The Strawberry Hearts Diner(37)

“Probably.” Jancy nodded.

“Nettie told me that the heart never steers us wrong. Sometimes it doesn’t answer us as fast as we want it to, but we have to give it time and be patient. It doesn’t see, hear, or smell, but it has an acute sense of feelin’ and it will never lie to us.”

Jancy hugged Vicky. “You and Nettie are the best things that have happened to me in years. I’m so glad that fate put me in that parking lot last week.”

“So are we.” Vicky headed for the kitchen. “Let’s have a glass of strawberry wine for each of us to celebrate the kiss.”

Jancy finished off the beer and set the empty bottle on the coffee table. “Oh, no!” She clamped a hand over her mouth.

“What?” Vicky stopped in the middle of the floor.

“What if the stars are lined up all wrong? What if I’m fallin’ for a good guy at last and the timing is wrong? What if folks find out that I was on probation and they look down on him because of me? I can’t do that to him.”

“Do what to whom?” Emily appeared in the doorway coming from the hall. “Shane kissed you, didn’t he?”

Jancy nodded.

“We’re going to have a glass of wine to celebrate.” Vicky brought out a quart jar from under the counter and poured a little into four glasses.

“Do we get wine when I kiss my boyfriend?” Emily joked.

“Depends on who it is,” Vicky shot back. “What number are we at?”

“Only two down,” Emily said.

“Then you’ve got a few to go.”

“What are you talking about?” Jancy asked.

“She’s hung up on that old movie Lucky Seven.”

“I am not,” Vicky said.

“Yes, she is,” Emily said. “She thinks I need to see the world and have lots of boyfriends before I settle down. In the movie, the mama is dying and she tells the daughter that at certain times in her life she will meet a man—like number three will be her first sexual experience in college. But it will be the seventh man who will be her soul mate and the one she will marry.”

“I know. I checked that movie out at the library and watched it about six times before I had to take it back,” Jancy said. “Why do you want Emily to wait until number seven? Is it because you only had that first real love in your life and then you had a baby to take care of?”

“Pretty much,” Vicky said. “I want her to experience lots of life before she settles down.”

“Sometimes life isn’t a substitute for love,” Jancy whispered as she sipped the wine.

Vicky’s head bobbed a couple of times. “And sometimes love ain’t a substitute for life.”

Those words stuck in Jancy’s mind as she made her way to her bedroom, opened the drawer, and took out the second letter from the bottom. She turned on the bedside lamp and propped a pillow against the tall headboard.

“I need to hear your voice, Mama. Even if it’s through words on paper that don’t say a thing about relationships. Shane kissed me and I felt something new and strange. Is that what you felt with Daddy even though you knew he was probably the wrong boy for you?”

She unfolded the letter and read slowly.

Happy birthday, Jancy! I hope that you are having cake and ice cream. Take this ten dollars and buy a fancy cupcake and a pint of rocky road ice cream. Today I’m sitting here in the trailer with the smell of a chocolate cake filling the whole place. It’s your eighteenth-birthday cake. We’ll move again as soon as you graduate. Your father is getting antsy, but he’s promised me that we’ll stay right here so you can finish your education. I’ve got a feeling if we move this close to the end of the year, you’ll never finish, and I so want to see you walk across that stage and get your diploma.

Tonight we’ll have cake and ice cream and I’ve made a little throw for you from scraps that I bought from a remnant bin. It reminds me of the tiny baby clothing that I stitched for you before you were born. You came home in a pretty smocked outfit and you were wrapped in a pink quilt. Each square had a special bit of embroidery. You completely wore that quilt out. I hope you do the same with this throw and that you think of me every time that you use it.

Enough sadness. I’m gone and it’s your birthday. Wherever you are, be happy. Eat cake and ice cream and remember all the good times we’ve had.

Her mother was right. Just remembering that chocolate cake and ice cream on her eighteenth birthday made her happy. She tucked the letter back into the envelope and into the drawer beside the throw that was one of her prized possessions. She ran her fingers over the stitches. She used the throw when she was so homesick for her mother that sadness filled her whole being, and it never failed to bring her comfort and happiness. “But Mama, what do I do? You gave me love and memories, but I need your advice.”

Be happy, her mother’s voice whispered in her head.

Jancy picked up the picture and looked into her mother’s eyes. “I’m not sure I know how, Mama. Can you send someone to guide me?”

I already did, the soft voice said.





CHAPTER NINE


The diner was quiet that Tuesday afternoon. The lunch rush hadn’t been too bad with Vicky taking care of the kitchen and Jancy and Emily dividing the dining room duties. Vicky had just refilled her glass with ice and water with a slice of lemon and was on her way to a booth when the phone rang. She grabbed it, listened for a minute.