The Boarding House

by Sharon Sala

  “Are you sick?” Ellie asked.

  Doris shook her head. “No, baby, I’m not sick.”

  “Then why are you crying?”

  Doris choked and pressed a hand to her lips.

  Ellie frowned. She hated it when she asked questions and adults didn’t answer. It wasn’t fair. They sure expected an answer when they asked her one.

  Fine, Ellie thought. She sat up, then looked down at her clothes. They didn’t match. She never wore stuff that didn’t match.

  “I need to change my clothes.”

  “It doesn’t matter about your clothes,” Doris said and grabbed a fresh tissue.

  At that point, Ellie zeroed in on the voices out in the hall. “Where’s Wyatt? Who are those people out in the hall?”

  Doris shrugged. She couldn’t account for the missing Wyatt and wasn’t going to be the one to tell this child that her mother had committed suicide and the house was crawling with cops.

  Ellie’s bedroom door opened. It was like someone turned up the volume. All the voices and noises became louder, but it wasn’t until she saw her Daddy’s face that she remembered—Daddy on his knees out in the hall—telling her Momma went to sleep and never woke up. He said Momma was dead, but she was pretty sure that he lied. Daddy did whatever he needed to make things work in his world.

  “Where’s my Momma?” Ellie asked.

  Garrett looked like he’d shrunk a foot as he crossed the room to her bed. His eyes were red-rimmed and his hands shook as he touched Doris on the shoulder. “Thank you so much for coming in on your day off. If you don’t mind, I need a few minutes alone with Ellie.”

  “Is she . . . is the body . . . ?”

  Garrett shook his head. “The people from the crime lab are still in there.”

  Ellie stood up on the bed. Her voice rose with her. “Where’s my Momma?”

  Garrett’s mouth crumpled. “I already told you, remember?”

  Doris stood up and left the room, closing the door behind her.

  The moment the door shut it dawned on Ellie that she and her father were alone. A shaft of panic shot through her so fast she had to sit down. This time, the challenge was gone from her voice.

  “Momma said you can’t be in here with me anymore.”

  Garrett sat down in the chair Doris had vacated, making sure to keep some distance between them. The last thing he needed was for her to start talking about their games with a house full of cops.

  “I know, Ellie, and I wouldn’t be, I promise, except I needed to check on you.”

  “Momma can check on me,” Ellie whispered, but reality was beginning to set in.

  Wyatt came in, glanced at his Daddy then positioned himself between them. “Leave her alone.”

  Garrett flinched. “Ever the protector, aren’t you?”

  “Someone had to be,” Wyatt said.

  Garrett leaned back in the rocker, eyeing his progeny and wondering if he was going to be able to pull this off. He was older and smarter, but he’d yet to find anyone more pigheaded than his own seed.

  “Ellie, talk to me,” he said.

  Her head came up and the look in her eyes caught him off guard. “You’re lying to me, aren’t you, Daddy?”

  “I’m not lying about anything.”

  “Where’s Momma?”

  Garrett exhaled slowly. The only way this was going to end was for her to see the ugly truth for herself. “The police are here. They haven’t moved her body yet, so she’s still in her room.”

  Ellie started to shake. Police were a big deal. It would be hard for Daddy to lie about that, especially if she was to see them for herself.

  “Ellie needs to see,” Wyatt said.

  Garrett eyed him curiously. “Did you look?”

  Wyatt nodded. There were tears in his eyes, but his jaw was set. Garrett knew he wouldn’t cry.

  Ellie gasped. “Did you really see her, Wyatt?”

  “Yes.”

  “I need to see, too,” Ellie said. “I think you just need to wake her up. Sometimes Momma takes too many pills, remember?”

  Garrett’s heart leaped. This was exactly what the cops needed to hear. “Come with me, baby,” he said softly.

  “Wyatt too.”

  He sighed. “Wyatt too, but no talking, do you hear me?”

  Wyatt nodded.

  Ellie crawled off the bed, and when Garrett might have picked her up, she pulled away and walked out of the room on her own. Within seconds, she was backed into a wall by a group of policemen who hadn’t seen her.

