Isaac gave a grin and said he’d have pancakes, bacon, and sausage. Benjamin ordered eggs. Eggs were something he had a fondness for. On the farm they’d always had eggs, even when there was little else. Still clinging to the memory of his dream, he wanted to once again breathe in the sweetness of eggs sizzling in a pan.
When the woman handed the two platters across the counter Benjamin eyed the room searching for a table set apart from the others, a colored section perhaps. When he saw none, he learned over the counter and asked, “Are we supposed to sit in here?”
“Ain’t no place else to go,” the woman answered.
He took the plates and carried them to a table near the back of the room. At the next table a bearded white man flipped through the pages of a newspaper. Seemingly unaware of anyone else, the man sipped his coffee and read. After several minutes he folded the paper and set it aside.
“Where you headed?” he asked.
It was something Benjamin hadn’t expected, and it took a moment before he answered, “Pittsburgh.”
The man looked at Isaac. “Looks like you’re ready for some snow,” he laughed. He drained the last of his coffee and stood to leave. “Have a good trip,” he said then started out.
Benjamin hesitated a second and called after him, “You too.”
On the second day they had a little more than a hundred miles to travel. It would be a short day. They’d arrive well before dinnertime, and Benjamin would have time to unload the truck and get settled in. Monday he would start work.
A million thoughts rolled through Benjamin’s head. He tried to picture the house, Marty’s face, the kind of work he’d be doing, but right now everything was a foggy shade of gray, too far ahead to see clearly and without a past to look back on.
He eased back on the gas pedal and slowed the truck. There was no need to rush. For too many years he’d rushed from one job to the next, never taking time to enjoy the moment. Never taking enough time to enjoy Delia and Isaac. This time it would be different. This time he would be both daddy and mama to Isaac. He’d make time to listen when the boy had a story to tell. He’d get to know Isaac as Delia had known him.
Now crawling along at thirty miles an hour, he turned to Isaac and asked, “How you feel about moving to Pittsburgh?”
Isaac smacked the baseball from his right hand into the catcher’s mitt and back again.
“I guess it’s okay,” he said. “I like having new clothes ’n stuff, but I miss playing with Jubilee ’n having Miz Carmella teach me lessons.”
“I miss them too,” Benjamin replied sadly. “They surely are good people.”
“I miss that nice playroom what had toys ’n games,” Isaac added. “When Miz Carmella finished lessons, she give me cookies.”
“Now I got a good-paying job, maybe we can see to some after-school cookies.”
Isaac looked across and rolled his eyes, “They ain’t gonna be good as Miz Carmella’s.”
Benjamin laughed. “Probably not.”
Isaac said nothing more; he just sat and stared out the window. They passed by a few billboards saying it was only fifty and then forty miles to Pittsburgh; the images were of brick buildings and steam belching steel mills. Isaac looked at them with childlike disappointment. After a long while he asked, “You think there’s kids what’s gonna play with me in Pittsburgh?”
“Pittsburgh’s a city, just like Bakerstown was a city,” Benjamin replied. “We ain’t gonna live in Pittsburgh. We’re gonna live a ways out in the country, where there’s plenty a’ things for a boy to do.” He gave Isaac a grin and added, “It’s a place where you can see real airplanes coming and going.”
Isaac turned with an expression that seemed to question whether such a thing could be true. “Even if I sees airplanes, it ain’t gonna be good as playing with Jubilee and living in that nice playroom.”
He gave a low mournful sigh, one that made him sound decades older than his years. “I wish we could a’ stayed there,” he said. “That place was perfect.”
Benjamin was relieved that neither Isaac nor Jubilee had heard the ruckus on Wednesday evening. When Paul started up the stairs, he’d turned up the volume on the television and both kids sat there mesmerized by Wagon Train.
Stretching his arm across the seat, Benjamin pulled Isaac a bit closer. “Perfect ain’t a place,” he said. “It’s a time when everything’s good and we’re happy. Folks don’t live in perfect, they just get to pass through every so often.”
“You ever passed through perfect ’fore, Daddy?”
Benjamin nodded. “I sure have,” he said and began telling of the night he first met Delia.
“Your mama was the prettiest lady I’d ever laid eyes on…”
As Time Passed
Back on Bloom Street it took many months for the wounds to heal. During the next few weeks several of the neighbors stopped by to apologize. Barbara Paley brought Carmella a potted plant. Prudence trotted over with two dozen homemade chocolate chip cookies.
“Being a widow makes me overly frightened of strangers,” she said.
It wasn’t much of an apology, but Carmella could see little value in carrying a grudge so she brewed a pot of tea and invited Prudence to sit.
Not all of those involved came to apologize. Some neighbors held on to the belief that they’d been right. They scurried in and out of their houses without ever glancing to the right or left.
But in time such anger wearies a person. It weighs on them like a heavy coat, worn threadbare and without warmth. After a while the wearing of it becomes a burden, so it gets pushed to the back of the closet and forgotten. That’s pretty much what happened with the last few holdouts on Bloom Street.
