Earl turned to Addy, puzzled. “You lived in this town?”
Addy nodded. “Grew up on Fowell Street. Right next door to the Williams'.”
Isaac nodded too and pretended not to recollect how and why she left. “That's right. We were neighbours.”
Earl thumped on Isaac's truck. “Well how's that for a coincidence?”
Isaac laughed. “In a town small as Rusholme we don't call it coincidence. We just call it life. You're bound to run into someone you know when you know everyone.” He turned back to Addy, asking casually, “What brings you back to Rusholme, Addy?”
Earl answered for her. “We thought to take a drive on the lake road and just never kept track of the time.” He didn't mind the nostalgia except that there was the matter of rescuing his fine car from the ditch. “You say you think you can rig up a tow?”
Isaac gestured at the cab of his truck. “Got room for one of you up front here. Not such a comfortable ride in the back but it's mostly dry, and I'll drive slow. We can go back to my place and get some rope for a hitch while you ladies have a visit with my wife.”
Earl couldn't picture himself sitting in the back of the old truck and didn't much want to leave the Caddy alone. “I'll wait here.”
Nedda giggled and squirmed as Isaac lifted her up into the truck, but Sharla was quiet and serious. She'd seen the change in Mum Addy, from dreamy confusion to just plain confusion, and she wondered what the rest of the visit to Rusholme would bring.
The truck motor purred and the tires hummed on the wet pavement, but none of it seemed real. Addy sat quietly in the passenger seat thinking, Yes, look at the strawberry fields dotted with plump red fruit. And over there, that army of young cornstalks. No one'd believe they'd grow taller than the tallest man in just a few weeks. And the old brick homes and the closed-by-the-rain fruit stands and the wide blue lake beyond. Yes. Rusholme. Yes.
The truck rounded a curve and the church, preserved by the Lord and the generous donations of parishioners, appeared before them. Addy heard herself say, “Mind stopping, Isaac? Just for a moment?”
Isaac figured, rightly, that she wanted to visit her dead in the cemetery and he turned into the church parking lot like that had always been their destination.
Sharla and Nedda were told to stay in the back of the truck and they didn't mind. Neither was interested in the gravestones, and Sharla didn't want to see her Mum looking strange-eyed like she had before. Nedda amused herself with the stick she'd brought along. Sharla tried to ignore the prickly sensation at the nape of her neck.
Isaac helped Addy out of the truck but did not accompany her beyond the willow tree to the edge of the yard. He wondered briefly if she knew her mother'd gone down South and it was only Leam and her Daddy in the ground there now.
“Leamâ¦? Leamâ¦?” Addy called out silently. “Leamâ¦?” But he did not come. In all the years she'd known him, she hardly ever had to call Leam twice. He'd always been there, watching over her shoulder, just like he promised when they were children that first time he rose from the dead. A chill ran through Addy, for she didn't know what it meant that he was gone. She looked at the gravestones of her brother and, beside that, her father. She closed her eyes, remembering how they all once were, in the little house with the matching lace curtains.
This was something else she'd not expected. She'd longed to return to the cemetery to stand at Leam's stone again, but the thing seemed now not a dwelling, but just a stone. And looking at her father's grave, she felt not remorse or anger, just a little sad it'd taken so long for her to find forgiveness. She turned back to see Isaac Williams and the girls waiting in the truck. She whispered a good
bye, just in case anyone was listening, then, breathing in the scent of the lake, found her path back through the wet green grass.
In the truck again, with Isaac quiet and uncertain beside her, Addy watched for the landmarks. She pointed at the big house on the cliff. “Still there. Kept up nice, too.”
“Bishops'?” Isaac said. “Oh sure. Teddy died years ago, of course, but Jonas and Camille kept it going till they passed on and now their son, my brother-in-law in fact, lives there with his wife and little one.”
Addy looked at the big house, remembering. She heard what Isaac said like an echo and inquired, “
Camille
and
Jonas
?”
Isaac glanced at her, surprised she didn't know. “Jonas Johnson. Sure. Him and Camille got married young. Weren't you still around?”
Addy shook her head.
