CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Wildflower

 

The light from the other flashlight bounces up the hill. It is Lily. My relief comes out as anger.

“You scared the life out of me,” I say, when Lily reaches the porch. “Where have you been?” I clutch the top of my robe, suddenly feeling the cold air again. “Were you at Melody’s?”

“I was at Pearl’s,” Lily says, avoiding looking at me, which means there’s more to the story than she’s saying. “Why would you think I was at Melody’s?” she asks.

I pause. I don’t have an answer, except that my worst fear was that Lily was already in Kentucky.

She steps inside the house and leaves her shoes at the door. Inside, she tosses Daddy’s coat onto the back of the sofa. I resist yelling at her to put away her things.

“By my watch, it’s three in the morning,” I say, following her into the kitchen. “What were you doing at Pearl’s? I woke up at 1 o’clock and couldn’t find you.”

Mama stands at the kitchen table, where she’s been holding a prayer meeting all by herself.

“I made coffee,” she says to me. Then she stands and gives Lily a look like she’s glad she’s not her. It is unlike Mama to stay out of things, but I’m glad she is. “I’m going back to bed,” she adds, and closes the door so Lily and I can talk.

“Was Pearl up in the middle of the night?” I ask.

Without answering, Lily gets a glass of milk from the refrigerator, drinks it down and then places the glass in the sink. She seems tired, but also distracted. Not to mention, silent.

“I don’t care how angry you are,” I begin again. “That gives you no excuse for taking off in the middle of the night without leaving a note.”

“I’m not angry at you,” she says.

“Then why would you go to Pearl’s?” I ask.

Lily hesitates. Her shoulders drop. “Don’t get mad,” she says.

I wait. Anytime a conversation is prefaced with don’t get mad, I know it’s something guaranteed to anger me.

“I was actually talking to Crow,” she says.

“In the middle of the night?” My voice reaches toward a shriek, and I sound like Mama.

Lily turns to face me. “I couldn’t sleep after all that happened yesterday, so I went to see Pearl but she was sleeping.” Lily’s words race to explain. “But then I saw Crow was in the kitchen so I knocked on the window, and he invited me in. He was having trouble sleeping, too.”

“What did you two do?” I forget how much I like Crow, and that I’ve known him since he was a baby. He is a man now. Eighteen years old while Lily is fourteen.

“We just talked.” Lily’s cheeks flush.

I tell myself not to overreact, and my worry returns about history repeating itself. Until now, it never occurred to me how much I fear Lily finding herself with a baby at fourteen. I stand and go to the sink, washing her glass, not knowing what else to do.

“What did you talk about?” I ask, trying to stay calm.

“We talked about how lucky you are to have Bee,” Lily says. “And about how it doesn’t matter what people say. And how everybody gets hurt, whether we want to or not.”

“You talked about all that?” I ask.

“That, and about how he can’t wait to get back to Katy’s Ridge.” Lily sits at the table. She seems to have matured overnight. For a few seconds, I get a secret sense that somehow life will be kind to her.

“I was selfish for wanting things different,” Lily says, looking at me.

“Selfish?” I ask.

“You should get to love whoever you want to,” she says, as though convinced.

Lily stands, and I wonder if I imagined what she just said. She tells me she has to go to bed, and kisses me on the cheek before leaving the kitchen. I pour myself a cup of coffee and sit back at the kitchen table. I feel grateful to Crow, and really all of the Sectors. I allow myself to fantasize about it being a different world, where Bee and I don’t have to pretend we’re only friends.

For years, I’ve feared what might happen if Lily found out. By the time I went to bed last night I had decided that she would warm to Bee eventually, if we were patient and lucky. It never occurred to me that her acceptance might come so fast, though it sounds like Crow’s response helped. Of course, her understanding could also be short-lived.

While searching for Lily, I questioned whether I should break it off with Bee. That seemed the safest thing to do. I have a business here, and if anybody else finds out, I could lose it. I know these people. It took them nearly a decade to grant me eye contact after Lily was born. Then I remember my next set of worries: Melody Monroe. I want her to leave. Sooner rather than later. And if she comes near Lily again, Mama won’t be the only one looking for the shotgun.

After the sun comes up, Mama comes into the kitchen where I remain sitting.

“Louisa May, did you not go back to bed?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” I say.

Mama puts on her apron, as she does first thing every morning, and sits in her place at the table. I pour her a cup of warmed over coffee and place it in front of her. A cat scratches at the kitchen door, as if noting that the McAllister Diner is now open.

“Will you let Pumpkin in?” she asks.

“I thought you hated cats,” I say, remembering a time when she threatened to drown them all.

“I do,” she says. “But this old boy and I have become friends.”

Secrets everywhere, I say to myself, including my own.

Mama drinks her coffee without speaking as Pumpkin sits in her lap. When you’ve spent your whole life with someone, surprises are rare.

“You’re awfully quiet this morning,” Mama says.

It isn’t like her to notice my quietness.

The cat arches his boney backside and lifts his rump to enjoy the last benefits of Mama stroking him. Pumpkin and I exchange a look, and I can almost hear him bragging about how he won her over.

“How did your talk go last night? Before Lily pulled her disappearing act.”

Directness is not like Mama.

“It went okay,” I say.

She knows better than to ask me details. We McAllisters aren’t big talkers.

“Where was she last night?” she asks.

“She was with Pearl,” I say, deciding a half-lie is better than the truth in this instance.

“Growing pains?” To Mama, no matter what age you are, every problem in life has something to do with growing pains.

