Page 10 of The Reformatory

Telling never made Robert feel better, but he couldn’t help it. Her dying always sat at the tip of his tongue. Mr. Loehmann glanced at him with sadness that shocked Robert so much that it pricked his eyes.

“Sorry to hear it, Robert,” he said. “You’re young to lose your mother. Your father too?”

“No, sir. My papa’s not dead. He’s…” Robert remembered what his nervousness had made him forget in the courtroom: Papa being in Chicago was a secret. The sheriff in Gracetown might hate Papa enough to try to track him down. Now he’d gone and announced it in a courtroom where anyone might have heard—a judge! “He’s somewhere else.”

Mr. Loehmann asked his own questions with his eyes. Robert fidgeted and turned to his window. During the drive, woods had turned to cow pastures. Robert rarely traveled farther than walking distance, so he tried to memorize everything he saw: the hulking old tobacco barn, the skeletal oak burned dead at the roadside, the aging albino nag pulling a hay wagon under a farmer’s watch. He filled his eyes to forget where he was going.

“Let your window down if you want,” Mr. Loehmann said. “I like the air-conditioning, but my kids and our dog like the wind in their hair.”

Despite the thrill of the cool air massaging him from the car’s vents, Robert was glad to crank his window down. The wind was hot, like the car was taking off in space, breaking through the atmosphere with a chunk-chunk-chunk sound of the air thrashing inside the car.

Robert’s stomach growled. Loudly.

“When’s the last time you ate?” Loehmann said.

“Dinner. Last night.” It seemed so long ago, Robert could barely remember the scrawny chicken wings he and Gloria had shared—scraps from Miss Anne’s table, where wings were not anyone’s favorite. And at least two days old to boot, judging by the toughness of the meat. Even the bones had been dry, with no good moist marrow to suck out. Gloria had sounded so proud when she brought the food home, he hadn’t had the heart to complain. And with the pain in his ear pounding so bad, he’d barely noticed he was still hungry. And he’d been hungry when the deputy came. And hungry while he waited in the sun. He was so often hungry, sometimes he didn’t notice it, the way he was getting used to the throbbing deep inside his ear. The drumbeat of pain had kept him awake much of the night, so he hadn’t thought about being hungry.

“Nobody’s fed you today?”

“No, sir.”

Mr. Loehmann cursed then: “Damn hicks.”

His anger frightened Robert. The car swerved slightly off the road, spitting gravel as Mr. Loehmann reached behind him to grab a Woolworth’s sack from the back seat. Robert clung to his seat, bracing to feel the car roll into the parallel ditch. His favorite teacher, Mrs. Cherry, had died this way on a stormy night, her car running headlong into the earth.

Sack in his lap, Mr. Loehmann righted the car as if it had never strayed. “Take this. I was saving a sandwich for later.”

Robert’s mouth flooded. He grabbed the sack and rifled through, past napkins and paper straws. The sandwich was at the bottom, wrapped in paper. The soggy, toasted bread hugged lettuce and a yellow core he did not recognize right away.

“Egg salad,” Mr. Loehmann said.

Robert could not remember ever eating egg salad. Mama had never made it, or Nana. Maybe Miz Lottie had made it for church picnics, but he’d never tried it. “I’ll like it fine, sir.” Robert hesitated, shy about saying grace before a stranger. His stomach rumbled again. Acid scalded his belly.

“Thought you were hungry,” Mr. Loehmann said. “Like I tell mine, if you’re hungry enough, you’ll eat what’s put in front of you. Go on, now.”

Robert had forgotten that everyone didn’t say grace. Or expect you to. Before now, he’d never seen it with his own eyes. His chin nestled his chest. Thank you, dear Lord, for this bounty—a silent, abbreviated version of Papa’s dinnertime blessing. He took his first bite of the food, and it tasted more than fine, like the gift from God it was. A mash of boiled eggs and celery and mustard and pepper filled his cheeks, soft down his throat. Oh yes, but it was good. He’d hardly blinked before the first half of the sandwich was gone.

“Go on, eat the rest,” Mr. Loehmann said. “I’ll grab a bite somewhere else.”

His stomach screamed for more, so Robert ate the second half, but more slowly this time, remembering that he might not eat for a long time again. What kind of food would he eat at the Reformatory? Nothing but porridge and gruel, like in Mama’s storybooks? For the first time since he’d climbed into the grand car, Robert let himself think of the place. Let himself wonder.

“Better?” Mr. Loehmann said.

Robert forced a nod. He felt worse somehow. As if the food had awakened him. “Lyle McCormack started it,” Robert said. “He pushed me first.”

“Wondered when we’d get around to all that.” Loehmann didn’t sound interested. “You tell your side to the judge?”

Robert stared at his boots, which looked all the bigger now. He shook his head. “No, sir.”

“Might’ve been a good idea, don’t you think?”

“The deputy, he said keep my mouth shut.”

Loehmann lit a cigarette with his car lighter. Then he cranked his window down a bit.

The swooshing wind in the car evened out, making it easier to hear through his sore ear’s buzzing. “How long did the judge send you there for?”

“Six months!” Robert said, emotion cracking his voice. He’d counted on his fingers, and six months meant he wouldn’t get out until January. He’d never spent Christmas away from home. “And Lyle started it. We weren’t doin’ nothin’ but walkin’ down the road. He started the whole thing.”