Ardath Mayhar by The Crystal Skull

Author:The Crystal Skull [Skull, The Crystal]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2012-02-02T15:37:50+00:00

YOU CAN’T GO HOME AGAIN

(This one grew out of a dream. I do have interesting dreams!)

A swirl of oak leaves danced out of the wood, across the road, and slapped pettishly at the windshield. For an instant, the cool October moon stared through their mottling shadows into my face. Then they blew on, and the road shone dimly in the glare of the headlights.

It was familiar, yet there was a difference. The sharp curve that my hands were braced for had turned into a gentle arc, banked to hold a car on the road. The uphill grade was cut down. I no longer would have had to shift into second to keep the engine from clattering, though my powerful Lincoln took any grade without a problem.

The cut that had lowered the road left banks rising as high as the top of the car on either side. There it was dark, for the moon was still low and it was early evening. At the darkest point, something pale and small flashed through the cone of light and was gone. A cat? Perhaps the umpteenth great-grandchild of the Angora that my mother had doted on and tormented?

Then I was at the top of the hill, looking out across clear space that had been thick stands of oak and ash and pine, when I left home. The house shone in the moonlight, tall and commanding. Mama always resented the forest that hid her imposing home … she must have had it cut at last.

I wished it back with all my heart, but the shorn meadow glimmered mockingly as the moon rose higher and the stars stared down. The house stared, too, from bleak, malicious windows.

I eased off on the gas, slid the lever into neutral. The car eased to a stop. How many years was it since I left that house behind? Almost thirty … I had left my girlhood behind me, since last standing here. It was no rebellious nineteen-year-old who now returned to claim the heritage she never wanted and would never have possessed except for the deaths of two well-loved brothers.

Sitting there, sheltered from the pitiless moonlight, I thought of Ed and Vance. My big brothers, always sources of pride and frustration to me. Kind, off-handedly patient with my unfeminine presence, they bridged, to some extent, the hostile gap between my helpless smallness and Mama’s powerful will. They meant me well, even while leaving me out of plans, ignoring my questions and comments - and me. I never quarrelled with either of them, and now I was grateful for that. That unforgiving house could not charge me with disliking my brothers!

I shook myself from that dazed recollection. Fanciful notions, for one considering herself a skeptic! Now I owned that tall house, lock, stock, and barrel. I could burn it down, if I chose, for the insurance had lapsed while the lawyers tried to locate me to hand over this unexpected and unwanted heritage. They had had no cash to pay insurance or upkeep.

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