Return to Cedar Hill

by Jacie Middlemann

  Mary glanced in the direction of the church he spoke of. The church her grandmother had walked to more than one day out of the week. The tilt of her head spoke louder than the words she searched for. Unable to find them, she reverted to manners.

  "Please, would you like something to drink?"

  "No thank you. I just finished an early lunch with my wife." Jackson was an astute man. He'd been a curious child...something he believed to this day made him all the more competent at his chosen profession. For as long as he could remember he had heard the call to serve God and care for his children. He'd heard that call today. Jackson leaned against the porch rail. "I've been meaning to visit with you. And today, even before I saw you sitting outside, I felt the need to."

  "Why?" Mary asked simply, curious more than anything.

  "I couldn't really say," he moved his shoulders in more of a shift than a shrug. "But I've learned along the way to listen to myself and Him so..." he waved a hand in a gesture that spoke clearly, here I am.

  Mary let the swing drift back and forth. "How long have you been at the church?" She asked, gazing up at the remarkable historic structure with its tall imposing steeples that she had no doubt dated back to the earliest days of the community.

  "Almost thirty years." He watched her gaze move back to him, watched the information she sought click into place like a puzzle. "This was my first church," he smiled remembering the young man fresh out of seminary so certain he knew it all then finding out he knew nothing that truly mattered. Not then. "Before I knew it, when I wasn't looking it became home again." At her questioning look, "I grew up here and when I left I had no plans to return. When I did I had no plans to stay." And that he believed after so many years was the way of the Lord. His plans ultimately became yours.

  Mary studied the face, the gestures, and the memory that had been vague solidified. "You knew my grandmother. You were at her funeral. You spoke."

  "I did." He tilted his head, went with truth which he believed in as firmly as he did his God. "It wasn't my first funeral but it was the first for someone I knew personally and cared for deeply. And I can admit to you now, I was terrified." He smiled gently, remembering. "It would have been easier had I not known your grandmother, if she hadn't been my friend." He took Mary's hand. "If I hadn't come to love her like my own mother and felt her loss so keenly."

  "I didn't know." She heard herself stumbling over her words. "I had no idea." And was coming to realize just how much she didn't know. She had left here all those years ago a child with a child's memories.

  "You were very young. And coping with a tremendous loss." He smiled at her, patted her hand again as he would one of his own children. "You look very much like your mother."

  At her questioning look he went on. "Miri visited me often, almost every time your family was in town." He thought back over the years, "It was a rare thing when she didn't." He paused. "Her loss was felt by all of my family." He stood as he continued, "We grieved as well when your Aunt Leslie passed away." He turned and looked at the church that towered over the neighborhood like the beacon it was. "But your mother was a sister to me, one I grieved for deeply."

  Mary felt that grief always, but in this moment, on the heels of his admitted sorrow, her own pierced through her carefully erected shields. Before she could speak, he continued, surprising her when she thought she couldn't be.

  "I came to her funeral. I almost didn't make it, had to change flights a few times. Airlines don't cater to people's needs only to their carefully crafted schedules." He shrugged, there were some things that would never change and living with them was often the best solution unless one thrived on stress. He saw her surprise and smiled. He believed life was less burdened if you smiled occasionally whether it was called for or not. "Miri would have loved the service. The time and thought you so obviously put into it would have meant more to her than anything." This time when he smiled it was with the joy he had felt at that moment. "She would have been very, very pleased."

  Mary was shook, more caught off guard than she had been in a long time. "Pastor," she began with no real idea of how to express all that was swirling around in her unusually muddled mind.

  "Jackson," he corrected gently. "Please, call me by my given name as your mother and grandmother did." He paused for only a second before he continued. "And as your grandfather did before that."

  "You knew my grandfather?" Mary stood now, this time it was she who took his hand, clutched it tightly. "You would have had to have been very young." She struggled with her memories, how could all this have eluded her, why had her mother never spoken of this man, this family, one who must have been so very close to her own. Connected. They had been connected and she had not known. Could barely remember this man from her grandmother's funeral and even then it was only vague memories of a face, a kind word, an understanding touch.

  Jackson saw the confusion, understood the despair. Families were a complicated business. "Our families have always known each other. My grandfather's father did a lot of work for your grandmother's parents. They were, I was told, as proud as he when my father graduated from medical school. He later returned to Burlington to care for those in need."

  Mary sat down abruptly, a story her mother had often told her when she was little flickered at the edge of her memory, and understanding began to take hold.

  "When your grandfather died so suddenly," Jackson remembered his own shock, his as well as his parent's deep grief at the loss of a friend so young. "Your grandmother had a difficult time."

  "She fell apart," Mary filled in what he was too kind to say.

  "Yes," Jackson agreed gently. He had heard the stories as well. "Your mother was the oldest and was struggling to cope herself with the death of her father."

