Excerpt of Sugartown by Leandra Logan

Tina Mills had forgotten about the miniature Royal Doulton tea set.

She set an Old Country Roses cup on a matching saucer and whimsically lifted it across the long table in salutation. "Your tea, Daddy, just the way you like it."

It was easy to envision jolly Bill Mildenderger seated opposite her, accepting his refreshment. As he had twenty- five years ago.

Hard to believe so much time had passed since her childhood parties here in the family dining room. Harder to believe she'd lost her dad completely in a pileup on the Long Island Expressway eight years ago. A pharmaceutical salesman, he'd been on the way home from one of his tristate trips that took in parts of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. He'd had the same territory for decades, and judging by the Christmas gifts that had poured into their Brooklyn house every year, many customers found him as charming as Tina did.

Tina had been at Columbia University when it happened. Looking back, she remembered a strange feeling, midafternoon during a film editing class, around the time Bill's soul left his body at the crash site.

That was how close she'd felt to William E. Mildenderger.

Upon college graduation several months later, she'd left Brooklyn for Tribeca, finding a loft space to live in and starting up a small independent film company called Reality Flicks with her school pal Emmy Snow.

Tina had been surprised to discover that in his will her dad had left money to her separate from that which he'd left her mother, Angela. She hadn't thought about it much at the time and had just been grateful for the chance to make a financial contribution to Flicks along with her monied socialite pal.

Their venture had taken off eighteen months later when their documentary on battered women who were trapped in poverty won accolades at film festivals around the world. They'd been on a hot streak ever since, chasing one story after the next.

Tina had never stopped to look back until now, at age thirty, sitting in her old Brooklyn house on Hillerman Street. She set the tiny saucer down on the Irish lace tablecloth and studied the delicate red and gold floral cup in both hands. It was empty now. Back then it would have been filled with 7-Up or lemonade, anything that could be easily cleaned in case of spillage. Angela Winston Mildenderger had always hated mess, and would not have approved of the father-daughter tea parties with her china and on her lace, both handed down from the Winston side. Mother was all about taking sides. Building high walls around herself. She'd certainly keep an emotional distance from her only child.

Tina rose from her chair and moved back to the giant hutch standing open at the opposite end of the room. She'd been in the process of unloading it when she'd paused to sit for one last tea party. The back of the hutch was mirrored, and she couldn't escape her reflection as she resumed emptying the shelves of treasures. She'd always wondered why her mother had never warmed to her. Perhaps because she was so like her father, with his long, slender form, unruly black hair, high cheekbones and generous mouth. Tina had a strong Mildenderger personality, as well — boisterous, impulsive and direct. Not bad traits for a film producer, but a constant irritation to a repressed soul like Angela.

Mother liked rules. Structure. Self-control.

Still, it stood to reason that whatever she'd originally appreciated in Bill, she'd have found equally admirable in Tina. But even as a small child, Tina sensed that Angela merely tolerated her husband, and was frequently exasperated with him. It didn't stop Bill from making physical, spontaneous gestures toward his wife, a twirl around the kitchen, a surprise bunch of flowers, unexpected takeout Chinese. Sometimes in an unguarded moment with her sisters, Angela's face filled with humor and affection. But mostly her mother was a one-woman corporation.

Tears slid down Tina's cheeks as she thought of her mother's present state, robbed of coherency by a severe stroke, sentenced to a nursing home. Angela's life expectancy was only a matter of months. Incapable of communication, she wore a vacant stare, as if the vital part of her had already moved on to a better place.

Tina mourned what could have been between them. Intimacy. Joy. Chances lost forever. And because of all this Tina didn't want children of her own. She didn't feel she knew how to be a mother, after her own childhood experience.

The dining room was in the front of the house and because it was a warm September day, Tina had opened the windows for some fresh air. Hearing an engine in the driveway, she glanced out between the blinds and saw that she had company — her aunts Peggy and Jean. Tina watched Angela's younger sisters emerge from Jean's giant red van. The three Winston women were close in age and all were of similar make and model, with stout and plump bodies, pale- blond hair and dark-blue eyes. Peggy was the kindest of the trio. The pampered baby of the family, she at least had some humor and playfulness about her. Which was why Tina had chosen to contact her in particular, with a cordial message that she was going to be at the house, sifting through family things to hold an estate sale to help raise funds for Angela's care.

Car doors slammed. Hard.

They didn't ring the bell, and Tina didn't expect them to. The sisters were totally at home in one another's homes. Now they stood in the foyer like awkward children, staring into the dining room. Tina's heart squeezed in sympathy for them. They usually shouted, Knock-knock! to Angela and she would shout her location in the rambling two-story.

"Hello," Tina ventured softly.

They moved into the room, jaws slack, eyes riveted on the table stacked with china and glassware. Peggy was the first to recover.

"How are you faring, Tee?"

Tina smiled weakly. "It's been tough. Mom's always been so healthy. This is the last kind of trouble I expected."

With a passing glance to stony Jean, Peggy moved to hug Tina. "I know, Tee. Angela ate healthy and exercised. Sixty isn't all that old anymore by today's standards. Jeanie and me, we're only years behind her. It's all very scary."

Tina hoped to lose herself in her aunt's embrace, but it was too light and brief for any real comfort.

Arms folded across her chest, Jean stiffly moved to the open hutch. Her tone was as tight as her short, outdated perm. "Your message to Peg mentioned some kind of sale?"

"I hate to part with anything, of course. But Mom's hospital bills must be paid —"

"There is the health insurance!"

