The River Valley Series

by Tess Thompson

  “I came and packed them up the year after they died.” Mrs. White lowered her voice, as if someone were listening. “Matter of fact, I used to come up here and clean when I brought groceries and such to your mother. She used to space out in front of the idiot box in the afternoon.”

  “I snuck in here one time when I was a kid. Looking for clues about them.” She sat on the side of the bed and shivered. “But all I found was the back of my mother’s hand.”

  Mrs. White plumped a pillow, eyebrows knitted. “I could tell you anything you want to know.”

  “I’d like that sometime.” Lee shivered and jumped from the bed to shut one of the windows. “It’s raining.”

  “March. Nice one minute, cold the next.” Mrs. White pulled on the front of her dress and crossed her arms over her chest. “You hungry?”

  Lee shrugged and walked towards the door. “A little.”

  They moved in silence down to the kitchen. The counters and floor looked scoured, as did the appliances. Mrs. White gestured towards a chair. “Sit, I’ll fix you something before I go.” On the table was a fresh pie, berry juice seeping through the top of a browned crust. Mrs. White hustled about the kitchen and Lee, feeling like a guest, sat in one of the metal chairs and watched. Mrs. White pulled a carton of eggs from the 1950’s refrigerator, yanked an old frying skillet out of the cupboard, poured oil in the pan, turned on the burner, and, hands on her bony hips, watched the pan heat. “Shoulda got you some bacon. I didn’t think you’d be so skinny.” When the room filled with the smell of hot grease, she cracked two eggs into the pan. They sizzled and snapped and she flipped them in the air without using a spatula. She slipped the eggs onto a plate, set it in front of Lee, and then poured a glass of milk. “You need your calcium if you want to be moving around when you’re seventy.”

  Lee poked an egg with her fork and the yolk squirted onto the flowered surface of the old plate. Her stomach turned and she felt the crackers make their way to her throat. She ran to the back door, yanked it open, and vomited into the wet dank earth of the flowerbed next to the back steps. She wiped her mouth with her hand and limped up the steps into the kitchen. The smell of fried egg lingered in the air. She went to the sink, turned on the water, and slurped from her cupped hand. A branch of a cherry tree, dripping with pink flowers, wavered outside the kitchen sink window, rain beading on the soft pink petals. She splashed the frigid water over her face and then collapsed onto the chair.

  Mrs. White stood at the stove and watched her. “Please don’t tell me you’re a drunk?”

  “What? No, of course not. I don’t drink.”

  “Thank God. Y’know, they’re saying now it’s hereditary.”

  “Don’t touch it. Always figured it was best not to start, given Mom.”

  “I’m awfully glad to hear you say it. I worried about you up there in that mean old city all these years. The temptations are many, I imagine.” She put her hand on Lee’s forehead. “You don’t feel hot. You think you’re sick?”

  “I’ve been feeling kind of sick all afternoon but I’m probably just tired. It’s been a hard couple of weeks.”

  Mrs. White scrutinized Lee for a moment and then sat in the other chair. “What happened to bring you here?”

  “Dan died. Unexpectedly.” Lee watched the sprinkles of rain turn to drops outside the kitchen window, staying silent until she was sure the tears weren’t about to start. She made her tone matter of fact. “Shot himself.”

  “I see.” Ellen crossed her arms over her chest and matched Lee’s understated tone. “What was wrong with him?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “It always is.”

  “He took a loan from someone he shouldn’t have but couldn’t get our product to work in order to pay it, the consequence of which was the loss of our company. I guess the idea of that kind of failure was too much for him.”

  She shook her head as if she’d heard the same story many times before. “Son of a bitch. Gosh durn selfish bastard.”

  “Dan was so driven, Mrs. White. Crazy half the time over this idea of making it. He just took me along for the ride. I didn’t know about the construct of the loan or any of the details of it. The sad thing is, his product was good. It was a game for serious gamer types. Do you know what that is?”

  “Sure, it’s those pasty, stoop-shouldered idiots that play ridiculous games instead of living their lives.”

