Secrets of the Red Box (27 page)

When Glen arrived, she felt her heart flutter as he stepped through the door. He had on a
charcoal gray suit, a pale blue shirt, and a bold geometric-patterned tie with bits of blue, white, and
yellow. His shoes were shiny black loafers, and he sported a new fedora of dark gray felt. The tip of
a peaked yellow handkerchief inched out of the front breast pocket of his suit. Bonnie felt herse lf
gasp at the dashing sight of the man before her.
His dimpled smile glowed back at her. He leaned forward and kissed her cheek. “You look
amazing,” he said, stepping back to take her in.
Don and Irene hovered just behind Bonnie. Irene held her hands clasped together in front of
her waist, eyeing the young couple with a beaming smile. “Oh, I wish I had film in the Kodak.”
“They’re not going to the prom,” Don said under his breath.
“You two have a wonderful night,” Irene said as Glen helped Bonnie on with her coat.
“Thanks, we will.” Bonnie flashed a smile.
Glen escorted Bonnie to his father’s car and opened the door for her. He stopped her before she
entered, took her by the arms, and reeled her in. He kissed her, leaned back, and smiled. “Now you
can get in,” he said with a grin.
Bonnie touched his face and gave him an affectionate smile. “Imissed you.”
“Not half as much as I missed you.” Glen offered his hand as she slid into the front seat.
Glen started the car and pulled away from the curb. “I had an interesting meeting yesterday,” he
said with a cheerful sound in his voice, “about a job.”
“I thought you were going to school,” Bonnie said.
“Oh, I am, but I still need a job. My dad hooked me up with the son of one of his friends from
work. He’s in the insurance business.” Glen glanced at Bonnie for a second. “Did you know he
issued a policy out on a prize-winning horse? A horse. Can you imagine?”
Bonnie laughed. “How can you insure a horse?”
“I don’t know, but I guess you can.” Glen shrugged. “Andrew, that’s the insurance guy, said he
could insure just about anything.”
Bonnie nodded. “I heard Betty Grable’s legs are insured for a million dollars.”
“See? I guess you
can
insure almost anything.” Glen chuckled. “So, anyway, Andrew needs some
help because his business has grown so much lately. For now, it’s mostly filing and organizing for
him, answering the phone and things like that. But he wants me to learn more so I can help people
who call or come in if he’s busy. He gave me stacks of papers I need to read to learn about the
different types of policies, how to read actuary tables, and all sorts of things.”
“What’s an actuary table?”
“It’s a table that shows the probability of a person at a certain age dying before their next
birthday. It’s pretty interesting, really. There’s a lot of mathematical calculation involved,
probabilities, risk factors, all sorts of things. There’s a lot more to insurance than I thought.”
“You sound pretty excited about it,” she commented.
He gave another shrug. “I guess. Anyway, I start on Monday, and Andrew is willing to work
with my school schedule once I start.”
Bonnie touched his arm and smiled. “I think it sounds great,” she said.
Glen grinned. “Say, what are you doing all the way over there?”
Bonnie glanced at the distance between them and sidled up next to him. Glen wrapped his arm
around her shoulder. “That’s better,” he said and kissed her temple.
They drove for a little while contented in the quiet. Bonnie sighed softly and rested her hand on
his thigh. She felt so comfortable with him, as if they belonged together and to no one else. If she
never lived another moment, she’d be happier now than in all the years before combined.
“You know something?” Glen asked. “When I was growing up, I always felt a little alone. Ihad
my brother, and we got along pretty well, but I still felt alone. It’s kind of funny when you think
about it. How can you feel alone when you’re always around people? But I did. It was like there was
something missing inside. It got worse after my mom died. I just withdrew…sort of shut myself off.
I guess that’s why I didn’t like going to school much, didn’t go out much. I figured if I was going to
feel alone, I might as well
be
alone.” He kissed her on the temple again. “Now, I don’t feel like that
at all…not since I met you.”
