The Seventh Mother (13 page)

“T
hat’s really pretty,” Lashaundra said, watching me dab paint onto a candle.

We were making Valentine’s Day presents for our moms. I was kind of proud of mine. The lines were clean and straight. I hoped Emma would like it.

“Yours is good, too,” I said.

Lashaundra’s candle was sort of a mess.

She shook her head. “No, mine’s not near as pretty as yours.”

I smiled at her. “I think your mom will love it.”

She smiled back. It felt so good to have a friend.

“All right, ladies. It’s time to start putting things away.”

Mrs. Hensley walked from table to table, inspecting our work.

“Why, that’s beautiful, Jenny,” she said. “Just beautiful.”

She turned to look at Lashaundra’s. “Yours is nice, too, Lashaundra.”

We closed the paint cups and started washing the paintbrushes.

“Just leave your candles on the shelf here to dry. Next week we’ll make something for your fathers,” Mrs. Hensley said. “And then we’ll make wrapping paper for your gifts, just in time for Valentine’s Day!”

Mrs. Johnson was waiting outside the library for us.

“Did you have fun?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” I said.

“What did you make?”

“It’s a surprise,” Lashaundra said.

“I want a surprise!” Malcolm yelled.

“It’s not a surprise for you,” Lashaundra said. “It’s for Mama.” He stuck his tongue out at her.

“Well, I can’t wait to see it.” Mrs. Johnson smiled at us. “Jenny, are you having supper with us tonight?”

“No, thank you. I can’t,” I said. “I’m helping Emma make vegetable soup.”

Mrs. Johnson dropped me off in front of our house, and I ran inside to find Emma stretched out on the couch, fast asleep and snoring. She woke up when she heard me and smiled, sitting up and rubbing her eyes.

“Are you okay?” I asked. I’d never seen Emma asleep during the day before.

“I’m just tired,” she said. “Being pregnant makes you tired, I guess.”

We chopped carrots and onions and potatoes for the soup. “Should we add some sage?” I asked.

Emma looked up at me like she was surprised.

“I’m sorry,” I stammered.

“It’s okay,” she said, smiling and reaching for the spice drawer. “I never put sage in my soup before. Where did you learn to cook?”

I shook my head, my cheeks reddening.

“Jenny, honey, it’s okay if someone else taught you to make soup. Was it Jackie?”

I shook my head. “Jackie didn’t like to cook.”

“Oh.” Her voice was soft.

“Before Jackie lived with us, and before Trish, there was Cara.”

I didn’t look up at her. I didn’t want to see her face. I didn’t want to tell her about Cara or Jackie or Trish or Ami. I wished I’d never volunteered to help with the soup.

“And Cara taught you to make soup?”

I nodded.

“Well,” she said, “I’ll be glad to use her recipe if you liked it.”

I looked up at her then and she smiled at me.

“It’s okay,” she repeated, her voice gentle. “I know your dad had friends before me. That’s his past. It doesn’t matter now.”

She put an arm around my shoulder and kissed my cheek.

“He didn’t marry any of them,” she said. “He married me.”

I smiled at her in relief.

“Cara put thyme in the soup, too.”

“Well, then, get me some thyme.”

We’d just put the soup on the stove when we heard Daddy at the front door.

“How’s my favorite girl?” he asked, kissing me on the head.

“I’m good,” I said.

“And how’s my other favorite girl?” He kissed Emma on the mouth.

“I’m okay,” she said, yawning. “Tired, but okay. Did you get all your stuff?”

“It’s in the truck.”

“Do you need help bringing it in?” Emma wiped her hands on a dish towel.

“Jenny can help me.”

“I can help, too,” Emma said, laughing.

“No heavy lifting for you, pregnant lady.”

Daddy kissed her again and nodded at me. “Come on, Jenny.”

I put on my parka and followed him out to the driveway, and we began carrying boxes and bags inside. Pretty soon the living room looked like a small warehouse.

“Where are we going to put all this stuff?” I asked.

“Some of it in the basement and the rest in the attic.”

Daddy walked back outside and returned carrying a big wooden rocking chair. Pale pink-and-yellow cushions covered the seat and back. He put the chair in the corner, right next to the fireplace. It looked like it belonged there, like it had been there forever.

“Hey, that’s beautiful.” Emma touched the wood with one finger. “But it needs a good dusting.”

