Yet without children, Sheila also thought, What do I know?
Being alone so much of the time during Jim’s nine months away, things that had happened in her past came to mind.
One story that Lily repeated so often it became Sheila’s own story, centered on the night that her grandfather, Thor, showed up at a little apartment Carl and Lily and Sheila, who was only a few months old, lived in. This apartment was upstairs in the house owned by Rose, Carl’s widowed mother, in the town of Chambers, Minnesota, population 2,500.
Carl worked at a flour mill, loading bags on trucks. He would return to the apartment powdery white each night. Lily would laugh and say, “I didn’t care.” She was so happy to see him that white powder soon covered her. On weekends, in order to bring home extra money, Carl tended bar at Bernie’s, a tavern located a few blocks away from the apartment.
This summer evening of 1946, despite being by herself, Lily would tell Sheila, “I felt complete peacefulness, rocking and nursing my baby—you Sheila.” That is until she heard a clunk-clunk-clunk of heavy boots coming up the steps on the outside wall of the house. These were followed by a bang-bang-bang of someone’s fist striking the door to their apartment. “I almost didn’t answer it. Who could have been stopping by after 9:00?” Then, she said, “I couldn’t hide there like a frightened mouse. I was a wife and mother. An adult.”
She buttoned her bodice with one hand, pushed fine blond hair behind her ears, and tucked a pink blanket around Sheila, who slept in her other arm. Lily opened the door.
There, standing under the porch light, a brown felt hat pulled down almost concealing heavy-lidded, pale-blue eyes, fist raised and ready to pound again, stood the father she hadn’t seen in more than ten years. Lily stared at him, speechless.
“Been to Bernie’s. Heard about my new granddaughter.”
Sheila would imagine Lily pulling her close, so tightly that she awakened yowling at Thorvald Norstad hulking there.
He said, “Great lungs,” staring into Sheila’s puckered, red face.
Several times Lily tried to cover her with the blanket.
Tiny fists flailing, Sheila pushed the blanket aside. Her face carried an expression that seemed to declare, “Do not touch!”
“Aren’t you going to invite your father in?” the old man demanded.
Sheila pictured Lily thrusting out her pointed chin and for the first time ever, standing up to Thor. “I have to put my baby to bed.” With that, she slammed and bolted the door, before collapsing against it. A minute or two later, Lily heard her father’s heavy boots descending the stairway.
A bit past 2:00 Sunday morning, after the bar closed, Carl tiptoed up those same wooden steps. Entering the apartment, he found lights ablaze and Lily wide awake.
“Why did you tell him I was here?” were her immediate words.
“Never did!” Carl’s features darkened. “If I find out who it was, they’ll have hell to pay. The boss would’ve let me come home if we figured Thor headed this way.”
Bernie Olsen, the owner of the bar, along with almost everyone else in Chambers, knew of Thorvald Norstad’s wicked nature, so unlike the mythical god Thor.
“It’s all right,” Lily said, relaxing now that Carl filled the apartment with his presence. “He won’t come back. Sheila scared him off.”
“How’d she do that?” Carl sounded bemused.
“She was in my arms and yelled her little head off as soon as I opened the door.”
He gently held Lily. “Don’t worry. I’ll never let him hurt you again … or Sheila.”
He gazed into the bassinet at his sleeping baby girl. A moment before his heavy black eyebrows had been knitted together, and his near-black eyes had sent off sparks. Now, his face resumed its easy smile, dimples deepening. Touching the baby’s cheek at her own dimple, he said, “None the worse for her ordeal.”
“Wore herself out,” Lily said, and added, “Sheila has good instincts.” She scrunched her eyes shut and rubbed her forehead.
“You’ve got a headache.” Carl lifted Lily’s chin. “Let’s get you a bit of whiskey before going off to bed.”
Grown up, making it on her own, sometimes Sheila didn’t feel strong at all. Sometimes she felt alone and frightened by nighttime noises. The sound of someone pounding for half an hour or more on one of the other apartment doors caused her to pull the covers over her head and hide. She’d repeat, in a muffled voice, “I’m the strong one.”
CHAPTER 9
Lessons
EVERY PAYDAY SHEILA SHOPPED FOR JIM. SHE BOUGHT HIM STACKS OF “CIVVIE” SHIRTS because she wasn’t sure what else he would like. She knew he would bring special things back from the cruise—maybe a jade ring or a pearl necklace—gifts that looked like they could have been purchased stateside. She’d told him not to bring back any red and black enamel bowls or boxes.
Even if he didn’t bring presents for her, Sheila wanted lots of stuff to give to him, in addition to the money she saved for a car. Shopping made her feel closer to him. She imagined his broad shoulders in the plaid and striped shirts. Placing her accumulated purchases in a circle on the Murphy bed, turning the radio on, she fantasized about their celebration when he finally came home.
In June of 1966, Jim’s ship docked at Yokosuka, giving the men an opportunity to call their wives and girlfriends with news that the time apart would soon end.
Sheila had been waiting for almost a week, every night going to bed with the thought that, Maybe he’ll call in a few hours. She would toss and turn. When his call finally did come through on a Tuesday, long after midnight, she had dropped into a sound asleep. She groggily listened to several rings, rubbed her eyes, then jerked awake, and grabbed the receiver.
