On Hummingbird Wings Read online

  Heaving a sigh after all, she hung her clothes in the closet and pulled on lightweight denim capri pants and a white long-sleeve blouse, rolling up the sleeves. Slip-on wedges for her feet and a promise to ice the toes again later, and she returned to the kitchen to put the groceries away. At home she would have music filling the rooms, a scented candle burning, and a bottle of white wine cooling in the fridge. She would not be gearing up to repair a broken window.

  Maybe she could leave this until tomorrow and let Adam fix it. The thought rang with truth and good sense. “But how hard can putting that window back in be? After all, what good is locking a door when an intruder could open it as easily as you did?”

  She thought of the silk shirt sleeve and her aching foot. Being able to tell her mother that she fixed the window had a certain cachet.

  Of course, her mother probably had done something like this many times. She was the original do-it-yourselfer, most likely because she’d not had a husband to fix the small things around the house, nor the money to hire help. All those years she’d worked at the school to supplement the money she’d received from her late husband’s life insurance policy and a small pension. And she was still home to take care of her two girls.

  After vacuuming the hall and part of the living room to make sure she got all the slivers of glass, Gillian put the machine back in the hall closet. First thing: clean all the broken glass out of the space. She shouldn’t have put the vacuum away. After removing the large pieces, she dampened a couple of paper towels and wiped any spare glass bits out of the window frame and off the vinyl flooring by the door. She considered getting something to eat before proceeding further.

  “Don’t be silly, just finish this and then make a good dinner. That salmon looked perfect.” Back to talking to herself. “After all, how much time can this take?”

  She carefully unwrapped the paper from around the glass and inserted it into the space. It didn’t fit. Too long by a good quarter of an inch. She tried again, closed her eyes, tipped back her head, and deliberately loosened the jaw clamping her teeth together. Her options: Take it back and have the clerk re-cut it. Go back and order another pane and make sure she didn’t talk with the same man. Search the tools for a glass cutter, whatever that looked like. Throw the whole thing in the trash, or against a wall, and let Adam take care of it in the morning.

  Shutting the door with a little more force than necessary, she hauled the toolbox back to the garage, dragged out the vacuum, vacuumed and put it away—again. Maybe she should use the brick on this piece of glass, too. Or maybe she should just throw the brick.

  Surely the empty pane would not be visible from the street with the stretched curtains pulled back in place. She sank into a chair at the oak table in the kitchen and contemplated the foot she’d raised up to rest on the adjacent chair. She knew elevating a foot was good for an injury. Her phone rang from deep within the bowels of her bag. What had happened to her? Her mind went out when she crossed the Rocky Mountains? Why wasn’t the phone in its holster? It stopped ringing as she pulled it out. Checking the calls, she recognized the number. Allie. Call her back or wait to see if she left a message?

  It rang again.

  “Hello.”

  “How’s Mother?”

  “Sound asleep, what more can you expect?”

  “You don’t have to bite my head off.”

  “No, I don’t, but consider yourself lucky you are not here or I might.”

  “Oh.” Pause. “Did you get Mother to eat again?”

  “No, she didn’t like the coffee I brought her. And I’ve been a bit busy so I haven’t started dinner yet.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Trying to replace the window.”

  A silence extended.

  “No one would come?”

  “Not until Thursday, and their minimum charge was one hundred dollars.”

  “I see. Maybe I could ask…”

  The doorbell rang. At least now she knew it worked. “Hang on. Let me see who’s at the door.”

  “Just call me back.”

  Gillian tossed the phone into her bag and headed for the front door. She glanced through the lace curtain. Adam. Turning the lock, she opened the door. “Come on in.”

  “Couldn’t get someone to fix it?”

  “Nope.”

  “I can come back in the morning. You got a tape measure?”

  “You don’t need one.” She picked up the paper-wrapped glass and handed it to him. “This is one quarter inch too tall.” She pointed at the plastic bag sitting on the chair. “There’s calking and pointy things in there.”

  He checked the bag. “I see you are well supplied.”

  “And if you say one word about this, I might be forced to lose my temper. Ask Allie, that is not a pretty picture.”

  He nodded, rolling his lips together. His mouth might not say anything, but the demon dancing in his eyes said more than enough.

  “Someday this will be a funny story to tell at a gathering, but right now…”

  He nodded. “It’s not.”

  She unclenched her teeth again, she was going to end up with the TMJ at the rate she was going. “Can I get you something to drink?”

  Adam shook his head. “What did the doctor say?”

  “How did you know we went to the doctor?”

  “Called Allie. I didn’t have your phone number.”

  “She didn’t fill you in?”

  “Nope, just said you went and she had another call.”

  Leave it to Allie. “He said Mother had a TIA and shouldn’t be having any trouble unless something else has happened. He wants to see her on Wednesday.”

  “But I thought…”

  “I know. She said she was dying. But you see, Mother is always dying, at least according to her.”

  “But I’ve never heard her complain.”

  Gillian shook her head. Of course not. She only acted that way with her daughters. Unless…unless this time there really was something seriously wrong and even the doctor didn’t know.

