Prodigal Daughter

by Patricia Davids

  Chapter Nine

  The next day was Saturday and Melissa spent the early-morning hours in her room. The sound of cartoons filled the house but she wasn’t in the mood for animated antics. She still couldn’t believe the things she had confided to Richard. He must think she was the most pathetic creature on the face of the earth.

  As much as she hated to admit it, he was right about one thing. Talking seemed to help. She had had a dream about Jenny.

  It wasn’t the usual one, the one that had haunted her nights for so many years. This dream had been about their secret hiding place. In the dream, they were seven or eight years old. She and Jenny were huddled inside the hayloft of the abandoned carriage house at the back of Jenny’s parents’ property. They were giggling and playing house with the dolls they kept hidden there.

  Melissa’s doll was bundled in a tattered blanket and clutched lovingly in her arms as she walked around the perimeter of the old wooden floor pretending to be on her way to Jenny’s home. She stopped and knocked on an imaginary door. Jenny leaped to her feet and answered the knock. “Oh, how lovely. You’ve brought your baby to see me.”

  The dream ended there, but when Melissa woke, a touch of warmth and happiness remained in her heart. It was nice to remember Jenny the way she was before she became ill.

  A knock sounded on the real door to her current hiding place. An instant of trepidation made her hesitate, but she couldn’t hide all day.

  “Come in,” she called.

  Angela opened the door. “Are you up?”

  From her seat in the chair by the window, Melissa answered, “Barely.”

  “Dave and I are off to work on the house. Do you have plans for today?”

  “Nothing but a little laundry.”

  “The girls were asking if you could come with them to Aunt Lettie’s this afternoon. Richard will take them, but he has some work he needs to do at his office. I hate to saddle Lettie with both girls for the afternoon without a little help. She isn’t as young as she used to be and the girls can be…labor intensive at times.”

  “I’ll be happy to visit with Lettie again. I really enjoyed meeting her the other night. She’s quite a character.”

  “She is that. Thanks so much for doing this.”

  “What time are we leaving?”

  “Not until after one o’clock. That should give you plenty of time to do your laundry.” With a fluttering wave of her fingers, Angela left the room.

  Melissa glanced at the clock on the wall. It was already nine. That might leave her enough time to do laundry, but it didn’t leave her near enough time to decide what she would say to Richard when she saw him.

  Should she act as though nothing happened? Did he think she was a nutcase? She certainly didn’t want his pity. If he started acting as if he felt sorry for her, she would have to thump him upside the head. No, she would act as if nothing out of the ordinary had transpired.

  Later, she couldn’t decide if she was relieved or miffed that he acted as if she hadn’t revealed to him the most painful experience of her life. Maybe he was used to women pouring out their sad sob stories. He was an attorney, after all. He must have heard a few confessions in his time.

  His mood was jovial as he drove them to Lettie’s home. He dropped Melissa, Lauren and Samantha off at the curb with barely a backward glance.

  “Well, so much for pouring my heart out,” Melissa muttered as his car rounded the corner and disappeared.

  If he could act as though nothing had changed between them, so could she. The fact was, nothing had changed between them. It was only her foolish imagination that wanted to paint their relationship as more than it was.

  Determined not to give him another thought, she followed the girls up the stairs where Lettie was waiting for them with a bright smile on her face.

  Inside Lettie’s cheerful, but antique-filled home, Melissa saw why Angela didn’t want to leave the girls without supervision. The rambunctious pair could easily dispatch several thousand dollars’ worth of china plates or porcelain figurines with little effort. Fortunately, Lettie had a way to keep them occupied and out of the living room.

  “How would y’all like to bake something special with me?”

  “Could we?” Lauren looked at Melissa with undisguised eagerness.

  “If Miss Lettie says it’s okay, I don’t see why not.”

  “Cool,” Samantha added, trying not to look as excited as her sister.

  Lettie shooed them into the kitchen. “I’ve got to bake three apple pies for the church social tomorrow. If you girls help me, we’ll have them done in no time.”

  She soon had Samantha and Melissa busy paring fresh apples while she showed Lauren how to measure flour and cut the shortening into the dough.

  “Cut the flour into the shortening like this. You don’t want to handle it too much.”

  “Why?” Lauren was peering into the bowl intently.

  “It’ll make the crust tough.”

  “Why?”

  Lettie paused, then chuckled. “Child, I don’t rightly know, but it does.”

  “Can I roll it out into a circle?” Lauren begged.

  “You can roll the bottom and your sister can roll the top so both of you can say you made it.”

  When the first pie was finished and in the oven, Lettie gave both the girls the leftover dough. “My mother always let me make turnovers out of the extra. I called them teensy pies when I was little. You girls find some jam and make a few for me.”