  She smiled. “That’s right.”

  Mrs. White grinned, patting her bun. “I stay informed for an old lady.”

  Lee looked towards the ceiling, trying to control the wobble in her voice. “I’ve lost everything.”

  The way Mrs. White looked at her, Lee saw she had it figured, how desperate she was, how broke, how alone. “Except for this beat-up old house,” said Mrs. White. She swept her hand against the tabletop in a half circle. “Well, it’s something to start with.” She traced the rim of her coffee cup with her pinkie finger until she reached the crack above the painted rose. “My husband was killed in a logging accident in the woods when my son was ten years old. I had enough money to last exactly two months. Your grandmother helped get me through it. We ate dinner at this very table every night for I don’t know how long.” She paused and patted the top of her coiled bun. “You’ll be alright.”

  Lee’s eyes filled with tears and she wiped them with the back of her hand. “How? I don’t see how.”

  Mrs. White looked out the window, tapping her finger on the surface of the table. “Y’know, I had to, that was one thing. My boy needed me. But, the thing I did then was go back to work. I’d been trained as a teacher and I started subbing at first and then they hired me on to teach full-time. Then I’d come home and take care of my place and my son. I guess work got me through, now I think of it.”

  Lee stared at the tabletop, wiping the end of her nose with the back of her sleeve. “Thought I’d fix up the house to sell.”

  “I hate to see it go out of your family, but I’ll do what I can to help.”

  “You’ve done enough, dealing with my mother all those years.”

  “I’ve known your family for what feels like all my life. Your grandmother Rose and I were twenty years old when our husbands built these houses. We were twenty-one when we had our babies. Your grandmother was the best friend I ever had.” Mrs. White’s eyes reddened. She put her cup in the sink and it clinked against a fork. “I held your mother the day she was born.”

  “Did she have vodka in her baby bottle?” Lee looked out the screen door. The sun poked through the gray rain clouds, illuminating the multiple shades of greens in the yard and forest.

  Mrs. White’s eyes were sad. “She was the prettiest, smartest baby you ever saw. Her life just went in the wrong direction. It was too much, being alone with a baby and so young.”

  “You did it.”

  Mrs. White blinked and nodded her head. “So I did, but I’m a different sort than most. Shoot but your mother caused me fits half the time but now she’s gone, I miss having someone to look after. My son died when he was eighteen, but once a mother, always a mother.”

  Lee put her hand over Mrs. White’s and shivers went up her spine. “Mrs. White, I never knew that. I’m so sorry.”

  She looked at her, and Lee read surprise in her stoic face. “He died in the car accident with your grandparents.”

  Lee stared at her. “I had no idea. My mother would never talk about them, so I don’t even know how they died exactly.”

  “They went to pick up Chris from the county fair. He was showing his FFA pig,” said Mrs. White. “It was a way to make college money, raising an animal for market at the fair. The kids used to stay the whole week, get their animals judged and then auctioned off. Matter of fact, your mother had the flu that night or she would have been with them too. Your granddaddy offered to get him for me so I wouldn’t have to drive the thirty minutes by myself. A car drifted into their lane on the mountain pass.” She ran her hand across the table again, li
ke there might be a stray crumb. “None of them suffered. I was always grateful for that.” Mrs. White touched the top of her bun and then held up a hand. “Shoot, I don’t know why I’m talking about all this morbid history. I’ve got to go and let you get some rest.” She headed towards the door. “I sure would like it if you’d call me Ellen. I spent too many years as Mrs. White teaching school.”

  Lee agreed and walked her to the door. She touched the woman’s wiry arm as she stepped from the kitchen to the top step of the small back patio. “Thanks for the pie. And for everything all these years with my mom, and the mattress. I can’t repay your kindness.”

  “Why, you’re welcome. I don’t have much else to do these days, especially now. I’ll be glad to see a light from your window on a dark night, for however long you stay. Now you call me tomorrow and I’ll help you come up with a plan to get this old place fixed up.”