When winter turned to spring, crocuses broke through the earth and people started once again setting out pots of daffodils and spring lilies. By then the memories of that night had faded to nothingness. Although no one spoke of it and few cared to remember, the truth was that the residents of Bloom Street were never quite the same.
In the wake of such bitterness a new understanding was born. A greater tolerance, you might say. On Saturday afternoons when Sid returned from the store, he’d often find his lawn mowed. When Paul returned to college, Bab Paley’s son volunteered to work in the grocery store after school. And that first Christmas a basket chock full of homemade cookies, cakes, and candies was left on the Klaussners’ front porch. No name; just a card saying, “Merry Christmas from your friends.”
~ ~ ~
In early January, Sid Klaussner received a letter postmarked Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Dear Mister Sidney,
I hope you, Miss Carmella, Paul, and Jubilee is all doing well. We surely did enjoy that box of Christmas presents you sent. Isaac said he ain’t never tasted a cookie good as the ones Miss Carmella makes. He loves his new school and has made lots of friends but still misses Jubilee and talks about her often.
Settling in has been real easy. Mister Marty had a house ready and waiting for us. It’s not big as yours, but it’s got plumbing and electricity inside. We been here less than two months, but already it feels like home.
I’m real happy working for Mister Marty. He lets me manage the place by myself. Once or twice a week he stops by to check on things but don’t stay long. His missus makes sure of that. She says he’s still recuperating, but he says he ain’t never felt so good.
The real exciting news is that soon as the snow melts, Mister Marty is gonna start teaching me to fly. He figures six months maybe, then I can get a license and do the crop dusting.
Life’s funny, ain’t it? I joined the army air force thinking I’d learn to fly and never got to so much as sit in the pilot’s seat. Now here I am. Pittsburgh’s a long way from Grinder’s Corner and it’s a whole different world, that’s for sure.
The letter continued for three pages. Benjamin talked of the town, of how they’d had Christmas dinner at the Hinckleys’, and how Marty had given Isaac a train set he’d had as a boy.
As Sidney sat there and read, he could feel the joy in every word.
That evening when they sat down to dinner, he read the letter aloud for the family. Despite the fact that Carmella had made a double chocolate fudge cake for dessert, there was no clattering of forks. Everyone sat still and listened.
When Sidney finished reading, he looked up and his eyes glistened with a few teardrops not yet spilled.
“Sidney Klaussner,” Carmella said, “are you crying?”
“No, I am not,” he replied gruffly. “I’m just glad things worked out for Benjamin. He’s a good man.”
“He sure is,” Paul added.
“Can Isaac and his daddy come visit us?” Jubilee asked.
Carmella smiled. “I doubt they want to come back to Wyattsville,” she said sadly.
“Maybe not,” Sidney replied. “But I think a visit to see my old pal Marty is long overdue…and who knows, we might even pay a call on Benjamin and Isaac.”
~ ~ ~
The future is always an unknown, but this much I can tell you: Sidney and Benjamin remained friends for the rest of their lives. Isaac went off to college just as Delia had wanted, but he became neither a doctor nor pastor. He studied engineering, and when he returned to Pittsburgh he became the manager and co-owner of the airport Benjamin eventually inherited from Marty.
Benjamin never again married, but in the years to come he dated a number of charming ladies. Although they enjoyed many wonderful evenings together, his heart forever remained with Delia.
Other Books by
Bette Lee Crosby
THE WYATTSVILLE SERIES
Spare Change, Book One
Jubilee’s Journey, Book Two
THE SERENDIPITY SERIES
The Twelfth Child, Book One
Previously Loved Treasures, Book Two
Wishing for Wonderful, Book Three
CRACKS IN THE SIDEWALK
WHAT MATTERS MOST
BLUEBERRY HILL, A Sister’s Story
LIFE IN THE LAND OF IS,
The amazing story of Lani Deauville, the World’s Longest Living Quadriplegic
To read more about the author and see other books, visit:
www.betteleecrosby.com
Table of Contents
Passing Through Perfect
Benjamin Church – 1958
Grinder’s Corner, Alabama – 1946
Rain
Not as Expected
Benjamin
Delia’s Daddy
Benjamin
And the Word Was…
Benjamin
At Home in Grinder’s Corner
The Day of Birth
Delia
The Barbeque
Letters
Delia
Revisiting Twin Pines
Delia
The Sadness of Bakerstown
The Knowledge of What Was
Delia
Hard Times
Bad Luck Years
Delia
The End of a Generation
Cloak of Sorrow
Benjamin
A Plan for the Future
Delia
The Last Perfect Day
Cross Corner Road
The Search
Benjamin
And Then Sorrow
Moving On
Benjamin
The Blue Truck
The Whitehall
A False Truth
Benjamin
Leaving Alabama
On the Third Day
Benjamin
The Guests
Carmella
The Plan
Benjamin
Coming to Agreement
Sidney
Talk of Babies & Bombers
Sidney
Sunday
And Thus It Began
Carmella
A Simmering Situation
Ugly Anger
Sidney
The Petitioners
Paul
Voices in the Night
A Sleepless Night
Martha
The Goodbye
Sidney
Road Trip
As Time Passed
Also by Bette Lee Crosby
Passing Through Perfect Page 24
