Page 75 of The House on Prytania
“Got it. I’ll get to work right away. Although, by the way Cooper kept looking at you when we were on the swamp tour, I’m not sure if he’s planning to remain long in the friend zone. And you should make up your mind soon. I don’t know how patient he is, but looking like that, I don’t think he’ll stay single for long. That man is finer than a frog’s hair split four ways.”
She’d said that with such a perfect imitation of Jolene’s voice that it made me laugh out loud. “Wow. You’re amazing.”
“Like I said before, I’m a quick study when it comes to imitating people. Probably comes from hanging around backstage for all those high school productions.” She let out her bubbly laugh again, and it kept me smiling until we’d reached the kitchen.
Beau sat at the table beneath the large picture window overlooking the vibrant garden. Just like in Charleston, flowers and foliage alike burst forth with a new palette of fall colors. I peered out the window, trying to see what was being planted now that I considered myself an amateur gardener working on her green thumb.
Melanie’s father, an avid gardener, had given me my own trowel as soon as I’d arrived in Charleston, and I had knelt next to him in the dirt, reluctantly at first, for many hours as we made holes in the earth to plant seeds and bury roots. I learned how to coax dormant plants to rise and grow, and how every living thing in the garden had a purpose and a cycle. Most of the time spent had been in silence, our bond forming through the scents of green growing things and through the unspoken connection we had to each other and to the house on Tradd Street. He’d never asked me to call him Grandpa, but when I did, it wasn’t a surprise to either of us.
A deck of cards sat on the table, along with three individual cards placed facedown.
“What are you playing?” I asked.
“Not a game, really,” Sunny said. “We’re trying to see if I have any psychic abilities, so Beau’s testing me on guessing the cards.”
“Any luck?” I asked.
Sunny grimaced. “Nope. Nada. I was hoping that maybe all the psychic genes hadn’t bypassed me completely. Or maybe Beau just hogged them all before I came along.”
Beau squeezed her around the shoulders, then used his knuckles to rub the top of her head. “But you got all the looks.”
“And the brains,” I added.
They both laughed as Sunny tried to jump high enough to give her brother a noogie and failed miserably.
Mimi entered the kitchen, and her face broke out into a wide grin as she spotted her grandchildren. She looked years younger, her eyes brighter and her face more relaxed than I’d seen since we’d met. It had been as if she’d worn her grief like a sheet of cellophane that muted her features. The sudden reappearance of her granddaughter had ripped it away, allowing us to see the grandmother she had planned to be before Sunny had been taken and her son and daughter-in-law had been lost in the storm.
“Children, settle down or take it outside.” Her smile took away any sting that her words might have held if the children in question were, well, children.
“Sorry, Mimi,” Sunny said, and planted a kiss on the older woman’s cheek. “Beau started it.”
“I’m not sure that’s how I remember it,” I said.
“Well, regardless,” Mimi said, trying to sound stern. “I lost my helper, and I need her back to help me move a bag of mulch.”
“I’m on it!” Sunny said, opening the door and motioning Mimi ahead of her. She hesitated briefly before following Mimi outside.
Beau turned to me. “I thought we could go up into the studio room so we could talk in private.”
I thought of the Frozen Charlotte dolls staring at me from the wall shelves. “How about a snake pit? Or a mime convention?”
His lips quirked. “If only I knew where to find one.”
“What about your grandfather’s library?”
“No. Absolutely not.” His abruptness startled me.
“He’s not there, you know, if that’s what you’re worried about. He seems to have made my house his permanent residence.”
Beau opened the refrigerator and took out a pitcher of iced tea. “It’s not that. Mimi doesn’t allow anyone to go in there, not even Lorda. Mimi does all the dusting and vacuuming. She hasn’t moved a thing since he died.” He held the pitcher up to me. “Sweet tea?”
I shook my head. “Blech. Just water for me, please.”
“Blasphemy,” he said as he reached into a cabinet for two glasses. “Does Jolene know you don’t like sweet tea? We might have to ask Jaxson’s brother the priest to say a mass for you.”
“Very funny. And yes, she knows. She has a plan to convert me.” He handed me an empty glass. “Back to your grandfather. Do you think you can suggest to him that he return to wherever it was we sent him?”
He glanced out the kitchen window to where Mimi and Sunny stood next to an empty flower bed. “You might not want me to. Not yet. Let’s talk about this upstairs.”
