The Seventh Mother

by Sherri Wood Emmons

“That’s a little town from an old TV show,” Brannon explained.

  “Look!” Jenny pointed to a storefront window painted with hamburgers, french fries, and milk shakes.

  “Happy Days.” Brannon read the sign aloud. “That’s another old TV show.”

  “Can we eat there?” Jenny looked at her dad, her eyes wide.

  “Sure,” he said. “A late lunch . . . or maybe an early supper.”

  We settled into the vinyl seats of a booth with a red-checkered vinyl tablecloth. A pretty young woman with blond hair piled on top of her head approached, carrying menus.

  “Welcome to Happy Days,” she said, smiling. “I’m Resa and I’ll be taking care of you today. Ya’ll ain’t from around here, are you?”

  “Just got in,” Brannon said, smiling back at her. “I’m working at Amazon for the season.”

  “Well, I hope you like it here.” She smiled at Jenny and then at me. “Campbellsville is a good place to live.”

  I laughed when I opened the menu and read the selections, all themed from the old sitcom.

  When the waitress returned, Jenny ordered the Love Me (Chicken) Tenders and Onion “Rings of Fire.” Brannon asked for Chachi’s Chili Cheeseburger. I got a veggie wrap.

  “That’s not very authentic,” Brannon said, laughing. “You should at least try some fried pickle chips.”

  “Not if I plan to stay in these jeans,” I said.

  “Honey, if I could fit into those jeans, I’d eat until I burst wide open.” The waitress looked down at her own curvaceous figure. “I wasn’t that size when I was her age.” She nodded at Jenny.

  We all laughed.

  “So, what is there to do in Campbellsville?” Brannon asked.

  “Not much,” she said.

  “What about Main Street Saturday Night?” Jenny asked.

  “That’s over for the season. Ya’ll missed the last one just last week.”

  She paused then, looking at Jenny’s disappointed face. “Still,” she said, “there are some fun things to do around here. Let’s see, there’s Green River Lake. That’s real pretty. You can go boating or fishing, if it’s not too cold. Or you can take a horseback ride.”

  “We did that all summer,” Jenny said, her lower lip drooping just a bit.

  “Well, there are a lot of Civil War sites close by, and there’s the place Abe Lincoln was born. That’s a fun trip.”

  Jenny sighed.

  “Sounds great,” Brannon said, his voice just a shade too loud. “We’ll find lots of fun stuff to do.” He put his arm around Jenny’s shoulders. “I’ll bet you and Emma will have lots of great adventures.”

  9

  Jenny

  I didn’t like Campbellsville much at first. The town was okay, but I hated the campground. It was gray and dusty and there was nothing to do; it didn’t even have a swing set. I guess they didn’t get a lot of kids staying there.

  Daddy worked the night shift, ten hours at a time, four nights a week—unless there was overtime. Then he worked five nights. When he came home we had breakfast together, and after breakfast he went to bed.

  Emma usually took me to the library to do my schoolwork. I loved the library in Campbellsville. It was in an old church and still had stained-glass windows. I brought my laptop and did my work while Emma read books or looked at magazines. At lunchtime we walked to Main Street and ate, sometimes pizza at the Snappy Tomato, but more often at Happy Days. I loved their onion rings and Emma liked the salads. After lunch, we went back to the library until two o’clock. Then we’d go home, where Daddy would just be getting up.

  On a sunny, warm afternoon in early November, we walked home from the library, each carrying a book.

  “There are my two favorite girls!” Daddy sat at the table in his sweatpants and a T-shirt, drinking coffee. “How was your morning?”

  “Okay.” I plopped down beside him. “Just the usual.”

  “Did you finish your lesson?”

  I nodded, reaching for a cookie. “Emma checked it for me.”

  Daddy raised his eyes to Emma. She smiled and nodded.

  “It’s just English today,” she said. “I figure I can handle that.”

  Daddy laughed. “So, what’s the plan for today?”

  “Well, since the weather’s so nice, I thought we could go to the lake,” Emma said. “Maybe take a picnic?”