  “’Scuse me. I need to get by,” she said loudly.

  They jumped at the sound of a kid’s voice, then stared at Garrett in disbelief. “Man, she doesn’t have any business here.”

  Ellie frowned. “This is my house. I know the law. You can’t make me leave my own house.”

  Ellie didn’t really know the law, but it sounded good, and she was going to see her Momma. She needed to tell Momma she was sorry that she didn’t help carry in the groceries, and she was sorry that she didn’t tell Momma good night.

  “She refuses to believe me,” Garrett told the police. “I think she needs to see this for herself.”

  “Momma’s just asleep. All you have to do is shake her hard to wake her up, ’cause sometimes she takes too many sleeping pills.”

  Bingo. It was all Garrett could do not to smile. Ellie couldn’t have done any better if he’d fed her the line.

  The officers looked startled, then eyed Garrett with a different air as he took Ellie by the hand and led her into the room.

  At first Ellie couldn’t see past the men standing around the bed, but someone was taking pictures. When he stepped back to take a photo from a different angle, she realized they’d turned Momma onto her back.

  “Look, Daddy. I told you she’d wake up. She turned over.”

  Garrett put his hand on Ellie’s shoulder. When she walked out from under his touch, he didn’t push it.

  “They turned her over,” he said softly. “She’s dead, Ellie. She took too many pills and it killed her.”

  Ellie pushed past the photographer, then past another policeman until she was standing at the foot of Momma’s bed. Only this didn’t look like Momma.

  “What’s wrong with her face? Why is it so purple?” Ellie asked.

  “Because she died face down, Ellie, and that’s where all the blood in her body went when her heart stopped beating.”

  Ellie reeled as if she’d been slapped. She looked up. Everyone was staring at her. She looked back at her Momma, then poked the toe of her shoe. It flopped lifelessly.

  She heard someone whisper the word suicide. She frowned, uncertain of what that meant.

  “Momma?” Ellie said it again, and louder. “Momma.”

  The room was so quiet Ellie could hear the blood rushing through her body. Her shoulders slumped. For once, Daddy hadn’t lied. There was no way to describe what she felt, but the bottom line was that she’d just been abandoned.

  “I’m sorry I made you mad, Momma,” Ellie said softly, then turned around and walked out of the room.

  Garrett followed, taking care that they all see his concern for his child. As he’d hoped, Ellie had played right into his plan. She’d confirmed what he’d told the police about Fern’s drinking and prescription drug addiction, and the apology in Fern’s suicide note fit perfectly with what Ellie had just said. For all intents and purposes, Fern Wayne and her daughter had a fight last night. Despondent, Fern had taken her own life, leaving behind a note to explain the act. No one would suspect the nonspecific note referred to her dereliction as a parent that had led to her daughter’s molestation.

  Ellie walked through the house, then outside onto the back porch. She was pretty sure she was supposed to be crying, but she felt numb. Wyatt was sitting on the far side of the porch as Garrett came out of the house. She glanced at Wyatt, then at her father, her eyes narrowing.

  For a moment, Garrett thought she’d found him out. The look on her face
was so accusatory, he was certain somehow she knew what he’d done.

  “Why did they say suicide?” Ellie asked.

  Garrett sat down on the porch swing, taking care to keep a distance between them, then leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “It means someone died, but not because they were sick or had an accident, or were murdered. It means someone took their own life. Like Momma.”

  Ellie’s frown deepened. “Momma took her own life?”

  Garrett nodded.

  “She swallowed a whole bunch of pills when she knew they would hurt her?” Ellie asked.

  He nodded again.

  “She did it knowing she wouldn’t wake up.”

  “I guess so,” Garrett said.

  Rage made knots in Ellie’s stomach. “She went away so she’d never have to be with us again?”

  “I’m sorry, baby,” Garrett whispered. “Don’t be afraid. I won’t go away. I won’t leave you alone.”

  Ellie stood up, and for that moment, was eye to eye with Garrett. “I already knew that,” Ellie muttered. She’d been trying to hide from him her whole life and nothing that had happened led her to believe anything was going to be different. “And just so you know, I’m not afraid. You can’t ever make me afraid of you again.”