Bonnie knew exactly what he meant. She didn’t feel alone either. For the first time in her life,
she felt as if she belonged to something, to someone, and that she would never be alone again.
“Irene told me about what happened to your mama,” she said softly.
Glen gripped the steering wheel harder. “I’d come home from school, expecting to find her in
the kitchen, like always.” His voice thinned and sounded hollow. “She wasn’t there and I saw the
door to the cellar open so I remembered, I was supposed to clean the clinkers out of the coalburning furnace. She’d asked me to do it before I left for school that morning, but I gave her some
excuse and sort of got mad at her for reminding me again.” He shuddered. “I was the one who
found her, lying at the bottom of the stairs, her neck twisted back, her eyes open.”
He flexed his grip against the steering wheel again and kept his gaze fixed on the road ahead. “I
knew she’d gone down to do my job, to clean out the furnace. Everyone tried to tell me it was an
accident. She could have gone downstairs for a bottle of peaches, or to collect the drying clothes on
the winter clothesline. But Iknew it was my fault she was dead.”
Bonnie felt her emotions well to the surface, feeling so sorry for Glen that she wished she could
take away his pain. “I sort of felt responsible for my mama, too. I mean, I couldn’t get her to leave
my father. She stayed even after I left. I begged her to come to Omaha, told her I’d pay her way
here.” Bonnie fell quiet and closed her eyes against the tears that began to form. “I failed her and
now she’s dead.”
“No… no…” Glen replied, his voice filled with empathy. He pulled to the curb, set the brake,
and turned to face her. He took her hands and held them tight. “Bonnie, you didn’t fail her. She
chose to stay. It wasn’t your fault.”
Bonnie blinked back her tears, the yellow shaft of street light illuminating the inside of the car
with a pale glow. Maybe he was right. Maybe she hadn’t failed her mother so much as her mother
had failed herself. And then she thought about Glen’s mother, knew Glen hadn’t failed her, either.
“It wasn’t your fault your mama went downstairs, Glen. You can’t hold yourself responsible for that.
You’ll never really know why she went down there, just as I’ll never know why my mama couldn’t
find the courage to leave.” She bit her bottom lip, then looked at him in the watery light. “Blame
doesn’t undo what’s been done. We need to let it go.”
Glen took her face in his hands, pressed his forehead to hers. “Oh, Bonnie…why couldn’t I
have met you years ago?”
His voice was soft and filled with a bittersweet pain that touched Bonnie’s soul. She kissed him,
a tender kiss meant to comfort him, to speak to him of her understanding. Her arms encircled his
neck. All the years of aching loneliness were gone from her, all the ugliness seemed to slip away. She
kissed him again. “Don’t ever leave me, Glen. Promise me,” she whispered.
“Never…I’ll never leave you, Bonnie.” He brushed his fingers over her brow, traced the li ne of
her jaw. “Not as long as I live.”
///////
Bonnie was surprised to see Irene still up when she came home. She was sitting in her chair
knitting, counting stitches as Bonnie entered. “You’re up late,” Bonnie said quietly.
Irene sighed and lowered her knitting to her lap. “Couldn’t sleep,” she said. “Sit down and tell
me about your evening.”
Bonnie took off her coat, laid it over the arm of the sofa and sat down. “We had a wonderful
dinner,” she said, her eyes sparkling. “Glen ordered a bottle of wine and we talked and talked. He
held my hand across the table…we laughed…it didn’t seem like any time had passed until the waiter
finally told us they were going to close soon. I guess Glen felt a little guilty and gave the waiter an
especially large tip for taking up one table most of the evening.”
“Sounds like you two are really hitting it off,” Irene said, pushing her knitting down on the
needle to put it away. “I’m glad. It’s good to see you so happy.”
Bonnie lowered her gaze. For a moment, she felt a flash of worry skittered through her mind. “I
am happy, Irene, for the first time in my life.” She raised her face. “It scares me to death. I haven’t
had a lot of good things happen in my life, and I’m so afraid of losing it.”
