Ella.

When he drove to Chicago Street to her little house after she had called him at school it was late in the afternoon. He parked and walked up the sidewalk past the three elm trees, the one with the sap still showing the dark stain but no longer so raw nor fresh this late in the year, and then when he stepped onto the porch he discovered that she was already waiting for him at the door. She opened it even before he could knock. She let him in and he entered the little front room of the place and saw at once that she had been packing. Her two suitcases were set out on the floor and the room itself was clean and spruce and neat again, as it had been when she’d moved in. Dustfree and anonymous again, it was returned once more to its former state: a little rental house on Chicago Street on the east side of Holt.

When he had a good look at Ella he could see that she too was better now. Not as good as she had looked once, but her hair was pretty again, just washed and brushed back from her face, and she was dressed in wool slacks and a good white blouse. She had lost weight since he’d last seen her, but it didn’t appear that she would lose any more.

He gestured toward the suitcases. Are you going somewhere?

I’m going to tell you about it, she said. That’s why I called you.

So tell me, he said.

She looked at him. Her eyes still bore a kind of wounded fierceness, as though the sadness and the anger were both just below the surface. I hoped you weren’t going to be that way today, she said.

What way?

I didn’t want it to be like this, not this time.

Why don’t you go ahead and tell me what you have in mind, he said. You called school and I came.

Can we at least sit down? she said. Will you do that?

Yes.

She seated herself on the couch and he sat opposite her on one of the wooden chairs. On the couch she looked small, almost frail. He picked out a cigarette from his shirt pocket. Are you going to object if I smoke?

I’d prefer that you didn’t.

He looked at her. He held the cigarette but didn’t light it. Go ahead and talk, he said. I’m listening.

Well, she said, I wanted you to know that I’ve decided to go to Denver to my sister’s. To stay with her for a while. I called her and it’s all set. She has an extra bedroom and I can have the use of that. I won’t be in the way and it’ll give me time to think. We both think it’ll be for the best.

For how long?

I don’t know. I can’t tell that yet. For as long as it takes.

When?

You mean when am I going?

Yes, when do you plan to leave?

Tomorrow. In the morning. I’ll be taking the car.

You’ll be taking the car. That’s news.

You don’t need it. You have the pickup.

He looked around, out into the little dining room and through the arched doorway into the kitchen. He turned back. And you think this’ll be the answer? Taking off like this?

She regarded him steadily. You know, you make me really tired sometimes.

I guess that goes both ways, he said.

They looked at each other, and it seemed obvious to Guthrie that she was thinking hard, trying to get back to how she wanted this to be. But it wasn’t going to happen. Too much had gone on.

She spoke again. I’m sorry about that for both of us, she said. I’m sorry about a lot of things. And I’ve decided I’m finally tired of being sorry.

He started to speak, but she cut him off.

Let me finish, please.

I was only going to say—

I know. Let me finish. I don’t want to forget this. I want something more than this. I understand that now. I’ve been submerged and abstracted. I wanted something more from you all these years. I wanted someone who wanted me for what I am. Not his own version of me. It sounds too simple to say it that way, but that’s what it is. Someone who wanted me, for myself. You don’t.

I used to, he said. I did once.

What happened to it?

Lots of things. It wore out. He shrugged. I didn’t get back what I gave you, what I wanted in return.

What you wanted? She flared up now, speaking heatedly. What about me? What about what I want?

What do you want? he said. He was angry now too. I don’t think you know. I wish you did but I don’t think you do. This is just another example of it.

You can’t say that, she said. That’s not for you to say. I’ll take care of that.

They sat facing each other across the room, and Guthrie thought, So they had reached this point again. It hadn’t taken them long. They’d arrived at this place one more time despite whatever good intentions they’d started with. It didn’t matter, this is where they would end up. It had been this way for the past three or four years. He looked at her. They were waiting, both trying privately to regain some calm in themselves. At the back of the little house the heater clicked on and the fan blew warm air into the room.

What about the boys? he said.

I’ve been thinking about that. You’ll just have to keep them.

You mean as opposed to what I’ve already been doing.

I know you’ve been taking care of them by yourself, she said. I can’t do anything else right now. But I want them to come stay with me here tonight. Then I’ll leave in the morning. I’ll bring them back to the house before I leave.

They still have their papers in the morning.

They’ll be home in time.

What about money? he said.

I’m going to take half of our savings.

The hell.

It’s half mine, she said. It’s only fair.

He took out matches and lit the cigarette he’d been holding. He blew smoke toward the ceiling light and looked across at her. All right, he said. Take the money.

I already have, she said. And you’ll be good to the boys, won’t you. And you’ll pay attention to them. And I want them to call me and for you to let me talk to them. I want you to promise you won’t make that a problem.

You can call any time, he said. They can call you any time.

And I want them to come and see me too. After a while. After I’ve gotten settled.

I think they should, he said. They’ll want to. They already miss you now. It’ll be worse after you leave.

He smoked and looked around for an ashtray but there wasn’t any and she didn’t get up to find him one. He tapped ashes into his cupped palm.

So that’s it?

Yes, I think so.

All right. I think I’ll go.

