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Eddie. I can fall asleep with him.”
“He’s the problem, Bunny. If you could get rid of him, I could get out of this.”
Bunny rested her head on the steering wheel, facing away from me. “It’s that simple?” she asked.
“Yes. At least, I think so from the way Mrs. O’Brien talks.”
She waited. Seconds passed. Her head was turned away, but I could see how tired she was by the curve of her back and the slope of her shoulders. “But where’ll I be?” she asked finally. “You’ll go off, and then I’ll be absolutely alone.”
“Bunny, I’ll never leave you,” I said, though I knew I was lying. I told myself it didn’t really matter. Things will change. I’ll make it up to her. When she fell silent again, though, I grew frightened.
At last, Bunny straightened up. “Why’s Dwayne always hanging around here?” she asked. He’d ridden past on his bike, and now, circling back, he was watching us as he passed on the other side of the street.
“I think he’s looking out for me. Ever since that day on the square, he thinks he’s been protecting me.”
“I wish someone would protect me,” Bunny said glumly.
Later that evening, I tried to call her. I didn’t have anything particular to say, but I had the idea that the sound of her voice would still the jabberings that were filling my head. I tried all the numbers several times, but I couldn’t find her. Finally, just to keep busy, I called Reverend Vaughn’s number at the Congo. I knew it was hopeless, but I let the phone ring for five minutes, not giving up until the operator came on a second time to insist that no one was home.
The next morning, Mrs. Vernon was unusually perky. She’d been out to buy milk and had detoured past the fairgrounds. “People are already starting to go in,” she said, as she set toast and tea in front of me at the kitchen table. “And the Ferris wheel was running. Can you imagine? Nine o’clock the first day. This is the biggest fair ever. They’ve got tents almost all the way out to Banyon’s Woods, and lots more exhibits. Plus, the farm news is so good.” She dropped a copy of the day’s Exponent next to my plate. I glanced over the front page just long enough to notice an article about Percy Granville’s former assistant. He’d been found in his home with a bullet in his head, a presumed suicide. I quickly turned the paper over and pushed it away.
“An article there says the corn grew eleven inches last week,” Mrs. Vernon said. “That’s almost fast enough to see!” She pinched out one of her dry, formless laughs. “It’s the same in my garden. Plants are just charging out of the ground. Green things love that warm rain—the rain and then the hot, sunny days.”
Mrs. Vernon puttered while she talked, consolidating two opened jars of peanut butter, rinsing off the cutting board, picking the bad strawberries out of a basket that had been sitting in the refrigerator for three days. From years of housework and neglect, the fingers on her hands were dried and cracked—gaunt, ruddy twigs of skin and bone. Yet her fingers and hands never rested, they darted around in movements unconnected to her conversation. Watching them, I couldn’t help feeling that I was being reproached.
At about four that afternoon, Mrs. O’Brien showed up. I was in Sissy’s room and didn’t bother to come down. Mrs. Vernon let her in, and I heard their low, muffled talk in the hallway. Soon, the social worker climbed the stairs, and her footsteps thudded sadly toward Sissy’s room. She knocked and entered before I could say anything. Her face was slightly flushed, and perspiration made dark stains under her arms. She came over and sat in Sissy’s small, armless desk chair, sitting with her legs apart, in a faintly masculine way, and leaning forward, panting softly. I just lay there.
“Well, I think we’ve worked something out,” she said. “I’ve been back and forth between your mother and Mr. Moon all day, and I think we’ve finally worked something out.”
I rose on my elbows, like a patient in a hospital bed. Didn’t she realize what she was saying?
“Judge Horner doesn’t always follow my recommendations, but he usually does, and now we’ve got Mr. Moon along, too. The judge doesn’t have to agree, though, so be prepared.” She set one elbow on her thigh and rested the weight of her upper body against it. The desk chair looked like a milking stool beneath her. “In any case, I’m going to recommend that you go back to live with your mother, as long as the three of us—you, your mother, and me—keep up regular counseling sessions. We’ll ask the judge to put an unlimited time frame on it, and just see how it goes. Is that agreeable to you?”
“Yes.” I nodded frantically.
“Good. I must tell you, Martha, that your mother is a very stubborn woman. Very stubborn and, at times, disagreeable. She makes things hard for herself. I don’t tell you this to make you feel bad, but to help you understand. She’s agreed to change certain things in her life because she sees now that her family is at stake. But her agreement is a fragile thing, I can see that, and it’s going to take work from all of us to keep her on track. To be frank, I’ve felt all along that the problem here was much more your mother than you. And I told your mother that. I told her that today in exactly those words.”
She watched me for a reaction and I kept smiling. “We really haven’t talked much about your problems, have we? About what got you into this,” she said.
“No.”
“It was a bad thing for a young girl like you. That little boy.” Her eyes were dark and solemn. “You are ashamed, aren’t you?”
I hesitated. I’d felt a lot of things since this all started. Confusion, fear, embarrassment, hope, fury, despair. But shame? There hadn’t been time for it. I’d been too overwhelmed by emotions that were more real. No, I really hadn’t felt any shame at all.
“Yes,” I said.
Mrs. O’Brien sighed. “Well, that’s a start, anyway.” She stood slowly. Outside of the swimming pool, her body seemed only a burden to her. She pushed the chair back under the desk, and I walked her downstairs. “I’ve still got one client to see today,” she said. “This case has thrown off my entire schedule. But don’t worry, we’ve taken care of that now.”
She stopped at the door. “Your mother will be around later. She’s taken the night off so you two can be together. Relax a little for tomorrow.” She put her hand on my arm and squeezed. Then she opened the door. “Goodbye, Mrs. Vernon,” she called out as she left, though she knew Mrs. Vernon was out in the garden and couldn’t possibly hear.
TWENTY-FOUR
After Mrs. O’Brien left, I went into the parlor. Copies of Life, The Saturday Evening Post, and National Geographic were stacked on the bottom bookshelves along the wall. Some of the magazines were very old, going back ten or fifteen years. I took a handful of National Geographics and sat in the middle of the sofa, looking at the pictures and reading the captions.
Leafing through the magazines, my movements were slow and limited to what was absolutely necessary. I was careful not to rustle pages. I hardly dared breathe deeply: I wasn’t going to do anything to disturb the world. I felt as if the least commotion from me, a sneeze, a shout, an angry thought, could upset the arrangement that would let me go back to Bunny.
After about an hour, Mrs. Vernon walked in. “Oh, there you are,” she said. “You startled me. Aren’t you warm in here?”