Irene moved forward in her chair. “Losing it? Why do you think that?”
Bonnie shook her head, pressed a palm to her forehead. “Because I don’t deserve it,” she
admitted softly. “I’ve done things…” She stopped herself, steeled her determination.
Irene’s voice was tender, maternal, as she reached across and took hold of Bonnie’s hand.
“Listen to me. You deserve to be happy. Everyone does. If Glen makes you happy, then you grab
on to that and don’t let go.” Irene shook Bonnie’s hand as if to drive some sense into her. “Let the
past stay there, Bonnie. Whatever’s happened, whatever makes you think you don’t deserve to be
happy, leave it back there. It doesn’t matter anymore.”
Bonnie wanted to believe Irene, wanted to think she deserved to be happy. “It’s just—”
“No,” Irene said firmly, shaking Bonnie’s hand again. “You want to know what I see?” She
smiled and drew Bonnie’s gaze to hers. “I see something in you I’ve never seen before. I see a light
shining in your eyes that wasn’t there until you met Glen. And I see the same thing in him. I think
you two have been a little lost up until now, and now that you’ve found each other, you belong to
something special. Am I right?”
Bonnie’s worry began to dissolve. She couldn’t help the smile that began to soften her mouth.
“Yes.”
“All right then,” Irene said, coming to her feet and bringing Bonnie with her. “You hold on to
that man with everything you’ve got. Trust him, Bonnie. He won’t let you down, I promise.”
Bonnie prayed Irene was right, hoped it was all true. Hadn’t she endured enough heartache to
last a lifetime? Wasn’t it her turn to enjoy some happiness? Couldn’t it be different just this once? “I
will,” she said, falling into Irene’s embrace. “I’ll trust him with my life.”

Sunday dinner was over. Most of the Orton family lounged in the living room or sat outside,
having stuffed their bellies full of roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, fresh-baked rolls,
and apple pie for desert. Bonnie washed dishes while Glen dried. It seemed to be a weekly event,
Bonnie insisting that the other women enjoy time away from the clean-up. They might have
suspected that it was a good excuse to have more time alone with Glen, not that she couldn’t find
other ways to be alone with him. She actually enjoyed their little routine, her washing, him drying,
talking quietly together, just the two of them. It made Bonnie feel connected to Glen in a strange,
domestic sort of way. She could imagine them standing in a kitchen of their own some day, years
and years from now, washing dishes together just as they were now.

“Do you know what Peggy told me this afternoon?” Bonnie asked with a whimsical smile.
“Little four-year-old Peggy?”
Glen curled the dishcloth into a glass and smiled. “What?”
“She told me words were shooting out of her toes.” Bonnie paused in her washing, cocked her
head, and laughed. “Can you imagine? Words shooting out of her toes?”
Glen chuckled. “She does have an imagination.”
“So I asked her, ‘What do the words say?’ She got this serious look on her face and stared me
right in the eyes. She said, ‘You can read, can’t you?’ I tried to keep a straight face and said, ‘Sure,
but why don’t you tell me what it says.’” Bonnie began to laugh again. “Dead serious, she said, ‘It
says, the cow jumped over the moon and landed in France’.”
Glen grinned, shook his head and put the dried glass away. “Whatever happens to our
imaginations? What do we do with them when we get so old we think we’re too smart for such wild
ideas? I think a world where words shoot out of our toes would be a pretty wonderful place to live.”
Bonnie swished another glass in the rinse water. “I think imagination is lost when innocence is
lost. One can’t exist without the other.”
“Oh, I don’t know I believe that,” he said, taking the glass from her hand. “Without imagination,
how do you account for all the inventions in the world, all the novels that have been written, all the
great paintings?”
“That’s not really imagination—that’s calculated creativity.”
Glen gave her a sideways glance. “Whatever that is.”
“Give me a four-year-old’s scribbled picture of a crooked house with a big sun over it any day to
a Rembrandt.”
