by Connie Cook
"I'm so sorry, Ruth. I didn't take enough money. I need fifty-eight cents, if you have it."
"Of course. I'm the one who should be sorry I didn't give you enough. Seeing I never do the shopping, I forget that prices keep going up."
Ruth dug through her change purse as the two women rushed back to the check-out. An impatient line-up was forming already, but, as Ruth handed her a small handful of dimes, nickels, and pennies, Sandy, the cashier, took the time to say to Ruth sympathetically (though too honestly to be socially acceptable), "I was so sorry to hear about you losing your husband."
"Losing him?" Ruth snapped. "He didn't die, y'know!"
Sandy looked down with her face turning a shade that matched her reddish hair.
"I'm sorry," she stammered. "Maybe I shouldn't have ..."
"No, I'm sorry," Ruth said, instantly contrite. "I had no call to bite your head off. Thanks for bringing it out in the open at least." Then she raised her voice and her head to look at the rest of the line-up though she was still ostensibly speaking to Sandy. "I appreciate that you'll talk about it to my face, not behind my back," she said.
Mom shrunk into herself and avoided looking at anyone until the bag boy had loaded their purchases into the trunk, and the women were alone in the car.
She hummed to herself in a way that Ruth recognized.
"What?" Ruth said. "Out with it."
"I think you already know. If you don't, you should." Mrs. MacKellum wouldn't have dreamed of saying such a thing to Ruth back in the old days.
"I know. I was rude to Sandy. I embarrassed her and hurt her feelings, and I feel badly about it. But I did what I could to fix it. I think she'll be okay."
"Not just that. Did you have to say what you said afterwards? So everyone could hear you?"
"Well, I meant it. It was a good chance to tell all those old busybodies what I think about their endless gossiping when I had them all together like that. I don't get an opportunity every day to make a speech like that." Ruth chuckled, pleased at the memory.
"But there are right ways and wrong ways to do things."
"You know I believe in saying things straight out. I think that is the right way to do things," Ruth said.
"Believe me. I know you do. But, my dear, it puts people's backs up. If you would just ... modify your way of expressing yourself, sometimes ..."
"You mean, there could be a nicer way to tell a bunch of old gossips that they're a bunch of old gossips? Sometimes the truth hurts, but it needs to be said, anyways. If I'd hurt them unfairly like I did Sandy, that would be one thing. But I didn't hurt anything about that bunch except maybe their pride. I just made 'em mad."
Mom had to laugh in spite of herself. "Don't you care what they think about you?" she asked, astonished.
"Why should I?" Ruth asked, astonished back.
What astonished her were ideas, new to her, growing out of her mother-in-law's astonishment. It occurred to Ruth just then that she was the abnormal one. Maybe it was normal to care more about what the general public thought about oneself than almost anything else. She'd known other people who lived in such a way, but she'd always thought of them as abnormal.
Then she wondered, all in a hair's-breadth instant, if this abnormality in herself was congenital or if her life's circumstances had twisted her.
And she pondered, in that same instant, the sane insanity behind this abnormal normality. How could it be a matter of such vital importance to (the rest of) the entire human race what the rest of the entire human race thought about oneself? The opinions of the masses were changeable as weather. It just wasn't logical or practical to build anything on them. But was she the only person who saw it that way?
Ruth's mother-in-law looked back at her with no ready answer to the question. She was having revelations of her own. Mrs. MacKellum had never bothered to wonder if we should or shouldn't care about what other people think of us or why we do. That first realization that a particular unquestioned value of our own is not a universal one is always a revolutionary concept.
Each realized that she was looking at the other across that gulf no human can cross. There is no bridge of perfect understanding between humans. Yet those moments of realizing that truth are those moments where bridges can be built towards partial understanding.
Ruth had a flash of insight, not only into her mother-in-law's character but into her husband's.
Thought buried her as she helped Mom carry the brown paper bags into the kitchen and as they unpacked them together.