  Garrett’s eyes widened. When Ellie got up and walked off the porch toward the creek, talking to Wyatt as she went, he didn’t have the nerve to call her back.

  The church where Momma was buried was the same one where they’d gone every Sunday. The one that looked like a castle, and where Ellie pretended she was a princess. But they held the services in the afternoon, so there was no sunshine in Ellie’s lap. Like Momma, the sun had already moved on.

  Ellie heard the whispers at the cemetery and afterward at their house where everyone brought casseroles and platters of all kinds of foods. She couldn’t figure out why they had to feed people at their house when they were the ones who were supposed to be sad. It seemed more sensible that someone would be feeding them. But she was just a kid, and it was becoming more and more evident that until she grew up, her voice would not be heard.

  Doris served platters of fried chicken to the people from the choir and to Preacher Ray, who preached the sermon. The creamy mashed potatoes and thick brown gravy were just like Momma liked it, and vegetables and biscuits were abundant. The sideboard was covered with so many pies she didn’t think they’d ever get eaten, and the number of casseroles, where the food was all mixed up together, was overwhelming. Ellie didn’t mind it all that much, but Wyatt didn’t like his food to touch, so casseroles were out.

  In between bites and chewing and the clinking of glasses and Momma’s good silver scraping against the bone china plates with big pink roses, Ellie heard them talking in low, hushed tones . . .

  “. . . what a shame . . .”

  “. . . going to hell . . .”

  “. . . suicide a sin . . .”

  “. . . poor Ellie . . .”

  “. . . poor troubled Fern . . .”

  The whispers circled the rooms like vultures circling the skies.

  In the midst of it all, Doris sought her out, then handed her and Wyatt a plate of food to share. They carried it to a corner of the room and sat down behind the black leather wingback chair where Daddy watched football. They were out of sight, speaking in whispers or not at all. It was enough that they were together. She wasn’t hungry, and Wyatt was just picking at the food on the plate. It was easier for them to take what was offered and go along, than to argue.

  Throughout the whole ordeal, Ellie watched Daddy cry and pray and shake hands with people she’d never seen before. She didn’t know what to think. It seemed like he was truly sad. But there were other times when she caught him looking at her, and her throat closed up.

  How was this going to work?

  When everyone went home—even Doris—she and Wyatt would be alone with Daddy. In her worst nightmare, she’d never imagined it would come to this.

  “Ellie,” Wyatt whispered.

  “What?” she whispered back.

  “It will be all right.”

  She shuddered. Wyatt always knew what she was thinking. “I don’t think so, Wyatt. We need a plan.”

  “What kind of plan?”

  “I don’t know,” Ellie whispered. “I’m thinking on it.”

  Wyatt didn’t respond. He knew when Ellie got like this, it was useless to argue.

  Finally, the people began to leave. Ellie and Wyatt stood at the door beside Daddy as he shook hands and thanked everyone for their condolences. Ellie didn’t know what condolences were, but she was pretty sure Doris hadn’t put any on her plate.

  It wasn’t until Mrs. Markham, the lady who played the organ at church, went to leave, that Ellie’s world was yanked into perspective in a way she had not expected.

  “Poor Garrett, y’all know I’ll be prayin’ for you, don’t you?” Mrs. Markham said.

  “Yes, ma’am, and we appreciate your kindness for the fine pie.”

  Mrs. Markham beamed. “I suppose it was a success. There wasn’t a bite left in the dish when I went to claim it.”

  Ellie frowned. Vanity. She knew that sin. Mrs. Markham was standing in their doorway being vain about her own cooking when she was supposed to be sad about Momma.

  Mrs. Markham looked down at Ellie. She glared back. Wyatt looked away. He didn’t want to draw any attention to himself.

  Mrs. Markham frowned then. Unruly child.

  She patted Garrett’s arm. “You take care of yourself. Don’t want to orphan anyone, if you know what I mean?”

