Mom! . . . You didn’t answer.
My head throbbed. The skin under my eyes felt hot and tender. I reached over the side of the bed for my tea—now cold. I sipped. I shivered. I tucked my arms back under the covers. I think it was only minutes later that I woke to a lapping sound: Guffer, with his nose in my mug, was finishing the last of my tea.
“No, no. Not for you,” I said, and I took the mug. He sat staring at me. I put my fingers into his fur. He sighed and lay down beside my bed.
I was awake when Aunt Brat came to check on me. “Did you sleep?” she asked.
“Yes.”
So weirdly.
“Feeling any better?”
“Somewhat.” I yawned. My throat ached.
“Hmm . . . well, I think I’ll stay home with you—”
“Aunt Brat, you can go for your ski. All I’m going to do is lie around.”
“Are you sure? What about Guff? Want me to encourage him back downstairs? I can crate him.”
“No, he can stay.” The truth was, I wanted him.
The other truth was, I might not have wanted Aunt Brat to leave me. When I heard her go out the front door I got out of bed. I took her sleeping bag to the window with me, then nearly burst into tears as she went planting her poles and gliding on her skis. I watched her knees alternately popping angles into her long skirt as she slid along the outside of the enclosure to the corner of the clearing. She disappeared into the woods.
Aunt Brat skis through trees.
I heard that almost like a whistled tune. I loved that. I loved it enough to buck up and not get weepy.
I dragged my art stuff out but ended up just sitting on the floor with the sleeping bag around my shoulders while I sifted threads and paper scraps through my fingers.
Mom. I hate this! . . . Art doesn’t happen anymore. . . .
A hot tear rolled down my cheek. I pushed the box back under the bed. I scuttled over to the sheep poster, peeled it from the wall, and sat next to the opening. I needed to look at these goddesses—mine and Mom’s—and not the ones from my dream, which seemed upsetting to me now.
A certain big yellow dog came over, shoved me aside, and stuck his nose into the hole. He picked up a scent—mouse, no doubt.
“No, no, Guffer.” I gently elbowed him away. He turned and followed his nose to the poster, which he stood on and creased. Great. Then he sniffed along the edge of the floor all the way to the crack under my door.
I wondered, Does the dog know where the mouse goes?
Later, I met Elloroy in the kitchen. He turned from the stove. “Up and around,” he said brightly. I nodded.
“No sign of Aunt Brat?” I asked. “Hasn’t she been gone over an hour?”
“Stays out quite a while on the non-university days,” he said thoughtfully. “Today turned into one of those. I’m warming up soup for lunch. Got some here for you, too.”
“Really?” I smiled. I hadn’t even known I wanted soup, but now I felt both parched and hungry.
“This will fortify.” He gave the pot a stir. “Did you get some sleep?”
“Yeah. Sort of crazy sleep,” I answered.
“Oh yes?”
“Dreams.” I shook my head. “I was seeing dogs and . . . more dogs. Their tongues,” I said. He tipped his head back and let out a silent laugh.
We ate our soup together. Elloroy noticed that we were both slurping.
“Yeah, sorry,” I said. “It’s because I can’t breathe through my nose.”
“And I’m old,” he said. Then a long noisy sigh filled the air. “Was that you, Lydia?” Elloroy glanced about.
“No, that was Guffer,” I told him. “He’s under the table. He just lay back on my foot.”
“Oh! He’s being good. You women have brought that dog along by a good measure recently.”
“He is much better,” I said. “Maybe goodness is always possible.” I slurped another spoonful of soup. “Elloroy,” I said, “were you always good or did you have to work at it?”
Elloroy set down his spoon. “I don’t know,” he said, his eyes wandering around behind his glasses. “It seems like you’d have to ask the people who knew me a long time ago. Trouble is,” he said, “they’re all . . .”
“Dead?” I said.
We were laughing when the dogs rushed the door to greet Aunt Brat. Both dogs sniffed her up and down as she stepped out of her short ski boots. She stopped to pull dry grasses from the ankles of her woolen snowflake socks. She tilted her rosy face up and raised her arms to sweep her hair back and retie her ponytail. Circles of sweat dampened the armpits of her shirt.
