We Hope for Better Things

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We Hope for Better Things Page 30

by Erin Bartels


  “You’ll never be happy that way.”

  All the things he worked to grow in this cavernous space reached their full height and beauty in gardens he would never see.

  “You’ve got to do what’s right for you.”

  I felt something inside of me shift and click, like the right key in the right lock.

  “Hey,” I said when the clipboard dropped to his side, “I think I’ve made up my mind about that job.”

  He turned guarded eyes on me from across two long tables filled with seed trays. “Yeah? And what did you decide?”

  fifty

  Bloomfield Hills, July 1967

  Nora made a conscious effort to close her mouth as the Corvette pulled into the driveway at her parents’ house. “Aunt Margaret isn’t Mary Balsam’s daughter?”

  Over the past couple years, Nora had felt a growing connection with her sweet great-aunt, despite Margaret’s confusion about who Nora was. Now she realized that Margaret’s understanding of their relationship was more the true nature of things. They were unrelated, disconnected souls sharing an hour here and there.

  “Does she know this?”

  “I have no idea.” He opened the car door and stepped out onto the driveway.

  Nora scrambled out of the car. “Did Nathaniel know?”

  “Whether he knew is anyone’s guess. There’s no one left alive beyond Margaret who might know. I shouldn’t even have told you.”

  “Did Big George know?”

  “Big George?”

  “That’s what Margaret called him to differentiate him from your father.”

  Daniel pulled the seat back forward and retrieved Nora’s suitcase. “I never spoke to that man. Whenever we came around, he and that younger colored fellow made themselves scarce.”

  “But if Margaret did know—”

  “Leave it alone, Nora. Better to let her die in peace.”

  Nora chewed on the inside of her cheek as they walked through the foyer. “Have you heard from Wanda?”

  “She’s fine. We told her to stay home until this all gets sorted out.”

  She started up the stairs with her suitcase, then stopped. “Do I still have a room here?”

  “Yes. But don’t shut yourself up there. The Free Press is on the veranda—and so is your mother, I imagine. You need to come apologize to her.”

  “For what?”

  “You know what, Nora. She told me about her trip to Lapeer after you and I spoke on the phone.”

  Nora continued up the stairs to her old room. It was just the same as ever. She was not. Gone was the girl who had listened to those records, drawn those pictures, played with those dolls, talked on that phone. She had been replaced for a few years by a woman who knew what it was to enjoy an impossible love. And now, looking in the vanity mirror, Nora saw only a woman who was unraveling.

  She sat on the edge of the bed. Tears she’d held back when her father stepped out of that black Corvette now trickled down her wind-dried cheeks. Nora hadn’t cried since her miscarriage two years before. When she’d lost her baby, the source of her sadness had been clear. But now she struggled to parse the emotions swirling within her. She wasn’t crying for Margaret’s ignominious origin or for Mary’s devastating mistake. She wasn’t even crying about William’s silence over the past two days.

  She was crying over how easy it was to be back in this house, this room. About how simple it had been after all to call her father. About how she knew that when she saw her mother on the veranda, all it would take to patch up their relationship was a glance. This was her family. As much as she had told herself that William was all the family she needed now, that he was enough, he wasn’t. She wanted the love of her parents too. And now she was so close to reconciliation with them that it scared her. It should not be this easy. It should not even be possible.

  Could she embrace the woman who had called her dead baby lucky? The man who, it seemed, would exile her all over again? How could those things be forgiven? What was she even doing here?

  Nora wiped her face with the back of her hand and picked up the phone. She dialed Mrs. Rich’s number, then Bianca’s work, then one of William’s old friends, the only other number she could remember. On the third ring, someone picked up.

  “Lowell?”

  “This is Marvin. Who’s this?”

  “I’m Nora Rich. I’m William’s wife. Lowell’s friend William.”

  “Yeah, I know Will Rich.”

