The cry from my stomach suddenly overpowered my foot. It was as if I hadn’t eaten in years. And I hadn’t—at least not anything like this. I glanced behind me. Bert was across the street, holding up a newspaper he very obviously was not reading. He would have money to buy something. All I would have to do is ask. But nothing in the world would convince me to ask that man for anything. Not even my howling stomach.
It wouldn’t hurt to smell it, though. And seeing as how I was having no luck on the street, maybe I could finally get some directions to Helen’s in the process. So stuffing my hunger as far down as I could, I entered the shop. A bell tinkled overhead.
The shop was empty.
“Excuse me?”
No answer. The aroma of freshly baking bread was enough to weaken my knees. I pushed forward, swallowing too much spit, the allure of the cakes and croissants more than I could take. I put one hand on the glass divider, imagining the sugar on my tongue.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
I jumped as an aproned shopkeeper emerged from somewhere in the back. His eyes were narrowed, greased mustache dusted with flour.
“I’m trying to—”
“Paying customers only!” he barked, moving his hands to his hips. “You got any money?”
“No, but I—”
“Then out! Out with you!”
I pulled my hand from the glass. I’d left a smudge. “Please, I’m just trying to get dir—”
“You deaf or just stupid? I said skedaddle!” He moved toward me, arm raised.
Flinching, I fled from the store and didn’t stop until I’d retreated to the closest alley, sliding onto my butt to give my aching legs—and heart—a break. I patted my shoulder. No, I hadn’t grown a second head. I was still me. My hands traveled down my arms. Past the dirt and scabs and bruises. Over my ripped flour sack dress. Down my bloodied knees and scrawny legs to my scuffed-up shoes. One normal. One stuffed with a sock but obviously twisted. Yes, I was still me. But that was not good enough for Indianapolis.
Once again, stupid tears clouded my eyes. I slapped them away, glancing up as a shadow blocked the light.
Bert slid down next to me. “I tried to tell you.”
I didn’t look at him.
“The people here don’t understand you. The rest of the nation doesn’t understand you. Okies, I mean.” He tugged at his shirtsleeves. “They have no idea what it’s like. What you’re like. They just see a flood of people coming into their neighborhoods, begging for handouts they don’t have the money to give, a problem they don’t have time to fix.”
The lump in my throat refused to be swallowed. I closed my eyes tightly. “I just want to see my pa.”
Bert’s hand hovered above mine for an uncomfortable moment before patting me once. His skin was clammy. “Where is your pa?”
“4275 Meridian Street.” How I remembered it after all this time was beyond me. Probably because Helen never shut up about it. Whatever the reason, it fell off my tongue like a Bible verse.
“Stay here.”
Bert’s boots scratched against the gritty pavement as he left the alley. He was gone less than five minutes. When he returned, he was whistling.
It hurt my ears. “What?”
He tapped a small yellow piece of paper against his temple, a smile on his quivering lips. “Well, are you coming?”
“Where?”
He rolled his eyes, letting out a roar of laughter. “To find your pa, of course!”
My body slumped, my mouth falling slack. “How did you . . . ?” A more pressing question came to mind before I could finish. “Why?”
“Why am I helping you?”
I nodded.
He shrugged, long hair rolling off his shoulders. “I don’t have any right to say quit.” He winked. “At least that’s what someone somewhere told me anyway.”
After about thirty minutes of walking, the tall buildings died down and the honking cars grew fewer. Houses replaced stores, all of them with pretty picket fences and manicured square lawns set back from the road. Everything was so clean. Even the sidewalk was free from dust and weeds.
“This one,” I said, stopping suddenly. “Number 4275. This has to be it.”
The house was massive, easily three times the size of the Mayfields’. Two stories tall, brown brick with white trim. The arched doorway perfectly matched the rows of windows on either side, the trimmed shrubs forming a protective fence around the base of the house. The door was red—bright red—brighter than any color I’d seen in a long time. A small iron balcony curved over the top of the door toward bay windows on either side.
