The Willows

by Mathew Sperle

  “Yeah, well, everything’s grand,” Jude said. “What are you all doing outside so late at night?”

  Jude’s gaze went straight from her uncle to Gwen, taking in the damp, clinging underwear. The girl missed nothing, Michael thought irritability

  Gwen stumbled through a confusing explanation about how neither of them had known the other meant to take a bath, but stiff and serious, Jude clearly didn’t buy any of the story.

  “It’s time you children went to bed,” Michael said, cutting her short. He earned a collection of moans from the porch column or the boys had gathered to watch. “Go on now, the excitement’s over.”

  “You don’t know that,” Jude said stubbornly, looking at the bayou. “No telling what the other gators will do. Maybe someone should stay up tonight, and make sure his buddies don’t try anything.”

  She was right. This would draw more predators. “I will drag it off, maybe down to Jeffrey’s house. He will be happy for the meat anyways.”

  “We could sure use the meet ourselves, come winter,” the girl pressed. “I will be happy to stay up and stand watch.”

  Michael is tempted, for the gator would go a long way toward feeling their stomachs, but he’d come to close to losing one child this evening; he was not about to risk another. “I will be taking it to Jeffries,” he told everyone sternly. “Now the rest of you go to bed.”

  “But Michael-“

  “Go to bed, Jude. And give me that gun. I don’t recall giving you permission to use it.”

  For a moment, he fear she might argue, so he frowned at her, holding his hands open. There was bust ration – and no little hurt – in her expression, as she handed over the weapon. Michael new he was being a bear, but Jude was a child, for heaven sakes, a little girl we should be playing with dolls, not weapons. He wanted her snug and warm and safe in bed, not sitting up all night guarding the house with a gun. Especially not with the memories this weapon must hold for her.

  Dragging Christopher behind her, Jude slowly walked up the steps, gesturing for her brothers to follow her inside the cabin. With a sigh of relief, Michael turned to Gwen. “Take this,” he said, thrusting the shotgun into her hands. “I have got to go.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me. “She held it away from her body with obvious disgust. “You take this away from Jude to give to me?”

  Apparently she cannot shoot, either. It was no major crime–few ladies were expected to master the military arts–but for some reason, her inability–as well as her feebleness–merely fueled his anger. How could she be so helpless, so in need of protection? Her hair was tangled and her underwear covered with mud–how in hell could he still find her beautiful?

  “Jude is just but a child,” he bit out, turning toward his boat. “You are supposed to be the adult.” Reaching for a rope, he wrapped it into the water and around the nose of what remained of the gator.

  Gwen followed him. “That child just put a bullet into a charging alligator, Michael. I’m not much of a gambler, but faced with an emergency, I would put my money on Jude. I would certainly hand heard the gun.”

  “But then, she is not your niece, is she?” With more force than was needed, he tightened the rope, then attached the rope to his boat.

  “How dare you. You accuse me of talking down to those kids, but what of you? It wouldn’t hurt to praise her marksmanship, you know. To give Jude credit for saving her brother’s life.”

  “So all of a sudden, you’re her champion? Or is it just that you’ll seize any excuse to fight with me.”

  “No.” Her voice went soft, lost its edge. “For what it’s worth, I don’t try to make you angry. I don’t know why I always manage to do and say the wrong thing.”

  Clutching the shotgun, she stood still as a statute, her trembling the lower lip the only sign of movement. She looked so hurt and bewildered, he almost apologize, before reminding himself it was just an act. She was doing it again, twisting him around her little finger, making him want her so badly, was all he could do to pull away. “Go to bed, my lady,” he said, getting into his boat.” “We can talk when I get back.”

  “Talk?” She asked, her voice trembling like her lip, “or just exchange more accusations?”

  “What else do you have to exchange? As you are so fond of pointing out, we come from different worlds. I’m beginning to agree that bringing you here was a lousy idea.”

  Pushing off, he left her standing there on the rise. Enough, he told himself, but her image remained with him. Even when she was no longer insight, he could still see her pale, lifeless face in the moonlight.