  Samantha asked, “What kind should we make?”

  “Surprise me,” Lettie answered.

  She left the girls working on the counter and sat at the table beside Melissa. Picking up her paring knife, she started in on the next pile of apples. “How is your father doing, Melissa?”

  “Okay, I guess.”

  Lettie stopped peeling and peered at Melissa over the rim of her glasses. “You guess? Don’t you know?”

  Embarrassed to admit to this kindly woman that she hadn’t been to see her dad, Melissa ducked her head. “Daddy and I haven’t exactly been getting along.”

  “I see.” Lettie began peeling again. After the fourth apple, her continued silence was more than Melissa could stand.

  “I do plan to see him soon. Mother says he’ll be home by Thanksgiving.”

  “That’s good.” Lettie kept paring. The quiet was broken only by the voices of the girls at the other end of the kitchen.

  “It’s not that I don’t love my father,” Melissa added to reassure Lettie and perhaps herself.

  “Of course you do.”

  “I do. Only…”

  “Only what?”

  “He’s going to be so disappointed in me,” she finished in a small voice.

  Reaching across the table, Lettie laid a hand over Melissa’s. “Why on earth would he be disappointed in such a lovely young woman?”

  Meeting Lettie’s kind gaze, Melissa sighed. “Because I’m pregnant.”

  Lettie’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, I see. If you don’t mind my asking, where is the baby’s father?”

  “Long gone. He doesn’t want anything to do with us. Now you know why I can’t face my father.”

  “That certainly makes it more difficult for you.”

  “Daddy will have a cow.”

  “Is your father a Christian man?”

  “He goes to church.”

  “There’s more to being a Christian than sitting in church, but it’s a start. Have you thought that instead of ‘having a cow’ your father might order the fatted calf slain in celebration that his daughter has returned?”

  Melissa gave her a look of disbelief. “No.”

  “Do you know the parable of the prodigal son?”

  “Sort of.”

  Lettie left the room and came back a few minutes later with a Bible. She opened it and thumbed through a few pages until she found what she was looking for. “Melissa, I want you to listen to this story. In Luke 15, Jesus tells us the story of a man wi
th two sons. The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them.

  “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.

  “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him, Father, I have sinned against Heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired men.’ So he got up and went to his father.

  “But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him. He ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

  “The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against Heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’

  “But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again, he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.

  “Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. ‘Your brother has come,’ he replied, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’

  “The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’

  “‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again, he was lost and is found.’”

  Melissa listened intently to the old woman’s voice. At the end of the story, Lettie closed the book and waited. Melissa said, “I’d love to think my father will welcome me with open arms, but I’m afraid I know him better than that.”

  “You’ll never know for sure until you give him the chance. I can’t imagine how it would hurt knowing my own child was so afraid of me that she couldn’t come see me in the hospital.”

  “I want to see him, I do. Only…”

  “Only what?”

  “Only…this sounds so stupid.”

  “Child, you ain’t said anything yet so it can’t sound stupid.”

  “I’m afraid.”

  “Of your father’s anger?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid to face my dad, but I’m…I’m terrified of hospitals. Isn’t that the stupidest thing you’ve ever heard?”

  “I once heard a man say he had a horse that could drive a truck. Honestly, I think that was the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. We can’t always help being scared of things. Why, a spider will near send me into a fit, and you and me both know I’m bigger than a bitsy old spider. Why do you think you’re scared of hospitals?”

  “After my friend Jenny died, I couldn’t set foot inside one without shaking like a leaf.”

  “Do tell? When did your friend die?”

  “Just before Christmas, when we were sixteen. It’s odd. I haven’t talked to anyone about Jenny since her funeral…until yesterday.”

  “What happened yesterday?”

  “Richard asked me about her. He said it would help to talk about things that trouble me. I’ve always heard that, but I never really believed it until now.”

  “Are you still angry with her?”

  Puzzled, Melissa said, “With who?”

  “With your friend, for dying.”

  Melissa opened her mouth to deny it, but the words stuck in her throat. How could she be mad at Jenny? Jenny hadn’t asked to die. Shaking her head, she said, “That’s ridiculous.”

  “I was mad at my Gilbert for a long time after he passed away. I was mad at God, too.”

  “Isn’t that against your faith?”

  “The good Lord has broad shoulders. He took all my anger and sorrow into Himself. In the end, I was healed by His love and by the love Gilbert and I shared. We had a good life, but it’s nothing compared to the eternal glory waiting for me. Every morning when I wake up, I’m a little sad because the Lord didn’t call me home. I’m eighty-eight, you know. But each day I recall my Gilbert’s voice saying, ‘What you got planned today, Lettie Mae?’ just like he used to ask me, and I know it’s the Lord’s way of telling me my work on earth ain’t done. He’s got a plan for me even if I can’t see it.”