“He was bootlegging for Teddy over to Sandwich for a time, but then he came home. They always do.”
“I suppose they do.”
Isaac turned to look at her. “This can't be your first trip back to Rusholme.”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“But you been living in Chatham all this time? Since you left?”
“Mostly. Mmm-hmm. And out at the Lakeview.”
Isaac didn't ask why she hadn't ever come back when she lived so close. He had a good idea why. Though he was
younger by six years, Isaac knew the story of Addy Shadd like a parable from the Bible. He'd told the story to his wife, Rochelle, that night after dinner at The Satellite. Isaac also didn't ask why Addy was returning now, even though it seemed unlikely she and that man Earl had just been driving and lost track of the time like he said. Isaac believed there was a reason for all things.
“What happened to Josephine, Isaac? She stay in Rusholme?”
“She got married off to a friend of Teddy's down in Chicago. She never had children, but she had some fine fur coats and liked to lord that over Camille. She came back about fifteen years ago, for Camille's funeral. She was skin and bones. Like a skeleton. You wouldn't have guessed it was her.”
Addy thought of that Strawberry Sunday when she was fifteen years old and Chester Monk broke her heart by asking Camille Bishop for a stroll. She mused, “Jonas Johnson and Camille Bishop. Jonas and Camille. I suppose they had a number of children?”
“Just had the two, actually. Rochelle, my wife, she was the first, then her brother, well he came along as a surprise, many years later. Some thought it a littleâ¦wellâ¦what with Camille being grey and Jonas so sick with the diabetes. Rochelle's been more a mother than sister really.”
“Rochelle, that's your wife. That's Camille and Jonas's daughter?”
“That's right.”
Addy wagged her head. “It's a small world, just like they say.”
Isaac shrugged. “It's Rusholme.”
As they drove, Addy wanted to beg Isaac to slow down, to let her out so she could walk, to stop the earth from turning altogether, for even though it was slow motion, time was still moving much too fast. Addy hadn't known she would say it until the words were already in the air. “Did I see Chester Monk's grave down by the Rusholme crick?”
“Chester? Oh yes. He came back here, when was that? Not so long ago. Sometime in the early sixties, I believe.”
“But I thoughtâ¦it was said that Chester drowned in the Detroit River.”
“It was said wrong. Chester came back fit and fine. He'd been living down the States someplace. His wife passed on and I guess he just longed to come home. He did well for himself. Built that big house for his daughter's and his grandchildren's summer visits. You see the place?”
Once Addy began to shake her head she could not stop. Chester had lived? Chester had
lived.
Not only had Chester lived, but he'd lived
here
for years, just miles away on Lake Erie, until not so long ago.
Isaac misunderstood Addy's puzzlement. “Oh it's hard to see all right. Pretty secluded back there with the trees and all. Nice house though. And when he died, well, he wanted to be buried near the crick instead of the cemetery.”
Addy felt heat in her cheeks, remembering Chester and
their youth and the things she'd thought about him and the way she'd planned for their future. She whispered to Mose in her heart, “Don't be mad, Mose. You're my true love, but he was my first.”
Addy didn't know she was grinning until Isaac asked, “What? Something funny?”
“No,” Addy said. “Just a little strange to be here after all this while. I believed Chester drowned with my brother. I'm glad to know he didn't and that he had a wife and children who loved him.”
Isaac slowed down as they came into the town. “Few of the old houses left, Addy.” He knew what she was thinking. “Yours is gone. Ours next door too. They got a museum going up on the Fowell block where we used to live.”
“A museum? That right?”
“Government's designating Rusholme as a historical sight and putting up a museum dedicated to the Reverend Mills and the original settlers.”
Addy nodded, impressed, and thought of what Verilynn Rippey'd snidely said all those years ago about how someone should write a book about Rusholme.
“Earl your husband?” Isaac asked.
“Earl? No. No. He's just a friend.”
“You ever marry, Adelaide?”
“Yes. Yes, I did. I married a good man called Mose. He died some time ago.”
“I'm sorry.”
Addy nodded.
“And childrenâ¦?” Isaac asked. He'd known for sure about the one.
