Fiction Friday

Fiction Friday: A Story To Tell Chapter 11

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 3 Comments

This is part of a serial story I share part of every Friday for Fiction Friday. Are you reading along with Blanche’s story? If you need to catch up, you can find the links to the other parts HERE, or at the link at the top of the page.

The sound of the ceiling fan barely drowned out the sound of the couple next door arguing. The humidity was stifling, the sheets sticky against my bare skin. My gaze traveled along the crack in the paint chipped ceiling above my head. I couldn’t sleep and I was hyper-aware of every sound, every smell, every touch. I felt Hank’s bare back against mine, hot, sweaty like mine and closed my eyes tight against the anxiety.

Even with Hank asleep next to me, I felt insanely alone. I missed my own room, my own bed. I missed talking with Edith. I missed Mama cooking breakfast in the mornings and Daddy sitting in his chair smoking his pipe, reading G.K. Chesterton in the evening. I missed feeling safe.

The judge’s office where Hank and I had got married was dark and smelled of stale cigars. We drove to the office before Hank had even shown me the apartment.

“I made the appointment last week,” Hank said, grinning as he parked the truck. “I knew you were going to come with me.”

My legs were weak as we walked up the steps of the courthouse, Hank’s hand tightly gripping mine. The courthouse towered above us, larger than any building this smalltown girl had ever seen.

The judge was kind, but I could feel the sting of disapproval in his gaze as it moved from me to Hank then back to me again.

“You’re sure you’re 18?” he asked me.

I nodded but didn’t speak.

“I just can’t believe we forgot that birth certificate,” Hank was saying, nervously shifting from one foot to another. “It means a lot to us that you’re doing this for us without it.”

The judge looked at Hank for a moment, then glanced out the window, appearing deep in thought.

“I’ll sign this, but I want you to know I’m not comfortable with it,” he said.

“I understand, sir, but you have nothing to worry about,” Hank said. “We’re old enough to know what we’re doing.”

I knew I wasn’t old enough to know what I was doing. I didn’t know what I was doing at all. Each time I repeated after the judge I was simultaneously asking myself if this was right, wondering if I’d regret it all.

“By the power vested in me by the state of New York, I pronounce you – “ The judge looked from Hank to me and back to Hank and cleared his throat. “Man and wife.”

When we left with the certificate we celebrated with a trip to a local diner, eating hamburgers and fries, sharing a milkshake, making plans about our future. We giggled, feeling like two young kids, which, really, we were.

Hank already had a job at the local factory and on the weekends he played and sang at local clubs for extra money. He sang to me from the stage, green eyes focused on me, so I felt like we were the only two in the room.

“Lee says I’ve got some real talent,” he told me as we walked back to the apartment one night. “He says he can get me some more gigs around town and hey – have you heard this new song by Hank Williams? It’s great! Lee played it for me at the club last night when I stopped after work. I’m going to try to learn it so I can play it at my next gig.”

His eyes lit up when he talked about his music and I loved to see him happy. I thought we’d always be happy like we were that first six months; late nights at the club, kissing and laughing as we fell into bed, bodies intertwined.

I started to enjoy cooking for him, making sure his food was hot and on the table when he got home from work like Mama had done for Daddy. I walked to a small market two blocks from our house and bought ingredients for dinner, never exactly sure what I was doing or how to cook it, learning as I went.

Hank would tell me I was a wonderful cook, even if I burned it, grabbing me around the waist, pulling me into his lap to kiss me.

When Hank was at work, I washed his work clothes in a small washing basin and dried them on a line that rolled out between the buildings.

As the days went by, I began to realize I was becoming exactly what Mama had said I would become. I loved being with Hank and I loved when he said I was a good cook, even though I knew I wasn’t. I washed his clothes, did my best to keep the apartment clean, but I’d left home to show Mama and Daddy I could be more than they thought I could be and now I was turning into exactly what Mama said I would be.

“I can’t sleep.”

Hank’s voice broke through my thoughts.

“Me neither.”

Hank rolled over to his back and slid his arms behind his head.

“I don’t know, maybe I’m never going to do anything with my music,” he said. “I hate that factory job. It’s wearing me down, Blanche.”

“You’ve only been there six months,” I said. “I’m sure it will get better. And the music will come. You said Lee said you’re great and I already know you are.”

I leaned down over him and covered his mouth with mine.

“You always know how to make me feel better,” he said when I pulled away.

He reached up and sank his hands into my hair and pulled my head down for another kiss.

“Get over here and take my mind off things, girl.”

He turned toward me and pulled me against him, laughing, kissing me fully on the mouth. I closed my eyes and thought about how I felt like I could never be happier than I was right now – his hands gently caressing me, his skin warm against mine.

***

I pressed the side of my face against the tiled floor of the bathroom and closed my eyes, my body curled up around the toilet. The coolness of the floor against my face was welcome after a night of throwing up. The vomiting had been ongoing for two weeks and was draining me of my energy. I knew it was more than a stomach bug. My belly felt empty and full at the same time. When I ate I rarely kept food down and the reflection looking back at me in the mirror each morning was pale and gaunt.

I knew something was horribly wrong, but I was too afraid to visit a doctor. I was afraid to call Mama or Daddy, Edith or Emmy. I was afraid even to pray. I had convinced myself God was punishing me for my sins. Hank and I had been married six months and I still hadn’t asked God to forgive me for leaving my family and running away with Hank.

“Blanche, you need to go to a doctor,” Hank said, standing in the doorway of the bathroom, groggy and leaning against the door frame. “You can’t keep sleeping and throwing up all day and night. Maybe he can give you something to make it stop.”

Later that morning I staggered into a doctor’s office, frail and my hair uncombed.

“Make it stop?” The doctor looked at me with a bewildered expression. “No, I can’t make it stop, but your sickness should go away in a month or so as you move out of the first trimester.”

