Prayers and Lies (19 page)

We finally swam back to shore as the sun dipped behind the hills.

“You wanna come home with me for supper?” I asked, toweling myself dry.

“No, thanks. I gotta cook dinner at home. If I don’t cook, dinner don’t get made.”

“But if you come home with me, you don’t need to cook dinner. Jolene’s not there, is she? You can just eat with us.”

“Bethany Marie, if I don’t cook, what’ll Caleb do for supper? A woman’s gotta cook, or a man don’t eat.” She smiled. “That’s what Caleb says.”

I shook my head in frustration. I wanted to shake this woman-child and demand the return of my Reana Mae. She must have seen something in my face that reached her, because suddenly she broke into her old grin and grabbed my hand. “Come on! Let’s race!”

We ran headlong down the road, laughing like little girls, until we came to the cabin she shared with Caleb and Jolene. Panting slightly, she grabbed me in a quick, tight hug.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Bethany. Okay? I promise!”

I watched her disappear into the house, her small hips swaying. When had she gotten so grown up? And why was she doing it so fast?

I shook my head hard, my wet hair slapping my cheeks. Then I ran toward home and supper, where everything still seemed familiar.

16
Another World

A
few nights later, Mother convinced Reana Mae and Caleb to eat supper with us. Daddy had already gone back home, so Caleb was the lone male at our table, a position he seemed not to mind. He ate four helpings of meat loaf and mashed potatoes before pushing himself back from the table.

“Thank you, ma’am,” he mumbled toward my mother. “That was real good.”

“I’m glad you enjoyed it.” Mother smiled.

“Lord knows he ate enough of it,” Melinda whispered at Nancy as Caleb rose.

Mother shot a quick warning glance at them before continuing, “I hope you saved room for some pie.”

Caleb grinned at her then—the first smile we’d seen from him all evening—and sat back down. He didn’t look menacing at all when he smiled. In fact, he looked almost like Bobby Lee. Glancing across the table toward Reana Mae, I was startled to see Nancy’s eyes scanning Caleb quickly, as if reappraising him.

“Let me help you with those dishes, Aunt Helen.” Reana Mae rose and began stacking plates.

“Now, you just sit down, Reana Mae. You’re our guest tonight—no dishes for you!”

Mother turned and looked meaningfully at Tracy and me. Tracy pretended not to notice as I rose and took the plates from Reana.

Sighing, Mother tried again. “Tracy, will you go out and get some water from the pump, please?”

“I’m not finished with my dinner, Mother.” Tracy smiled sweetly at Mother and pushed a small puddle of potatoes, peas, and butter around her plate.

Mother frowned slightly, then turned to the older girls. Before she could speak, Nancy rose gracefully, laying her napkin on the table. “I’ll go, Mother.”

She smiled down at Caleb and said, “Apparently, my little sisters need to brush up on their company manners.”

Tracy stared at her balefully, but she still made no move to rise. I stifled my own protest at being included in the indictment. After all, wasn’t I carrying dishes to the sink at that very moment? And wasn’t it Nancy herself who sidestepped chores at every opportunity?

Nancy took the chipped enamel dishpan from Mother, then turned and asked in a breathy little voice, “Caleb, would you pump the water for me? That darned thing is so rusty, it really needs a man to work it.”

All of us were staring now. Why, I could make that pump work with just one hand. Nancy had certainly never had trouble with it before.

Caleb rose and grinned down at her. “Sure,” he agreed. “I’ll get it goin’ for you.”

I glanced back at Reana Mae, who sat frowning slightly as she watched them walk out the door. Nancy had turned eighteen that spring and was just done with high school. She was very pretty, with a small but curvy frame, dark hair, and flashing black eyes. Nancy had broken off with her latest beau just after the senior prom. It seemed like she was always breaking some boy’s heart. For the moment, at least, she was unattached. And Caleb apparently had just registered on her feminine radar.

When they returned from the pump, Caleb was carrying the dishpan splashing full of water, and Nancy smiled brilliantly up at him.

“Thank you, Caleb,” Mother said as she took the dishpan from him. “But you’re company tonight. No more chores for you.”

She handed Nancy a dishrag and slightly shoved her toward the kitchen. “Now, how about some pie?”

So Caleb and Reana Mae ate pecan pie while Nancy and I washed the dishes. That is, I washed dishes. Nancy rinsed and stacked them haphazardly on the counter, fuming at Mother. By the time we finished, Caleb and Reana Mae had risen from the table and were edging toward the door.