  “Sounds good,” he said. “Let me just grab a shower first.” Outside, we heard the rumbling of a motor. I opened the door to watch a big RV maneuver itself into the lot next to ours, a Coleman with bright stickers from around the country covering its door. An old VW Bug was hitched behind it. I watched as a woman climbed out of the RV.

  “Daddy!” I hollered after him as he closed the bathroom door. “The Johnsons are here!”

  I opened the door, hopped down the step, and ran toward the truck. “Hi, Mrs. Johnson! It’s me, Jenny, from last winter.”

  The woman turned and grinned. “Well, hey there, Jenny. We didn’t know you’d be here. How’ve you been?”

  “I’m good,” I said. “Where’s Lashaundra?”

  Before the woman could answer, I saw Lashaundra running around from behind the RV.

  “Hey, Jenny!” She threw her arms around me and hugged me tight. “Are you staying here, too?”

  I nodded, feeling a flood of relief. It was so good to have a friend, someone I’d met before.

  “How’s your daddy?” Mrs. Johnson asked.

  “He’s okay. He’s taking a shower.”

  “How’s Jackie? Is she inside?” Mrs. Johnson took a step toward our trailer, then stopped suddenly. I turned to see Emma standing in the doorway, watching us.

  “Oh,” Mrs. Johnson said. “Um, hello.”

  Emma opened the door and stepped down. “Hi,” she said. Her voice sounded stiff.

  “I’m Angel, Angel Johnson. And this is my daughter, Lashaundra. We camped beside Brannon and Jenny last winter, in Georgia.”

  She extended her hand. After a slight pause, Emma shook it.

  “I’m Emma,” she said.

  A man walked around the RV carrying a small boy.

  “And this here is Michael,” Mrs. Johnson said, waving toward the man. “And our boy, Malcolm.”

  “Nice to meet you.” Mr. Johnson put the boy down and extended his hand. Again another pause before Emma finally took his hand.

  “Well, hey, you guys!” Daddy appeared on the step, grinning. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

  “Good work, good pay,” said Mr. Johnson, shaking Daddy’s hand. “How’re you doing? Where you been working?”

  “We’ve been out west, working at a campground in Idaho. How about you?”

  “Dollywood,” Mr. Johnson said, shaking his head.

  “We did that a few years back. When was that, Jenny?” Daddy turned to me.

  “That was when I was seven,” I said. “Cara was there.”

  There was a sudden silence. I saw Mrs. Johnson raise an eyebrow slightly at Mr. Johnson, who said kind of loudly, “Well, we won’t be going back there anytime soon.”

  “Yeah,” Daddy agreed. “Not much of a setup.”

  “Still, it paid pretty well.”

  “Let me give you a hand, Michael.” Daddy and Mr. Johnson began unhooking the car from the RV.

  “Well,” Emma said, stepping back toward our trailer. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  “Can Lashaundra come with us to the lake?” I asked.

  “I . . . um, I don’t know, Jenny. She probably has to stay and help her mom.”

  “Can I go, Mom?” Lashaundra grabbed her mom’s hand. “Please?”

  Mrs. Johnson stood quietly for a minute. Then she said softly, “I don’t think so, honey. We just got here. We’ve got a lot to do.”

  “Please?” Lashaundra repeated.

  “Maybe I could stay and help you set up,” I said. “Is that okay, Daddy?”

  Daddy turned from the hitch and wiped his forehead. “It’s okay with me if it’s
okay with Mrs. Johnson.”

  She smiled at me. “Well, that would be fine, Jenny. More hands, fewer chores.”

  She turned to look at Emma. “I hope that’s all right with you?”

  Emma looked from Brannon to me to Mrs. Johnson and finally said, “If Brannon thinks it’s okay then I’m good with it.”

  She turned and walked into our trailer, the door clanging shut behind her.

  Mrs. Johnson put her hand on my shoulder and smiled. “It sure is good to see you and your daddy again.”

  “I’m glad you’re here,” I said. “I missed you guys.”

  With Daddy helping, it didn’t take long for Mr. Johnson to hook up the RV. Then Lashaundra and I helped Mrs. Johnson set up inside. Soon, the place looked just like I remembered it from the year before.

  Daddy and Emma climbed into her SUV with a picnic packed in a brown paper bag.

