Where My Heart Belongs Read online

  “Why, God? Why is this happening? Why do we have to suffer this misery?” She felt alone . . . deserted. It was then that her heart started to harden.

  Kathy opened her eyes to realize that she was safely back in the farmhouse with Sunshine hanging on her every word. For several minutes Kathy could say nothing more. The pain of those memories had drained her of all energy.

  “What happened after that?” Sunshine asked. “What happened to Mom and the transplant surgery?”

  “There never was any surgery. Mom’s condition deteriorated much faster than the doctor had expected, and by the time a heart was available, it was too late. Everything else had started to shut down and her condition was far too compromised. They gave the heart to someone else. Someone more healthy.”

  “I’m so sorry, Kathy,” Sunshine said hesitantly.

  Kathy looked at her sister as if she’d lost her mind.

  “Sorry? You should be, but it doesn’t change anything. Sorry won’t bring our mother back to life. She died because of your selfishness. The pain of losing you was too much for her to endure.”

  Kathy couldn’t ignore the anger that hung on her every word. She moved to the door. “I hope you were happy with the choices you made, Sunshine,” she said, barely able to keep the sarcasm from her tone, “because none of the rest of us ever were.”

  FOUR

  SUNNY WAS ABOUT TO STEP INTO the kitchen when the telephone rang and Kathy answered it. “Still nothing?” she heard her sister say. Then, “Yes, I know it’s a lot of money. Yes, I can appreciate the situation, but surely you can appreciate my circumstances.”

  Intrigued by the comments, Sunny continued to listen. She knew she probably shouldn’t, but she feared Kathy wouldn’t volunteer more information.

  “It’s really the only hope I have. I’ve depleted all of my savings.”

  What in the world was she talking about? Sunny heard the desperation in Kathy’s voice. Something was wrong.

  “All right, then. Well, call me if you have any other news.”

  She hung up the phone and Sunny heard Kathy heave a heavy sigh. Rather than confront her about the situation, Sunny decided instead to visit her father. She backed down the hall and nearly jumped a foot when Kathy said her name.

  “Can you stay with Dad for a few minutes? I need to go out.”

  Sunny smiled. “Of course. I want to be useful.”

  “He shouldn’t be alone,” Kathy stressed. “If you can’t do it, say so now.”

  “I’ll do it. Don’t worry.” Sunny knew her reputation was in shreds where Kathy was concerned, but here was a chance to prove herself. “Just go for as long as you need.”

  Kathy said nothing more. She brushed past her sister in the narrow hall and headed out the front door. “I shouldn’t be gone more than an hour.”

  There was no other explanation. No comment about the phone call. Sunny watched her sister leave and felt the heaviness of the moment. Something wasn’t right.

  Kathy knocked on Sylvia’s back door and waited. After everything that had happened at home, Kathy longed only for some refuge—some semblance of normalcy. This familiar Kansas farmhouse would do the job. Kathy had been seeking help and encouragement from Sylvia for as long as she could remember.

  “Kathy, what a surprise,” Sylvia said, pushing back strands of blond hair. “I was just canning green beans. Come on in.”

  “I knew you’d most likely be busy, but something has happened and I needed to talk to someone.”

  Sylvia frowned. “Has your dad passed?”

  “No, but it won’t be long. He’s eating so very little, I know he can’t last.” Kathy followed Sylvia into the large kitchen. “The reason I came is going to come as a shock, so prepare yourself.”

  Sylvia shook her head. “I don’t like the sound of this.”

  “Neither did I. Amy . . . I mean Sunshine . . . has come home.”

  “Your sister?”

  Kathy nodded. “None other.”

  “She’s alive!” Sylvia continued to shake her head. “She’s actually alive.”

  Kathy couldn’t even begin to work up enthusiasm for that truth. “Yes. She’s alive all right. Alive and full of questions.”

  “Goodness, but it’s been over . . . eleven . . . twelve years. Where has she been all this time? How is she?” Sylvia seemed quite pleased. “It’s an answer to prayer. Your dad must be so happy.”

