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; “Your father is the kind of man who needs a woman in his life, just as my son is. Damian hates being alone, hates doing anything alone. He likes to come home and smell good food cooking. He likes someone to run his home, to keep it clean, to take care of his clothes, and I’d gladly do all that for him, even if he never marries me. Audrina, doesn’t love make it not ugly? Doesn’t love make all the difference … doesn’t it?”
I didn’t believe Papa loved her. Standing with my back to her, I stiffened and wanted to scream.
“All right, darlin’,” she whispered in a hoarse voice. “Hate me if you must, but don’t make me leave the only real home I’ve ever had, and the only real man who’s ever loved me.”
Pivoting to confront her, I said sarcastically, “Perhaps you’d be interested to hear that my aunt Ellsbeth loved him as much as you say you do, and he claimed he loved her in return, too. Regardless, he soon tired of her, and night after night, after she’d slaved all day to prepare his meals and keep his house clean, and take care of his children, he still had other women. She ended up just his slave. That’s what she used to call herself—his kitchen and bedroom slave. Is that what you want for yourself?”
I paused, gasping for breath as I heard the TV in Vera’s bedroom giving the morning news. Lazy, lazy Vera, who seldom got up until noon.
“There will come a day when he will stop loving you, Billie. A day when he’ll look at you and say such ugly words you won’t have any ego left. He’ll have some other woman he’ll say he loves like no other before, and you’ll be only another notch on his belt with many notches of conquest.”
She winced as if I’d slapped her. Fresh tears came to shine her blue, blue eyes. But perhaps she’d cried too many times before to let them spill because of anything I could say.
“If a kitchen slave is all I’ll ever mean to Damian, or just another conquest… even so, Audrina, I’d be grateful, even so.” Her voice lowered. “When I lost my legs I thought that never again would a man want to hold me and love me. Damian has made me feel like a whole woman again. Tell me that I smile and act cheerful, Audrina, but that’s the facade I wear, like a pretty dress. The ugly dress I wear is the fact that I hate the way I am now. There’s not a day goes by when I don’t think of the way I used to be, graceful and strong, with the agility to do anything, and when I walked down the street I pulled all admiring eyes my way. Damian has given me back the pride I used to feel. You don’t know what it’s like to feel half a woman. To be restored and complete again, even if only temporarily, is better than the bleakness I faced before.”
She opened her arms wide and pleaded with her eyes. “You are just like my own daughter. To lose your respect hurts so much. Audrina, forgive me for disappointing you and giving you pain. I love you, Audrina, as I’ve loved you since you were a child and you came running to me through the woods as if you’d found a second mother. Please don’t hate me now, not now when I’ve found such happiness …”
Unable to resist, I fell into her arms, forgiving her anything, crying as she cried. And praying that when the time came, Papa would be kinder to her than he had been to Aunt Ellsbeth—and Momma.
“He’ll marry you, Billie!” I cried as I embraced her. “I’ll see that he does!”
“No, darlin’ … not that way, please. I want to be his wife only if he wants that. No force, no blackmail. Just let him decide what’s the right thing to do. No man is made happy by a marriage he doesn’t want.”
A small snort of disgust in the doorway made me look. There stood Vera with the cane she had to use until that lame leg strengthened. How long had Vera stood there eavesdropping?
“What wonderful news,” said Vera drily, her dark eyes hard and cold. “Another freak to add to the Whitefern collection.”
“I’ve never seen my mother happier,” Arden commented a few weeks later as we ate breakfast together in the refurbished solarium. Hundreds of beautiful plants surrounded us. It was April and the trees were leafing out. The dogwoods were in bloom, and the azaleas made a riot of color. This was one of the rare occasions when we had the chance to be alone. Vera was on a side porch lounge chair wearing a brief little bikini, pretending to be sunbathing. Arden took great pains not to notice she was there.
Sylvia was on the floor with a stuffed cat taken from the playroom upstairs. “Kitty,” she said over and over again. “Pretty kitty,” and then, dropping the cat, her attention span always short-lived, she picked up one of the crystal prisms and began to hold it in such ways as to throw rainbows everywhere. She had gained considerable skill at directing the rays, and it seemed she wanted to dazzle Vera’s eyes. Vera, however, wore sunglasses.
Feeling uneasy, I glanced away. Sylvia stepped on all the refracted colors that I avoided—what was that Arden was saying?
“Mom said last night that this is the way she always wanted to live, in a wonderful house, with people she loves. Audrina, has it occurred to you my mother might be falling in love with your father? We can’t expose his fraud. It would ruin him, and destroy her. I’ll speak to him privately and tell him he has to stop.”
Gathering up his papers, Arden neatly bumped them on the table to even the edges, then stashed them in his attaché case before he leaned to kiss me goodbye. “See you around six. Have a good time with Sylvia down by the river. Be careful, and remember, I love you …”
Before he left he had to steal a glance at Vera, who had taken off the top of her bikini. I glared at him, but he didn’t turn to see me. Her breasts were medium-sized and firm—very pretty breasts I wished she’d keep covered.
“Come along, Sylvia,” I said, getting to my feet. “Help me put the dishes in the washer.”
Papa came into the kitchen as I finished putting everything away. “Audrina, I’ve been wanting to talk to you about Billie. You’ve avoided me since that night you caught us. Billie says she talked to you and you understood. Do you understand?”
I met his eyes squarely. “I understand her, yes, but not you. You’ll never marry her.”
He seemed thunderstruck. “She wants me to marry her? Why, I’ll be damned … it’s not such a bad idea at that.” He grinned and chucked me under my chin as if I were two years old. “If I had a wife again who adored me, I wouldn’t need daughters at all, would I?”
He grinned again as I stared at him, trying to see if he was serious or only teasing. He said goodbye and hurried out to ride to work with Arden.
“Come along, Sylvia,” I said, catching hold of her hand and guiding her to the side door. “We’re going to have a lesson on nature today. The flowers are all in bloom, and it’s time you knew how to name them, too.”
“Where are you going?” Vera sang out as we passed her. She’d put her bra back on now that Arden had gone. “Why don’t you ask me to go with you? I can walk now … if you don’t go too fast.”
I refused to answer. The sooner she left, the better.
Trotting at my heels, Sylvia tried to keep up. “Going to see the fish jump,” I called to her. “Going to see the ducks, the geese, the squirrels, rabbits, birds, frogs and flowers. It’s spring, Sylvia, spring! Poets write about spring more than any other season because it’s the time for rebirth, for celebrating the end of winter—and, hopefully, the departure of Vera. Summer comes next. We’re going to teach you how to swim. Sylvia will soon be a young woman, and no longer a child. And by the time she is, we want Sylvia to be able to do everything other young women her age do.”
Reaching the riverbank, I turned to look for my ten-year-old sister. She wasn’t behind me. I glanced back at the house and saw Vera had carried a blanket down onto the lawn and was sunning herself out there as she read a book.