"Jean, her coverage is only eighty percent. Have you seen some of the itemized bills? Hundred-dollar pills? Ten- dollar bandages?"

Jean's haughty turn and lift of her double chin suggested she hadn't.

Tina traced a finger along the top of an ornate captain's chair at the head of the mahogany table, her voice even but firm. "We all know that Mom is never coming home. Seems best to use Mildenderger resources to make her final days as comfortable as possible."

"Bill sure owes her that much!" Jean stated.

Peggy gave her sister an elbow nudge. "You always did have a good head for things, Tee. While we understand and appreciate your intentions —"

"We want some say in what goes out of here!" Jean blurted.

Tina's voice held audible strain. "I called you here as a courtesy, because I'm sure certain items hold special value to you." Because I thought you'd give me a boost in this latest crisis. She wouldn't lower herself to reveal the weakness, the huge hole in her heart, drilled deeper and deeper with every passing year of their indifference.

"There are some things, Winston things, we will want, Tee," Peggy said, her voice tighter now.

"Winston things," Tina repeated warily.

"Things from our mother," she clarified.

"My grandma."

Jean inhaled sharply. Peggy shot her a warning look.

To Tina's own surprise, she was feeling more angry than sad. This was fortunate, as it kept the tears at bay. "What, exactly, is your problem?"

"Well..." Jean began, "we have reason to doubt your family loyalty. I mean, you changed your name and all."

"I shortened Mildenderger to Mills, yes," Tina said in surprise. "I did it because of my production company with Emmy. Instant name recognition is important. Dad would have understood, and it is his name at issue."

"Oh, sure, he would have gone for anything," Jean muttered.

Just as the Winston sisters went for nothing.

Tina briefly studied them, perplexed. "Are you mad that I didn't choose the name Winston?"

"No!" they chorused with a force that set her back on her heels.

Tina took a steadying breath. "I only wished to give you an opportunity to take a memento or two —" Her voice broke off as Jean feverishly grabbed a crystal butter dish.

"This belonged to our mother!" Jean plopped the dish on a free corner of the large lace-covered table.

"Fine. One butter dish for Jean."

"There is a whole set, the set must stay together." Jean edged between the open hutch doors and rooted through shelves. She triumphantly produced salt and pepper shakers, a creamer and a sugar bowl. Stacking it with the dish, she frowned. "The cover to the sugar is missing."

"Dad broke it years ago."

Jean nodded heartily. "He broke a lot of things."

"Jeanie," Peggy sniped. Jean pointed jerkily at the loaded table. "You choose something, Peg. Hurry up! I already know what I want next."

Peggy took hold of one of Tina's coveted Doulton teacups. "I want those, Peggy," Tina swiftly admitted. "Of everything here, they mean the most to me."

"But they are Winston pieces," Jean said primly. Peggy held the china to her chest, uncertain what to do. Tina was flabbergasted. "Technically, they all are my pieces."

The sisters looked as though they'd been slapped. And wanted to slap back. Pain and anger swelled through Tina, but she wouldn't let them see it. She'd never let them see it.

"I asked you over as a courtesy. Hoped at such a harsh time we could pull together."

"But the very idea of selling family treasures," Peggy said mournfully.

"Not all the treasures," Tina corrected. "Just things that no one really wants or needs. I don't like this, either, ladies. But it's my responsibility as heir and executor to see to Mom's best interests."

"As if Angela would want it this way!" Jean cried.

"Bill set up the will. Angela didn't change it because she thought she had all kinds of time."

Tina gaped at her. "Are you telling me Mom wouldn't want me looking after her?"

"Jean is overreacting," Peggy said hastily.

Jean whirled on her sister in fury. "I am not! You know I'm not. We've been in complete agreement until the minute we walked into this house. Now you're getting all wimpy."

"Jean," Peggy cautioned. "Tina suffers, too."

Jean sniffed in dismissal.

"Never mind," Tina said. "Why change the habits of a lifetime? I was never good enough to play with your kids outside the holidays. Never said the right things or wore the right clothes or did any damn thing right!"

With a trace of shame, Peggy averted her gaze.

Jean pounded the table. "There are Winston things and there are Mildenderger things. We will want possession of all the Winston things! Period."

Tina gasped in outrage as Jean skirted the table and frantically began dividing pieces by origin. "How dare you?"

Jean's pudgy face flushed. "I am loading up my van. Just try and stop me."

"Slow down," Peggy ordered, wrapping plump arms around her sister.

"But she isn't entitled, Peg. She's not one of us."

"I'm not one of you?" Tina challenged in shock.

"Not a Winston at all!" Jean buried her face in Peggy's shoulder and began to sob. "Angela's already left us! It's all over. I miss her so much!"

"We shouldn't have come here. Let's go home." Peggy's voice was gentle but her intentions were forceful as she steered Jean toward the foyer.

Tina was in quick pursuit. "What is Jean talking about, Peggy?"

Peggy never stopped moving. "She is half out of her mind with grief. Pay no attention."

"How ridiculous. She basically said we're not related!"

"I spoke to Angela's doctor after I got your message," Peggy said breathlessly. "She's expected to last three months at the most. Surely there are enough savings to last that long."

"Maybe. Barely."

"Let's postpone all this for now — until the cash is needed."

Postponement. A typical, passive Winston reaction. Did any of them ever face an issue head-on? "Wait! Please, Peggy! I'm not who I think I am?"

Peggy yanked a despondent Jean down the stoop. "That's not for me to say."