by Nancy Hedin
“I don’t think anybody killed the man. Mr. Hollister had been sick a long time and dodo-headed since his stroke several years back. He probably died of natural causes.” Sheriff Scrogrum speculated further that after old man Hollister died, Kenny got scared and buried him to make sure his social security check kept coming to Mrs. Hollister. “God knows she had at least that coming to her for all the years she lived with that cuss, and then had to take care of him when he had no control of his senses, let alone his shit and piss. Pardon my French.”
Sheriff Scrogrum turned to Dad. “At any rate, Kenny will do some jail time for hiding the body, illegal burial, and whatever else the county attorney can come up with to keep him off the place. You file for temporary custody of that little boy. While Kenny’s gone, let that dog have a sniff. Mrs. H won’t give you any trouble. She’s pretty worried about a trip to the pokey for cashing those checks.”
It was another half hour before the ambulance got there. The medics put the body in the back of the ambulance before they took a look at Kenny.
“He gonna live long enough for me to get him to jail?” Sheriff Scrogrum hovered by the medics. When the medics said Kenny would be sore, but fine, Sheriff Scrogrum put him in the back of his squad car.
What was I supposed to do now? Celebrate the nearly missed tragedy? Momma, Dad, and I went home, but Dad didn’t stay home. He had asked Twitch for the use of his backhoe when Twitch had brought Little Man back to the farm. Twitch wasted no time in getting the machine over to Dad. Twitch offered to help, but Dad flatly refused.
“I have to do this myself.”
Dad’s words were clear, but I defied him. I hustled back through the woods to watch him. I justified my sudden departure by telling Momma I needed to retrieve her binoculars from where I’d left them.
Dad took Satan back to the same spot behind the small barn where Kenny had dug up the rotting corpse of Mr. Hollister. After Satan scratched in the dirt and ran in circles, Dad tethered the dog to a tree away from the area. He dug all along the small barn and about five feet into the surrounding yard. He dug down eight feet or so where he could. The blade of the backhoe scraped against the remnants of what I guessed was an old barn foundation. There was probably no way that Kenny could have made any more headway with just a shovel, and he didn’t have any heavy equipment except a small front loader he used to clean barns and move snow.
Dad stopped digging. His shoulders slumped, and he removed his hat, wiped his forehead, wiped his eyes, and blew his nose with his handkerchief. He loosed the dog and drove the backhoe back to the farm. I made sure I was seated in the kitchen with Momma when he returned.
“Nothing,” Dad said when he came in the kitchen and made brief eye contact with Momma. Momma had Little Man on her lap, but passed the boy off to me.
“Take that boy in the living room and let him practice cruising the couch and chairs,” Momma said. I left the room with Little Man and without argument, but I positioned myself so I could see and hear Momma and Dad.
Dad washed his hands and arms in the kitchen sink and dried them with the towel that hung decoratively from the handle of the stove. Use of that towel usually got the user an earful from Momma. Silence hung in the air until she broke it.
“Just say it, Joseph. I know you blame me for Becky being gone, maybe dead.”
“I don’t blame you. I blame Kenny Hollister,” he said. “Eventually, he’s going to get caught, and I want to be there when it happens. He’ll spout some shit about losing control, but Christ knows he only lost control when he was raising his fists to his hundred-and-ten-pound wife. He never punched the bruisers he hung out with or the cops with guns who pulled him over every so often. He had control not to hit them.”
Gerry came to the door with a Tuna Helper hot dish. She hadn’t visited at all since Becky had gone missing. Momma looked at Gerry through the window. She turned back to me and said that she wanted nothing to do with fair-weather friends or anyone being a spectator to our grief. I knew she wouldn’t be inviting Gerry into our house. Momma opened the door, took the package from Gerry, thanked her, closed the door without explanation or apology, and threw the food in the trash. “Road kill helper, no thanks.”
