Later, as the sky turned orange and the temperature dropped a couple of degrees, the four of them lay back on the grass and watched fireflies. The sky deepened in color and stars began to pop out.
Addie held her arm straight up and pointed. “I see the first star!”
“Actually, that one’s a planet,” Betsy said.
Ty turned his head to her. “You sure about that?”
She nodded. “It’s Venus,” she said, her voice quiet.
“I think it’s a star,” Addie said. “We should all make our wish.”
“You’re right,” Betsy said. “We should.”
Ty turned to Addie when he heard her whispering, “Starlight, star bright, first star I see tonight.” Her eyes were squeezed tight, her hands clasped in front of her.
Ty smiled and turned to Betsy to tell her to look at Addie, but he stopped. Betsy’s eyes were closed as well, her mouth moving with her own silent wishes.
twenty-six
Betsy
Elinore hosted a Summer Festival every year in late July. At one time, it was a Fourth of July celebration, complete with a potluck picnic on the grass and a fireworks display that tried, but usually failed, to compete with nearby Gulf Shores’ fireworks. That tradition ended when the fireworks went haywire six years ago and caught an empty field on fire. Smoke spread throughout the town, scared cows, sent flocks of birds to the sky, and terrorized Elsie Roberts’s schnauzer. Elsie, then-president of the Friends of Elinore, had left her windows open that night before leaving for the celebration. She said her schnauzer, Terry, was never the same.
No one was physically hurt during the fireworks mishap, but Elsie ended the fireworks show right then and there. And since the Friends all agreed they couldn’t very well host a Fourth of July celebration without fireworks, they moved the party to later in the month and called it the Summer Festival. Same potluck picnic, but without the side of danger.
The day of this year’s festival was hot and humid—not so different from most days, but this day was extra damp, a clear indicator of wet weather ahead. Betsy could almost sense Elsie’s panic, even though Ms. Roberts lived three miles away in downtown Elinore.
Knowing the girls would be up later than normal with the picnic and games afterward, Betsy put them down for a late nap. Their clothes were covered in dirt and grass from the morning outside, so she peeled them off and helped the girls into clean T-shirts and pajama pants. Walsh was asleep in minutes, and Addie lay quietly in the dim room with a handful of books. Betsy tiptoed out, leaving the door open a crack.
While the girls rested, Betsy straightened up, did a load of wash, then made potato salad for the picnic. She pulled out her favorite white mixing bowl and all her ingredients—red potatoes, hard-boiled eggs, dill pickle relish, mayo, mustard, paprika. The first year she brought it to the festival—Ty’s and her first summer on the farm—the Friends of Elinore came over and shook their hands, welcoming them to town. Elsie said they were welcome at the festival every year as long as they brought that potato salad. Betsy had brought it every year since.
She could make the dish with her eyes closed, automatically reaching for the right ingredients, her hands doing the work on autopilot, but today she concentrated on the simple act of stirring. Mixing separate ingredients together to make something new, something whole.
After a final stir, she covered the salad in plastic wrap and slid it into the fridge for later. She checked the pitcher to see if there was enough tea left for Ty to have a glass when he came in to get ready.
It had been a month since he had told her he wanted to take her on a trip. When he first mentioned it, she was hesitant, but then she allowed herself to get excited about it. Lazy naps on the beach, as much fried shrimp as they could eat, fruity frozen drinks. Maybe if they pretended things were like they used to be—free, easy, unencumbered—they would be.
But Jenna hadn’t come back, Ty never booked the vacation, and now it was as if a distance—not angry, but obvious—had crept between them while they weren’t looking. Or maybe they had been looking but hadn’t had enough energy to do anything about it. With the longer hours Ty worked to get more Franklin milk on store shelves and prepare the farm for the hurricane season—not to mention the girls’ constant needs, wishes, and curiosity—the two of them had been mostly in survival mode.
But that happened, right? After almost nine years, no marriage could keep up the passion and excitement of those first few. That’s what the pastor had told them during their premarital counseling sessions as he sat across from them, chin in hand, nodding and squinting.
At the time she scoffed, unable to see her passion for Ty fading in five decades, much less one. And now, approaching the end of that first decade, she still loved Ty with her whole heart. She appreciated his hard work, tried to be a good partner, slept with him, laughed with him. Looking at the big picture of their eight married years, she’d have to say things had been good. She did as well as she could, but at the edges of her mind—the far reaches of her consciousness—something told her it wasn’t enough.
As she worked tension out of her head with her fingers, a soft noise came from the second floor. She tiptoed upstairs and peeked into the girls’ bedroom through the open inch. Addie and Walsh were sitting up in bed playing with their ponies.
As she watched them, their soft words a balm to her tense spirit, she heard the back door open downstairs. Ty crossed the kitchen floor to the fridge. A glass on