I stared at him blankly. “First trimester?”

“You don’t get it, do you?” he asked a clipboard in his hand.

I shook my head, afraid if I opened my mouth, I’d throw up on him.

He placed a bottle of pills in my trembling hand, closed my fingers around it with his hand and looked me squarely in the eyes.

“This should help the nausea,” he said, his words slow and even. “You’re about three months along if the information you gave me is correct. Your due date is about seven months from now.”

Then, as if to reiterate the point he was trying to get across to me, he said, “You’re pregnant, young lady. Congratulations.”

I opened my mouth to speak and promptly threw up on his shoes.

No one had ever told me how it felt to have a baby growing inside. We didn’t talk about those things in my family. Maybe Mama would have told me when I got older – if I had waited, but I hadn’t, and Hank had been the one to show me what men and women did when they were married. I knew that’s how babies were made because I’d read about it in books, but I didn’t think it would really happen to me, not until I was ready, not this soon.

I walked back to the apartment, stopping three times to throw up in garbage cans or along the sidewalk along fences. Inside the apartment I gingerly took my coat off and stumbled to the couch, laying across it on my back.

“So, what did the doctor say?” Hank asked, walking out of the bedroom, rubbing his eyes.

I laid my arm across my eyes, gulping back bile, my stomach empty of the breakfast I’d tried to eat that morning. I sat up slowly and looked at him, trembling.

“He says I’m pregnant,” I said, terrified at the words.

Hank looked at me, incredulous. I could smell a mix of bitter and sweet in the room.

“You’re what?”

“Pregnant.”

“How did you let that happen?” he snapped.

I looked at him, shocked.

“I – I didn’t let it,” I stammered. “It just happened.”

I suddenly felt overwhelmed with exhaustion and anger.

“It’s not like you didn’t have anything to do with it,” I said sharply.

He walked toward the kitchen, snatched a half-empty bottle of whiskey from the counter and gulped some down, wiping his hand across his mouth.

“I don’t want to take care of any baby,” Hank said, anger thick in his words.

He drank more of the whiskey, his eyes narrowing, slightly glazed, as he looked at me.

“Is it even mine?” he asked suddenly.

I looked at him, trembling now, my head spinning. Did he really think I was seeing someone else behind his back? I had started attending an evening class at a small community college, studying to become a secretary, about a month after we had arrived and when I wasn’t there I was at the library. The teacher of the class had accepted me even though I didn’t have my high school diploma, telling me we’d work out how I would pay for the classes later.

“Are you serious?” I asked.

“I don’t know what you do here while I’m at work,” he snapped. “Do I? You could be doing anything.”

He stood over me, a smirk tugging at the corners of his mouth.

“It probably isn’t even mine,” he said. He repeated it, pacing in front of me as if he’d struck on an idea and was thinking how to use it. “It probably isn’t even mine.”

He tossed the empty whiskey bottle at the wall behind my head and it shattered, glass raining around me. I screamed in terror and fell to the floor on my knees, my hands over my head.

His fingers encircled my upper arm and he pulled me up to look him, his eyes wild.

“That’s it isn’t it? It isn’t even mine!” He shouted the words at me. “Maybe you’re just a whore like your sister.”

His face was twisted in a terrifying scowl and I turned my head from the overwhelming smell of alcohol on his breath.

“You’re just a little whore, aren’t you? Aren’t you?”

He was shouting and he pulled his hand back to hit me.

I closed my eyes, turning my face away from him, waiting for the blow. He wasn’t the Hank I had fallen in love with. He had turned into someone I didn’t even know – a monster with a beautiful face.

The blow never came.

He let go of my arm and I fell to the floor on my side, sobbing. I looked up and his hard expression had softened. He stumbled back a few steps, drawing his hand across his face, shaking his head as if to shake himself sober.

“I’m sorry, Blanche,” he said softly. “I’m drunk. I don’t know what I’m saying. I’m sorry I raised my hand to you. I don’t want to hurt you or .. or..” His eyes drifted to my stomach. “Or the baby.”

His gaze stayed on my stomach for a few moments, then he looked away, rubbing his hand across his face again, then through his hair and down the back of his neck.

“I’m going out for a while,” he said hoarsely. “We’ll talk about this when I sober up.”

The door clicked closed behind him, between us, and I sat at the kitchen table, laid my head on my arms and cried.

A Story to Tell Chapter 10

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 4 Comments

Need to catch up on Blanche’s story? Find the link to the previous chapters Here, or at the link at the top of the page. Following Blanche’s story? Let me know in the comments.

 

“He wanted to explain how people were never quite what you thought they were.” 
― William Golding, Lord of the Flies

At dinner one night I tried to talk to Daddy about the book I was reading.

“It’s called Lord of the Flies and it’s about some boys who are shipwrecked on an island,” I said.

“Mmmhmmm,” Daddy said, finishing the food on his plate.

“The boys in the book are trying to figure out who they are and what it means to be an adult or in society,” I said. “It’s sort of sad but makes me think.”

Daddy continued to eat, took a drink of his iced tea, and looked at the picture on the wall behind me.

Edith was at one of her beauty classes and Mama was beginning to clear the table. I felt tears welling up, wishing Daddy would treat me like his little girl again.

“Aren’t you ever going to talk to me again, Daddy?” I asked tears in my eyes.

Daddy tossed his napkin aggressively onto his plate.

“Maybe you should be reading your Bible instead of a book about boys on an island,” he snapped. He sat, elbows propped up on the table, looking at me with an angry expression, fingers together, under his chin.

“And why would I talk to you when you didn’t talk to me,” he continued. “I never expected this from you, Blanche. I thought you had a good head on your shoulders. Now I’ve got two daughters to try to keep from destroying their lives by running around with worthless boys. I can’t even imagine what you were thinking and I don’t know where to even start with you. I don’t know if I even want to start trying to figure all this out with you.”

