Tommy arrived at the shed. Empty. Even Fern and Teddy were gone. His stomach growled. There must be something left from dinner at Mama’s. His head still buzzing, he entered the kitchen and slammed the door, rattling the windows. His bird gripped his shoulder tighter. “Hi, lady,” Frank squawked at Mama.
Tommy fell back against the door and propped himself there, arms across his chest. Reed Hayes stared at Tommy, his mouth slack. Tommy scowled, irritated at the man’s presence. He touched his ribs, the swelling increasing. He’d had enough fighting for the night.
He wouldn’t have gone there at all had he not been desperate to fill his belly and soak up the firewater he’d been served. It was as though he’d drunk something that changed him completely in a matter of a few servings. He’d never felt so out of control, numb—but alive—at once. The acid turned his stomach, but the scent of bread, chicken, and potatoes reminded him why he was there.
“Tommy, what’s the matter? You’ve been out of sorts since this evening. Look at you. What’ve you been doing?” Mama went to him, taking his face in her hands, stealing glances at his bird. She examined Tommy as though he were a plant with leaf rot and she were trying to determine how best to treat the ailment. The bird pecked toward Mama. She backed away.
“I’m hungry, but I’ll be out of your hair in a minute.” He glowered in the direction of Mr. Hayes.
Mama took his chin and turned his face back and forth. “What’s wrong with you?”
He didn’t answer.
She sniffed. “You’ve been drinking.”
He looked away.
Mama’s mouth fell open, her eyes filled with disappointment. “You know better than anyone that you can’t drink like this. Is that what had you so awfully rude earlier?” Her lips went into a hard line. “Not after what your father went through with the laudanum. You’ve been drunk all day?”
Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree . . . Judge Calder’s words floated back, filling him with rage.
“’Course not. I wasn’t feeling well earlier. I tried a cure and . . . Never mind. What’s it matter? Bad day is all.”
His vision wavered between focused and blurred. He wiggled away from Mama and went to the stove, where there was a pot of potatoes. He grabbed a fork and began to eat right out of the pot.
Mama took a plate from the cabinet. She pushed it in front of him, and he loaded it heavy, clanging the fork. He stopped for a moment. Mama’s expression was sad and searching, the way she’d looked at his father when the curtain of laudanum dropped over him.
Now he understood his father better than ever. The man may have used laudanum to numb away his life, having to deal with his mother, who clearly turned disappointed easily. Her sad expression made Tommy want to slam back another glass of red-eye.
Mama took the fork from him and added chicken to his plate. He fell into a chair and leaned his forearms on the table.
“Glad you’re home safe, Tommy,” Mr. Hayes said with all his feigned friendliness.
Tommy gnawed on the words that he wanted to say but shouldn’t. Then he gave them their legs. “So friendly. Mr. Friendly. Right here in my kitchen.”
Mr. Hayes gave what Tommy was sure was a chuckle before gathering himself. “Maybe Katherine has some headache powder? You’re going to have a mean one,” Mr. Hayes said.
“How ’bout this, Mr. Smart. I already got myself a blazing headache. Beat ya to it.” Tommy didn’t want anything from him, least of all his concern. “What on earth are you doing, Mr. Reed Hayes? Haven’t you had your fill of putting your hands in my family garden? Haven’t you gotten enough articles and dissertations out of us for now?”
Mama set the plate on the table and clamped onto his shoulder. “Stop it. Mr. Hayes has done nothing but be helpful and kind.”
She slid into the chair next to Tommy. “You can’t drink whiskey, Tommy. Yes, people get drunk by accident. But that’s why you can’t drink at all. Not one drink. It’s like a family curse or something—” She lifted and dropped her shoulders. “One round,” she said through clenched teeth. “One round to lose all sense. It’s in our blood, like a rule we can’t break. Your father, your grandfather . . .”
Tommy snorted, shoveling food down his throat. She was the one who broke sacred rules. She’d gotten divorced. She’d made his father leave and shamed them all. Who was she to tell Tommy what to do with his free time?
He pointed his fork at Mr. Hayes then Mama. “You two in the garden this summer. Laughing and writing in that blasted book and digging and composting and bent over those roses like the two of you birthed them. It’s wrong. My father might not be here,” Tommy pointed his fork at his heart, “but he’s here. He belongs to us, with us, and he’s coming back just as soon as . . . I don’t know. But soon.”
Mr. Hayes stood, scooped up Yale, and headed for the stairs. “I’ll put Yale to bed and leave you two to discuss this alone.”
