The Love Birds Complete Series

Whoever said you can’t go home again clearly never faced the arduous task of closing out their late mother’s estate. I felt that in my bones as I entered my childhood home and shut the door behind me before collapsing against it with a groan.
There were no direct flights from Seattle, where I’d just completed my master’s, to Baltimore. After braving two layovers, crowded airports, and what felt like the longest drive ever with a talkative taxi driver, I breathed a sigh of relief at the quiet stillness of the house. Returning to Cedar Haven was not my choice, but a part of me was glad to be home.
I left my suitcases by the door then shrugged out of my wool coat. Moonlight filtered in through the windows, but otherwise, the house was dark. Flicking on a light switch, I turned toward the living room. Little had changed since I’d left six months ago.
Well, that wasn’t completely true. The hospital bed was gone and with it the IV pole that had supplied my mother with the sweet elixir of pain relief. Also missing was the annoying, repetitive beeping that kept time with her heartbeat. I shook my head. What I would have given to hear that obnoxious beep again. The noise and her labored breathing had at least provided proof that she still lived.
I squeezed my eyes shut, fighting to suppress the ache in my chest. It had been a hell of a year. When I took off the spring semester last year to help my mom after her diagnosis, I never thought I would be planning her funeral six months later.
I crossed the room to my mother’s worn-out red couch, which contrasted nicely with the soft-pink cherry blossoms she and I had sponge painted on the wall behind it, a memory I would always treasure. The day of my parents’ divorce, she insisted we needed to liven up the place. My father never would have let her paint something so “girly,” as he would say, on the walls of a common area. In defiance, she’d roped me into helping her, and we’d spent a Sunday afternoon dripping paint all over the hardwood and laughing at ourselves.
The ache in my chest spread. She’d found a way to make a dark day bright but only after she’d extracted a promise from me. The promise was one I risked breaking by my mere presence in our house, in my hometown. But it was her fault I’d returned, so I supposed she couldn’t hold it against me if my fulfillment of that promise was delayed.
Sinking down into the lumpy cushions, I let my eyes sweep the room. The flat-screen television my older brother, Steven, had insisted on installing hung on the opposite wall, gathering dust. Had he stopped by at all to check on the house? If he had, it didn't surprise me to find he hadn’t done much cleaning. When we were growing up, he used to pay me part of his allowance to clean his room.
With a sigh, I pushed off the couch and headed to the kitchen. Picture frames dotted the walls, right where Mom had left them. Family portraits from before the divorce hung by the stairs, and framed collages of school pictures were on full display in the hall. As I moved deeper into the house, my annoyance grew as I realized how little Steven had bothered to do in my absence. A groan rumbled in my throat. Only then did it dawn on me what a monumental task I was undertaking as the personal representative of the estate.
My phone vibrated in my pocket—James had texted to make sure I arrived safely. Should I text him back? I hesitated before pushing the call button, needing to hear a familiar voice after a day surrounded by strangers.

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