by Leanna Ellis
But then I realize Mother is actually admitting she played a part in Daddy leaving her. It’s the first chink in her armor I’ve ever detected. Truly, it’s a first of historical proportions.
Mother glances out the window toward Cal Henry’s car. He hasn’t emerged yet. Unfortunately that leaves us another minute or two to talk. Her brow pinches into a frown. “I was right. It is bad between you two. That’s what I was afraid of.”
“No, Mother. What’s awful is that you would blame me. It’s my fault if Mike looks at another woman. Because I’m not pretty enough or entertaining enough or satisfying him in bed—”
“Uh,” a male voice makes us both turn. I stare at my sleepy-eyed husband. He rubs his spiky hair. “Just needed a cup before my shower.”
“Let me get that for you.” Mother stands, nudges me in the back as if to say, This is your job. But he’s already pouring himself a mug. “Would you like some cream?” She hovers about his elbow. “Sugar?”
“Black’s fine.” He lifts the mug in a half-hearted salute. “Ladies.” He eyes me, then heads down the hallway toward the shower.
Mother pulls a carton of eggs out of the fridge, along with a plastic container of bacon. “I never said you weren’t pretty enough. Or smart enough. Or anything of the sort.” She looks out the window again as if to check how much time she has before Cal Henry interrupts us. She cracks an egg on the side of a ceramic bowl. “But everybody has to work at it. You’re not eighteen anymore. Young women are your competition. That is, if you want to keep your husband.”
“You’ve always made me think I wasn’t good enough, Mother.”
“Nonsense. You were. Are. Who else in this neck of the woods could have snagged a man like Mike? Estelle?” The bridge of her nose crinkles. “Not likely. She was pretty enough once, but she has really let herself go.”
“She’s had five babies.”
“Exactly.”
“No one can remain a size two, Mother.”
“Not if they keep having babies. And wearing clothes with spit-up all over them. And your friend, Josie—” she snorts—“she wouldn’t have made it into a school like UCLA. Oh, she might attract a man’s interest for a short period of time, but she can’t keep one.”
“Mother—”
“Why, with her, shall we say, loose morals, she would have lost a man like Mike long ago. A man likes to know he’s the only man in your life. That you belong to him.”
“Is that why you never told Daddy you were married before?”
She pauses for only a second, but it’s enough to tell me I hit close to home.
“Oh, it didn’t matter. Not in the least. Besides, it wasn’t a marriage; it was insanity. And it was all annulled.”
“Like it never happened. Right?”
“Exactly.”
“But it did happen, Mother. You can’t just erase something because it’s offensive to you. Life isn’t a counter that Clorox bleach can clean.”
“I never said—”
“But that’s how you act!” I interrupt. It’s not often someone, especially me, can get away with such a thing. I rush forward before she can stop me, before I can stop myself. “You don’t like what Daddy does, so you kill him off. You don’t like the fact that you got carried away in the heat of the moment and married a man, so you pretend it never happened. You have to maintain control. Always. Well, you can’t always be in control, Mother! Of your emotions. Or of things that happen to you.”
My own words strike me. Isn’t that what I’ve done? Tried to pretend that the night with Drew didn’t produce a child? Josie’s words echo deep inside.
Mother opens her mouth to remark, then closes it. Stunned that I’ve managed to silence her, I am caught off guard. My words have made me vulnerable to the truth as well.
“You’re right,” she finally manages. “There are some things you can never erase. No matter how hard you try.” Her gaze is cold and hard as ice. “Now Cal Henry,” she says slowly, as if tasting the name after so many years, “was not the man for me. It was a bit of a lark. Just like that old boyfriend of yours, Drew Waring. He never aspired to anything. He would have made you miserable. The fact that Cal Henry did as well as he has done is a surprise.” She whisks the eggs into a yellow froth. “But you’re wrong. You are always responsible for your actions. Always.”
