“We did have fun, didn’t we? You two coming to stay a few weeks was the highlight of my summer. I waited on the porch for your folks to bring you, and the day you left I spent a lot of time at the falls crying.” April smiled. “I’m glad we all came back home.”

“I’ll tell Jackson that I can start work full-time tomorrow. Shall we take it out of the frame?” Flynn asked. “I’m not willing to work on another one, but I will admit that doing this has helped me. April, coming here was the highlight of my summers, too.”

“I don’t have to tell y’all how much I loved my time here. Seems like it took coming back as an adult to realize that although I loved Nanny Lucy, it was spending time with y’all that was the real prize.” Nessa undid a few clamps. “I’ll get it all pinned while y’all are at work today, and we’ll get the hemming done after supper.”

Flynn got to his feet and rolled the kinks from his neck. “Sounds like a good plan to me. I’ll miss our time together out here, though.”

April pushed back her chair and stood up to help fold. “Let’s get this folded and . . . Oh, my goodness!”

“What?” Nessa undid the last clamp.

“Look at the back side.” Tears flowed down April’s cheeks.

Flynn flipped the quilt over, and all three of them went speechless. There was a photograph, maybe an eight-by-ten, right in the middle of the backing. Nanny Lucy was sitting on a quilt with all three of them gathered around her, and underneath she had written: Good memories.

“How did we not see or feel this?” Nessa wiped tears from her eyes with the back of her hand.

“Dammit!” Flynn’s voice cracked as he moved from his spot and hugged both of his cousins at once. “Grown men don’t get all weepy.”

“They do at times like this.” Nessa soaked his shoulder with tears.

“I hope Nanny Lucy meant it when she said the quilt brought good memories for her,” April said between sobs. “She deserved to have something good in her life.”

Flynn took a step back, pulled a white hanky from his hip pocket, and dried his two cousins’ eyes before he wiped his own cheeks. “She wouldn’t want us to carry on like this. Let’s get this folded and taken in the house.”

“Putting a quilt in the frame needs more than one person. I bet Stella and Vivien helped her, but how did she know that she wouldn’t be quilting anymore? Did she ever tell y’all that she was sick?” Nessa blinked away more tears. Flynn was right. Nanny Lucy had been strong, and she’d expect the same from them.

“Not me,” April answered. “She didn’t open up to me about anything—ever.”