  “You sure you don’t want to come with us?” Emma asked.

  “No, I’m gonna stay here with Lashaundra,” I said.

  “It’s all good, babe.” Daddy put his hand on her shoulder. “It’s good for her to have a friend. And it’s good to have a little time, just us.”

  He winked and waved at me and they drove up the dusty road, Emma watching me through the back window.

  “Is she your new mom?” Lashaundra asked, waving at them.

  “Yeah.”

  “She’s prettier than Jackie.”

  “She’s okay.” I shrugged my shoulders. “I like her all right.”

  I could see Mrs. Johnson in the window of their RV, and I knew she could hear us. I wasn’t sure if I should talk about Emma or not. Daddy always said what happened in our family was our family’s business and no one else’s. But the Johnsons were friends. Last year, Daddy and Jackie had spent a lot of time with Mr. and Mrs. Johnson, playing cards and drinking beer. We even celebrated New Year’s Eve together.

  “Where’s the playground?” Lashaundra asked, looking around.

  “There isn’t one,” I said. “There isn’t anything, really, at least not here. But downtown is nice. There’s a great restaurant called Happy Days. You’ll love it.”

  Mrs. Johnson called out the window. “You girls want to come with me to the store?”

  We piled into the Bug. Malcolm stayed at the RV with Mr. Johnson, but he wasn’t happy about it. He wriggled in Mr. Johnson’s arms, trying to climb into the car with us.

  “You stay here, baby. You stay with Daddy. Mama will be back after a little while.” Mrs. Johnson kissed Malcolm through the window. He was hollering like crazy when we drove off.

  Mrs. Johnson wheeled a cart through the Kroger, pointing to things for us to pick off the shelves. I found the creamed corn and Lashaundra got the whole-kernel corn. Then we ran in search of corn muffin mix and cheddar cheese. Mrs. Johnson made the best corn casserole ever.

  When the cart was full, we stood in the checkout line behind a lady who seemed to have a coupon for everything in her cart.

  “Can we get some gum, Mama?”

  “No, baby. It’s bad for your teeth.”

  “Even sugarless?” Lashaundra smiled at her mother, her dark eyes wide.

  “All right.” Mrs. Johnson sighed and put a package of gum in our cart.

  “So,” she said, not looking at me, “what happened to Jackie? I’m surprised she’s not with you.”

  “She left,” I said. “When we went to Idaho, she didn’t come with us.”

  “Is that where you guys got Emma?” Lashaundra asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, that explains that,” Mrs. Johnson said so softly I could barely hear her.

  I watched her move items from the cart to the checkout counter and thought of the woman in Walmart, the one who’d bumped into Emma.

  “She’s not racist,” I said. “She’s just not used to being around black people. There aren’t any black people in Idaho.”

  “Mmm-hmm.” Her back was to me.

  “Honest, Mrs. Johnson, Emma’s really nice. She’s just shy, I guess.”

  She turned to look at me then, cupped my chin in her hand, and smiled. “I’m sure she’s nice, honey. Is she nice to you?”

  I nodded. “She worked with the horses at the campground we were at, and she let me help. I know all about taking care of horses now.”

  “Well, that’s good, Jenny. That’s just fine.”

  I slept that night in the Johnsons’ RV, sharing Lashaundra’s bed like I had so often the winter before. Daddy kissed me good night, while Emma watched from the trailer doorway. They must have been tired from their picnic, because they turned out the lights even before Lashaundra and I went to bed.

  “Did you like Idaho?” she whispered to me under the covers.

  “Yeah,” I whispered back. “It was really pretty and there were mountains and a river. And we saw lots of deer and ducks and stuff, even a moose one time.”

  She sighed. “I wish we could have gone there instead of stupid Tennessee. That campground was awful . . . worse than this one.”

  We giggled for a minute.

  “The campground in Idaho was nice. Lots of grass, and they had bonfires at night, and we swam in the river.”

  “How come there aren’t any blacks there?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “But I didn’t see anybody but white people the whole time we were there.”

  “Maybe that’s why we didn’t go, too.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Do you miss Jackie?”