Ruth broke her preoccupied silence to say, "I don't think he ever really loved me."
"What?" Mom said.
"I always knew that I felt more for him than he did for me. But I felt sure he loved me in his way. Now I see I was just deceiving myself."
"That's simply not true, Ruth. Don't tell yourself things like that. I know my son! It was just the hard time after his dad died and being out of work and all. I guess he isn't one to deal with life's harsher realities any better than Guy did. Just because Guy couldn't ... face things, I don't tell myself that he never loved me. Though they both committed very wrong and unloving acts in the way both of them left their wives. But don't you start believing it was because Graham never loved you! Where did that come from?"
"It's just that I suddenly realized that what people thought about him was about the most important thing in the world to Graham. I think that was what attracted him to me in the first place. It was because I, being me and saying right out whatever I think without bothering what anyone else thinks about it, I said something to him the first time I saw him after all my years away, and it hurt his feelings, I think. Or made him mad, at least, and he felt a need to win me over because he couldn't stand it that anyone should think badly of him."
"I don't doubt that opposites do attract even if those differences are what makes marriage challenging. But I know that your honesty is one of the things that drew Graham to you. He said you were different than all the other girls. I'm sure that's one of the things he noticed about you right off that interested him. Your real-ness. I think he found it refreshing compared to all the other girls who seemed artificial."
"That's not what I mean. I mean, the more that I think about it, I think it was just because he wanted to win my good opinion that he ever started going with me. After that first time when I hurt his feelings, the next time he paid any attention to me, he knew that he'd done something to give me a bad opinion of him, and I think he couldn't live with that. That's why he went out of his way to get back in my good graces. It wasn't that he was interested in me, personally. It was about him and the way I thought of him."
"He isn't a terrible person, Ruth. You have to believe that. The things he's gone through would break a lot stronger men."
"No, no, no. I don't mean he's a terrible person. It's just that things are making sense to me that have never made sense to me before. Like, why he would ever notice me in the first place. I wondered, at the time when he first asked me to go see a movie with him, what was behind it. I was pretty sure he couldn't have really been interested in me. Now it makes sense. My big appeal was the fact that he felt like I disapproved of him and he was driven to change that."
"Ruth, listen to yourself! Why shouldn't my son have noticed you? He told me himself that it was because you were good and fine and, I think 'straight' was the word he used, that he was attracted to you. He saw that beauty you have on the inside, I know he did. And I know he appreciated it. You have to believe me that he loved you, Ruth. I believe he still does, even if he has a funny way of showing it. I don't know about the time you're talking about. I don't know when he first started to notice you. Maybe you did intrigue him and he had to get to know you at the beginning just because you weren't like others, falling all over yourself to make a good impression on him. Maybe you're right about the first time he invited you out. But I know, as sure's sure, that he did come to see you for what you are and to love you for it."
There was a sti
nging sensation in Ruth's eyes that was very unfamiliar to her.
"I'd like to believe you, Mom. I would. It's just that I'm beginning to see, now, how important other people's opinions of him are to him."
"Look, Ruth. You know that you and I got off to a rocky start, didn't we?"
"Yes, and I'm sorry for it. It was my fault. Me and my outspokenness."
"No, it wasn't your fault. I had a prejudice against you because you weren't ... well, you weren't what Graham's father and I had planned for him. And because I didn't know you. But don't you see? Now that I've got to know you, don't you think I realize what a treasure you are? Don't you worry! Graham knew what he had. The bigger question is, 'Why would he toss it away?' I think it was only shame that made him do it. He couldn't live with you always seeing his shame, so finally he up and left. That's how I see it. But there's nothing you could have done differently, my dear. You wouldn't want to be less than you are, would you?"
The stinging grew stronger in Ruth's eyes. It began to feel like she was cutting onions.
"Thank you, Mom. It means a lot to me to hear you say things like that. If I can just keep believing that Graham really did love me at one time, it makes all the difference."
