by Anne Mateer
“Really? I imagined you to be in the center of the social whirlwind.”
“That would be Mama. Not me.” I sighed. “I thought maybe if I were in a bigger place, with more to do, more people to meet, life would be more exciting. Without Mama to direct everything. But it’s likely that’s not meant to be.”
“I’m sure you’re appreciated wherever you are.” His gaze captured mine, held it even as he picked up the empty basket.
Dan tromped onto the porch. “We’re all hungry, Bekah. Is it dinner soon?”
I pushed to my feet. “Yes, it’s dinner soon.”
Frank stepped between his son and me. “But first Dan is going to ask nicely. Aren’t you, Dan?”
The child sighed with his whole body—arms and shoulders and head heaving up, then shrugging down. “Yes, sir.” He turned to me. “Bekah, could we please have dinner soon? My belly is growling something awful.”
I bypassed Frank and lifted Dan so he and I could see each other face-to-face. “Let’s heat up some coffee for your daddy while we get dinner on the table.”
Dan grinned. Warmth spread from my fingertips to my toes. If only I could convince myself it was lit by Dan’s grin alone and not by his father’s nearness.
Other chores called Frank from the house more often than not for the next few days. At first I felt more comfortable. But loneliness crept in right behind. And fear. I wondered when, exactly, Frank planned to tell the children I’d be leaving. I felt sure he had some plan.
Weather more like spring than winter arrived as February continued. Thirty-four days remained on my makeshift calendar.
I wiped an arm across my forehead, drying the perspiration sparked by the blazing stove. Janie whined in the corner, her face pink with heat. The boys and Frank would be warm out in the fields, too. And thirsty. Water would cool them. But then I spied two lemons Frank had picked up at Crenshaw’s store. He’d had a hankering for lemonade, he’d said. I’d laughed. Lemonade in February? But it didn’t seem so outrageous on a day like today.
It wouldn’t take long. And the water from the cistern would be cool enough without ice. I mixed it up in a jiffy, then lifted Janie onto my hip, securing her with one arm, carrying the bucket of lemonade with the other, a ladle for dipping it out hanging from the pocket of my apron.
Janie clapped her hands and laughed as we walked through the barnyard and toward the fields. Almost one year old and still no discernable word.
“Birdie? See the birdie, Janie?”
“Ba, ba, ba.” She pointed and babbled something else I pretended to understand.
“Daddy. We’re going to see your daddy.”
Nothing. She just bounced in my arm, nearly knocking me off balance. I held the bucket a bit higher, determined to steady it, to arrive without spilling a drop.
The fields did indeed look ready for something. Not like when I’d first seen them, with their crops newly harvested. My stomach clenched at the reminder spread out before me. Frank was a farmer. He led a farmer’s life. A life I longed to escape.
I set Janie on the ground but kept hold of her hand. Frank and the boys huddled farther off, their backs to us, bent toward the ground, intent on something. I lifted my chin and marched forward. Frank had no intentions toward me. He’d said that before my parents arrived and again during their visit.
Frank turned, straightened. His slow smile made me want to turn and run. I wouldn’t be tethered to the land. I would find a life that mattered, a life with an open door to adventure, to change.
“What have we here?” Frank lifted his daughter high in the air. Her laughter cackled through the clear air, twisting my heart.
If Frank didn’t want me, I wouldn’t have these children, either.
I thrust my bucket into the space between us, lemonade sloshing onto the dirt beneath. “I thought you’d all like something cool to drink.”
He set Janie on his shoulders, letting her pound his hat farther down on his head. I handed him the dipper. He drank, eyes widening. Then he handed a half-full ladle to James. “Lemonade. Boy howdy, does it taste good!”
The boys slurped down their share, as did Janie. When my bucket grew light, I reached for Janie’s tiny hand. “We best get back and get dinner ready.”
Frank nodded—that lopsided, little-boy grin never leaving his face. I bit my lip and stared at the dirt, begging my heart to be still, to be reasonable, to understand that I couldn’t want him, couldn’t want this. But like an unruly child, it refused to obey. And like an exasperated mother, my irritation flowered into anger.
