The Waking Bell

by Jackie Weger

  “I do.”

  Matt said it with such certainty that I calmed and took a deep breath. No words came. I found I could only stare at him. The bells began to fade.

  “What if I told you I understand?” He rubbed his chin, struggling for his words. “Do you believe that Otis is the first man who is a homophile?”

  Startled by his comment, I caught my breath and lowered my gaze. He lifted my chin.

  “Goldie wants to talk with you,” he stated with a firmness he had never used with me. “She is coming over after lunch. I want you to listen…there’s more you need to know.”

  “What more do I need to understand?” Words choked in my throat. “I know that it’s wrong…ever so wrong.”

  “Do you?” he said. “I mean, we are told that it’s a sin, and we readily condemn any who lean in that direction, but why would the God that we worship create creatures who desire the same sex and then rebuke them for how they were made? We are all sinners, Cady. Who are we to judge?” He slung his hand toward the road. “The Bible tells of many sins. Tell me what the difference is between Walter McGee having an affair with Gina Mills or Tatter Connally gambling his last paycheck. For that matter, Deacon Whitmore driving drunk and almost killing his boy. Do you want me to go on?”

  I put my hands over my ears. I didn’t want to hear it. There was no excuse…for any of them. I felt strong hands lowering my arms.

  “Remember when I talked about my Canadian Air Force bunk mate, Clifford Tutte?”

  “You said he died on your last mission with the CAF.”

  Pressing his lips tightly together, he nodded slowly. “He did, but it wasn’t by the Germans. The shot that took his life came from his own hand. When we landed, I found him with a single shot through his temple. It didn’t come from the outside. There was no entrance hole. I went on the outside of the plane and put one through it so he could be declared a hero instead of a suicide.”

  Matt swallowed hard and continued, “The night before, I had been told that my transfer into the U.S. Air Force had been accepted. It was then that Cliff had confessed his secret to me… that he preferred the company of men. I never would have guessed it in a million years. He was a strong, athletic kid from Nova Scotia. He had met a guy in our unit. I reckoned they began an affair. Then it turned ugly. Someone saw them together and started to blackmail them both. He was so distraught. He told me he didn’t have any more money to give. The blackmailer threatened to send a letter to our commander. Cliff said that it would have killed his parents.”

  Matt shook his head and stared up at the ceiling. “Cliff cried when he told me he never wanted to be that way. He wanted to be what everybody else considered normal…he prayed to God to make him normal. There was no normal for him. I believe he took the only way he could see out of the situation. I cried with him when he told me he was a homosexual…because he was more like my brother than a buddy. We had been through so many missions together. We depended on each other. Helped each other survive from one flight to the next. Sometimes I think it was more nerve-wracking to wait for the call to go up than it was to answer it. I got through it because of him.”

  Matt rested his hands on her shoulders. “Don’t you see, Cady Blue? It wasn’t his choice to be the way he was. He lived in constant fear of discovery. Why would anyone want to live that way by choice?” He paused and collected himself. “I believe it is the same way for Otis. I can’t say I understand an attraction to another man, but I do feel compassion for someone who can never declare the love they have for another.”

  “They betrayed me, Matt…used me to hide behind…as if I condoned their behavior…” The hurt relayed in my voice, I was certain, was unmistakable. “Frazier was angry at me… when I broke whatever we had off…”

  My words faded. My hands covered my face to hide the tears streaming down my face.

  “I can’t answer why Frazier did what he did, but Otis is your family…the only father you’ve ever known. He’s cared for you, protected you when your own relatives didn’t. Families are never perfect, but nothing is. Goldie wants you back, and I think you need them as well.”

  I looked back up at him. “How can I forgive him?”

  “I don’t think he’s asking for your forgiveness, Cady Blue. Just acceptance by his daughter.”

  Matt drew me up into his arms and held me. I will admit to being relieved to have shared my secret with my husband, but I realized it wouldn’t be easy to give Otis what he wanted. I didn’t know if I was ready to make that leap.

