“I’ll put one on that pole.” Daisha started to walk toward a light pole.
“Hold up.” The woman followed. “You forgot the stapler.”
“Sorry.” Daisha kept walking until they were in the shadows, until they were farther away from the already empty street.
“It’s okay,” Bonnie Jean said. “If we hurry ... I have a date.”
It’s okay. Daisha heard the words, the permission. It’s okay. Like Maylene. She wants to help.
“Thank you,” Daisha whispered before she accepted Bonnie Jean’s help.
Afterward, Daisha walked through the peaceful streets, wishing that Maylene were still alive. She’d tell me stories. Bonnie Jean didn’t tell me anything before she was empty. After a few moments, she’d become motionless while Daisha ate. She didn’t share any words. She wasted her breath on whimpering noises, and then she stopping making any sounds.
REBEKKAH SAT AT MAYLENE’S WRITING DESK. SEVERAL PAPERS WERE stacked to the side of the blotter, and a note to “pick up oranges” was scrawled across the topmost paper. Absently, Rebekkah ran her fingertips over the wood of the desk. Maylene had refused to let anyone refinish it, arguing that the pattern of the scratches and wear marks earned from years of use made it uniquely hers. Years leave stories written on every surface , she’d said. The room, Maylene’s bedroom, was filled with stories. The tatting on the pillow shams and on the delicate doilies atop the chest of drawers had been done by Maylene’s great-grandmother. The noticeable chip at the foot of the Tudor four-poster bed was from when Jimmy threw a toy car at it when he was a toddler.
Family.
Sometimes it felt odd to know so much about her stepfather’s family tree and nothing about her biological father’s, but Jimmy had been a part of her life, and her bio-father was just a name on her birth certificate. Jimmy had been the only real father she’d had—even though he hadn’t been in her life more than a few years—and after he died, Maylene had been her closest family. Rebekkah and her mother were close: they talked and visited and got along well enough, but they’d never had the kind of bond Rebekkah and Maylene shared.
And now it’s gone. Maylene is gone.
Rebekkah ran her hand over the desktop. Stories hovered like ghosts in Maylene’s room, and Rebekkah wished she could hear them all one more time, that she could hear the ones Maylene hadn’t spoken yet, that she could hear Maylene’s voice.
Instead, she’d spent hours listening to people tell her that Maylene would be missed. No shit. She’d smiled while they told her how wonderful Maylene was. As if I didn’t know that. She’d tried not to scream while they assured her that they knew how hard it must be for her. How could they?
After much badgering, Rebekkah had resorted to flat-out rudeness to get the last of the mourners out of the house. It wasn’t that she didn’t appreciate the solicitousness of some of Maylene’s friends and neighbors—okay, maybe she did resent it a bit. Maylene had never been altogether accepted by the community. They’d all been kind enough, but they’d never simply stopped by for a cup of tea or piece of pie. For reasons Rebekkah never understood, the community was always slightly reserved where Maylene and her family were concerned.
Not that Maylene ever complained . If anything, Maylene defended the peculiar distance the town kept from the Barrow family. “They have their reasons, lovie,” she’d murmured every time Rebekkah mentioned it. Rebekkah, however, wasn’t quite so willing to accept that there was any reason not to want to have Maylene at their tables.
The stillness of the house felt calming, despite everything. There was something right about Maylene’s home— my home —that had always soothed whatever upset Rebekkah felt. Even now, being in the old farmhouse eased the weight of Maylene’s loss more than Rebekkah could’ve anticipated. She stroked a hand over Maylene’s writing desk and opened the envelope Mr. Montgomery had handed her earlier.
April 1993
I can’t say that I’m liking writing this letter, Beks, any more than you’re liking reading it. I’m not sure I’ll be ready to talk about any of this stuff anytime soon. If that changes ... perhaps I’ll become a braver soul. If not, try to look kindly on me when I’m gone.
You’re the child of my heart as much as Ella Mae is was. You’re stronger, though. Never doubt that strength. There’s no shame in admitting it, no disrespect to Ella Mae. I love her, but I don’t pretend she was something she wasn’t. You can’t either. A day will come when you might hate her for the choice she made. A day might come when you’ll hate me. I hope you’ll forgive us all.
Everything I have, everything I am, and everything the women before me had—it’s all yours. The paperwork is all in order. Cissy and the girls have known for years. Your mother has, too. When Ella Mae died, you became my sole heir. The house, the contents, everything: it’s yours and yours alone now. The good and the bad, unfortunately, are both part and parcel of the deal. I’d ask your permission if I thought there were other options, but you’re my only choice now. Once I’d thought it would be Ella Mae and you both who could’ve made the decision for yourselves.
Someday you’ll read this, and God willing, you’ll be ready for it. I hope my dying wasn’t a surprise. If it was, the answers you’ll need are in the house. Trust the Montgomerys. Trust Father Ness. Look to the past. All those before you kept records. The journals are here in the house. Every question you’re having—I hope —will be answered between these ... except of course, why I’m too much a coward to tell you all of this in person. That one I’ll answer now: I am afraid, my dear. I am afraid that you will look at me the way Ella Mae did. I am afraid you will look at me the way I looked at my grandmother. I am afraid that you will abandon me, and I’m too selfish to lose you. I’d rather we go on as we are right now, with you loving me.
Forgive me, lovie, for all my mistakes, and think of me after I’m gone. The alternative is too horrible to bear.
All my love and hopes are with you.
Grandmama Maylene
The tight script of Maylene’s handwriting was as familiar as her own. The words, however, made little sense. Rebekkah could think of nothing that would change her love for Maylene, nothing that would turn her affection to hate.
The second item in the envelope was a copy of Maylene’s will, which Rebekkah gave a perfunctory read to verify what Maylene had said in her letter. Maylene had, indeed, left every item, every cent, and the house solely to Rebekkah. Everything? Rebekkah wondered how long Cissy had known. Is this why she’s always hated me? Rebekkah stopped herself from dwelling too long on that train of thought: Cecilia Barrow had taken up more than enough of her energy today.
Instead, she turned her thoughts toward the journals that were somewhere in the house; she also couldn’t figure how the answers to her grandmother’s murder would be found in journals—or where in the rambling farmhouse they would be. A cursory glance around the room revealed nothing so much as the fact that Maylene had lived a long time in one spot. Shelves were built close to the ceiling and above the door frames, and lined the perimeter of the room. They were packed full of books, some well worn from repeated readings or advanced age, none looking like journals. A wardrobe sat on either side of Maylene’s bed. At the foot of the bed sat a wooden chest. They were obvious storage spots, but neither the wardrobe nor the chest held any journals.
Rebekkah began looking through the three other bedrooms on the second floor—her own, Ella’s room, and the one Jimmy and her mother had shared. Although her own room wasn’t cluttered, the other two were packed. The third-floor attic was worse. It overflowed with Maylene’s accumulated possessions from decades of living—and decades of living by those who’d been here before Maylene. The downstairs was equally stuffed. The secret “cubbyhole” in one wall of the living room was crammed to the point that Rebekkah had closed it with a grimace almost instantly upon opening it, and the pantry had always been near overflowing—a topic Maylene had dismissed