Glen managed a snorting laugh. “Sure, but then, if Rembrandt drew like a four-year-old, it
wouldn’t be hanging in a museum.”
“I just mean that most great painters studied, they knew what they were doing, every stroke was
calculated. A child’s drawing is pure, absolutely pure. There’s no hidden message, no underlying
theme. It’s just a simple expression of delight.”
Glen studied her a moment. He flicked the dish towel over his shoulder and opened the
cupboard to put away the plates. “How many children would you like to have, Bonnie?”
The question so caught her off guard that Bonnie nearly choked. Her thoughts darkened and she
could smell the musty room hidden in the back of the shed, could feel the air saturated with her fear,
could see the young intern’s face beaded with sweat.
“Two, three?” he prodded when she didn’t answer right away.
Bonnie wiped her hands on the apron around her waist and turned from the sink. How could
she tell him? Would it make a difference in how he felt about her? Would he reject her if he knew?
“Four?” he continued with raised brows.
Bonnie shook her head, let her hands come together in front of her as if she was about to pray.
“I…I might not be able to have children,” she said quietly. “A doctor once told me so.”
It wasn’t really a lie, was it? A doctor had told her that. But she couldn’t bring herself to explain
why the doctor had made that pronouncement. Bonnie held her breath.
Glen came up behind her, wrapped his arms around her, and placed his cheek beside hers. He
held her for a moment and Bonnie shuddered inside, waiting for his response, for his rejection. But
they hadn’t discussed a future together really, not anything in concrete terms, nothing that would
indicate having children together. His silence drilled into her soul with a painful sting.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said sincerely. “It wouldn’t change the way I feel about you.”
Bonnie wanted to cry. He deserved so much more than she could give him. “But you’d be a
wonderful father,” she said, her eyes misting with tears. “Maybe you should—”
He turned her around, took her face in his hands. “Maybe nothing,” he said. “Whether I become
a father or not doesn’t matter, Bonnie. All I need is you.”
Her chin began to quiver and warm tears slid down her cheeks. How did he always know the
right things to say? She swallowed and covered her face with her trembling fingers.
Glen took her by the wrists and slowly withdrew her hands. He placed a knuckle beneath her
chin and raised her gaze to his. “I love you, Bonnie. And if you love me, I don’t need anything else.”
For a second, just a split second, the words seemed impossible to comprehend. Then the full
impact hit her in the center of the chest, nearly knocking her breathless. A penetration of warmth
spread through her, reaching the darkest recesses of her soul, lighting her with incredible joy. Bonnie
threw her arms around him, her tears turning to ones of happiness. “I do love you, Glen. I love with
you with all my heart.”
He pulled her against him, his arms strong and steady around her. Bonnie felt herself conform to
his body, mold to his shape. They fused together into one being, their love bonding them now,
making them stronger together than either one had been apart. She kissed him and knew nothing
would ever be the same again.
Glen took her face in his hands, studied her blue eyes. “I know now why I survived the war,” he
said quietly. “Iwas meant to find you.”
Bonnie blinked back her tears and felt her heart quicken. “And I came to Omaha so you could.”
He smiled and kissed her again. “I’ll thank God every day for you, Bonnie. Every single day I
live.”
Bonnie caressed his face, absorbing his essence through her fingertips. “You have no idea how
much you’ve changed my life,” she murmured. “I had nothing, and now… I have everything.”
She kissed him, feeling the light radiate from her, illuminating the two of them, filling the room
with love.
“Mom!” a young voice cried. “Glen and Bonnie are kissing!”
“Leave them alone!” Don called with a mild scold. “Get away from the kitchen.”
Bonnie and Glen laughed and turned back to the dishes. Glen slid his eyes toward Bonnie and
offered an impish grin. She slipped another dish beneath the rinse water and returned his grin.
“So, next Saturday’s the big moving day,” Glen said, wiping a dish dry with his towel.
