A Year on Ladybug Farm - Donna Ball [128]
The leather tool belt they gave Farley made his eyes mist over, and Bridget’s, too. Sam brought his pregnant wife to admire the job he had done with their heating and cooling system, and Sonya the banker came with her husband and three big-eyed children, whom she kept warning not to touch anything as she wandered through the house munching cheese straws and admiring every nook and cranny. Plates were filled with ham and turkey and sweet potatoes and cheese biscuits and zucchini tarts and sausage dressing. Ida Mae discovered a Christmas album among her vintage records, and—without stereo speakers, without electricity—the strains of “Oh Little Town of Bethlehem” and “What Child Is This” were added to the happy cacophony.
“Do you know,” Lindsay whispered to Cici in a brief free moment between greeting and serving, “I don’t even know the names of half these people.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Cici replied, and the smile that spread over her face was of pure contentment. “They’re our neighbors now.”
Bridget, sailing by with a tray of canapés in her hands and a smile on her face big enough to illuminate the entire, electricity-deprived Eastern Seaboard, declared, “Have you ever in your life had a better party?”
Cici was about to agree that she had not when the door opened again with a gust of snowflakes and a blast of cold air, admitting yet another head-to-toe bundled guest. “Oh-oh, that one’s going to need hot cider,” she said, and turned to make her way toward the drinks table.
Lindsay caught her arm. “Cici,” she said softly.
And Bridget, too, stood still, holding the tray, staring at the newly arrived guest as she unwrapped herself. “Oh . . . my,” she breathed.
Cici turned at Bridget’s urging and watched as a snow-stiffened scarf dropped away from familiar features, a backpack dropped to the floor with a familiar shrug, an ice-encrusted toboggan cap was stripped away to reveal a cascade of fiery red hair. Feeling as though she was moving underwater, Cici made her way slowly through the laughing, jostling crowd toward her daughter.
Lori’s eyes were big with wonder as she looked around, and her face was filled with delight. “Mom,” exclaimed the girl who spent weekends in her father’s Bel-Air mansion, who partied with celebrities, who had forgone a ski trip to Aspen to be here. “Look at this place!” She opened her arms expansively, her expression filled with disbelief as she tried to take in everything at once. “Why didn’t you tell me? You’re rich!”
A laugh bubbled up from Cici’s chest and out through her lips, and by the time she had embraced her daughter in a fierce, one-armed hug, it had become mixed with hot, happy tears. “Yes,” she declared, and couldn’t seem to let go of Lori. “I am!”
Then, wiping her running nose with the back of her hand, laughing again when she couldn’t find a tissue, touching Lori’s hair, her sleeve, her cold face, she demanded, “How did you get here? Why didn’t you call?”
To which Lori returned, “Why didn’t you call? I had to hear that you almost died from a stranger? Your only daughter, and you don’t think I’d be interested to know that you fell off a roof? What were you thinking?”
Cici stared at her, the tears and the laughter drying up into pure astonishment. “What? How did you know? Who called you?”
Lori unbuttoned her parka, shrugging out of it impatiently. “Some woman who said she works for you. Housekeeper or something. Like you couldn’t call me yourself? Or get Aunt Bridge or Aunt Lindsay to call?”
Lori waggled her fingers at Bridget and Lindsay across the room, while Cici searched the crowd until she caught Ida Mae’s eyes. The older woman gave her a superior look and a half nod, and turned back to serving punch.
“But it’s not like I wasn’t coming