No wonder Helen hated our dugout so much.
“Well, go on.”
I’d almost forgotten Bert was there.
“You need me to walk you to the door or something?”
I shook my head.
“Well, whatcha waiting for, then?”
“Nothing!”
“Alright, alright. If you say so.” He stood beside me, staring at the house for several moments, shifting from one foot to the other, waiting for me to move.
I didn’t.
“Are you sure—?”
“I’m fine!”
He rolled his massive shoulders, letting out a long sigh. “Okay. Well, if you’re fine, I guess this is goodbye.” He stuck out one hand.
“You’re leaving?” I stared at his hand but didn’t shake it, ashamed of the anxiety in my voice.
Bert smirked. “You care?”
“No.”
He pulled his hand back to his side. “I got you to your pa, didn’t I? Didn’t quit. But now I’ve got some business to take care of.”
“Business?”
Bert’s fingers flittered over his bag. “There’s a wire service here in town. Maybe I’ll go send in those pictures.”
I dipped my head to the side. “Really?”
He gave a sideways smile and gestured to the sky. Daylight was fading, the sun sinking behind the concrete hills. “It’s getting dark. Perhaps I can get people to notice the stars.”
A truck rumbled on the street behind us, sending vibrations through the soles of my feet. It was a nice thought. And I almost believed he would do it. Almost.
He gave an awkward bow, his too-tight jacket straining with the movement. “Well, good luck, Kathryn Okie. Tell that pa of yours I said hello.”
I watched him walk away, his massive body turning into a speck on the horizon. When I finally turned back toward Helen’s house, the driveway had tripled in length. And I was suddenly too tired to take another step. Over a thousand miles in six weeks, and I couldn’t make these last few yards. My foot seized inside my shoe, sending fire up my leg and into my spine. It had finally had enough.
By the time I arrived on the stoop, I felt as if I might faint. My mouth was dry. My stomach growled. My hands looked so dirty against that red front door, I was afraid to touch it. I gave a weak knock with my shoulder instead. It left a smudge anyway.
The door opened to reveal a gray-haired man with thick spectacles. “No soliciting,” he said simply, as if he’d repeated the words a hundred times and almost couldn’t bear to say them again.
“I ain’t—”
“Kathryn?”
A beautiful woman appeared behind him, yellow hair coiled in a tight bun, her green dress glowing in the pale light.
“Kathryn, oh, my goodness.”
Helen. The woman was Helen. She rushed toward me.
The last thing I remembered was her fingernails—clean, long, manicured—reaching for my arm and the crisp smell of lilac soap filling the air before I collapsed under the weight of my own exhaustion and filth.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
MELISSA
The end of August 1935 in Boise City, Oklahoma, was a collective pause. All of Cimarron County held its breath, waiting, hoping. There were no dusters. No wind at all, really. The air was hot, still, and smelled of rot. The streets emptied; the town hesitated. Maybe this was t
he year. Quiet prayers, breathless and whispered so as not to jinx it. Maybe this was the year the September rains would return.
I didn’t pray for rain. Like the scorched earth that no longer gave way beneath my feet, I was too far gone for rain. Rain would not save my marriage or my home. Rain would not save me. So I did not pray for rain. I prayed for absolution.
I made up a bed in the library, no longer wanting to lay even my eyes on our marriage bed, and also where I could more easily listen for Henry’s return. I needn’t have bothered; he didn’t come home that first night. A respite, though a fitful one. But by the second night, my relief had faded into worry. And by the third night, I had taken to pacing the front room, chewing the ends of my hair. His absence was more frightening than his anger. The reality of what I’d done—no matter the justification—filled our house. Henry could walk in at any moment and throw me out. I had betrayed our vows, stolen. Lied. And to the most powerful man in town. My mind wandered to Annie, to Mary Beth, to every other faceless, hopeless shape that shifted through our town like the prairie dust. Alone, destitute, hated . . . I would never survive.
