Someday Home

by Lauraine Snelling

  She let herself be led down the street, past her car parked at the curb, to the gaudy neon facade of the Stop Inn Diner. Expressing forgiveness face-to-face would be better than writing a letter. Gwynn was right; she should at least talk to him.

  And what would she do if he was as changed as Gwynn thought? Could she put the past behind? She was suddenly very uncertain and confused.

  And hungry. She had been planning to eat leftovers when she got home, but since they were here…

  “What would you like?” Jack pulled the menu off the clip and studied both sides. “How’s their meat loaf?”

  “Quite good.”

  The waitress appeared, pencil in hand.

  “The meat loaf, but I don’t want the gravy on it. And I want French fries instead of the mashed potatoes.”

  Good old Jack; he never simply ordered off the menu, he had to change it, presumably to improve on it. Same as he had done with his wife, Angela realized with a start.

  “The Reuben, please.” Angela smiled at her. The child didn’t look sixteen and here she was working the late shift.

  “Lettuce?”

  “Please.”

  He watched the waitress leave. “I thought lettuce always came with it.”

  Silence.

  Long silence.

  She said, “My lawyer still hasn’t heard anything about the house sale yet. Is there a hang-up?”

  He cleared his throat. “My lawyer’s working on it. Little snag, nothing serious.”

  Long, long silence.

  “So, uh, Angela, how have you been doing? The kids say you’re getting by okay.”

  No, she could not forgive him face-to-face. She would have to work out the Letter, find the appropriate phrasing. His unexpected appearance had sort of unhorsed her. “Doing fine.”

  More long silence.

  He broke it with, “Your address is a box number now. That’s the only one I could find.”

  “My lawyer didn’t tell you where to find me, did she?”

  “No, the kids did.”

  Anger boiled up all over again. She must not let it cloud her judgment.

  Long, long, awkward silence. Minutes passed.

  He leaned forward. “Look. I made a mistake. A big mistake. I’m sorry. But now I want to unmake it. I want you back.”

  She tried to arrange her thoughts, marshal an intelligent response. It didn’t rise to the surface of her brain where she could articulate it. Good thing she was putting off the forgiveness letter; her brain was tongue-tied. “Well, uh, a decision that big would require a lot of thought.”

  He spread his hands. “What’s to think about? I admit I made a big mistake. Now let’s just start over.”

  “It’s not that easy, Jack.”

  “Of course it is. I’ve changed. I want to start over. That’s pretty simple, right?” He watched her expectantly, waiting for the answer he wanted to hear.

  Waiting for the answer he wanted. Of course. She recognized that for the first time, this expecting the “correct” answer, the one he wanted. And she realized that in the past, she had always provided it, never once thinking about what she might want instead. He let her know what he wanted, and it was up to her to provide it. And she always had.

  She watched his face. “Have you ever considered what I might want?”

  He shrugged. “We want the same things; we’ve always wanted the same things. The kids are all upset and getting back together will take care of that. We want that.”

  “Why did you not want that when you filed?”

  “I wasn’t thinking. But that’s all behind me. Now I just want us to be happy again.”

  “I’m happy now.”

  “Oh, don’t give me that, Angela! A woman can’t be happy without her man.” He sat back as the meat loaf arrived. The waitress plunked ketchup down on the table and returned in a moment with the Reuben. She left.

  He leaned forward again. “You need me. And I need you. The kids need us. See? Nothing more to think about.”

  She picked up her Reuben and savored that first bite. The corned beef was juicy and not too salty, the sauerkraut mellow. They made great sandwiches here. In fact, she might make Reubens some night for dinner. All the ingredients were at hand in their pantry—even homemade bread.

  He cut into his meat loaf. “It’s not hot in the middle. I’ll bet this was frozen five minutes ago.”

  Of course it was. Do you think they keep their meat loaf ready for when you happen to walk in? She checked herself. Back off. Look for the good stuff. Forgiveness, don’t forget.

