A Million Little Lies

by Bette Lee Crosby

  The smile on Ida’s face vanished. “I thought you’d at least spend a few days with me…”

  She hesitated, her eyes grew misty, and when she spoke again the lighthearted sound of happiness Suzanna had heard earlier was gone.

  “You and Annie are all the family I’ve got now. It’s terribly lonely here without Bill, and this house is so full of memories…”

  Annie scooted her chair closer, her small hand patting Ida’s knee. “It’s okay, Grandma, we’re here.” Glancing up at Suzanna with her face pinched into a look of determination, she said, “We don’t really gotta go, Mama. You said—”

  Fearful of what might come out, Suzanna jumped in. “I know what I said, Annie, but there’s only one New Jersey bus and it leaves at 10:30.”

  “But I don’t wanna go to New Jersey. I wanna stay here.”

  Annie was a child who could often be coaxed into doing one thing or another, but once she’d set her mind to something she could also be stubborn as a mule. Given the pinched-up pout stuck to her face, Suzanna knew she was in for a fight.

  “Annie, we’ve already discussed this. You know I have to start looking for a job and…”

  “I don’t care. I wanna stay here with Grandma. She said I can have my own room and she’s gonna let me—”

  Ida interrupted. “I have a suggestion that might help. Instead of looking for a job right away, why don’t you stay here and work for me? This house is way too big for one person, and without Bill’s pension I can’t afford to keep it. I’m going to put it on the market, but it would be foolish to do so right now. First, it has to be cleaned top to bottom. The windows washed, the closets emptied out, the clutter packed away, the hydrangeas cut back…”

  Suzanna smiled as Ida continued listing the multitude of things that needed to be done in the house she’d seen as perfect.

  “That’s a very tempting offer,” she finally said. “But I wouldn’t feel right taking money from you. Besides, Annie and I need to get settled, find a place of our own—”

  “Wouldn’t that be a lot easier if you had some extra money in your pocket?”

  “I guess so, but I still wouldn’t feel comfortable taking—”

  “Do it, Mama, please do it. Please, please!”

  Suzanna looked across at the two them, the same expression of hopefulness on both faces, the same pleading looks in their eyes. It seemed unfair, the burden of such a decision being placed on her shoulders, and yet there it was. She wanted this every bit as much as either of them did. When she weighed staying or leaving against one another, the happiness of staying was light as a feather, while the thought of leaving had the weight of a boulder. Her resolve began to fade.

  “I really think we should be going…” she said, but her words were weak and without much determination.

  “Just for a few days,” Ida pleaded. “To help with the heavy work. That bus runs every day. You could take it tomorrow or the next day or the day after that.”

  Annie’s lower lip began to quiver, and her eyes grew teary. “I don’t wanna go. I wanna stay here and make cookies with Grandma.”

  Suzanna felt her heart crumbling. “Please, Annie, don’t make this harder than it is.”

  “It’s not hard, Mama, all you have to do is say yes.”

  All you have to do is say yes. Suzanna turned her head and stared out the kitchen window as her thoughts raced back to eight years earlier when Bobby Doherty asked for the same thing. She’d finally said yes, then ended up pregnant and alone. Instead of going off to college, she’d been thrown out of her daddy’s house and had to move in with Earl.

  Saying yes had been a costly mistake back then, and if the truth were discovered it could be even more costly now. She not only had herself to think about; she had Annie. Saying yes had taken away her future, but it had given her Annie, a gift more precious than anything she’d ever owned. A single yes could take or give, but there was no way of knowing which it would be. Should she chance it again, or be smarter this time and move on?

  Turning back, Suzanna saw the two eager faces waiting expectantly.

  “We can stay for a few days,” she said, “but then we have got to go.”

  ——————

  THAT SAME AFTERNOON, SUZANNA RETURNED to the bus station and retrieved the battered brown suitcase. Ida had suggested she take the car, but Suzanna chose to walk. It was fourteen blocks from Ida’s house to the station, just far enough to give her time to think.