“In a way,” I say, thinking that Lily has certainly grown in knowledge about me and Bee.

Mama lowers her voice. “Is it about that Melody woman?”

I pause. “I went to see her yesterday morning.”

Mama stands, dumping Pumpkin off her lap. He lands on his feet, but looks up at her like he should have known not to trust her. She opens the kitchen door and shoos him outside. He turns and looks at her with what I take as disgust.

“You went to visit that woman?” Mama says, now standing over me.

Mama is not an overly large woman, but the force of her question causes me to scoot back in my chair.

“This isn’t the day to test me, Mama.”

Our eyes lock, like our horns have plenty of times. But neither of us wants to fight.

She backs off and sits in her chair.

“I went to ask Melody what she was going to tell Lily.”

“What did she say?” Mama asks.

“She said she wouldn’t tell Lily anything unless Lily asks.”

“And you think Lily won’t ask?”

I sigh.

Despite Mama’s grumbling, I don’t have the energy to tell her that Lily skipped school yesterday and that she’s already talked to Melody. Nor will I tell her what Lily saw at the mill.

“I don’t understand why Melody Monroe would show up in the first place,” Mama says. “Is that place of hers even livable?”

“Barely,” I say. “You should see it, Mama. It’s so small and sad. I can’t believe a whole family used to live there.”

Mama nods. “Mabel Monroe used to take in people’s laundry, and they sold practically everything they had just to get by. Your Daddy would drop things by to help out. He even gave them two good laying hens,” she continues. “Arthur worked for a while at the mill, but he only came half the time, so Joseph had to let him go.”

This is the most I’ve ever heard Mama say about the Monroe family.

“What else did Melody say?” she asks.

I hesitate, wondering how much to tell her. “She wants Lily to visit Kentucky. Evidently her aunt sent money so Melody and Lily could go back on the bus.”

“Over my dead body,” Mama says. “Don’t you dare let that child go anywhere near those people.”

I nod. For once in my life, Mama and I are in full agreement.

A knock on the front door breaks the growing tension. Mama stays in the kitchen, tidying up, and I go to see who it is. When I open the door, Bee is standing on the porch.

“What are you doing here?” I say, surprised to see her.

“I brought banana bread.” She holds up the basket that looks like her mother packed it. Like me, Bee is not much of a cook, but her mother is. “I was worried,” she adds in a whisper.

Bee is dressed in her Sunday best, even though it’s only Saturday. I forgot how concerned she must have been, not hearing from me last night, but I was certain she would already be in bed by the time Lily and I got back to the house. I was also too tired to go back to the mill or to Daniel and Jo’s to use the phone.

“I’m not sure this is a good idea,” I say to her.

“Are we okay?” Her eyes don’t leave mine.

Mama steps up behind me and Bee beams a smile at her.

“Anybody in the mood for banana bread?” Her eyebrows raise with the question.

Mama invites her inside and tells me to go get dressed. Greeting guests in a housecoat and slippers is never encouraged. Granny leads Bee into the warm kitchen, and I go into the bedroom to change. Lily is sleeping, her head covered to shield her from the morning sun making its way into the room.

I get dressed, run a brush through my hair and pull it back with a rubber band. When I glance into the small round mirror on the wall by the door, I practice a smile, even though I don’t feel like smiling.

When I go back to the kitchen, Mama has put on a fresh pot of coffee and is just unwrapping the basket with the banana bread inside. She makes the noises she only makes for company, telling Bee how sweet she is to bring banana bread by. Mama can be practically friendly sometimes, and not just at church. Perhaps Bee has encouraged her by wearing church clothes to the house.

After filling coffee cups, Mama returns to the table where Bee and I sit. I feel jittery after all the coffee I’ve had, not to mention the secret sitting here in the kitchen between us.

“Banana bread is my favorite,” I say to Bee, as if this is something she doesn’t know.

“I remembered that,” Bee answers.

At that moment, we act like acquaintances instead of what we really are. At least Lily knows now, and is reaching toward acceptance, thanks to Crow. When I try to imagine Mama’s reaction if she knew our secret, all I can see is a shotgun pointing toward Bee. I shut down my imagination before she has time to pull the trigger. Whatever the scenario, I can’t imagine it would be good.

“Did Louisa May tell you about the stranger who came to visit us two days ago?” Mama asks Bee. Whenever Mama calls me by my given name, I wonder if I’m in trouble. When I was younger, I wished sometimes that Jane Eyre had been her favorite book, instead of Little Women, since Charlotte is a much more glamorous name than Louisa May. At least to me.

“Lou—isa did tell me,” Bee says, with an awkward glance in my direction. When we are alone together, Bee calls me Lou, and it isn’t like her to slip and call me that in front of someone.

“That Melody woman stood there in the front yard as brazen as a hussy,” Mama says. Calling someone hussy is as mean as Mama gets in front of company.

“I remember her brother Johnny. I went to school with him,” Bee says. “We were in the same grade.”

I turn to look at her. “I’d forgotten about that,” I say, which is true. Somehow, I always think of Bee teaching school, not being taught.

Mama mumbles something under her breath about Johnny that I decide to let drop.

Bee glances at me periodically to determine if we are okay, and I try to reassure her with a glance that everything is fine. Though I’m convinced nothing will be fine until Melody Monroe leaves Katy’s Ridge for good.

A railroad of secrets chugs along underneath all the polite conversation, while the three of us enjoy the banana bread. We are only one secret away from Mama throwing Bee out of her house, and probably me along with her. If I liked drama, this might be exciting. But as it is, I’m trying not to choke on the banana bread.