After Daddy read the letter he leaned forward, putting his elbows on his desk to read it again. Then another time. With his fingers he rubbed at his forehead.
“Daddy?” I asked. “Are you okay?”
He lifted his face like he’d forgotten I was sitting right there on the other side of the desk from him. Standing, he turned his head one way, then the next, feeling of his shirt pocket like he’d misplaced something. Then he looked down at the letter and folded it once, twice, pressing the creases between his fingers like he wanted to keep it sealed like that forever.
“We gotta go home, darlin’,” he said. “Come on.”
He walked his normal pace and I trotted along to keep up. Every couple steps I looked up at his face to see if he’d broken yet or if he was near to it. I wasn’t sure why, but he’d seemed close to tears when he read that letter. But he kept his face firm and strong. If anybody’d been walking by, they wouldn’t have known anything was wrong at all.
I wasn’t watching where I was going and tripped over my own two feet, falling down on my knees and feeling the sting of where the pavement tore at my skin.
“You all right, darlin’?” Daddy asked, taking a knee beside me and getting a look at my bloody legs. “Oh, honey. You got it good. You think you can walk?”
I told him I could and he helped me to my feet. But once I was standing the pain started throbbing in my knees, my head, my heart. I thought if I opened my mouth to tell him how it hurt I’d get to wailing and moaning and all the town would hear my very heart breaking.
I still didn’t know why.
When we got home we found Opal standing out on the front walk, waiting to be let in to start work for the day. Soon as she saw us coming, saw my roughed-up knees, she rushed to meet us and took my hand in hers and put her arm around my shoulders.
“I’ll take care of this,” she told Daddy.
He didn’t put up a fight.
She made to walk us all the way around to the back door, but Daddy stopped her.
“Go on in the front,” he said.
“Yes, sir.” She led me up the porch steps and right inside to the bathroom.
“Now, sit on the edge of the tub. I’ve got to put something on those knees,” she told me. “What happened?”
“I fell on the pavement,” I said. “I wasn’t looking where I was going.”
“That happens sometimes, huh?” she asked, taking a little brown bottle out of the bathroom cupboard. “I’ve still got the scars from when I was a girl.”
She poured the ointment on a washrag and dabbed my knees. It stung something awful and I breathed in a hissing sound through my tight-clenched teeth.
“Sorry,” she said. “Just a little more.”
When she’d cleaned them out as much as she could, she put bandages on them, saying I should take it easy for the rest of the day.
“Maybe just stay inside so they don’t get infected or anything.” She jiggled the bottle of ointment. Only a few more drops sloshed in the bottom. “I’ll make sure your mother knows you need more ointment.”
“But she’s gone,” I whispered.
“I don’t understand,” Opal said back to me.
I didn’t understand, either.
Daddy told Opal she could go home for the day. He told her we’d need her tomorrow and maybe the rest of the mornings that week.
“I’ll pay you extra if you’ll do a little cooking, too,” he told her. “Mrs. Spence had to leave town unexpectedly.”
“Is everything okay, sir?” Opal asked, her eyes wide.
“Sure. Yes.” He nodded and folded his arms. “Just family business is all. I don’t know when she’ll be coming back.”
“Yes, sir.” And with that Opal turned for the back door.
“Opal?” Daddy said, stopping her. “From now on you’ll use the front door when you come and go.”
“Yes, sir.”
Once she got to the front door she hesitated a moment before turning the knob.