“I know you like red,” Amy says, “and daisies are also wildflowers, just like your name.”
I appreciate how thoughtful her gift is and tell her so. Amy sews better than anybody in Katy’s Ridge and a lot of women pay her to make them things they see in the Sears & Roebuck catalog. The extra money really helps out since Nathan’s crops depend on how good the weather is and it isn’t always good.
“Here’s a little something extra,” Nathan says, hitching up his pants for the hundredth time. He hands me a corncob pipe and everybody laughs. “You’re old enough now to start up smoking any day,” Nathan adds.
I laugh, too, though I’m not feeling that festive.
But then Mama chimes in, “She’d better not ever smoke,” and all the laughter stops.
Next to give presents are Daniel and Jo. Daniel hands me a carved wooden box he whittled that has a small wooden cat inside. Both are beautiful and I thank him and Jo for such a perfect gift.
“My turn,” Aunt Sadie says. She hands me a present wrapped in fabric with wildflowers stitched on front that is beautiful enough to be the gift itself. Inside is a little book with blank paper in it to write down my pondering thoughts. Only Aunt Sadie would think of something like that. She also brought me some herbs for my cramps, without me even asking; like she had the secret sense that I needed them.
Sadie gives me a big hug and whispers in my ear, “He’s looking down on you right now, sweetheart, and he’s very proud.
Her words bring tears to my eyes that I brush away as quick as they land on my cheeks.
Aunt Sadie is Daddy’s older sister by sixteen years. She took care of him back in Ireland when he was a baby, while their parents worked. She often tells me that I remind her of herself as a girl. She says I have gumption. I’m not sure what ‘gumption’ is but I take it as a compliment.
Aunt Sadie likes telling the story of how she came to America on her own when she turned twenty-two. Daddy came two years later after Grandpa McAllister died. I asked her once why she decided to settle in Katy’s Ridge because it seems to me there would have been much more exciting places to live. She said the Tennessee mountains reminded her of home.
None of my grandparents are still alive, but Aunt Sadie comes closest to being a grandmother to me. She has solid white hair and sometimes uses a walking stick with a tree carved on the side. Not that she is the least bit feeble. It just helps to steady her when she climbs the mountain looking for the plants she needs for her remedies, especially the ginseng, hiding out on damp, shady hillsides. Her dog, Max, always goes with her and carries a leather pouch on his back for collecting the plants and roots Sadie finds. Max and I are friends, too, and whenever I go over to Sadie’s house he lets me pick cockleburs out of his fur and brush him.
Today, Max is lying on the end of the porch sleeping. Every now and again he opens his eyes to make sure Sadie is where he left her.
Everybody makes a big deal of my birthday, probably because they know how hard it is to not have Daddy here. Next month marks the one-year-anniversary of his death. Earlier that day at the cemetery, I told God that I’d settle for no presents for the rest of my life if Daddy could just come home one more time. As a result, I keep glancing down the hill, half-expecting to see him coming home from work, whistling and walking with his familiar gait.
Jo goes inside and in a few seconds brings out the cake she made. We will eat it on the front porch so the crumbs won’t get everywhere in the house. Everybody knows how Mama fusses over the house and nobody wants to make her mad.
“Make a wish,” Jo says. She lights a single candle in the center of the cake, the same candle we all use for birthdays, kept in the kitchen drawer with the twine and matches.
While everyone watches, I exaggerate a big breath and blow out the candle. Then everybody claps and I glance down the hill to see if my wish has come true. My shoulders drop with the knowledge that I probably won’t get my wish of seeing Daddy again until the day I don’t have birthdays anymore.
In the meantime, Daniel and Nathan eat big slices of cake with their hands. They make noises like it’s the best they’ve ever tasted. The rest of us have forks and plates, but make the same sounds. It is vanilla cake with vanilla frosting and coconut resting on top like the first snow of winter. The taste is heavenly, which makes me wonder if there is food in heaven. The next time I sit with Daddy in the graveyard I’ll have to ask.
After we finish our cake, Mama asks, “So when is Mary Jane coming home, Louisa May?”