By the time we’d finished dinner and Frank and the boys left the house again, I had to calm my agitation. And I knew a surefire way to do that: scrubbing floors.
Ollie arrived home from school, dropped her books in the hall, and shuffled slowly into the parlor.
“Ollie?”
No answer. I didn’t have the energy to fight her. I left the books where they lay and moved into the far corner of the dining room. The final room. I returned to my knees, scouring away the dirt even though my shoulders and back and arms ached. But the exhaustion kept my mind off other things. Like the man who loved this farm and his children.
I sat back on my heels, wondering how I’d find the energy to cook supper. Maybe Ollie could help out.
Dan held on to the wall, his head poking through the doorway. My heart danced at the sight of him, even in my tiredness. He seemed so much more grown up than when I’d come four months ago. Was that possible? I tiptoed across the dining room and pulled him to me. The scar on his head couldn’t be seen anymore unless you searched for it.
“Ollie’s shiverin’, Bekah.”
“Shivering?” I hadn’t noticed it grow colder, but I’d worked myself into a sweat.
He wiggled free of my grasp. “Shiverin’ under three quilts!” He shoved three pudgy fingers in my face.
I rubbed my forehead. Thank goodness the Spanish influenza was no longer a threat. I would isolate her from the others and slather the Vicks VapoRub on her chest. I wished I still had a lemon to squeeze into hot water with some honey.
My teeth searched for some scrap of thumbnail to gnaw on.
“Where’s your daddy, Dan?”
He shrugged. “Said he and Brother Latham had to go somewhere, but he’d be back afore supper.”
Just when I did need Frank, he wasn’t here. No matter. I’d make Ollie rest, and she’d be better in no time. “You and James take Janie to the kitchen and play patty-cake with her. After I take care of Ollie, we’ll fix supper.”
Dan nodded with the solemnity of an old man before darting off, yelling for James and Janie.
I found Ollie under a mountain of quilts in the parlor, her dull eyes staring through me. I pressed my hands against her cheeks. Her skin flamed hotter than a smithy’s forge, setting my stomach to quivering. Quilts and all, I managed to get her into her mother’s bedroom.
As I pulled back the clean sheets, her eyes widened. “Am I dying?”
I sat beside her on the bed, scolding myself for scaring her.
“No, honey.” I stroked back the little hairs that curled around her face as I pulled the sheet over her shaking form. “I just wanted you someplace warm and easy to get to. And away from the others. We don’t want them getting sick, too, do we?”
She shook her head and shut her eyes.
“I’m going to brew you some tea, and then you’re going to sleep. You’ll be fine. I promise.”
Her weak smile ripped at my heart as she curled into herself and turned away.
“Where’s Ollie?” Frank eased into the chair at the head of the kitchen table. I turned from the stove and set the pot of beans on the table, ready to spoon them onto plates.
“She’s not feeling well. If you’d been here earlier, you’d know that.” Where had that come from? Even I hadn’t paid Ollie much attention at all until Dan had alarmed me. But I wouldn’t tell Frank that. “I put her in the downstairs bedroom.”
His chair scraped against t
he floor before his feet thumped across the hall. The bedroom door creaked open and clicked shut. Even though I couldn’t see his face in that moment, I imagined it all too well.
When he returned to the table, his silence prickled the hairs on my arms. Had I missed something? Was Ollie worse off than I’d imagined? The cornbread seemed to lodge in my throat, cutting off my breath. I carried my half-full plate to the slop bucket and scraped it in. I didn’t care if Mama said waste was a sin. Another mouthful and I feared it would all come back up anyway.
I wiped my hands on my apron. “I’ll check on Ollie.” Before Frank could answer, I’d left the room, my insides as agitated as cream in a churn. But Ollie seemed some better when I reached her side—not quite as hot to the touch, or as restless. I sank into the chair near the bed, the same one from which I’d watched Aunt Adabelle die.
The thought lifted me to my feet. I splashed water on my face and pinched color into my cheeks before I forced my feet to keep moving, across the floor, around the bed. My nerves might be frayed to the edge, but I refused to let Frank see that.