  Kathy felt an instant sense of frustration. If her best friend in the world couldn’t understand the pain this reunion had caused, no one would. “Dad is happy, but I’m not.”

  Sylvia pointed to the table. “Sit. I’ll get the coffee. The beans will wait.” Sylvia swung into action. She energetically maneuvered through the kitchen, first turning the heat down on the stove, then pulling down two mugs from the cupboard.

  Kathy took a seat at the rectangular table. Twenty clean quart jars were lined up and ready to receive the beans, but there was still plenty of room for the mug of coffee Sylvia placed in front of Kathy.

  Wiping her hands on her apron, Sylvia took a seat opposite Kathy. “I want to hear everything. Start at the beginning.”

  “I opened the door yesterday and there she was. She acted as though she hadn’t been gone any longer than to run to the store for milk. I didn’t want to let her in—something in me just rose up in protest. All I could think of was her barging back into our lives and hurting Dad worse than he was already hurting.”

  “What does she look like? Has she changed?”

  Kathy sipped the coffee and considered the question for a moment. “She’s all grown up. She’s filled out and doesn’t have that gangly teenage girl look to her anymore. Her face seems . . . well, it’s more like Mom’s, but not exactly.” Kathy frowned. “Actually, she looks a lot like Mom. Anyway, she seemed no worse for the wear. She dresses better than I would have expected and more conservatively too. She bleached her hair, but it seems to suit her. She’s got dark roots though.” Kathy added the latter as if it somehow lessened Sunshine’s appeal.

  “Wow, I can’t believe this. It just doesn’t seem real.”

  “Tell me about it. That’s why I came here. I don’t know what to do.”

  Sylvia leaned forward with a puzzled look. “What do you mean?”

  Kathy put down the cup. “I don’t want her here. I don’t know what she wants or why she suddenly chose to come back. Dad acts like it’s something to celebrate, and for him I’m sure it is.”

  “But we used to pray for her to come back. Don’t you remember?” Sylvia toyed with her cup. “I remember all those times we cried over what happened and begged God to bring her home.”

  Kathy hated Sylvia’s accusatory tone. “That was then. I stopped praying for her to come back a long time ago.”

  “But why?”

  Kathy hated the way she felt. “I know I sound absolutely awful, and I really don’t want to feel this way. I know I should be happy about Sunshine coming home—Dad was. Goodness, but you should have seen his face. He couldn’t have been happier if Mom herself had walked through the door.”

  “Well, in a sense, a part of her did. I can’t imagine what I’d think or feel if one of my children disappeared for twelve years and then suddenly reappeared.”

  Kathy felt such a sense of guilt. “I know. I thought about that.” She looked at her friend and buried her feelings of longing. For so many years Sylvia had lived the life Kathy had wanted. A good husband, three beautiful children, a farm and peaceful life. Sylvia had it all.

  Sylvia reached out and touched Kathy’s hand. “I can see you’re in pain, Kathy. I hate that you’re hurting, and I want to help . . . if I can.”

  Kathy sighed. “I’m a terrible person. I know that now. I should be happy to see Sunshine come home. But, Sylvia . . . I’m not. I’m terrified of being hurt. I’m frustrated by her intent to come back to make everything right, when it will never be right again. A part of me says she’s just here to ease her conscience so that she can
get on with her real life, while another part says to give her a chance.”

  “I think you should listen to the latter part.”

  “I know what I should do,” Kathy said, shaking her head, “but I don’t want to do it. I keep trying to pray about it, but I just end up straying from talking to God, and I start thinking of all the horrible things I want to say to Sunshine.”

  “Like what? Maybe if you say them to me, it will somehow diffuse the power they have over you.”

  Kathy considered the idea for a moment. It had merit. “Well, I guess I’d say she has no right to come back—not after all this time without a single word to let us know whether she was dead or alive. Not after having caused our mother a heart attack. Not after leaving our father so full of sorrow that he stopped being the man he once was—all vibrant and happy. She has no right to assume she could go off on her own terms and come back on them as well.”