She disappeared into the kitchen and returned with furniture polish and a rag. Before long, the oak wood of the rocker gleamed.

“That was Hailey’s,” Daddy said softly, looking at the rocker with a small smile. “When she was pregnant with Jenny, she used to rock in it all the time, just singing to her belly. And then when Jenny was born, she rocked Jenny in it.”

“That was my mom’s?”

I sat down in the chair, running my hand over the smooth wooden arm.

“It’s beautiful,” Emma repeated. “And you kept it all these years.”

“I couldn’t get rid of it.” Daddy put his arm around her shoulder. “Most of the stuff I had before we started moving around, I sold. But this . . . this I had to keep.”

Emma kissed his cheek and stroked his face. He smiled at her with tears in his eyes.

“And now you can rock our baby in it,” he said.

She nodded and I could see tears sparkling in her eyes, too.

“Is this everything?” she asked after a minute, surveying the stacks of boxes strewn around the room.

“Yep, everything we own in the world is right here. It’s not too much,” Daddy said, shaking his head. “But it’s enough.”

I got out of the chair, walked up to a box on top of a stack of boxes, and began tearing away at the masking tape holding it closed.

“Not now, Jenny,” Daddy said, his hand on my shoulder. “The unpacking can wait till tomorrow. I’m going to have to go through all of these boxes and figure out what goes where. And Lord knows there will be a lot of things to pitch. But right now, I think I’m going to take a shower. I’m beat.”

“I’ll bet you are,” Emma said, kissing his cheek. “Soup’s on, so whenever you’re ready, we’ll eat.”

“Thanks, babe.”

Daddy smiled at her and disappeared into the bathroom. Pretty soon we heard the water running in the shower.

“Come on,” Emma said. “Help me set the table.”

We ate vegetable soup with sourdough bread Emma bought at the bakery.

“This is really good, babe,” Daddy said, ladling a second helping of soup into his bowl.

“Jenny helped me with the spices,” she said, winking at me. “It’ll be even better this summer, when we have vegetables fresh from our garden.”

He grinned at her. “I guess then we’ll be Old MacDonald and his wife.”

“And their daughter,” I said.

“The whole MacDonald clan then.” He nodded, laughing.

He rose suddenly and walked into the living room, returning with a photograph in his hand.

“I thought you might get a kick out of this.”

He handed the picture to Emma. She looked at it for a minute, and then snorted.

“Oh my God!”

She held the picture out to me. It was Daddy, but he was much younger in the picture. His long hair was dyed blondish with black ends, and it was slicked back in the front. In the back it was short and spiky.

“That’s funnier than a pig on a swing.” Emma winked at me and I started laughing, too.

Daddy stared at us, confused.

“What did you say?”

“I said, ‘That’s funnier than a pig on a swing.’ ”

Emma threw her head back and laughed out loud, and that made me laugh even harder.

“Okay,” Daddy said, “what are you two on?”

That just made both of us laugh even harder. I laughed so hard I thought I might pee my pants.

“Hey!” Daddy rose, his face dark, his voice almost angry.

I stopped laughing.

“Just exactly what is so funny?”

Emma winked at me again and stood, taking Daddy’s hand in hers.

“So this morning, we met our neighbor,” she said quietly. “The old lady next door. She’s kind of wonderful and pretty much . . . well, I guess you’d say she’s a little bit eccentric.”

“She has a whole bunch of pets,” I chimed in. “Dogs and cats and a pig even! Some of them are alive and a lot of them are dead and . . . stuffed.”

“Stuffed?” Daddy looked more confused than ever.

“Taxidermy,” Emma said, reaching for his hand. “Every pet she’s ever owned is there. She has them stuffed and puts them all over the house.”

Daddy sat back down in his chair, staring from Emma to me.

“She sounds crazy,” he said finally.

“I know!” I yelled triumphantly.

“I think she’s just really lonely,” Emma said, sitting back down in her chair. “She never had any kids, so the animals are her babies. And . . . and when they die she has them stuffed and keeps them. Like I said, she’s a little bit eccentric.”

“She has a pig in the kitchen,” I said. “A stuffed pig; it’s dead. But when it was alive, her husband made a swing for it, a baby swing.

“Seriously,” I said, because Daddy was staring at me now as if I was crazy, too. “He put up a swing. And the pig, her name was Petunia, she loved the swing. Honest, Daddy, that’s what Mrs. Figg said. The pig loved being in the swing.”