“I’m sorry, Daddy, I never meant to upset you –“

“Never meant to upset me? You never even thought of me,” Daddy snarled. “You never thought of me or your mother. You never thought of anyone but yourself. You didn’t think of how people would talk or judge your parents if it got out you were seeing someone like – like – that man.”

“But no one knows – “

“And they’re not going to because you’re not going to see that fool again. Do you understand me?”

I nodded and looked at my hands clutched together on my lap.

“That’s all I’m going to say about all of this.”

Mama had stepped into the dining room from the kitchen, ready to be the peacemaker she always was.

“Alan…”

“No. Not tonight, Janie. I’m still too angry.”

Daddy pushed his chair back from the table, stood quickly and stomped from the dining room while I sat at the table, Mama’s hand on my shoulder as I cried.

At that moment I felt like Daddy would never love me again.

 

***

When Emmy slipped the letter into my hand I knew it was from Hank.

“He saw me at the market and asked me to give it to you,” she whispered as we stood by the bookshelf I was stacking. I shoved the letter in my skirt pocket to read later, looking back over my shoulder at Mrs. Hall, the librarian.

“Is your daddy still mad as a hornet?” She asked.

“He barely talks to me,” I said.

Emmy leaned back against a book shelf, huffing a book to her chest.

“Tell me, Blanche, what’s it like to be kissed by a man?” She asked, a wistful expression on her face. “Is it wonderful?”

I immediately felt embarrassed that I was the one Emmy was asking. These were questions we usually asked Edith.

“It’s definitely better than I thought it would be,” I admitted, unable to keep my smile contained.

“Does he smell as good as he looks?”

“Yes. Absolutely.”

I leaned against the opposite bookshelf and closed my eyes.

“And his hands – they are so manly and . . . I don’t know. . . sexy,” I said remembering how his touch had felt last time we had been together. “I just love when he touches me.”

I opened my eyes and watched Emmy’s eyes widen.

“How does he touch you?” She asked, sounding slightly alarmed.

“Oh, Emmy, nothing like that,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I mean, I know he wants to do more and the other day he tried to reach up my shirt, but I don’t let him. I’m not that kind of girl. You know that.”

“Do I?” Emmy’s eyes were still wide.

“Emmy! Yes. You do.”

“I didn’t even know you were seeing Hank.”

“No one knew I was seeing Hank,” I said. “I didn’t even know what I was doing with Hank. I just liked talking to him and I liked that he liked me.”

Emmy smiled and patted the pocket where the letter was.

“I don’t know why you keep talking in the past tense. It’s clear he doesn’t think of it that way,” she said. “Open it – what’s it say?”

“Emmy, we really need to get you a boyfriend,” I teased.

I pulled the letter from my pocket and opened it, looking over the books to see if Mrs. Hall, the librarian, was still at her desk. She was looking down at a book opened in front of her on the desk.

Blanche:

I’m no good at writing letters but I didn’t know how else to tell you I want to meet you again soon. It’s too risky to try to meet at your house. I don’t feel like pulling bullets out of my back. Meet me under the bridge tomorrow at noon if you can get away. I need to hold you in my arms again.

Love,

Hank

Emmy whispered a squeal which I didn’t think was possible.

“Love Hank? Oh my gosh. He loves you! It’s so exciting! Are you going to meet him?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m supposed to be working here but I do get a lunch break about that time. Maybe he can meet me somewhere here in town.”

“You think you’re going to marry Hank?”

“Good grief, Emmy,” I said rolling my eyes. “I haven’t even decided if I’m going to meet him tomorrow, let alone marry him. I’m only in high school.”

I didn’t tell her he’d already asked me to marry him.

I quickly wrote a note back for Emmy to take to him on her walk home and handed it to her.

“I’ve got to get back to work, but I’ll talk to you later,” I told her.

I thought about Hank as I slid books back into their spots on the shelves.

“I don’t know, maybe I could do something with my music,” he told me one night before Daddy caught us. “Music takes me away from everything. I feel alive when I sing, especially one of my own songs. It would be a lot of hard work if I ever wanted to make a go of it and I definitely can’t live around here if I want to do something like that.”

He sighed and leaned back against the fence along the field, under the maple tree.

“Maybe I’m just being crazy, but it’s good to have dreams, right?”

I smiled at him and laid my hand against his face, suddenly overcome with tenderness for the boy I saw in the growing man.

“It is very good to have dreams,” I told him.

He laughed and took my hand in his, kissing my palm and then pressing it against his chest.

“You’re too sweet for me, Blanche,” he said, kissing my cheek.

He shook his head and let go of my hand, turning from me, his hands on the fence, looking at the moonlit field.

“I’m just sick of this town, you know?” he said, tightening his grip on the wood. “I’m sick of the people. I’m sick of the smell of cow poop and I am sick of being told I’ll never be anything because my old man tells everyone I’m worthless. I’m getting out of this place, Blanche.”

He turned and took my hands in his. “Come with me and we’ll make a life of our own,” he said, his eyes bright, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “We’ll go find a new life and I’ll play music and you can read books and eat ice cream; get fat for all I care. There won’t be anyone to tell us who or what we’re going to be.”

“I can’t do that,” I looked down at the tip of my shoe and bent my ankle back and forth.

“Why not?” he touched my chin with his fingertips, and I looked up into his deep green eyes and my knees felt like bread that had been kneaded too long.

“My daddy would be so mad. He doesn’t like you.”

“Your daddy doesn’t like me ‘cause he knows you’re better than this little garbage farm town and I can take you away from it.”

I looked away. I didn’t know if Hank was right about how Daddy felt about him that night, but now, stacking the books in the quiet library, I knew how Daddy felt and I knew he’d be even more furious if he knew Hank wanted me to run away with him.