  “Do you know where he is? Have you seen him or heard from him at all? He went to Detroit on Sunday night to look for his nephew and I haven’t heard from him since and I’m worried something’s happened and—”

  “You got to slow down. Listen, there’s lots of people missing right now. He’ll turn up. Probably just got picked up by the police for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Out after curfew or something. Paper said thousands of people have been arrested. You call the station?”

  “Which station? I don’t even know who to call!”

  “Calm down, girl. I can call around for you if you want.”

  Nora flopped back on the bed in relief. “You would do that?”

  “What’s your number?”

  Nora gave him her parents’ phone number.

  “Where you at?” Marvin asked, no doubt puzzling over the non-Detroit number.

  “Bloomfield Hills.”

  “Bloomfield! What you doing up there?”

  “I’m at my parents’ house.”

  “Psh. That’s right. You the white girl. Where y’all been?”

  “Lapeer. Listen, please call me as soon as you can. Even if you can’t find out anything, please call me so I know you tried. I’m going crazy.”

  “Whole city’s going crazy, girl—wait, what’s your name again?”

  “Nora Rich.”

  “Got it. Listen, Nora Rich, I’ll give you a call soon as I can.”

  They hung up and Nora breathed a small sigh of relief. Something, at least, was being done.

  Now it was time to face her mother.

  She found her parents on the veranda in the exact positions they had been four summers earlier when she and William had come to break the news of their marriage. Now the memory threatened to undo her. Where would she be now, at this very moment, had she not married William? She might still be on the veranda, she decided, but the stark black-and-white photos of billowing smoke that graced the newspaper lying on the table beneath her mother’s drink would hold no special terror for her. She would look at them much as her parents probably had, with a scornful eye and a tongue quick to lay blame, then toss them aside to be gathered up later in a basket by the hearth. Yesterday’s news to start tomorrow’s fire.

  Without looking at her mother, Nora slipped the papers from beneath the glass and took a seat in an empty chair. She searched each photo for a figure that might be William but came up empty. Jagged words leapt out at her—snipers, looters, chaos, shots, flames, curfew, troops, destruction. As she sat on the veranda on the hot, still day, it was as if she was reading about the war in Vietnam. But she knew that if the wind turned she’d be able to see the smoke.

  When she looked up, her parents were staring at her. Then she heard the phone ring. She rushed into the house, snagging the phone from the cradle on the fourth ring. “Hello?”

  “Nora?”

  “Bianca? Oh, thank God.”

  “Someone named Marvin gave me this number for you. I tried calling you at your house an hour ago, but no one answered. We’re at my boss’s house on Buena Vista right now.”

  “Who? Is William with you?”

  “No. Mama’s here.”

  “What’s going on? Where is he?”

  “I don’t know. We saw him Sunday night at Aunt Dee’s, but just for a few minutes. We had to get out of there because the house next door started on fire.”

  “What about your house?”

  “It’s gone,” Bianca choked out.

  “Oh my. No word on J.J. either?


  “He’s being held in the Wayne County Jail. I only know where he is because our minister is there trying to get word to people. They ain’t even processing anybody. Don’t even know who they have. Just throwing them all in together like animals.”

  Nora heard Bianca’s voice catch.

  “Pastor said he’d been beaten pretty bad.”

  “He’ll be okay, Bianca. He’s just a kid. They bounce back fast.” Nora didn’t want to be insensitive, but J.J. wasn’t her real concern. The kid’s arrest made William’s desperate trip into this war zone futile. “Did your pastor talk to J.J.? Did he say anything about William?”

  “He couldn’t talk to him! He was lying against a wall unconscious! Pastor almost didn’t recognize him!”

  Nora had to pull the phone away from her ear at Bianca’s agonizing groan of despair. Then the choked sound of her weeping faded away.

  “Nora?” came Louise Rich’s steady voice.

  “Mama, what is going on over there?”

  “Sweetie, it’s bad. We just in shock. Nobody knows nothing. I just don’t know what to do. We got people out looking for Will. I’ll call you as soon as there’s word, but right now we got to pray. You understand? We got to pray like never before. You pray with me now, all right?”

