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I tore open the envelope gently and pulled out his letter. Then I sat back and began to read.
Dear Dawn,
Winter here has been very hard. We've had one blizzard after another, but the army doesn't pay much attention to weather. We have to go out and do what we're supposed to do no matter what.
You'll be happy to know I've been promoted to Private First Class. I'm part of a motor pool of mechanics who service tanks. Pretty impressive, huh?
Anyway, I couldn't help but notice how your letters continue to get shorter and far between. I suppose this means you've been very busy with your career, so I'm happy for you. I tell everyone I have a girlfriend who is studying to be a singing star.
I have one bit of news from the home front. Daddy's new wife is pregnant. I'm having a little trouble getting used to the idea of a new brother or sister, especially with Momma gone. It all seems so strange.
But he sounds happy about it. I think he's hoping for another daughter, one just like you.
I didn't tell him, but there can be only one you.
Love,
Jimmy
I put the letter down and closed my eyes. How my heart ached. Poor Jimmy, I thought, so far away and so trusting and loving. How would I begin to tell him what I had done and what had happened to me?
When the nurse came to look in on me again, I asked her for some paper and a pen to write a letter, but I never got to write it. Before I had a chance, I heard the sounds of sharp footsteps in the corridor outside my room, footsteps accompanied by the tap, tap, tap of a cane. I gazed curiously through my doorway and a few moments later, Grandmother Cutler appeared.
My heart seemed to flip over. For a moment she simply stood there, leaning on her cane and glaring in at me with her gray-stone eyes. She looked older, thinner. Her steel gray hair was still cut perfectly under her ears and just at the base of her neck with every strand in place. As always, she was elegantly dressed, not a crease showing. Under her mink stole, she wore a dark blue jacket and a white frilly collar blouse, with an ankle-length matching blue skirt and dark blue boots. Gold drop earrings dangled from each of her lobes, a small diamond glittering at the center of each earring. She wore a touch of red lipstick, just as she always did, but the brush of rouge on her cheeks looked brighter and larger than I remembered. I thought it was her way of trying to compensate for her more pasty and waxen complexion.
Her mouth didn't look as firm. The lower lip trembled either from anger or a bit of palsy. But the pride and arrogance that had put a rod of steel in her spine and hoisted her shoulders before was still there. Despite the onslaught of age, she looked just as formidable.
Being away from her this long, I had forgotten how much I despised her and how cold she could make my blood run whenever she turned those flint-like eyes on me. My heart pounded in anticipation. She began to shake her head slowly, her mouth curling into a smile of disgust and loathing. I wanted to sit up and scream that I loathed her twice as much as she loathed me, but I didn't move; I didn't utter a sound, afraid that I wouldn't be able to find a voice that didn't quiver.
"It doesn't surprise me one bit," she said, closing the door behind her and coming farther into my room, "to find you in such a place under such circumstances.
"Just a few weeks ago, I told your mother that you and she were cut of the same mold, that your own selfishness and lusts would take over and no matter where we sent you or what fine and expensive things we did for you, you would be the cause of some family embarrassment for us."
Her smile came bitter, wry.
"Agnes Morris has kept me quite informed as to your behavior. I knew it would only get worse and worse until something like this happened. And now it has," she concluded without disguising her satisfaction.
"I don't care what you think," I said quickly, but I had to shift my eyes from hers, for hers burned through me with more fire.
She flicked me a scathing glance and then laughed as she gazed about the hospital room.
"You've done your best to make that quite evident," she replied.
She lifted her cane and tapped the foot of the bed sharply.
"Look at me when I speak to you," she flared. I raised my head and tried to shout back at her, but the cruelty in her eyes stunned me so much, I was speechless.
A tiny smile came and went on her lips, lips that seemed to have forgotten how to smile.
"Don't worry, I didn't expect you to do anything wonderful here, despite the frequent reports we received concerning your supposed singing and musical talent. I knew how you were brought up and how you would turn out. I have been anticipating the eventuality of your causing more problems. I just didn't think it would happen as quickly as it has. In that respect you did surprise me."
I covered my face with my hands. I felt as if Fate had pulled me once again through a knothole and stretched me out, thin and flat. I trembled and had trouble bringing out my thoughts. It was as if I had lost my voice and everything would be trapped forever inside me, even my tears.
"There's no sense trying to hide your shame. Soon it will be sticking out prominently. Fortunately," she added, "you had the good luck to have had an accident."
"What?" I lowered my hands from my face. "How can you call being hit by a car, good luck?" I demanded. A small smile, tight and cold, met my question. No, it was not a smile, it was more of a sneer.
"The accident provides us with a proper excuse for removing you from the school," she replied, her sneer turning into a smile of victory. Whenever she looked at me now, it was at some particular part of me. She didn't see me as a whole person, but in sections that seemed to arouse her anger . . . and she would destroy whatever made her angry.