I had just cut myself a piece of pie when Mother asked, “Where’s your mama tonight, Reana Mae?”

Reana glanced at Caleb first, then shrugged. “Oh, you know, Aunt Helen. She’s got herself some friends up in Crayville. She’s probably havin’ supper with them.”

“Will you tell her I’d like to see her tomorrow?”

Reana Mae nodded quickly, then leaned over to kiss Mother’s cheek. “I’ll tell her, Aunt Helen. But I can’t make you a promise she’ll come.”

With that they left, walking back up the road toward the cabin they both called home. Mother watched them from the porch, her eyebrows knit tightly together. I watched her watching them, then turned toward Nancy.

“Reana Mae said Caleb helped her swim all the way across the river. You should ask him to help you do it, too.”

Nancy had never been a strong swimmer, and she had taken loads of grief from Melinda every summer because she couldn’t swim across the river. Melinda had even formed a “there-and-back” club, just for kids who could swim across the river and back—a club Nancy couldn’t join.

“Maybe I’ll do that, Bethy,” Nancy purred at me, smiling.

Good
, I thought grimly.
Take all the time in the world. Just keep him away from Reana Mae
.

But Nancy didn’t seem overly anxious to join the there-and-back club. For most of June, at least, she seemed content to bask in the sun, reading fan magazines and drinking Tab colas. Some days Caleb joined us by the river, cutting cleanly through the dark water, throwing younger kids out into the deep, diving off the wooden raft, then dropping down beside Nancy and staring hungrily at her tiny waist and rounded breasts when he thought she wasn’t looking.

Whenever Caleb came to the beach, Reana Mae was right behind him. She struggled to keep up with him in the water, matching him dive for dive from the ramp. But back on the shore, she could only sit unhappily in her own tiny bikini—the kind Mother would never let any of us wear—and watch Caleb stare at Nancy’s breasts rising under the tight black nylon of her swimsuit.

Otherwise, I didn’t see much of Reana Mae. Most days she worked, either at Ray’s store or at home. I stopped by her house almost every day, anyway, sometimes staying to help with laundry or cleaning. Once I even helped her bake bread, and took a loaf home to Mother, receiving a kiss in return. Some days, though, Reana was neither at the store nor at home. Invariably, those were the days Caleb had off work. Sometimes on those days the two of them would show up in the late afternoon at the beach. But sometimes they never came at all. We didn’t know where they were, and I never asked.

Jolene finally showed up at our house a couple weeks after our dinner with Reana Mae and Caleb. It was late morning and I was at home, nursing cramps with a hot water bottle and aspirin. I’d been having my period for several months now. It was the only time when Mother let me lie about in bed, reading or listening to the radio, while she brought me crackers and hot tea.

Mother was in the front room snapping green beans for supper and listening to the radio, and I was lying miserably on my bed, feeling very sorry for myself, when I heard a loud thudding on the porch. I sat up, hearing Mother open the screen door and say, “Why, Jolene! Are you all right?”

I sat quietly, listening to shuffling sounds. Then I heard the screen door screech closed again and Jolene’s voice saying, “Why, sure, Helen, I’m okay. Your damned step’s crooked, that’s all.”

“I’ll ask Jimmy to look at it next time he’s down.” Mother’s voice was so soft I had to strain to hear her.

“Reana Mae said you wanted to see me.” Jolene’s voice sounded muffled, like she was talking with a mitten in her mouth.

“I just wanted to visit with you. We’ve been down here almost a month now, and I was missing you.”

“You got any coffee made, Helen?”

“I’ll put the water on right now.”

I heard Mother bustle around in the kitchen for a minute, then return to the couch.

“How are you, Jolene?”

“I’m just fine. I’m all right.” Jolene’s voice had a sharp edge. “You shouldn’t go believin’ half what you hear down here, you know. Damned valley’s nothin’ but a bunch of gossips and liars, Helen. That’s what they are. Just gossips and liars!”

“I hadn’t heard anything at all, Jolene. I was just wondering how you are.”

An uncomfortable silence followed, broken finally by the teakettle’s whistle.

“I’ll get us some coffee.” Mother’s voice was unnaturally bright, like chrome on a new bike.

“Now, then,” she said, “do you want cream or sugar? … Okay, then, how about some banana bread? Melinda made it just this morning.”