Frank. My hand ran over the top of the combination bookcase, across the front of the pull-down desk where I’d first read his letters. A sudden chill washed over me. I tried to rub warmth into my arms, but by the time Frank entered the room, my teeth chattered as loudly as Ollie’s.
He looked from me to Ollie and back again before pulling a quilt from a trunk in the corner of the room. To my surprise, he laid it around my shoulders. “Cold’s moving back in. I’ll stir up the fire in the next room. It’ll help warm this one.”
I let myself relax into the chair. But then he stood in the open doorway, struggling to control the concern on his face. “Should I go for someone?”
I shook my head, reveling in the fact that he’d asked my advice instead of taking over. “Not yet. I think she’ll be fine. She already seems better. I’ll sit with her through the night, just to be sure.”
He didn’t want to leave his daughter. I could tell. But he didn’t want to stay in that room, either. I could see the anguish in his eyes, as if he imagined his wife’s final moments in that same bed.
“You take care of the others. I’ll watch over her.”
He finally complied. But even after the house quieted, it was deep into the night before I heard his footsteps crunch over the dead grass on his way to the barn.
A heavy cough shook Ollie’s body as the scythe-shaped moon cut the inky sky with a slash of brightness. It reminded me all too well of the wet rattle of Aunt Adabelle’s final moments. If the cough turned deeper I’d have to boil some water and make her breathe the steam. At least I remembered that much from my own childhood bouts of coughing.
Night crawled toward day. My head nodded toward my chest in spite of my concern. I knew a night in the chair wouldn’t make for a good morning, so I curled myself on the far corner of the bed.
Next thing I knew, I startled awake, heart racing like a train at full speed. The windows remained dark. No noise invaded the house or its environs. I listened for a little while, on alert for whatever had disturbed my slumber. Finally I eased my head back down, my eyes closing of their own accord.
Then Ollie moaned. I crawled up beside her, felt the heat of her body even through the covers.
“It’s okay, honey. Bekah’s here.” Hands shaking, I fumbled for a match to light the lamp. The flame threw its brightness into the room, illuminating Ollie’s face, afire with fever.
A smidgen of cold slippery-elm tea remained in the cup by the bed. I held her head and forced the liquid between her lips. After opening the top of her gown, I dipped my fingers in the Vicks and smeared it over her chest. The sharp menthol smell cleared the last dregs of dreamland from my head.
“I’ll be right back, honey.” Shivering, I stirred the coals in the stove, brewed more tea, took down the bottle of cough medicine, and prayed. I would not panic. And I wouldn’t call for help, either. Nights were hardest in the sickroom. Patients almost always looked better by the light of day.
I returned to Ollie with the fresh tea and a spoonful of medicine. She’d fallen asleep again. I hated to wake her, but after a gentle shake, her eyes opened enough to take both. I sat on the edge of the bed and stroked her wheat-colored hair. She snuggled into me, as a sick child does to her mama. My breath caught in my throat.
“It’s okay, baby.” My arm cradled around her as I whispered the words. I leaned back against the iron headboard and lifted my legs to the mattress. Slowly, gently, I spread the quilt over us. Then I closed my eyes and fell fast asleep.
“Who’s fixin’ breakfast?” James whizzed into the bedroom.
I’d hardly opened my eyes before Ollie moaned. “I hurt all over, Bekah.”
“Janie’s awake!” Dan yelled from the top of the stairs.
I put my hand on my head, trying to figure out what to focus on first.
“How is she?” Frank downed the cup of coffee in his hands—cold, I felt sure—and sat in the chair I’d vacated long ago.
“Who’s gettin’ Janie?” Dan called again. Then I heard Janie’s mad cry.
Frank’s face looked as haggard as mine felt. Had he slept at all last night? My socked feet hit the chilled floor.
“Bekah!” Dan again.
“Make Ollie drink some of that tea.” And I was off. A quick breakfast. Something to feed Ollie. A cold noon dinner. More tea. And coffee. One minute in the kitchen, the next in the bedroom, forgetting in one place what I meant to do in the other. Frank appeared oblivious to the chaos. He had eyes only for Ollie now.
