The Sea Glass Cottage

All this time, she thought her aunt loved her. Olivia always sent fun gifts on birthdays and holidays, texted her funny memes she found, used to call her up sometimes, just because. Caitlin had even gone up to stay with her a few times and Olivia had taken her to cool restaurants and clothes stores that weren’t like anything they had here in Cape Sanctuary.

She had loved her right back. In a way, they were more like sisters separated by about fourteen years, since Olivia’s actual mother was Caitlin’s mom, too, in every way that mattered.

Then Caitlin had read her aunt’s diary and discovered everything was a lie. Her aunt didn’t love her. She despised her.

Since then, Caitlin couldn’t shake a terrible sense of betrayal, as if a best friend had humiliated her, stabbed her in the back in front of the entire school.

Olivia didn’t look sharp or put together now, she thought with a small-minded sense of satisfaction she was immediately ashamed of. Right now, her aunt’s eyes looked bloodshot and her hair was in a messy bun that looked more messy than bun. She wore yoga pants and an oversize sweater, and her face was pale and tired looking.

Olivia’s eyes widened when she spotted her and Mimi inside the room. “Oh. You’re still here,” she whispered, with a careful look at the bed where Mimi was sleeping. “The nurse at information who gave me the room number thought Mom might be in surgery already. I’m glad I checked here first.”

Hospital information ought to know where its patients were, Caitlin thought grumpily. She closed her notebook to hide the names there. Her quest to find her father was none of Olivia’s business.

“We’re still here. The anesthesiologist is on his way. You didn’t have to come. I told you that on the phone. I can handle things.”

She cringed inside as she heard her own tone. She sounded like a cranky three-year-old who insisted on crossing the street by herself, without holding a grown-up’s hand.

All of her interactions with Olivia were like this lately. She wanted to sound cool and polite and detached. Instead, she suspected she usually came across petulant and childish.

The words she had read in her aunt’s journal seemed burned into her brain, flashing there like glaring neon signs.

Whiny.

Brat.

Annoying.

Needy.

That had been hard enough. Who would possibly want to read that about themselves?

Worse, though, had been discovering Olivia’s love-hate relationship with Natalie. Olivia’s own sister and Caitlin’s mother.

Her resentment had come across loud and clear on the pages of that journal. She had written about Natalie throwing her life away by having Caitlin, about the terrible choices she was making, about how she could never stay out of trouble.

Okay, Caitlin knew she should never have even looked at the pages of that diary. It had been a serious invasion of Olivia’s privacy. How would she feel if somebody read her teenage diary sometime in the future and judged her for the things she’d written?

In her defense, Caitlin was on a quest to find her dad and had thought maybe her aunt’s diary from that time when Natalie had still been alive might provide valuable information that might help her.

Instead, all she had discovered was exactly how much her aunt had resented her.

As if Caitlin could help the situation. She’d only been a little kid. It wasn’t her fault her mom had been an addict who couldn’t take care of herself or a kid, that she had been in and out of jail and Mimi had to take care of Caitlin or else let her go into foster care.

She wasn’t a brat and she wanted to toss those words at her aunt right now like an ax at one of those throwing clubs.

Why did Olivia have to come back to Cape Sanctuary? They didn’t need her. Mimi wouldn’t want her here, either. Caitlin knew it.

As if Mimi sensed Olivia’s presence, her eyes started to flutter open.

Right now her grandmother looked older than her years. She wasn’t wearing makeup and the few wrinkles that fanned out from her eyes seemed more pronounced.

“Oh. You’re here.”

Mimi’s voice was filled with so much relief and gratitude, Caitlin tried not to feel invisible.

“Hey, Mom.” Olivia went to Mimi’s bedside and stood kind of awkwardly, as if she wasn’t sure whether to hug her or not.

While Caitlin and Olivia used to get along for the most part until she read that diary, she had always been aware that Olivia and Mimi’s relationship was a little funky, as if both of them had a hundred things they wanted to say to each other but could never find the words.

Olivia was never mean to Juliet and vice versa, but they were always überpolite. Kind of like when Caitlin’s friends Allie and Emma got in a huge fight then made up and were way too nice to each other for weeks.

