“Thanks so much for coming, Debbie. I’ve got two TV dinners in the oven for you and C.J. I hope you like meat loaf.” She closed the door behind her.
“Yes, ma’am,” Debbie said without smiling. “That will be fine.” She held a stack of heavy schoolbooks, and Edith admired her optimism. The only time she ever got anything done with C.J. around was when he was at school, watching Gunsmoke and Dennis the Menace on television, or sleeping.
She led Debbie toward the kitchen. “Why don’t you come put your books down on the kitchen table while I go find C.J. Mrs. Williams will be here any minute to pick me up. We’ll be at the Butlers’ house tonight, and I’ve written her phone number on the pad by the phone.”
She put her books down while Edith opened up the back door and called for C.J. When she turned back to Debbie, she was watching Edith closely. Edith ran her tongue over her teeth, making sure they weren’t smeared with lipstick. She was patting the back of her chignon to check for loose bobby pins when Debbie finally spoke.
“This might be the last time I can come babysit.”
“Oh, no, Debbie. Why? Am I not paying you enough?”
The teenager shook her head, her lank ponytail shaking, too. “No, ma’am. That’s not it. It’s just . . .” She fidgeted, turning her Keds-clad feet outward onto the sides of the soles.
“It’s okay, Debbie. You can tell me.”
She looked at Edith with pale blue eyes and she suddenly knew what Debbie was going to say. “Last time I was here, he hit me. On the arm. Hard enough to make a big bruise. Mama saw it and said I couldn’t come back here unless you promised that C.J. wouldn’t hit me anymore.”
It was as if Edith had turned to ice, as if one small tap anywhere on her would make her crack into a thousand little pieces. Sins of the father. She managed to hold on to her composure. “I’m so sorry, Debbie. So truly sorry. I’m sure he didn’t mean it. I’ll talk to him. Tonight—before I leave—and I’ll make him promise to never hit you again.”
With a tentative smile, she nodded. “Thank you. I know he didn’t mean it. We were playing cards and I was winning. . . .” She stopped, either because she knew what she was saying wasn’t making it any better, or because she suspected that Edith didn’t want to hear it.
Edith opened up the back door and called for C.J. again, her voice more strident. She pictured him hunkered down beneath the oak tree, digging in the dirt with the penknife he’d found in his father’s desk. Since he was a small boy, C.J. had always hidden in the garden when he was upset, finding refuge beneath the heavy arms of the oak tree and within the fragrance of the gardenias and roses Edith tended with a mother’s care. She thought it was because as a baby she’d set up his playpen in the oak’s shadow while she tended her garden, and that must have brought warm memories to him. But sometimes, when he looked at her with his father’s eyes, she saw the dark sky exploding in fire all over again, as if he were remembering things he shouldn’t.
Edith eventually found C.J. on the ground by the garden wall, whittling on a stick. They had their talk, and he seemed penitent enough that Edith chose to believe him. He didn’t protest when she asked for the knife, or when she told him he shouldn’t use his fists when he got angry. He even allowed her to hug him and he hugged her back, his soft, “I’m sorry,” choked with tears. He was truly sorry; she knew this. Just as much as she knew that he was his father’s son.
When Edith finally pulled away from the house in Betsy’s Buick, she’d glanced up at the dormer windows, an orange glow coming from the light she’d left on. She probably wouldn’t be able to sleep again tonight and would spend most of it working on her special project in the attic. She needed it to be done with, for the answer to her question to be found. It was what kept her going, besides her son. She had to believe that there was an answer, a reason. An explanation more complicated than anything she’d come across before in her work. More than that, it was a labor of love, a show of solidarity with a woman she’d never met. It would be her crowning glory, a nod to her own past. A promise to a secret kept.
She slid a cigarette and her lighter out of her pocketbook, catching sight in the side-view mirror of the lit attic window one last time before Betsy turned the corner and the old house disappeared from view.
chapter 12
LORALEE