He shook his head, but he was smiling now.

“So,” he said, looking from me to Emma, “so I’m as funny as that pig in a swing?”

“No,” Emma said, “you’re not that funny. But God, Brannon, look at your hair!”

She took the picture back from me and smiled at it.

“You were beautiful,” she said softly. “Not as beautiful as you are now, but damn, honey, you were hot!”

B
rannon was already sorting through boxes when I got up the next morning.

“You want some help with that? I’ve got time before my shift.”

I was already dressed for work.

“No thanks,” he said, not looking up from the folder that lay open in his lap. “I’ve got it covered.”

“Angel says it’s okay if Jenny comes to their house while I’m at work. I can drop her on my way, if you want.”

“That would be great.”

Still, he didn’t look up.

“Brannon?”

“Yeah?” Finally, he raised his eyes.

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.” He smiled, set aside the folder, and rose to hug me.

“Sorry,” he said. “I guess I’m just kind of distracted with all this.” He nodded toward the boxes.

“It’s okay.”

“I’ll have all of it put away by the time you get home tonight.”

“Have you found any more pictures you want to share?” I smiled at him.

“After the whole pig-on-a-swing bit? I think I’ll just keep my pictures to myself, thanks.”

“Are you sure you can get all these boxes up into the attic?” I asked. “It might help to have an extra set of hands.”

“I’ll be fine.” He kissed me. “You just go on to work and I’ll get this stuff sorted out and put away.”

I dropped Jenny off at the Johnsons’ and went to work, still feeling a little bit groggy. I hadn’t slept well the night before.

“Did you hear?” Resa asked as soon as I walked into the diner.

“Hear what?” I asked.

She followed me to the back room where I hung my coat on a hook.

“The sheriff’s saying Damon’s accident might not have been an accident at all.”

“What?” My eyes widened. “Why does he think that?”

“Good Lord, Resa,” Harlan’s voice bellowed from the kitchen. “Don’t you go starting no rumors now. Wiley said it’s possible, but he still thinks it’s more likely Damon had an accident. God knows he was drunk enough in here that night. And after he left here, he went to the tavern and drank some more.”

“Well, but what about those tire marks?” Resa put her hands firmly on her hips.

“Could be a coincidence,” Harlan said.

“What tire marks?” I asked.

“There were two sets of tire marks on the road. One of them was Damon’s. But they don’t know whose the others were.”

“Could have been someone swerving to avoid Damon,” Harlan said. “Or those other marks could have been there a long time before. No one knows for sure.”

He waved a spatula at Resa over the stove. “What this town don’t need is you spreading rumors and talking crazy. Poor Shirley’s got enough on her hands without worrying over whether it was an accident or not. Just leave it alone, Resa.”

She shook her head at me, her lips pursed together, and said in a low voice, “I know what I heard. Wiley ain’t convinced it was an accident.”

“But who would drive Damon off the road?” I asked, swallowing hard, forcing myself to breathe.

“Who knows?” Resa said. She tied an apron around her waist and patted her bleached-blond hair. “A lot of folks around here didn’t like Damon, that’s for sure. He was a mean old cuss. Just a couple weeks ago he fired three men from the car lot. Said they weren’t making their sales quotas. More likely he was just in a foul mood.”

She shook her head darkly. “A lot of people had it in for Damon.”

“Will you please stop with the gossip and open the shop?” Harlan yelled from the kitchen. “I ain’t paying you to run a gossip mill.”

“You ain’t paying me diddly squat,” Resa shot back, winking at me.

The day seemed to drag on and on. Business was slow for a Sunday, and I had plenty of time to wonder about who might have run Damon Rigby off the road. Brannon had been gone a long time that night. And he was certainly furious at Damon. But still, I couldn’t imagine Brannon ever hurting anyone. Sure, he got mad sometimes, but this was Brannon. I’d known some violent men in my life, and Brannon was nothing like any of them.

“Emma!” Harlan’s voice broke through the noise in my head. “Order’s up.”

I took the plates from the counter and carried them to the booth by the front door.

“I asked for ketchup,” a boy in the booth said.

“And I wanted onion rings, not fries,” said another.

“I’m sorry. I’ll take care of that right away.”

“You okay?” Harlan asked when I returned to the kitchen for the onion rings.

I nodded. “I’m just tired,” I said.

