“Everyone complains about the snow.”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“Addy?”
“Yes, Mary Alice?”
“I'm sorry I didn't know your birthday.”
“Truly, it don't hurt me one bit. I just as soon let it pass quiet.”
Mary Alice nodded but didn't believe her. She thought of Addy as a friend
and
a daughter and felt guilty and sorry she hadn't asked about her birthday sooner. It was then she had the idea. A gathering, she thought, a birthday party of sorts, or at least a party to make up for all the birthdays lost. A surprise, she thought, so Addy couldn't say no. A mixer with a few young men, grandsons of her mother's friends and Gabriel Green with the soft eyes and big hands. Gabriel's Mama was pushing him to marry a second cousin who stood to gain some land out near the lake. But Mary Alice was determined, and felt sure she'd have what she wanted. And what she wanted, more than she had a right to want, was for Addy Shadd to marry Gabriel and stay in Chatham, right there on Degge Street, just three doors down.
June slid into July and the air turned swampy and sick. The sun fired the earth all the long day and left the ground to smoulder when it set. On such nights Addy couldn't sleep. She'd rise and slip out into the darkness to go sit by the river, or just stroll the quiet, empty streets and wonder at the stars. The first night, years ago, when Mrs. Lemoine'd found Addy gone from her bed, the woman assumed she'd run off to Toronto, or that the boy from Detroit had come and claimed her back. She'd been surprised to find her in the kitchen the next morning and wasn't sure she believed her when Addy explained she'd gone to the park near the river for some air and a few winks of sleep.
Addy woke in her bed, slimy with perspiration, her heart racing from a bad dream. She felt too tired to head for the river, so she took to the porch to try to catch a breeze. The air was lazy, but the mosquitoes were lively and enjoyed a feast of her blood that left her with welts on her arms and face. Mrs. Lemoine was normally unconcerned about the welts, for it was the same with Addy every year. She could never persuade the girl to come inside on those heat-wave summer nights. This morning, however, she was vexed. “Adelaide Shadd,” she said, “you look like you been stung by fifty bees!”
“Like to take a wire brush to myself,” Addy said, and brought her fingernails to her cheeks.
She was shocked when Mrs. Lemoine slapped her hands from her face and fairly screeched, “Don't scratch!”
Addy shrugged. “They'll go away in a few days, Mrs. Lemoine. They always do.”
Mrs. Lemoine kept a special homemade ointment she called a potion in her bedside drawer. She insisted it would ease inflammation and ward off infection. She used the same ointment for toothaches and pink eye and seemed not to notice it stunk of rotten cabbage. She brought the jar into the kitchen and though Addy protested loudly, smeared the greasy stuff over her face and neck and arms, announcing, “That'll take it down by tonight, don't you worry, Addy.”
Addy hadn't been worried and, except for the itching, didn't care much about the appearance of the welts. As it was, she was merely annoyed that with the awful odour up her nose she could no longer eat her breakfast.
“Don't forget,” Mrs. Lemoine called out before Addy left with a batch of blueberry tarts for the Ferguson boys, “I'll be over to Mrs. Alexander's house this afternoon and evening.”
“I know.”
“So don't come back here thinking you have to cook my dinner.”
“I won't.”
“You could do anything you like today, Addy.”
“Mmm-hmm. I appreciate that, Mrs. Lemoine.” Addy grinned tightly and wondered if Mrs. Lemoine was losing her mind. She'd come to her Monday and said it was high time she take a day off and Friday'd be a good
one seeing as how she'd be spending it with her sick friend, Mrs. Butler.
“Just no reason whatever to come back here. You could go do whatever you like and no reason to come back here until after suppertime.”
“All right, Mrs. Lemoine.”
“Won't be able to get inside anyway, Adelaide. I'm locking this house up and I have the only key.”
“All right, Mrs. Lemoine.” Addy'd flown out the door wondering why on earth Mrs. Lemoine would lock her house when there was nothing to steal and stealing hardly a common thing in the neighbourhood anyway.
As was her habit, Addy entered the Ferguson home without a knock at the door or any other formality. She was not surprised to look down the hall and see Gabriel Green sitting at the kitchen table, for he often lent a hand, especially in the summer when Hamond was on the farm. But she was surprised by the strange look on his face and by the tone in Mary Alice's voice when she called out, “That you, Addy? Just wait. Just wait there. I'll be right out!”