No, Henry wouldn’t do that. His pride would never survive the gossip. He desired control above all else. Well, almost everything else. As long as his seed was in my belly, he would not throw me out. But there was no telling what would happen the moment the child’s cord was cut. He craved a son; if the baby was a girl, as I knew she’d be, perhaps he’d cast us aside anyway. Or maybe he’d keep her. Just her. The only thing that scared me more than being thrust into poverty was the thought of my daughter being ripped from my bosom and raised a Mayfield, her mother’s arms nothing more than a hushed memory.
On the afternoon of the fourth day, Henry’s continued absence became less of a whisper and more of a scream. Fearful or not, I had to talk to him. He was still my husband, and I was still the mother of his child. And his silence about the future was a different kind of torture from his past abuses; it was worse.
I started at the big house. It seemed the most logical place. He had to be sleeping somewhere at night, and even those houses in town whose beds were warm for a fee did not offer a full night’s respite. But the big house, I discovered, was not a place of rest. Dozens of trucks crowded the front lawn. Bodies milled around the porch, their murmurs wrapped around them like a blanket.
Maybe I’d start in town instead.
But before I could retreat, Mrs. Brownstone broke free from the crowd. “Mrs. Mayfield! There you are!”
I stiffened in her embrace, the starched fabric of her dress scraping against my skin like thorns. She could feel the truth in my arms, I thought. What I’d done, what Henry had said, the lie of our union and the emptiness of my soul. She’d see it all.
But when she pulled away, her eyes were watery and soft. “We’re here for you both, dear. I’m sure you know that.”
I did?
“Look at me, clucking away. Please, don’t let me stop you. Go, go.” She pushed me gently toward the porch. “A husband needs his wife.”
Not a reprimand. Not even a critique. An appeal. On rubbery legs, I took a step forward, keeping my gaze on Mrs. Brownstone, hoping for answers. But all she gave me was a small frown, sad and helpless, before stepping back into the crowd. Silence fell over the group as I turned my attention ahead. My steps echoed on the porch, the only sound for miles.
The screen door creaked shut behind me, finally breaking the chains of their stares. But my relief was short-lived. The stillness of the house held no peace. Henry was here.
I found him kneeling in the sitting room, head drooped against his chest.
“Henry?” His name felt dusty in my mouth. The man before me was a stranger.
He didn’t move.
I took a step forward. “Henry?”
He jerked his head back, eyes red and moist. He was crying. This hard, strong man was crying. Had I really hurt him so bad? He wiped tears with the back of his hand quickly, any trace of softness disappearing. “What are you doing here?”
“I—”
He stood suddenly. “I guess it’s just as well. Now is not the time for a scandal.”
I touched my throat. How foolish I was. His tears would never be about me.
He pushed past me to the window, fingers drumming on the sill as he surveyed anything but me. “Go back home and find something to wear. Black. I won’t have you embarrassing me today of all days.”
I clutched the sides of my dress. Pale blue. He had bought it for me. I remembered the day he brought it home. It felt like years ago. “Henry, what are you talking about?”
He turned, jaw clenched and skin mottled. Pain was there, just below his cold exterior. Pain I recognized all too well. Pain I experienced as a child and in a million little moments afterward.
“He’s dead, Melissa. My father is dead.”
It hit ninety degrees at 10 a.m. on the day of the funeral. There was a pale, cloudless sky without even a hint of a breeze. It was a day when most people would have stayed home. No good would come out of a day like that. But today was the day we would bury the senior Mr. Mayfield, so the entire town crowded into St. Paul’s to pay their respects. Or gawk with morbid curiosity. Or both.
Henry was silent when he picked me up, the two of us still maintaining separate residences. He was silent during the drive. And he was silent, making last-minute notes on his eulogy, as we waited in the choir room. I should have been used to it by now. But this silence felt different.
“Are you okay?” I shouldn’t have cared. But I did.
Henry’s pen scratched against paper. He didn’t look up.