  Chapter 6

  Lee watched the woman’s purposeful stride as she disappeared out the creaky gate and down the dirt road. So much loss in one lifetime, Lee thought. Was life only a series of griefs? The fortitude it must have taken Ellen White to keep moving, to continue fighting was humbling. Was it the measure of character?

  Hungry now, she remembered the pie on the counter. She’d allow herself one piece before she went upstairs and rested. Not bothering to cut into it, she scooped some onto a fork, juice dripping onto the tabletop. The blackberry filling was fragrant and fresh, with a hint of tartness. Perhaps some lemon juice had been added, she thought. It was the perfect combination, not overly sweet like pies from the grocery store. The crust was flaky and light, tasting of butter on her tongue. She ate two more bites, enjoying them. And then she thought of Dan. His mother made a pie every year for his birthday. He’d loved pie. The reality of the last several weeks came to her in a rush, the anxious hollow feeling returning to the pit of her stomach. She pushed away the pie and stared out the window, fighting the sobs that came anyway. She’d not known grief would come in waves, brought on by the smallest of things. Nor had she realized that ordinary acts of living would continue even after the loss of a love and that it would remain possible to get caught up in the moment of a simple pleasure before remembering.

  And it washed down upon her in an inescapable truth, this bath of grief. Her husband was never coming back. He was gone and nothing she did would bring him back.

  A thousand “what ifs” came to her, as they had for days and weeks now, all useless to the outcome but unavoidable. The biggest of which was, what if she’d been in the marriage with open eyes instead of simply getting through the day, the week, the month. If only she’d been awake to really see him, perhaps she could have saved him.

  Her thoughts jumped to this new knowledge that she was pregnant. It settled into her mind for the first time. She’d put it aside for the miles between Seattle and now. Hard as the pregnancy was to fathom, it was time to think it through, to figure out what must be done.

  They hadn’t touched in months. They’d been to a party that night and he’d been almost like his old self, joking and laughing with friends in the kitchen. He’d had several drinks so she’d driven them home. He’d been quiet in the car but strangely attentive, twisted in the seat, watching her with soft eyes like he’d done when they were first together. At home he ran his fingers up the sides of her arms. He spoke softly, earnestly, “No matter what happens, remember I’ve loved you since the moment I met you.” She choked up and put her arms around his neck, holding him close.

  It was the last time. And now there was a pregnancy.

  She rummaged in her bag for the test, needing proof suddenly that she hadn’t imagined the pink lines. The test was there at the bottom of her bag, evidence of a new life that she could see and hold in her hand, while the evidence of her husband’s death seemed somehow without substantiation. She understood the ritual of the funeral was supposed to give her this symbol of closure but she remembered so little of it that it seemed almost like someone else’s dim nightmare.

  They’d had the memorial service at an old Seattle church, all dark wood and ornate carvings on the beams and benches. It smelled of incense and burning candles and the powdery florist shop smell of the roses in oversized vases in front of the pastor’s pulpit. His mother looked shrunken, slumped against his father. His sister’s tears soaked through the paper program in her hands, the husband next to her.

  She remembered that the pastor prattled from his script the facts of Dan’s life from the obituary. “Dan Johnson was born in 1974, raised by Ralph and Betty Johnson in Seattle, Washington. He graduated in 1996 from Stanford University with a degree in computer science and went on to get his MBA in Finance from Wharton in 2000. He co-founded, with his wife, Lee, Existence Games, Inc.” He said something about the arms of Jesus and she looked left to the stained glass depiction of Mary holding her baby. And Jesus couldn’t have felt farther away than in that moment.