  Nora squeezed her eyes shut to hold back the tears.

  “Lord, hear us now,” Louise began. “Hear us as we cry out to you. We know you know where our Will is right this moment. We know you see him, that you’re looking at him even now. We’re trying to trust you with him, but it’s hard. We’re trying to leave him in your hands, but it’s so hard to do. Lord, bring him back to us. Bring him back even today, even this very hour. Hear our prayer as you heard your own Son’s voice as he cried out to you on the cross. Amen.”

  But Nora could not say “amen.” Because all she could think about was what Jesus had said upon the cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

  “Nora, honey, we’ve got to trust. He got a plan and he don’t make mistakes. I’ll call you again, sweetie.”

  They said their goodbyes and Nora replaced the handset on the cradle. She looked up to find her parents standing in the open doorway, her father’s face looking grim, her mother’s streaked with silent tears.

  “Oh, sweetie,” Mallory said.

  Nora gathered her anger up inside her chest and locked her heart against their sad eyes. “I don’t need your pity.”

  She walked back upstairs into her old room and slammed the door.

  fifty-one

  Lapeer County, June 1875

  With great effort, Mary raised her eyelids. Nathaniel’s face came into shaky focus against a background of blurry colors. Baby Margaret wiggled in his arms.

  “Mary?”

  He sounded like he was outside, speaking through a closed window.

  “Mary, can you hear me? The doctor is on his way.”

  Margaret did look remarkably like Nathaniel.

  “Mary?”

  She closed her eyes.

  “Mary?”

  Oblivion.

  Mary opened her eyes. Mrs. Farnsworth sat next to her with a bucket at the ready.

  “Mr. Balsam is sending someone to hurry the doctor along.”

  “George,” Mary whispered in a hoarse voice.

  “You want to see Little George?”

  Mary shook her head. The movement made her dizzy and she began to heave. Mrs. Farnsworth thrust the bucket at her, making it just in time. She let Mrs. Farnsworth wipe her mouth with a cloth.

  “Big George.”

  “Ma’am, I—”

  “Please?”

  The housekeeper let out a long sigh. “I’ll get him.”

  Mary closed her eyes, but her head still spun. When next she opened them, George’s face filled her vision, looking so much like the man who had stayed at her bedside that fateful night when her first baby died—her real baby girl.

  “Mrs. Balsam?”

  “George,” she whispered.

  “I’m here.”

  She smiled. “You’re always there.” She moved her fingers. “Hold my hand.”

  George stood up and closed the door. Then he took her hand in his.

  “I need to tell you something.”

  “Save your strength.”

  “George, we have a baby.”

  A look of panic came over his face, and he glanced at the closed door. “No, ma’am, we don’t.”

  “Don’t call me ma’am.”

  “Let me get you some cold water.”

  “That day in the woods. I wasn’t with child. I thought . . . But I was wrong. But after . . . The midwife switched them. Took our baby boy away. And gave me the baby of Nathaniel’s prostitute.”

  George was shaking his head. “You’re not thinking straight.”

  “He’s out there. Someone has him. Mrs. Farnsworth knows. Please forgive me.”

  “No, Mrs. Balsam.”

  “Please forgive me. Oh, God, I’m so sorry. God, please forgive me.”

  “Shhh,” he soothed.

  “Anna knows where he is. You need to find him. Little George knows. Somehow. Figured it out. Maybe saw the baby in the basket. I don’t know. Clever, dreadful, spiteful boy. It would have been better if he had been the one born dead.”

  “You don’t know what you are saying.”

  “He helped them.” She began to cry. “Those awful men. The fire.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Somehow. I don’t know. Wanted you all gone. Please forgive me.” She squeezed his hand. “I love you, George.”

  Mrs. Farnsworth opened the door. George snatched his hand away from Mary’s and put it in his lap.

  “Mrs. Balsam needs her rest.”