Leaning against the kitchen counter near the refrigerator, Dad said, “Peggy, I don’t blame you for her disappearance. I won’t say she’s dead. I don’t blame you for her being gone, but by God I blame you and your religion that pushed them to get married.” He was red-faced and he set his jaw. He opened the refrigerator and scanned the shelves as he spoke. “Becky thought it was more important to be married—period—than married to someone who’d treat her right, and once she done it, the church kept her there being beaten as surely as the church was a live trap—stay and die or cut off her own foot to maybe get away.”
“A baby needs a father, Joseph. Not everybody gets to marry their dreamboat. Some people settle for what seems good enough at the time.”
“By God, I never settled. I married the woman I fell in love with the first time I saw her at a little country diner. I still love that woman with my whole heart though she hasn’t ever made it easy, God knows.” His voice sounded cracked and ragged. He opened drawers and cupboards and then slammed them closed.
“You settled, Peggy, and you got it in your head that everybody’s done the same thing. I’m sorry I wasn’t your first choice—your dreamboat—but he didn’t step up, Peggy. I did, and you married me and raised kids with me, and for God’s sake, I hope someday you can make peace with your choices.” He moved to the dining room and abused the drawers and doors on the buffet.
“How dare you accuse me of not making peace with my choices! I’m here every day for you and our girls, Joseph.” She pounded her fists on the table. “And I am sober.”
“Yeah, throw that into my face. How convenient for you that I drink—makes me an easier target than you, the Holy One.”
The tone he used surprised me.
He went on. “Speaking of which, where’d you put it?”
“It’s in the toilet tank.”
“Thank you, at least it should be cold.”
Dad went into the bathroom and came back to the kitchen with a six-pack of Grain Belt Beer. He sat at the kitchen table across from Momma, put the beer down, and pulled one can loose from the plastic loops. He took a big swig.
“Ahhh.” He peeked at Momma. “You keep looking back, searching for how you can make it all turn out differently. Marrying that old boyfriend wouldn’t have kept your little brother from dying in that corn bin, and it sure as hell wouldn’t have kept your folks from blaming you for it. Their hearts were set.”
His chair scraped across the floor as he moved closer to Momma. I craned my neck to take it all in. Dad touched Momma’s hair. He cried. Momma cried too. Dad slid off his chair, dropped to his knees in front of Momma’s chair. He bowed his head. “Those old regrets won’t bring William back, and they won’t bring Becky home.” He laid his head in her lap.
Momma raised her hands like it was a holdup. She picked some lint off Dad’s collar, petted his head, and ran her hand along his neck. I swore Dad was purring. Momma’s face contorted, her lips tightening and then puckering, and she smoothed his hair and kissed the crown of his head. She raised his face between her hands and kissed the tip of his nose and finally his lips.
“Old man, you infuriate me, but I know my life is with you, and I don’t need to make over the past, especially where you’re concerned. I may act like I do sometimes, but I have everything I need right now, especially if we can find my Becky. Now go get Little Man and give Lorraine a break. You show that boy how to paint some of those wooden cages you call birdhouses.”
Dad rose up and laughed. “You just don’t appreciate my art.”
“Yeah, that’s it,” Momma said.
Once Dad and Little Man were outside, I took a chance at asking Momma for the truth. “Who was dad talking about?”
Momma lifted the coffeepot and tipped it upside down ov
er her cup. A drip or two fell in. She mechanically measured out fresh coffee grounds, let the tap run until the water was cold, and filled the coffeepot. The lid rattled as she worked it into the opening and carried the pot to the stove. Her hands shook. The water on the outside of the pot hissed when the gas flames licked it up.
I planted myself where Dad usually sat and waited for Momma to speak. She perched in her chair and stared into her cup. I knew that if Momma was going to push me out of her business, she would have done it already. For the first time in a long time, she really looked at me.
“Lorraine, I wish I had an alibi for my life, something that evokes some sympathy and at least masquerades as an explanation.”
As if the day hadn’t already had its share of weirdness, Momma opened a can of Grain Belt Beer, took a long pull, opened another one, and slid it across the table to me. I accepted it along with all the other unexpected events.
