Late in the morning on the day that altered her family’s fortune forever, six-year-old Penny Louise Lockshire sulked in her lukewarm bath. She slouched back and glared at the ceiling. Then she gasped. 

​

A tightrope of cotton-candy cobwebs stretched between the ceiling globe lights above. On any other day of the year, the sight wouldn’t provoke a second thought. A distinguished, bloomy rind ordinarily coated the surfaces of the Lockshire home—her mother was no domestic goddess and never aspired to be. No one expected perfection, at least where housekeeping was concerned. 

 

But for the past six weeks Mama had purged, scrubbed, and dust-busted to get ready for this weekend. Daddy insisted these two days had to go flawlessly. A weird energy had taken over the family: her goofball father had grown stern, her dreamy mother galvanized, her older sisters too preoccupied to pick on Penny, until she missed the teasing. 

​

Now here hung this forgotten cobweb, revealing the flaws her family had tried to hide. What if this ruined everything? 

Then Penny remembered that she didn’t feel particularly charitable toward her parents at the moment. In spite of the stunning blue skies and soul-warming sunshine outside, they insisted on keeping her confined indoors all weekend. She was expected to stay as pristine as the house itself. To play-act at being quiet and well-behaved. To appease a crowd of strangers Penny had no desire to know. 

​

Resuming her pouting, she slid back down to chin-level and stared glumly at her belly rising out of the graying bath water like a dormant volcano. Downstairs the screen door slammed and slammed. Since late morning she’d watched out the upstairs window as cars drove up their long driveway and parked on their broad front lawn in rows. People strolled up the lawn in small groups, carrying green and yellow Tupperware with LOCKSHIRE written in black marker on the lids. 

​

On any other day, Penny would have rolled out of bed and run down to the lake before bothering to eat breakfast. Her skin prickled with longing for the silky water and the cold mud and satisfying scratch of shells against her feet. 

​

But her daddy had laid down his ultimatum a few nights ago. “Stay out of the lake this weekend, Penny Louise, or I’ll tan your hide.” 

She’d laughed at him when he said it. He sounded so silly. Her parents, normally too distracted to enforce discipline, let Penny roam the woods and waters surrounding their property at will. If she’d ever heard talk of tanning hides it had been on TV. 

 

But her father James’s face remained stern. 

​

“I’m not kidding around, young lady. Don’t try me.”

​

Penny, who would try anything, hadn’t decided yet how she planned to respond to this challenge.

​

• • • • 

​

The preparations for the Lockshire family reunion had begun during Penny’s final weeks of first grade. One balmy afternoon she’d disembarked from the school bus to see black smoke rising from the back of their house.

​

Like most country people, the Lockshires burned their trash, but usually only on Sunday evenings. Curious, Penny climbed the driveway and rounded the corner of the house. She found her mother Kate in the back, wearing a pink apron and stacking a decade’s worth of Life magazines into a milk crate. 

​

“Collage, Mama?” It was a reasonable guess. Ordinarily, a stack of magazines in Kate’s hands meant she was about to embark on a spontaneous new project she’d dreamed up that day. 

​

“Not this time, baby.”

​

Penny dropped her book bag and sat on the back stoop. She watched as her mama fed the ravenous fire in the steel drum with the raw materials of her creativity—pile after pile of fabric, paper scraps, newspapers, catalogs, ribbons, and buttons.

​

Over the next few days, the rooms of the Lockshire house grew airier. Penny became newly aware of the crisp lines of tables and the actual colors of walls. Meanwhile, their normally energetic mother grew somber. 

​

“Why is Mama burning all her stuff?” she asked her sister Helen before bed one night. Normally Penny hated the nights her officious older sister handled her bedtime routine. She tucked Penny in with taut sheets that left her breathless and only agreed to read baby books because they were short. 

​

But Penny knew thirteen-year-old Helen to be wise. Plus, her older sister had been preparing for the family reunion by studying the Lockshire family tree—Jeannie-ology, she called it, as if Barbara Eden could fold her arms and poof up devotion to people Penny had never met. 

​

Helen, in the middle of reading Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See, sighed at the interruption. 

​

“The Lockshires are coming,” Helen said. 

 

“But we’re the Lockshires.” Penny knew this to be true.

​

“We’re not the only Lockshires, peabrain. Daddy has a big family: lots of cousins, aunts, and uncles. And his sister Sue is coming from California.”

​

“But why does that mean Mama has to get rid of all her stuff?” Helen’s explanation didn’t justify the erasure of their mother from the landscape of their home. 

​

Helen snapped the board book closed. Relieved, Penny plucked Brown Bear out of her sister’s hand and set it aside. 

​

“You know how Daddy’s great-grandfather built this house when he moved to Tennessee a hundred years ago?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Well, even though Daddy inherited the house from his dad, the house kind of belongs to the whole family. Mama and Daddy are sort of its caretakers, of the house and the family business. And Daddy wants his family to see that he’s taking good care of it all.”

 

“But…”

 

“Mama’s collection was starting to get out of control. It was time to clean it out anyway. But I think they also didn’t want to give

Daddy’s family another reason to not like Mama.” 

 

Penny stared at her sister. Who wouldn’t love their mother?

 

“You need to help Mama too. Don’t be wild. The three of us, you and Anna and I, need to be perfect children this weekend. Otherwise Daddy’s family is going to think she’s a bad mom.”

 

“She’s not a bad mom! She’s the best mom!”

 

“So do what she tells you and promise not to be a peabrain.”

 

“I promise.” Penny meant it at the time.

 

• • • • 

​

The bathroom door opened, and Kate burst into the room. “You’ve been in the tub too long, Penny. Let me dry you off.”

“I’m not a baby, Mama.”

​

Kate spread the towel open like a flag. “Out.”

​

She climbed out, letting her mother wrap her in the towel and rub her short hair dry with the end of it. Kate yanked a starched, gingham dress off a hanger on the back of the door. Penny recognized the dress as one formerly belonging to her sister Anna, who’d fought wearing it as hard as Penny was about to.

​

“I’m not putting that on,” Penny informed her mother.

​

“Yes, you are.”

​

“I am not.” 

​

“Penny,” her mama said in a low, even voice. “This weekend is very important for your father. We are all giving up something to make it a success.” 

​

She remembered her promise to Helen, but Penny couldn’t find it in herself to be good. She locked eyes with her mother. For good measure, she stomped her foot. 

​

When she was much older, Penny would remember this moment and understand why Kate softened. Her mother’s only hope of getting through the weekend with any dignity was to keep peace with her daughters. 

​

“Fine. Put on shorts. Go outside and play with your cousin Aaron from California. But do not go near that lake. Your daddy will tan your hide.”

​

Penny couldn’t believe her luck. In a brief moment of gratitude, she pointed up at the ceiling. “You missed some cobwebs, Mama, if you want to knock them down before someone sees.” 

​

Her mother blinked twice at the ceiling, then flashed a mischievous smile and winked at her daughter. 

​

“Go.” 

​

Penny was out the door before her mother could change her mind, slipping through the crowd of family members as deftly as a fish escaping a net. No one could hold on to her now.