The Memory of All That (10 page)

Chapter 19

When Marnie woke up the next morning, she felt as if some of her burden had been lifted.

How odd that I feel better,
she thought,
since I found out so much bad stuff about myself yesterday.

At least it was out in the open—those reasons why everyone thought the worst about her. She was sure she hadn’t heard about all the bad things she had done, but she got the general idea. And although anybody else would have been depressed upon hearing all David had told her, in a way she was relieved that her past was no longer a secret. She hoped there was nothing else to surprise her and that she had heard the worst. She would hold on to that thought, anyway, unless told differently.

She had spent the last week getting well, worrying about who she was and what she had done. Now it was time to move on with her life, as best she could.

David had told her, when she asked, that she did not work anywhere, nor did she do any volunteer work. As far as he could tell, he said, she shopped and visited with friends during the day and went out with friends in the evenings. She had no hobbies he knew of.

As she dressed in jeans and a red sweater she thought about what David said about her scant amount of time with Jonathan.

I’m going to change that pattern,
she thought.
I’m going to spend more time with him, do things with him, get to really know him—what he likes and doesn’t like. A mother needs to know all that.

Although her husband had cautioned her about disappointing Jonathan again, she was sure she wouldn’t go back to ignoring him as she had in the past. She stopped at the nursery and found Mrs. Tucker and Jonathan getting ready for breakfast.

“I was just coming to see if I could join you, or you join me, for breakfast. May I?”

“Sure!” Jonathan said excitedly. “We were just going down to the kitchen to eat.”

“Certainly, Mrs. Barrett. Of course you may join us,” the older woman said. She appeared to be flustered, wringing a handkerchief in her hands and taking a few steps to and fro. Every few seconds her slender fingers would dart to her cheek. Marnie surmised this was something out of the ordinary, breakfasting with her son, and it made Mrs. Tucker nervous.

“I don’t know what the custom is for breakfast—that is, I’ve forgotten. I’ve been getting my breakfast delivered on a tray, but now that I’m back on my feet I can go to breakfast instead of breakfast coming to me,” she said, smiling at Jonathan, who gave a giggle at the lame joke.

“We usually have our meal in the kitchen,” Mrs. Tucker said. “The elder Mrs. Barrett eats in her room, and Mr. Barrett’s schedule varies. Sometimes he eats with us. Other times he has already left for work by the time we go downstairs.”

The trio descended the staircase and passed through the dining room and into the large kitchen. There were two places set at the island, where brightly striped pottery plates were set on cheerful yellow placemats.

“Here now, Mrs. Gravy has to put out another place at the table,” the cook said in a jolly voice. “We have a new one this morning, we do.” She winked at Jonathan. “Yer mother’s joining us today, is she?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied, politely.

“Well, it’s oatmeal this morning. Will that be suitin’ ye this mornin’, Miss Marnie?”

“Yes indeed. As far as I know, I like oatmeal.”

The rotund cook placed bowls of steaming oatmeal in front of each person and started pouring orange juice into their glasses when the swinging door opened and David joined the group.

“Ah, now we have everyone here, we do. Oatmeal this mornin’, Mr. David?”

David lifted his eyebrows as he observed the three people at the breakfast bar.

“Er, OK, Mrs. Gravy, uh, Grady.”

Marnie was looking into her oats as she stirred them. “Mrs. Grady, would you happen to have any brown sugar handy? And some butter? I think I’d like some on my oatmeal.”

“Lord love ye’, o’ course I do. Not that you’ve been eatin’ breakfast much lately, but I remember what people like, I do, and I have it all ready for ye’.” She reached over to the counter and put two small covered bowls in front of Marnie.

“There ye’ go. Had the butter out softenin’ and here’s yer brown sugar, just like you like it,” she said as she pushed the bowls forward.

“That’s what you like on your oats?” Jonathan asked.

“I think so. That’s what my appetite is telling me. Isn’t it funny I can’t remember much, but I know what I like on oatmeal?” She smiled at her son.

“I like raisins in mine,” he said, reaching for the bowl sitting in front of his place.

“And here’s some sausage that goes well with it,” Mrs. Grady said as she put a plate of links in front of David, who immediately forked several onto his plate.

“Mrs. Gravy knows what I like, too,” he said.