“Things were supposed to be different. I was smart and obeyed my parents. I was supposed to be a nurse. I thought I was supposed to marry him. I wanted college and city life, to raise a family where there was culture and malls. William was supposed to live and grow up. When William died everything crumbled. I couldn’t take my parents’ money for school, never thought it was mine before William died and certainly didn’t think I deserved it after. I couldn’t marry the man I thought I’d marry. I was dead to my parents, but they only had grief for William. So, I left home. I got a job in Bend, away from Clearmont. It wasn’t where I wanted to go, but it was out. I got married. Before I had time for reflection, I had two kids.”
In my head a voice screamed, Ask her now. Ask her if the man she thought she’d marry was Allister Grind. Ask her if Grind is my dad.
“You girls, you have been inside me, seen my innards, and left my body through my intimate portal, but you don’t know me and I don’t know you. I don’t even know where Becky is. It’s like once you were feeding from me—sharing my food and blood—and then you were born. I delivered you like a magician pulling rabbits out of his hat and what did I find? I found I’d given birth to bunnies. What was I supposed to do?” Momma swiped her big hand in the air in the direction of the barn.
“Your dad was no help. He did things, but in his mind he believed that you would just turn out if we kept you fed. He believed in hope and potential. Children need direction and discipline too, or they get lost and they die. While he was being optimistic, I had the thankless job of guiding you, which was damn hard work.” She sighed and laughed.
“I couldn’t get over the fact I gave birth to rabbits. I didn’t feel like I did anything special myself, but there you were. You were so small. How was I supposed to know how to keep you safe?”
My chest was tight with heartache for her. “Momma, I’m sorry about everything. I’m sorry you lost so much, that William died, and you didn’t get to go to college.”
“You’re a tender-hearted girl aren’t you, Lorraine? I always liked that about you. You’re just like your father.”
That was as close to a compliment that Momma had ever given me. I locked up. I couldn’t bring myself to break the spell by asking about the real identity of my father.
A couple of days passed. While Momma and Dad shopped for groceries in town with Little Man, Gerry came over to our farm. She had a stack of books. When I came to the door, Gerry motioned to me to come out on the lawn.
In a loud voice—not her library voice—she said, “I have the books you ordered.”
She’d never delivered our books, but maybe she was doing it because she knew how stressed we were and she just lived the next farm over.
Then Gerry leaned in and used her official library voice. “Make some excuse and get over to my place right away. I don’t know if I can keep her there much longer. Come alone.”
“Keep who?”
“Your sister.”
“Becky?”
“Do you have another sister I don’t know about?”
“Wait, what are you talking about?”
Gerry headed for her car like she was running from a fire or going to a really good book sale.
“Wait.” I raced to the passenger side of Gerry’s car and got in. Gerry did a U-turn in the yard and barreled out of the driveway as I clung to the seat and tried to close the car door.
“Is Becky okay?”
“‘Okay’ is a relative term.” She pulled into her yard. “I’m sorry, Lorraine, she’s only been here a few days. I believed what she said about Kenny, and I wanted to give her a chance to make a plan, but then today . . .” Gerry’s voice trailed off, and she motioned for me to follow her into her house.
I followed Gerry through the mudroom and into the kitchen. There, at Gerry’s yellow Formica table, sat Becky. Her back was to me, but I’d have known her anywhere. Her perfect blonde hair fanned out over her shoulder blades. I recognized the stubborn set of her jaw as she turned in profile. She looked at me. Her eyes were blackened, and she had bruises and welts up and down her arms and neck.
“Jesus Christ! He beat you again? How—”
Gerry interrupted my rant and pulled me into the pantry.
“Kenny didn’t do that. When she came here a few days ago, she didn’t have those marks and I haven’t let her out of my sight except yesterday, when I came to your house, and today when I came to find you. She called me four days ago and begged me to come get her. She had traded her car for time at a ratty motel outside of Langston. She was out of money and time at the motel. She made me promise not to tell anyone. She said her life depended on my discretion.”
I took frequent peeks at Becky while Gerry talked.
