Carry the Light

by Delia Parr

  Charlene blinked hard. Her mother had died only months after Charlene and Daniel had been married, and Charlene welcomed a chance to hear and talk about her. “You teased each other by playing tricks on one another?”

  “All the time,” Aunt Dorothy replied, and placed a piece of donut in front of each of them. “Try this frozen. To my mind, it’s the best way to eat a cream donut.”

  Daniel tried a bite and shrugged. “It’s okay, but I’m not a good judge. I don’t really favor sweets, but I think I like the cream better when it’s soft and gooey.”

  “You try it, Charlene,” Aunt Dorothy urged as she nibbled her own piece.

  Charlene took a tiny bite and then another. “It tastes even sweeter this way. I like it,” she declared and polished off the last bite.

  “That’s just what your mother said when I convinced her to try one frozen. Of course, she didn’t always agree with me, especially when I outwitted her in one of our little games.”

  “Tell us about one of those games,” Daniel urged and leaned back in his chair.

  Aunt Dorothy thought for a moment, and smiled. “Marie and I both had a sweet tooth, even as youngsters, you know.”

  Charlene grinned. “I’m afraid it’s genetic, Daniel.”

  “As I was saying,” Aunt Dorothy continued, “Marie and I both loved our sweets, but we also loved our toilet water.”

  “I remember that about her. She always smelled real good, like you do,” Daniel put in and looked at Charlene almost shyly.

  “That definitely wasn’t genetic,” Charlene said. Judging by the look in Daniel’s gaze, however, she hoped wearing a light scent could be an acquired habit.

  “Father used to bring us each a bottle of toilet water now and then, and we’d trade back and forth,” Aunt Dorothy reminisced. “One time Marie gave me a bottle of Tabu. In return, I gave her half a bottle of Evening in Paris.”

  “Half a bottle?” Daniel asked.

  “Well, the bottle of Evening in Paris was twice the size of the Tabu. We always tried to keep things even, so when that happened, we’d pour the toilet water into tiny glass bottles we had for our baby dolls and label the scent. As a matter of fact, I still have most of them stored up in the attic,” she explained before popping the last bite of donut into her mouth.

  “So how did you tease her that time?” Charlene asked.

  “That was easy. I waited until she fell asleep one night, switched bottles with her and changed the labels. The next time she got all fixed up to go out with Gary Nelson, she doused herself real good with Tabu,” she admitted and started laughing again. “Marie tried washing it off, but she still smelled like Tabu when he came calling. I think he must have liked that scent a whole lot better than Evening in Paris, too.”

  “Really?” Daniel asked. “Why?”

  “It’s the only thing that explains why he stopped by one day when Marie was at the library and asked if he could keep company with me instead of my sister.”

  “You didn’t say he could, did you?” Charlene asked.

  Aunt Dorothy’s gaze hardened. “All I gave him was a good tonguelashing! There isn’t a man who has ever walked this earth who would have been worth hurting my sister. Blood’s thicker than water—or in this case, toilet water.”

  She turned and looked directly at Daniel. “Not all men have the same good heart you do, Daniel. I know you’re not blood, but you’re as good to me as any son or nephew could be, sharing your wife with me during the week to take care of me and coming down here yourself on weekends to help me. I won’t forget you, either. After I’m gone, you and Charlene will both share everything I own.”

  Daniel blushed, adding a rosy hue to his tanned features. “We’re family. Let’s hope we have lots of time to enjoy together.”

  The elderly woman sighed and glanced from Daniel to Charlene. “I know what the doctors say and I know what this old body of mine is telling me, too, but I also know the good Lord will take me Home when He’s good and ready. When He does, I pity you both,” she said with a hint of a smile on her lips. “You’re going to have a mess of a time cleaning all my junk out of this house after I’m gone, and don’t think for a minute you took care of most of it in that spare bedroom. There’s a whole lot more in that attic,” she warned.