I’ve told her twice already, but it isn’t like her to make conversation with me, so I figure, along with the chicken and dumplings, this must be part of my birthday present.
“She won’t be home till the first of September,” I say.
Mary Jane and I have been inseparable since we were babies and our mother’s laid us on a blanket together in Pritchard’s Meadow on the 4th of July.
“Oh, that’s right,” she says. “I think you told me that before.”
With a glance, I suggest she ask me something else, since she had already asked the previous question, but our conversation stops there. If Daddy were here he would joke her out of her grumpiness and have her smiling and hanging on his arm in no time. Wishing for a miracle, I glance down the hill again.
Mary Jane always misses my August birthday because every summer she goes to Little Rock, Arkansas, on a Greyhound bus. If not for Mary Jane I’d be friendless. A year ago, I used to have more friends, but then after Daddy died they acted like they didn’t know what to say to me. Mountain people are superstitious, especially about accidents. I think they stay away so they won’t get any bad luck on them.
Sometimes Mary Jane goes with me to the graveyard to visit Daddy. She has a couple of uncles there and a grandfather. Whenever we visit she says hello to them, but mostly she just goes to keep me company. Most other girls I know get squeamish about graveyards and tombstones, but not Mary Jane. Dead people don’t bother her.
While my family sits on the front porch looking full and content, Amy gets Nathan a second slice of cake. Before the night is over he’ll probably get thirds and fourths. Jo and Daniel hold hands in the porch swing that Daddy made. Mama and Aunt Sadie pull out the quilt they’ve been working on since last Christmas, made out of the scraps of our old clothes. They are good at making something beautiful out of scraps.
As I lean against the porch, I break a stick into knuckle-sized pieces and corral an ant carrying a piece of coconut across the porch rail. The ant keeps hitting against the wall I’ve created and I feel bad for making its life harder. But in a way it feels like what God has done to me by letting my father die.
Forgetting all about my promise to be tough when I turn thirteen, I start to tear up again. It occurs to me that all this emotion might be from having my monthly, given Jo cries at the sight of a hummingbird when she has hers.
After excusing myself, I meander around back to give Pumpkin some of my cake crumbs. I have to shoo off the other cats. From the ice box, I steal her a tiny bit of cream, hoping mama won’t miss it. Cream is not to be wasted on cats, she has said more than once.
Pumpkin and I sit on the back porch and watch the last rays of sunlight stream through the trees. It will be dark soon. Lightning bugs blink in the forest like tiny stars come to earth.
My thoughts keep me company as Pumpkin finishes off the last of the cream and begins an extensive cleaning ritual. Thirteen feels old to me. I’ll graduate from grade school this year. Not everybody who goes to our grade school goes to high school, too. But Daddy wanted all of us McAllisters to get our high school diplomas so I’ll be going to Rocky Bluff High School next year. Meg was the smartest in her class and even gave the commencement speech last June, so it is doubly hard to understand her fascination for tawdry novels.
The grade school in Katy’s Ridge had a total of twelve students of various ages. We meet in one big room with a coal stove in the center. A big pile of coal sits out back and we kids take turns going
to get a piece to throw in the stove in the winter. Beyond the coal pile we have a field where we play kickball every day after lunch. In contrast, Rocky Bluff High School has nearly a hundred students and more classrooms than I’ve taken the time to count.
To get to the high school from Katy’s Ridge, I will have to walk a mile down the river road to catch an old Rocky Bluff city bus that comes only a little ways into Katy’s Ridge. After the weather gets cold, Meg says the buses are freezing and you can see your breath out in front of you. Then you hardly warm up before you have to get back on the cold bus again and head home. On the coldest winter days I plan to wear my overalls under my dress and take them off once I get to school.
From my pocket, I take out Mary Jane’s letter that came yesterday. She will be home next week. I can’t wait to show her the things I got for my birthday, and tell her about Ruby Monroe, and about hearing something in the woods behind our house. In her letter she said her grandmother bought her some dresses at the J.C. Penney store in downtown Little Rock. Mary Jane sent me pictures she tore out of the J.C. Penney catalog and I look at them again, thinking they must look like something Shirley Temple wears. I have never owned a store bought dress in my life.