Though she looked kind of out of it from the medication the nurse had given her, Juliet tried to sit up. “I told you not to come. Oh, honey. You must have driven all night.”

“I’m glad I made it before they took you for surgery.”

“I am, too. But you still didn’t need to come.”

Much to Caitlin’s dismay, a tear leaked out of her grandmother’s blue eyes. Juliet reached a trembling hand out, and after an awkward kind of moment, Olivia reached for it and squeezed.

“How are you feeling?”

How did Olivia think she was feeling? Jeez. Juliet had a grand total of four broken bones, including her hip and her ribs.

“I’ve been better,” Juliet said, forcing a smile. “How are you? How was the drive?”

“Good. There’s not a lot of traffic on the interstate at 3:00 a.m.”

Before Juliet could answer, the door opened again. This time it really was the anesthesiologist, Dr. Zane, a really nice middle-aged man who had come in earlier to introduce himself to Mimi and Caitlin. She still wasn’t sure if Zane was his first name or his last. Or maybe he was like Beyoncé or Drake and only needed one name.

“Are you ready for this?” he asked with a kindly smile.

Mimi suddenly looked nervous. “Do I have a choice?”

“Not if you want to heal properly. I’m sorry.”

With a sigh, her grandmother nodded. “I guess I’m ready.” She squeezed Olivia’s hand again then released it, and Olivia stepped away.

“Bye, Mom. I…I love you.”

Caitlin wanted to roll her eyes. It wasn’t really that hard to tell someone going into surgery that you love them, was it?

“I love you, too, my dear.”

“Everything will be fine,” Caitlin said briskly, stepping forward to give Mimi a genuine hug. “You’ll be back on your feet and getting things done at the garden center before you know it.”

Her grandmother hugged her tightly. “You still should have been at school, but I’m glad you’re here, too,” she murmured.

Dr. Zane spent a moment unhooking the bed from the wall, set a chart at the foot of the bed and started wheeling the whole thing out of the room.

“You two can come as far as the door of the surgery unit, if you want,” Dr. Zane said cheerfully. “We have a waiting area for family members that’s closer. You’re welcome to wait there or you can come back here and wait in the room. Either way is fine. The surgeon will find you after she’s done and let you know how things went.”

He pushed Mimi in her bed and they both followed after him like they were in one of those crazy New Orleans funeral processions she’d seen in a documentary once.

After a series of hallways, they reached an area of the hospital with a big sign hanging from the ceiling that said Surgical Suite.

“The waiting area is just through those doors,” Dr. Zane said, pointing. “This shouldn’t take long. Maybe two hours from start to finish. You’ve got plenty of time to go get something to eat, if you need to. We can page you overhead throughout the hospital if we need you.”

They said their goodbyes to Mimi again and the look in her eyes made Caitlin’s stomach hurt all over again.

Mimi looked scared. Really scared. And her grandmother never looked scared.

What if something happened to her during the surgery? She had heard about those things. Yeah, complications were rare, but they did happen.

Dr. Zane scanned his ID badge on a sensor on the wall and a door swung open.

Once he’d pushed Mimi through and the doors swung shut again, Caitlin felt like she was going to throw up.

“Don’t worry,” Olivia said gently. “Mom is tough. She’ll be okay.”

Caitlin was suddenly furious, all the hurt and betrayal and fear tumbling together in her chest into one thick, nasty ball. “What the hell do you know? You’re never here. You don’t even know her. Don’t try to pretend you give a shit what happens to her.”

She stalked off, needing desperately to be alone.

6

OLIVIA

What had she said?

Olivia stared after her niece as Caitlin stomped down the hall.

The girl was a mystery to her lately. She had no idea what was going on behind those hazel eyes. She did know Caitlin seemed to hate her these days. She obviously couldn’t stand to be around Olivia.

That shouldn’t surprise her. Caitlin’s mother hadn’t liked her much, either. After their father died, Natalie had largely ignored her. They had gone from being very close siblings to Natalie caring only about her friends, partying and the men in her life.