“Well, thanks, Helen.” Jolene sounded like she’d swallowed an entire sheep now. “I didn’t get me no breakfast. Reana Mae’s workin’ down to the store today, so she left before I got up.”

“Reana certainly is growing up,” Mother ventured. “Why, I hardly would have recognized her, she’s gotten so grown up.”

She paused, waiting for a response, I guess, then plowed ahead.

“Why, she looks almost like a little woman these days. Jimmy and I both noticed it. The girls have, too…. In fact, Jolene, I … that is we, me and Jimmy, I mean … well, we were wondering if Reana Mae isn’t growing up too fast? Of course,” Mother continued quickly, “of course, she’s bound to grow up sooner or later. But my goodness, Jolene! She seems older even than Nancy sometimes. Years older than Bethany and Tracy.”

Mother paused to catch her breath. Still, Jolene said nothing except, “You got any more of that bread, Helen? That’s real good.”

“Jolene!” Mother sounded angry now. “Are you hearing what I’m saying? We’re worried about Reana Mae, Jimmy and me. And about you, too, honey. Reana is too young to be taking on all this responsibility. And you … Jolene, I do believe you’ve been drinking even this early in the day. Good gracious, it’s not even noon!”

Jolene sighed heavily—so heavily I heard it in the bedroom. Then she answered in a dull, flat voice, “Helen, you don’t know nothin’ about it—nothin’ at all. Hell, you don’t know nothin’ at all about real troubles … with your rich husband and your nice house…. But I do, Helen. I surely do know. And I guess Reana Mae’s gotta know, too. I want that girl to know how to take care of herself, ’cause ain’t nobody in the world gonna do it for her. That’s the devil’s own truth. And Reana Mae’s gotta learn it now, so it don’t kill her later.”

A loud crash made me sit up straight.

“Oh, Lord Almighty, Helen! I went and broke one of your nice teacups. I’ll pay for it…. No! I will! I’ll pay for the damned cup! I don’t need no charity from you or from no one else, either! I’ll pay for the goddamned cup, and I’ll take care of my own goddamned kid, too!

“You just stay outta what you don’t understand, Helen, you hear me? You stay outta my life and outta my business! I’ll raise my own goddamned kid any goddamned way I want to! I don’t need no help from you!”

A scraping of chairs and the banging of the screen door told me she was leaving.

“You just leave me be, Helen! Leave me and Reana Mae alone! You hear me?!”

She thumped down the step and I heard her voice grow faint as she stumbled down the road. Then I heard the springs of the old sofa in the front room, as Mother sank back down, sobbing softly.

I tiptoed into the front room to sit beside her on the couch. Wrapping my arms around her bent neck, I crooned to her the way I’d heard her do all my life.

“It’s okay, Mother. It’s okay. They’ll be all right. I know they will. I’m sure Bobby Lee will come home soon and make it all okay. You’ll see.”

She sat quietly for a long moment, then raised her head, wiped her eyes, and kissed me on the forehead.

“Yes, Bethy, it will be okay. Whatever happens, it will be all right. We’ll just keep praying for them, okay? You keep praying for Reana Mae and for Jolene and Bobby Lee, and it will be all right.”

In late June, Melinda solemnly inducted me into the there-and-back club, while Nancy stared at us bitterly.

The next day, as I set out for Ray’s store on an errand for Mother, Nancy fell into step beside me.

“Whatcha up to, Bethy?” She smiled down at me sweetly. I half expected her to pat me on the head.

“Going to the store for Mother.”

“I’ll come with you.”

I stared at her a moment before elaborately shrugging my shoulders. “If you want,” I said as casually as I could.

We walked in silence most of the way. Just before we reached the store, Nancy touched my arm, saying, “Did Caleb really help Reana Mae swim all the way across the river?”

I nodded in relief. Life made sense again.

As we entered the store, I heard Reana Mae’s voice from the back.

“That there’s a fondue pot, Mrs. Perkins. You fill that little pot at the bottom with lamp oil, and then you light it up. And that heats the cooking oil in the big pot up top. And then you cook yourself up some meat in the big pot, right at the table! Ain’t that somethin’? Folks out in California use ’em all the time—three meals a day, I hear tell!”

I knew if Reana Mae was there, Caleb would be, too. Sure enough, we hadn’t been there more than a minute before his hulking shadow overtook us.

“What’re you lookin’ for today, ladies?” he asked, smiling down at Nancy.