I met Hank behind the drugstore on my lunch break the next day, looking over my shoulder, anxious and wringing my hands, afraid someone would see us.

“I’m serious about leaving, Blanche,” Hank said. “I’m going to do it and soon. I want you to come with me.”

He stepped closer, touched me under my chin and kissed me gently. “Don’t you want to find something more exciting than this old town? These old people who want to tell us what to do?”

I closed my eyes, breathed in the smell of his cologne, let the feel of his hands against my skin fill my mind and lifted my face toward his. When his mouth covered mine I thought about Mama’s words to me about the difference between lust and love. What I felt for Hank was love, I was sure of it. I wanted to be in his world and experience life with him. I wanted to let him touch me and kiss me, teach me what love was all about.

I nodded slowly, my eyes still closed.

“I’m going to save up some money and then I’ll send a letter to you through Emmy,” he said, taking my hands in his, pressing his forehead against mine. “We’ll find a day to leave this town and never look back. We’re going to start our own life together.”

Two months later, a week before my senior year was supposed to start, I was holding a letter in my hand. It was one of many that Hank had been mailing to his cousin Jerry who had slid them on to Emmy, but somehow I knew this letter was different. My fingers trembled as I opened it, Emmy watching me, alternating between biting her lower lip and her fingernails.

Blanche:

It’s time to take our leap of faith. Old man Porter fired me yesterday and I’m getting out of this place. I’ve already found a job in Syracuse. The manager of a factory promised me a job on the manufacturing floor if I get up there next week. I’m going up to find a place for us to live and I’ll be back to pick you up in two weeks. If you want to come with me and start a life together meet me under our bridge May 22.

Love,

Hank

“What’s it say?” Emmy asked anxiously, trying to peek at it.

I folded it, looked at her, my best friend since seventh grade, and lied.

“He just says he loves me and wants to see me again sometime behind the drugstore.”

Emmy smiled but then her expression shifted to worry.

“I don’t know, Blanche,” she said. “Maybe you shouldn’t be sneaking around with him, you know? I mean, I know you really like him, but your parents would be really upset. They really love you – they probably think they’re protecting you.”

I hugged her and stood back, my hands on her shoulders.

“You don’t have to worry, Emmy,” I said. “They don’t have to protect me from anything. Hank loves me. Things will settle down eventually and they’ll accept Hank. It’s all going to be fine.”

I knew I was only telling Emmy what she wanted to hear. I didn’t believe my parents would ever accept Hank and I wasn’t sure if my parents were trying to protect me or control me. All I knew was I was sure Hank loved me and I was catching the fire he had to start a new life somewhere else together.

***

I could hear birds outside the window and Edith snoring softly in her bed. The Worley’s cows were mooing in their fields down the road and I could smell the bacon Mama was cooking.

It was the Saturday I was supposed to meet Hank. I’d barely slept the night before, my mind swirling around and around as I tried to decide what to do. I wanted to be with Hank, but I still had a year left of school and it was about to start. I knew if I left Mama and Daddy would never speak to me again.

I closed my eyes and pictured Hank, handsome and smiling, his promises of a better life still fresh in my mind. I thought about his kisses and the way my heart seemed to skip when he said my name. I thought about how I wished I could heal the wounds his father had inflicted on him. I thought about how Mama already had my life planned out for me. I thought how Daddy wouldn’t even talk to me and maybe he never would again, whether I left with Hank or not.

I remembered what Mama had said that night daddy caught us. “Sometimes we have to move past our feelings and do what we know is right.”

Then I remembered that record of Elvis skipping.

“So lonely I could die…so lonely I could die…so lonely…”

Holding the crumpled letter, I knew what was right. I knew I didn’t want to be so lonely one day that I could die.

When I reached Hank’s truck, parked by the bridge, I was breathing hard. I felt like I had escaped into one of my books. Edith was at the movies with Billy Tanner. Daddy was at the office finishing paperwork for the Bishop Oil account. I’d told Mama I was taking muffins to Mrs. Grant up the hill and I had thrown them into a basket and skipped out the door before she could ask why.

I had dropped my pillowcase filled with some clothes, my journal, my Bible and a copy of The Three Musketeers into the bushes under my bedroom window.

Hank was smiling as I climbed into the cab. He slid his arm around my middle, pulling me across the seat against him. I giggled as he kissed me and then whooped like he was at a rodeo.

“I knew you’d come,” he said. “This is going to be a new life for both of us. I have so much to tell you. You’re going to love the apartment I found. I booked a couple gigs. I’ve got a job at the factory and I found a judge who’s going to marry us. . . ”

I took a deep breath when I heard about the judge and getting married. Was I really doing this? Was I really leaving my family, throwing away my senior year and running away with a man to a city four hours from home?

As Hank pulled the truck out onto the road, I knew I really was doing all those things. I was writing my own story, not letting it be written for me. I was finding my own story to tell.

 

A story to tell Chapter 9

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 5 Comments

Have you been following along with Blanche’s story? Let me know in the comments! To catch up to the story find the links to the other chapters at the end of this one.

 

Chapter 9

The few weeks after Daddy caught me were what I would call overwhelmingly tense. He didn’t speak to me. He didn’t speak to Edith. He barely spoke to Mama.

He left for work early and came home late. Dinners were silent and then he went to his chair to read his paper. I went to my room to do my homework or disappear inside a book.

Edith was quiet as well. She barely looked up from her plate at dinner. I knew she was thinking a lot about what Daddy thought of her. I hadn’t seen her flirting with boys as much lately, even though they flirted with her.

I listened to Daddy at first. I didn’t see Hank and he didn’t try to see me. I went to school and came home, helped Mama with the chores, went to church and did my best to be the Blanche I’d been before Daddy had caught me. I even visited that Bible study Lillian had suggested I attend, and I tried my best to really listen to the stories the women shared.