She labored to breathe, even with Vicks on her chest and steam in her face. She barely managed to lift her head from the pillow to drink down the broth I’d made from a scrawny chicken. Frank bathed his daughter’s face as tenderly as any nurse.
I took the rag from his hand sometime that afternoon. “Go romp with the boys awhile. They need you, too.”
He blinked up at me, confused. As if he’d forgotten he had other children. Then his eyes cleared. “You’re right. You’ll stay with her, won’t you?”
I pushed him toward the hall. “Yes. Now go handle the boys and Janie. I’ll watch Ollie.”
Worry pecked at me while the boys whooped their excitement at their daddy coming to play. We couldn’t endure a worse night than the last. I feared she needed the doctor. But while Doc Risinger had indeed recovered from his tangle with the Spanish Lady, he’d slowed his workload and had sent inquiries for another doctor to come to Prater’s Junction. Irene said he hadn’t found anyone yet because most of the younger doctors hadn’t returned from France.
The sun dipped closer to the earth. Daylight would disappear in a few hours.
“Frank?” I hoped he would hear my call over the boys’ squabbling.
He did. In fact, he came dragging each boy by the shirt collar.
I kept my voice calm, though I wanted to shriek. “I think we need to get the doctor—and maybe Irene.”
Frank’s fingers unclenched, leaving the boys free. Without a word, he charged into the pinking light. I watched from the window until I couldn’t see even a speck of him in the distance.
Ollie groaned out my name. I returned to the little mound in the middle of the big bed. “James, take the little ones to the parlor and keep them there.”
“Okay. But the fire’s ’most died away.”
Of course. I hurried in, poked the logs, and fanned the flame. The moment I returned to Ollie’s side, my knees hit the floor by the bed, fingers clutching at one another, squeezing until the pressure cramped my hands.
Please, please, dear Jesus. I grabbed fistfuls of the quilt now, and lowered my face against their colored patches. We can’t put her in the ground, too.
The boys and Janie made more noise than a pack of dogs treeing a coon. I hushed them, managing to get more tea and medicine into Ollie before she drifted to sleep once more. Building blocks still banged from the next room, but at least they tried to keep their voices quiet. And
still the sun lit the window.
It seemed like it’d been forever since Frank disappeared from my sight. And yet it also felt like only a moment. I wondered if God had stopped the sun in the sky as He had for Joshua and the children of Israel. But just as the thought entered my mind, the sun dropped behind the horizon and the earth fell into shadow.
I needed light to fight off the darkness. But for the lamps to burn again I had to trim the wicks, and I hadn’t made the time. Truth be told, Ollie often did that job. But now my little helper lay too weak to rise from her bed.
I poured kerosene into the clear bowl, trimmed the wick, and touched it with a burning match. Light glowed brighter as I replaced the chimney.
Dan appeared at my side. “I think Janie’s scared of the dark.”
As I picked up the lamp and plunged into the hall, the darkness peeled back, giving way to light. James and Dan herded Janie to the kitchen while I remembered all the sermons I’d heard about Jesus being a light in the darkness, showing us the way.
Stumbling through the hall and into the kitchen, I brightened another lamp, dispelling the dark within its reach. Had I let Jesus illuminate my path—or had I tried to make my own light? I refused to let myself dwell on the subject, but it loomed up in the gloaming, forcing a confrontation.
Had I mistaken my own light for God’s leading? Maybe. It seemed I’d completely misread God’s plan for me. My heart had yearned toward the wrong thing. And now it pined for what I insisted it didn’t want.
But still, Aunt Adabelle had believed—and said with her dying breath—that God had brought me here. To this very place.
I poured milk, cut cornbread. Janie whined, her hands pulling at my skirt. I lifted her into my arms. Her shape shimmered before me as I heard Irene’s voice in my head. “Life has a way of surprising you sometimes.”
My heart swelled, pushing tears into my eyes. I beckoned Dan and James to my side, pulled them in, held them tight.
Dan wriggled away first. “When will Daddy get back? He said we’d build a tower of blocks afore bed.”