33

The piano music meant it was time to begin the service, but Kate didn’t move toward her seat. Dear Aunt Hattie. She needed her to sit up and start talking to her. She needed her prayers and her wisdom in her ears.

Almost as though she had an answer from heaven, Aunt Hattie’s words were in her head. Now, Katherine Reece, I ain’t wantin’ to listen to none of your nonsense. Any wisdom you ever got from me came straight from the Good Book. I’m knowin’ you has a copy of that Book. All the answers you might ever be wantin’ are between them covers if’n you read it with a prayerful heart. You’s on a bumpy road right now, but ain’t nary a one of us promised an easy road. Just ask your sweet sister Victoria about that. Sorrows come. With the good Lord’s help, we keep on going till the day comes, like it has for me, o glory, when troubles are over forever more. Your little baby child what only knew a flicker of life in your womb won’t never know a trouble one. Naught but love then and now.

Kate’s mother circled her arm around Kate’s waist to turn her away from the casket. Kate kept her eyes on the little woman’s wrinkled face, but she wasn’t seeing her there. Instead Kate saw her out in the middle of the yard, her hands raised toward the heavens, talking to the Lord about whatever burden was on her mind.

Kate thought about doing the same. Just lifting up her hands there in front of the church to surrender it all to the Lord. Then she realized she’d already done that. Maybe not the way Aunt Hattie would have, but in the way she, Kate, needed to. She and Jay had given their baby to the Lord the night before.

Now it was time to tell Aunt Hattie goodbye. Not that Aunt Hattie needed any kind of send-off. She was already with the Lord she loved so much, but the words and songs might ease the hearts of those who would miss her. Kate took one last look at Aunt Hattie’s peaceful face and knew without a doubt that Aunt Hattie would always be with her. Her words would echo in her head. Her prayers would sneak into her heart. But oh, how she was going to miss her voice in her ears and her hand on her cheek.

Kate reached for Jay’s arm and Mama moved to let him step back beside her. Kate had hardly been aware of the full church as she’d walked down the aisle. All her attention was on the casket, but now she saw the packed church. Some of the women had hankies out, wiping away tears in between waving their fans.

Evie worked her fan too and looked miserable as she watched Kate with worried eyes. She mouthed the words, I love you. Kate managed a smile and relief raced across Evie’s face.

Mama sat down by Tori and lifted Samantha into her lap, but Lorena stayed beside Kate. Tomorrow Kate would tell Lorena about Miss Myrtle’s cousin and the man in Cincinnati named Birdsong. But not today. Today was Aunt Hattie’s. Today Kate couldn’t bear the thought of perhaps losing Lorena too. Some things were better put off until tomorrow.

The church door opened and closed and people turned in their pews to see the latecomer. When they saw Fern, whispers circled around the church.

“Oh good.” Lorena kept her voice low. “I was afraid she wasn’t coming.”

Fern stopped just inside the door as though unable to move a step farther down the aisle without Aunt Hattie urging her toward one of the pews. She wore a print dress faded by too many washings, but it looked freshly pressed. Her gray hair was combed and tied back from her face with a strip of black cloth.

Graham got to his feet, but Fern didn’t pay him the first bit of attention. Her eyes bore into Kate. Kate stared back, thinking of all the years she’d known her. Strange Fern who had no interest in being like other people. Scary Fern who stepped out of the nightmares of kids in Rosey Corner—the bogeyman behind the bushes. Brokenhearted Fern who shut away the world for fear of being hurt again until Lorena pushed her way into Fern’s heart. Because of Lorena’s easy acceptance of Fern’s oddities, Kate had begun to see Fern as more than the weird woman who lurked in the shadows of the woods. And now she was seeing her as Aunt Hattie saw her. A woman in need of a friend.

Kate smiled as much as she was able with the sadness weighing down on her and held a hand out toward Fern. “Come, sit with us.” Kate’s voice sounded loud in the quiet church.

Fern didn’t smile back, but her face softened the barest bit. Lorena hurried up the aisle to lead Fern down to their pew. Fern’s rubber boots squeaked on the wood floor.

When they got almost to the front of the church, Lorena whispered something to Fern. Fern didn’t bother whispering but spoke out loud. “I don’t need to see Hattie dead. I saw that already. Better to wait and see her next in heaven.”

An uneasy murmur traveled around the church, as though some doubted Fern would have that chance. She was too different. She hadn’t spent enough time in church. She wasn’t like they thought she should be. Kate wanted to tell the whisperers the Lord didn’t care about rubber boots and shapeless dresses. He didn’t care about combed hair and washed faces. He cared about hearts, and he could see into hearts that nobody else could.

But Fern didn’t need Kate to defend her. She didn’t care what other people thought. She was who she was, and she had come to say goodbye to a friend. That was why Kate was there too. Nothing else mattered right now. Later, other worries could horn in. Where would Fern stay with Aunt Hattie gone? Would Lorena want to go live with her birth family? Would Daddy’s cough ever get better? Would she and Jay have more babies? So many worries.

It took the good Lord six days to make the world. Ain’t no way you’re gonna be fixin’ everythin’ about it in one day, Katherine Reece.

Kate’s smile felt a little more at home on her face then as Tori scooted over to make room for Kate and Jay. Then they moved even closer together so Fern could push in the pew with them. She smelled of the woods, but it wasn’t a bad smell. Instead it was fresh and somehow right for Aunt Hattie’s funeral. The aroma of nature enduring through the ages. Storms and fires came. Branches and leaves fell, but the trunk of life continued putting out new growth.

