“We stole all the footballs right before the biggest game of the season, because I was injured and the team was likely to lose without me.”
Cassie remembered. She also remembered that they’d been suspended from school for a week because of it. In high school she had loved leading the older, more popular Cole into mischief. It was only later, when he’d come home from college, that their best-buddy relationship had turned into something else.
Thinking of the stunts she’d instigated, she smiled. “That was different. No one was really harmed by it. And they played, anyway. The coach went home and found a football in his garage. The team was so fired up by what we’d done, by the implication that they couldn’t win without you, that they went out and won that game just to prove that they didn’t need you to run one single play.”
Cole laughed. “It was quite a reality check for my ego, that’s for sure.”
“Okay, so we chalk that one up as a stunt that backfired,” she said. “Anything else you remember us doing that was so terrible?”
“There was the time you talked me into taking all the prayer books from the Episcopal church and switching them with the ones at the Baptist church.” He grinned. “Why did we do that, anyway?”
She shrugged. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. And I think I was mad at my mom, because she kept pointing out prayers she thought I ought to be learning to save my soul from eternal damnation. I was tired of hearing the same ones over and over again, so I thought a switch would give her some new material.”
The mention of her mother snapped her back to the present and the worries that had been stirred up about her health, first by Cole, tonight by Karen and even by that incident in town.
Suddenly she simply had to know the truth. She handed Cole her glass. “I have to go.”
“Where?” he asked, his expression puzzled.
“Home. I want to talk to my mother before it gets to be too late.”
The fact that he simply nodded and didn’t challenge her abrupt decision to leave confirmed her fear that something must be terribly wrong. Moreover, Cole obviously knew what it was. There was too much sympathy in his expression.
“Give her my regards,” he said quietly.
She considered trying to question him again about what he knew, but it was pointless. Cole could keep a secret as well as anyone, and it was evident he intended to keep this one out of loyalty to her mother.
“I will,” she said.
She started across the parking lot, but he called out to her. “Cassie?”
She turned back. “Yes?”
He lifted his glass in a silent toast. “Thanks for the dance.”
“Anytime,” she said.
He grinned. “I’ll hold you to that. There will be a great country band at the picnic tomorrow, and I haven’t had a decent Texas two-step partner in years.”
“You might still be saying that after tomorrow,” she retorted. “I haven’t been dancing in years.”
And then, because she was far too tempted to go back and steal a kiss as she once would have done without a thought, she turned on her heel and strode away without another backward glance.
* * *
At home Cassie kicked off her shoes in the living room, then noted with relief that there was still a light on in her mother’s room. She padded into the kitchen and brewed two cups of tea, then carried them upstairs. In her bedroom Edna was reading her Bible as she had every night before bed for as long as Cassie could remember.
“I made some tea,” she announced.
Startled, her mother’s gaze shot up. Worry puckered her brow. “You’re home awfully early. Weren’t you having a good time seeing all your friends?”
“Cole was there,” she said, as if that explained everything.
“I see.” Her mother set aside her Bible and patted the edge of the bed. “Come, sit beside me.” She smiled. “I remember when you used to come in here after one of your dates and tell me everything you’d done.”
“Almost everything,” Cassie corrected dryly as she set the teacups on the nightstand and sat beside her mother.
“Some things a mother doesn’t need to know.”
Cassie leaned down and pressed a kiss to her mother’s cheek. “I’m sorry I made things so difficult for you.”
“You were testing the limits. It was natural enough. So, tell me, did you and Cole talk tonight?”
“Some, but I don’t want to get into that right now.” She took her mother’s hand in her own, felt the calluses on the tips of her fingers put there by mending countless shirts, sewing on hundreds of buttons and hemming at least as many skirts, month after month, year after year. “I want to talk about you.”
“Me?” Her mother withdrew her hand and looked away, her expression suddenly nervous. “Why would you want to talk about me?”
“Because of that spell you had in town and because twice in the past few days people have said things, things that didn’t make any sense to me.”
“About?”
“You.” She studied her mother’s face. “Are you okay, Mom? Is there something going on that you haven’t told me?”
A soft smile touched her mother’s lips. She raised her hand to tuck a wayward curl behind Cassie’s ear. “I’m glad you’re home for a visit.”
The evasion only made her impatient. “Mom, tell me.”
Her mother drew in a deep breath, then blurted out, “I have cancer.”
There it was, that single, plainspoken word with the power to instill terror. Cassie was devastated. For a full five minutes after her mother said the words, Cassie simply stared at her in shock.
“But you don’t look sick,” she whispered finally, her voice catching on a sob. “Except for that little spell yesterday afternoon, you’ve looked just fine since I got here.”
“They tell me I’m going to look a whole lot worse before they’re through with me,” her mother said, managing to inject an unexpected note of wry humor into the solemn discussion. “And that spell was because of the heat, not the cancer.”
Tears spilled down Cassie’s cheeks as she reached for the woman who’d had to endure so much by having a daughter who was always causing trouble.
“I want to know everything the doctors said. When did you find out?”
“I found the lump in my breast two weeks ago and had a needle biopsy that was positive. They wanted to operate right away, but you were coming home. I told them they’d just have to wait.”
Cassie was appalled. “You haven’t even had the surgery yet?”
“There will be time enough after you’ve gone back home.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not leaving you here to go through this alone.”
“You’ve made a life for yourself,” her mother countered. “You can’t know how grateful I am that you and Jake are doing well. I won’t disrupt that.”
“You don’t have a choice,” Cassie said decisively. “We will call the doctor first thing next week and schedule the surgery. You’ll need someone here when you’re going through treatment, too. Will you be having radiation? Chemotherapy?”
“That will depend on what they find when they operate, but I have plenty of friends who will stand by me,” her