She nodded. “Back in my own place,” she sighed. “I have to admit I’ve really enjoyed it here. It’ll
be hard to get up in the morning and not have breakfast with Irene, not sit around the kitchen table
at night for tea.” She scrubbed at a spot of dried gravy, then looked at Glen. “But it’ll be good to be
on my own again, and for Baby Girl to have the run of the apartment.”
Glen moved a stack of dried dishes to the cupboard. “You know, Aunt Irene will be expecting
you here every Sunday for dinner.”
“Maybe,” Bonnie said. She wanted to come, wanted to feel like a part of the family, but she
wasn’t really, no matter what Irene said.
“And Thanksgiving will be here before you know it, and so will Christmas,” he said with a wide
smile. “Some of my best memories are of family dinners at holiday time.”
Bonnie was quiet. She’d never celebrated Thanksgiving or Christmas with her parents. Even
after they moved to Long Beach, there were no turkey dinners or Christmas presents. She only
heard about such things secondhand from kids at school. “I imagine that would be something…”
Glen looked at her and she felt his thoughts penetrating her silence. She looked at him with a
fleeting smile. “We didn’t…Inever…”
Glen placed his hand on her shoulder. She could see the regret on his face. “I’m sorry…I wish I
could have made that different for you.” He smiled and kissed her cheek. “Maybe we can ma ke up
for it this year, huh?”
Maybe so, she thought. Maybe now life would be all she’d ever hoped it would be. She’d never
be alone again, never feel abandoned or unloved. Her entire life had changed in the blink of an eye.
Everything she’d thought would make her happy meant nothing now. Finally, she realized that being
loved by someone, and loving in return, was what she’d been looking for all along.
///////
Closing the apartment door, Glen waved goodbye to the last of the Ortons. He let out a breath,
relieved that everything was now in place. He turned to Bonnie with a smile. “I’ll help you unpack
the boxes,” he said.
“No, no, just as I told the others, I’ll take care of that. You’ve all done more than enough getting
me moved in.” Bonnie pawed through a box in search of something. “Why don’t you go on home?
You must be tired.”
He was tired, but he didn’t want to go home. He hated the thought of leaving Bonnie alone in
her new apartment. It wasn’t that he feared for her safety—he just didn’t want to be without her. He
lay awake nights thinking about her, dreamed about her, yearned to take her. But he wouldn’t do
that. She deserved his respect, his patience, his endurance even if it nearly killed him. He wanted her
more than any woman he’d ever known, but he wanted her the right way, the way he’d been raised
to believe was correct.
“What are you looking for?” he finally asked, ignoring her question.
“Baby Girl’s dishes,” she replied, moving to another box. “I found her food and thought they
would be in the same box.”
“Speaking of Baby Girl, is it safe to let her out of the bathroom now?”
Bonnie didn’t look up from her search. “Yes, thanks.”
Glen walked to the bathroom door. “Ba-a-a-by Gir-r-r-l,” he called. “What are you doing in
there all alone?”
He inched open the door, expecting to find the kitten anxious to get out of her confined space.
His eyes scanned the sparse room, looking for the cat to respond. He didn’t see her. There was only
the bathtub, a toilet, and a pedestal sink in the tiny room. No cabinets or closets to hide in. Glen’s
heart sank with a sharp plunge. “Bonnie? She’s not in here.”
He walked the short distance to the living room and saw Bonnie frozen in fear. “She has to be,”
she said, darting by him. “I put her in there myself.”
Glen came up behind Bonnie and peered over her shoulder. “Maybe someone used the
bathroom and accidently let her out.”
He didn’t like the look in her eyes, didn’t like the panic that seemed to overtake her.
Bonnie swung from the bathroom, her eyes welling with tears. “What if she got outside? She
wouldn’t know how to come back. She might get run over—”
Glen took hold of her. “She’s probably in here somewhere,” he said calmly. “I’ll bet she snuck
into a box or a closet with all the commotion.”
