Crazy Cecile Crazy CecileONE OF ELLIE’S UNCLES—HER LEAST FAVORITE, NAMED Trapper—married a western woman while he was living out in Arizona a while, and he brought her with him when he came home to visit so she could see the snow.
Her name was Cecile, and she reminded Ellie of the witch in Snow White. The witch who tried to kill the girl who was fairest in the land. The girl with white skin. Like Ellie’s. That witch.
Ellie called her Crazy Cecile when nobody was around to hear.
Crazy Cecile would do things no one else dared do. Unspeakable things. If the beef was tough and stringy at supper, they could all count on Cecile to say, “Toughest, stringiest beef I’ve ever eaten.”
It made Ellie’s mother nervous about her cooking.
And all five girls were absolute wrecks about their looks when Cecile was around. She’d tell one her hair could grease a car, or another her pimples would be improved if she washed regularly. The day she commented on how flat Wanda was, the whole household went into dark corners.
Okey was the only one of them that Crazy Cecile didn’t pick on. It was a mystery to them all. Okey cussed too much, drank too much, raced his pickup too much, and he was even growing slightly bald.
Crazy Cecile was unconcerned.
They all tolerated her as best they could. The older girls stayed mostly with friends, Ellie’s mother spent hours in the kitchen, Okey ignored her and Ellie wasted more time outside with Bullet.
One night, though, Cecile and Trapper had an argument and he went off in Okey’s pickup to buy a carton of cigarettes and blow off steam. Then, Cecile could not be avoided.
She sat at the kitchen table and cried. So they all sat with her, even Okey.
She sobbed and rocked and said Trapper would leave her for sure. Her crying was loud, full of strange sounds from her throat, and her nose dripped. Ellie thought she was disgusting.
No one seemed to know what to say to Cecile. The older girls looked embarrassed. Ellie’s mother looked perturbed. Okey looked confused. But no one was willing to leave her.
Cecile wailed and said things about Trapper none of them knew—about Trapper losing his job, getting arrested, wrecking their car.
Her face was awful. Puffed-up eyes, scarlet splotches up and down her neck, and a real mess around her nose.
Ellie wanted to throw up.
But softly, Okey rose from his chair, walked over to the sink and pulled a clean dish towel from the drawer. He held it under some hot water, wrung it out, then came back to the table.
Okey bathed Cecile’s face. He held the back of her head with one hand and wiped her tears, using the hot cloth, with the other.
It quieted Cecile. It quieted them all, deep inside. Okey didn’t say much. Just, “There now,” and “All right, Cecile.” But the sight of him bathing that woman’s face shook them all.
Cecile sobbed a few times more, then stopped altogether. Okey sat down again and lit up a cigarette.
“Well, Cecile,” he said, “looks like you and Trapper have got yourselves some trouble.”
Cecile nodded and clutched the dish towel.
“Seems to me,” Okey said, “Trapper ought to come home. Live around here somewhere, where he’s got family.”
Cecile started to nod her head, but then her eyes widened.
“Live here?” she said. “In these rotten hills?”
She flipped the dish towel onto the table.
“I’d rather die.”
She pushed back her chair and went into the living room.
Okey and Ellie and Ellie’s mother and the four girls all looked at each other.
Okey grinned.
“That woman’s crazy,” he muttered.
“Yep,” she said.
All of them grinned at each other. Okey shook his head and went off to bed. The girls headed for the television. And Ellie sat with her mother.
“You think she’s really crazy, Mama?”
Her mother nodded her head.
“Anybody who won’t live here,” she said with pursed lips, “has got to be.”