He rose without saying anything more and he walked out onto the front porch and she followed him and shut the door. Outside, he brushed the ashes off his hand and that evening he drove the two boys back to their mother’s house, driving across town in the old pickup with a grocery bag containing their clean pajamas on the seat between them, with the blue streetlights turned on at all the street corners and the town itself looking quiet and serene. He pulled up and stopped in front of the house. The lights were on inside.

Mom’ll bring you home in the morning, he said. And you’ve got your pajamas.

They nodded.

You’re all set then.

Can we call you if we need anything? Bobby said.

Of course. But you’ll be all right. I know you will. You’re going to have a good time here.

Guthrie and the two boys sat in the heated cab, looking at the little stucco house with the lights showing in the windows. Once they saw her pass before the window carrying something. Patches of snow under the bare trees in the yard were shining in the house light.

All right? Guthrie said. That’ll be good. You’ll have a fine time. Who knows, maybe you won’t even want to come home again. He patted them on the legs. A joke.

But they didn’t smile. They didn’t say anything.

Well. You better go. Your mom’s waiting. I’ll see you in the morning.

Good night, Dad.

Good night, he said.

They climbed out of the pickup and walked one after the other up the sidewalk and knocked on the door and stood waiting without turning to look back at him, and then she opened the front door. She had changed clothes since the afternoon and now was wearing a handsome blue dress. He thought she looked slim and pretty framed in the doorway. She let them in and closed the door, and afterward he drove up Chicago past the little houses set back from the street in their narrow lots, the lawns in front of them all brown with winter and the evening lights turned on inside the houses and people sitting down to dinner in the kitchens or watching the news on television in the front rooms, while in some of the houses some of the people too, he knew well, were already starting to argue in the back bedrooms.

When they entered the house Ike and Bobby found that she had already set the table in the little dining room. It was pleasant, with lighted candles and the flames reflecting in the glasses and silverware, and out in the kitchen she had hamburger chili ready to dish up and a round chocolate cake, which she had made specially for them. She wanted it to be festive.

Well come in, come in, she said. Don’t be strangers. Take off your coats. I have everything ready.

We ate at home, Bobby said, looking at the table. We didn’t know you’d have supper.

Oh. Didn’t you? She looked at him. She had both hands on the back of a chair. She looked at his brother. I thought you would eat here. I thought that was understood.

We can eat some more, Ike said.

Don’t be foolish. You don’t have to make yourselves sick.

No. We’re still hungry, Mother.

Are you?

Yes, we are.

I am, Bobby said.

They sat down and ate the supper she had prepared. They were able to eat quite a lot while she told them about her decision to go to Denver. They listened to her without saying anything since Guthrie had already told them about it. She said she wanted them to come visit her soon and that her leaving was going to be better for everyone, including the two of them, even if they couldn’t see it yet, because soon she’d be able to act like their mother again, and then when she was feeling completely better they would all decide what to do next, didn’t they think that would be all right? They didn’t know, they said. Maybe, they said. She said she guessed that would have to do, that it was about as much as she could hope for right then.

After supper they played a game of blackjack which she had taught them a year ago. She went to the closet and opened her purse and took out some coins and they used these to bet with, determining for the sake of the game that the coins were all the same worth, even the quarters and pennies. During the card game she sat across from them on the carpet with her stockinged legs folded back to the side and her dress covering her knees. She acted as though she were happy, as though they were having a real party, and made little jokes to tease them, and once she stood up and brought each of them more cake from the kitchen and they ate it sitting on the floor together. They watched her with their heads down and smiled when she said things.

Later they put on their pajamas in the bathroom and then went into her bedroom and got into the bed that she used.

She undressed in the bathroom too. She brushed her hair and washed her face and put on a long nightgown, then came into the bedroom. She said she’d made up the bed in the other room for them. But they asked to sleep in this room with her. Couldn’t they, this once? They were already in the bed. She stood beside the bed looking at them. They wanted to sleep one on each side of her but she said that would be too hot. She got in on the outside and Bobby lay in the middle with Ike next to him. The ceiling light down the hallway shone in through the half-open door. They settled down and lay quietly. Occasionally a car went by outside on Chicago Street. They talked a little in the dim light.

Mother, are you going to be all right in Denver? Ike said.

I hope so, she said. I want to be. I’ll call you when I get there. Will you call me back sometimes?

Yes, he said. We’ll call you every week.

Does Dad have your number? Bobby said.

Yes, he does. And you know how much I love you, don’t you. Both of you. I want you always to remember that. I’m going to miss you so much. But I know you’re going to be all right.

I wish you didn’t have to go, Ike said.

I don’t understand why you are, Bobby said.

It’s hard to explain, she said. I just know I have to. Can you try to accept that, even if you don’t understand it?

They didn’t say anything.

I hope you can.

After a while she said, Do you have any more questions?

They shook their heads.

Do you think you can go to sleep?

In the night after they were asleep she got up and looked out the window at the front yard and the empty street, at the stark trees that stood in the lawn like arrested stickfigures. She went out to the kitchen. She made coffee and took it to the front room and lay down on the sofa and after an hour or more she went to sleep. But she woke early, in time to wake them and set out cereal, and then she drove them in the car back to the house in the early cold winter morning. She leaned across in the front seat of the car and kissed them both, and Guthrie came out on the porch to meet them, and then she turned the car around and went out the drive onto Railroad Street and drove through Holt, which didn’t take long, and then she was in the country on US 34 driving west to start her next life in Denver.