  The Letter. She asked, “Your mailing address is the same, right?”

  “Uh, no. I’m not at the house right now.”

  “Who is?”

  He looked guilty, then defiant. “Doesn’t matter. Soon as my lawyer works out the details, I’ll move back in.”

  She thought about this. Flagged the waitress and asked for tea. Thought. And thought.

  Cold in the middle or not, he polished off the last of his meat loaf and sat back. “You look very librarian-ish.”

  “Probably because I am a librarian.”

  “Picked up some weight. Eating well, huh?”

  Anger. Quell it, Angela. Her tea came. She took her time dipping the bag.

  He leaned forward eagerly. “So what about it? When can we get back together? I was thinking maybe even tonight. I’m in that motel on the edge of town. We’ll have a good time getting back together. For old times’ sake. And the kids.”

  She dipped the bag. The tea got darker than she liked, but she kept dipping.

  “Angela?”

  She kept dipping. Finally she pulled the tea bag out and leaned forward on both elbows. “You know what I think, Jack? I think you haven’t changed a minute. When I said I was happy, you instantly called me a liar.” She snapped her fingers. “Just like that. But I was telling you the truth. I am happy now for perhaps the first time since the kids left home.”

  “I don’t believe you. You’re all alone.”

  “No, I am not. I have close friends now for the first time in many years. Friends who support me and do their best for me.” She paused. “And I’m assuming that ‘librarian-ish’ is a euphemism for frumpy. Right?”

  “Well, uh, er, I wouldn’t call it that. Not exactly. But—”

  “But I’m not ultra-ritzy anymore. No longer arm candy in your eyes.”

  “That’s not it at all! Look, Angela, I want us back together. What the kids want. So let’s just do it instead of talking it to death.”

  “And I finally rediscovered that I can think and function as a human being, a fully human human being, and not just an adjunct of you.”

  “Then start thinking straight. If you—”

  “Thinking straight? You’d be surprised. Now I’m going to think some more. This Marillee.” His face went blank. She pressed on. “Yes, I know her name. I would assume that she’s the floozy that you traded me off for. You showed her around the house, and she liked it so much she wanted to live there. So you rescinded your offer to sell your half and asked to buy my half instead.”

  “You’re just guessing.”

  “Now I’m going to guess you gave her half ownership of the house in return for paying the mortgage because you couldn’t afford it just then. And now she’s in the house and she’s kicked you out. Am I right?” She watched his face a moment with smug satisfaction. “And I can see that I’m right on. No, you’re not going to buy my half of the house. I think you’re broke. And probably in debt. And you need me to get back into real estate and make some money to bail you out and get your house back for you.”

  “Do you really…?”

  “Am I wrong?”

  “That’s not…I mean…We…we have to think about the kids!”

  “Oh, I’m sure you’ll go whining to the kids about how stubborn and unyielding I am and how I’m ruining your life, but frankly, Jack, I don’t give a rip. You forced me off onto a path I never would have chosen for
myself, but I’m going to stay on it because I. Am. Happy!”

  His lower lip trembled. She saw fury in his face that she’d never seen before. And she understood now, finally, that she had never seen it because she had always bowed immediately to his will before. This was the first time she ever opposed him, the very first time.

  And it gave her strength!

  He bolted to his feet and stormed out.

  She stared at her tea. She was boiling inside and could not figure out why at first. Eventually she decided that it was a play of intense emotions at war with each other.

  So what would she do next?

  She got the Lists and the first paragraph of the Letter out of her purse, looked at them a moment…

  …and tore them up into a bazillion little pieces.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Judith came out into the kitchen. Tom was there and Phillip. Both of them were wearing jeans that were wet and muddy to above the knee. Mud streaked their clothes and arms. And both were perched on stools at the counter wrapping themselves around pieces of Lynn’s latest pie. This one was peach using the peaches from that farm stand down the road. And ice cream, of course. Peach pie must be à la mode.

