Simon spread his hands. “I don’t know that, either. I think there was a lot of personality in the family—my grandmother, as well as my mother.” He paused, as if he were going to say more. “They were very dramatic, emotional people.” A tension had crept into his voice, his mouth tightening, his eyes narrowing.
“Well, you know what they say,” Abby said, only semi-joking as Simon started the car, “dysfunctional families are ones with people in them.”
“Right.” He managed a small smile before seeming to shake off his dark mood, the way a dog shook off water. “Anyway, looking back, I don’t suppose you realize at the time that you’ve lost touch with someone. You just see them less and less, a gradual slipping away. I think that’s how it might have been for my grandmother and her sister.”
“So you never met Lily.”
“No, not that I can remember.” He considered for a moment. “I’m quite sure I didn’t.”
Simon started to reverse out of the driveway, and Abby waved to the Wegmans, who were still standing on the front doorstep.
“And when you’re a child,” he continued ruminatively, “you don’t think about the adults in your life having lives of their own, do you? They’re just part of the backdrop—weekend visits, slipping you a sweet or a fiver. When I was older, I asked my grandmother a bit about the war—I did my thesis in university on the Mass Observation Project, and I wanted her input.”
“The Mass—what? What was that?”
“People were encouraged to keep diaries during the war, to record their thoughts and feelings as well as what they got up to, and then send them to a national review. It’s a fascinating glimpse into what life really was like back then. I wrote about whether the diaries were an accurate reflection of wartime life, or if people were writing down what they thought others wanted to read. Anyway, I asked Granny about it, but she didn’t have much to say, at least that was personal. She’d talk about rationing or the Anderson shelte
r in their back garden, but it all seemed pretty removed from what she was experiencing or feeling. And she didn’t mention Tom Reese until shortly before her death.” He shrugged. “Your father is right in that, I think. There are some things people just don’t want to talk about. I would have asked more, but it felt invasive.”
“I can understand that.” Abby knew she certainly wasn’t one to press anyone about anything. And yet the result was a vacuum of knowledge, a yawning ignorance, and one that she felt now more than ever.
Lily and Sophie. Two sisters, eighty years ago, and somehow her grandfather had been involved. How? Why? What had he needed to forgive Sophie Mather for?
“Do you have to get back?” Simon asked. “Or would you like to grab some lunch?” They were driving through Genoa City’s main drag, a friendly-looking street with a variety of brick and clapboard buildings on either side, looking as if it had fallen straight out of the 1950s. Simon nodded towards an old neon sign above a small diner. “That place looks like it could have been around in the Bryants’ time.”
“Yes, something out of that Rainbow Corner Helen mentioned.”
“So are you all right to stay out a bit longer?”
Abby hesitated, caught between temptation and a niggling anxiety. Would her father come back to the house for lunch and notice she was missing? Would he care? She was thirty-two years old. She didn’t need to answer to him for absolutely everything. She just felt like she did, an endless atonement for the way she’d once failed.
“Yes, although I should get back fairly soon to let Bailey out,” she said at last. “But another hour can’t hurt.”
Faye’s Diner was nearly empty when they walked through the door, a waitress behind the counter pouring coffee for a lone customer at a table in the back.
Simon slid into a red vinyl booth in the window with an expression of delight.
“This place is amazing. I’d say it’s retro, but I don’t think it’s ever changed. It’s vintage.”
“Hopefully the food isn’t,” Abby quipped as she took one of the slightly greasy laminated menus that had been stuck between the salt and pepper shakers and perused the usual offerings—all-day breakfast, burgers and hotdogs, club sandwiches and fries.
“The food looks delicious,” Simon declared. “I’m going to eat my body weight in French fries.”
Abby laughed at his air of intent. “I am not,” she assured him and he pretended to look crestfallen.
The waitress came to take their orders, and she asked for a club sandwich, while Simon was as good as his word and asked for a large order of French fries, along with a cheeseburger.
“They seemed like a sweet couple, didn’t they?” Abby remarked once the waitress had gone.
“Douglas and Stella? They did. I’m sure I could include lots of lovely tidbits for this book I have yet to write.”
“But you will write it, won’t you?” Abby asked. Something about his tone made her think he doubted himself.
Simon shrugged. “To be honest, I’m feeling more interested in the mystery of my grandmother and your grandfather than writing about a load of other couples.” He paused. “Your father’s reticence made it seem even more like a mystery to me. I know you don’t think he’s hiding something, but if he was… what would it be?”
Abby glanced out the window at the sleepy main street of the little town. The heat was radiating up from the black tarmac in visible waves, and not a soul was in sight. “Honestly, I have no idea. I think he just doesn’t like anyone digging into his past, getting personal.” And neither did she.
“Was he close with his father? I know you don’t remember him, but did you ever get a sense of their relationship?”