  ***

  Jude waited on the porch, ease dropping on their conversation, needing to know what the woman meant to say about her. She expected complaints in the long list of criminal acts, so it came as a total surprise to hear her praise. Did when it really think she was good with a gun?

  Having Michael’s ear, Gwen could have complained about the snake, about the awful meals and unwashed dishes, but she did not say word. Uncomfortably, Jude found herself thinking that there was more to her than they’d expected, that none of them knew Gwen at all.

  Glenn’s shoulders sag as Michael went pulling off. Against her will, Jude felt sympathy. Why did Gwen just stand there? Didn’t she realized another gator could come along?

  Jude tried to tell herself it was none of concern if the stupid female got eaten, but she kept seeing Gwen, leaning down to hug her little brother, so plainly happy to see him alive. It had been so long since anyone had hug him. Hug any of them.

  For pity’s sake. She thought as she stopped over to Gwen; some people just couldn’t think for themselves.

  As Jude touched her arm, Gwen gave a little scream. “Oh, you startled me,” she said it breathlessly.

  “Yeah, well, it’s late. Considering there is probably still gator’s guts around, it’s not exactly safe to be standing so close to the water.”

  Gwen looked at her feet, then with a quick shiver, part her lips. Turning to Jude with a measured expression, she handed over the shotgun. “Here, you take this. You know what to do with it.”

  “But Michael said –“

  “Between you and me, I don’t think he knows what he wants. He certainly doesn’t know much about women.”

  “I don’t know –“

  “Look, Jude, I can’t hit the broad side of a barn with that thing. Giving it to me was a mistake. Giving it to you makes sense, which your uncle would realize if he weren’t so stubborn. So you take it and do whatever you must with it, and since Michael isn’t here, he need never to know. It can be our own little secret.”

  Despite herself, Jude could not stop a slow, growing grin as she looked back to the shotgun. “Code of honor?”

  “Code of honor; I won’t tell” hugging herself, Gwen stared down the river into the darkness. “He is an angry man, your uncle,” she said in a broken voice. “He doesn’t like me very much.”

  “Michael is all right.” Though she felt compelled to defend him, Jude knew he had been especially mean to this woman, that he’d given her no chance to explain. And must hurt, facing his anger like that. In Gwen’s place, she, too, would feel the need to cry.

  “He was right about one thing,” Gwen said suddenly. “We’re all tired of this. I guess it’s time we headed for bed.”

  “I will be in one minutes. I want to make sure everything is all right.”

  Gwen looked uncertain. For a moment, Jude feared she would order her into the cabin, but with a sigh, Gwen nodded. “Stay on the porch, though. Your brothers need you too much to risk you getting hurt.”

  She turned and went into the house, leaving Jude washing with confusion. Gwen seemed so subdued, so much a stranger; could she trust what had just happened between them?

  She hated that woman, she insisted. One brief, moonlit conversation couldn’t change the fact that they had to be rid of her. Come tomorrow, Gwen would be putting on ruse again, treating them like dirt beneath her feet, so there was
no call for Jude to change her mind about her.

  Looking over her shoulder, she thought of the lizard, waiting the need Gwen’s bed, and cursed softly under her breath. She went into the house, insisting again and that nothing had changed, but for tonight, maybe that lizard could sleep somewhere else.

  Tomorrow, well, they could see what happened then.

  Chapter 16

  Next morning, Gwen sat on the porch swing, trying to calm snarls from her freshly washed hair. She’d taken her bath at the crack of dawn, partly for privacy, but mainly to distract her from disturbing thoughts

  flinching as the comb got tangled in a not, she decided that Michael did it on purpose, tossing out some inflammatory remark, then taking off before she could argue, leaving no opportunity to protest or make excuses. He left his words behind like a swarm of angry insects, stinging and biting, leaving her no choice but to turn and face them.

  It was no pleasant thing, seeing herself as others saw her.