  She slapped a paper down at Tom’s elbow. He jumped. Stared at it. Grinned wide. “I knew you could do it!”

  Phillip asked with his mouth full, “What’s that?”

  “Her last regular exam and she scored eighty-nine. Out of a hundred, right?” He looked at her.

  “Yes, and I stand a good chance of acing the final. I was terribly afraid I’d have to take precalc over again when I started the class. Tom, you are an amazing teacher! But then, I think I already said that.” She sat down on a stool nearby.

  He was smiling. “I think I heard that once or twice. And you told me when you came back from that first exam that your prof was looking for good math instructors.”

  “Dr. Stern.”

  “Yeah. So I made an appointment to sit down with her and we talked awhile. Actually, what it was, she asked me to explain factorials, so I did. And then she asked me to explain logs, so I did. Then she whips this old slide rule out of her desk and said, ‘Can you show me how to use this?’ Sure, it’s based on logs. So I showed her how it is set up and how to multiply, divide, take square roots and cube roots—you know, just the basic stuff.”

  “Tom, that was a job interview!”

  “And she hired me.”

  Judith squealed. It wasn’t a congratulatory squeal, just a disorganized, thrilled, and delighted one.

  Phillip was grinning as broadly as everyone else. “He’s teaching math lab sessions both winter semesters, Judith. And since he’s at the school anyway, he’s enrolling in the master’s program. Someday this will be Professor Thomas Lundberg.” Phillip stuffed more pie into his mouth.

  Tom cut himself another piece. “It fits perfectly. Winter is always slow in the plumber’s shop. Repairs, yes, and broken pipes, but for some crazy reason, we can’t dig for new plumbing.”

  Judith laughed. “Of course. The world is frozen solid.”

  Tom scooped ice cream onto his pie. “I can teach the lab sessions and do some plumbing and still have plenty of time for ice fishing. My kind of winter.” He paused and turned to look Judith directly in the eye. “You got me started. You showed me the way and even provided the door. Thank you, Judith.”

  That evening Judith settled at her desk by the window and just spent some time looking out. So Tom was also setting out along a new road in life. And he credited Judith with that. Was it true? Was she a helper as well as one being helped? True or not, the thought absolutely delighted her.

  The next day, her biology course loomed, her other nemesis. She had conquered one dragon, math, with Tom’s help, but this biology…The biology she had learned those many years ago was not the biology she faced now. Then it had been all plants and animals, and of course, digestion and things. She had loved it. Now it was pretty much organic chemistry with a few life-forms thrown in. The structure of messenger RNA, the chemistry of foods going down and digestion going on and wastes coming out, in all the myriad animal and plant kingdoms and…What? The mushrooms and other fungi are not plants? They now have their own kingdom?

  The previous session had been the last how-am-I-doing test before the final exam. Today she would get that test back. In theory, the test showed you your strong fields and weak areas, and of course, you would then spend your study time boning up on the weak fields before the final. But that was theory. She felt rather swamped by all of it.

  She slid into her seat and flopped open her laptop. It was easiest to take notes on her laptop, then later print them out to study. Rereading notes in both electronic form and hard copy seemed to help her remember better.

  Professor Thompson’s graduate assistant returned the exams simply by shouting a name. That person called “yo” and raised an arm; helpful hands would then pass the test to its owner. Fairly efficient, just like Dr. Thompson.

  Judith’s came to her, folded in half with the grade concealed, as were they all. She opened the fold. A green-circled eighty-three greeted her. Eighty-three, B, better than she thought she would do but certainly not an A.

  The doctor then began his lecture; Judith had to work to keep up as he expounded on the significance of the structural integrity of the double DNA helix and the value of apoptosis. She had no idea what he was talking about until she realized that the second p in apoptosis is not pronounced. She had read her text; now it made sense. She felt a certain heady flush of pride in working out that little factoid. The hour came to an end and she gathered her laptop and notepad (for drawing diagrams that she could not draw in Word) into her backpack. Like all the other students, she swung her pack around onto her back and stood erect. Like all the other students, she headed for the door.

