“You have a lot of siblings?”
“Oh, yah. Seven of us. Agnes was the oldest, and I was smack in the middle.” She ran off the names of the five other siblings. I should’ve been taking notes. “If I had to make a stab at a murder victim,” she said, “I’d pick Luke. You meet some bad people in jail, you know?”
Whether she meant Luke was bad, or that Luke met bad people, I wasn’t sure.
“Or J.T.,” Gloria added. “She’s got Pop’s temper. Wouldn’t be surprised if she’d started one fight too many with that slacker husband of hers and he finally got guts enough to fight back,” she said. “Yah, that I could’ve seen. But Agnes? Who would’ve figured that?”
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered. “This must be very difficult for you.”
“It’s been hard for years, with Agnes. You know, I can’t think of the last time I saw her.”
“Have you ever been down here to Rynwood?”
“Nah.”
Agnes had been principal for ten years, and her sister hadn’t managed to find the time even once to drive down? But I knew how the years could speed by. You always thought there would be time to do everything, until suddenly there was no time left at all. My father had died young from a heart attack and left behind a shelf full of travel books for the places he and Mom planned to visit after he retired. I yearned to make Gloria feel better but knew I couldn’t. “If there’s anything I can do,” I said, “please ask.”
“Actually,” Gloria said slowly, “there is one thing. I wouldn’t ask, except that you and Agnes were such good friends.”
“Um . . .” This was what I got for saying I instead of the PTA we. Maybe they were going to bury Agnes down here and she was going to ask me to visit the cemetery and plant flowers. Or maybe she wanted me to speak at the funeral. I could cheat and write a note to be read aloud at the service. I had the letter half written by the time Gloria spoke again.
“See, it’s such a long ways and I’d have to take time off work, and the boss hates when I do that. You’d think being a clerk in an auto-parts store was like a general in the army for how he goes on when I want a day off. I got to be there by noon today, dead sister or no.”
“Um . . .”
“So if I send you a key, you’d take care of things, right? Seeing as how you and Agnes were close.”
“Things?”
“At her house. Clean out the refrigerator, change the mail, do something with the plants, if she has any.”
“I’m not—”
“I’ll call the cops down there and tell them it’s all good with me. You’re a peach for doing this. Beth, right? What’s your address, honey?”
Thirty seconds later, I’d given Gloria my address, agreed to forward any important mail, and promised to keep an eye on the shuttered house until spring, when Gloria or another sibling would come down for house sale arrangements. “None of us goes far in winter,” she said.
Again I spoke before I thought. “Who’s going to make the house payments? Pay the utility bills?”
“That’s not a problem,” Gloria said, and there was a deep sense of bitterness in her tone.
I said good-bye, hung up, and stared into space. What had I done this time? But on the plus side, at least I didn’t have Marina shaking her head and telling me I needed to learn how to stand up for myself.
Cheered, I got up and went to tell Lois to break out the chocolate. Even if I’d been guilted into a job I didn’t want to do, at least I’d made the dreaded phone call and survived—a chocolate-worthy day if there ever was one.
“Mom?”
“Yes, Oliver? Jenna, you’re not wearing flip-flops to school.”
“But, Mom—”
“No whining. I don’t care how trendy they are. A pair of flip-flops is not suitable footgear for forty-five degrees and rain.”
“It won’t stay this cold.” Her lip started to jut out. “And it might get sunny.”
“And it might not. Go change.”
A mutinous ogre took over my heretofore cheerful daughter. The friendly face of yore was replaced by a squatted chin, crossed arms, and slitted eyes. “Bailey’s mom lets her wear flip-flops all winter long.”
“How nice for her doctor.”
“Huh?”
“Unsuitable footwear can lead to colds and flu and bronchitis and pneumonia.” Or at least it might. I was going on instinct; that’s what moms do. “Go change. Now.” I pointed in the direction of the stairs, and she began the long trudge to her bedroom.
“Mom?”
I looked past the empty cereal bowls I was still holding and focused on my son. “Yes, Oliver. What is it?” And please don’t bring up the subject of the dog. Not on a Monday.
Oliver tugged at the collar of his shirt and didn’t meet my eye.
Uh-oh. I put the cereal bowls in the dishwasher, then sat on an island stool. I patted the seat next to me. “What’s the matter, sweetheart?” I asked in a bad Jimmy Cagney imitation.
His thin shoulders rose and fell.
“Did I forget to kiss Polly the Hippopotamus last night?”
He shook his head.
“Did you forget something?” Oliver often forgot things the minute he walked out the classroom door. While I appreciated his ability to compartmentalize, it meant numerous mornings scrambling to finish projects and find permission slips.
“Oliver?” I glanced toward the stairs. When Jenna came down, we had to leave. “Okeydokey, kid.” I gave him a hug and laid my forehead on top of his soft hair. “We can talk tonight. Right now—”
“I did it,” he said to the floor. “I was bad and now we’ll never get a dog and it’ll all be my fault. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m—”
“Oliver.” I spoke sharply. It seemed harsh, but it was the best way to handle the boy when he edged into inanity. “Oliver!”
He dragged a hand across his face and his palm came away wet. My heart crumpled, and it took a superhuman feat of strength not to pull him tight against my heart. I had to be both mother and father to my children now, and this was a time for Dad to show up. “Tell me what you did.”
“I haven’t, not for a long time. I haven’t!”
“Okay.” I had no clue what he was talking about—none whatsoever.
“Please don’t be mad.”
How I hated when the kids said that.
“Oliver, just tell me.”
“It’s the . . .”
“The what?”
“The bed.” Jenna thudded into the kitchen. “He wet the bed again last night. Are these okay for me to wear?” She lifted her leg and thumped her hiking boot onto the kitchen table.
“Jenna! Get that boot off the table!”
She dragged her heel across the glossy wood, leaving a dark trail.
“Oh, Jenna. Why did you do that?”
Her face took on that dreaded stubborn look. “All you care about is the furniture and what we wear. You don’t care anything about us. Especially me!” She ran across the room and opened the door to the garage.
“Don’t—”
Too late. She was already out the door, slamming it shut behind her. I winced. I recognized it alclass="underline" the sulks, the slams. At long last, my mother’s curse was coming true. I had a daughter just like me.
“Mommy?” Oliver asked.
“Yes, sweetheart.”
“Are you mad?” His big, round eyes looked up at me.
I abandoned the father mode and ran straight back to being Mom. The hug I gave him was as full of love and reassurance as it was possible for a hug to be. “Don’t be silly,” I said. “It’s not your fault you wet the bed. These things happen.”
“They do?” He squirmed out of my embrace. “Did you do it when you were little?”
I decided to fictionalize my childhood. “No, but I had a friend who did.”