  "She adored him." There was simply no other way to put it. Mary looked at the man before her. There were connections...and then there were connections. She continued the story, one she remembered hearing as a very young child and later when she was older. That story included more of the details that she hadn't been told as a child. "Mom knew Nanno needed help, knew too she would be upset if anyone saw her in that condition. Weak." Mary paused, remembering her mother's emotional telling of the tale that had been as real in the telling as when it happened all those years ago. "She sent Aunt Charlie to get your father. He came right away, without question." She looked into his dark eyes that were steady on hers. There she saw understanding and more, the acceptance that no one was perfect. People were flawed...were human. "And he came for many days after that without being asked. He not only treated Nanno, he sat with my mother and aunts, let them talk, helped them make decisions they'd been left essentially to make alone." She took a deep breath, she could remember, could still feel the vibrations of her mother's anger even now. "And for that they were ostracized. Unjustly."

  Jackson only laughed. "That sounds so like Miri." He shook his head, remembering their long talks. "She was one of the kindest people I ever knew. I never heard her speak a word against anyone and rarely heard her lose her temper. But she was quick to fire up on some issues, that's for certain."

  She took his hand, this time to make him understand not just her mother's stand, but her own. "My mother told me more about it when I was in my early teens, I wanted to understand." Mary laughed softly in contrast to the importance of the conversation, then and now. "At the end, after she told me how people treated them for letting your father into their house let alone providing medical treatment for their mother, she told me that even though it was long ago and things had changed for the better, that those types of situations were the very reason there had to be a law forcing people to understand that everyone regardless of their color had the right to be treated civilly." She laughed again, very close to tears, remembering the fire of her mother's indignation. "I can count on one hand the number of times I heard her swear. But she told me the way they were treated, how your family was treated, made all those people nothing less than pompous asses."
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  "Your mother always had a way with words." As did the daughter, he thought proudly. And, he decided, all stories needed an ending. "When I returned to Burlington after Seminary I wanted to make a difference. I wanted to change things." Idealism had run rampant through his soul at the time, he remembered fondly with a dose of healthy cynicism. "I saw things as they should be." And those beliefs had been sorely tested. "It was slow going," he admitted. "Until your grandmother walked through the doors of my Sanctuary one Sunday morning." He smiled at the memory. "She walked right to the front row of the church and sat down right next to my Mama."

  Mary waited, knew there was more. She'd known and loved the woman he spoke of and had more than once seen that strong sense of right and wrong in her own mother.

  "I could tell even from where I stood my Mama wanted to cry. She knew my heart. Knew what I wanted and while she may have been seriously worried about what would come of it, she put it to the back of her mind and into the hands of the Lord where she believed it belonged." There had been difficult times, he remembered sadly, but they had led to good ones in the end. "Your grandmother was one of my most ardent volunteers. She brought in more church members in those few years that were left of her life than anyone else has since." He smiled grimly. "Including yours truly."

  Mary searched his face, looking for what she couldn't put words to.

  Jackson saw the questions, the weariness. "Our families are tied together in ways stronger than many families tied simply by blood."

  Mary leaned back in the swing. She accepted that, not just from what he had told her but from what her mother had. Buried deep in her mind though it was. She also believed that all things happened for a reason, sometimes fate, sometimes intentionally. "Why are you telling me this?" She spoke softly, not wanting to question or insult, very much wanting to understand.

  Jackson reached out once again, waited for her to extend her hand into his. "Because we are connected. Because our families, despite their places in this community or perhaps because of it, counted on each other and knew they could. In the best of times and... in the worst of times." He tightened his grip on the hand in his. "I would like to think that the same holds true in the here and now." He looked straight into the eyes that came from her mother and her mother before her. "And I would hope you know that whenever you need, when you feel you can, that you can come to me about whatever it is that is bearing down on you." He felt her jerk, felt the sudden withdrawal that came so often when one felt threatened. And knew he had to let her come to that time on her own.

  He stood and stretched, wished he had walked so that the walk back through the streets of his home town would both empty and fill his mind. "I've got to get back. Our church secretary is probably wondering where I am and what I'm doing to earn my keep." He pulled out one of his cards, handed it to her. Cards that still included both the church phone number and his home number. If someone needed him, he wanted them to be able to get a hold of him where ever he was and whatever the time. Need was rarely limited to the forty hour work week. He believed when he left the seminary, idealistic and full of hope just as he believed now, if he could not be there when he was needed, whatever the time, he might as well not be there at all. "Call me anytime."

  Mary watched him go, speechless and wary. How could he know that anything specific weighed on her, when so much did. And why did she feel he knew what she worried of so deeply, felt such guilt over, and had spoken of to no one including Casey or her Daniel. Shaking it off she stepped forward, unwilling to let him walk away without a word. "Pastor...," she corrected herself when he turned, "Jackson." She stumbled for words, and settled for the only ones that mattered. "Thank you." She sighed heavily. "For everything."

  He nodded and turned to his car and in moments was driving the short distance to the church only streets away. Mary stood and watched him go. Wondering.

  

  CHAPTER TEN

  Mary was still going over her conversation with Jackson when Casey walked into the kitchen a couple of hours later. Glancing up at her cousin from the batch of cookies she was laying out on the pan had her stopping altogether. Casey looked happier than she'd seen since her arrival. "I take it you had a good afternoon."

