Page 8 of A Whim and a Prayer

Winnie couldn’t help but grin as she thundered down the wooden staircase in her saddle shoes, aware her mother would be cringing, wondering where she went wrong with Winnie when Hope and Julia were so refined.

“I’m off!” she shouted as she barreled into the living room after dinner, where her mother knitted, her father read the paper, and her little sister Julia sprawled on the Persian rug doing a crossword puzzle.

“Where to, Pooh?” her father asked, looking up from his paper with his reading glasses perched on the edge of his nose.

Although Winnie thought her parents were two of the handsomest people for their ages—her father sixty-three and her mother, forty-seven—tonight her father appeared overly tired, which always worried her, given his age. But then as editor-in-chief of The Boston Herald, he had a lot on his mind, she supposed. She leaned to press a gentle kiss to his head, lips squirming as she glanced at her mother. Not the least of which was his wife.

“Abby, Beck, and I have a planning meeting with Mrs. Cullen at Cathedral High—you know, for the Boston Children’s Aid Society fundraiser?”

“Oh, that’s right,” her father said with a tired smile. “I forgot.”

“And it’s no wonder, darling, working late every night like you do,” her mother said as she laid her knitting aside, no doubt to do battle with Winnie. She shifted her focus to her eldest daughter, her tone suddenly strained. “How late will you be tonight, sweetheart?”

Winnie silently fumed as she bent to kiss her mother’s cheek. “I don’t know, Mama, that depends on Mrs. Cullen, but not too late, I shouldn’t think. Although Abs, Beck, and I might stop at Robinson’s for a malted after.”

“Oh, Winnie, do you think that’s wise? You do have orientation tomorrow ...”

Winnie smothered a groan. “Seriously, Mother? I’m almost eighteen—”

“Not for four more weeks,” her mother corrected with a sudden edge to her tone.

“And I’m a sophomore in college, for heaven’s sake—”

“And it’s precisely for heaven’s sake that I keep such a close eye on you, young lady.”

“Charity, let it go,” her father said in a quiet tone of authority that trumped her mother’s. “Winnie’s right. She’s a young woman in college, sweetheart, so she deserves an element of freedom.”

Her mother issued a grunt, almost making Winnie smile.

Almost.

“Yes, well it’s that ‘element of freedom’ that I’m concerned about,” her mother muttered. “No later than ten-thirty, then.”

Bypassing his wife’s comment, her father offered a gentle smile. “Have fun, sweetheart, but be home by midnight, all right? You driving?”

“Midnight!” Her mother sat straight up with eyes wide, palms gripped to her chair.

“No, Daddy, Beck is, and you know what a good driver he is.”

Her father grimaced. “Yes, but it’s not his driving I’m worried about, Pooh. It’s that old jalopy of his.”

AHOOGA! AHOOGA!

Said jalopy blared out front, and Winnie expelled a grateful breath. “Whoops, there he is now, so I better scoot. G’night, Daddy, Mother, Jewels.”

“Not too late, all right? And take a sweater—” her mother called as Winnie hurried out the front door, grateful for her father’s intervention. At least one of her parents realized she was growing up and should be given more freedom to live her own life.

Just because she was small for her age and skipped a grade didn’t mean she couldn’t be trusted. She unleashed a heavy sigh as she bounded down the brick walkway lined with boxwoods interspersed with her mother’s newly planted mums.

Sometimes she felt like a prisoner in her own home, the way her mother tracked her every move, just like she’d done with Henry, but even more so, it seemed. True, Hope and Julia were the perfect daughters, but for crying out loud, Winnie wasn’t that bad, was she?

Relief expanded her ribcage when she spied Beck butted against the passenger side of his car with arms folded. Slowing her pace to a casual stroll, she delivered a cheerful smile, which he returned as he opened her door.

“You look flustered,” he said, obviously ignoring the free-and-easy demeanor she’d worked so hard to display, hating that her mother could always ruin her mood with a mere look or word.

She huffed out a cleansing breath and slid into Beckett’s 1936 Chevrolet 6 with its tan herringbone seat covers—a hand-me-down gift from his adopted father that Beckett meticulously maintained.

Waiting for him to round the car and get in, she turned as he slammed the door and started the ignition. “How do you do that, anyway?” she demanded, both relieved and a little miffed that her best friend could decipher her every mood no matter how hard she tried to hide it.