  But would I ever be given a choice? My nature was to run. Today, though, they weren’t giving me a chance. I would have to face Goldie this afternoon.

  We walked down to the lake. By the time we returned, Goldie was at the cabin sitting on the deck with a glass of iced tea in her hand which she must have gotten out of the ice box. Goldie had no problem making herself at home. Strangely, it put me more at ease.

  She sat there in her overalls and the sun hat I had brought back from Charleston. The lines etched in her face seemed deeper when she frowned at me.

  “About time,” she said. “Thought you two got lost or something.”

  “Good to see you, too,” Matt replied. “I’m going in to make some sandwiches.”

  I realized he was giving us time alone. Goldie gave him a look of pure gratitude. I hadn’t seen that look often.

  Being Goldie, she didn’t waste small talk. She came to say her piece.

  Taking a deep breath, I took a seat by her. “It’s good to see you. I missed you.”

  “Really?” she huffed. “Ain’t the way it seemed when you stormed out of the house and drove off.”

  “What else did you expect me to do?”

  “Listen,” she stated. “You owed that to me…to Otis. Just cause you married a Pritchard don’t give you a right to look down your nose at us.”

  “I would never—”

  “Disrespectful. I didn’t raise you that way.”

  “I was shocked. Hurt.”

  She blew out as she stared a hole through me. “We needed to work it out as a family…we are still family?”

  “Always,” I said in a voice not much louder than a whisper. Guilt surged through me because of my actions. Most times when I ran away from a situation, it had been to Goldie. This time, I had run away from her.

  “Then start acting like it,” she said bluntly. “And doncha go thinking I’m here to make excuses and beg forgiveness.”

  “But, Goldie…”

  “Ain’t no buts. Otis is the way he is and always been. He has to hide who he is because the world won’t accept him. Don’t mean his momma don’t.” She clutched her heart. “Doncha think I wanted him to be an ordinary man. I can’t—won’t—turn my back on him. He’s a good man, Cady Blue. It’s time you know that before he packs his bags and leaves.”

  “Leaves?”

  “He won’t say so, but I ’spect that he can’t take ya looking at him like you did.”

  “Goldie, he betrayed me.”

  “Betrayed?” She huffed again. “Girl, there was no way you were marrying that preacher man, but I didn’t know about the two of them, either. You need to know that.”

  I admitted to myself that fact made me feel better. I saw that she was deeply affected by the events.

  “I love my son, but I don’t never want to know nothin’ about…you know.”

  Nodding, I reached over and took her hand. Tears welled in her eyes.

  She gripped my hand tighter. “There’s something you need to know, child. Your husband has been after me since I told him.”

  I released her hand and straightened in my chair. “What do you mean? What did you tell Matt?”

  She twisted her mouth in a way she did when she was thinking. Her hesitation told me that it was something bad. “About the night your daddy died.” She took off her hat and wiped the sweat from her forehead. “There’s something that no one else knows except Otis and me…and now Matt.”

  I ca
ught my breath. Suddenly, I didn’t want to know what it was. The bells began.

  “Your daddy didn’t die trying to save you in the fire,” Goldie continued. “Your mother killed him.”

  Chapter 13

  In silence, I listened to a sordid tale about the night my father died. Looking back, it marked a turning point in my life.

  Growing up, I had accepted the story of my parents. My father was supposed to have been a hero. He was praised for sacrificing his life for me. He’d supposedly lost his life because of me. Instead, Holden Reeves had been the devil incarnate.

  The mother I had known had been a drunk. Momma couldn’t even look at me without a drink in her hand and tears running down her cheek.

  Goldie had been the one to care for me.

  Now, after all this time, Goldie believed I should know the truth. At first, I was resistant. I shook my head at what Goldie was trying to say. My world spun as the words echoed around me, but flashes of remembrances told me she spoke the truth.

  At some point, Matt came out and stayed by me. By then, everything seemed unreal, like Goldie was talking about someone else’s life.

  While Goldie talked, I imagined my mother as she must have been. Beautiful. Young. Innocent. I imagined her excitement in falling in love with a Reeves. She probably couldn’t believe her good fortune to catch his eye, much like I had been when Matt came into my life.