  Charlene chuckled, grateful her aunt had used her sense of humor to lighten the sad mood after talking about her death. “We could always sort through some things while I’m here,” she offered.

  “There’s not much I care to see again right now, other than a good view of the creek behind my house,” her aunt replied.

  “Which I’m ready to tackle today,” Daniel said as he rose from his seat.

  When he started to clear the table, Aunt Dorothy shooed him away by waving her hand. “Charlene can take care of the kitchen. I need those muscles of yours outside.”

  He leaned down and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Then I’ll get started right away.” He grabbed his coat and headed out the back door.

  After he left, Aunt Dorothy rose from the table. “While you clean up, I’m going to get a few things from my bedroom. Meet me in the living room when you’re finished. And don’t dawdle. I’m thinking I might need a bit of a nap this morning, but you’re right. I should probably show you some things before I do, just in case I’m still napping when you have to leave to open the store today.”

  Curious, Charlene watched her aunt walk slowly from the kitchen and through the dining room. Once she had the dishes washed and the table wiped clean, she joined her aunt in the living room.

  Aunt Dorothy was lying on the sofa with her head propped by a bed pillow and the black lap shawl with a purple fringe covering her legs. In addition to the tissue box and a plastic flower arrangement, her aunt had placed an old, square candy tin on the coffee table.

  Aunt Dorothy scooted over on the sofa and patted the edge of the cushion by her side. “Sit with me and open that tin.”

  Charlene did as she was told. Cautiously, she lifted the lid and glanced inside. Neatly lined up in a single layer were tiny cardboard jewelry boxes. Some had turned golden brown with age. Many carried the names of jewelry stores Charlene recognized, although most of them had closed down years ago.

  “I’ve got a whole drawerful of costume jewelry I don’t think is worth much to anyone but me, but I keep what little I do have that’s valuable or important to me in that tin,” her aunt explained. “There’s not much there, but once I’m gone, these will all belong to you. You can pass them down to Bonnie and your grandchildren someday. It’s the least I can do to thank you for taking good care of me.”

  Charlene blinked back tears. “I don’t expect—”

  “I know you don’t,” her aunt argued. “And I’m afraid I’m being just a little selfish about this.”

  “Selfish? You don’t have a selfish bone in your body,” Charlene countered.

  “We all have a touch of selfishness now and then,” her aunt cautioned. “I was hoping I could tell you about the jewelry. Each piece has a story, you know, and if I don’t tell them to you, those stories will die with me. I’m hoping you’d like to hear them,” she whispered.”

  “Of course I would,” Charlene said, then glanced down at her lap, counted the tiny boxes and put the tin back on the coffee table. “I think I should probably write down the stories, though. Would that be all right? I’m afraid I might never remember them all.”

  Aunt Dorothy removed her glasses, put them on the coffee table, folded her hands on her lap and closed her eyes. “There’s paper and a pencil in the kitchen.”

  Charlene found a notepad and a pencil in one of the junk drawers quickly enough, and paused for just a moment to peek out the kitchen window. She couldn’t see Daniel, but she could hear the snapping of tree limbs, and assumed he had started to trim.

  By the time she got back to the living room, Aunt Dorothy was asleep and snoring. Loudly. “Apparently, you really did need that nap,” she mumbled, and adjusted the lap
shawl.

  Although tempted to take a peek inside one of the jewelry boxes, Charlene merely laid the notepad and pencil down next to the candy tin. She returned to the kitchen again to get tonight’s supper into the Crock-Pot, hoping Aunt Dorothy would wake before Charlene had to leave to open the store at noon. If not, she might hear more about the stories tonight after supper.

  She glanced at the kitchen clock when she finished making the pot roast. It was only nine-fifteen, and she had more than two hours before she needed to leave. In Grand Mills on a weekend with Daniel, she would have kept busy with laundry or other chores. Living here, however, she was loath to do anything that might disturb her aunt’s sleep.