I sigh. Once again she has twisted my words. She misses my point but manages to skewer me with hers. She’ll never understand. I set aside my coffee, turn away from her, and busy myself opening the bacon package. Carefully I lay slices in the pan. Each long, even slice reminds me of our lives laid out side by side.
“Maintenance,” she goes on. “That’s all I’m saying. It’s the key to a long, healthy marriage.”
Out the window I see Cal Henry still sitting in his car. What is he doing? Why isn’t he coming in? “So what did you do wrong in your marriage?” I say, angry and irritated. A tiny voice in my head says, Honor. So I add, “I’m just trying to learn from your mistakes.”
Mother pulls out the toaster and places two slices of bread in the slits. “I’m sure I did many things wrong, if you want to know the truth. You think I can’t own up to my own mistakes? Well, I can. Would a face-lift have kept your father interested? The Karma Suntra?”
My mouth drops open, then curves with a smile at her mispronunciation.
“I should have insisted that your father perform his duty.”
“That would have gotten Daddy in the mood, I’m sure.”
“Men don’t need candles and music, Suzanne.” She looks at me as if I’m too naive and stupid for words. This conversation comes about twenty years too late. Too bad Mother wasn’t as forthcoming with information when I was a teen. She never even liked me to use the word period and was furious when I asked Daddy to buy me tampons when I was in high school.
“This is all I’m going to say on the matter, Suzanne. Mike is your husband. But if you let him get away, if you allow a woman like Josie to steal him right out from under your nose, you’ll regret it.” Her mouth tightens. Does she regret letting Daddy get away? Doesn’t she realize she could have him back? Only her pride stands in the way.
“Okay, one more thing.”
Cringing, I bite my lip and reach for another slice of bacon.
“I know you’ve known Drew Waring. Since high school, I mean. In the biblical sense.”
My hand falters. My soul cringes. I refuse to look in her direction.
She grabs my elbow, pinches hard till I look at her. “I’m warning you, Suzanne, you will lose Mike. And it will be the worst thing imaginable. You don’t think it’s obvious who your son looks like?”
I suck in a quick breath.
“You’ll realize soon enough your mother knew a thing or two. I must say my disappointment runs deep, Suzanne. Deep. So don’t lecture me about my marriage any longer. You haven’t had a perfect track record yourself.”
A knock at the back door announces Cal Henry’s arrival.
“I’ll let him in.”
Her tone floats over me as I sink deeper and deeper into the mire I’ve created.
26
I sit on the back porch, unaware how long I’ve been here. I stare off at the prairie dog mounds. Occasionally I see a little brown furry critter dart out of a burrow and zip along the terrain. They look playful and cute as they scamper this way and that. Life, an observer might think, is fun and games for prairie dogs, but they would be wrong. The cuteness is a lie, a façade. Prairie dogs scurry back and forth because they’re hiding from predators who would eat them for lunch.
My thoughts scamper and scurry in their own directions. They burrow into the certainty that my mother is a liar. Everything she says. Before this weekend I often laughed off Mother’s tendency to exaggerate. If she had to chop ten carrots, it became a hundred. If she took food to an ailing friend once, the story became ten times. If someone, especially my father, acted foolishly, she’d say, “No one has ever acted like such a doofus.�
�� Harmless exaggerations, really. But are they so benign? The odd thing is, she’s known throughout the area for this trait, and yet everyone seems to have bought into her lie about my father’s death.
And now I learn that she’s been covering up things in her past. Like a marriage. An annulment. And what she believes about me. It’s just another form of control. These cover-ups are starting to look little prairie dog mounds of dirt.
I remember running through the fields as a little girl. Suddenly, the ground I thought was there wasn’t. My foot went right through a prairie dog tunnel, twisting my ankle. Prairie dog mounds of lies leave the ground uneven, unsafe. Has my own lie, which is far worse than any my mother concocted, left my marriage on unstable ground?
