Where The Old Roses Grow

By Gracie Gable

A psychic prediction. A disappearing father. A world of secrets.

 

Rose Aberdeen and Jahi Adams grow up half a continent apart. She becomes a psychologist in Los Angeles, while he is a firefighter in small town Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

 

Death and disappearance threaten to devastate their lives, but an unlikely savior, a 500-year-old painting, shows up to redeem them.

 

Discover the backstory of Where The Old Roses Grow.

 

Click to read the backstory of Rose and Jahi in this Prequel for Where The Old Roses Grow.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gracie Gable
• Release date: Dec 22, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223085829

Book preview

1

ROSE

California

The beginning. First grade.

R ow, row, row your boat gently down the stream, I sing and gesture to my best friend, Martha Park, to join in.

Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream, we sing in unison.

Let’s do rounds, I say and concentrate on my part of the song as Martha starts hers. The third part goes unsung this time.

We skip on chalked-in hopscotch lines inscribed on the sidewalk. It’s been a long day, and I’m almost home. Our after-school voice lessons ended early because the teacher came down with a cold. I don’t mind one little bit. I had opera lessons yesterday at UCLA, where Daddy works, because he insists on it, which sometimes makes me groan.

Here I am, complaining about singing, but what am I doing? Singing!

My house is three blocks from the elementary school, so I’ll be home soon. I hug Martha goodbye when we get to her house and skip along her street singing to myself. As I turn the corner onto the next street, I stagger to a halt. Daddy’s in the street. My daddy’s six feet tall and he’s got green eyes like me. His hair is bright red, redder than mine. Like Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer, you can see it a mile away.

He’s leaning into a car with the windows rolled down. He’s kissing a woman with long, jet black hair!

I can’t look away. Daddy is supposed to be only kissing Mommy. Why is he kissing this lady? Why is he on this street? I stand there, stiff, like the Tinman in The Wizard of Oz. Daddy must feel me staring at him because he pulls his head back from the woman and faces me. My tummy hurts. It tells me to run, to hide, to leave the spot, but I can’t.

The lady turns her head to see what’s taken his attention and freezes when she sees me, her eyes wide open like in cartoons where the eyeballs shoot out of the character’s head, attached to springs. Everything moves in slow motion. I look away and run down the street, turn the corner, go up another two streets, and finally speed into my house, slamming the door behind me, confused.

The front door creaks open a few minutes later as Daddy tiptoes in. He disappears into his bedroom without looking at me. I’m in the living room, sitting on the couch, my hands and legs shaking and my teeth chattering. When I get nervous, I get cold and my teeth chatter like I’m sitting on a big ice cube. My lunch bag is still full of uneaten chips I’d usually munch on, but I’m not hungry. I sit here like a frog on a lily pad, unable to watch TV or do anything else while I wait for Mommy and Beatrice to return from school.

They burst through the door an hour later, bubbling over with excitement.

"You were fabulous today, Beatrice. It’s amazing how quickly you’ve learned to perform a piqué arabesque," Mommy praises my sister and Bea blushes. She can be shy sometimes.

Thanks, Mom, Beatrice says quietly. She’s three years older than me and quite advanced in ballet. She’s already won a bunch of awards. I'm the one who always receives praise for being a strawberry blonde, but Bea isn't as fortunate. People don’t make a fuss about her auburn hair. I know why they don’t, because it’s so pretty. But Mommy and I talked about it, and Bea gets all the nicer dresses that are brand new. Mommy thinks it will make Bea happy, but I know Bea still notices the compliments I get.

Daddy finally appears and acts like nothing happened.

Hey, that’s great news, Beatrice. I’m proud of you, Daddy smiles as he hugs my sister. He’s still not looking at me.

I say nothing as Mommy makes spaghetti with meatballs. When we sit down for dinner, Mommy and Beatrice jabber about ballet and don’t notice Daddy’s silence or mine.

That night, I lay in bed, tossing and turning, thinking about Daddy kissing that lady. What Daddy did is called cheating. Cheating is bad.

The rest of the week, I can’t think straight and nothing goes right. Daddy ignores me. Normally, he asks me to stand in front of him and says to anyone who will listen, Look how beautiful my Rosebud is. I’ve always loved that nickname. I feel close to him when he says it. But now, he doesn’t even mention my name.

I know it’s because of our secret. I can’t tell anyone what I saw on Wednesday. Mommy will be mighty mad and sad if I tell. She’ll cry so much she might cry her eyeballs out. That scares me. I would hate for her to go blind.

I just wish Daddy would go back to showing me off and telling people I’m the one who’s gonna make him proud, instead of Beatrice.

Every night, I think about our secret and wonder how I can get Daddy to look at me again and make everything right.

Daddy is a diehard opera fan. This year he enrolled me in private opera lessons with a voice teacher at UCLA, forcing me to drop ballet while he left Bea free to do whatever she wants. If I can’t take ballet, I’d rather flip through Daddy’s art books, the ones with the half-naked ladies, rather than sing opera. My favorite book has a lady with long reddish-blonde hair and pale skin, standing on a clamshell. Daddy tells me this is a famous Botticelli painting. I don’t know Botticelli, but I like his paintings.

I remember Daddy telling me he grew up dreaming of singing opera, but he never got the chance. Pawpaw pushed him