“Ladies, did we all get a chance to read the chapter in Proverbs about a virtuous woman?” Fran Sampson asked opening her Bible.

All the women opened their Bibles and I opened mine. I read:

Proverbs 31:10-31 “Who can find a virtuous woman? For her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands. She is like the merchants’ ships; she bringeth her food from afar. She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens.  She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard.  She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms.”

I decided not to comment too much, unsure what it was all supposed to mean. It sounded like to be a real woman I needed to be perfect and make wool. I couldn’t even sow, let alone make wool. And what did it mean to “girdeth her loins?” What were loins? It all sounded fairly ridiculous to me.

The women around me, most of them much older, nodded and smiled in agreement. Apparently, it made sense to them, then why couldn’t I figure it out?

“What do we think about this verse?” Fran asked, looking around the room.

I looked around the room too, hoping someone would enlighten me.

“Well, of course, it is probably unrealistic to believe we can live up to all of this, but it’s a wonderful guideline,” April Spencer said encouragingly.

April always had a sweet smile, perfect white teeth, blond hair, milky-white skin. Her daddy had been a farmer and her husband was a farmer and she looked like she should be on an ad for dairy products.

“It’s more of a goal to strive toward, something to work toward, rather than a list of how we need to be, I believe,” Lillian said.

The women around the room nodded in agreement and I felt a little more relieved about the passage, even if I didn’t understand all the words.

I decided I would think about the beginning of the passage: “The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life.”

I thought I could handle that much, at least, when I got married. I could “do no harm” and I could make sure a husband could always trust in me.

***

I was walking with a basket full of baked goods Mama had asked me to take to the neighbors the evening before the last day of school when Hank pulled up in his truck. I was about a half a mile from home, on the dirt road, and along the edge of the Worley’s hay field, the grass high.

“I’ve missed you,” he said as he drove along next to me.

“I can’t talk to you,” I said, keeping my eyes on my steps as I walked.

“Haven’t you missed me?” he asked.

I had, but I couldn’t tell him.

“Come on, Blanche. I haven’t seen you in weeks. Go for a drive with me.”

I kept walking, trying to ignore him.

“Your daddy won’t find out. We’ll drive down by the covered bridge.”

I shook my head.

I wanted to be the good girl again. It had been easier when I was the good girl. Daddy had loved me when I was the good girl.

“Not now, Hank.”

“Suit yourself, but I’m going to try again,” he said and sped up, driving past me, his truck disappearing down the dirt road in a cloud of dust.

He did try again, two weeks after school ended. I had taken a walk to try to decide if I should apply for a summer job at the library and to think about what I wanted to do after I graduated the next year.

This time when he pulled up, I looked up from the road and our eyes met. I felt a funny feeling in my stomach, a mix of fear and excitement.

He was as handsome as he’d ever been.

“Come on, Blanche,” he pleaded. “I have to see you. Just take a little drive with me. I miss our talks and want to see how you are..”

I hesitated. I thought about Bible study and how we’d talked about resisting temptation. I felt like God wasn’t helping very well with keeping temptation from me.

“I can’t talk long,” I said.

Hank’s grinned. “I’ll take any time with you I can get.”

When I climbed in the front seat Hank’s smile sent heat rushing through me. He leaned in and kissed me hard. I knew I shouldn’t lean into the kiss, but I did, reaching out and sinking my fingers into his soft, brown hair. It felt so good to hold him and to be held by him. My body reacted as he opened my mouth under his and clutched at my hair.

“Girl, I’ve missed that mouth,” he said breathlessly, kissing me again.

We spent an hour kissing and talking under the covered bridge, his hands gliding where they shouldn’t be, but me liking it and reveling in the feel of his mouth on my skin. I was starting to understand what Edith had meant that night when she said that one day I’d understand how nice it was to have a man who paid attention to me.

“We can’t ever be apart that long again,” he said, leaning back to look at me. “What have you been up to?”

He kissed my neck.

“Trying to decide what I want to do after high school,” I told him, closing my eyes.

“What do you mean what you want to do?”

His mouth moved to my earlobe.

“Like, what career will I have,” I said, distracted with his hand gliding up my leg. “Mama says maybe I will be a housewife like her, but I don’t know if that’s what I want to do. I want more – you know?”

“I do know, yes,” Hank said leaning back to look at me. “I want more too. I want to get out of this area. I want to be away from all the people who tell me who I should be and who I never will be.”

He sat up, laid his arm across his propped up knee.” Why don’t you come with me? If you’re going to be a housewife, you can be my housewife.”

I laughed a little as he grinned.

“You can cook me some good food and wash my clothes and I’ll make crazy love to you,” he said.

“Is that a proposal?” I asked with a roll of my eyes. “If it was, it wasn’t a very good one you know.”

Hank laughed.

“What if it was a proposal?” he asked, flipping a piece of my hair off my shoulder with his finger.

I shook my head and laughed.

“Hey, girl, I’m serious.”

I looked up at his face and I felt weak. His expression was serious, his eyes watching me intently.

“Oh, Hank – I’m too young to get married,” I said softly.

“You’re not too young. You heard what I told your daddy. A lot of girls your age are already having babies.”

Hank grinned.

“You wanna have babies with me some day?” he asked.

I swallowed hard. I’d never thought about having babies. I shook my head.

“Not really,” I said honestly. “Or at least not now.”

“If I ever have babies, I want it to be with you,” Hank said, lightly touching the buttons of my shirt then trailing his fingertips along my collarbones

I only knew a little about where babies came from, and I knew what Hank wanted to do might lead there. I wasn’t ready for babies. I didn’t even like holding someone else’s baby.

“I have to go,” I said abruptly and pushed his hands away.

“Come on, Blanche. Just a little longer,” he kissed my neck and slid his hand across my stomach under my shirt.