While Mother lectured me about saving my marriage, exaggerating that I was about to lose Mike because we hadn’t had sex while we were sleeping in her house, I knew her concern was not that marriage is a sacred thing. She simply doesn’t want me to lose Mike who makes a “gazillion dollars.” But all the money in the world can’t compensate for a satisfying, trusting marriage.
“He’s the catch of the century,” she said when we got married. No one believed her, but everyone smiled and went along with it. The proud mother of the bride. Or should I say, the proud mother-in-law of the groom who had a brand-new law degree.
Now she tells everyone at the Dippity Do how he handles case after case and rakes in the dough. She rhapsodizes about our house overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Now I realize why she hasn’t been keen on us coming home: She knew my secret. Knew it! Knew my son wasn’t Mike’s. And she didn’t want anyone else to know. It’s why there are no pictures of Oliver over the age of five in the house. She didn’t want anyone else to notice the resemblance between her grandson and the local sheriff.
“Mom?” Oliver steps outside. His face is creased from the sofa pillow.
“Morning.” I pat the swing. “Did you sleep well?”
“Okay.” He grunts as he settles next to me. “That guy’s in the kitchen with Grandma.”
“Cal Henry. Yes, I know.” I draw a slow breath and release it like I might be able to see it. But the day is already warm.
“We’re supposed to call the sheriff’s office today.”
“I know.” I rub his shoulder. “It’s going to be okay.”
“How do you know? What if the test is positive?”
“I don’t know what will happen. But I do know we’ll stick together. No matter what. Your father and I are here with you.” I look him in the eye trying to make him understand the love we have for him. If the result is positive and Oliver is charged, I don’t know what I’ll do. Will I stand back, let the chips fall as they may? Or will I step in, try to fix things? “Do you want me to call the sheriff for you?”
“No. I’ll do it. Or maybe I’ll go see him myself.”
“You know I’ll protect you. I won’t let anything—”
“You can’t do anything to stop this, Mom.”
“I can—”
“What are you going to do? Call your ex-boyfriend?” His tone dips into that teen range that sets my nerves on edge. But I know it’s simply fear speaking. It’s fear making me want to protect him.
“That’s enough!” I put a hand on his arm. “It’s my job to protect you.”
“But you can’t, Mom. You can’t. I don’t want you to do anything.” He pushes away from the swing, walks several feet away. Then he turns back. “Don’t do anything.”
I watch him walk to the end of the porch and down the steps. I slow my respiration one breath at a time, adjusting it like a metronome. I always prided myself that I hadn’t become my own mother. I wasn’t obsessed with furniture or redecorating or creating the perfect pot roast. I didn’t exaggerate. I didn’t look down my nose at others. I tried to love, encourage, and nurture my son to the best of my ability.
But it hits me just the same. My mother is a world-class liar, and this funeral is her curtain call. Oh, how pride can lead to a downfall though. And I’m falling, falling, falling fast.
Because I too, am a liar.
I haven’t changed my story. I don’t concoct wild fabrications or fantasies as Mother has. My lie is one of omission. I left out something fairly important. Not that my hair is not really blonde or that I’ve had my teeth whitened. Or like my friend Cindy who had breast implants. Those things would never be talked about but would be fairly obvious to the casual observer.
No, I’ve been lying to myself. To Mike. To our son.
My whole life is a lie. Everything I stand for. My friends think I’m a strong Christian, going to church, running charity drives, even going on mission trips. But it is all a façade hiding my sin deep down inside. The outward appearance doesn’t make me clean or pure or safe or nice. It simply makes me a liar.
27
Drew
Drew couldn’t have been more surprised when the kid walked into his office than if he’d come in doing a handstand. “This okay?” Oliver asked, his dark eyes intense. “Me coming here?” “Always better of your own volition. I was just about to call your grandmother’s place.” The kid hesitated, then moved into the office. He didn’t smile. “Have a seat.” Drew closed the folder he’d been working on. “What can I do for you?”
