Clark Freeman drove off with his daughter in his ’94 Cadillac, taking her straight to her former home on Mollie Drive to pick up clothing and other personal items. It was a strange experience for Mary to enter that empty house.
The sound of children, playing and laughing, squabbling and crying, once filled the four walls. Now, all that remained was a dusty silence. The two dogs who once welcomed her with yips of joy were now living with her sister in Knoxville. In their absence, nothing greeted her but the dark memories of a distant day.
The last time she’d passed over the threshold, her husband of ten years lay dying on the bedroom floor. Now his body was gone and all signs of his blood were washed away by the ardent ministrations of Bio-recovery Solutions. Here and there were pockets of dishevelment, and empty spaces where computers or portraits once stood, all evidence of the law enforcement search.
Mary went straight to the laundry hamper and lifted the lid. She dug through the dirty clothes and pulled out a shirt belonging to Matthew. She held it to her face. She inhaled deeply. She remembered his presence, his touch, the love they once shared. Now it was gone. But even the pull of the trigger could not take those memories away.
As if she were rewinding the hands of time, Mary followed the same roads, in reverse, that she’d journeyed with Matthew a year-and-a-half before, when they moved to Selmer for a new and better life. Now she returned to McMinnville to begin again—but this time, she was alone.
Mary did, however, have someone keeping an eye on her—her new probation officer Donna Dunlap. She would meet with Donna every week until the commencement of the trial.
She moved in with Kathy and Rudy Thomsen and their son in a home on Fairview Road perched atop a hill on the outskirts of a congested downtown. At first, she kept to herself, coming out of her room for meals, but little more. In a short while, though, she integrated into their family life. She developed a playful relationship with the Thomsens’ teenaged son. She called him her “big little brother.” He called her his “shorter older sister.”
Mary entered Cleaners Express, where she once was a customer. She now was an employee of owners Paul Pillow and Matt Hash. She had a great manner with customers, and even many who didn’t know her loved catching a glimpse of her timid smile. She still had many friends in town, and they came in to greet her, often bringing their dry-cleaning business there. Some friends brought gifts to Mary. Others gave her cash. Occasionally, Mary encountered hostility from a customer, but Paul watched over her and was always ready to jump in and shield her from harsh words and ugly glares.
She didn’t talk at work about what happened to Matthew. But every now and then, she’d mention his name in conversation. If they were talking about a particular food, she might say, “Matthew really likes that.” Or if a television show was mentioned, she might say, “That was one of Matthew’s favorites.”
Mary resumed attendance at Central Church of Christ. On the first Sunday, people lined up outside to hug Mary when she arrived. Tears glistened on her cheeks as she made her way into the sanctuary.
It was a large congregation, though, with nearly 600 members. With the addition of Mary, it became a divided one. Not everyone was pleased to have her in their midst—even people in the same family were on opposite sides when it came to the question of Mary. Some welcomed her with open arms. Others struggled with Christ’s admonition to forgive and to judge not. The latter were looking for a demonstration of remorse or an act of contrition from Mary, and found none.
The problem was magnified because so many church members had known Matthew, had great respect for his work as youth minister and remembered him fondly. Mary quietly left the dissension there behind, attending services at the smaller Arlington Church of Christ.
She socialized a bit, going to lunch with friends and having dinner at the home of former neighbor Evon Dennis, across from where Mary and Matthew lived on Franklin Street. She returned to the chair of her beautician, Stephanie Fann, who regularly cut the hair of Mary and the girls—and occasionally Matthew—when they used to live in McMinnville.
Mary’s sister drove to the Thomsen home to re unite Mary with Lady and Lucy Lou. The dogs filled a tiny piece of the emptiness in Mary’s heart. But a family visit raised a new dilemma. There was no extra room in the Thomsen home—where could her family stay when they visited?
JoAn and Dewey Cantrell came to the rescue. When JoAn’s mother passed on, she’d inherited her house, complete with furniture. Occasionally, they had one of their grown children in the home for a short period of time, or visitors from out of town stayed there for a weekend, but for the most part, it sat vacant and neglected. Nothing had been done to it in years. They offered it to Mary.
The court mandate required that Mary live with Kathy Thomsen, so she couldn’t move into the Cantrell house, but it would be the perfect place for visiting family to stay. Mary spent her free time there, keeping busy, fixing it up for company. She cleaned every room, scrubbing the woodwork, scouring the sinks, chasing away dust bunnies and cobwebs. She picked out colors, painted every room and added personal decorating touches.
When she was finished, the transformation surprised and delighted JoAn. There was one thing, though, that made JoAn uneasy. Scattered about the home were Mary’s family pictures, including many photographs of Matthew. She averted her eyes from his image. After all that had happened, the presence of Matthew’s face in Mary’s home “just seemed too weird.”