  Then she remembered an important project that needed her attention—a project dear to her heart.

  She tiptoed back to the spare bedroom, grabbed a coat and a pair of gloves and went straight outside to the backyard. The air was colder than usual for March, but the sun was bright and warmed the top of her head. She wasn’t sure if Daniel wanted her help, and the look of surprise on his face when she found him tying up branches he had cut told her he hadn’t expected to see her at all.

  He stopped working. “Is something wrong with Aunt Dorothy?”

  “I thought you could use an extra pair of hands,” she replied and waited for him to send her back into the house.

  He narrowed his gaze. “You’ll probably wind up ruining your good gloves if you help.”

  “I have other pairs of gloves,” she said, quite sure now that this was the only man she ever wanted—and she was determined to win him back.

  He shrugged and tossed her the ball of twine he had been using.

  Naturally, she missed it and had to use her feet to clear away last fall’s leaves to find it again. When she did, she turned around and found him still watching her, and the smile on his face gave her hope that he might want to salvage their marriage as much as she did.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Nearly two weeks after her mother’s emergency surgery, Ellie was sitting behind the desk in her classroom long after the school day had officially ended. She waved off the two students she had held for detention for the past half hour with a smile, satisfied she had been able to help them resolve the argument that had exploded during class earlier in the day.

  “I’m really sorry I disrupted your class today,” Harry offered.

  “Me, too, Mrs. Waters,” Peter added before the two of them grabbed their backpacks and headed home together, apparently friends again.

  Both pleased and relieved that she had been able to help the two boys settle their differences, she reached for her briefcase, wondering why she had never seemed to have the same success resolving the differences between herself and her mother. Humbled by the lesson in forgiveness she had just learned from her students, she pulled the cell phone from her briefcase to call both of her sons before heading home.

  “I need to go home. Today.”

  Ellie heard her mother’s terse pronouncement the moment she stepped into the house from work. With a briefcase full of papers to be graded in one hand and her keys and purse in the other, she kicked the front door closed with her foot. By habit, she turned to disarm the security system, then remembered she was no longer arming it for fear her mother might set off another false alarm.

  She had no idea what could have happened during the day to make her mother so determined to leave today. When they had talked about the subject last night, they’d agreed that her mother was still too weak to live on her own.

  Now Ellie found her mother sitting in the upholstered rocking chair next to the aquarium. She was wearing her spring tweed coat and matching hat. Her suitcase was on the floor next to the chair. With her gaze hard and her lips pursed, she was clearly a woman with her mind set on what she wanted to do.

  Ellie spied one of her water turtles swimming leisurely about the calm water in the aquarium, and took a deep breath. She resisted the urge to argue with her mother’s demand. She set down her briefcase and drew in another deep breath as she stored her keys in her purse.

  Before she could pose a single question, however, her mother glanced at the clock on top of the television and frowned. “You’re usually home by three-thirty. I’ve been waiting for over half an hour. Why are you so late today?”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were waiting for me. I had a few things to do after school,” she replied without going into any detail. “Did you have any problems today?”

  “Phyllis stopped to see me earlier. She offered to run me home, but I told her she had done enough for me already and that you wouldn’t mind taking me home. Unless you’ve got too many papers to grade again,” she added.

  Ellie dropped down on the sofa. “I always have too many papers to grade, but I can save them until later. I took some fish out of the freezer this morning. Are you sure you need to go home right now, before supper?”

  Her mother scowled. “You know I’ll be too tired after supper to do much of anything.”

  Ellie tried a different approach. “Did I do something to make you upset with me today?”

  “Other than the fact that you’re late getting home from work and you didn’t bother to call me to let me know, you weren’t here all day, so I rather doubt it. Now, if we don’t leave soon,” her mother cautioned, “I’ll be so overheated from sitting here wearing my coat, I’ll be bound to catch a chill when we do leave. If it’s too inconvenient for you to take me home, just say so. I’ll call a cab. I need to go home, Ellie. It’s as simple as that.”