Bonnie clung to his arms, her eyes flashing with fear. “I can’t lose her…I can’t lose her…if I do,
I’ll die…”
“You won’t lose her,” he assured her. “You look in the bedroom and I’ll look around outside.”
Bonnie raced to a box and pulled out a sack of kibble. “Here,” she said, thrusting the bag toward
him. “Take this and shake it. She loves her food. Maybe she’ll come to you.” Suddenly, she took
back the bag. “No, I’d better do it. She knows the sound of my voice.”
Glen didn’t argue. She was probably right. But then he thought that the two of them looking
together had a better chance of finding the cat. “I’ll come with you,” he said, racing her to the door.
The apartment building consisted of three stories, with a centrally located staircase in the middle
of each floor; the apartments surrounding the four walls of the building. Glen knew that cats
instinctively like to go up and wondered if Baby Girl had wandered to the third floor from Bonnie’s
apartment on the second floor.
“I’ll check the third floor,” he said, taking the stairs two at a time.
He tried to remain calm, his heart pounding. He didn’t want to scare the cat should he find her,
but more importantly, he didn’t want to further alarm Bonnie. Glen hated the way she had looked at
him, the fear in her eyes, the tears. His heart wrenched. He had to find that cat, had to alleviate
Bonnie’s panic and make everything all right again.
He walked softly along the third-floor landing, calling the cat with an encouraging tone. He
checked every recess and doorway, every corner of the floor. Nothing. A prayer left his lips,
something he’d only done while embroiled in combat.
Please let me find this cat. Let me find it for Bonnie.
He went to the second floor and the first, searching them before he joined Bonnie outside. It
was cool as the sun began to fade in the autumn sky, casting plum-colored shadows about the tan
brick building. He heard Bonnie calling her cat, her voice strained, broken by gasps and tears. Again,
his heart lurched, torn by the helpless feelings he countered with his need to find the cat. Once he
found Baby Girl, Bonnie would be all right—everything would be all right.
“Where have you looked?” he asked, coming around the corner of the building.
She spun, her face streaked with tears, her eyes desperate. “Everywhere,” she blurted, smudging
the tears from her cheeks. “I can’t find her.”
Glen couldn’t stand to see Bonnie in pain. He wanted to hold her, to make everything better, but
he wasn’t ready to give up the search yet. “We’ll keep looking,” he said firmly. “If she’s out here, she
can’t have gone far.”
“What if she’s lost? What if someone saw her and took her? What if—”
“Listen to me,” he said, taking her by the shoulders. “We’ll find her.” He wasn’t as sure as he
sounded. “It’s getting dark. Let me look out here and you try the apartment.”
Bonnie sniffed back her tears and nodded. “All right. I’ll check with you in a few minutes.”
Glen took the bag of kibble and kissed her. “Try not to worry, babe. We’ll find your kitty.”
Registering a flicker of the pleased look on her face when he’d called her “babe”, he wondered
why he had called her that. And then he remembered hearing his father use the endearment when
referring to his mother. He decided he liked it. It seemed to fit.
He realized now that it was more than just wanting to be with Bonnie—he wanted to take care
of her. He wanted to love her and protect her and try to make babies with her. If they weren’t able
to have children, maybe they could adopt. Either way, he knew without question now that he
wanted to marry her.
///////
Bonnie returned to the apartment, her heart aching with the thought of losing Baby Girl. She
couldn’t face the possibility of never seeing her again. Tears kept welling in her eyes. At times, she
wanted to stop and wail, fall to the floor, and cry out in anger and pain. But she pushed down those
feelings, hoping she would still find the kitten. She had to keep looking until every corner of the new
apartment had been searched.
She closed the door behind her and took fresh courage that she would find Baby Girl
somewhere in the apartment. Calling as she searched the living room, Bonnie methodically peered
beneath furniture, looked in opened moving boxes, checked behind curtains, did everything but pick
up the rugs to look underneath.