Yale put her head on Mr. Hayes’s shoulder, and the sight crumbled what was left of Tommy’s good sense. Mama moved closer to Tommy, whispering in a taut tone, “Mr. Hayes is a friend of our family. You need to respect your elders. I’ve taught you—”
“Nothing, Mama.” Tommy tossed his fork onto the plate. “I’ve learned nothing from you except I have to depend on myself.”
“Tommy!” She grasped his shoulders. “Who in their right mind served you this . . . whatever it is you drank to turn you into the devil? If you stumble into the street like this and the police see you, they’ll toss you in jail. You don’t want to know . . . It’s awful what happens to boys in jail.”
Tommy shrank, glad that she didn’t know he was plenty acquainted with what it was like in jail. He clenched his jaw. “I’ve been on my own long enough to decide when to have a sip of joy-juice.”
“Really? This is joy to you?”
“Yes.”
“You won’t mind jail? Frigid cells, brutish men who will be more than happy to give you a beating just for fun. Or worse. Surely you realize that?”
He shrugged. Mama’s brow creased with sadness and confusion. She grasped Tommy’s face and pulled him toward her, kissing his forehead.
“You’ll ruin your opportunity to shape your life in a meaningful way, in a way that provides a comfortable home, one that allows for a solid life, a wife someday, children.”
“It’s already ruined.” He moved Mama’s hands from his cheeks. “My father left because it’s so bad with us. He left us, Mama, and that’s why I’m like this. You made him leave. That’s why I need things like a beer once in a while. Or a whiskey for medicine.”
Her mouth dropped open.
Her stunned expression reflected back at him, shocked at what he was saying, but he couldn’t stop himself, the words loosened by alcohol. “You ruined our life, Mama. You.”
She drew back, looking as though he’d run her down with a wagon. She put her quivering hands in her lap. Tommy breathed heavily, nauseated. He hadn’t realized how angry he’d been with her, how much resentment had curdled inside, waiting to unfurl, veiling both of them. It felt good to let it out. Then he saw her absorb the pain, the silent flinch before she looked away.
Finally she met his gaze hard. “You can do anything you want, Tommy.” Her voice was strong, not weak, as he’d expected it to be after what he just said. She balled a fist and set it on the table. “You’re in school; you’re working for Reverend Shaw. You can build up what you see as destroyed. Carousing, running away doesn’t solve anything. You’re old enough to claim your life choices and not blame others.”
“I’m not the one who ran away from everything that mattered. You ran, and my father just did what you told him to do—leave. You ran away. You sent him away.”
Her face reddened. Tommy braced himself, thinking she might hit him. The tendon in her neck tensed a cord snaking down, disappearing into her collar.
“We can reshape our lives. I’m doing that. Katherine is. You can, too. But if you’re falling into drink, then you are most surely running away, even if you never lift a foot to leave Des Moines.” She pulled him into her arms. He was stunned that she didn’t strike him, that he let her hold him.
She kissed his forehead again and rocked him. “Your life could be grand, Tommy. Finish high school, be a draftsman, a lawyer, anything. You’re just as smart as James. Never forget that.” Mama’s voice caught. Had she ever said that before?
He was as smart as James, just not in the way that James was smart. His mother didn’t understand Tommy’s intelligence. “I’m not James, Mama.” Tommy pulled away. “And I’ll never like that Mr. Hayes. No matter how much you do.”
“But—”
“You know why?” Tommy said. The resentment reared up again, his ability to stifle it, gone.
Mama shook her head.
“Because Mr. Hayes isn’t my father and I’m not James. James would love Mr. Hayes. But not me. And as much as I miss my brother, I have to say the only reason I wish he was here is so that you wouldn’t have to press the memory of him, the shape of him into me. If he was here, I’d be free. His death was like a house falling in on me. I’m forever trapped by him—what he was and what I’ll never be.”
“Tommy, no.” Her voice was thin. He’d hurt her good; he could see that plain as if they shared broken, half-beating hearts.
“I know you were never like James, and that wasn’t bad. That was wonderful. It was—”
Tommy pushed his plate away, the entire thing clean. “I’m done, Mama.”
He hopped up and ran out the door with Frank squawking, “Bye, lady,” as the door slammed behind them. Into the night, he stomped through the kitchen garden and he finally felt empty of all the fear and worry and guilt and anger. Trouble was, the emptiness, it sat there yawning, ulcerous, filling right back up with all that turned his soul rancid in the first place.