“Oh, sweet baby,” she said and took Charlie by the face. “Your mama almost had to get rid of you, but she didn’t. She wanted you, you hear?” Charlie nodded, a little stunned. “Goddamn,” Red said. “I didn’t expect that. Whew!” Charlie giggled.
Red pulled up her chair to Kit’s bedside and brushed the jagged layers away from her face. “You sure do have goofy-looking hair . . . What have you been cutting it with, a fork and knife?” Kit laughed a little and Red sighed. “Hon, I tried looking out for you. I hope it felt like something to you, but it sure wasn’t enough. You were a kid, I turned the other way. I should have called the cops on him. I should have taken you by the hand and led you out of there myself.” She pulled a cigarette out of a rhinestone-encrusted case and went to light it, then put it away. “My drug counselor says, ‘Winifred, you’re shoulding all over yourself,’ but fact is, I owe you an amends.”
Kit’s eyes clouded up and she felt faint. Red was right. She had been the only person in a position to help her and she’d let her stay with Manny. Maybe Red hadn’t known how bad he was. She must have known something wasn’t right, though.
“Don’t you hate me?” Red said with eyes brimming. “I sure would feel better if you did.”
Kit cooled as she considered her old friend. She took a full breath and tried to let go of the ugly feeling that had passed over her. Red was here in good faith. She didn’t want to push Red away. Kit could feel forgiveness coming on, and she wanted her old friend to know it.
“Look, Manny’s the one who hurt me,” Kit said, “and no one’s responsible but him. I appreciate your telling me in person like this. And I missed you. I did. I hope you don’t feel too bad, because you were there for me when I called.” Kit looked down at her scarred and calloused hands. “But I think it might be too painful to see you anymore, cause of everything you said. Knowing you knew and didn’t help. I’m glad you came, though, Red. Thank you.”
Red kept her eyes on Kit and squeezed her hand.
“I gotcha, babe,” she said. Then she tipped her head toward Charlie. “You did good.” Kit nodded.
“Welp, I got a hot date tonight. I better mosey.” Red hoisted herself up, hovered over Kit, and smeared her forehead with a glossy kiss. Then she picked up her purse, fluffed her hairdo in the chrome of a cabinet, and jiggled out the door.
“The hell was that?” Charlie said, emerging from her corner of the room. “That . . . woman was your friend?” Charlie didn’t think she’d forget her as long as she lived.
“I didn’t mean for you to hear all of that,” Kit said, a touch shameful, fragile, almost.
“It’s okay,” Charlie said, softening her tone. “It was kind of interesting to hear a little more about you. I can’t believe you know someone like her.”
Kit kept her eyes closed and waved for Charlie to sit down next to her. She looked like a ragged doll lying there, her strange bob a mess around her face, the covers pulled up to her armpits.
“I’m sorry,” Kit said. “I guess I kept you in the dark about a lot of stuff. Some of it you should know about.” She took a deep breath and let it go. “I’m not so good at looking backward. It pains me to do it. But I want you to know where I’ve been in case . . .”
Charlie leaned in. “In case what?”
Her eyes met Charlie’s for a moment and then fluttered closed.
“I don’t know,” Kit said. “In case it helps you make sense of why I’m so hard to love.”
Charlie was very still, as if the wrong move or word would break her mother’s moment of honesty.
“When I was born,” Kit said, “my mother left me and never came back.”
Charlie’s throat filled up with emotion.
And then Kit told her everything—about the foster families and running away and meeting Manny. She told her about the stealing and robberies, how Manny had taken advantage of her, and what happened the day Kit fled to Pecan Hollow. After she got it all out, she was quiet for a while, maybe thinking things over.
“I worry sometimes I made you suspicious of everyone, cause I never learned who was kindly and who was not. And I think that’s made it hard for you to have friends. And I’m really sorry for that. But you have to know it’s because I was trying to keep you safe. If I done right or wrong, it was always for you.”
Charlie didn’t realize she was crying until she felt the tears splash on her arms. She wiped them away but they came and came. She pitied her mom, so lonesome for so long. And she understood, maybe a sliver, of how her mother had felt. Charlie, too, had felt motherless sometimes. But hearing her story now, told straight, it didn’t matter how awful the truth was. It was just such a relief to shine a light in the shadow.
Chapter Forty-Seven
The day Kit was set to leave the hospital, she waited for Charlie and Doc to pick her up. She’d been cleared by doctors and said goodbye to her nurses and the physical therapist who had been helping her use her leg again. The doctors had urged her to take her pain meds, but she did not want to numb anymore. She was afraid of losing feeling, because the feeling, whatever it was, let her know she was still there. The doctors warned her the limp might not go away, and if that wasn’t bad enough, they’d served her up a hospital bill the size of Texas. It was the kind of debt that she’d spend the rest of her life repaying unless she won the lottery or robbed a bank. The only thing she owned of any value was Eleanor’s house.
She had already started to consider selling when she found out from Caleb that Sandy had been killed in her room, that the clothes Sandy had worn were found in the dryer. It was hard to imagine getting a full night’s sleep in the house knowing all that. She wondered bitterly if Manny had known he was ruining the place for her. She figured she could get enough out of it to pay down the bulk of her bill and maybe buy a trailer, a home you could move. She felt lighter when she imagined a fresh start, but only when she didn’t think about what it would do to Charlie.
It wasn’t just the house she dreaded, though, it was the town. She couldn’t forget how they had looked back at her that night at the church, rows of judging eyes and scolding lips. She couldn’t face them again, not after they had turned their backs on her and Charlie. There were a couple dozen greeting cards she hadn’t opened stacked on the counter next to the cotton balls and hand soap. She didn’t need sympathy from them. What she needed did not fit on a card.
She thought of Eleanor, how much she had loved that house and left it to Kit, and wondered what she would have said. If her great-aunt had known what happened at the church, would she still have told Kit to stick with it, make nice with everyone? Or would she have been outraged and given her blessing to sell the house and make a home somewhere new? Kit hated the thought of someone else coming in and stripping the wallpaper, painting the walls, adding their personal touch to a home in which four generations of her family had now lived.