Addy couldn't tell him about her sweet baby Leam or explain how her beloved daughter Chick had died with her father. She smiled sadly and shook her head. Then she remembered suddenly. “Birdie? What about Beatrice Brown?”
Isaac laughed. “Birdie Brown? Well she taught school here for about a hundred years. She taught my children and their children and we all thought she'd go one more generation but she retired down to Florida last year.”
“Married?”
“Never.”
“Never?” Addy couldn't believe it, until she remembered the way Birdie had loved her good brother Leam. Addy was still thinking of Birdie when Isaac pulled into the driveway of a modest brick home. His wife, the woman Addy'd seen before in the restaurant, came out the door at once, curious about the strangers in her husband's truck. She recognized Addy right off and smiled in that easy way a person does when they want you to know they'd never judge.
Up close, the resemblance between Rochelle Williams and her mother, Camille, was uncanny. Addy had the sense she was being greeted not by a stranger but a grown-up friend from her past, one ripe and sweetened with time.
“This is my wife, Rochelle. Rochelle, like you to meet Addy Shadd. You remember, I told you about her after weâ”
“Of course.” Rochelle Williams took Addy's hand, looked into her eyes, and scrunched her nose. “I know. I look just like my mother. I've heard it all my life.”
“I bet you have.”
“Thank the Lord I took after my mother and not my Aunt Josephine.”
Addy nearly laughed, for Camille and Josephine were identical twins, but she saw Rochelle Williams was not joking.
Isaac went to find his rope as Rochelle caught sight of the suddenly shy little girls in the back of the truck. “Well who do we have here?”
Sharla and Nedda looked up, guilty.
Addy smiled. “That's Sharla there, and that's her neighbour friend, Nedda.”
Rochelle smiled warmly but looked twice at Sharla Cody, like she was trying to decide something. After a moment she said, “Well, I happen to have some cookies just out of the oven.” She turned to Addy, explaining, “My three-year-old nephew's coming over and he doesn't get cookies at home. Not fresh baked anyway.” She smiled at the girls again. “You girls like a cookie?”
Nedda clapped her hands. “Yeah!”
Sharla checked in with Mum Addy and waited for the nod before she said, “Yes please, Ma'am.”
The women settled at the kitchen table where they could see Sharla and Nedda through the big picture window. The girls were in the backyard munching cookies and taking turns on a tire swing hung on the limb of a huge old
maple. Addy prayed the girls wouldn't start fighting and embarrass her. She listened, genuinely interested and not a little envious, as Rochelle described her children and grandchildren. “And of course there's little Otis. He's my nephew, but he's like my grandson. I couldn't say whose block he was chipped off, my brother or my sister-in-law, since they're both a trial, but he's a darlin', my little Otis.”
“Is your brother's wife from Rusholme?”
Rochelle shook her head and poured black coffee into large mugs. “Windsor.” She lowered her voice. “She's white. But she's all right. Not, well, not, you know, but she's all right.”
Addy understood what Rochelle meant and nodded. She wondered out loud how things were progressing with Isaac and Earl and the Caddy in the ditch.
Rochelle rose to tend to the big pink ham in her oven. “We got plenty of room to put you up for the night.”
“Oh thank you, but we'd never impose.”
Rochelle basted her ham without turning around. “You'd do the same, wouldn't you? So if they can't get the car tonight, you'll stay over and take care of things in the morning.”
The women sipped their coffee and watched the girls swing on the tire. The front door opened and the sound of a screaming youngster pierced the quiet. The child ran bawling into the kitchen and into his aunt's waiting arms. Rochelle kissed the head of dark curls and whispered, “What's wrong, Darlin'? What is it?”
The boy extracted his face from his aunt's ample bosom just long enough to point a dirty finger at the pretty young white woman who'd followed him in. He opened his mouth and unleashed his vitriol, but no one in the room could make out a single word. The young woman set a casserole dish of baked beans on the stove and plopped down in a chair after nodding to Addy something between a greeting and an apology.
Rochelle spoke over the crying boy's head. “Addy, this is my brother's wife, Tracy Johnson. And this here is Otis, but I still don't know what's wrong with my baby. Do I?” She held him close.