  Momma came from a poor mountain family, poorer than most around here. From what I had seen of them, they lived a simple life, but the men seemed to have an aversion to good hard work. At least, that was what Goldie had said.

  “The Goodmans are too fond of the bottle. The whole lot of ’em,” Goldie had told me more than once. It was the reason they made no objections when Goldie took me in after Momma died. “Wasn’t going to let them get hold of you. They didn’t care. It was one less mouth for them to feed.”

  As for the Reeves’s reason for not taking in an orphan grandchild, I surmised that it had to do with the scorn they held toward Momma. Ginny Rose had insinuated that it had been Momma’s fault that my father died.

  Goldie said they had never inquired about my welfare. Moreover, I don’t think she would have cared even if they had. She never liked the Reeves.

  Walking back in time is hard for the soul. I wrestled with truths that had to be faced. I thought for a long moment of blocking out what I had no desire to hear.

  It was an ability I had conquered when I had gone to school and engaged with the other children. I learned that it was easier to deal with unkind words and bullies by pretending they didn’t exist.

  But I wasn’t a child anymore. I had to trust Goldie and summon the courage to face the past.

  As she talked, I realized the truth was harder than the lie I had led. The dark tale unwoven seemed much like another person’s life, not mine.

  “Your mother fell for Holden’s charms long before they married. She got herself pregnant. Holden,” she grimaced. “From what your momma said, refused to marry her and laughed at the suggestion. Like most folks around here do, she came to me. She had nowhere else to go.”

  Goldie was then as she was now. It wasn’t surprising that Goldie had taken Momma by the hand and walked straight up to Holden Reeves while he was working at the bank. Goldie had called him out. “His father, Boyd Reeves, stormed out of his office madder than a hornet. He wagged his finger at us, saying, ‘No son of mine will marry that slut. Nothing more than white trash. Hillbilly. All she wants is his money. I won’t have it. I say, no. Get on out of here.’”

  As the story unfolded, I imagined Mr. Reeves standing there, pointing at Goldie, condemning her version of my parents’ love story. He’d accused Momma of being a seductress, trying to trap his stupid naïve son into a marriage in hopes of gaining the Reeves’s money.

  “I had said my piece,” Goldie continued. “I didn’t expect anything else at that moment. I wanted the town to know whose child it was. At the very least, Holden Reeves could be held responsible and support you,” Goldie said. “I took Naomi’s hand and walked back toward the door. Boyd ran in front of us and looked at Naomi’s growing stomach. ‘That’s no grandchild of mine,’ Boyd stated firmly. ‘Don’t try to pawn off your bastard on us.’”

  Goldie rubbed the side of her face. There was something in her eyes that revealed how hard it was for her to tell my story. It made me nervous.

  “I’d misread Holden,” Goldie said. “He called the next day. I asked him if he wanted any tea. Before I could even make it, I looked up to see that he had taken off with your mother. I was pleased. I thought he had stepped up to do his duty. At the time, I didn’t know that Holden’s actions were made not out of love for Naomi, but out of spite for his father. He openly defied his father and married your mother much to the chagrin of the Reeves.”

  I remained quiet, listening to the unfolding story.

  “Lordy!” Goldie shook her head. “Holden up and quit his job at the bank and seemed unable to get another. His thrill in the show of defiance was short lived. Frustration set in and, in turn, he directed it toward Naomi. It wasn’t good for your momma, child.”

  Goldie’s tale went into detail of the abuse Momma endured and the dominance at the hands of Holden Reeves. Black eyes. Bruises. A broken collar bone. Yet, Momma refused to leave him until it got so bad, she had no choice. “Naomi always went back to the bastard, though, because of one reason—the one thing that your momma valued more than anything else—you. He told Naomi if she left him, she would never see you again.”

  Goldie said that she had no doubt he meant it. Despite the Reeves’s aversion to Momma, they still supported their son financially. They had bought Holden a nice house not far from them. While Momma worked as a waitress at Logan’s Restaurant, Ginny Rose would come over and help look after me.