“There you are,” Daniel says. He walks around the side of the house and sits next to me on the back porch. “Why’d you leave the party?”
I shrug and Daniel nods like I’ve given a perfectly good reason. For several seconds the two of us share a duet of silence. Then I notice my pad from yesterday hanging on the clothesline and think, God in Heaven! I flush hot from something so private being all exposed. But Daniel doesn’t even notice. Or if he does, he doesn’t let on.
Pumpkin weaves between our legs. Daniel is the only other human, besides me, he will get close to.
“Thanks for the carving,” I say. I pull the wooden cat out of my pocket and admire it for his benefit. I left the wooden box on the porch with my other things.
“I thought you’d like it,” he says. “The wood came from the mill. It’s oak. It’ll last forever.” He smiles and looks proud that he’s made me happy. Two years before, Daddy got Daniel a job at the sawmill. They used to walk there together every morning.
We sit quietly, watching Pumpkin spear the last piece of coconut on the plate with one claw. He nibbles it down.
“A penny for your thoughts,” Daniel finally says.
Maybe my thoughts aren’t even worth a penny, I don’t know. But I feel like asking for at least a quarter. Grief, I decide, comes at great expense. I shrug again and ponder how the sadness of losing somebody you love never goes away. It just fades over the years like the pattern on a dress that’s been passed down.
“Well, whenever you want to talk about it, I’m here,” Daniel says.
I smile, remembering how much Daniel reminds me of Daddy sometimes.
“I can’t believe I’m thirteen,” I say finally. “It’s the oldest I’ve ever been.”
Daniel chuckles, but stops himself when he sees I am being serious.
I spit on my fingers to wipe a streak of mud from my shoes. Truth is I’m not so sure I want to share what I’ve been thinking. But when I look over at Daniel I know I can trust him to understand.
“Daddy had all these plans for my thirteenth birthday, on account of me becoming a teenager,” I say. “He promised to take me on the train to Nashville and visit the state capital.”
Daniel pauses. “You still miss him don’t you,” he says.
“More than anything,” I say softly.
“He was a good man,” Daniel says, his voice low, matching mine. “I miss him, too.”
I tell myself not to cry, that I’m being ridiculous, and the voice in my head sounds a lot like Mama. I choke back the tears that want to pour out over the front of my dress, over Pumpkin, then all the way past the graveyard, and out to the river to the sea.
Daniel puts his arm around me. The scent of sweat and sawdust reminds me even more of what I’m missing. Tears stream from my eyes. I bury my head in the skirt of the dress that Meg handed down to me after it was Amy’s before it was Jo’s. We McAllisters usually don’t let anybody see us cry, even family, unless something really bad happens.
“It’s okay,” Daniel says. “There’s nobody here to see but God and some crickets.”
For the next few minutes I make a friend of my misery imagining how my life could have been different: Daddy here celebrating my 13th birthday with me, playing his banjo on the front porch with everybody dancing and laughing; Daddy looking over at me, smiling, like he’s the luckiest man alive to have me as a daughter. Then afterwards we would catch a ride to Rocky Bluff and take the train to Nashville.
These thoughts serve no purpose but to torture me. Meanwhile, Daniel has his arm around me, waiting for the unexpected cloudburst of tears to stop. It feels good to have a man’s arm around me, even if he isn’t the man I really want.
“Hey you two,” Jo says, coming around the corner of the house. She hesitates when she sees me crying, but then keeps coming. Every time I see Jo she gets more beautiful, like those girls in magazines advertising Ivory soap.
“Am I interrupting?” she asks Daniel, resting a hand on his shoulder.
“We’ve just been reminiscing,” he says.
“Do you need more time?” Jo says, stroking my hair.
“No,” I say.
I wipe my face on the underside of my dress, and tell myself to snap out of it, that I am not a little girl any more. Again, the voice sounds more like mama’s than mine, but it serves its purpose.
“Let’s get back to the party,” I say, standing up to leave. When I move, Pumpkin runs behind the old washing machine.
