In those first months after her sister’s death, she couldn’t recall having tasted a single thing. Now, her mouth watered at the sights and smells of the bustling old market that was as much a tourist destination as it was a staple for those who lived near enough. She released a happy sigh as she headed back to the Camaro. How nice it would be to enjoy a good meal and charming company!
As she headed home, the purr of the Camaro’s engine was so strong that she felt it vibrating through her thin fingers and down past her hands, all the way to her elbows. Sixteen years ago, when she’d bought the car, she hadn’t needed to sit on a pillow seat to see over the hood.
Ida remembered being young and proud and hoping the frailty that came with a long-lived life would somehow not find her when old age did. How silly she’d been not to realize it was all part of a beautiful circle.
She’d been considering it for a while, but she knew the time had come to put the house on the market and head home to Connecticut where her children were waiting. Her sister was gone, and there was nothing but memories holding her here.
And she was almost ready to announce this decision to her family. Her sons had been in their twenties when their father died and she’d left to join her sister here in St. Louis. Her older boy had been living in South America, teaching English at a Brazilian elementary school. Her younger son had been in LA. She hadn’t expected them to return home when they started families of their own years later. But they had. They’d been hoping she’d come back ever since, though it was something they’d never pushed for before Sabrina passed.
Ida had held off on announcing her intention to return to her childhood home and her family, knowing when she did, her kids would be anxious for her to start the process. But doing that would be leaving behind Sabrina. And before she was ready for that, she wanted to make sure the cogs her sister had set in motion would continue turning.
Though Ida had first been skeptical, she saw how right her sister’s decision to leave her house to the shelter had been. During the long months it had sat abandoned with no life but Mr. Longtail and the mice he neglected to hunt, she’d had her worries.
But now she fell asleep lulled by the happy energy radiating out of it once again. Not only was her sister’s beloved house essential in healing those dogs, but something very important in the lives of two humans seemed to be happening as well.
Ida was hoping that after dinner tonight, she’d be more certain of this.
* * *
If Kelsey kept a bucket list of the zillion things she wanted to do during her life, canning fresh fruits and veggies would’ve been on it. The urge to try canning stemmed from trips she could hardly remember to her great-grandparents’ house. She’d only been five when they died, months apart, so her memories were sporadic. But one of them involved her great-grandmother’s garden and the canning she did in late summer. The small farmhouse counter had been lined with glass jars, and a large pot had been simmering long enough to steam up the small kitchen window over the sink.
Kelsey couldn’t remember what her great-grandmother had been canning at the time. From what her father had told her, she’d canned a bit of everything. Perhaps because her great-grandparents’ quiet farmhouse life had been so different from her jam-packed suburban one, Kelsey had wanted to try canning ever since she could remember.
Now that she was knee-deep in a rescue op gone viral, Kelsey wasn’t sure today had been the best time to experiment. But the refrigerator full of pears from Sabrina Raven’s private orchard had been tempting her for the last week, and Ida’s dinner invitation was the call to action she needed.
After finishing a few essential chores by late morning, she’d headed to the store for the supplies and returned with the hope of having the beautiful, fair-trade African basket she’d purchased filled with freshly canned jars of pears for Ida tonight.
After peeling four dozen pears and discarding seven or eight of them because they’d begun to rot on the inside, Kelsey had the rest sliced and simmering in the spiced sugar water.
She was scooping the discarded peelings from the sink into a paper shopping bag when Kurt came into the kitchen. He and his grandfather and Jim, the shelter’s volunteer electrician, had spent the last few hours working on the roof of the carriage house, patching a large hole and strengthening a few support beams.
His grandfather had been a frequent presence in the house the last week, and the old mansion was getting a face-lift as a result. Kurt’s grandfather and mother had rented a small, furnished apartment near Siteman Cancer Center for the course of her treatment. It was twenty minutes away, and when his grandfather wasn’t with her, he was here, working on the house. While Kelsey couldn’t exactly say she’d gotten to know him—he didn’t stop working until he needed to leave—she understood where Kurt got his ceaseless work ethic.
Sara’s surgery, a lumpectomy, had been outpatient. From what Kurt shared, she was recovering quickly. Her radiation was expected to start in the middle of next week.
After wiping his shoes on the rug—it had rained last night—Kurt joined her at the sink. His