And it was true, I was tired. I was tired and anxious and worried. My stomach churned and my head ached.

“Don’t you let Resa get you all upset,” Harlan said. “She’s got a big mouth and too much time on her hands. Everyone knows Damon was drunk as a skunk that night. He didn’t need any help driving his car into that ravine.”

“It’s just so awful to even think about. That someone might do something like that.”

“The world is full of awful, Emma. But there’s more good than bad. That’s what I think, anyway.”

We had just locked the front door when someone knocked on it loudly.

“Who is that?” Harlan yelled from the kitchen.

“It’s the sheriff,” Resa yelled back.

She unlocked the door and a man in a uniform walked in.

“Hey, Wiley,” Resa said. “You need some coffee to go?”

“Not tonight, Resa,” the sheriff said. “I just wanted to ask Emma here a couple questions about last week, the night Damon was killed.”

“Sure thing,” Resa said. “You got any new leads?”

“Resa McCoy, you sound like you think you’re on
Law and Order
. Let the man ask his questions and be done with it.” Harlan stood in the middle of the restaurant, a dish towel over his shoulder.

“It won’t take but a minute,” Wiley said.

He looked at me and raised his eyebrows.

“You okay to answer some questions, Emma?”

I nodded. I had served Wiley and his wife several times at the diner.

“Were you here last Wednesday night?”

I nodded again.

“Can you tell me anything about that night?” He opened a notebook and stood with his pen poised.

“Well,” I stammered. “Damon’s son was in earlier, and he was making kind of a commotion.”

“He was teasing some girls who were here, right?”

I nodded. “My stepdaughter, Jenny, and her friend Lashaundra. I guess he and Lashaundra had a run-in at school, and he was being pretty rude to her.”

“And then what happened?”

“Resa told him to behave himself or she was going to call his mother.”

Wiley grinned at Resa and winked. “I’ve heard that threat before.”

Resa smiled back. “Honey, everyone who’s ever been in here has heard that threat.”

The sheriff nodded and turned back to me. “And then . . . ?”

“Then Jasper and his friends left.”

“What happened later?”

I looked from Harlan to Resa. I knew they had already answered the same questions. I wondered if either of them had mentioned Damon’s not-so-veiled threat.

“Damon came in just before closing,” I said. “He was pretty mad and he yelled at Resa, said she’d kicked Jasper out of the restaurant. Resa told him what had happened, and then he made a comment about race mixing, because of Jenny and Lashaundra. And Harlan told him to leave.”

The sheriff nodded and made some more notes.

“Did you smell alcohol on Damon when he was here?” He looked up at me.

“Yes,” I said. “He smelled like bourbon and cigarettes.”

“Well, bourbon was Damon’s poison of choice, that’s for sure.”

He smiled at me. “Thank you, Emma. I’m just covering all the bases.”

“What about them tire marks?” Resa said.

“Probably a coincidence,” Wiley said. “No evidence at the scene of anything but an accident.”

“There,” Harlan said, flicking Resa with the towel. “I told you it was an accident. Now maybe you can stop with all the gossip and concentrate on your job.”

“So that’s it?” Resa asked. She sounded a bit disappointed. “It was just an accident?”

“That’s what it looks like,” Wiley said. “Sorry to disappoint you, Resa.” He laughed.

“I am not at all disappointed, Wiley Ruben!” Resa sounded indignant now. “Lord knows I didn’t
want
it to be murder. No one would want that.”

“You’re right,” Harlan said flatly. “No one at all would want that.”

I picked up Jenny from the Johnsons’ on my way home, grateful that I had put a chicken in the Crock-Pot before I’d left for work. I was bone-tired and the thought of cooking was almost too much to bear.

“Hey, Emma.” Angel smiled at me in the doorway. “You look half-dead.”

“That’s about how I feel.” I sank gratefully onto the couch in the living room.

“The girls are upstairs,” she said. “Do you want a cup of tea or a soda?”

“No, thanks, Angel. I’m okay.”

“Well, I wanted to tell you something before the girls come down.” She sat down beside me on the couch.

“The sheriff was here earlier, asking about the night Damon Rigby died.”

I stared at her.

“It’s okay,” she said. “He just wanted to know about what happened with the girls at the restaurant. And then he asked if Lashaundra had told us about what happened.”

“He came to the diner tonight, too,” I said.