The teen shrugged one shoulder, more an uncomfortable tick than an answer. He slunk into the chair facing the desk. “What happened to your desk there?”
“Got shot.”
“Did it try to get away?” Oliver said, humor loosening his stiffness.
“A snake actually.”
Oliver’s eyes widened.
“My deputy shot the desk, missed the snake.”
The kid cracked a smile at that. It was only the second time Drew had seen him smile. He seemed the serious sort. But Drew wasn’t sure if that meant he was studious or simply disturbed.
“What happened to the snake?”
“I killed it.” Drew tilted his head toward the windowsill where the chunk of wood was missing.
“You get snakes in here often?”
Drew shrugged. “It’s a jail.”
Oliver laughed outright then. He leaned back in his chair, more relaxed than when he first came into the office. “I was wondering if you were going to file charges against me or what?”
“Or what?” Drew smiled this time. “We don’t use the stockades anymore.”
Oliver didn’t laugh. “Did the test results come back?”
Drew leaned his elbows on the desk, met the kid’s direct stare. “You staying clean?”
“Yes, sir.” Then that half, sly smile emerged again. “My dad’s got me cleaning out my grandpa’s tool shed and garage. So maybe clean isn’t the right word.”
Hard work was something Drew would have done to his own son. If he had one, and if he been caught doing something against the law. “I’ve seen Archie’s tool shed. You got your work cut out for you. Do you think your grandpa will come home eventually?”
“If Grandma will let him.”
“She can’t keep him out. It’s his house. His right.”
“You know my grandmother, right?”
Drew laughed. “Yeah, I do.”
The kid rubbed the palm of his hand with his other thumb. “What about the test?”
Drew leaned back, and his chair squeaked. He gave the kid a moment to sweat, but he didn’t seem nervous. “Looks like you told the truth. Or maybe you got lucky this time. But the test showed you weren’t smoking.”
“What about the others?” Oliver asked. No slump of relief. No smile that he’d gotten away with it. Just a simple question about those who got caught with him.
“I can’t discuss pending cases.”
He nodded. “Can’t you let Rick go. Just this once?”
“What do you care about Rick Parker?” Drew countered. “You just met him. You haven’t seen him since Sunday night, have you?”
“No, sir. I just …” He shrugged, more awkward than evasion.
“You fe
eling guilty for getting off?”
“Maybe.”
“Don’t. I don’t like to see kids go to court, much less juvenile detention. But if that’ll scare you straight, then I’d do it in a heartbeat. Look, Rick Parker … I’ve known him a long time. Know his family. This isn’t the first time he’s been in trouble. Not even the second. He’s never taken my warnings seriously. Now, I hope he will. Understand?”
Oliver leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He took a couple of deep breaths, his head down as if wrestling with more questions. Finally, he looked up. “Are you doing this because of my mom?”
That sucker punched Drew.
“Did she ask you to?” Oliver went on.
“No.” He had asked himself the same question though. But without any evidence, other than being in the wrong place at the wrong time, the case was clear cut. He wouldn’t show favoritism because of feelings he once had for the kid’s mom. That was over. But he admired the kid, especially because it seemed Oliver didn’t want favoritism either. A remarkable trait in anyone. Especially a boy trying to be a man.
“But you know her, right?”
“I do.”
“You used to date her, didn’t you?”
“That was a long time ago. We were young and stupid. That was before your daddy swept her off her feet.” Drew didn’t want the kid thinking anything.
Oliver kept on staring, as if he wasn’t sure what to say or do, as if Drew hadn’t answered the way he expected.
“Don’t worry, kid. I’m not doing you or your momma any favors. If you even smell of pot or anything else illegal, you’ll see the inside of my jail and then the courthouse so fast your head will be spinning. And our judge won’t go easy on juveniles. No matter who their momma or daddy is.” Drew didn’t want the kid to think his famous attorney father could get him off either.