  “You mean you aren’t afraid of dying?”

  “’Course I am! I’m human, aren’t I? It’s natural to fear dying, but Jesus went down into the grave and rose from the dead to show us that our fears and doubts are but a veil that keeps us from seeing clearly the glory awaiting us. When my time comes, and it will, it comes to everyone, I believe Jesus will pull the veil from my eyes and I’ll see all those I love waiting to greet me.”

  “It’s nice to think I could see Jenny again.”

  “Those that die in the Lord are never lost. You should talk to her.”

  “Talk to her? You mean, go to her grave?”

  “It helps some folks to visit their loved ones that have passed on. I always feel close to Gilbert when I’m there. I go to visit regular like.”

  Their conversation was interrupted when Lauren raced to the table. “Aunt Lettie, we finished our teensy pies. I made peach ones and Samantha made strawberry.”

  “That’s wonderful. We’ll bake them up as soon as the one in the oven is finished. I reckon Melissa and I have enough apples peeled for two more pies. Melissa, why don’t you come into the living room? I have something you might like to see.”

  Melissa followed her into the next room and waited as Lettie opened one of the curved doors on an antique cherrywood credenza and withdrew a box filled with yellowed newspaper clippings. “I got these out after meeting you the other night. Did I mention that I knew your grandfather Hamilton?”

  “No. How did you know Grandpa?”

  “I was a reporter for his paper in 1936. These are a few of my articles.”

  Melissa took the box and sat on the plush red velvet of the camel-back sofa. She began to leaf through the pile, reading snippets of news about Davis Landing before World War II.

  “Lettie, these are wonderful. I remember my grandmother talking about this fire and how she saw the orange light in the sky all night long and wondered if the Dispatch building would still be standing in the morning. Only the bylines on these say Leonard Corbet.”

  “That was my pen name. It would have been scandalous to use my own name.”

  “Why?”

  “Honey, a nice Southern girl didn’t work as a reporter for the newspaper in those days. My folks would have had a fit if they knew. They thought I was a secretary, which I was for the most part. But I loved going out to cover the news. Your grandpa, he always said a woman could do the job as well as a man, but not many men felt that way back then.”

  “So you never received credit for your work?”

  “No, but I got my paycheck, and that was enough in those days. Times were hard. The country was in the depths of the Depression. My name in a byline wasn’t as important as the little bit of money I earned. Besides, there were other women doing the same thing.”

  An idea began to form in the back of Melissa’s mind. What if she could get the paper to do a story about women like Lettie?
/>   “Do you know their names?”

  “I reckon I can find a few in my old letters in the attic. Why?”

  A knock sounded at the door and both Lauren and Samantha hurried to answer it. Beating her big sister by a narrow margin, Lauren pulled open the door. “Oh, it’s you,” she said, clearly dejected.

  “If that’s the kind of welcome I get, maybe I should leave.”

  At the sound of Richard’s amused voice, Melissa’s pulse accelerated. She hadn’t realized how much she had been missing him and how eager she was to spend time with him. She only hoped her eagerness wasn’t apparent to the others.

  “Sorry, Uncle Richard,” Lauren apologized. “It’s just that we don’t want to go home yet. Our teensy pies aren’t done.”

  “Come in, dear,” Lettie called. “I’m just bending Melissa’s ear about the good old days.”

  Richard walked in and took a seat on the sofa beside Melissa. “Your stories are always worth listening to, Aunt Lettie. Even the ones I’ve heard a hundred times. We’ll stay until you’re done baking, girls.”

  The timer on the oven began buzzing. Lettie rose and handed the box to Melissa. “Come on girls, my pie is done. It’s time to put yours in. Don’t forget to put your initials in the crust with a fork so you can tell which is which.”

  The girls hurried into the kitchen ahead of their aunt. Richard leaned close to Melissa and whispered, “What are teensy pies?”

  The scent of his aftershave engulfed her and his breathy whisper tickled her ear. It took all her powers of concentration to reply in a normal tone of voice. “They’re popovers made with leftover pie dough.”

  “Why don’t they call them popovers?”

  “Where’s the fun in that?”

  “Must be a girl thing.”

  He didn’t move away. She hoped she wasn’t blushing. She liked it far too much when he was close.

  “What do you have here?” He picked up one of the yellowed strips of newspaper.

  “Your aunt was telling me about her years as a reporter for my grandfather’s paper.”

  “Lettie was a reporter? I didn’t know that.”