“Lorraine, Becky told me Kenny was just awful to her, that he was evil and that she needed to get her son away. I believed her. I’ve researched wife abuse.”
“Just tell me what happened.”
“As much as it grieved me to know your family was so worried, I trusted Becky. Then I saw what she did.”
“What?”
“Becky slipped outside with a knife. She cut switches from the brush and whipped herself, all the time chanting something about the devil and God and your momma,” Gerry said. “One minute she’s herself, and the next minute it’s like reasoning with the girl in the exorcism movie. She talked about how Kenny killed the father and the son wasn’t safe. I couldn’t make heads or tails out of her ravings. Heavens, she used to like women’s magazines. What happened to her?”
“We need to get her to a doctor. Let me call Twitch.” I moved toward the phone, but Gerry pulled me back into the pantry.
“Lorraine, this is out of Twitch’s league. She needs a head doctor.”
“I don’t know any head doctors.” I called Twitch at the vet office. I asked him to come to the Narrows’s farm, and if he saw Dad and Momma, to send them that way too.
“Becky is here and she’s real sick.”
“Does she need an ambulance?”
“I don’t know. She’s breathing okay and she’s not bleeding, but the inside of her head is a mess. Come quick. I’m scared. I don’t know what to do.”
I went back to the kitchen where Becky sat. She looked so thin. Her perfect complexion bleached in contrast to the bruises on her face and arms. I wanted to touch her, be sure she was real.
“Becky? Where have you been? We’ve been so worried.”
Becky peered at me like she didn’t know me. Her eyes were wide but dull. Then she turned her head toward the ceiling and to the side before she spoke to me.
“Lorraine, I’m glad you are here. You have to help me.” She glanced side to side, then leaned forward and whispered, “Gerry doesn’t believe me. He got to her. Don’t let her know you’re going to help me.”
“Kenny? You’re safe now, Becky. Kenny is in jail. Who do you think got to Gerry?”
“Satan. Sometimes, he got to Kenny too. Lorraine, you can never be sure who Satan takes. He took Kenny, but then Satan gave him back. He’s just trying to get me, and he’ll use all his powers.
That’s why you’ve got to help me.” She grabbed my hands in hers. There was genuine terror in her eyes.
I squeezed Becky’s hands. “I’ll help you, Becky. I’m going to get you help.”
Becky closed her eyes, rocked, and prayed.
“I beseech thee, Lord. Protect me from the power of Satan.” She spoke the words over and over again. She didn’t seem to hear the sound of a car arriving in the yard. I let go of Becky’s hands and looked out the window.
It was Twitch. He had Momma, Dad, and Little Man in his Jeep with him. I went outside, not certain where to begin except that I knew that Little Man shouldn’t see his mom like she was. I took Little Man in my arms. He was real and just the same as I had remembered. I hugged him. He yanked on my hair and ears as I did some raspberries on his tummy. His few teeth scraped on my scalp.
Everyone spoke at once. With a look, Momma silenced everyone else.
“Where is she? What’s wrong with her?” Momma asked, but didn’t wait for any answers. Gerry stepped forward and blocked her route to the house, a brave and possibly dangerous gesture.
“Before you enter my kitchen, you need to hear something from me. I’ve been keeping your daughter at my house for four days. For the worry I put you through, I’m sorry. I believed Becky’s story that her husband was evil, and I assumed he’d beat her. I still don’t know that he didn’t before. The only thing I can say with some certainty is that he hasn’t touched her since she’s been here, and she still tells the same story.” Gerry hesitated. “I saw her hurt herself.”
“I need to see my daughter,” Momma said. “I appreciate what you’ve done, Gerry. But right now I need to see Becky.”
“Becky is having some sort of nervous breakdown,” Gerry said to Momma’s back.
Momma stomped up the steps to Gerry’s house. Dad and Twitch were right on her heels. Little Man, Gerry, and I stayed outside. I held Little Man. His nose ran and his cheeks were chapped. Momma had him coated temple-to-chin in Vaseline.