  “So you think she should be here on your terms?”

  “I don’t think she should be here. Period.”

  “Do you wish she’d never let you know she was alive?”

  Kathy looked away. “Yes,” she whispered. “I think I would.”

  “But why?” Sylvia’s tone caused Kathy to meet her friend’s gaze.

  “I know it may sound strange,” Kathy said, drawing a deep breath, “but if she hadn’t come home, I could always pretend that she had tried years earlier and failed because she died or met with some tragedy.”

  “Would you really rather that have been the case? Would you prefer she had died?”

  Kathy folded her fingers together and then unfolded them. “Please don’t hate me, but I think I might. I could have pretended that she actually loved us. That she realized how stupid her choices had been, and that in repentance she had headed for home just days after leaving. But then something happened and she died. I know it doesn’t sound right, but it’s the only way I could have it all make sense. I used to lie awake at night and imagine that she’d been in some car accident and died while driving back home.”

  “And that made it better?”

  Kathy thought back to those memories. She had been convinced in her heart that if something along those lines had taken place, it would have somehow redeemed her sister. If Sunshine had died while trying to make her way home, Kathy could forgive her lapse of judgment and selfish demands. Of course, now it was very clear that nothing even remotely similar had happened.

  “It made it bearable,” Kathy finally managed.

  “I guess I never knew that,” Sylvia said, lifting her mug.

  Kathy wanted to crawl into a hole. She knew how stupid and heartless she sounded. “Sylvia, would you be able to forgive your children no matter what they did to you?”

  “Sure.”

  “Just like that?” Kathy looked at her intently. “There would be no thought to withhold that forgiveness—to make them pay for what they’d done?”

  “No. I suppose I would imagine all sorts of hideous ways in which they’d already had to pay. Kathy, a home should be a sanctuary or refuge. It should be that one place that, no matter how much time has passed, would always be open to you to offer hope and restoration.”

  “No matter the price to those you hurt? No matter the loss?”

  “I don’t think this is really about Sunshine at all. I think you’re terrified of losing your father and leaving the farm. I think you feel displaced and you’re wondering how in the world you can make the pieces fit together when someone keeps knocking the puzzle on the floor.”

  “It’s about people making selfish decisions without considering other people’s feelings.”

  “And you’ve never made a selfish decision?”

  “Not like Sunshine made. Her choices hurt people.”

  Sylvia got to her feet and went to refill her coffee cup. “So deciding to leave Slocum and all your friends wasn’t a selfish decision that hurt people?”

  Kathy heard the pain in her friend’s voice. She’d never once considered that Sylvia would be upset by Kathy’s choice to move to Colorado Springs. “I suppose I never thought about it that way. I didn’t realize it bothered you so much. I mean, you have Tony and the kids. How much could you possibly miss me?”

  Sylvia came back to the table with a look of disbelief. “We’ve been best friends since forever and you can ask a question like that? Won’t you miss me—miss our talks?”

  “Of course. But we’re lucky if we see each other once a week, and usually it’s more like once every few weeks, especially during the summer. I know we talk on the phone more than that, but it’s usually not for very long—and more times than not it’s related to our farms.”

  “Still, I always knew you were there—just down the road. I knew I could call and you’d be here. That’s not going to happen once you’re gone. You’re going to be looking for a job and a place to live. You’re even going to try to rekindle the romance that you put off. That was a selfish choice as well.”

  Kathy squared her shoulders, almost feeling as if she were preparing for a fight. “How can you say that? I put Mom first. I even put Kyle first—not myself.”

  “Don’t be so sure. You did what you had to do to get by—to deal with the mess at hand. You gave Kyle no say in the matter.”

