CHAPTER 20
I wasn’t the only one who feared it was my turn to get really sick.
When Grandma felt my forehead, I saw in her eyes the same worry I was feeling. “I reckon you’re warm all right,” she said, nodding, her lips pursed tight together. “Ricky, I think you oughta be headin’ home ’bout now. Tell your mama I’ll check in with her tomorrow.”
He stood up. “Pixie’s gonna be okay, right?”
Grandma’s lips found a smile this time. “’Course she will be. Probably a silly cold or something. Don’t worry. Tell your mama hi.”
But as soon as Ricky left, Grandma didn’t look as certain as she put her hand on my forehead again, followed by her lips. “Hmm . . . let me get the thermometer.”
I wrinkled my nose, since that thermometer always tasted of the bitter alcohol it sat in between uses. But before I could protest, Grandma was back and shaking the thermometer down. “Open up, now.”
The cool glass warmed fast under my hot tongue. I couldn’t even think about the bitter taste, since I was watching the worry in Grandma’s eyes. And I couldn’t quiet the worries in my own head.
Is this my turn?
Will they be taking me to the hospital tonight?
Grandma sensed my worry. “You’ll be fine. Just fine.” She put her arm around me and squeezed me tight.
Then she pulled the thermometer out of my mouth and tipped it to read where the red line stopped. Her face couldn’t hide her reaction. “Let’s get you into bed so you can get some rest.”
“What’s my temperature?” I asked.
“Never you mind that. You’ll be fine,” she said again, but this time I wasn’t sure which one of us she was trying to convince.
Grandma tucked me into bed while Daddy went to the Browns’ house to call Doc Simpson. My eyes felt so heavy I had a hard time keeping them open, but still I couldn’t sleep.
Daddy came up to see me when he got back. “How’re you doing?” he asked, touching the top of my head, his hands ice-cold.
“Not good.”
He sat on the edge of my bed. “I know what you’re thinking, and I want you to know that Doc Simpson said polio doesn’t spread much during the winter and you definitely couldn’t catch it from Charlotte five months earlier. He said for us to keep an eye on you, and he’ll be out tomorrow to check in on you.”
That night, tired and achy as I was, I tossed and turned. Grandma stayed with me, putting cool, wet towels on my forehead.
By the weak light of the moon, I could see her in the rocking chair she’d moved into my room, with her head down. I guessed her to be asleep, but I had to tell her nonetheless. “I deserve to get polio.”
Grandma didn’t move her head, but her words came out louder than a whisper. “Don’t talk nonsense.” Her eyes stayed shut.
“But I do. I deserve to get polio. It’s my fault Charlotte’s sick. It would be right if I got it too.”
Grandma got out of her rocking chair and sat next to me on my bed. I was certain she was going to demand I confess my sins right there. But her face was kinder than I’d ever seen it before. She put the back of her hand gently on my forehead, tickling me a bit when she brushed away my hair. “What’s right is that you get better. What’s right is that I don’t lose another of my girls. Now hush and get some rest.”
I think I finally slept then.
When I woke up in the morning, Grandma was still there. And maybe it was the fever making me what Charlotte would call delirious, but I swear when I blinked my eyes open, Grandma called me Pixie.
Doc Simpson came out later that morning and assured us what I had didn’t look at all like polio. And he was sure some bad-tasting medicine would make my burning throat better. He wanted Grandma to keep me home from school a few days, which was fine with me.
For the first couple of days, I think we all worried the doctor might be wrong. Grandma was never far from my side. And on the rare moment when she wasn’t next to me, Granddaddy or Daddy took her place.
But after lots of chicken soup and yucky medicine, my fever broke—and I could finally swallow without it feeling like broken glass.
No sooner was I out of bed than I got the best news. Well, not the best news, since that would have been Charlotte coming home. But I got the second-best news I could get.
I was sitting with Granddaddy, listening to the radio playing music I imagined people in fancy clothes dancing to. I’d shut my eyes to picture the dancing in my head.
“You feeling better, Prudence?”
My eyes popped open, surprised to see Daddy standing there, his cheeks still red from the winter winds. He rubbed his hands together and blew on them to warm them. “I’m so much better, Daddy.”
He sat down next to me. “Well, good, ’cause I got a big job for you.”
Now, I wasn’t feeling good enough to do my jobs around the farm. I’d enjoyed the break being sick gave me from the dishes, and ’specially from gathering the eggs. “Maybe I’m not that much better, Daddy,” I said.
Granddaddy laughed as Daddy continued. “I’ll bet you’ll like this job. You see, Clyde Grayson has a ewe who had triplets. That’s a lot of babies for one sheep to care for—and she had ’em too early. The mama ain’t tending to one of the lambs—rejecting it.”
“That’s awful! How could a mama do that to her baby?”
Granddaddy spoke up. “That’s just the way nature works sometimes, Pixie. Sometimes a mama won’t feed one of her babies. Sometimes there’s no rhyme or reason for it.”
Daddy nodded. “That’s right. And Clyde was saying he was thinking about killing the lamb so the other two baby lambs could grow stronger.”
“Oh, Daddy, don’t let him kill that baby lamb!”
“I thought you’d say that. I suggested to Clyde that we take the lamb in and raise it. But it would have to be your job to feed it and take care of it. Do you think you could do that? But before you answer—keep in mind this here’s a farm. The lamb would be an animal on the farm—not a pet you get to keep.”
’Course I knew the lamb would be an animal on the farm. That didn’t matter—I’d still try my best.
But was my best ever good enough?