  She winced again, though this time, the comb lay still in her hand. Michael had called her pain and selfish and shallow, and she now knew why the words hurts. Deep inside, down where she was still being honest with herself, she’d known he was right

  Even Mrs. Tibbs, a relative stranger, had seen it. Gwen might have been angry at her words, but she saw now that the woman had meant to warn her. All these years, Gwen had been building a wall around her heart, letting herself get wrapped up in her pain and problems. Mother’s death had jolted herself, she slipped into a habit of saying, I don’t know how, and letting others act and even talk to her, until she’d lost the will to do anything on her own. No wonder everyone eventually turned away from her. What use was she to father, to the children or even herself, if she continued to run from every fight?

  She took the comb and yanked through the wet stance. The old Gwen would have wined, and called life unfair, but the new Gwen was tired of being considered useless. Perhaps she’d been full hearted, risking her life to grab Christopher last night, but the impulse of act had been the first thing she been proud of in a very long time. She’d been terrified–she’d trembled for hours afterward–but seeing the boy safe and unharmed at a filter with more happiness that she felt in years.

  Too bad Michael had spoiled it with his comments.

  The comb dropped to her lap as mine flashback to the top, to what had so nearly happened between them. No, she wouldn’t think about kissing him anymore. Hadn’t she’d been up happened night, tossing and turning and wondering what might have been?

  Christopher proved to be a welcome distraction by popping out the door. He stood on the steps, still half asleep with his hair poking up at odd angles. He looks so normal and alive, it was all she could do not to rush over and hug him close.

  From his tentative pose as he stared at the river bank, he obviously half-dreaded, half-hoped to find out gators in the water. “Jude was not lying. She did stand guard. Eight no gators left.”

  Gwen smiled as she thought of finding the girl this morning, asleep on the swing, shock and still clutched in her hands. She’d walk pass quietly, knowing how the prickly Jude would hate to be caught napping on the job. Code of honor, she vowed silently. Not even Christopher would learn the truth from her lips.

  “Is it true?” He asked suddenly, looking to face her with a worried frown. “Were you really kissing Uncle Michael last night?”

  Startled, Gwen open her mouth to deny it, but she hated to base her new starts with the children on a lie. “Why do you ask?”

  Came over to stand beside her. “Jude says you’re out to steal him away. They you want you to do get married, so you can go live on your father’s plantation and leave us alone in the Bayou.”

  Clearly, she and Jude had to talk. “That is not true,” she told him, her that anyone could believe her so easily. “You know you’re on local would never leave you. He loves you too much.”

  Christopher shrugged. “Yeah, maybe, but Jude says you can’t trust grown-ups. In the end, they always leave you behind.”

  It shocked her to here so bitter of a conclusion from such a young child. She wanted to argue, but now how could she convince him otherwise, when she’d so often felt the same? Seeing it from both perspectives now, she saw how unfair she’d been to her mother. She’d deliberately avoided all memories of her, blaming her mother for her absence, blaming her for dying.

  Fingering the locket at her neck, she suddenly wanted to put the anger, bitterness, and even guilt behind her. Maybe then she could help this boy avoid making the same mistake.

  Taking Christopher’s arm, she spoke gently. “Sometimes, people have no choice but to leave. They don’t want to, but they have to. But every time someone leaves, I’ve found, there is someone else to take their place if you let them. You children might have lost your mother, but now you have your Uncle Michael. You’ve got to know he’d fight the devil himself not to leave you children alone.”

  A slow smiled transferred over his features. “Yeah,” he said, practically beaming, “we sure are lucky we found Uncle Michael. And we are lucky she found you for us, too.”

  Gwen, who’d been smiling with him, felt her lips drop. “Mistake,” had become a popular term used. Maybe she should warn this boy that the day would soon, when she, too, will be forced to say goodbye.

  No, she thought stubbornly. She just had to convince Michael otherwise. Glancing at the weathered porch boards, the lush sprinkled vegetation, she now saw this as her battlefield. If she stayed as bold as any knight, and twice as valiant, she could yet prove her worth. One way or another, she would win these children over, and before she left, she teach them to read and write. When she at last went to her true love, when she stood at the altar speaking her bows, she could face Michael with pride and confidence.

