The Memory Keeper: A Heartwarming, Feel-Good Romance(63)

“Were you fine? Because that kind of thinking doesn’t seem fine to me.” She shook her head. “What about you, Christie? What are your dreams?”

“Me? Oh, I can’t paint or anything. And I don’t live a fancy life like you do. I just work up at the supermarket as a cashier. It’s good pay and they let me work during daytime hours so I can find childcare, and that’s nice of ’em.”

“But when you were a little girl, what did you want to be when you grew up?”

Christie’s dubious stare hung between them before she answered. “That’s just it, Miss Townshend—those were my childhood dreams; not talents, not reality. That’s what I’ve been tryin’ to get through to you and Ethan both.”

“Okay,” Hannah said, switching tactics. “What was your childhood dream then?”

“To be a dancer. That should prove what I’m sayin’, right there.”

“Why should it prove anything? If you want to do that, you can. Do you remember when you stopped wanting to be a dancer?”

“I’ve never stopped, but it makes no sense to think I’d ever be a dancer. I’m five foot three.” She laughed incredulously.

“However, if you had pursued it, you could be in New York dancing while Ethan paints. Now wouldn’t that be something?”

Frustration showed on Christie’s face as she put her hands on her hips. “People like Ethan and me don’t live in a big city. It’s not who we are.”

“Then don’t live in the big city. But I do think you should give yourself permission to follow your dreams.”

“Let’s agree to disagree.”

Hannah grinned at her. “I’m gonna get you dancing,” she said.

Christie looked at her like she’d lost her mind. “What?”

“I am,” Hannah declared. “I’m going to get you dancing and Ethan painting, and I guarantee it’ll change your life.”

“Miss Townshend, I think you might be a little crazy.” She said the words, but Hannah noticed the interest in her stare. Perhaps Hannah had offered some faith in the possibilities when Christie hadn’t thought there was any. She definitely didn’t look convinced, but she seemed contemplative.

“I probably am crazy,” Hannah said. “But I’ve never missed an opportunity.”

“This talk has been… interesting,” Christie said, turning toward the door. But as she left, she said quietly over her shoulder, “I’ll send Ethan by to take a look at what you need done.”

“Christie, you’re fabulous!” Hannah called as the door shut behind her. When Christie walked past the display window, Hannah almost swore she could see the makings of a smile on her face.



“Have you completely lost your mind?” Hannah’s mother asked on the other end of the line, as Hannah stood in the middle of The Memory Keeper. “You’re going to throw all your money into the shop, and for what? We have no way to keep it going, nor has anyone proven that it can be successful in this day and age. We’ve already sunk so much into that place; I just can’t, in good conscience, allow you to spend your hard-earned money on this…”

“I’m an adult, Mama,” she said. “I’m not going to be reckless, but I have to try. I’m wiping the bills—that’s final. It’s important to me to make it work.”

“Why, Hannah?” her mother asked.

She tried to figure out the answer, and while she wanted to say that it was for Gran, something inside her told her it was more than that. She wanted to make memories too, and she truly felt like this was something she should do. She wanted to look back on her life and know she’d made a difference. “I want to see if I can make it successful,” she said.

“How? You’ll be in New York.”

“I know. I haven’t figured everything out yet, but the one thing I’m sure about is The Memory Keeper. I can’t let it go.”

“You’ve always been strong-willed,” her mother said, “but you’ve also been great at everything you do. Let’s see what you can do with it.”

“Thanks, Mama. I love you.”

“Love you too.”

Hannah looked around Gran’s shop with a new sense of purpose. Time to spread her wings.



“How did the interviews go?” Hannah asked Georgia when she came into The Memory Keeper. She stepped down off the ladder, having finished the wall.

“I met a great news reporter who’s gonna look around to see what he can find, though the historian had no leads at all.” Georgia let Jerry out of her bag. “But my conversation with the reporter wasn’t entirely about me.”

“Oh?” Hannah beckoned Georgia to the back, as she went to the kitchenette to wash the paint off her hands.

“I hope you don’t mind. I was telling him about The Memory Keeper. He wants to do a piece on the revitalization of it.”

“What?” Hannah asked, flicking the water off her hands, and drying them on a paper towel.

Georgia stepped up next to her. “Yes. It would be part of a series the paper’s doing on historical properties, and it would be featured on the front page next to the town’s Spring Festival.”