  Kathy set down her mug with more force than she intended. “I did. When he came back and apologized for getting so angry with me, I heard him out. I listened to what he had to say. You don’t understand how it was, Sylvia. Kyle’s career would require him to travel. He needed that in order to advance. We knew then that it could even require international travel. He knew that eventually it would mean we’d have to leave Kansas. I couldn’t go, so I set him free. What’s selfish about that?”

  “You chose how things would be and then dictated those choices to him. You did the same with me. I can still remember that phone call telling me that we couldn’t get together anymore on Saturday mornings. That I probably shouldn’t even call unless it was some sort of emergency. Do you have any idea how that felt?”

  Kathy rubbed her temples and tried to think. “It was only until Mom was better. I felt too incapable of handling the situation unless I put up boundaries. I knew Mom would need a lot of care. I knew I couldn’t give her the quality attention she needed and keep up with fifteen other things. If that’s selfish, then all right—I was selfish.”

  “But why should your selfishness be any more forgivable than Sunshine’s?”

  “Because my choices weren’t made for me. They were made for my mother.”

  “Think about that for a minute, Kathy. Your mother would have loved to have you marry Kyle. She was delighted that you two were planning to marry. Kyle would have been on the road working for the pharmaceutical company, and you would have been free to live at home and care for your mom. When he came home from his trips, he could have comforted you—encouraged you—loved you. Those would have been positive things—not negative. Your mother might have even found his presence a comfort. Instead, she may very well have died believing that it was her fault for having separated the two of you.”

  “That’s not true. She knew better. I told her I sent Kyle away because . . . well, because I needed the space. I needed the . . .” Kathy stopped. She hadn’t thought about the way she’d handled things as being anything other than selfless. Now her best friend was telling her that the choice had been selfish, and unfortunately, it all made too much sense.

  “I’m sorry,” Kathy finally said after several moments of silence. “I never meant to hurt anyone. I felt like I was coming apart at the seams. I took the only way out that I knew would work.”

  “I don’t want you to regret the past and your choices, Kathy. I just wanted you to see how easy it is to misjudge motives. Sunshine made selfish choices based on what she felt she had to do. She probably felt like she was coming apart at the seams. Leaving was no doubt the only way out that she thought would work.”

  “But leave for twelve years and say nothing to an
yone? Never send a letter? Never call?”

  “At first she probably didn’t care to do either, and then, as the years went by, maybe she thought that no one would receive it even if she tried.”

  “Why are you on her side?”

  Sylvia shook her head. “I’m not. She was wrong—cruel to leave you all guessing. But I’m a mother, and I’m trying to help you understand why I would open my arms to a child who hurt me so deeply. The deeper you love someone, the more painfully they can hurt you. Your father is dying. Seeing the child he’d given up for dead or thought lost to him forever has got to be the biggest blessing in his life. He probably feels like dancing a jig. He probably feels better than he has in months. Would you take that away from him?”

  “Of course not.” Tears came to Kathy’s eyes. “I guess I never thought of it that way.”

  “When you love someone, you only want the best for them. Just like I want the best for you. If that best is in Colorado Springs, then I can bear the pain of my loss.”

  Kathy wiped her eyes and gave a little laugh. “You make it sound like I’ll be gone forever—like I’ll never come back.”

  “What do you have to come back here for? Be honest, Kathy. Your father and mother will be gone—the farm sold. Short of a few friends, Slocum, Kansas, will have nothing of interest for you.”

  “It’s only a five-hour drive. I’ll come back often—I promise.”

  “Please, Kathy. Don’t promise me something like that. It’s not fair. I’ll always love you and be your friend, but don’t pretend that things won’t change. We’ll both do what we have to do to get by. I’ll invest myself even more in my family, and you’ll turn to Kyle and your aunt and uncle. We might even make other friends.”

  “But none of them will ever take the place of what we have,” Kathy protested.

  “Of course not. We will always be close, but it will be different. Kathy, you have to find a way to leave the past behind you. You have to find a way to forgive Sunshine or you’ll never be any good to Kyle or anyone else. No matter how many miles separate you and your sister, you’ll steep in an anger that will eat away at your heart.”