She has such good health.
“Hello, Guffer! Hello, Soonie!” She crouched to pat them. “And hello, humans,” she said, laughing. “I see you two found the soup. Lydia, how are you feeling? Maybe time for another dose of meds? More tea and honey?”
She came across the floor. She reached up into the high cabinet, one sock-covered foot coming up behind her. I had to smile; there was more of that grassy stuff caught on the hem of her skirt. But I quit looking at that because I wanted to watch her open the bottle of pills again—just like Mom had.
37
Orange Envelope
The last of the worst of my cold coincided with the start of yet another big storm. I’d missed three days of school, and honestly, I wanted to make it back on Friday. But snow fell from Thursday night right up to suppertime on Friday. Pinnacle Hill had been plowed once midstorm but was ready for another pass anytime. None of us were sure there’d be mail. But Aunt Brat thought she’d heard rumbles down on the road, including, she said, the putter of Jaycinda’s mail truck. Guffer had sounded a few alarms in possible agreement—maybe the uncle Capperow was riding the scary four-wheeler nearby, or maybe, like me, the dog was feeling pent up.
I’d already set the table and fed the dogs. Anytime was a good time to get Guffer outside, “to do his biz,” as Eileen would say. So the dog and I started off down the long hill to the road.
The fresh snowfall lay like an endless deep felt on the meadow. It weighed down the pine boughs so the trees looked like closed umbrellas. Even the narrow fence rails held tall slices of snow.
Guffer bounced just far enough ahead of me that I felt a tug every tenth step or so. He was reveling—being adorable. He tucked his nose into the powder, came up as a white-faced dog, then shook off the frost. Energized, he galloped forward. I tried to trot along and leave slack in the line. A dog should have his joys. If only we could trust him completely.
When I saw the height of the snowbanks where the plow had come through, I double doubted there’d be mail in spite of the indomitable Jaycinda.
Our box looked like it was sitting atop the snow with no pole. But the bank had been disturbed enough that I could tell our faithful mailwoman had done it again.
The snows had made the roads narrow, and drivers weren’t likely to be watching out for a girl and her naughty dog. I shortened Guffer’s leash to keep him close. Then I plunged into the snowbank.
“Be good. Be good,” I told the dog, and he seemed to take a patient stance, looking majestic, with a scarf of little snowballs all stuck to his ruff.
A fat roll of mail had been wedged into our box. I drew it out and tucked it under my arm. “Done! Good boy!” I said. Well. You would have thought I’d told him ready-set-go!
He started jumping away from me. “Guffer, no! Heel!” I wasn’t sure it was a fair command in this ocean of snow. I was in thigh-deep and Guffer well up to his chest. He scrambled now to get unstuck. He let out a little whine. He made his way forward a few yards.
I heard something drop behind me—just a whisper of a thing. I glanced back and saw a bright orange envelope sliding away on the snow. “Shoot!” Legs pinned in the bank, I reached back with one arm. I lost hold of everything at once. The bundle of mail slipped from under my elbow. I let go of the leash. Guffer hopped back to the trail we’d made and started away.
“Come!” I called. But he w
as done with the business of collecting mail. “Oh! And you were being so good!” He stopped for a split second and looked right at me. Then he was off again, pushing his way through the snow without me. “Okay, okay. But stay out of the road. Head for home.” Under my breath, I added, “Please!”
I gathered up the mail and rolled it tighter this time. I checked on Guffer. He was heading in the right direction: up the hill toward home.
I had only that stray orange envelope left to grab. Even facedown it looked like something important, with its triangular back flap all sealed shut—a personal letter, perhaps, for Aunt Brat or Eileen or Elloroy. I took my glove off with my teeth. I twisted back and laid myself across the snowbank and got my fingertips on the envelope. I flicked it toward me and tucked it into the roll of mail.
“Got it, Guff! If you care. . . .”
Where was he? I squinted into the dusk. I found our path of broken snow and started back up the hill.