  Later that evening after telling her mother good night, a wave of weariness nearly washed Gillian out to sea. She finished wiping down the counter and turned out the kitchen light. Nine o’clock seemed far too early to go to bed, unless one counted that her body was still on East Coast time. By the time she’d finished her nighttime routine, checked on her mother, and crawled in bed, another half hour had passed and her eyes refused to stay open.

  Under her pillow she found a lavender sachet. Inhaling the fragrance, slight though it was, she smiled and settled in. Would she hear her mother if she needed anything? Both doors were open, so other than sleeping in the master bedroom, this was the best she could do.

  Sometime later, she blinked at the clock beside the bed. Two a.m. She listened with every sense alert. Was someone at the door? The door that was now missing a windowpane? She crept from her bed, tiptoed down the hall, and peeped around the corner. No one there. The streetlight would have shown. A couple more steps and around another corner she could see through the glass doors to the backyard. No one there. She exhaled a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding and went down the hall to peer into her mother’s room. The streetlights gave enough illumination that she could faintly see the mound in the bed. She could hear breathing.

  Heaving another breath, Gillian returned to her bed and collapsed into it. Maybe she’d look into an alarm system in the morning.

  Four o’clock found her body wide awake, while her mind insisted she needed more sleep. But this was her normal waking time on the East Coast where it was now seven a.m. She laid there for a while before throwing back the covers, grabbing her wrapper off the chair by the bed, and making her way to the kitchen. At home her coffeemaker would have the pot all ready for her, the coffee brewed with freshly ground beans, its fragrance as vital as the hot liquid itself. She fumbled with the percolator and the can of ground coffee, trying not to make any noise that would disturb her mother. W
hen the basket clattered into the sink, she gave up trying to be quiet. It would take the baying dogs from The Hound of the Baskervilles to disturb Mother.

  While the coffee perked, she took a quick shower, dressed, checked on her mother, and returned to the kitchen. With doughnut quarters on a covered plate and a hefty mug of coffee in her hand, she trailed into the living room to look for the television remote. Where would my mother keep that? she wondered after searching every available space. The television clicked on when she turned the knob. Surely she’d bought a new TV since remotes came into being. She found the New York channel by turning the dial, rolled her eyes, and settled into the recliner she knew to be her mother’s chair.

  The morning news made her want to gag. Mayhem in Afghanistan, bombings in Iraq, a junta in Central America, and the really good news: a serial murderer in Seattle had been taken into custody. An alleged serial killer; one must be careful of libel. While the commentators did their thing, she read the small print tracking across the bottom of the screen. “A hostile takeover at Fitch, Fitch, and Folsom and…” The rest of the message slid past her before she could read it all. What? Surely that hadn’t been her company? Were there any other Fitches? Her stomach clenched, squeezing the coffee back up to burn her esophagus. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the doily that protected the plush fabric from oily hair. This was Saturday. Whom could she call? Eight o’clock, New York time. Was her boss in the office yet? Would he be going to the office? Would any of them have offices to go to? She headed to the bedroom for her computer. Would Scot be picking up messages today?

  Chapter Six

  You’re up early for a Saturday.”

  Adam glanced up at his father with a smile. “Have to go fix that window at Dorothy’s before I head to the marina. Found your glass cutter out in the shop.” He snapped the paper to make it stand upright. “How was your night?”

  “Okay.”

  But Adam could tell from his father’s eyes that his dad had not slept well. Was it just the grief of losing his wife, or was there something else going on? No, not just. But it had been nearly two years. Shouldn’t his father be recovering? Every article he’d read about grief said people responded in their own time, but usually by two years they were able to deal with life better. His father seemed to be getting older and weaker, not better.

  “Coffee’s ready and the orange juice is fresh squeezed.” He’d been up early all right. Had he been dreaming of Gillian Ormsby or did he only think of her when he woke?

  “Did you get to visit with Dorothy?” Bill set his coffee mug on the table and sat in his usual place where he could watch the action in the backyard. “You filled the bird feeders.”

  “Didn’t dare go outside if I hadn’t. Dive-bombed by a hummingbird, scolded by the scrub jay, and the house finches put up such a chattering I thought they’d wake you.” His hope to make his father smile paid off. For a man who used to wear a permanent smile, now he had to work at it.

  “And the fishpond?”

  “The hose is running into that now.” Adam folded the paper and pushed it toward his father. “How about going out on the boat with me later?”

  Bill studied the dark liquid in his cup. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  Adam knew “maybe” was just a polite way of declining. “Are you going into the office?”

  His father shrugged. Bill owned two nurseries, one in Martinez and one in Pittsburg, up the river to the east. All those years he’d insisted that a man needed to spend the full weekend with his wife and family. But since losing Alice to cancer, he found more solace in his business.

  Adam had come home ostensibly to help with the business, but the real reason was to cheer up his father and get him interested in living again. In the twelve months he’d been in Martinez, he’d not accomplished much of his goal.

  “You want some eggs?”

  “I guess. How about scrambled?”

  “Bacon?”