  Michael? Lance, she corrected silently. It was Lance she must prove herself to, Lance she would marry.

  “Who did this?” Jude screech suddenly from inside the house. “Christopher, you little, get in here this instant.”

  The boy froze, eyes going round in wide as he stared at Gwen. “The ham,” he said in a small voice. “I told you she’d be mad.”

  For a moment, Gwen felt like a child again, at some mischief. It to the crash of a pot lid to snapper back to reality. Jude was a little girl, for pity’s sake. If Gwen hope to tame any of these children, it was time to take charge.

  “That little thief butchered my ham,” Jude flaunt out the instant the reach the pantry, her hand poised to throw a skillet at the door.

  “Put that down.” Gwen used what she hoped was an authority of tone. “I have already demonstrated, tantrums encumbers nothing more than ruining doors.”

  If nothing else, she managed to surprise the girl. Clearly confused, Jude lowered the skillet.

  “That’s better. Now, before you go around accusing your brother of anything further, I think you should know I took the ham.”

  “You!” Making the word and accusation, Jude glared at her.

  “Yes, me. I see no sense of going hungry when there is food in the house, and as you well know, I’ve been reduce to near starving.”

  A slow flush crept into Jude’s cheeks, but the girl held her ground. “You had no right,” she bit out. “I was saving it for Michael’s birthday next month. I can’t make much of a party with a half-eaten ham.”

  To Gwen surprise, Jude began to cry.

  “She wanted to make it special,” Christopher explain in a whisper, tugging at Gwen’s skirt. “To make sure he will never want to leave us.”

  “Be quiet, you little chatterbox,” Jude lashed out at him. “Whose side are you on anyways?”

  Christopher seemed close to tears himself. Squatting down beside him, Gwen and gave him a hug. “Jude is a little upset right now,” she told him in a whisper. “I will try talking to her, but maybe if you can go outside and pick some flowers, it will cheer you up.”

  “Okay,” he said, smiling again. “But make sure you talk nice.”

&n
bsp; The boy sounded like his uncle, Gwen thought as she rose.

  “I have nothing to say to you,” she told her with a sneer after her brother had skipped off.

  Thinking of the boy’s request, Gwen resisted an urge to correct his sister’s grammar. If she hope to succeed with Jude, she’d need to use all her patients and cunning. It will be no easy thing, convincing the stubborn child to give her another chance. “It isn’t fair, asking your brother to choose between us,” she began gently. “And there is no need. If you stop being so contrary and start listening to reason, you will see you and I are actually on the same side.”

  Jude snorted. “Use that on Christopher. He believes in fairytales, not me.”

  Gwen sucked in a breath. “I am not here to steal your uncle away from you, Jude. Last night by the river, I thought you understood that. Code of honor, remember?”

  Jude cocked her head, for a moment, Gwen thought she had her, but she should have known the girl could never be so easily won over.

  “Yeah?” Jude asked, even her sniff seemed belligerent. “If you are so good at keeping secrets, why did you tell Michael I was a girl?”

  “I don’t know. To be perfect honest, he was yelling at me about being such a horrible person, and it was the only thing I could think of to shut him up.’ Seeing the start of a grin on her face, Gwen decided maybe honesty was the best policy.

  “Well, you made a big mistake of things.” True to form, Jude covered her amusement with hostility. “Michael told us never to keep secrets from him. Now he thinks ‘m any liar, and it’s all your fault.”

  Again, she remembered herself that she was the new Gwen, who didn’t snap at children are talked down to them. “That is one way of looking at it,” said instead. “Of course, a more practical person might say that you’ve got off easy, that I did the hard part for you. Michael already knew the worst. All you had to do was explain why you lied in the first place.”

  “Yeah, right. You would like that, wouldn’t you, if he kicked me out of the house?”