  It was then that Linus walked to the pulpit to speak. The crowd was silent. The microphone squeaked as he adjusted it up to his height. He explained that he was in the restaurant business and that he’d thrown their wedding reception. He cleared his throat and wiped the corner of his eye with a lime green handkerchief before continuing. “When I met Dan I remember thinking he was the ultimate golden boy, what with his crown of blond curls, his movie star smile, his pedigree of Stanford and Wharton, his athletic prowess. And yet I was skeptical of this man that wanted to marry my Lee, wondered if he was good enough for her, wanting to be sure this man deserved her. What happened next I will never forget. Dan could not dance. Not a move without stepping all over his partner’s toes. Two months before the wedding he asked me if I’d teach him to waltz. He wanted to surprise Lee at their wedding reception.” He made a frame with his hands. “Picture straighter than straight, masculine Dan, and little ol’ me waltzing around his living room.” He choked up, breathing heavily into the microphone. “Dan learned how to dance to please Lee, and as many of you may have observed, he was beautiful that night, dancing with his bride. No matter what, we all have that memory of him and I have to believe he was happy in that moment. I hope that might give us all some peace in the days and months to come.”

  Now, sitting in her mother’s kitchen, she closed her eyes, recalling the night of their reception. “Dance with me,” he asked. Surprised, she’d looked at Linus and he’d nodded, yes. She put her hand in Dan’s and he walked her to the middle of the dance floor. He nodded to the band and they began to play a waltz. He guided her in perfect time, his silk tuxedo against her bare arms. Dan looked into her eyes and she whispered tearfully, “Thank you.” And she thought to herself, this is the beginning of my real life, the one I was meant to have. Everything was right.

  Now, at her mother’s old kitchen table, she wiped her eyes, wondering if anything would ever feel right again.

  Chapter 7

  Lee slept the rest of that first day and through the night, awakening to birds chirping outside her window. She reached over to Dan’s side of the bed with her foot but there was nothing but a cold fold of bed sheet. In that instant between sweet insensible sleep and consciousness, it was as if the previous month hadn’t happened. Once fully awake the sick ache roared through her. She got out of bed and looked out the window, still nervous that somehow Von followed her. But there was nothing in the driveway but her minivan. She shivered, yawned, and, rubbing her eyes, shuffled to the bathroom. She glanced in the mirror and gasped, shocked by the greasy hair and dark circles under her eyes. She tugged at the rusty faucets in the shower until they trickled russet-colored water into the yellow-stained tub. She sat with her arms around her ankles, head resting on her knees, and rocked until the water cleared.

  She went to the hall closet for a towel. It smelled of old neglected wood. There were two ratty towels, the material so thin she could see through it, folded in squares on the second shelf that Ellen must have washed and put away for her. Steam drifted into the hallway from the bathroom.<
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  She stood under the warm spray with her eyes closed. Compared to the shower at home, the water was a trickle on the back of her neck. But it was hot and comforting to her skin that felt beat up from the strain of the last weeks. She moved her hand over her stomach, taut and bloated. It was hard to comprehend there was anything inside her except longing and despair instead of a multiplying mass of cells that would turn into a human baby.

  She scrubbed her body with soap and as the suds washed her clean she began to sort through and organize her thoughts, as she had with all new ventures, devising a plan that she would execute step by step. She saw it unfold in five phases: fix up the house, sell it, pay DeAngelo, move to a new city, and get her career back on track.

  She washed her hair, holding her breath because the smell of the shampoo brought nausea in waves, and tried to focus on breaking down the first step of the plan. This morning she would conduct a full assessment of what it would take to get the house ready to sell. If the house foundation and construction were as strong as Ellen White indicated, she might be able to sell it for more than she owed DeAngelo. After the assessment, she would gather any items she could sell to get started on the repairs.

  * * *

  She stared at her image in the mirror on the bureau. Her tender breasts strained against her blouse, enlarged from their usual modest size to the size of large apples, and made her feel like a porn star. She popped a cracker in her mouth, slipped on a long cardigan sweater, and surveyed the master bedroom. There were two bedside tables, the bureau, and the bed, all brought with her grandmother from the east when she married in 1943. They might be considered antiques. She swept her hand on the smooth wood of the headboard, calculating its worth. She jotted that amount in a small notebook under a “To Sell” category, next to “Grandmother’s furniture” with a circle bullet, in her precise angular printing.