Chapter 4
Late July 1955
Jude
“What happened to Mom?” Jude demanded to her father’s back. He stood facing Gram Ruth’s scrubbed granite countertop, his shoulders rigid.
“She had an accident, Jude,” he murmured.
She grabbed his arm and tried to turn him. Her dad had been acting strangely since their mother’s death, disappearing for hours at a time, walking the house mumbling to himself. He was like a man possessed.
“Why won’t you tell us what happened?” Jude bellowed, fists balled at her sides. She wanted to hit him, to beat his chest with her fists, to run to the bedroom that was not hers, but a tomb in Gram Ruth’s mausoleum, and rip the wallpaper from the walls.
He turned and looked at her with bleary, red eyes. He’d been drinking scotch, and his hands shook when he lifted one and ran it through his hair.
“Peter and I are fifteen years old, we deserve the truth. Was it a car accident?”
Her dad blinked at her as if she were demanding he solve complicated trigonometry.
“Jude, I just can’t right now. Okay, honey? I don’t feel well.”
He patted her shoulder absently and walked from the room toward the stairs.
Jude snatched the crystal glass that stank of scotch and threw it to the floor. She didn’t jump back at the sound of the shattering glass or the shards that grazed her legs.
Wildly, she looked around for something else, a piece of Gram’s pristine china, but Peter peeked his head around the doorframe.
“What was that?” he asked looking from Jude to the shattered glass. He sighed and walked toward her, stepping carefully around the slivers strewn across the tile floor.
Jude cried when he touched her, huge gulping sobs that Peter liked to tell her sounded like bleating sheep.
“Oh dearie.” Camille’s voice interrupted them. She swept into the room in her stiffly pressed white smock. “Had a little accident, did ya?”
Jude shook her head, crying.
“Why won’t anyone tell us? Camille, do you know? What happened to Mama?”
The word Mama created a wave of grief so strong it threatened to pull her under.
“Come on Judes,” Peter mumbled. “Sorry about the mess, Camille.”
He pulled Jude from the room and out the front door.
In their treehouse, quickly growing too small for the two to sit comfortably, Peter watched her with sympathetic eyes.
“I’m sad about Mom, too. I am. But she’s gone, Jude. She’s up there now,” he gestured toward the sky.
Jude snorted.
“And you’re okay with that? Some bullshit story about an accident?”
Peter rubbed his big hands together. He’d definitely make varsity football that year. Jude guessed he’d gained twenty pounds that summer.
His eyes welled up, and he shook his head.
“I don’t know. I mean, no, of course not, but maybe it was gruesome or something and they don’t want to upset us. Hattie’s already falling apart, and you’ve seen Dad. It’s like everyone’s eatin’ grape’s off the wallpaper. I just want it all to be over.”
“Don’t you realize it will never be over, Peter. Mom is dead!”
Peter closed his eyes, but Jude could still see the tears flowing over his red cheeks.
“It’s more than Mom being dead,” Jude continued, sitting up on her knees. “It’s like, when Dad first told us, he acted as if it wasn’t real, you know? He said he’d tell us all soon, but then he stopped saying that and he’s not just moping around. He’s acting kooky. I’ve seen him walk in and out of Gram’s barns like a hundred times. Why?”
Peter shrugged and threw up his hands.
“I don’t know, Jude. Are you writing a book? You’re Sherlock Holmes, right?” he rolled his eyes. “Every thing’s a big conspiracy with you. Maybe it’s not. Maybe Dad’s sad. End of story.”
Jude glared at her brother wondering how they could share the same genes and still be so different. Did he not see it? How everyone was skirting the truth?
Jude
“Give me that.” Jude snatched the bottle of whiskey from Danny’s hand where he’d been ready to drink.
“Hey,” he sputtered when some sloshed onto his wrist. The smell filled the car.
Jude tilted her head back and took a long drink, grimacing at the taste, but savoring the burn as it roared into her belly. She leaned her head against the leather passenger seat and wiped her mouth on her arm.
“Come on,” she said gruffly, pulling her dress up over her thick thighs, past her waist so that Danny had a view of her black-clad bottom as she climbed over the seats into the back of his car.
“Whoa,” he breathed, taking a drink. “You’re bitchin’ hot, Jude.”
“Don’t talk,” she whispered when he climbed back and lowered his face close to her own. He kissed her and when he slipped his tongue into her mouth, she thought of biting it, but instead grabbed his shirt and pulled it over his head. He fumbled with his pants, finally getting them off.
“Are you sure?” he murmured, kissing her neck, trying to look into her eyes, but Jude didn’t want to look in his eyes.
She didn’t answer, just reached down and grabbed him, forcing him into her. It hurt, and she gritted her teeth until he broke through her unopened body and sank into her. They both gasped, him in pleasure, her with release, some sensation that abated her rage.
The moments after were less fulfilling as Danny mumbled and whispered and pumped into her. He finished with a strangled groan and collapsed onto her, dripping saliva down her neck. His weight felt oppressive and the temperature in the car seemed stifling and unbearable.
“I have to go,” she huffed shoving Danny off her. He fell to the floor, surprised, but she was already up, turning the door handle and pushing the car door open, falling out into the cool grass. She scrambled up to standing, the moonless night welcome as she pulled her dress back down.
“Hey, wait,” he whispered.
She watched him in the lit backseat shuffling into his pants, his face red, welts on his shoulders where she’d sunk her fingernails into him.
“Just give me my shoes,” she muttered, looking toward the dark estate. They had parked at the end of Gram Ruth’s property where Danny was dropping her off.
“Are you okay?” he asked, stepping from the car holding Jude’s Mary Janes.
She snatched them and turned, running into the dark woods that edged the property. Her bare feet sank into the grass. The sobs she’d been holding hostage burst forth. She doubled over and dropped to her knees, pressing her face into the ground as she wailed. She wanted her mother, needed her mother so badly she thought her body might split open from the pain.
“Please, please, please,” she murmured, crying, begging whatever god existed to bring her back, to restore her family to whole.
Eventually her eyes ran dry, her head throbbed from the effort and she stood, not bothering with her shoes as she tromped through the woods back to Gram Ruth’s house. The veranda was lit and as she left the shelter of the trees, she saw her father standing near the rail smoking a cigarette. She had never seen him smoke before.
He turned when he heard her, stubbing the cigarette on the ground.
“Jude?” She watched his eyes take in her puffy face and rumpled clothes. “Oh dear, we’ve messed everything up. Your mother was right.”