Soon I saw the dog’s handsome form—the up ears, long back, and low tail. A sense of calm and gladness wicked through me. He was moving easily through the snow, like any creature going home for the night, though this one was dragging his leash beside him.
“You are missing your person,” I whispered. “But I’m right here.”
I followed as he pushed ahead, opening up the path. We were going home together, the yellow dog and I. My next thought was so unexpected, my eyes filled with water.
I love him . . . so much.
He went up the front steps and sat. The blond bowl of the back of his head waited in front of me, ears in the happy, sweet-dog position.
When I reached to let Guffer in, I heard that same papery swish-whisper I’d heard down at the mailbox. That orange envelope—again. This time it stabbed itself into a crack in the snow-dusted deck boards. Guffer cocked his head at it. “No,” I said. I stooped to pick it up. He didn’t challenge. “Good boy.”
I held the envelope under the porch light just to see which one of my adults it was for. My breath caught.
Lydia Bratches-Kemp
It was addressed to me. I knew the handwriting, and in the upper-left-hand corner was the same address sticker I’d seen off and on for the last seven years. “Kemp,” I said.
He found me. That means he looked.
I unzipped my jacket and stretched open the neck of my shirt. I tucked the letter against my chest.
I did not tell Aunt Brat about the orange envelope from Kemp.
A thought kept striking me—one that I knew was sort of twisted. It had to do with Mom being gone now.
So stop . . . stop hurting us.
Every card that Kemp had ever sent had pierced both Mom and me.
Aunt Brat and I had not talked about Kemp, but I was sure she’d be as surprised as I was that he’d reached me this way.
My aunt didn’t like secrets—and I was keeping a few: the hole in the wall, the goats at the Gerber farm, and now this letter from my walk-away father.
This one was hitting my bones. I felt like I couldn’t afford it. I’d felt settled in the last few weeks—if not quite nestled. My new adults and I were moving pretty easily around one another. If nothing else, I wanted time to think before I told Aunt Brat.
I ate supper with that envelope in my shirt. I helped with the dishes, then climbed the stairs to my room, and by then, any importance that orange envelope had come with had faded. I stuck it into the bag with all the others and shut them all back inside the box that I’d brought with me from Rochester.
My father sent cards. That’s what he did. This was just another one.
38
Snowshoes
Chelmsford had just gotten itself dug out, it seemed, when Sunday night brought another storm. School was closed again on Monday. I was no stranger to heavy snowfalls. Rochester averaged eighty-four inches of snowfall annually—a fun fact from my early elementary years. People had their snow day rituals. I’d known kids whose families had headed straight for the best sledding hills or ski slopes. Others popped corn and watched old movies. Mom and I had baking days, and that usually meant oatmeal-raisin cookies.
This was Chelmsford, and Raya Delatorre and Sari Winkle arrived wearing snowshoes on their feet. A third pair—well-worn and dented—waited with a set of poles stabbed into the snow beside them.
“Oh . . . I’ve been sick,” I said, eyeing that third pair.
“We missed you,” said Raya. She pointed at the gear in the snow.
“But I’ve never even tried—”
“Neither had I until this morning,” Sari said. “But it’s easy! You just walk. Well, you march. Or stomp.”
“Come on. Get your hoofing boots on,” Raya said.
So I doubled my socks and put on the brown boots. “Oh, hey, Raya,” I said. “Did you give me Moss Capperow’s old boots?”
Raya shrugged. “I don’t know. Probably.”
“Probably?” I turned the tongue of the boot out so she could see the letters: MCAP.
“Yeah, that’s Moss,” she said.
“Yeah, it is,” Sari echoed.
“Well, how did you get them?” I asked.
“Hmm . . . my mom must have picked them up at the town clothing exchange. Had to be a few years ago, by the look of them. No way those would fit Moss now.” She laughed. “Come on,” she said impatiently. “Snowshoes!”
