The Liberators of Willow Run
Page 21
Minutes later Ruth dropped into the chair across the table and released a sigh. “Done for the day. Done with new customer questions and demands. Done with being bumped with a tray of hot soup on board, and done with lousy tips.” She offered Audrey a tired grin. “Tell me something good.”
Audrey leaned forward and rested her elbows on the table. “I’ll tell you two things. No, three. Good things should come in threes, I think.” She acknowledged Ruth’s lightened expression. “I’m done with Mr. Fast Hands. I told him that women employees were there to earn a paycheck to pay their bills, they were not there to satisfy his cheap pleasures.”
“That is good,” Ruth replied. “I hated knowing that you put up with that every day. Do you think he will stop?”
“With me, yes. He fired me.”
“Oh, no.”
“Yes,” Audrey said. “It’s the second good thing.”
“Well, then, the third better be a doozie.”
“It is,” she said, her voice lifting with excitement. “I have a new job, a real job.”
“That fast? I can’t believe it. I mean, of course I believe it, but wow. That’s wonderful. What is it?”
“I’m going to be a driver. Part of me doesn’t believe it myself. I was driving home after getting fired, and there was this delivery truck pulled off on the side of the road. I slowed way down when I saw this man kickin’ the heck out of the front fender where the tire was as flat as this tabletop. I stopped and asked if he needed a ride and, you know, I think he was so frustrated that he didn’t care if it was a woman or a beagle offering the ride. He was delivering ignition parts to the Willow Run plant, and all it took was me asking if they would fit in the car.”
“So you helped him deliver them.”
Audrey nodded. “It was so strange seeing cars being assembled there instead of our Libs. It just didn’t seem right. But that was one grateful man. He owns the shop that makes those parts and he sure didn’t want to lose that contract. He’s expanding as fast as he can and he needs drivers.”
“And something put you right where you needed to be, right when you needed to be there. Sometimes I wonder how that happens, but since I can’t answer with anything rational, it becomes the luck of it.” Ruth leaned forward, absorbed in thought. “But you know, I think it may be more than that. Maybe what we give out to the world comes back. What if you had driven on by and just thought, That’s an angry, frustrated man, and I’m glad I’m not in his place?”
“He wouldn’t have had the opportunity to offer me a job.”
“And even though it wasn’t your purpose in helping him, the result was a job.”
“I wish I could believe that it always works that way.”
“You have good reason to be skeptical,” Ruth said. “I suppose we both do. Maybe there’s no absolute. But isn’t it a better hope to live by? Shouldn’t we be putting our best out into the world anyway? We have seen it. Look at Nona.”
“I couldn’t understand how she kept offering kindness and forgiveness to such an ugly world. I don’t think I could stand it myself,” Audrey admitted. “But you’re right. She was able to have a really good job and earned enough money to stick to her plan. Even with the servicemen filling admissions to the college, she kept reapplying until she got in.”
“She has the patience of Job.” Ruth smiled. “And she’s going to make a fine teacher.”
“I have no doubt of that. She’s exactly where she’s supposed to be.” Audrey scanned the wall of pictures that documented an important part of her life. “I wonder,” she said, her eyes returning to Ruth’s, “if we will always be where we’re supposed to be?”
“Let’s just keep putting out there what we want to come back.”
There was one thing she was sure of, Audrey thought as they left the restaurant, she was supposed to be wherever Ruth was. It wouldn’t matter where they lived or where they worked, as long as they were together.
Ruth settled behind the wheel of the car. “I do know where we need to be tomorrow,” she said, starting the engine.
“The woman Lillian called about last night?”
“Yes, and it’s not going to be easy.”
“I don’t expect any of them to be easy.”
Ruth continued as she pulled from the parking lot. “Well, this woman wants to keep her baby despite every known odd being against her. She has no place to live, no money, a newborn, and if that’s not enough of a challenge, the baby’s father is a wealthy, married politician.”
“Let me guess,” Audrey replied. “He wants no bastard heir showing up.”
“Well, no. How inconvenient for him.”
Audrey cocked her head and narrowed her eyes. “Let’s see how inconvenient we can make it. Who says it’s not up to her?” As the car headed left toward the west end of town, she added, “Where are we going, by the way?”
“Molly and I,” Ruth patted the dash of her beloved car, “are taking you for a ride in the country.”
Ruth naming the car still made Audrey smile. And her reasoning made good sense. Anything that important to their independence, that essential to their mission, deserved the dignity of a name. So Molly it would be.
Molly carried them comfortably out of the city and into the now familiar countryside. Much needed getaways from work and worry often included long leisurely rides, sandwiches for dinner, and stolen moments of affection in the open air. Today, Audrey assumed, would be a getaway that would serve to make devising a complicated mission plan a little more comfortable. Until, that is, Ruth pulled Molly into the drive of a neglected farmhouse set back a good distance from the road. It was apparent even from the road that the building had seen its best days long ago. The once straight porch roof now had a sway like the back of an old horse. There were broken windows, missing porch rails, and only sparse evidence of whitewash on the old board siding.
They continued up the drive and Audrey sent a questioning look at Ruth. “If I didn’t know better,” she said with another look at the house, “I’d say the war had come to the home front.”
“And I say it’s time for us to take another look at our finances.”
“Our finances?”
Ruth smiled and pointed to a small sign tacked to one of the porch posts that read, For Sale.
“You cannot be serious,” Audrey replied, as Ruth parked at the end of the drive and jumped out of the car.
“Come on,” Ruth called, already making her way through the tall weeds toward the house.
Audrey followed, carefully stepped up the rotted steps to the porch and joined Ruth, who was peeking through the windows.
“It doesn’t look as bad on the inside,” Ruth said, her hands shading the glare on the glass. “The rooms on this floor are big, and it looks like the kitchen must be in the back. We could get the inside in shape first. I wonder how many bedrooms are upstairs.”
“You are serious.”
“Think about it,” she said, excitedly grabbing Audrey’s hand. “We have Molly, so we don’t have to live in town. And it would make the perfect safe house whenever we need a temporary place for someone to stay. And I’ll bet we can afford it now. What do you think?”
“I think you’re crazy, and beautiful, and,” she glanced around at the work that would be involved, “this is such a mess.”
“But if I can handle a mixer . . .”
“Then why not a drill,” Audrey replied with a wide grin.
“And a hammer—and a screwdriver—and whatever it takes.”
“You think we could make it work, don’t you?”
Ruth took Audrey’s hands and squeezed them tightly. “If we go at it, I don’t think there is anything we can’t do.”
“We’re doing something important, aren’t we?”
“We are, we absolutely are,” Ruth replied.
The delight on Audrey’s face had softened into pensiveness. “I wish . . .”
Ruth stroked the side of Audrey’s face and stayed with her gaze, the eye
s that often told her more than her words. “Velma,” she said softly.
“I wish she could know the good that we have done, what more we want to do. I wish we could tell her our plans. Her heart would sing if she knew.”
“Then we’ll tell her, honey, “Ruth said. “You’ll whisper it to the part of her that hears your voice, the part deep in her that feels your strength.” She drew Audrey closer and there on the porch of their future, she kissed her. “She’ll know all the important things,” she whispered. “We’ll always tell her.”
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