CHAPTER
forty-nine

Norman and I had gone through a rough patch around the time Mom Sweet died. Neither of us had done anything wrong and we hadn’t entertained the idea of divorcing. Still, we’d struggled. Hindsight told me he was in the throes of grief and that sometimes it made a man pull away.

At the time, though, I worried that the good years we’d had together were a thing of the past.

One night, after a month of silent meals and even more distant bedtimes, I couldn’t hold it in any longer. I’d sat in my chair and cried my eyes out over my plate of roast chicken and broccoli. Norm had stayed in his chair, a potato wedge speared on his fork.

“Don’t you even care that I’m crying?” I’d asked, hands over my mouth.

“Of course I do,” he’d answered, although his voice certainly hadn’t sounded like it to me.

“Then do something!” My voice had been shrill, wildly out of control. “Isn’t there anything you can think of to say?”

“No. I don’t know what you want me to do.”

“Maybe ask me why I’m crying.” Although it was meant as a suggestion, the tidbit had tumbled out of my mouth more as an accusation.

“Why are you crying?” he had asked, putting the potato in his mouth and chewing.

Oh, but that chewing had driven me over the edge.

I’d let him have it. He sat in his chair, eating bite after bite and taking everything I could dish out at him. Not batting an eyelid.

The very last of my rant was to claim that he didn’t care.

“I’m sorry you feel that way,” was all he’d come up with in reply.

That night he’d slept on the couch.

In the morning, he’d called Pop and said he needed the day off. He made me breakfast, carrying it to me on a tray and refreshing my cup of coffee when it grew tepid. We’d dressed and gotten into the Chevy he owned at the time and went for a drive.

We’d ended up at Greenfield Village, just twenty minutes or so west of Detroit.

While I didn’t remember any of the buildings we’d seen that day or the streets we’d walked, I hadn’t forgotten the conversations.

Norm had admitted to being heartbroken over his mother’s death. I let him know how unloved I’d felt over the months. We listened to each other all day. We’d held hands and I’d let him kiss me for what seemed like the first time in forever, his small act of apologizing and mine of forgiving.

We’d ended the day riding on the top deck of the steamboat called Suwanee, going lap after lap around the man-made lagoon, swatting at mosquitoes and listening to the man play banjo. Norm stood behind me, his arms wrapped around my waist as we watched the paddle wheel go around and around.

“I never want you to feel like you aren’t loved,” he’d said.

Then he’d paid for one more trip around the lagoon for us, the last of the day.

Marvel had wanted one last hurrah of summer before the boys went off to school and we started working at the bakery, so we put together a plan and packed a whole bunch of sandwiches. It was the first time I’d been back to Greenfield Village since that day with Norm, and I felt no small measure of missing him because of it.

After a while, though, I determined that I would enjoy my day. The sun was shining, it wasn’t humid, and the boys were patient enough to stop and listen to the prepared speech of each of the actors dressed the part of an engineer or housewife from 150 years in the past.

When we traveled from one exhibit to the next, Hugo kept up with Nick and Dick, laughing at their silliness.

“I’m not ready for summer to be over,” Marvel said. “But don’t tell my boys that. They’ll try to convince me to let them quit school and stay home all the time.”

“I wouldn’t dare betray your secret.” I grinned. “I’m sad for it to end too.”

“Is he excited for school to start?” She nodded at Hugo.

“I think he is,” I answered. “It surprises me that he isn’t more nervous. I certainly am.”

“I felt the same when Nick and Dick started kindergarten.”

“It’s more than just that.” I stopped, watching the three boys staring up at a sign. “What if the other children are mean to him because he’s different? What if they say something about the color of his skin?”

Marvel heaved a sigh. “I thought about that too.”

“Kids can be so nasty.”

“Yup. They can,” she said.

“There’s nothing I can do if something happens to him at school.” I shook my head. “I wish I could shield him from every ugly thing.”

“Honey, we can’t keep them safe all the time,” Marvel said. “All we can really do is pray our hearts out and be there for them when someone is cruel.”

“I guess so.”

“You know, I told my boys they needed to watch out for him.” She crossed her arms. “They’re already so protective of him.”

“They’re good boys.”

“When they want to be.” She raised one eyebrow. “They know that if they need to defend him, I won’t punish them. They just can’t throw the first punch.”

“Do you think it might come to that?” I asked, hand to my chest.

“Oh, I hope not.”

“Me either,” I said.

One of the twins pointed into a mess of tall grass, and the other hopped over the wooden fence.

“What are you doing?” Marvel called out to them.

“Snake!” Dick yelled. “We saw a snake!”

Then he hurtled into the weeds.

Without looking to me for permission and without so much as a moment’s hesitation, Hugo followed after him.

“He’s changed so much over the past few months, hasn’t he?” I asked.

She nodded. “You’ve been good for him, Betty.”

“Well, I don’t know about that.” I moistened my lips. “But I do know that he’s been good for me.”

We didn’t go on the Suwanee that day—the boys opted for a ride on the train instead. That was all right with me. When Hugo slid onto a seat smack-dab in the middle of the train, he patted the space right beside him for me to sit in. As the train chugged along with its jerky motions and slow-moving pace, the little fellow took my hand and smiled up at me.

“I never want you to feel like you aren’t loved,” Norm had said.

I thought he would be quite pleased to know that his wish had come true.