Addy stood in the front room, staring down the hall at Gabriel. She waited, thinking it most annoying to have been told to do so. She minded less when Gabriel rose and came down the hall to join her. His face took on an even stranger look and he asked with grave concern, “You sick, Addy?”
“Sick? No.” Addy shrugged, then remembered the welts and touched her face. “This? These? Just mosquito bites is all.”
“I get skeeter bites too, but they don'tâ¦well, they don't look like
that.
”
“I know.”
“Sure you're not sick?”
“I'm not sick, Gabriel.” Addy smiled and leaned in to squeeze his big arm. “But I do appreciate your concern.”
The odour of the ointment hit Gabriel Green like a fist. “WHOA!” he cried, stepping back.
Addy cringed, for she'd grown accustomed to the stench. “It's ointment. That's all. A smelly one. Mrs. Lemoine put it on the bites.”
Gabriel used some restraint not to gag. He called out to Mary Alice in a voice that said he was holding his breath, “I'll come by later if you need.”
“That's all right, Gabriel,” Mary Alice trilled. “Thanks for your help and don't let me keep you now.”
Addy silently cursed Mrs. Lemoine as she scratched the itchiest of the welts on the left side of her nose. “Mary Alice?” she called.
“Just wait one minute, Addy.” The way Mary Alice spoke was more like singing than talking and that meant she was hiding something. Addy strode down the hall and came upon her friend in the small kitchen, her back toward the door, her face buried in the icebox. Mary Alice shut the door quickly and turned around, damp and glistening. Addy looked at her. “What are you hiding?”
Mary Alice would be spared telling Addy that her icebox was filled with food for tonight's party and that she'd
just put the finishing touches on a tray of canapés, because at that moment she noticed the welts on Addy's face and shrieked, “No!”
“It's all right. It's all right. It's just the mosquitoes again.”
“You look terrible! You're swollen and puffy and⦔ Mary Alice drew closer to have a better look. “You stink!”
“Your Mama's ointment.”
“Oh, Addy.” Mary Alice looked like she might cry. “You think they'll go down by tonight?”
“They'll go down when they go down. I don't care, long as they stop itching me.” Addy settled into a kitchen chair and fanned herself. “Have a cold drink, Mary Alice?” She passed her the plate of blueberry tarts. “These want to go into the icebox too.”
Mary Alice hesitated, opened the icebox a crack, and drew out a pitcher of fresh lemonade. She set the plate of tarts on the counter, hoping Addy wouldn't notice. She poured the lemonade and asked casually, “Don't you have any nice summer dress to put on yourself?”
“Looking nice ain't in my mind now, Mary Alice. I'm just so hot and scratchy. Wish it was winter and the river half frozen. Wouldn't that be nice? To float down the river on a chunk of ice?”
Mary Alice wasn't listening. She left the room and returned after a moment with a new dress, cotton, pink-hued, not too fancy, but pretty and cool. “Try this on. It was a present for Olivia, but if she doesn't want to come
home for her birthday, I guess she doesn't get a present.”
Addy liked the look of the dress and didn't care that it had been meant for Olivia. She slipped out of the old dress and slid into the new one. Caressed by the soft cotton, she felt better and cooler than she had in days. Mary Alice pronounced the fit perfect and said she looked pretty as a picture, “Except for the skeeter welts.”
Addy looked out into the backyard. “What'd he help you with?”
“Mmm?”
“Gabriel? What'd he help you with?”
“Oh, some things in the yard is all.” Mary Alice looked away like she always did when she was lying. “How long's that smell gonna last, anyway?”
Addy shrugged and sniffed the back of her hand. “Your mother was in a strange humour.”
“She was?”
“Mmm-hmm. She told me do whatever I like today. I don't even have to cook dinner tonight.”
“That's good, isn't it?”
“Suppose. I just hardly know what to do with myself though.” Addy sniffed her hand again. “Think it truly does ward off infection?”
Mary Alice lowered her voice. “I
know
it truly wards off a husband. I put a little under my arms from time to time just so Hamond be sure to give me a night off.”
