Evanelle shook her head. “You’re putting it off is what you’re doing. When you have to do something, you have to do it. Putting it off only makes it worse. Believe me, I know.”

“I’m trying,” Fred said. “I bought rose geranium wine from Claire.”

“What I’m saying is you have to talk to him. Don’t wait for him to come home. Call him and ask the serious questions. Stop putting it off.” Fred got a stubborn look to him, and Evanelle laughed. “Okay. You’re not ready for that. Maybe the wine will work, if you can get him to drink it. But no matter what you decide to do, you should probably do it with shoes on.”

Fred looked down at his stocking feet, horrified, and hurried back into the store.

With a sigh, Evanelle walked up the sidewalk, looking in windows. Most of the morning joggers were gone, so maybe she would just go home and clean up before she went to visit Sydney. Claire was a little panicked, though she tried to hide it when she called Evanelle last night to tell her about Sydney’s arrival. Evanelle calmed her down and told her everything was going to be all right. She reminded Claire that coming home was a good thing. Home was home.

Evanelle passed the White Door Salon, where women with too much time on their hands and too much money in their purses paid way too much for haircuts and hot-stone massages. Then she stopped in front of Maxine’s next door, the posh clothing shop that the women from the White Door liked to shop in after their hair was done. There in the window was a button-down silk shirt.

She walked in, even though they hadn’t put out the open sign yet. Her gift was like an itch, like a mosquito bite in the center of her body, and it wouldn’t go away until she did what it demanded.

And it suddenly, insistently, demanded that she buy Sydney that shirt.

Sydney woke up with a start and checked her watch. She hadn’t meant to fall asleep. She stumbled to the bathroom and drank water from the sink, then she splashed her face.

She left the bathroom and stopped to check in on Bay, but Bay wasn’t in her room. Her bed was made, though, and some of her favorite stuffed animals were sitting on the pillows. She checked all the rooms upstairs, then jogged downstairs, trying to stave off panic. Where did she go?

Sydney walked into the kitchen and froze.

She’d just walked into heaven. And her grandmother was right there, in every scent.

Sugary and sweet.

Herby and sharp.

Yeasty and fresh.

Grandma Waverley used to cook like this. When Sydney was young, Claire always found a way to run Sydney out of the kitchen, so Sydney would sit in the hallway outside the kitchen and listen to the bubble of sauce boiling, the sizzle of things in skillets, the rattle of pans, the mumble of Claire and Grandma Waverley’s voices.