I pushed his hands away again and stood up abruptly.

“My parents are going to wonder where I am and I’m pretty sure my daddy was serious about that gun,” I said.

Looking down at him I felt a rush of warmth move from my chest into my cheeks. He was so handsome, and I still couldn’t figure out what he saw in me. I knew if he asked me to marry him again I would say yes, just so I could spend my life looking at him.

But I didn’t want him to ask me to marry him again. My head was spinning. I was as confused about my present as I was about what I wanted for my future.

I knew Hank didn’t want to, but he drove me back to the end of our road, kissing me hard before I jumped out of the truck, like he wanted me to know who I belonged to. I smoothed my hair down and pulled the bottom of my shirt over the top of my skirt as I walked back to the house, ready to be the good girl for Mama and Daddy again.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

 

A Story to Tell Part 8: Your Sin Will Find You Out

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 5 Comments

This the eighth part of my fiction story A Story To Tell. The story isn’t really broken into chapters, but bite-size sections for the blog. When I start to rewrite and tighten the story I’ll figure out chapters. To catch up with the story find the links at the end of this section of the story.

A Story To Tell (1)

“How old are you anyhow?” I asked Hank, laying back in the grass, looking up at the star filled sky.

He leaned up on his elbow and grinned.

“How old do you think I am?” he asked.

“My friend Emmy says you’re like 24,” I said.

“I don’t know if it’s a good thing I look older or not.” He laughed and pushed his hand back through his hair.

“I’m 21,” he said, then laid back on the grass, his arms behind him. “But I feel like I’ve lived enough life to fill two lifetimes since the old man kicked me out.”

“Is it scary living alone?” I asked.

“Maybe at first, but not now,” he said. “I’m used to it. I like coming and going when I please, no one to tell me ‘no’ or ‘you shouldn’t do that.”

“Isn’t it lonely?”

He shrugged. “Sometimes.”

He leaned up on his elbow again and grinned at me.

“It’s not so bad lately, now that I have you,” he said.

I smiled, hands folded across my stomach as I looked at the stars.

“You know, Blanche, you’re the only one who really seems to care about what I think and wants to know about me,” he said.

I looked at him, smiling.

“I feel the same way about you,” I said.

“I don’t think I’ve ever felt more calm than I do when I’m with you,” he said softly. He twirled a strand of my hair around his finger as he spoke. “You know, when I first took off on my own, I did miss Mama and my little brother. Judson – he’s my little brother – he always looked up to me. I felt bad when I came home drunk one night and he saw me. He looked so sad because I wasn’t acting like the Hank he used to know. I tried not to drink as much after that when I went in to parties. But then I wrecked the old man’s car and I guess that was the last straw for him. He hit me so hard that night my head vibrated. But at least he was hitting me that night and not mama.”

His voice was full of sadness. I rolled to my side, leaning my head on my arm, laying my other hand against his face.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered.

“For what?” he asked.

“That your daddy treated you and your mama so awful.”

His eyes searched mine for a few moments before he leaned over me and covered my mouth with his, sinking his fingers in my hair.

“You’re a sweet, girl, Blanche,” he said as he pulled his mouth away. “I definitely don’t deserve you.”

“No, sir, you don’t,” I said, smiling as I sank my fingers into his hair and pulled his head toward me, kissing him hard.

“What the hell are you doing out here?”

My daddy’s voice, booming, cut through the silence of the night. Hank jumped back from me and I felt my heart pounding so hard I thought I was going to faint. My knees felt weak as I stood and I had to grab on to the fence to stay standing. My ears were roaring and for a moment I thought I had gone deaf from the shock. Hank stood and calmly brushed the dirt and grass from his clothes.

“Well, hey there, Mr. Robins,” Hank tried to look confident as Daddy stomped toward us in the dark.

“Hey there?! Hey there?!”

I’d never seen Daddy’s face look the way it did that night. Rage flashed in his eyes and his mouth was twisted in a grimace. He reminded me of a picture I’d seen of the devil in my grandma’s Bible one time.

“You little… ,”

Daddy’s voice was practically a growl and the curse word he uttered was sharp and sent a cold chill rushing through me. I’d never heard Daddy swear before.

His fist hit Hank’s face and Hank hit the ground. Blood was trickling from Hank’s mouth when he lifted himself to his feet and I could hear daddy breathing hard.

“Don’t you ever touch my daughter again!” his finger was pointed at Hank and it was shaking.

“I wasn’t doing anything wrong.” Hank spat blood on the ground.

“Get off my property!” Daddy shouted.

“I’m not going anywhere unless Blanche wants me to. This was a private meeting,” Hank snarled back.

“You don’t have a ‘private meeting’ with a little girl!”

“She isn’t a little girl! She’s practically a grown woman!” Hank yelled back. “This isn’t the 30s, old man. Girls her age are getting married and having babies by now.”

“You son of a – “Daddy grabbed Hank by the front of his shirt and then swung at him again. Hank moved and daddy almost fell onto the ground but righted himself and started to lunge toward Hank again.

Suddenly I was angry. I was angry at Daddy for always treating me like a child. I was angry at him for punching Hank. I was angry at Mama for deciding my life for me. I was angry at Edith for always getting the attention. I was angry at the boys at school. I was angry at Hank for yelling at Daddy. I was angry at life. I didn’t want to be stuck in this town my whole life and I was sick of people acting like I was going to.

“I’m out here because I wanna be!” I shouted over Daddy and Hank, as startled as them at the angry tone of my voice.

Daddy’s face was red as he stepped away from Hank and turned to face me.

“What did you say?!” he said, half snarling, half screaming, like a rabid dog.

I’d never seen him so angry but I kept yelling anyway, my fury overriding my common sense.

“I like talking to Hank and I’m tired of being told what to do! Hank’s the only one who treats me like a real person and not a baby!”