“Jim … Jim, is that you?”
“It’s me, doll baby. I didn’t think you were going to answer.”
“I was out of it. Haven’t been sleeping much.”
“Sorry the call took so long.”
“How are you?”
“I miss you. Can’t wait to get home.”
“I miss you so much … when will you get here?”
“I don’t know. They only give us possible information.”
“Sure are secretive … I love you.”
“You know how much I love you.”
They continued to stumble through more words like these. Every attempt at other types of conversation felt like they were total strangers, hunting for a common language.
After several minutes, Jim said, “I have to go. Other guys are waiting.”
“Be careful of those Yokosuka street girls,” Sheila couldn’t help but say, the one thing besides endearments that lurked in her mind.
“You, too … ah … what about all your friends at work? Been going out with them?”
“I don’t have that many friends at work. And no, of course I haven’t been going out with any of them. I’m either at the plant or in the apartment.” There was a catch to her voice. “Here for you.”
“It won’t be too much longer … and we’ll never be apart again.”
“I hope not.”
Before he hung up, Jim said, “I’m going over to the Rollys’ tonight. I’ll greet them for you.”
“Sure, do that.” She felt barely able to get the words out. “I haven’t heard from Brenda in quite a while.” Remembering Ted’s sleazy behavior and Brenda’s endless whining letters, the tears came harder than ever. She couldn’t even tell Jim about Ted being such a jerk. When he got home she’d let him know exactly what she thought of Ted Rolly, his supposed friend. How can Brenda stand him?
The call ended when Jim repeated, “There’s a whole line of guys pushing for the phone.”
She could hear rumbles in the background and said for about the tenth time: “I love you so much.” After she hung up, Sheila used the bathroom and went back to bed, where
she cried herself to sleep. Hearing his voice, and knowing it would still be months until he returned, having nothing much to say, and such a short time to say it, made this the worst night of the cruise.
She awakened to what sounded like a waterfall. Overflow gushed onto the floor. The innards of the tank had gotten stuck. Not knowing about the intricacies of plumbing, she made an emergency call to Mr. Grey, who came running down to her apartment to dam the flood.
“This is the knob that turns water off,” he said. “If this ever happens again, turn it right away. This could cause a lot of seepage downstairs.”
Sheila nodded. She went over to her one chair and set her guitar aside. She sat down, clutching her robe, knees under her chin, feeling like a chastened child.
He rapidly sopped the water up with a mop and pail, his robe swinging.
When he came into the living room, the pail in one hand, the mop in the other, his robe parted.
Sheila thought, So pitiful.
Mr. Grey slurred, “Gotta get back to the wife. She’s havin’ a really bad time. Needs me to talk to her all night long.”
In addition to having a painful conversation with Jim, Sheila learned about the functioning of toilets that night and about being so drunk from sadness that a person couldn’t even feel his own nakedness.
Her best friend at work was Jane, and by extension Mary Beth. At first, Sheila spent time with Mary Beth to please Jane, but with their weekly lunches the two became fairly close.
Mostly, Sheila talked about how much she missed Jim. Mary Beth didn’t seem the least bit interested in any of her plans for the future. Mostly, Mary Beth complained about her mother and brother. She had no plans for her own future.
“She’s always into my business,” Mary Beth would say, between bites of a hamburger and fries, and sips of a milkshake. “I can’t stand it. One of these days I’ll move away.”
“Your mom cares about your happiness. She’s trying to help you figure things out.”
“Control me. That’s what she wants to do. She tries to control Bradley, but there’s no way he’ll let her tell him what to do. So, she targets me and he bosses me around.”
Sheila felt like saying, You don’t know what it’s like living with a parent who really tries to control you. She didn’t. What good would that do? She let Mary Beth go on and on, hoping that the positive things she said might help.
When Sheila felt the loneliest, like after the horrible night of the disappointing phone call and the flooded bathroom, she missed a really good friend the most. Even though she talked to Jane all the time, it wasn’t the same. She didn’t want to come between Jane and Mary Beth. She and Brenda had gotten close. They were near enough in age so Brenda seemed to understand the things that were important to Sheila. But that ended.
Occasionally she splurged and called Patty. These conversations never made her feel better. By now, their feeble attempts at communication felt awkward. They had so little in common—Patty talked about studying for tests and going to keggers, Sheila talked about boring office work and missing Jim.
Often, she thought of Grandma Rose and wished for her arms and soft bosom to cuddle up to. And wondered how she was doing with her failing mind, living in the home. Sheila had been the first grandchild in the Doty family, the one born after Rose’s husband, Carl Senior, died in a pheasant hunting accident. That next spring of 1946, along came Sheila, Grandma’s make-up gift from God. She never doubted how much Grandma loved her, because of words spoken every time they were together. Tommy, who was the only other grandchild, had never been the same for Grandma, of this Sheila felt certain.
Grandma had often said, “Sheila came to replace Carl in my heart.