  I nodded. “Sometimes. She was funny.”

  “I liked her. She told the best jokes.” Lashaundra yawned. “Why did she leave?”

  “I don’t know. She just left, like they all do.”

  “Do you think Emma will leave?”

  I nodded again. “They all do.”

  Long after Lashaundra fell asleep I lay awake, listening to Malcolm snore in the bunk below. Finally, Mr. and Mrs. Johnson turned off the television and the light.

  “So, what do you think about Brannon and that woman?” Mrs. Johnson’s voice carried softly across the RV.

  “She’s a looker, all right.”

  I heard a slap and a laugh. “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”

  The bedsprings creaked.

  “I don’t know, Angel. Brannon says she’s real good with Jenny.”

  “Jackie was good with Jenny.” Mrs. Johnson’s voice was sharp.

  “And she left.” Mr. Johnson sounded tired.

  “Well, this new one sure has issues.”

  “Brannon says she grew up in some weird town in Arizona and never has been anywhere except there and Idaho.”

  “Hmmph.” Mrs. Johnson sounded unconvinced.

  “She can’t be too bad, honey. She let Jenny spend the night.”

  “That wasn’t her choice. That was Brannon.”

  “Well, we’re stuck with her for a few months. So we might as well make the best of it.”

  There was a long silence. At last, Mrs. Johnson said quietly, “I’ll be nice. You know me, I’m always nice. But if she says anything to hurt my baby . . .”

  “Go to sleep, Angel. It’ll be fine. You’ll see.”

  “Michael?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you, too, honey.”

  I lay in bed awake for a long time, wondering what it would be like to have two parents who both stayed.

  10

  Emma

  “Y a’ll want the usual?” Resa called out as we walked into the diner.

  “I think I’ll have a chef’s salad today,” I said.

  “You want dressing, or are you eating it naked?” She pulled her pad from her apron pocket.

  “Italian,” I said, sliding into our usual booth.

  “How ’bout you, hon?” She smiled at Jenny. “The usual?”

  Jenny nodded and smiled back. It was impossible not to smile when Resa was around.

  She took our ticket to the kitchen
and returned with our drinks.

  “So, what are ya’ll up to?”

  “We’ve been at the library,” I said, taking my iced tea. “Jenny’s working on a big science paper.”

  “Good girl,” she said, placing Jenny’s milk on the table. “Study hard, get good grades, go to college, and get yourself a real job that pays real money.”

  “What do you think I pay you?” Harlan yelled from the kitchen. “Monopoly money?”

  Resa laughed and rolled her eyes. “You don’t pay jack shit, and you know it,” she called back to him. “If you did, maybe Carol Sue wouldn’t have quit.”

  “Carol Sue quit?”

  “Yeah,” Resa said, leaning against our table. “Last night she walked out in the middle of the dinner shift. Told the old man to take the job and shove it.”

  She sighed. “So now we’re shorthanded for the evening shift. You know anyone looking for a job?”

  “Actually,” I said, “I might be interested.”

  Jenny stared at me. “But who will take me to the library?” she asked.

  “I will,” I said. “If it’s the dinner shift, I can work while you’re with your dad.”

  “You got any experience?” Resa asked.

  “Yeah, I’ve waited tables before. Did a couple years at a truck stop in Utah. It would only be until we leave in January, but it’ll give you some time to find someone permanent.”

  “Well, let me get you an application,” she said. “Like I said, it don’t pay much, but it’s better than nothing. And of course, you’ll get all the pleasure of working with me!”

  I guess I thought Brannon would be happy when I told him about the job. But he wasn’t, not at all. That night, before he left for his shift, he let me know just how unhappy he was. Thankfully, Jenny was at the Johnsons’.

  “I can’t believe you took a job without even talking to me about it first!”

  “It’s just the dinner shift, and it’s only three nights a week. We can use the money.”

  “Damn it, Emma! I am the man in this family, and I can take care of the money.”

  “But I thought . . .”

  “I don’t care what you thought. I’m telling you I don’t want you working at that goddamned diner!”

  He slammed his fist on the table so hard the whole trailer shook. I stared at him in disbelief. I’d never seen him so mad.