Addy was shocked at first, then began to laugh. Mary Alice began to laugh and soon they were both laughing so
hard they sounded like madwomen. They'd been laughing that same crazy laugh on another occasion when Hamond had unexpectedly come home. He'd known that they were laughing about him and he'd sneered at his wife and warned quietly, “Neighbours think you lost your mind again, Woman.” Addy had wondered briefly what Hamond meant by
again.
Addy asked Mary Alice if she and the boys wanted to take a stroll down by the river or through the path in the woods by the edge of town. Mary Alice pretended to consider her invitation, then decided she had too much work to do. She was telling the truth, too, for there was still more food to prepare and decorations to be hung around her mother's house. It was Hamond who'd suggested the ruse. He'd said, “Tell Addy old Nora's got to tend to a sick friend. Just get her out the house for the day is all you really have to do. Have her come back after the dinner hour and make sure you got the party guests all in by then.”
Hamond wouldn't attend the party of course, and that was fine with Mary Alice. He'd promised to take the boys out to the pond for a swim in the evening and she thought that was the best help he could give. She didn't need the boys getting in the way or making a mess of her mother's house the way they did. They'd be happy to go swimming with their father and wouldn't even have to know there was a party they were missing.
Alone as she was, and unsure what to do with her time, Addy walked down to the park to sit in the shade,
watch the river ripple, and think her thoughts. But today her thoughts were cluttered and confused, and though it was not to say things would make
sense
to her by the end of the day, at least some of the things she was wondering would be availed of a reason. Like why Mrs. Lemoine and Mary Alice had been so concerned about the welts on her face. And why she'd been told to take the day off and not come back till after supper, and why Gabriel Green had looked the way he did when she came in the front door on Degge Street.
The bark on the maple behind her was sharp and informed her of a few bites on her shoulder blades she didn't even know she had. She squirmed and scratched her back against the tree, thinking she must look like an animal and maybe that's just what she was. She closed her eyes and, as often happened when she came here, L'il Leam whispered in her ear. “Hey, Sister. Why you think Mary Alice and her Mama acting so peculiar today?”
“I don't know. At first I thought I was just imagining. But Mary Alice
was
telling some lies.”
“Why though?”
“Must have something to do with Gabriel and me. He sure had a look on his face.”
“She'd like to match the two of you up, that's sure. Been trying for years.”
“He make a good husband do you think, Leam?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Best husband be one that loves his wife.”
“He could love me.” Addy was indignant at what Leam was implying. “I know he had that look on his face when he got close and smelled my ointment, but he's had other looks on his face too. I see him glance my way. I see him think his thoughts.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
Addy sighed and scratched her face and thought it was lovely when the wind blew a gentle gust her way. “Leam? You think it's fine I'm here in Chatham looking out for Mrs. Lemoine or you think I should be somewhere else?”
“Where else you like to be, Addy?”
“I don't know exactly. I suppose I just worry sometimes that I might get to the end of my life and think I should have done something I never did.”
“Done what?”
“I don't know. Something special, I guess.”
“Special? Good thing Daddy's not around to hear you talk like that. You know how he feels about people thinking they're special.”
“I know, but to live a life and never do anything
important
? Don't it seem like that's a life wasted?”
“I never did one important thing in my life, Addy. Not one. I don't like to think my life was wasted.”
“You're wrong, Leam. What you did important was you were good beyond measure and you made people happy and never complained when you was sick and never was cruel to any person and best of all, you loved Birdie Brown in a way that made her feel like she won a prize.”
“That's all just simple living though, Addy. Simple living.”
“Think simple living is special living?”
“I do.”
If her feet had seen her fate they might have hastened to take Addy past the train station months or even years earlier. As it was, she'd fallen asleep under the tree by the river and awoken feeling groggy and thick. She thought she'd walk for a while then head on over to Degge Street to catch a glimpse of Gabriel Green and see what Mary Alice was fixing for supper. She saw him then, sitting on the old wooden bench with his legs propped up on a luggage trolley, a newspaper opened in his hands. He wasn't wearing his uniform, but she'd recognized him, even a hundred feet away as he was. She'd hardly thought of that train ride from Windsor all those years ago, and only remembered him when she poked through her undergarment drawer and found the book he gave her, the one she never read.