  She mulled over the potential problems of them staying, and the one that stood head and shoulders above all else was the very real possibility that Darla Jean could return at any time. Then what? Could she be arrested for impersonating the girl? Thrown into jail? And what about Annie? Would she be taken away and plunked down in some obscure orphanage? Without a daddy, that’s what would happen. If the truth were exposed, Annie would lose the grandma she had taken to so quickly, and she would be on her own.

  Suzanna knew there was no getting around it; she was Annie’s only family. Walking past the rows of tidy houses with freshly-mowed lawns and manicured flowerbeds, Suzanna pictured the shock on Ida’s face as she stood watching them take her away in handcuffs.

  Were it not for that one gigantic fear, she would remain here forever. She would gladly become Darla Jean and cast aside the miserable existence that had been her life. She would work her fingers to the bone, cleaning, scrubbing, running errands, doing whatever Ida needed done. She would do almost anything to have a grandmother like Ida, but the one thing she would not do was risk losing her child. Annie was her life, her reason for living. Her only reason for living. Regardless of what she had to do, what she had to sacrifice or give up, Suzanna was going to see that Annie had a better shot at life than she’d had.

  On the walk home, she decided to work like a fiend for the next two days, get the house in tip-top shape for Ida, and then move on. To make the leaving easier, she’d tell Ida that she would write and be back for visits. She’d promise to come for Christmas, but once gone she would have to stay gone forever. Annie would be angry with her for doing it, but she would be safe, and hopefully with time thoughts of Grandma Ida would be little more than a pleasant memory.

  Suzanna felt the weight of that decision settle on her shoulders like a lead cape. It wasn’t what she wanted to do. It was what she had to do.

  Ida

  Finding Family

  ONCE DARLA JEAN AGREED TO stay for a few days, Ida breathed a sigh of relief. Having her here at the house had changed things. The gloom that lurked in the corners of every room seemed to be disappearing; the house was suddenly brighter, happier even. The patter of Scout scrabbling up and down the stairs behind Annie reminded Ida of how it used to be. Before the cancer, before nurses came and went at all hours of the day and night, stepping softly in rubber-soled shoes, taking away hope and leaving behind bottles of pills. Back then, the house reeked of sorrow and antiseptics. The odor remained even after Bill was gone.

  Then this morning Ida had opened the kitchen window and for the first time in over a month caught the musky smell of the wisteria in the back yard.

  She saw that as a sign, a sure sign Bill was watching over her, telling her the time for mourning had passed, giving her the family she’d wished for. In those last few weeks, when he’d been too feeble to stand, she’d sat beside him and they’d talked for hours on end. That’s when he’d told her he would always be there.

  “Even after I’m gone from this earth,” he’d said, “I’ll still be watching over you.” Afterward, he’d closed his eyes. Ida thought him asleep until a raspy breath rattled through his chest and he added, “Both you and Darla Jean.”

  Now he was giving her the gift he treasured most: his granddaughter.

  How else could something like this happen? It was no coincidence that after 25 years Darla Jean had showed up to say goodbye to a granddaddy she’d never even known. If something like that wasn’t a sign, then Ida didn’t know what was.

  When Anni
e convinced her mama to stay a few days, Ida knew this was the one opportunity she’d have. Darla Jean clearly wasn’t her daddy. She wasn’t anything like him. After thinking about it, Ida had come to the conclusion that Tommy had been as callous with his daughter as he’d been with his daddy, because Darla Jean wouldn’t even talk about him. That in itself said a lot about her. A girl who wouldn’t run down her mean-ass daddy had to have a forgiving heart.

  Ida had two, maybe three days to show her granddaughter what being a family meant, and she sure as the devil wasn’t going to waste that time cleaning.

  Just moments after Darla Jean left to retrieve her luggage from the bus station, Ida pulled out a picture album that had been in the family for years; one that had been passed down from Bill’s mama, the leather cover worn at the edges and loose pages tied together with a narrow blue ribbon. She brushed a thin layer of dust from the top and called for Annie.