Caitlin was following the pattern, either distant and cool or straight-up rude to Olivia.

She didn’t think it was just adolescence. A few months ago, she had asked her mom about Caitlin’s attitude shift, trying to ascertain whether she was showing it to everyone or just to Olivia. Juliet seemed to think she was imagining things.

She took a chair in a corner of the half-full waiting room. The moment she stopped moving, all the nervous energy pushing her onward all night as she drove seemed to trickle away. Suddenly, she was completely exhausted, more tired than she ever remembered feeling.

She closed her eyes, thinking she would only rest them for a moment. The room was warm and soothing music played overhead.

She ought to take the anesthesiologist’s advice and grab something to eat.

It was her last thought for a while.

She dreamed about the happy childhood family she remembered. Juliet, Natalie, Steve. They were having a picnic lunch on Driftwood Beach—Juliet’s best fried chicken and the delicious potato salad she made where she used fresh herbs. It was the Fourth of July. Olivia could tell by the little kids running past with flags and the distant sound of a band playing patriotic music.

She was happy, her heart full as she savored this time with her family. Her dad, tall and handsome, pushed her and Nat on the swings, and they went higher and higher until her toes seemed to touch the clouds.

Then suddenly it was dark and the fireworks were starting. Only they weren’t fireworks. Instead, with whistles and crashing booms, explosions started going off up and down the beach. Juliet screamed and grabbed Olivia, pushing her into the ocean, out of the way of the flames.

Natalie didn’t want to go into the ocean. Her mom tried to call them both but Natalie wouldn’t leave the swings. She kept wanting to go higher and higher, until she and Steve both disappeared into the smoke and fire.

Then, oddly, Olivia’s little dog was somehow there, running into the fire. She tried to go after Otis but she couldn’t move, trapped in the water. Finally, out of nowhere, Cooper Vance appeared. He gave her a long, disappointed look, then took off into the flames after Otis.

Everything she loved. Gone, while she stood by, cowering in the water.

“Wake up. She’s out of surgery.”

Somehow the words pierced the tormented haze of sleep, yanking her out of that place of smoke and fear.

She blinked her eyes open for several seconds, disoriented. It took her several more seconds to register the bright glare of hospital lights and the muted chatter around her.

She found Caitlin standing a couple of feet away, scowling at her.

“What did I miss?”

“You slept like a baby through the whole surgery. Nearly two hours. I can tell you were really worried about your mom.”

She scrubbed at her face and sat up, stung by Caitlin’s sarcasm. Olivia wanted to remind her that she had just driven twelve hours across two states to get here before Juliet went under the knife but suspected it wouldn’t make any difference to Caitlin.

Nothing she did would be right, as far as her niece was concerned.

She also didn’t bother telling her about the week of sleepless nights she had endured since that attack that seemed a lifetime ago and how the cumulative effect of them must have caught up with her in this warm waiting room filled with low voices and calming music.

“Sorry. You said she’s out of surgery?”

“Yes. They called from the operating room and said she would be going back to the same hospital room where she stayed the night for the rest of her recovery time. They said to wait here and the doctor would be out to talk to us, though.”

Olivia still felt bleary-eyed and out of it. She wasn’t at all competent for any discussion with a medical professional right now. She didn’t have much choice, though. She needed to talk to the doctor and she wasn’t about to reveal any sign of weakness to Caitlin, with her current attitude.

“Okay.” She forced a smile. “Thanks.”

She had barely formed the words when a woman approached them. She looked to be in her forties with close-cropped salt-and-pepper hair and kindly brown eyes. She was tall and appeared elegant, even in scrubs.

“Hi. Caitlin, right? I think we met yesterday.”

“Yes. Hi, Dr. Adeno. How’s my grandmother?”

The woman gave her a reassuring smile but turned to Olivia without answering directly. “Hello. I know I haven’t met you. Are you a family member of Juliet Harper?”

“I’m her daughter. Olivia Harper.”