Daddy wrapped his big hand around my upper arm and dragged me across the field toward the house.

“You were doing a lot more than talking when I came out here!” Daddy was speaking through gritted teeth. “And don’t you ever speak to me the way you did just now. Not ever!”

He whipped me around like a rag doll, looking at Hank, his voice shaking.

“Hank Hakes, you get off my property before I get my gun and show you I know how to use it!”

Hank was smirking.

“Yes, sir, Mr. Robbins. I’ll do whatever you say,” he chuckled sarcastically, turned, but then paused and turned back toward Daddy and me.

“I’ll see you another day, Blanche!” he called, only making Daddy angrier.

Daddy’s footsteps were long and brisk and I couldn’t keep up. I fell when we were almost to the house, stones cutting into my legs as Daddy continued to drag me.

“Get up!” He yelled as tears spilled hot down my cheeks.

Mama was standing in the doorway when we reached the front porch, her expression revealing shock and horror.

“My God, Alan! What is going on?” She cried reaching out for me.

“Your little girl has been sneaking around with that Hank Hakes and I’ll have none of it! I won’t have two little whores in my house!”

He tossed me at mama’s feet and walked toward his truck.

“Jessie, I am too angry to think. I’m going for a drive.”

The truck sped away, out the drive and down the dirt road by our house, kicking stones and dirt up from the tires. Hank’s truck had already disappeared down the road in a cloud of dust.

I saw Edith through my tears, standing at the bottom of the stairs. I knew she’d heard what Daddy had said about having two whores in the house. Her face was scrunched up, tears staining her face.

Mama knelt next to me and for a moment I thought she might start yelling as well. Instead she took the edge of her gown in her hand, wiping the tears off my face.

“Come on, get up,” she said. “I’ll make us some cocoa and we’ll have a talk. Edith, you come down too.”

I slumped into a chair at the kitchen table and looked at my shin, covered in dirt and blood. My hair was in my face, full of dirt.

Edith sat across from me with her arms folded across her chest. She had wiped her tears away and a small smile was playing across her mouth.

I didn’t want to be the brunt of her mocking jokes today.

“Well, at least it’s you who is in trouble this time,” she said with a sneer. “I sure as heck didn’t see that coming.”

“Shut up,” I hissed at her.

Mama handed me a wet towel then poured milk into a pan on the stove.

“Clean yourself off,” she told me sharply and sat down. “And both of you shut up.”

I saw the creases in the corners of her eyes, creases I hadn’t noticed before. Her hair had fallen out of her rollers in a couple of places and she looked tired, more tired than I had seen her look in a long time.

“So, what’s going on with you?” She said softly. “What happened out there?”

I wiped the blood from my leg and didn’t look at her. I shrugged. I didn’t want to talk about it. I was embarrassed, but more than that, I was still angry.

“Were you with Hank?” she asked bluntly.

I winced as I wiped the dirt on my leg away to reveal a small gash. Blood trickled down my shin.

I nodded as she stood to find bandages and peroxide. The medicine cabinet door slammed in the kitchen.

“What do you see in him?” she asked a few moments later, kneeling in front of me, cleaning the gash.

I grimaced as fresh tears sprung to my eyes from the pain.

“He listens to me. He doesn’t think I’m a stupid little girl and he doesn’t call me a nerd,” I told her.

“You like the attention he gives you, don’t you?” Mama asked.

I nodded, wiping tears off my face with the back of my hand.

“That attention is all well and good right now, but with someone like Hank I’m afraid it wouldn’t last,” Mama said. “He’s a lot of talk. He’s a lot of ‘right now’ but not a lot of ‘what will be.’ Do you understand what I mean?”

I didn’t. I shook my head and looked at her through the hair that was still in my face.

She pushed the strands away from my eyes and hooked them behind my ears.

“Blanche, he likes what he sees but I’m afraid he likes a lot of what he sees. I know your daddy is angry right now, but it’s because we’ve seen men like Hank before. He doesn’t come from a good background and those type of men don’t stay in one place, or with one person, for very long.”

I looked away and felt my lower lip quivering.

“I love him,” I said quietly. I hadn’t even admitted it to myself yet, but it was true.

Edith laughed ruefully.

“I knew you’d be the one to fall for the bad boy,” she said. “It’s always the quiet ones.”

“Be quiet, Edith,” Mama instructed. She turned to look at me. “You’re too young to know what love is. What you have right now is lust.”

She stood and went to the stove, poured the milk in mugs and mixed the cocoa in.

When she sat again, she leaned across the table and took my chin in her hand, made me look her in the eye.

“Blanche, you need to be honest with me right now – has Hank ever told you he loves you?”

“No,” I said softly.

“Has he – has he – talked you into doing things that only married people are supposed to do?”

Mama looked worried.

Edith looked expectant as she watched me closely over the rim of her mug, eyes wide.

I looked back at Mama.

“No, ma’m,” I said firmly. “He’s kissed me and that’s all.”

Mama studied my eyes for a few moments and let my chin go. Out of the corner of my eye I couldn’t tell if Edith was relieved or disappointed in my answer.

“Okay,” she said. “I believe you. I know you feel like you’re in love, but I agree with your daddy. You need to stay away from Hank. It might be hard, but you have to understand that sometimes we have to move past our feelings and do what we know is right. Are you listening?”

I didn’t agree with her, but I was listening.

I nodded.

“Now, you girls finish your cocoa and get back to bed. You’ve both got church in the morning and I don’t plan to let you miss it. You need it more than ever right now.”

When Edith and I started up the stairs Mama called to Edith.

“Edith, I hope you heard all that I said to Blanche tonight,” she said, firmly. “It applies to you as well.”

Edith rolled her eyes and flounced up the stairs.