Mrs. Tucker had taken a few spoons of the porridge when she pushed it away. “Mr. Barrett, I hate to ask, I really do, but could someone watch Jonathan for a while this morning? I have a toothache. It’s very bad or else I would put it off until my day off, but I really need to see my dentist about it. I have been taking more pain reliever than is safe. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t necessary.”

Marnie spoke up immediately, before David had a chance to answer.

“I was going to ask him to spend the morning with me anyway, to show me around the house, and perhaps help me remember things. And I thought we could read or watch a movie on TV.”

David looked from one woman to the other. “Mrs. Tucker, of course you can take as much time as is necessary. Marnie, are you sure you’re up to caring for Jonathan for several hours?”

“I’m sure,” she answered as she looked at him expectantly.

“OK then. Mrs. Tucker, do you need me to drive you to the dentist’s office?”

“No, thank you, Mr. Barrett. I can make it. I’ll leave right now.” She placed her napkin neatly by her plate and left the room.

“Poor woman,” Mrs. Grady said as she gathered the uneaten breakfast and carried the dishes to the sink. “A sore tooth can give a body a right lot of trouble, all right.”

“I noticed her touching her cheek when I stopped in the nursery this morning, but I thought it was nerves.”

“And you’re sure you’re OK caring for Jonathan for the morning?”

“Of course! Why wouldn’t I be?”

“It’s just that you’ve never done it before. You’ve said he—that it made you uneasy to be in charge of a child.”

“Nonsense! We’ll do just fine. Won’t we, Jonathan?”

Jonathan nodded, his mouth too full to speak, but his eyes were bright as he looked at her.

“Well, if you have any problems, Alice will be to work before long, and Mrs. Grady is here. You can leave him with either of them if you need to.” He had finished his meal and pushed back his stool. “Good breakfast, Mrs. Grady,” he said, and after giving Jonathan a kiss on the top of his head, he left the room.

“If you’re through eating, Jonathan, let’s go get washed up before we start our morning activities.”

I must really have been pathetic if David thinks I can’t even care for my son for a few
hours
.
I’ll show him. I may have been a bad mother before, but I’m going to learn to be a good mother to my son from this day forward.

Chapter 20

Jonathan’s schedule included brushing his teeth after meals, so each of them went to their own room to complete their preparations for the day, meeting in the hall a few minutes later.

“Jonathan, maybe you can help me remember things around here.”

“OK,” he said. “How?”

“Let’s start by you telling me about all these rooms up here. There are a lot of them, and I don’t know who they belong to. That is, I don’t know who sleeps in them. Are they all bedrooms?” She hadn’t wanted to open any of the doors for fear of prying or invading someone’s privacy. “Will you be a tour guide and tell me about this house?”

“Sure.” He took her by the hand and pulled her back to stand in front of her own room. Pointing across the hall, he started his explanation.

“That’s Mrs. Tucker’s room,” he said, “right across from yours.”

“Yes, and the next one is yours.”

He opened the door to his room and led her inside. “See, there’s a door from my room to hers, so if I get scared during the night I can just go get her, or I can yell and she will come.”

“Do you get scared often?”

“No. I used to when I was little, but now that I’m four I never do.”

“That’s good.”

“That door”—he pointed to a door in his bedroom opposite the one to Mrs. Tucker’s room—“goes to the play room.”

“Yes. We came through it the other day when you were showing me around.”

They went into the room where she usually spent time with Jonathan.

“Do you spend a lot of time here? Or do you go other places?”

“I spend
lots
of time here,” he said dramatically. “We almost
never
go anyplace else.”

“Really? Do you ever go to the park, or to a friend’s house, or any place like that?”

“When it’s warm, we sometimes go to the park. Daddy says it will be spring soon and maybe Mrs. Tucker will take me to the park with the swings and slides and things. We used to go there before it was winter.”

“That sounds like fun.”

“It is. I like the slide and the teeter-totter. But I can’t play on the teeter-totter unless there’s someone about my size to do it with. Mrs. Tucker doesn’t like to push it up and down for me. She says it hurts her back. But Daddy does it when he takes me.”

“Don’t you have any friends about your age you can go with?”

He looked sad. “No. I don’t have any friends.”

“Do you ever go to a school, like pre-school?”

“No. Mrs. Tucker teaches me my numbers and ABCs. Grandmother says we pay her to do that and Daddy shouldn’t pay someone else to do the same thing.”