“All right. Good. I have to check these days, with privacy laws. I’m Dr. Sylvia Adeno. I performed your mom’s orthopedic surgery. Everything went great. As I spoke to your mother about before the surgery, we went ahead and did a total joint replacement because the blood supply to the ball joint was damaged in her fall. In that case, studies have shown that total replacement generally results in fewer complications in the long term. She’s got some fun new hardware.”

Just thinking about it made Olivia’s hips ache in sympathy. Her mother would be miserable.

“How is she? Can we go see her yet?”

“They’ll be taking her to her room shortly and you can join her there. I wanted to speak to you both first about her condition and what her recovery will require.”

“Of course,” Olivia answered. She still didn’t feel quite on her game, but at least she was no longer groggy.

“Juliet has had a very bad fall. She’s lucky to come out of it with only the injuries she had. The concussion is already healing nicely, though she may have lingering side effects for several weeks.”

“We can watch her carefully.”

The doctor paused. “I know your mother. She doesn’t like to sit still for very long, but she’s going to have to be realistic, and it is your job to reinforce that with her. Her recovery is going to take weeks, if not months.”

Not the news Olivia wanted to hear but rather what she suspected, judging by the severity of her mother’s injuries.

“Do you recommend she go to a rehab center during her initial recovery?”

“Can she get around the house in a wheelchair? Into the house and into the bathroom?”

“Some of it. Not all,” Caitlin answered while Olivia was trying to picture her childhood home and envision the possibilities.

“You have to discuss that with her and consider your options, then. If Sea Glass Cottage can be made more accessible, she’ll be able to recover at home.”

“I have a feeling that’s what she would prefer,” Olivia said.

“Of course it is,” Caitlin said. “She would hate having to go to a rehab center. They’re like nursing homes, aren’t they?”

The doctor shrugged. “Not exactly. But close enough that some people see them that way. You don’t have to decide anything about this today. I want to keep her at least a couple of nights for observation. We’ll make sure she has a safe place to go home to before we release her.”

“What about the garden center?” Caitlin asked. “The first thing she’s going to ask when she comes all the way out of anesthesia is when she can go back to work.”

Caitlin apparently knew exactly the way Juliet’s mind worked. Olivia could imagine her mother asking that very question.

“That’s going to be a personal decision. You as her family will need to remind her that work-related stress impedes healing. I would recommend at least three or four weeks away from the garden center and then she can slowly return for light office work only for another month.”

“Two months?” Caitlin exclaimed. “That’s the whole spring! She’ll go crazy!”

“It’s going to be difficult for her, certainly,” Dr. Adeno said. “But if she wants to regain full mobility, she’ll have to face the difficult and deal with it. She might need to find someone else to take over for her, at least for the first few weeks.”

She eyed the two of them. “Perhaps a family member could step up.”

“I can do it,” Caitlin said immediately. “No problem.”

Olivia did her best not to roll her eyes at her fifteen-year-old niece. “You’re still in high school. You can’t miss the last six weeks of school to run Harper Hill Home and Garden.”

“Who else is there? The assistant manager quit a week ago and none of the other employees have been there long enough to know how things work.”

Olivia was aware of the surgeon, watching the conversation with a polite but distracted expression.

“This isn’t really your concern, is it, Dr. Adeno? You’ve done your part in performing the surgery. Thank you for that. It’s up to us now to make sure Juliet gives herself all the time she needs to heal.”

“Excellent. It’s always so much easier for my patients when they have supportive family members. She should be coming out of recovery and heading to her room, if you want to head in that direction. Do you remember where to go?”

“I do,” Caitlin said, looking sour, as usual.

“Thank you,” Olivia said to the surgeon.

“You’re welcome. Juliet is one of my favorite people and has been very kind to me since I moved to Cape Sanctuary. Also, my husband and I love to garden and count on Harper Hill to supply us with everything we need. We need her healthy and strong.”

They all did, Olivia thought as she followed Caitlin along the hallways a few moments later.

The solution was clear. She was going to have to stay, at least through her mother’s initial recovery. Caitlin certainly could not shoulder the burden of running the garden center and going to school at the same time. Knowing Juliet, her mother would hate being sidelined and would probably override any attempts by Caitlin or employees of the garden center to keep her away.