As we strapped me into the foot traps, Guffer cavorted. He lunged and barked at the strange metal monsters, which now had me firmly by my feet. “It’s okay,” I told him. He licked his lips and wagged his tail. Then he tried to lead me out for a walk. “No, no. You have to stay.” I hated to leave him behind, but there was no telling how this would go. I’d have poles in both hands. If I tried to hold a leash, I’d be pulled down for sure.
Aunt Brat came out to corral the dog. She held up her fist, a treat buried inside. “Guffer! Come!” He did and she set the treat into his open mouth. (He was getting very good at taking them gently.) She stroked his golden coat while the dog leaned on her.
“Looks like fun, girls. Where are you headed?” she asked, one eye squinting closed against the low winter sun.
“Bushwhacking,” said Raya with a shrug. “Kind of wherever the walking looks decent. But we’ll be careful. I thought it’d be cool to head out that way.” She waved toward the trees.
“Yeah? How far do you think you’ll go?” Aunt Brat asked.
“Halfway to exhaustion and not a step closer,” Sari quipped.
“Practical,” said Aunt Brat with a nod and a smile. “Lyddie? Do you have your phone?” I assured her that I did. “Okay, then. Do be careful. This is a lot of snow.”
She should know, I thought. She’d skied off into the woods every chance she’d gotten in recent days. It was her tracks that Raya and Sari and I followed while I was getting a feel for the contraptions on my feet. We went out along the enclosure and into the woods.
“These tracks are great training ground. Easy going,” said Raya as we tromped along the parallel lines of packed snow.
“How does it feel, Lydia?” Sari called back to me. “Are you stable?”
“Yeah,” I said. I was surprised. “The poles help a lot. The balance, I mean.” I planted one of mine so that the basket fit into the circle of one that had gone before. Aunt Brat’s, I thought, and I smiled.
“If you’re good, let’s head up,” Raya suggested, and she punched a foot into the fresh snow on the uphill side of Aunt Brat’s tracks.
I hated to leave that trail, but I followed my friends, sidestepping up the hill, then traversing behind them as we marched below the pines. The snow carried us so high off the ground we had to duck under branches in some places. I worked and breathed, step after satisfying step.
I grew warm at my skin, and my nose ran so much—no holds barred—I had to pull a Florry Gerber and use my sleeve more than once. But there was something about this trek in the snow that had me all pumped up. I liked this. A lot.
Raya stopped where a downed
tree crossed our path. She leaned on her poles, turned around, and asked, “Everyone okay?” I knew she meant me.
“Woo-hoo!” I said. I stuck my poles, opened my arms wide, and faced into the treetops. “I am ready for the Winter Olympics!” I laughed out loud.
“Yes!” Sari cried. “We are the women’s snowshoeing team from tiny Chelmsford, Connecticut! We will put this place on the map! Gold medal!”
I stomped in place, looking down at the snowshoes. “It’s just so funny,” I said. “Like going out with a pair of cookie sheets strapped to your feet, though not as slippery!” All three of us laughed.
“Hey, Lydia, you’re not mad that I put you into Moss’s boots, are you?” Ray asked.
“Not mad,” I said. “Just surprised.”
And I think Moss was too. . . .
“Everyone around here shows up in everybody else’s old stuff. Recycling, you know? It just makes sense.”
“Perfect sense,” I said. I’d decided that I liked wearing the boots that had once belonged to Moss.
I looked down from where we’d come—our tracks the only human-made disturbance in the snow. The slope was not treacherous, but steeper than I’d realized. Almost dizzy making. I firmed my poles into the snow.
Stay on your feet, Lydia. . . .
We began descending. I tried to orient. I was sure we’d moved mostly eastward. What did that mean in regard to the places I’d come to know? Home was behind us, and the Capperow farm was even farther to the northwest. Soldier’s Chimney in the village center was to the south.
We hop-stepped down toward a level trail in the side of the slope, a place where the trees began to thin. Down and away, a creek had managed to melt a thin, shining black ribbon through the snow.
“Look! You can see down to the Gerber farm,” said Raya. She raised a pole and pointed to our right.
A Home for Goddesses and Dogs Page 14