I shifted in the squeaky wooden seat. My dress pinched my tender stomach, making me queasy. “I . . . I know what it’s like to lose a parent. I don’t think you ever really get over it. When I lost Ma—”
He exhaled sharply and crumpled the paper in his fist. “Melissa, I’m trying to think. Will you shut up about your dead mother? She ain’t got nothing to do with this.”
I curled into myself, hurt. There would be no intermission from our quarrel. No mutual grief to bind us, to soften the pain. We had become completely unraveled, and there was no knitting us back together again.
During the service, I stood next to Henry when I was supposed to stand, sat when I was supposed to sit, accepted hugs when they were offered. I knew how to play the part. But Henry never spoke to me, never touched me, never looked at me. At his father’s funeral, it was I who played the ghost.
The Ladies Auxiliary organized a potluck in the church basement after the service. I wondered how many people showed up just for the food. Henry walked in front of me, shaking hands and patting shoulders. I followed. The smell of potatoes and supper casseroles roiled my still-sensitive stomach. Sweaty bodies bumped into me, murmuring condolences through stale breath.
Henry disappeared into the crowd of mourners. He never looked back, his indifference sucking the last of the air from the already-suffocating room. His spurn was louder than any slap, and yet no one else seemed to notice. Head down and hands clasped, I stole through a side door and out into the bright sunlight. The air was hot and dry and plentiful. I gave a yank on my collar, one shiny gray button breaking free and falling to the ground in silent defeat.
“Mrs. Mayfield?”
Annie peered out from behind a tree. Her hair was tied back in a tight bun, her face free from dirt for the first time since I’d known her. Her brown dress was frayed at the bottom but had recently been pressed. She’d put effort into her appearance today. And it wasn’t for the sake of Mr. Mayfield. She embraced me with a sad smile, the smell of polish and cooked carrots intermingling with my perfume. It was the first time I’d allowed myself to cry in days.
After a long moment, she pulled away, her eyes searching my face. “Are you okay?”
Her words awoke truth, instantly drying my tears. “Mrs. Gale, please. Thank you. Thank you for coming. But you can’t be here.”
She cocked her head. “It’s
a funeral. Can’t anyone come to pay their respects?”
“It’s not that. I . . . ,” I stammered, still unable to tell her what I’d done. “I did something awful,” I said eventually. “And I got caught. Mrs. Gale, he knows I’ve been helping you. He knows.” I shook her outstretched hands. “You can’t be here. You have to—”
“Melissa.”
Never had the sound of my own name been so ominous. I dropped Annie’s hands and turned slowly.
Henry stood in the doorway, arms stretched to either side as if holding up the frame. Sunlight filtered down through the trees, making his blond hair glitter and shading his brow. “What are you doing out here?”
“I . . . I needed some air.”
He took a step forward and extended his hand. “Mrs. Gale, how lovely of you to join us.”
Annie hesitated. When she finally accepted his hand, it was with the face of one who smelled rotten flesh.
My eyes pleaded with her. Run, I screamed inside my head. Run.
“You look well,” he said, his voice slipping easily into the Mayfield charm. He took a step back and eyed her dress. “Very well. Especially for a widow who cleans houses for a living.”
Annie’s mouth puckered. She clenched her hands into fists and put them behind her back.
Please don’t. Don’t take the bait. You have no idea what he can do.
Henry looked to the sky, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand. “Sure is a hot one today.” He grinned. “So tell me, Mrs. Gale. How is that you’re doing so well when so many others are not?”
Annie stared straight ahead. “I work hard, Mr. Mayfield.”
“So does everybody else.” He glanced in my direction, an ugly smile on his handsome face. “Surely there must be more to it than that.”
“The Ladies Auxiliary helps me out. Bein’ the hands and feet of Christ, they call it.”
“Hands and feet of Christ, huh?” Henry ran his tongue over his teeth. “Right.” He sighed. “Well, I must be getting back inside. Melissa, it would be in your best interest to accompany me.”
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