  “Would you like to see pictures of your mama when she was a baby?”

  “Can Scout see too?”

  “Of course he can. Climb up here beside me on the sofa, and we’ll look through this album together.”

  “What’s an album?”

  “It’s a book with family pictures that go way, way back. Some of these were taken when your great-granddaddy was a teeny-tiny baby.”

  Annie grinned and scooted a bit closer. “Has it got pictures when Scout was a baby?”

  “There are some pictures of Scout, but I’m not sure how old he was at the time.”

  Having Annie curled up against her made Ida’s heart feel warm, like the sun appearing from behind the clouds after a year of rain. She untied the ribbon and opened the album to the first page. It was filled with sepia-colored prints of dour-faced ladies in long dresses.

  Annie pointed to a photo in the center of the page. “Who’s that?”

  “I believe that’s your great-granddaddy’s mama when she was a young girl. Some of these pictures have names and dates written on the back of them, would you like to see?”

  When Annie nodded, Ida eased the photo from the corner mounts that held it in place. “Looks like I was right. See, it says right here, Lucinda Graves.”

  “How come she wasn’t a Parker like you and me?”

  “She was a Parker after she married your great-great granddaddy. Graves was her maiden name, the name she had before she and George Parker got married.”

  Looking a bit puzzled, Annie asked, “Do people have to change their name when they get married?”

  Ida gave a chuckle and nodded. “That’s how it works. When a girl baby is born, she’s given her mama and daddy’s surname. Then when she gets married, she switches over to using her husband’s surname.” With Annie still looking as puzzled as ever, Ida continued. “Take your mama for instance; she’s a Parker right now because that’s the name she was given at birth, but if she falls in love and gets married, then she’ll use her new husband’s name.”

  Annie looked up, her forehead wrinkled and the corners of her mouth drooping. “If Mama gets married, I won’t be a Parker anymore?”

  Ida left the album in her lap and turned, gathering Annie into her arms. “You’re a Parker now, and you’ll always be.” She smiled and touched a finger to Annie’s chest. “Being a Parker starts here, inside your heart, and it stays there for as long as you want it to.”

  Annie’s lips curled into a smile. “I’m gonna stay it forever, ’cause I like being a Parker.”

  They went back to looking at the pictures in the album, and as Ida explained the relationship of this aunt or that cousin a thought settled in her mind. She was never going to lose touch with Darla Jean again. Never. She would try to get her to remain here in Cousins, but if that failed she would sell the house lock, stock, and barrel, and follow them to New Jersey. They were family, and what Bill couldn’t do in his lifetime he’d done afterward. He’d brought Darla Jean back home where she belonged.

  That afternoon, Ida went through the album twice. She explained the Parker ties to distant cousins, long-dead aunts and uncles, and showed pictures of Bill from the day he was christened up until the year he’d been diagnosed with cancer. That year they’d stopped taking pictures, and the joy of life disappeared from the house.

  When Suzanna returned, Ida and Annie were still sitting on the sofa with Scout squeezed between them and piles of photos scattered about.

  “Mama, look!” Annie grabbed a picture and waved it in the air. “This is when you was a tiny baby!”

  A look of apprehension flitted across Suzanna’s face. “How nice.” She set the battered suitcase beside the staircase, then crossed the room and peered over Ida’s shoulder.

  “This was taken on the day of your christening.” Pointing to the face of each member of the group, she said, “This is your grandpa, and that’s me standing next to him. Your mama’s the one holding you, and this here’s your daddy, on the end.”

  The picture was a grainy black-and-white snapshot, taken from too far away to see the faces clearly, so Suzanna squatted to get a better look.

  “Daddy looks mad in this picture, almost like…”

  “He was always like that,” Ida said cynically. “Mad at the world, griping about one thing or another.”

  Annie grabbed another photo. “This is great-granddaddy when he was little as me!”

  Suzanna leaned in, squinting to see the faded photo.

  Ida turned and looked up. “You shouldn’t be squatting down like that, it will give you bad knees. Come around here and sit next to me.” She scooted closer to Annie then patted the empty spot on the sofa.