  Eighty-three. She would have to be content with that and hope intelligence lightning would somehow strike her before the final. And she believed in intelligence lightning like she believed in the tooth fairy.

  “Ms. Rutherford?” Dr. Thompson flagged her on her way out.

  “Yes?”

  “I always want to learn what helps my students learn. Your scores have been rising all semester; this was your best score yet. What is making the difference?”

  She thought about it. “Honestly, I don’t know. A knowledgeable friend is tutoring me in precalculus. My grades in that course have come way up. Does that sort of success rub off on other courses?”

  “Interesting. I wonder.”

  “Also, I’m getting into the swing of college better. Into the rhythm of it. I attended UM for one year nearly thirty years ago; I’ve had to get used to academic life again.”

  He nodded, smiling. “Are you being tutored in biology?”

  “No, sir. Not that I couldn’t use some.”

  “You know, one of the advantages of a small college is that your professors are here to help you. All you have to do is ask.”

  Judith sucked in a deep breath and nodded. “I’m not used to asking for help. I was raised to work it out myself.”

  “Well, if you need help, please know that my TA and I are both happy to. Our office hours are posted in the syllabus.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Her phone binged on her way out to the car. She checked the screen: T Lundberg. “Hi, Tom. What’s up?”

  “How did you do?”

  “The best so far this semester, but it’s only an eighty-three.” She unlocked her car door and slung her backpack in, left the door open to let some of the heat out. “Clearly he thinks I should have asked for help a long time ago. Hey, but thank you for asking. Where are you guys working today?”

  “Other side of the lake. Eighty-three ain’t bad. Later.”

  Not bad, huh? She slid into her very hot car. Thank God for air-conditioning. She was waiting at a stoplight when her phone binged again. Lynn.

  “I’m almost out of sugar; can you stop and get me a twenty-five-pound bag
and three boxes of regular lids?”

  “Sure, anything else?”

  “Not that I can think of. Thanks. How did your exam go?”

  “Got a B. Can you believe Tommy called, too?” Do you know how wonderful it feels to have people who care enough to ask?

  “Of course. See you soon. Oh, and we caught the counter cruiser in the act. We set him up and he went for it. Later.”

  Judith chuckled her way to the grocery store. And sang her way home. She needed to call Melody tonight and catch her up on life in the west.

  Homer charged up to greet her when she parked her car, his tail whirling in a circle. She had learned that language of the tail wagging; in a circle was the happiest, used for greeting those he loved. Side to side, swinging his entire hind end was a close second. He greeted most people with a gentle wag, and no wag was from severe scolding or total distrust, and then the ridge of hair on his back stood at attention. As he wagged all over, she cupped his face in both of her hands, his long ears wrinkling, his eyes dancing.

  “Yes, I see you, and I say hello to you and thank you for the wonderful welcome. What have you been up to? Counter cruising, I hear.” She reached over and rubbed chest and belly. She slipped into her backpack so that she could juggle the sack of sugar and the lids with both hands.

  As she reached the back door, Miss Priss shoved open the screen door. “I didn’t think you would ever get here.”

  “Hello to you, too. What have you been up to?”

  “Helping G’ma. We picked raspberries this morning and we just made jam and we almost ran out of sugar.” The little girl danced beside her as she entered the kitchen and set the sugar by the counter.

  “To the rescue. Oh my goodness, but it smells heavenly in here.” Judith gazed with admiration; brilliant red pints of raspberry jam decorated the counter, including the bowl with the skimmings in it.

  “I baked that dough I had in the fridge, so we have fresh jam to spread on fresh bread.” Lynn grinned at her. “Are you a heel or a middle type person?”

  “Fresh bread? Definitely heel.” She watched Lynn slice her bread loaf. “You are amazing. You stand in the kitchen, turn around three times, and suddenly there are delectable goodies. You don’t even have to wave a wand. So how did you catch the counter thief?”