  He stood up. “Of course.”

  Mrs. Farnsworth placed a wet rag on Mary’s ashen forehead. When the housekeeper straightened, she did not try to hide her contempt. George didn’t need to ask her anything. He left the room and reentered a world that had been irreversibly altered, a world in which he was the father of a lost son.

  Mary tried to feel comforted by the cool rag, but the sensation of spinning out of control would not abate. She remembered the strange look Little George had given her at the dinner table that night. He had not looked her in the eye since baby Margaret’s arrival. Until that very evening.

  She’d seen him in the herb garden earlier in the day, digging up weeds, a punishment she had meted out for some small breach of protocol, though what the infraction was she could not call to mind. It didn’t matter. They both knew the real reason.

  Jacob had been talking to him in his new voice, courtesy of missing front teeth and a broken jaw that hadn’t healed correctly. “Carepul wi dat. Dat ain’t no parsnip. You best burn dat. Don’t let da pigs get at it. Dey be dead bepore you know it.”

  She hadn’t seen what he’d done with the plant as she returned to the task of mending a torn shirt for Nathaniel.

  No. It was Big George’s shirt.

  Big George.

  “No, that one is for you, Big George,” her son had said as the man set the plate in front of Mary.

  “You should serve your mother first,” Big George had replied gently.

  Roast chicken, spring peas, baked parsnips with butter and herbs. Mary loved parsnips. She had snuck a bite from her plate even before everyone had sat down, before they had said grace.

  What had she seen in Little George’s eyes?

  The convulsions returned and Mary felt her throat closing. She struggled for breath. She heard Mrs. Farnsworth’s strangled cry for Nathaniel.

  Then she was swallowed up by the darkness.

  fifty-two

  Lapeer County, March

  I stood at the calendar and peeked ahead. Just one more day until April started.

  The first day of spring had come and gone in a flurry of snow, followed by a week of constant rain. But March 31st had dawned sunny. Birds were nesting, brown grass was visible, some in
trepid herbs were pushing up their first leaves in the rich garden soil—scouts that would report back to the subterranean infrastructure about whether it was safe to emerge.

  “Oh, just turn it,” Nora said as she walked into the kitchen. “Let’s start April a day early.”

  I did as directed, happy to see that she was having a good day. “Coffee?” I asked.

  “Yes, that would be lovely.”

  “Great. I have something I want to talk to you about.”

  I went about the task of brewing our standard half pot of coffee, set everything on a tray, and took it into the parlor. Matthew had situated himself next to Nora on the settee in a spot of sunlight, his orange fur radiant, one green eye squinting up at me. I buried my fingers in his hot fur.

  “It’s been ages since I felt that warm. Maybe I need a fur coat.”

  Nora poured the coffee, revealing a shake in her arms that had not been there before. “What do you have on your mind?”

  I gathered my thoughts. It had been far more difficult and taken far more persuasion on Linden’s part than I’d anticipated to get Mr. Rich to agree to come out to the farmhouse. Linden first called in January with the news that his father wanted nothing to do with my scheme. But I would not be dissuaded. As Marshall Boon had said, I was tenacious. By mid-March I had finally gotten James Rich himself on the phone to hash things out.

  “It’s not that no one tried,” he said. “Nora shut down and shut herself away after it was clear that William wasn’t going back to Lapeer with her. She wouldn’t talk to anyone about it, and she sure wouldn’t want to talk to me—ever.”

  “Mr. Rich, I don’t think you quite understand. Sometimes she talks about William as if he’s still here. There have been a couple times lately when I’ve walked into a room and she’s been talking to him. If you could just tell her what really happened, maybe she’d understand and she’d be able to make her peace. You said you’ve been carrying around a burden for years. Well, that’s your burden. Not mine. I can’t lay it down for you. You need to lay it down yourself.”

  A long sigh. “Would you mind if I brought Denny with me? Just for support. I know you two didn’t hit it off, but . . . I can’t do this alone.”

 

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