Well,
Marnie thought,
there’s more to pre-school than just learning the alphabet and numbers. There’s making friends and playing games and learning to work in a group. I’ll have to see about that.

“So what about the rest of the rooms on this floor?” she asked, leading the boy back out into the hall.

“Daddy sleeps in that one,” he said, pointing to the last room at the opposite end of the hall from hers.

As far away from me as he can get,
she thought.

“How about the rest of them?”

“Nobody sleeps in them. They used to, a long time ago, but they don’t live here anymore. Now they’re for company, but we don’t ever have any company.”

“Let’s go downstairs, and you can tell me about the rooms down there.”

“OK,” he said and led the way down.

They went into the living room first. It was as dreary and gloomy as it had appeared the first time she had seen it.

“This is the living room,” Jonathan said. “I’m not allowed to play here. I can’t be in here unless an adult is with me.”

“Well, I’m an adult and I’m with you, so you can be here.”

He grinned at her. “Yep.” He quickly looked solemn. “I mean yes.”

“Are you not allowed to say ‘yep’?”

“The kids at the playground say it all the time, but Mrs. Tucker and Grandmother say I should talk properly at all times.”

“Hmm.” Marnie would not allow herself to say anything else about the subject. “I didn’t notice those portraits over the fireplace when I was in here before.”

“That’s Grandfather and his brother, Uncle John.”

“I see.”

“They died before I was borned.”

“Born. They died before you were born.”

“Yes, before I was born.” He struggled to not put the final -ed on the word, and Marnie smiled at his efforts.

“This doesn’t seem like a room I want to spend much time in. Let’s go on, shall we?”

The next room on their tour was the library.

“I came in here the other day,” Marnie told him. “There are a lot of books, but I don’t think I saw any for children.”

“Daddy uses this for an office sometimes when he works at home. That’s the only time I can come in here. He gives me paper to draw on while he works. I don’t think there are any kid books in here.”

“That portrait, is it your grandfather?”

“Yes. It’s Daddy’s father. Daddy says that makes him my grandfather,” he said, looking at Marnie to see if she followed.

“Yes, that’s right.”

The next two doors down the hall were ones she had not opened the first time she ventured into this part of the house. Jonathan put his hand on the first door they came to as he spoke. “This is a great big closet with a lot of old stuff in it.” He advanced to the next door and opened it. “Alice said they call this the ladies’ card room ‘cause folks used to play cards in it a long time ago, when my grandfather lived here.”

“Let’s see the next room,” Marnie suggested.

They entered the sunny room at the end of the hall.

“Sometimes Mrs. Tucker likes to sit here. I bring my cars and play on the floor while she reads.”

“It’s a very nice room. I like it a lot.”

“Me, too.”

Marnie thought the side yard that was visible from the sunroom would be an ideal place for a swing set and other outside toys for Jonathan to enjoy. She wondered if he had a set somewhere.

“Jonathan, do you have a swing set or climbing set or anything like that in the yard?”

He looked sad when he answered. “No. I have to get Daddy or Mrs. Tucker to take me to the park to play on stuff like that.”

She wondered if she could convince David to have some play equipment installed in the yard come spring—if she was still there by then. She couldn’t imagine David tolerating a wife who had done all he told her she had done.

The next room on the tour was on the right as they left the sunroom. Jonathan told her matter-of-factly, “This is the men’s card room.”

In it was not only a poker table, but a pool table as well, with all the trappings that accompanied it. Balls were scattered around the massive table, and a rack on the wall held pool cues.

“Does your daddy teach you how to play pool?”

“No. He said he will when I get older.”

The next room on that side of the hall was the room she had previously discovered. Bright and sunny, it was welcoming to the pair.

“I think I like this room best,” she told Jonathan.

“I like it, too,” he agreed. “I like my room and the playroom and this room bestest of all.”

“What do they call it?”

“The TV room.”

“Do you come here and watch TV?”

“Sometimes Daddy and I do, when it’s raining and we can’t go outside to play. We come in here and watch a movie.”

Marnie sat in one of the overstuffed chairs that were scattered around the room and patted the one beside her. “Come sit here so we can talk.”

Jonathan did as he was told, sliding back to snuggle into the pillows lining the chair.

“Remember when I said you could help me remember?”

He nodded his head enthusiastically.

“I want you to try to remember any time you saw me in any of these rooms we’ve talked about this morning. Remember who was there with me and what was going on, what I said, and what the other people said to me. OK?”