Prologue
“ARE WE REALLY sure this is such a good idea?”
Kneeling beside a freshly dug hole in the springdamp, rich Georgia dirt, Savannah McBride looked up at her cousins as she asked the question. Inside the hole rested a mud-encrusted cypress chest that had once belonged to their grandfather, Josiah McBride.
Fifteen years earlier the cousins had filled the chest with personal treasures and buried it in this spot in the woods with the solemn promise to dig up their “time capsule” on Savannah’s thirtieth birthday. They were still several weeks shy of that occasion, but they’d impulsively decided to excavate the chest today to take their minds off the reason they were together—the funeral of Savannah’s uncle, Josiah McBride Jr.
Now Savannah was having second thoughts about revisiting the past. She winced as she thought of that childish letter, filled with grandiose plans that were so completely different from the way her life had actually turned out.
“Maybe we should wait,” twenty-eight-year-old Tara said after a moment. “It has been only fifteen years. Time capsule contents are much more interesting after more time has passed, don’t you think?”
Emily McBride, the youngest at twenty-six, firmly shook her head. “We’ve already trekked out here and dug it up,” she said. “We might as well open it.”
It was Emily’s father who had been buried that morning, after a long, miserable illness through which she had unselfishly taken care of him. And it had been Emily who’d talked Savannah and Tara into changing into jeans and sneakers and following the old path into the woods behind Emily’s house to this huge oak tree where they’d spent so many childhood hours, munching candy bars and sharing secrets.
“Besides,” Emily added, “wouldn’t you rather be doing this than hanging around in the house with all those other people?”
That clinched it, as far as Savannah was concerned. She’d rather wrestle an alligator than go back to that house full of chattering townspeople and cold greenbean casseroles, where she was constantly aware of the surreptitious glances slanted her way, the avid murmurs that stopped as soon as she approached, the carefully veiled comments that let her know the old scandals hadn’t been forgotten by the residents of tiny Honoria, Georgia.
“Your children aren’t with you today?” several had politely inquired, even knowing that Savannah rarely brought her twins to this place where they would be eagerly studied for family resemblances, where they were likely to overhear gossip that would only hurt them.
Go back to the house? Not until she absolutely had to, Savannah thought flatly.
“Okay, cousins. Let’s see what’s in here,” she said, dragging the old chest out of the hole.
Mud had seeped through the cracks and seams of the wooden trunk. Her hands protected by gardening gloves, Savannah plunged in and pulled out the filthy contents, while her cousins leaned close to watch.
The three shoe-box-sized plastic containers protected within the bags still looked almost new. Each box had a name written on the lid in faded permanent marker. Savannah picked up the first one. “Tara” she said, reading the childishly formed letters.
Looking uncertain, Tara reached out to take the box from Savannah. She held it as gingerly as if she’d packed it with explosives all those years ago, Savannah thought with wry amusement.
“Where’s mine?” Emily asked.
Savannah handed her the appropriate container and Emily moved away, staring at the box with a mixture of anticipation and fear.
The final container in the chest had Savannah’s name written on it with a flourish of curlicues and squiggles. She hesitated a moment before picking it up. Waves of memories flooded her mind, whirling, crashing, almost overwhelming her.
The first ten years of her life had been almost fairytale perfect. “Daddy’s little princess,” she’d been. She could almost see him now, coming home from a hard day’s work with sweat on his brow and a gift for her in his shirt pocket—gum, candy, a pretty ribbon, an inexpensive bracelet. It didn’t matter. She’d loved them all, because she’d adored him. How he’d spoiled her, telling her she was pretty, she was smart, she was talented, that she could be and do anything she wanted.