Because of the glowing comments everyone made about Carl Senior—that he was honest and hardworking and loved his family and had a beautiful singing voice—Sheila came to think of this unknown grandfather as the saintly one, even though she had never seen him.
She had actually seen the wicked grandfather when she was only a few months old. Thorvald Norstad, the one who tried to barge into their apartment. All she ever heard about him were horrible stories—he beat his children, they wore terrible clothes from farm auctions, ate awful food like mush without meat or vegetables. From overheard conversations and secretive looks that passed between her two aunts and her mother, Sheila knew there were worse things.
After the saintly grandfather died, Carl and Lily lived with Grandma Rose for a couple of years in the upstairs apartment of the old two-story, yellow frame house. Sheila learned to walk in this house, on the dark varnished wooden floors. Later, she learned to climb the steps on the wide stairway that led to their apartment, going up and down for practice, holding a railing she could barely reach with the tips of her fingers. At last, she could go downstairs, by herself, to where her grandmother lived, where she was welcomed with open arms and that huge, soft hug.
Another of Lily’s stories was about how Rose was the only one who could comfort Sheila, a colicky infant. “Your grandmother snuggled you against her large breasts, and within minutes, you fell fast asleep.”
Sheila came to think of those breasts as Grandma’s pillows. A miniature woman, no more than four foot eight, with a little beak nose and arthritic knees, she looked like a barnyard hen rocking back and forth as she walked. Grandma blamed the size of her bosom on the binding cloths forced upon her by the nuns in the Catholic orphanage where she grew up when she developed too soon and too conspicuously. “My muscles broke down,” she would say. “Mean things like that made me run away from that awful place.”
Another story Sheila heard from her mother many times took place when she was three years old and she had a new baby brother named Tommy. Maybe she was so traumatized that its details became imprinted on her mind, and it also became one of her own stories.
As she packed to go find Daddy, Mama said, “Tommy’s putting on weight. Getting more content.” There had been bad problems with his birth. For weeks, Mama barely spoke to Sheila, preoccupied with caring for the little intruder.
Meanwhile, Grandma was always there to hold her.
Sheila shared books with Tommy every day, sitting next to his bassinet, trying to make him happy, trying to like him. She told Mama it was her reading that made him better, but Mama shook her head and said, “Don’t be silly. He doesn’t even notice you.” Grandma believed Sheila. Grandma never told her that she couldn’t really read, that her books were just memorized. Grandma sang, “You Are My Sunshine” for Sheila with her beautiful high soprano.
Skipping along the platform, sun shining on her strawberry blond ringlets, the little girl chanted, “We’re going on a big train … a big train … a big train.”
She held her grandmother’s hand. Grandma carried one suitcase in her other hand. Sheila smiled up at the buxom lady, tripped in her Mary Jane’s, and turned her eyes to her mother, anticipating a reprimand. Lily forged ahead, carrying the fussy blue bundle in one arm and the second suitcase bounced against her knees.
By the train, Grandma dabbed at her eyes with a lacy handkerchief. Sheila thought, Must be dust. “Pretty soon we get to go … get to go … get to go,” she singsonged.
“Be still,” Mama said in a tired voice.
They climbed aboard and went to a little room that she called a sleeping compartment. She put the suitcases on shelves, made a nest of blankets for Tommy, and placed a cushion in a corner by the window for Sheila to be with her books.
“Grandma can sit next to me.” Sheila patted the seat.
“She’s staying in Chambers.”
“No! Grandma’s going with us, aren’t you, Grandma?”
“I’m sorry, dear. I have to take care of my hou …” Grandma’s voice stopped like she had a piece of popcorn stuck in her throat.
“You must go with us!”
“Quiet, Sheila! You’ll upset Tommy.” Then, “Rose,
you better leave. She won’t calm down until you do.”
Grandma gave them all hugs and kisses and as Sheila pressed into her pillows, whispered, “I’ll be thinking of you every day. Be good for your mother. Help care for Tommy.” She stumbled out of the little room, amidst the sound of sniffles, bumping into the sliding door frame.
Through a blur of tears, Sheila watched from the window. Soon, the train chugged away, and her favorite person in all the world was left behind on the platform, a limp hanky fluttering in the wind.
Mama wiped Sheila’s runny nose and straightened her rumpled pink dress. “It’s time to go to your father. He hasn’t even seen Tommy.”
“I don’t want to go! I hate Tommy! I want my grandma!”
“You don’t mean those things. We’ll be a family again. You need to help me take care of Tommy.”
For the next two days, as the train bumped along, the little girl cried. Every few hours, she dropped off into a hiccupy doze, only to awaken minutes later, and start crying again. Squeezing her eyes tightly shut, with tears and snot covering her face, she tried to pretend that Tommy wasn’t there, that he wasn’t cradled in her mother’s lap. Every once in a while he let out a burp-like sound, to let her know he was still around. ’Scuse you, Sheila thought.
When they pulled into the Kellogg, Idaho, station, Carl, wearing a big grin, stood on that platform, waving. They came down the steps from the train. A dark brown man in a blue uniform followed behind with their suitcases. Sheila had never seen anyone like him, but she didn’t say so. She looked at the ground.
Making It Work Page 10