"I mean what I say. You know, I once told Graham that you and he weren't well-matched and it would lead to trouble. What I meant at the time, I hope you'll forgive me saying so, was that you weren't good enough for my son. But what I've come to see – I hate to say it, but I have to – is that I was right about the two of you not being well-matched. But that's because my son isn't good enough for you." The admission cost her dearly, and her own eyes began to sting fiercely. She left the kitchen abruptly to go and locate a hanky.
But he is good enough for me, Ruth's heart cried. At least, no one else could ever be. He's the only one I could ever want.
* * *
The burning question on Ruth's mind also made for a little interesting speculation for the town at large to indulge in.
The consensus of the townsfolk as to whether "he loved her" or "he loved her not" was that, if the daisy could have been made to reveal her secret but certain knowledge on the question, it would have been a "not" answer.
There were two schools of thought: The first theory was that, back before there was a Ruth and Graham, when there was only a Lily and Graham, Lily and Graham had quarrelled. (Speculation came up dry on the cause of the quarrel, but it was a moot point. They had quarrelled. It was common knowledge.) Lily had "taken up" with Bo right away to get back at Graham, and Graham had "taken up" with Ruth. Both Lily and Graham were too proud and stubborn to make up the quarrel, but they'd never "gotten over" each other.
Or maybe (this was the second theory), Lily had grown bored of Graham and run after a man more likely to be a challenge. But Bo Weaver, proving to be easy prey, had soon lost his appeal. And Graham, "taking up" with Ruth, soon regained his, someone else's grass always being greener.
The part where both schools of thought agreed was on the point that Graham and Lily had never really "gotten over" each other. Ruth had been a stopgap.
Whatever the speculation, they were admittedly only speculations. The truth could never be known.
Was there truth to be known? In this instance, as in all others, I believe there was. I believe there is always truth to be known even if we can't know it.
In this instance, I believe the truth to be that Graham had told Ruth the truth as he saw it in the final note he wrote her. As much as he was capable, I believe he did love Ruth. I find it impossible to believe that he could have known a Ruth and loved a Lily.
Yet he didn't want to lower Ruth to his level, and he couldn't bear his inability to rise to hers. The burden of his failures weighed less with Lily.
It's admittedly speculation, as well, but that's how I can't help but see it. You must decide for yourself.
I'm not sure if Ruth ever fully embraced one answer or the other to her burning question of that time or if it continued to scorch her until it finally burned itself out.
* * *
Ruth cared more about what other people thought than she realized. If she cared nothing at all, she wouldn't have felt a heaviness in her stomach every morning, walking the six blocks to the Morning Glory Cafe, as though she'd eaten a whole loaf of bread dough for breakfast.
She'd become a pariah. It was different than being bereaved. People knew what to say then. But being ... what? Being left was another story. She understood that it didn't seem quite right to treat her as though nothing at all had happened; yet it wasn't something that could be talked about openly (not to her, at least).
It was what people couldn't say to her that was hard to take (or so she thought at first). And what they couldn't say only made what they did say – like, “Make mine over easy,” or “Can I get another refill?” – uncomfortable. She had the feeling that for two weeks there hadn't been a single customer who had been willing to look her in the eye. It was just a feeling. She didn't know for sure. She wasn't looking to find out.
Not Jim and Glo, of course. Glo, as soon as the word was out, had approached Ruth about it in her usual straightforward way, hugged her tightly and told her they were praying for her. Jim had added his sympathy with a hand squeeze.
But Ruth hadn't known how to respond even to Jim and Glo. No wonder everyone was uncomfortable with her. Why wouldn't they be when she was uncomfortable with everyone and with herself? She'd become a pariah because she'd made herself one.
At first, in the earliest days P.G., she believed she was grateful to have her job to go to every day. Her days off stretched before her like the wilderness before the children of Israel. Yet, as much as she dreaded the days off, she was beginning to dread her working days even more.
