Page 52 of Paper Ghosts

“I’m not arguing against having the house torn down. I’m arguing for telling Tug. Don’t undo the good that’s happened these past few years. If you wait for him to find out after you’re gone, he’ll be hurt you didn’t share it with him. He might even believe the reason was because you didn’t think he deserved to live here.”

She turned out the light. After a moment, she said into the darkness, “You’re right.”

“I am?”

“You know you are.”

She could hear his fingers start snapping again.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

“You’ve never invited me to tea before. What a treat,” Tug said as he walked in, dressed in an absurdly formal dove-gray suit. He set the tray down, then turned and walked back to the sunroom door he’d left open. It closed on Jack, who was standing there with his hands in the back pockets of his bell bottoms, giving Willamena a significant look.

When Tug had brought her breakfast that morning, chatty as he always was, not wanting to talk about or even acknowledge that she was ill, he’d mentioned that Bailey was going to the Shadow Fair. He said she would be back in time for tea, but Willamena told him to let Bailey know she could stay as long as she wanted, and she invited him instead.

“That’s because you don’t like tea. The only time you’ve ever willingly had it was in the form of ice cream. What is that?” She pointed suspiciously to the plate on the tray next to the teacups.

“Hors d’oeuvres,” he said, walking back from the door.

“Did you think I wouldn’t recognize something from those recipe cards?”

“The recipes aren’t that bad. They’re the reason this is the first time I’ve ever been able to cook anything.”

“That’s because they’re evil and they’ve bewitched you.”

He lifted the plate and balanced it back and forth, as if that would make it tempting. “Potato salad wrapped in salami slices, and sliced hot dog pickle sandwiches.”

“Not helping your cause,” she said.

“More for me, then.”

She smiled. He was Terrence made over, handsome, affable, and highly susceptible to stronger female personalities. He loved everything. He loved fireplaces and dogwood trees and every stray that came sniffing around the house. He even loved rain. Everything he touched, even inanimate objects, shivered slightly with delight. The world was a better place with him in it, and Willamena would often torture herself by remembering she’d never intended to have him. She and Terrence had separate bedrooms in the Wester House. But years after their marriage, when she traveled with him to his mother’s funeral and afterward spent a few days at the beach, the first and only time she’d seen the ocean, she came back pregnant.

She’d been terrified that Jack would feel betrayed, that this would be the thing to finally make him go, but nothing could have been further from the truth. In fact, for weeks after he found out, all her blue clothing would come flying out of her closet when she opened the door to dress in the mornings, causing her to shriek in surprise. Jack thought he was being clever because the doctor had told her she was having a son.

Jack had loved Tug from the moment she brought him home from the hospital, and he’d strongly disagreed with her about telling Tug to make his own way in the world. After Tug had left for college, it was the longest she and Jack had ever spent without talking. It had been jarring. She’d missed his sense of humor, his ridiculous practical jokes. She’d even missed feeling his sadness on rainy nights. But what she’d missed most of all, what he’d been missing, too, was being a strange family all under this roof. It was only after Tug had called her and told her he’d met a woman and that they were expecting a baby that Jack had finally come back up from the basement to talk to her again. She had sunk to the floor after the call, terrified that the curse she’d inherited might be passed on to a granddaughter, after all.

“I’ll get right to it,” she said to Tug. “I invited you here because I need to tell you something. I had my will changed.”

He unbuttoned his jacket and sat. “Okay,” he said, crossing his legs and giving her his full attention.

“I did it years ago. It’s nothing involving the money. That’s still going to you and Bailey. But after I’m gone, I’ve left specific instructions for the house to be torn down.”

Tug pointed to the floor. “You want this house to be torn down.”

“Yes, this house. What other house do I have?”

“The one in France and the two in Italy come to mind.”

“You’re hilarious,” she said. “I want the basement filled in, and I want trees and roses planted over it. I also want my ashes spread here.”

“Are you talking about a memorial park?”

“Absolutely not. Just no more Wester House. I’ve kept the historical society from making it a landmark for years, just so I could make this happen.” She stopped him before he could speak. “Before you say some nonsense about the Wester legacy, we both know you and Bailey won’t stay here after I’m gone, nor would I want you to. But it recently came to my attention that my decision might be … misinterpreted later. So I’m letting you know now that the only reason I’m doing this is because the house is a monument to unfulfilled dreams, and my last wish is for everyone I love to be free of it.”

“I’m sure you know that I’ll honor any of your wishes. But I have to admit, this is a surprise.” Tug shook his head. “I thought this house meant everything to you. Why did you stay here if you were so unhappy?”

“For the same reason you came back.”