Catching Up
My journey with Grandpa has ended. I know Mama and Daddy see the same Ginnie Lee as before, but I am right different inside. Grandpa’s different, too.
After dinner, Mama insisted I lie down a spell, said my eyes look tired. They are, as is every speck of me from neck to toes, but my mind is full awake.
Until you, after each baby died, Mama’s eyes were the ones that sagged for need of sleep. And now she makes me lie down. I reckon this summer changed more insides then mine and Grandpa’s.
Virginia Lee Kent
I watch Mama’s eyes as she makes supper. They’re rimmed with red, but not so ready to crumple as what I recollect. They embolden me to say things I could never tell her before.
But I wade in easy-like. “I never knew you felt blameful for the babies’ dying.”
“It seems foolish now,” she says, “but I reckon nobody gets through life without wondering ‘What if?’”
A question flies from my lips unplanned. “Did you feel duty-bound to have babies to carry on your family’s bloodline? Since you don’t have brothers or sisters?”
Mama’s hands stop rolling dough into dumplings. “Mercy no. What a thought! Before I met your daddy, I was a schoolteacher, helping young’uns learn. With your daddy, I had my own young’un. The Good Lord didn’t see fit to give us the houseful we planned on, but you took to learning like bees take to buzzing.”
“But you didn’t marry Daddy just to have young’uns to teach? You loved him, right?”
“Of course, I loved him. Still do.”
I want to ask what love feels like, but I’ll keep that for another day. Instead I tell her about folks I met. “Folks as unlike each other as wildflowers in the Sunday garden.” I tell her about Florence, Mrs. Grome, and Corporal Westy.
Her eyes widen with interest when I say, “I met young men, too.” I tell about Rawley, the thieving polecat in Rockbridge. She gasps, but doesn’t faint dead away. So I tell her about Gerald Simms, who hid polecat ways behind sparkling blue eyes and a friendly smile.
Her floury hands reach for mine. “Oh, Sweet Pea. I’d always hoped to protect you from scoundrels like that.”
“I managed to protect myself.” I clap flour from my hands.
“And there’s Chance,” I say. “A blunt-honest Yankee boy with Confederate-gray eyes. The truth-tellingest person I ever met.” I add with a blush, “He kissed me.”
Her smile wavers a mite. “I forget you’re a young lady.”
The only boy I don’t mention is the scared soldier I saw on that hilltop, the one who went to war because his brother did, the one who grew up to be Grandpa.
“Have you talked to Freddie since you’re home?” Mama asks.
“Not yet.”
“You ought to.” She tries so hard not to smile that I reckon Aunt Freddie has a surprise for me.
I step out to the back porch and see a blue poke bonnet bobbing down the trail from Crutchers’. When it comes around the trees, Aunt Freddie’s face smiles from under its deep brim.
“My, my,” she says. “Who is this lovely lady wearing Ginnie Lee’s dress?”
I hug her.
“We missed ya, Darlin’.” She backs away and takes hold of my hands. “Reckon your ma told ya about the baby girl.”
“Rosemary. Mama said you were up to Crutchers’ when the pains commenced. Mr. Crutcher ailing again?”
Aunt Freddie blushes like a ripe apple. “He’s hale as a man kin be.” Her smile reaches clean across her face.
“Tell,” I demand.
“We’s gittin’ married. Soon as the preacher comes around.”
“Why, Aunt Freddie! I didn’t know you were sweet on Mr. Crutcher.”
The ripe-apple face grows even redder. “Didn’t know it myself until recent. Things happen a body don’t plan on.”