  “I thought maybe I ought to get busy with the cleaning. You said there was a lot—”

  “There is, but it’s nothing that won’t keep until tomorrow.”

  “Still, the sooner I get started, the sooner I’ll finish and—”

  “Darla Jean, don’t you start acting like your daddy. Life is too short to always be thinking about what has to be done. Relax. Take time to enjoy every minute, because once that minute’s gone, it’s gone forever.”

  Such a thought apparently weakened Suzanna’s determination to get the job started. She came from behind the sofa and sat beside Ida.

  One by one they turned the pages of the photograph album, with Ida telling stories of thrice-removed cousins, great aunts, and generations that were long gone before she arrived.

  “Your granddaddy used to claim his mama said her great-great Uncle Harold was rumored to have come over on the Mayflower.”

  “Really?”

  Ida nodded. She pointed to a photograph so faded Suzanna could barely see the figure standing in front of a cornfield. “This here was his boy, Fredrick. He never married and never had any children. Supposedly his sister, Helen, did, but I don’t have any pictures of her.”

  “Are you still in touch with anyone in that family?”

  “Heavens, no. There’re gone. Every last one of them. As far as I know, Tommy was the last of the line. That’s why Bill was so devastated when the boy left without a word about where he was going. It was a terrible thing to do.”

  With a flat-faced expression that gave away nothing, Suzanna nodded her agreement.

  For a long moment Ida sat there looking at that photograph as if there was more to the story; then she gave a sorrowful sounding sigh and turned the page.

  Annie tugged at her sleeve. “Are you sad, Grandma?”

  Ida smiled, wrapped her arm around the tiny shoulders, and gave Annie a squeeze. “No, I’m not. I used to be sad about not having any family, but now that I’ve got you and your mama, I’m not sad anymore.”

  By the time they finished going through the albums and photographs, it was almost suppertime, and then after supper Ida said it was far too late to start cleaning now. Besides, it was Wednesday, which she insisted had the best lineup on television.

  Once the dishes were washed, dried and put away, the three of them settled on the sofa to watch The Price is Right. Without a word passing betw
een them, Ida patted her lap and Annie climbed up onto it. That’s how they spent the evening. Annie fell asleep shortly after the Kraft Music Hall came on, but Ida never moved. She just sat there tracing her fingers along Annie’s shoulder and cheek.

  Later on, after everyone had gone to bed, when the house was silent and the only sounds to be heard were a night breeze rustling the trees and the faraway tinkling of a wind chime, Ida lay awake. She thought back on the evening and how good it had felt to have Annie snuggled up against her chest.

  “Thank you, Bill,” she said, giving her thoughts a whispery soft voice. “You know how lonely I’ve been without you.” She hesitated a moment and rubbed her fingers across the wedding ring she still wore. He’d placed that ring on her finger the day they were married and she could still feel the love in it, especially late at night, when she spoke to him as she did now.

  “Bill, no one will ever take your place in my heart, you know that, but having Darla Jean with me eases the pain of losing you. I wish you could have known her, honey; she’s everything you thought she’d be. Good-natured, sweet, not at all like Tommy. And, oh, how she loves that little girl of hers. Annie. You’d be very proud of them both, Bill, I know you would. I’m pretty certain it took a lot of doing to bring them here, but now I’m going to need your help with something else.”

  Suzanna

  Oh, Suzanna, Tell Another Lie

  THE NEXT MORNING SUZANNA WOKE early and as she was stepping into a pair of worn denim shorts, she caught the sound of Annie’s laughter coming from downstairs. When she arrived in the kitchen, Ida had a platter of bacon and eggs on the table.

  “I thought I’d skip breakfast and get an early start,” Suzanna said apologetically.

  “Skip breakfast? Good gracious, Darla Jean, that’s the most important meal of the day.” Ida pulled a tray of biscuits from the oven and started plunking them into a basket. “A person can’t possibly do a proper job on an empty stomach; it’s like trying to get a car to go without gas.”