  "I had an interesting and fun afternoon." And, Casey thought with no little bit of wonder, it felt good. She felt good. Try as she had over the last fifteen minutes or so during the drive back to the house, she couldn't remember any time in the last year she'd felt this at ease and relaxed. "The highlight of the afternoon had to be when I stopped by Pete's house."

  Mary went back to her cookies. "Did he know what the zoning was for this part of the neighborhood?" There was such a mix of homes and small businesses Mary didn't want to make any assumptions.

  "Not off hand but he's going to find out and let us know. He's got access to data bases at his office that will let him find the information quicker than we ever could." Casey picked at the cookie dough. "But that wasn't the highlight." She smiled before continuing. "The poor man was humiliated beyond belief by his youngest."

  "Children are capable of that without much effort," Mary said remembering back fondly to her own humiliating moments at the hands of her children.

  "Yeah, well in this case he had a little help." She laughed, she just couldn't help it. "While we were talking about the house, ordinances, zoning, and all that the kid came in and asked his Daddy what an erection was, did it hurt, and had he ever had one for hours and hours and hours...."

  Mary just shook her head knowing without being told exactly what the source of that question had been. "And how did Pete handle that?"

  Casey laughed, "He almost stuttered trying to. I don't think my being there helped him any. But when he finally got past his own embarrassment he just told him, very serious like, that it was a man thing and they would discuss it just between the two of them like it should be. By the time Pete was finished the kid walked out of the room more impressed than anything else that he was going to have a real "man" conversation with his Daddy." She chuckled as she had more than once at the thought of what had transpired during those entertaining moments. "I have a feeling if Pete has his way his son will completely forget about his original question as pumped up as he is about being included in his first man-to-man conversation."

  "Ummm."

  Casey looked pointedly around the kitchen and the rest of the living areas from her place at the doorway. "I take it that's one of your many reasons for not having internet or cable connections."

  Mary sent her cousin her own pointed look. "It's a contributing factor."

  Casey decided to delay her well thought out arguments for getting the internet until another time. "These are really good." She picked another piece of cookie dough off the pan.

  "You've haven't had one yet."

  "The dough's good, the cookie will be good."

  Mary shook her head again, still trying to decide if she wanted to get into a discussion about her visit with Jackson. Even as she leaned towards broaching the subject her cousin proceeded in knocking the wind right out of her.

  "We're going to check out the attic tomorrow morning." She glanced outside casually...far from what she actually felt. "If it weren't going to get dark so soon we could go up tonight but we're going to need the light so we'll wait."

  Mary stopped again, rinsed her hands off in the sink, and slid one of the prepared pans into the hot oven. She set the timer knowing she'd burn them otherwise and finally turned back to her cousin. "The only thing I ever heard in regards to the attic was it was full of bats." She shivered at the thought of them. "So why in the world would I want to even venture up there?" She asked even though she knew the answers. At least the heart of them. Casey would want to tear apart every inch of the house in search for more of what they'd uncovered in the basement.

  Casey licked her fingers before dipping them back into the bowl that had unfortunately been just about scraped clean. "Do you know who built this house?"

  "No
." Mary leaned back against the counter keeping a watchful eye on the oven's timer. She liked her cookies cooked but not crisp so she wasn't going to get too far away from them. "Do you?"

  "I most certainly do." She pulled a spoon out of the drawer to better complete the task of scraping the bowl. "I went by the library before I went to Pete's. They have a great local history section for a town this size. I was actually looking for information on the Marshall Street house but in the process came across some interesting stuff on this one." She glanced at her cousin. "Have you ever been to the library here?"

  "Not since I was a kid."

  "You would think walking in that it's one of Carnegie's libraries."

  Mary looked over at that, trying to remember back to the only time she remembered being in the old library. "That impressive?"

  "Very, very impressive." Casey wandered over to the pan of freshly baked cookies straight out of the oven. "I didn't take the time today but next time I'm there I may look into how they were able to build such an elaborate library in such a small town without Mr. Carnegie." She took a bite, thinking. "It would have taken a lot of money...marble floors, marble steps, pretty much really gorgeous marble everywhere you look. And that's just what you see." She chewed the cookie with zeal, no more watching every single ounce meant she was going to enjoy her food to the best of her ability.

  Mary tapped the spatula against her chin. "I don't remember all that." And try as she might, there was little she did remember about the library.

  Casey thought about it, thought about her few visits to the city library before today, which like Mary's had been as a child. "Odds are you were focused on getting a book and getting back here to play. Kids don't notice much and certainly not much along those lines."

  "Ummm..." was Mary's only response as she continued the process of getting the sheets of baked cookies out of the oven and another one in.

  "Anyway, they've got a great collection of books on top of all that and their local history section doesn't just look good it is truly wonderful." Casey thought about what she'd learned in the few books she'd taken the time to go through. She also thought about the numerous books and documents she hadn't looked at that appeared even more promising.