”
“Mom? You bought this because you wanted to give someone vacation memories like we have?” Emma looked like she was at a loss for words. “Mom! You could have bought a functioning inn. Not an inn that looks like it needs to be completely bulldozed and rebuilt.”
Emma bit her lip, as though she knew she was crashing her mother’s dreams to the ground. “I mean, it’s your life, but…” she started out, sounding a little unsure of how she wanted to phrase it. Like she was drawing on the persuasive speech instruction she’d gotten in college to try to convince her mother that this was a really bad idea. “Are you sure you can handle this financially? I mean, this has to be a huge money pit. But more than that, Mom, emotionally are you capable of the stress? I mean, you’ve been through a lot in the last year. Shouldn’t you go somewhere to rest and recover? This is definitely not going to help your emotional state.”
Shannon listened and allowed Emma to talk. What else could she do? Her daughter was entitled to her opinion. “Why don’t you walk in? Let’s bring your stuff. I have a room set up for you.” She was going to give Emma her room off the kitchen, since it was the nicest room in the inn so far. She planned to spend the next couple of nights in a room that was not finished at all and use the bathroom down the hall, sharing it with Marina.
“Is there a room in there that’s not crumbling?” Emma asked, looking dubiously at the inn.
“You’re going to love it. And I can see it clearly, the finished product, people happy, and yes, you’re right. It’s not going to be easy, but… I don’t necessarily think that the easy way is the best way. And I don’t think I taught you that growing up either. I mean, I guess we didn’t have a terribly hard life, but that wasn’t because we went around avoiding all the hard things.”
“You’re right. And you’ve always encouraged me to make the decision that was best, not easiest, but still… Mom, you’re fifty. You’re not young anymore.”
Okay, that was hard. She was right, but it wasn’t like Shannon woke up in the morning and looked in the mirror and told herself, “You’re not young anymore, you can’t do anything.”
Fifty wasn’t that terribly old. Sure, she was well past what would most likely be the midpoint of her life which was not something that she thought about very often. Instead, she wanted to keep her eyes focused on the things that she could do to be a blessing, to make her life count, to encourage and uplift others around her. She didn’t want to be someone who just sat out the rest of her days catering to herself all the time. She didn’t enjoy being around people who were only interested in making themselves happy. Why would she want to become a person like that?
She looped her arm through Emma’s as they climbed the stairs together, Emma carrying a suitcase in her other hand, with a bag slung over her shoulder.
“I don’t know how to explain it, other than I don’t want to just sitback and let the rest of my life pass me by while I’m focused on enjoying it, you know? I want to have a purpose. This is a purpose for me. And you’re right, it might fail, but… That’s okay. Failure isn’t the end. It’s just one way that didn’t work.”
Emma looked down before she raised her head and met Shannon’s gaze. “I suppose you’re right, Mom. You always told me that in college too and even in high school when things didn’t work out. Like losing a friendship isn’t the end of the world, even though it feels like it at the time. Or losing a boyfriend. Same deal. And you were always right. You always told me to look for the lessons. But, Mom. Wow.”
It seemed like Emma was coming around a little bit. But Shannon didn’t give her a long tour of the inn. Instead, once Emma put her things in the room, she said, “Why don’t we go check out the town? It’s been a while since you’ve been here, and there have been some big changes. And people are so wonderful and welcoming, I know they’re going to enjoy meeting you.”
“All right, Mom. You’ve always had such a positive spin on things. I’m glad to see that you seem to be coming out of the divorce depression you were in for a while.”
Had she been in a divorce depression? She hadn’t even realized that Emma thought she had. Or that she had a name for it. What a depressing name.
“Tell me about what’s going on with you,” she said as they walked back down the steps. She tucked her hand in her daughter’s arm. “I hope it’s okay if we walk to town? It’s only about ten minutes.”
“Ten minutes? Tell me there are more houses than what I passed when I drove here?” Emma said. “That’s another thing, Mom. You’re out in the middle of nowhere.”
“It’s only a ten-minute walk to town. Far less if you drive it.” She did not mention that they had been without electricity for two days the past week after a bad storm. That definitely wasn’t going to be put in the positive column for Emma.
They turned away from the inn and began to walk toward town. “Tell me about your job and your apartment and your life. I feel like we have so much catching up to do. And Brian, what’s going on with him?”
Emma smiled. “We’re just taking it slow. I promise. I do think he could possibly be the one, but I want to have a good foundation, you know? Like… So many of my friends are just about the physical first, and to me, that’s important, of course, but not as important as finding out if he has the same values and morals that I do.”
Her comments made Shannon smile inside. She hadn’t been sure that Emma had been catching her teaching growing up and especially since the divorce.
“Honestly, I think the divorce shaped my thoughts more than anything else. After all, you had no idea that Dad was going to do what he did, and I don’t know that there’s any way that you could have prevented it.”
“Me either,” she said, and she knew there was sadness in her voice. She wouldn’t have married her husband had she known that he was going to think it was okay to run off with another woman at any point.
“So I guess I just want to know that Brian doesn’t think that divorce is an option. That keeping his word is the most important thing, that when he gets married, it’s for a lifetime, not just for now until you find someone better, you know?”
It was obvious that Emma had been deeply affected by the divorce, but it was also obvious that she had taken the teaching that Shannon had given her in her early years and used it to try to find positive lessons in it. She could have focused on the devastation, how she was now a product of a broken home, how her parents weren’t together anymore, how her life had changed and not for the better, how she now had to try to somehow assimilate her dad’s girlfriend into her life, but Emma seemed to be focused on the positive lessons that she could use in her own life. It was impressive, and Shannon felt proud that she was her daughter.
Emma went on about her work and the things that she was doing and how she was not really using her college degree, although it had been a prerequisite to get hired.
They stepped onto the main street and started walking toward the lake.