She was discovering discontentment. Wherever she was was where she didn't want to be. Whatever anyone said to her was the wrong thing to say. Either they said nothing on the subject, and it was the wrong thing not to say, or they said too much, and it was the wrong thing to say.
Mars Mitchum was the first, outside of Jim and Glo and Sandy, to speak openly to Ruth about her misfortune, and what he said was definitely too much and the wrong thing to say.
Mars had been eating at the cafe more and more frequently since Graham had left. He'd also been cleaning up for his lunches or dinners out, disposing of his erstwhile perpetual companion – an oil-stained, orange toque – and carefully combing back his receding, dark brown hair and trading in his torn and sawdusty, checked flannel shirts for new, clean flannel shirts.
One memorable day, as Ruth passed him his menu, he snatched for her hand rather than the menu and held on. She tried to avoid obviously struggling to get away. She wasn't in the mood for a scene though she was fairly sure one was coming.
"Ruth, I wanted you to know how sorry I am."
"Thanks, Mars," she said, testing his grip by pulling her hand a little. His grip hadn't loosened in the least. She finally looked at him. As she'd feared, he was the one customer who wasn't afraid to look in her eyes.
"I know I tried to warn you that one time about your husband and another woman, but it didn't do any good, and I suppose it wouldn't have mattered in the end. Not much you could have done about it, anyways."
"You mean you were talking about Graham and Lily?" her voice rose on the last word until the customers at two or three other tables turned to look at her. Suddenly it didn't matter who looked at her or what they saw when they did. Or what they heard.
"There were rumours. They'd been at the tavern together quite a lot," Mars said, dropping his voice in response to Ruth raising hers. He let go of her hand, having said what he'd set out to say.
Ruth had often wondered how or why Graham could have managed to leave out of the blue with Lily Turnbull, of all people, whom, she imagined, he saw rarely in the ordinary course of events. But now she knew. It wasn't out of the blue. The why was still a complete mystery, but at least the how was partially explained. In the ordinary course of events, they s
aw each other regularly. At the tavern.
For no apparent reason, the irony of the situation struck her hilariously. It was too funny! She'd been picturing Graham with girls like Glenda. Girls who sell their reputations cheaply. Girls who frequent taverns and go with married men and wear perfume in a quantity to make up for what it lacked in quality.
And here, all along, it had been a girl like Lily. The girl of all girls in town who had always had the most expensive everythings and yet her reputation had been worth no more than a girl like Glenda's. Her virtue had been as inexpensive as Glenda's perfume.
She began to chuckle, a sound that was barely like laughing, from somewhere back deep in her throat that grew and grew until she was doubled over the table gasping for breath.
Glo came rushing over protectively like a fiery orange mother hen in blue eyeshadow.
"Now Ruthie Darlin', come on into the kitchen and have a set down. It's time for a break, anyhow."
"What've you bin sayin' to her?" she demanded to know from Mars.
"I just ... I ..."
The dumbfounded expression on Mars' face keeled Ruth over with fresh spasms. How ridiculously funny it all was! If only everyone else could share in the joke! But the fact that they couldn't only made it more hilarious.
"Never mind!" Glo said to Mars. "I can imagine. You never did have the sense God gave geese. Now, c'mon, Darlin'. Let's go. I'll go make you a nice cup of tea in the kitchen."
In the kitchen, Glo settled her into a chair and went to make a cup of tea while Ruth tried to regain her composure and Jim looked on, concerned. But his concerned looks added to the problem, and she went off into gales of hysteria again.
She wiped away the tears on her cheeks and cautiously sipped tea from the cup Glo held for her. She was sure she was going to spew the tea everywhere as some new provocation to laughter caught her in the funny bone but she managed to drink a half of a mug-full safely, and the act of drinking seemed to calm her.
"That's better," Glo said. "I was afraid I was gonna hafta smack you one, and I didn' wanna hafta do that. Wouldn' look good, havin' the boss smackin' her staff around."