  “I begged her, child, to leave that man. Nothing but evil in him,” Goldie said. “She never could do it for long. I sent Otis over several times to threaten Holden not to hit her. Beat him up once. Afraid it only made it worse. The night came when the phone rang,” Goldie said in a solemn voice. “Otis rushed me over. We walked into a horrific sight.”

  She described Holden Reeves naked in my bedroom—on my bed—with a knife in his back. Momma sat in the corner, cradling me in her arms as a child’s fire truck alarm rung.

  I had flashes of a man’s face above me with a look of shock. I saw him turn angry and slap a woman hard to the floor where the fire truck lay. I felt a warm, sticky liquid on my skin before I was whisked away.

  A sudden barrage of sounds assaulted me. Screams of pain. Screams of horror. The fire truck bells ringing.

  I felt arms about me, rocking me. I was safe. Safe in her arms.

  Pushing back through the pain, I returned to the present. Goldie explained there was nothing to do for Holden Reeves. He was dead. Beyond help. She made the decision to protect Momma.

  Nothing good was going to come from the truth. Otis burned the house and covered up what had happened. A story was made up for Old Man Reeves, one he would accept…one that made his boy a hero.

  “No one knew except you, Momma, and Otis?” I asked, but the look on Goldie’s face told otherwise. “Who else knew?”

  She sighed. “I suspect the Reeves knew well enough. Naomi said Ginny Rose had warned her not to leave you alone with Holden.”

  I rose and leaned against the railing. I felt sick, but I couldn’t let them see. I would never admit the revulsion I felt against my own father along with an overwhelming sadness for my mother.

  Thoughts raced in my mind: my mother’s drinking to forget her deed. Mr. Reeves’s rejection of me for being a deviled heathen. Ginny Rose’s insistence of hiring me to ease her conscience. The townsfolk’s stares as I walked down the street, thinking me a simpleton.

  There had only been one constant in my life—the only family I had known, Goldie, Otis, and Dickie. Family was the string that binds us. Perfection wasn’t a requirement. I needed them as they needed
me.

  Years later I would realize that there was much I couldn’t comprehend about the confession at that moment. Yet with this knowledge came strength. Strength I had never realized I had—a strength my mother gave me. One she lost, committing the act that had saved me. One that I would need in days to come.

  Chapter 14

  The night of the dinner party with the Reeves was an enlightening event. I looked around the table with the stunning realization that everyone around the table wore a mask of solemn smiles and futile gestures.

  I sat quietly with Matt by my side. My silence didn’t come from playing a part of a simpleton, but because of the demons I had only recently discovered that followed me.

  Matt, my loving husband, had been nothing but supportive of my past. A past he apparently had knowledge of before we married. Goldie thought it best to share with him—not me—the secrets long buried until she wanted to bring her family back together.

  Goldie knew me well. She had no doubt my heart would soften with the knowledge that Otis saved me. She orchestrated her version of the events surrounding my father’s death effectively, casting Momma in a sympathetic light. I wondered if I could ever cast aside the version of the woman I knew and accept the one of Momma doing what she had to do to protect me.

  I looked across the table. Dodie sat dressed in her finery, a long pale-yellow gown with a dinner jacket decorated with white sequins, which sparkled in the light. A cut crystal necklace graced her neck. She always loved her jewelry to shine.

  A thought crossed my mind in that moment. Unhappy lest he be tempted into doing what he knew was not for the glory of God, as the putting on of gold and costly apparel.

  I must have stared at her too long. She simpered at me. I returned her grimace.

  The tea-length gown I wore wasn’t as sophisticated but, it was quite fashionable. Matt had chosen it for me. He said the blue flattered me. I wore the wedding presents he gave me for my adornment and had my hair fixed that afternoon.

  I didn’t feel out of place, but I tried to see myself from others point of view. I knew the answer. The truth of the matter—no matter that I had been a Reeves—I would never meet the expectations of those around this table, except, perhaps, my husband’s.