  “You need to go or you want to go?” Ellie questioned.

  “Both,” her mother replied. “You may not care about the way you dress, but I certainly do. I’ve been wearing the same clothes for weeks now, and I wasn’t all that thrilled with what you picked out for me, anyway. I need to get more.”

  “Oh,” Ellie said and tried not to be hurt by her mother’s criticism. “Maybe I misunderstood. When you said you needed to go home today, I didn’t realize you meant you just wanted to go home to pack more clothes.”

  “Why else would I have my suitcase ready?”

  “The suitcase is empty?”

  Her mother rolled her eyes. “I couldn’t carry it out here if it were full, could I? Neither could Phyllis, which is really why I didn’t want to have her run me home. I didn’t want to hurt her feelings by telling her she wouldn’t be strong enough to carry the suitcase once it was packed.”

  Smiling, Ellie stood up, grateful she had cleared up the misunderstanding before it escalated into an unnecessary battle of wills. She grabbed the keys from her purse. “You’re right. If we leave now, we’ll be home well before dark and before you start to tire,” she said, helping her mother from her chair and grabbing the suitcase.

  As they walked to the front door together, Ellie’s spirit was refreshed and the light of her faith was burning just a bit brighter, with hope they might resolve their differences one day after all.

  While her mother sat on the edge of her bed giving directions, Ellie padded back and forth from her mother’s closet to the suitcase. She had already filled it with a dozen perfectly coordinated outfits, but there was not a single pair of slacks in any of them.

  Ellie was not really surprised. She had never seen her mother wearing slacks, not even during last year’s bitterly cold winter.

  “That should be enough for now. I don’t need anything else from the closet,” her mother said as she refolded the last blouse Ellie had given her. “Since there’s room, I think I’ll take one of the quilts from the hope chest at the end of my bed. I’m not used to sitting around so much, and I’m always getting a chill. The lap shawl from my friends at the Shawl Ministry keeps my legs warm enough, but it’s not long enough to keep my shoulders warm, too. If I move it up to my shoulders, my legs get cold.”

  “You might be surprised by how much warmer you’d be if you tried wearing a pair of slacks in the winter,” Ellie said. After she turned out the light inside the closet,
she closed the door and lifted the lid of the hope chest. She was so startled to see the little pink quilt covered with tiny green turtles in between two old blankets, she barely heard her mother’s response.

  She pulled out the quilt and lifted it to her face, remembering all the stuffed animals, mostly turtles, that had been heaped on top of this quilt when she was a small child.

  A sentimental keepsake from her childhood was not something Ellie expected to discover among her mother’s things. She swallowed the lump in her throat and handed the quilt to her mother. “I can’t believe you held on to this quilt all these years,” she whispered. She wondered what other treasures her mother might have saved.

  Her mother folded the quilt into quarters, laid it in the suitcase and smoothed the fabric with the palm of her hand. “I made this quilt for you, not that I had much choice.”

  Ellie closed the hope chest and sat down on top of it. “You made it? I don’t think I ever knew that.”

  “You were only two years old when we put your crib away and you started sleeping in the youth bed, but you knew your own mind, even then. I made the mistake of taking you with me to Mendlekoff’s to pick out a little quilt for your big-girl bed, but you’d have none of them.”

  “I don’t remember that, either.”

  Her mother frowned, although Ellie thought she detected a gleam of amusement in her mother’s eyes for a moment. “I’m certain the salesclerk who waited on us still remembers, if she’s still alive. You made such a scene I didn’t go back to that store for a good long while.”

  Ellie cringed and flexed her right foot. “Then I assume the stomping foot was there,” she ventured, vividly recalling how she used to stomp her foot to get her own way as a child, only to blame the foot itself, as if it had a will of its own, when she was reprimanded.