  “And a piece of toast.”

  They went through this every morning. Adam rose and turned on the stove. By the time he’d fixed breakfast, his father had wandered outside to check on his babies—starts of begonias from slips, irises from seeds he’d spent months hybridizing, and a flat of cyclamen he’d started just for fun.

  Adam called out the door, “Come and eat, Dad.” He waited until his father raised an arm in response and dished up the plates for the table. All the while Thor sat where he’d been told to, his gaze following Adam’s every move. When both men sat down at the table, the dog sank to the floor, jaws on paws, only his eyes moving.

  “Are you going to pot those cyclamen today?” Adam asked.

  “I planned on it. Might have to mix more potting soil. I potted that little chrysanthemum you asked me to.”

  “The rust-colored one?”

  “Actually there are several, take your pick.”

  “Why don’t you come to Dorothy’s with me? Maybe a visitor will help get her out of bed.” He’d told his father the night before what Gillian had said about her mother.

  “Your mother would have had her up. If there was someone who could talk a friend into living, it was Alice.” He scooped the last of his eggs onto the corner of toast and ate it, before giving Thor the final bit of bacon.

  Adam had given up telling his father that Thor had plenty of dog food, he didn’t need people food. Only Adam was more important than Bill in Thor’s eyes, but that was dubious when someone offered him bacon.

  Bill gathered up the dishes for the dishwasher. The two had a bargain, one cooked, the other cleaned up. The two jobs were interchangeable.

  Adam decided on the deep burgundy-colored mum, stuck a bow on a stick in the dirt, snapped the lead on Thor’s collar, and headed down the hill. What a glorious morning, blue sky, trailing clouds, and birdsong, what more could he ask? Since it was Saturday, he and Thor could run around the field at the school, in spite of the soccer players. During school hours, he was afraid Thor would be too distracting for the students.

  He stopped on the sidewalk in front of Dorothy’s house. Still an empty window frame, but the sprinklers had been turned on. Maybe the jasmine would come back and the lawn would of course. But only if they could get Dorothy out of bed and on her feet. Since when had Gillian’s fight become his? He wondered at that as he and Thor made their way to the front door and rang the bell.

  “Coming.”

  He heard the voice from a distance. Perhaps Gillian was in the backyard. He waited a bit more and then he could see her outline against the light from the kitchen windows. “Good morning,” he said as she opened the door. But one look at her face and he was sure she was not having a good morning.

  “Come in.” She stepped back and motioned.

  “Thor, too?”

  “Why not?” It was more a concession than an invitation.

  So, do I ask or pretend I don’t see anything wrong? He followed her to the kitchen and handed her the colorful pot. “My father sent this for your mother.”

  “How lovely.” She set the pot in the middle of the table. “I’ll take it to her when she wakes. Would you like some coffee?”

  In spite of already having had his two cup quota for the morning, he nodded. Since Thor sat right beside him, he dropped his hand to the dog’s head and scratched the black ears. “I know this probably isn’t my place, but what’s wrong? Your mother?”

  Gillian shook her head. “I had a rather traumatic surprise this morning.” He waited for her to continue.

  “There was an announcement on television that my company is the victim of a hostile takeover. When I called my boss, he confirmed it. I have no job and until Wednesday to clean out my office.” Her jaw clenched. “Just like that.” She poured two mugs of coffee. “Cream or sugar?”

  “Black.”

  When she set them on the table, her hands shook slightly. She took the chair at the other end of the table after a glance at Thor.

  “He won’t hurt you or anyone.”


  “Right.” She raised her mug with both hands cupped around it and took a swallow.

  While he saw her staring at the burgundy blossoms, he was sure she wasn’t seeing them. “Miserable way to find out.”

  “He said he was waiting until he was sure the West Coast was awake before he phoned me, but I called him first.”

  Adam propped his elbows on the table. “Did he have the particulars for you?”

  “He’ll have them on Monday. I guess the other company wants the weekend to celebrate before dealing with realities.” After a deep breath and exhale, she continued. “I’ve worked there all my career, from right out of college until now.”

  “That’s pretty unusual in this day and age.”

  “I know. I hoped to retire in five to seven more years.” After a dainty, ladylike snort, she continued. “Planned to actually, and everything was on track for that.” Another huff. “Everyone knew something was happening, but this was one closely guarded secret.”

  Her voice sounded lost, not decisive like the day before. In fact if Adam were not staring right at her, he’d have had a hard time believing this was the same woman. What could he say? He drained his cup and set it back down. “Why don’t I get that door fixed? Then I’m taking my boat out. Would you like to go for a sail?”

  She raised her gaze to meet his, her head already beginning to shake. “Thank you, but no. I’m not much of a sailor. I get terribly seasick.” She looked over his shoulder. “And besides, there is Mother.”

  He should have known better. “All right. I see you got the sprinklers going.”

  “I have the flowerpots soaking as well. Hopefully some of the plants will come back.”

  “I would have set the sprinklers if I’d had a way to get into the backyard. Shame to watch all the plants die.” He rose. “Where’s the glass pane you bought?”