Page 2 of Against The Tide

“Good,” he asserts, getting out and heading inside my childhood home.

Last time I was here was to pick up Dad’s burial suit a little over a week ago. Like it did then, my heart finds a way of breaking some more. I thought it was crumbled to pieces already.

“Mommy?”

Hearing the waver in Iris’s voice, I loosen her seatbelt and pull her onto my lap. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to take her in there and remind her that her grandfather won’t be there to chase her around the hallways and yard. God give me strength because I don’t think I can walk in there and face all the memories ghosting every wall. All those people from the funeral. Some are complete strangers to me.

“It’s going to be okay.” I’m not sure whether or not it will be. Right now, it seems we’re still falling down an endless rabbit hole.

It’s exhausting. The constant apprehension of when I’ll hit the bottom and not knowing how I’ll be able to pick myself up. I’m certain it’s going to happen no matter how hard I’m fighting to hold it off.

“When you’re ready, Mrs. Henderson.” The driver opens our door to the stone steps leading to the dark wooden front doors.

“Thank you.”

Holding tightly to Iris’s hand, I count each step that takes me closer to the doors. Pink and yellow perennials line the lawned borders on either side.

With his warning glinting in his eyes, Carl opens one of the doors, then waits for me and Iris to walk ahead of him into the house before he enters behind us. Instantly, I feel trapped with the sound of muted chatter coming from the opened-up dining room to my right and the formal sitting room to the left. The terrace doors are opened up at the back, but guests are milling around in the great room.

I can’t do this. Panic starts to build inside my chest as eyes pause on us.

“Don’t cause a scene.” Carl presses us forward.

He’s right. I need to hold myself together and push onward. In a few hours everyone will leave, and it won’t matter whether I cry silently or in the shower as I’ve done every night for the last two weeks.

Like the last time I came here, I’m staggered by the warm scent that envelops me the farther we make it into the house. The faintest hint of Old Spice lingers in the air from years and decades of my father walking these floors.

“Come on, darling, let’s get you a drink and some fresh air, huh?” Nora links her arm with mine while picking Iris up to sit her on her hip. “These things get stuffy, and you don’t need that right now.”

I don’t miss Carl’s glare as I look back, but even knowing that this is going to end badly, I can’t bring myself to shake her off. Nora is one of the few people here today who Dad genuinely loved. She’s straight-talking and a little overbearing, especially with Rafe, but she’s kind. She reminds me of Mom.

“You did great with the service. Your father will be happy it wasn’t an overindulgent, drawn-out affair.”

“I thought he’d love the same order as Mom.”

“It was beautiful.” She squeezes me to her side as we walk through the kitchen to the private study hidden away to one side of the house, overlooking the small rosebush maze.

The french doors are wide open with the scent of damp earth and roses tinging the air. We’re barely through the door when Nora draws me into her, hugging me to her chest.

“He wouldn’t want you to hold it all in,” she tells me, swaying me from side to side.

“I know, but it’s easier this way.”

“Just because it’s easy, it doesn’t make it right.”

“I know that too.”

“Daddy said classy girls don’t cry in front of people.”

“Your daddy wouldn’t know class if it bit him in the bee-hind!” She sits Iris on the edge of the desk, fussing with her hair while keeping me pressed to her.

“Nora…” I admonish her jibe lightly, pulling away from her to sit beside Iris.

One of the doors to the wet bar behind the dining room opens, and Rafe walks in with a tray of drinks. More drinks than bodies.

“OJ for you,” he says, putting the tray down on the sideboard and holding out a small glass to Iris. When she takes it, he grabs another glass and hands it to me. “G and T without the G. How’re you holding up?” He adds the latter in as though it’s an ordinary question.

Rafe is a politician through and through with the added bonus that he’s also as honest and down-to-earth as they come. It’s easy to see why Dad believed in him so much.