Kate was empty now, but she wouldn’t always be empty.

As Mrs. Taylor played the last chords of the hymn, Kate reached across Jay to touch Fern’s hand. Fern seemed surprised for a second, but then she turned her hand over and tightened her fingers around Kate’s.

“I’m glad you didn’t die, Kate Merritt.” Again she didn’t bother whispering, and her words were plain in the quiet of the church as Mrs. Taylor turned to a new page in her hymnbook.

Kate spoke aloud too. “I am too, Fern Lindell. Thank you.”

Fern let go of her hand and Kate sat back, surrounded on all sides by those who loved her. A hush fell over the church as Lorena stood to sing “Amazing Grace.” Her voice was so pure and sweet that chills ran up Kate’s back.

Then Mike stood up and grasped the pulpit behind Aunt Hattie’s coffin. He opened his Bible and began to read. “‘The Lord is my Shepherd . . .’”

He sounded like the old Mike, the Mike from before the war who knew he was meant to preach. Kate imagined Aunt Hattie smiling down on him with joy at the confident belief in his voice as he continued to read the psalm.

“‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil . . .’”

The familiar words fell gently on Kate’s ears. A laying to rest of not only Aunt Hattie, but Kate’s lost baby too.

“‘Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.’”

Kate waited until Saturday to tell Lorena about the man named Birdsong. Lorena was planting the iris bulbs Mrs. Alvers next door gave Kate. Other neighbors brought food, and of course, her mother made Jay a brown sugar pie. Kate hated feeling so weak she couldn’t sweep the kitchen floor without sitting down twice, but time would heal her body and soften the pain in her heart.

The morning air carried the fresh, sweet smell of lilacs, and the sun felt especially good on Kate’s shoulders as she sat on the porch steps watching Lorena. It seemed the perfect time to tell her what Miss Myrtle had said.

“Do you think he’s my father?” Lorena sat back on her heels to look at Kate, her face a mixture of sadness and hope.

“I don’t know, Lorena. Maybe. Maybe not.” The peaceful beauty of the day faded as Kate berated herself for not thinking through how the news of a man named Birdsong remarrying might upset Lorena. She should have waited for Jay to be home, but the words were out now. There was no taking them back. “But Birdsong is not a very common name. He might know your family.”

Lorena stuck her trowel in the ground and turned over some of the dirt. “Poor little worm,” she murmured as she picked up a fishing worm she accidently sliced in two.

“He’ll be all right. He’ll grow on a new end.”

“I know.” Lorena gently put the worm over in the part of the flowerbed already planted. Then she looked at Kate. “I’ll be all right too. Whatever we find out.”

Kate held out her arms and Lorena dropped the trowel to come lean against Kate the way she used to when she was little. Now Lorena was taller than Kate, but she would always be her little sister.

“Do you feel sliced in two?” Kate asked her. “Divided?”

“Not in a bad way.” Lorena raised her head to look directly at Kate. “I want to know about my family. My first family. But the Lord took care of me the way he does the fishing worms. He sent you to find me that day my mommy left me at the church and gave me a new family.”

“I’m glad he did.” Kate tightened her arm around Lorena, who rested her head against Kate’s shoulder again.

They sat like that for a few minutes before Lorena asked, “Do you think we can find this man with the same name as mine?”

“I don’t know, but we’ll try.”

When Lorena didn’t say anything, Kate pushed her back where she could see her face. She looked the way she did sometimes before she sang at a church. Eager and scared at the same time. Kate touched Lorena’s cheek. “But only if you want to.”

That was what she always told her about singing. Her voice was a gift, but she didn’t have to sing in front of people unless she wanted to. She always wanted to. Kate knew she wanted to do this too, but Jay’s warning from the night before when she told him about Miss Myrtle’s cousin played through Kate’s head.

“Birdie might find out things she’d rather not know.”

“Like what?”

“Think about it, Kate. They deserted her and never came back. They couldn’t know she found a good family to take care of her. For all they ever knew, she could have starved on that church step. That doesn’t sound like a very loving family.”

“It was hard times.” Kate felt compelled to defend Lorena’s unknown mother.

“Could times ever get so hard that you would have given up our baby?” He pushed the question at her.

Her hands had gone instinctively to her abdomen to protect what was already lost. “I don’t know.”

“Well, I know. It wouldn’t happen. You would have found another way.” He grabbed her hand and kissed it. “We would have found another way.”

“But she wants to know.”

“She thinks she does.” Jay sighed a little. “She’s still not much more than a little girl. She wants a fairy-tale ending, but there aren’t many of those out there in the real world.”

Kate had tried to lighten his mood. “You’re my prince. My knight in shining armor.”

It had worked. He laughed and pulled her into his arms. “I’m not much of a prince or knight either. But if you’d been a damsel in distress, I’d have fought the dragon for you without a moment’s hesitation. What do you say we just skip the fighting dragon part and go straight to the kiss?”

Now Kate watched the emotions race across Lorena’s face. Doubt, worry, hope. Kate did so want a fairy-tale ending for her, but Jay was right. Life didn’t offer many perfect endings, not without pain mixed in.

“I have to know, Kate.” Determination chased the other emotions away. “Even if it’s bad. I have to know.”

“Then if Jay can get off next Saturday, we’ll go.”

Lorena was right. Sometimes it was better to know than to wonder.