Confessions from the Quilting Circle, Maisey Yates [animal farm read TXT] 📗

missed her, the entire time. A sadness that settled into everything she did. A sense of loss. But this was keen and sharp, different in that way.

Lark set the coffee up on the counter in a reusable travel mug. “Are you okay?”

Hannah frowned. “Yeah. I was just thinking about Gram.” And that floor caught her eye again. The floor with the scars in the exact same places they’d been when she was a child. This place was so full of memories. And Lark making this Craft Café was keeping them alive. Keeping them here for the entire community.

It made Hannah feel connected in the strangest way. To this place that she had separated from so many years ago. Before she’d even left.

But you’re back. And you’re rehabbing the old house...

To turn it into something that would keep existing, yes, but she wouldn’t have to be here every day.

“I’m glad that you opened this,” Hannah said, feeling uncharacteristically soft and vulnerable. “I mean, I’m glad that more people will have the chance to come here. Use it.”

“She was so special to me,” Lark said, the smile on her face getting sad. “Sometimes I would just sit with her, and we wouldn’t talk. But I felt like she understood me.”

Another memory that Hannah had suppressed. “Me too. I felt like she was maybe the unacceptable part of me. The part that wanted to leave.” She blinked, her eyes feeling dry. “She’d gone on all those adventures, and she told me about them. All the places she’d seen in her convertible. And I just let myself forget that in all those stories Mom was sitting at home without her mother. Because I liked the image of a woman with red hair and a red car cutting a swath of terror through the countryside.”

Her eyes met Lark’s. “I guess we both kind of did that,” Lark said.

“I guess.”

She’d always felt like she and her sister were a world apart. But standing there in this space she wasn’t sure it was true.

“I have to go. I... You know, renovations and things.”

“You should play,” Lark said. “I mean, while you’re here.”

Hannah shifted uncomfortably. A long time ago she’d enjoyed messing around and playing folk music at bars with friends, but she didn’t really do that anymore. It was all work now, and she could never quite justify wasted time spent...messing around.

“The Gold Pan has an open mic night on Fridays,” Lark pointed out.

“Yeah. Not sure that I’m going to get in on open mic night at the Gold Pan.” She wrinkled her nose. “But, thanks for letting me know.”

“You should play here. I’d love to have some live music here.”

She let out a short breath. “Sure. Maybe. Just let me know.”

“I will. I want to have some fun evening things. I think it would be great. Music and crafting and wine.”

Hannah had to admit it didn’t sound terrible. But that was as far as she was willing to go.

“I’ll see you later,” Hannah said, taking her coffee and walking out of the Craft Café. She paused at the porch. Another spot filled with memories. Where they had snapped peas with Gram, another group activity. Gram had forced them to play together. To be nice to each other. In a way their mom and dad didn’t.

Hannah’s dad had always been indulgent of her specifically. For the first time she wondered...

She wondered if it was because she was like her mom.

He was good with Mom, too. Who didn’t like fuss or muss, and who’d always preferred action over talk.

She smiled as she turned and began to walk down the street, heading back toward The Dowell House.

It was made of bright, cheerful yellow brick. Large green trees covered part of the facade, swaying gently in the breeze. The stark, white balcony that led out to a widow’s walk, as well as the gleaming columns that stood sentry by the crisp door gave it the look of a Jane Austen fantasy. At least, it always had to Hannah. Whether it was an accurate fantasy or not was another matter. But it had always made her think that dukes and ladies might not be terribly far away.

But she had always dreamed of bigger things.

She walked up the sidewalk, and paused, planting both feet firmly on the marble heart that was laid into the pathway. She had always been curious about that. Because while her grandmother was eccentric, as far as she knew, she came from very practical people.

The Dowell family was well regarded, and had been for years. Their family history was written on many a plaque about town. The first Dowell in town had not only built the largest house the community of Beak Creek had ever seen, they’d bought a newspaper, built up the school system and been active in the politics of the town. Of course her grandmother’s behavior had put a slight dent in the family history.

But then, Addie had more than made up for it in her later years. As far as the community was concerned.

Not as far as Hannah’s mother was concerned.

And Hannah understood. She did. But then, her mother didn’t make mistakes. So maybe she didn’t understand that sometimes people do desperate things in low moments.

Hannah did.

She began to walk forward, moving slowly up the stairs, and pausing when she saw that familiar truck parked against the side of the house. Right up against the picket fence, a mockery of sorts. Of something, though Hannah didn’t particularly want to think of what.

She paused for a moment and let out a slow breath, then pushed open the front door. “If I would’ve known you’d be here already I would have brought you a coffee.”

She didn’t hear anything in response except for the sound of a hammer against drywall. “Are you breaking my house?” she asked.

“Sometimes you have to break it to fix it,” came the reply.

She rolled her eyes, then followed the sound of the hammer into the parlor. “That’s cute. Did you get it