She had already been off since the attack in the coffee shop and would have to call human resources about arranging several more weeks of emergency family leave.

She was already edgy after being in town only a few hours and wasn’t sure she could endure several more weeks.

But her mother needed her help. What choice did she have? She couldn’t abandon Juliet or Caitlin. Olivia might not be able to tackle an armed gunman in a coffee shop. But she could surely manage to put her life on hold for a few weeks in order to help out in a crisis.

JULIET

She flashed in and out of awareness for what felt like a lifetime.

One moment she was with Steve again and they were walking the cliffs on a summer evening with his old dog on a leash.

Another, she was with Natalie in the delivery room, half of her heart aching for her child and the trials she would face as a single mother and the other half overwhelmed with the miracle of life and this tiny, crying little girl.

Then she was laughing with Olivia over a show they used to enjoy together, watching her younger daughter’s face light up with glee as she understood some sophisticated, clever line of dialogue.

She hurt. Everywhere. She heard a whimper and realized it was coming from her.

“I think she might be coming out of it. She’s been moaning in her sleep. Should she be doing that? Is there something else you could give her?”

That sounded like Caitlin’s voice.

“Yes. We can give her more pain meds.”

She didn’t want to open her eyes to see who was speaking. It would hurt too much if she did.

Then a moment later, the tension and pain seemed to flow out of her like the tide receding, and she breathed out, her muscles relaxing.

It took her a long time to come back to full awareness. She didn’t want to. The drugs were lovely. Why would she ever want to leave this place where she was free of pain and fear, heartache and regret?

Eventually, she knew she had to open her eyes, especially when she heard Caitlin and Olivia arguing.

“I’m staying here, Caitlin. I’ve been on the phone with my company and have already made all the arrangements to take leave. I can handle the garden center during the day and work long-distance in the evening for my employer and my own clients.”

“Why? Don’t you think I’m capable? I’ve been helping out at the garden center for years.”

“It’s not a matter of whether you’re capable,” Olivia began.

Juliet wanted to tell her not to bother. When Caitlin was in one of her stubborn moods, there was no debating her. The best thing was simply to move on to another topic and quietly do what you were planning anyway.

She closed her eyes. When she opened them again, the room was quiet and she felt a little more clearheaded.

Olivia was sitting beside her. So she hadn’t conjured her in a dream, along with the husband and daughter she had lost.

“You’re really here,” she said, her voice croaking and her throat sore.

Olivia jumped up instantly. “Hi. You’re awake. That’s good. How are you feeling?”

“I’ve had better days.” She cleared away the dryness of her throat. Had she swallowed an entire bag of potting soil?

“The nurse said you could have some ice water when you wake up.”

Olivia retrieved a cup from beside the bed and the liquid trickling down her throat was the most delicious thing she’d ever tasted.

“Where’s Caitlin? Did she go home?”

“I made her go grab some dinner in the cafeteria.”

“She’s a good girl.”

“Yes.”

She sipped more water as snippets she had heard while she was out of it filtered through her head. “Did you…? I thought I heard you tell Caitlin you’re…staying.”

“For now. A few weeks, anyway.”

“You don’t need to do that. I don’t…want to be a burden.”

She had dreaded that most of all after her initial diagnosis, that someday Olivia would hate her for this weakness.

“You’re not a burden. I have everything arranged.”

“What’s…arranged?”

“I’m going to stay in town for now so I can take care of you and help out at the garden center until you’re on your feet again.”

“No.”

The word came out sharp, gruff, and Olivia looked taken aback.

“You don’t have a lot of choices here, Mom. Dr. Adeno says you need to take it easy for at least a month.”

A month! That was impossible. “We’ll be fine.”

Olivia rolled her eyes. “Will you? Caitlin said there’s no one to run the garden center right now. She, by the way, wants to drop out of tenth grade to take over.”

“That’s ridiculous. She can’t do that. She’s only fifteen.”

“Exactly what I told her.” Olivia studied her closely and Juliet was horribly aware that a tear might be dripping out of her eye. She pulled the scratchy hospital sheet up to wipe at it until Olivia handed her a tissue off the bedside table.