Rachel Goddard 01 - The Heat of the Moon

distance, our eyes met.
    Now. It was time, whether I was ready or not. Fighting down panic, I opened the car door and stepped out. She expected a stranger. I would be that stranger. I would play the part until I knew enough to make a decision.
    As I crossed the street, my bag slung over my shoulder just as Caroline had carried hers, Barbara came forward onto the lawn. She was smiling.
    “Are you Rachel?” she asked in the husky voice I’d heard on the phone last night. She offered a hand.
    “Yes, I’m Rachel Campbell.” My voice rose a note higher than normal. “Thank you for letting me come.”
    I reached out and touched my mother, slipped my hand into hers, felt a gentle warm pressure before she broke the contact. A wash of regret made me realize I’d expected to feel an immediate connection. But she was just a middle-aged woman, no one I knew.
    Up close I could never have mistaken her for Judith. Her face, beginning its surrender to the downward tug of age, was fuller, without Judith’s high cheekbones, and her eyes were a clear blue. But there were striking similarities between the two women’s coloring and lithe figures. Obviously Michael Goddard had liked this type.
    A shadow suddenly dimmed her eyes, and I felt the clutch of alarm. She does recognize me . Then she brightened again and widened her smile.
    “Another redhead,” she said. “Did you see my daughter leaving just now? Red hair runs in our family. My grandfather, my father, my brothers and me.”
    I could only smile and nod. In my mind rose a vague image of a man with red hair who hoisted both my sister and me onto his knees, so that our feet dangled together. Our grandfather, an uncle?
    Thrown off-balance by this slice of memory, I barely heard Barbara’s remarks about the beautiful autumn weather, the warm sunshine. I followed her up two broad concrete steps, across a black rubber welcome mat, and into the house.
    “Have a seat,” she said. “I just made a fresh pot of coffee for us. I’ll be right back.”
    She vanished through a doorway, leaving me in a living room with periwinkle blue walls and carpet. The fireplace, its mantel painted white to match the rest of the woodwork, was the focal point, with the flowered chintz sofa and chairs angled in front of it. A pleasant but bland space, utterly lacking the individuality and elegance of Judith’s living room.
    I shook my head. Don’t think about Mother.  
    Listening, I tried to determine whether anyone else was in the house. The only sounds I heard were faint clinks, no doubt Barbara gathering things in the kitchen. We were probably alone, thank God.
    I studied the framed photographs that crowded the mantel. Caroline with a flute in her hands. A blond boy who must be Mark, my half-brother, holding a soccer ball and wearing a tee shirt with Little Devils printed on it. In other pictures they posed in dress-up clothes, or romped in deep snow with a mixed breed dog that resembled an Irish setter. At the end of the row of photos sat a large one of Barbara herself with a blond man, arm in arm, smiling.
    This was her second life. Where in these captured moments of family happiness did Michelle and I belong?
    I was startled by Barbara’s sudden presence at my side, a touch on my elbow and a drift of floral perfume.
    “That’s my husband Mark with me,” she said, nodding at the photo. “On our last anniversary. And that’s Mark Junior.” She gestured at the boy with the soccer ball. “I’d introduce you, but they’re both off fishing with some of my husband’s buddies. That’s our daughter Caroline, you saw her.”
    My smile felt stiff. “You have a beautiful family.”
    “Oh, don’t I?” she said, laughing with pleasure. “I’m so blessed. I thank God every day.”
    A cold fear traveled down my spine and lodged in the pit of my stomach, a dread of revealing myself and seeing not joy but consternation in my mother’s face.
    Maintaining an outward calm that had nothing to do with what I felt, I sat on the sofa as she indicated. She settled into a chair across from me. On the table between us she’d placed a painted wooden tray with a glass coffee pot and two mugs.
    “Cream and sugar?” She lifted the coffee pot, filled a mug. “Just black?” She handed me the cup. “Tell me about this paper you’re writing.”
    Avoiding her eyes, I gave her my rehearsed story.
    She nodded and asked several questions. Like Steckling, she kept glancing at my scarred hand but