  Garrett muttered something acceptable, but Ellie wasn’t listening. She was trying to wrap her head around the fact that if anything happened to Daddy, she would become an orphan. She knew about orphans and looked up at her Daddy in a moment of clarity. Better the Devil she knew, than the one she did not. She didn’t want to be an orphan any more than she wanted her Momma to be in that box out in the cemetery buried beneath all that dirt. She was still struggling with the concept that Momma no longer needed air to breathe. Without thinking, she scooted one step closer to Garrett.

  It did not go unobserved. Garrett stifled a smile as he shut the door behind Mrs. Markham. All he needed was a little patience and time.

  “That’s the last of them,” Garrett said. “I’m going to check on Doris to see if she’s cleaned up the mess in the kitchen.”

  “I’m going to my room,” Ellie said.

  “Okay. When Doris leaves, I’m going to mine, too. I don’t know about you, but the past four days have been exhausting. We’re going to miss Momma like crazy, but we’ll get through this, okay? I’ll check on you right before bedtime just to make sure you don’t need anything, but I won’t come in. I promise.”

  Ellie squinted her eyes at him, wondering if he’d look as different as he was behaving, but he was already walking away.

  “He’s lying,” Wyatt said.

  Ellie nodded. She wanted to believe Daddy, but like Wyatt, they had too many years of betrayal behind them to take anything he said on face value.

  They made a run for their bedroom, and the moment the door closed behind them, Wyatt shoved the slide bolt in place.

  Ellie took off her good dress and hung it back up in the closet, then opted for her pajamas. She wasn’t about to get undressed and bathe. Not tonight. Not until she saw if Daddy could keep a promise.

  “Hey, Wyatt.”

  “What?”

  “We can’t live here forever with just Daddy.”

  Wyatt snorted. “It won’t be forever. As soon as we get old enough, we’re outta here, right?”

  “Right, but in the meantime, we need someone to look after us.”

  “We’re twelve. We don’t need babysitters,” Wyatt said.

  “We don’t have any grandmothers,” Ellie said.

  “I know. We don’t have any grandfathers either, but what does that have to do with anything?”

  “But we could have a nanny. One of the gi
rls I know at school has a live-in nanny.”

  “That’s because they have a little kid, too.”

  Ellie frowned. She didn’t like to be thwarted.

  “I want a nanny. If I had a nanny, Daddy would have to behave.”

  Wyatt shrugged. “And I wanna be six feet tall, but I don’t think it’s going to happen.”

  Ellie shrugged and reached for the remote.

  A short while later they were readying for bed when there was a knock at the door.

  “Ellie?”

  “What?”

  “I’m going to bed now, are you okay? Do you need anything?”

  “I’m fine. Wyatt’s fine.”

  “Then I’m off to bed. You know where I am if you need me. Good night.”

  “Night,” she said, and then listened as he walked away.

  Wyatt frowned. This didn’t feel right, but he didn’t have anything to add to what he’d already said. Besides, he was tired.

  “I’m going to bed, too.” Ellie aimed the remote at the television and turned it off. “Hey, Wyatt?”

  “What?”

  “Are you sad that Momma’s dead?”

  Wyatt shrugged. “I don’t know how I feel. She didn’t like me as much as she liked you, but then neither does Daddy.”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you, too,” Wyatt said and turned out the light.

  Ellie rolled over onto her side and closed her eyes. She was hanging on the verge of unconsciousness when Fern’s face slid through her mind. She didn’t look like she had the last time Ellie had seen her. Her face wasn’t all mashed and purple, and she was smiling. Tears rolled out from under Ellie’s eyelids onto the pillow.

  Momma looked happy.

  Ellie wished she could say the same.

  Chapter Seven

  A week had passed since they’d put Fern Wayne in the ground. Garrett kept asking Ellie if she wanted to go out to the cemetery with him to put fresh flowers on the grave, but each time she refused.

  “Why don’t you want to go?” Garrett asked as he stood in the doorway to Ellie’s room, watching her paint her toenails. He was still holding to his promise not to cross the threshold, although there were plenty of nights he wanted to retract it.