Jo hugs me gently, like I am a flower whose blossom might collapse if touched. Jo is my favorite sister, even though I love them all.
“We’ve got another surprise for you,” she says, smiling at Daniel.
“What is it?” I ask. I prefer good news to bad any day.
“We want to tell everybody all at once,” Daniel says. He takes Jo’s hand and the three of us follow the path back around the house lined with the rock Daddy and I carried from the river.
Mama is still in her rocking chair with pieces of quilt stretched between her and Aunt Sadie. Nathan balances on the porch rail picking his teeth with a twig he’s whittled down, while Amy pours more tea for everybody. Max is asleep at Aunt Sadie’s feet. He is the dog version of an old man and doesn’t trouble himself with much except watching out for Aunt Sadie.
“It’s about time you showed up,” Mama says to me. She looks up briefly from her stitching. “What kind of girl disappears from her own party?”
“A beautiful girl,” Aunt Sadie says, as if trying to make up for the softness Mama lacks since Daddy died.
I sit on the porch steps and refuse to let Mama ruin my birthday. Torches are lit now that it’s getting dark.
“Jo and I have an announcement to make,” Daniel says, standing in the middle of the dirt yard.
Amy grins and looks over at Jo like she already knows what it is, and Meg wears that moony look she gets whenever she reads romance stories. Everybody seems to know what Daniel is going to say except me.
“What is it?” I ask, the suspense nudging me from all directions.
“I’m going to have a baby,” Jo smiles.
I should have guessed this is what she was going to say. She is more radiant than I’ve ever seen her.
Everybody converges on Jo and Daniel, laughing and hugging Jo and patting Daniel on the back. Meanwhile, I sit frozen, like somebody has nailed my backside to the porch steps. Unexpected things throw me these days, even if they are good things.
“If it’s a boy we’re going to name him Joseph, after Daddy,” Jo says. “And if it’s a girl, we’ll call her Penelope.”
Mama rises from her rocker, puts the quilt aside and embraces Jo and Daniel. Penelope is Mama’s given name, even though Daddy always called her Nell. Only Sadie calls her Nell now, along with a f
ew people at church. I keep forgetting she has a name besides “Mama.”
Aunt Sadie tip-toes into the yard, her arms raised high in the air and starts to dance. Max barks excitedly. Aunt Sadie has been known to dance whenever the spirit moves her. Preacher hates it when the spirit comes over Aunt Sadie in church. Sadie’s dancing always sparks a sermon from Preacher about how the “heathens” are taking over the world. To me, it looks like God would want people to dance and celebrate life like that.
The celebration continues around me. I try my best to get excited about Daniel and Jo’s news but all I can think about is Daddy missing this moment, and how proud he’d be about having his first grandchild.
“You’re going to be an aunt,” Daniel says to me, a big grin on his face.
“Congratulations,” I say, smiling back. I like the idea of being an aunt, like Aunt Sadie. If Daniel and Jo have a boy, I’ll teach him how to use a slingshot and maybe play the banjo. If it is a girl, I’ll do my best to teach her how to stay clear of Johnny Monroe.
Jo walks over and gives me another hug. “We thought this would make your thirteenth birthday even more special,” she says.
I manage a smile, not wanting to get any of my sadness on the baby. What bothers me most is the thought that life just keeps on going, even when somebody you love dies. Another McAllister is going to be born into the world, one Daddy will never know.
CHAPTER FIVE
“Well, if it isn’t my best friend in the whole wide world, Wildflower McAllister,” Mary Jane says when she first sees me again. I can tell she’s trying to sound more grown up than she was two months ago when I last saw her.
I always forget how red Mary Jane’s hair is until she comes home. She is the only person in Katy’s Ridge with this distinction. Neither of her parents have red hair, which raises the eyebrows of the old ladies at church when they don’t have anything better to gossip about. Not everybody remembers that Mary Jane’s grandmother’s hair used to be red, before it turned solid gray.
“It’s about time you got home,” I say. “Katy’s Ridge is the most boring place on earth without you.”
The Secret Sense of Wildflower Page 4