“I guess he has to look at everything,” she said. “But then he asked Michael where he was that night.”

My stomach lurched. “Why?” I asked, my voice choking in my throat.

“Because we’re black,” she said flatly. “It’s always the black man, you know. No matter what happens, they always come for the black man.”

“But he didn’t have any reason to think that Michael would . . . hurt Damon Rigby.”

“No, except that Michael’s black.”

I could tell she was working hard to keep her voice steady and calm.

“Anyway, thank God, Michael was working that night. He’d pulled an extra shift at the warehouse, and about a hundred people can vouch for the fact that he was at work all night.”

I nodded and reached for her hand.

“I’m so sorry, Angel,” I said.

“You’ve got nothing to apologize for,” she said. “It’s the way of the world, I guess. But the girls were here when the sheriff came. So Jenny might have some questions. I just wanted to give you a heads-up.”

“Thanks, Angel. And thanks for keeping Jenny today. Brannon was up to his eyeballs in stuff when I left, and I think he really was glad Jenny wasn’t home all day.”

Angel smiled. “Jenny said he’d gone to get all of their stuff out of storage. That’s good. That means he finally feels at home.”

I nodded and smiled back at her.

“Yep,” I said. “We are finally at home.”

Jenny started talking as soon as we got into the car.

“The sheriff came to ask Mr. Johnson a bunch of questions,” she said.

“I know,” I said. “He came to the diner, too. He has to cover all the bases, I guess.”

“But I thought Mr. Rigby was driving drunk and had an accident.”

“That’s exactly what happened,” I said. “But the sheriff has to fill out all the paperwork, and that means talking to everyone who might have any information.”

“But Mr. Johnson didn’t have any information.”

“I know, honey. It’s just procedure.”

“Because Mr. Johnson is black?”

I sighed and shook my head. “There’s a lot of prejudice in the world, Jenny. I know that. But I think the sheriff was just asking questions because of the way Mr. Rigby was to you and Lashaundra that night in the diner. That’s all.”

I pulled into the driveway and parked.

“It’s okay,” I said. “The sheriff said Mr. Rigby’s crash was an accident. It’s over and done with now.”

Please, God, let that be true.

I unlocked the front door and stopped to stare. The room was cleared of boxes and bags. The rocker sat by the hearth, where a fire burned brightly. And above the mantel hung a huge painting of white and yellow daisies against a brilliant blue sky.

“Welcome home,” Brannon said, emerging from the kitchen with a cup of tea in his hand. “It looks good, doesn’t it?”

“I can’t believe you got everything put away,” I said, sinking into the rocker and taking the tea from him. “Where did you put it all?”

“Most of it’s up in the attic,” he said.

“Where did that come from?” Jenny pointed at the painting of daisies.

“I’ve had that a long time,” he said. “But there wasn’t any place for it in the trailer. Do you like it?”

“It’s pretty,” she said.

“Your mother painted it.”

Jenny stood with her mouth open, staring at the picture.

“My mother painted?” she finally asked. “How come I didn’t know that?”

“I guess it never came up.”

“Well, it’s beautiful.” I rose and touched the frame lightly. “She was very talented.”

“Yeah,” he said. “She did some nice stuff. That one was my favorite.”

“Are there any more?” Jenny asked.

“In your bedroom.”

Jenny ran down the hall and shrieked.

“Oh my God! It’s so pretty!”

Brannon and I followed her into the room, where another big painting dominated the wall above Jenny’s futon. A single tree covered in white blossoms stood in a field of tiny yellow flowers. It really was beautiful.

“There was a field behind the apartment building where we lived,” Brannon said, his arm around Jenny’s shoulder. “Your mom liked to carry her canvas and paints out there and do her thing. That’s spring. She did one for each season.”

“Where are the others?” Jenny turned to look at him, her eyes sparkling.

“I’m sorry, honey,” he said. “I sold the others. After your mom died, we really needed the money. I hated to do it, but I had to.”

“Oh,” Jenny said, her voice soft.

“But I saved this one for you.”

“And it’s beautiful,” I said. “Maybe we can buy a bedspread and curtains to match the colors. Would you like that?”

Jenny nodded. “I wish we still had the others,” she whispered. Her eyes were bright with tears.

“I know, honey. But how wonderful that you have this one, and the one in the living room. You must be really proud to know that your mom painted those,” I said.

She nodded again.