“Yeah, I heard you, but Blanche is getting more action these days than me, so it’s not like you have anything to worry about,” she grumbled as she stomped into our room.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

 

Fiction Friday: A Story to Tell, Chapter Seven

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 3 Comments

This is part of a continuing fiction story I’ve been working on and sharing each Friday for Fiction Friday.

To catch up find links to the past parts below:

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

Part Six

I didn’t want to lie to Daddy and Mama but I liked being with Hank. I liked how we could talk all night about all kinds of things and I liked how he seemed interested in what interested me. And I liked that he wanted to kiss me and hold me when there were so many other girls who wished he was doing the same with them.

“Where is this Bible study?” Daddy asked lighting his pipe.

“Mrs. Steele’s.”

“The pastors house?”

“Well, no, it meets at the social hall, not at the house.”

I was a horrible liar.

Mama looked at the Bible in my hand. I couldn’t read her expression at first but then she seemed pleased and smiled.

“I think that’s wonderful,” she said. “We should let her go, Alan. Learning more about God’s word can’t be a bad thing.

The words stung. Mama was right. Learning about God wasn’t bad, but I’d abandoned learning about God to learn about Hank. I hated that Mama thought I had chosen something noble over something frivolous.

“Do you need me to drive you?” Daddy asked, laying his pipe down.

“No sir,” I said quickly. “Emmy’s mom is going to pick me up at the bottom of the road.”

“Okay then. We’ll see you later tonight,” he said, eyebrows furrowed, a sign he still wasn’t sure about this Bible study thing.

Mama took my face in her hands and kissed my forehead.

I thought I saw tears in her eyes as she hugged me and I immediately felt the urge to blurt out – “I’m a liar! A horrible liar and you should lock me up and throw away the key!”

But I didn’t say anything. I just smiled as she told me she loved me.

“I’m so proud of you, Blanche,” she said softly.

I was so ashamed of myself. I could barely keep from crying as I walked down the the road toward the covered bridge.

A sharp whistle cut the silence and I looked up and saw Hank sitting in his red, Chevy truck. He motioned me over, leaned across the seat and opened the passenger side door.

“Climb in,” he said. “I’ve got a different idea about what we can do tonight.”

I climbed into the front seat and looked at him, confused. I swallowed the tears I had been fighting back a few moments before and laid the Bible on the seat between us.

“I thought we were going to the movies,” I said.

Hank winked at me and shifted the truck out of park, pulling on to the road. “I changed my mind,” he said. “We’re going somewhere exciting tonight. Somewhere not too far away but far enough that no one who knows us will see us together.”

He glanced down at the Bible and laughed.

“And somewhere you’re not going to need that.”

I felt a twinge of guilt as I looked at the brown, leather-bound Bible my grandma had given me for my 13th birthday. My name was engraved in gold on the weathered front cover.

My heart started pounding. Going to a movie was one thing but driving with him somewhere outside the area was entirely different. My hands felt slick with sweat as we drove and I tried to dry them discreetly on my skirt.

“I’m not really dressed to go anywhere else.”

My voice sounded high pitched and hollow.

“You’re dressed just fine don’t you worry about that.”

Hank glanced at me and I felt my body grow warm as his eyes traveled up and down. He reached over and laid his hand on my thigh as he drove.

When we pulled up outside of a bar I’d never seen before, I felt even more apprehensive. I thought of all the times Edith told me I needed to have more fun I knew she was right; I needed to at least try to have fun for once. I’d simply chalk this up to a new experience.

I slid my hand into Hank’s as we walked in. He looked delighted to introduce me to his world.

The interior of the bar was dim and the music coming from the stage was loud. The singer reminded me of the music Edith had played for Emmy and me.

“You want a drink?” Hank asked.

“No, thank you,” I said. I’d never even sipped alcohol and wasn’t interested in trying now.

Hank ordered a beer. He gulped down half the bottle before grabbing my hand and pulling me toward the mass of people dancing in the center of the room. The girls, mostly my age and older, danced around me. The boys, dressed in blue jeans and white shirts with hair slicked back, danced with them, surrounding us with a swirl of colors and noise.

“I don’t dance!” I tried to shout over the noise.

“It’s time to try!” Hank shouted back.

From the stage a man wearing a black suit coat, buttoned down to reveal a white dress shirt sang an upbeat song about rocking around the clock.

Hank pointed to his feet, then, to mine. I could barely hear his voice over the music, but I knew he wanted me to try to repeat what he’d done. I shook my head firmly and he laughed.

“Come on, just try something new,” he yelled in my ear.

I shook my head but started to laugh as I watched him swing his hips. He held his hands out to me.

I tried the dance, stumbling and stepping on his feet, laughing at each mistake.

We were laughing and spinning on the dance floor and I was trying my best to keep up. Other people were bumping into us, laughing and smiling while dancing with each other. Together we were a mashed-up mess of youth and I loved it. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had so much fun.

When the song ended, people dispersed to either their tables or the bar. A woman with long, dark eyelashes leaned back against the bar, watching Hank.

“Hey there, cutie,” she said. “Here alone?”

Hank grinned reaching for his beer and seemed to be pleased with the attention.

“Not tonight,” he said, winking at her and sliding his arm around my waist.

The woman smirked, barely looking at me.

“Well, if you get sick of that little girl and want to hang out with a real woman, you let me know,” she said in a husky tone.

She pushed herself off of the bar, walking past Hank, bumping her hip against him as she walked.

Hank watched her walked away and shook his head, laughing as he took a swig from the bottle.

“Hey, can I get a water for the little lady?” he asked the bartender.

He held the bottle toward me. “Unless you want a sip?”

I shook my head, holding up my hand.

“No, thank you,” I said, guilt about lying to my parents already weighing heavy on my mind.

“You never have any fun, Blanche,” Hank said grinning. I knew he was teasing, but in his voice I heard my sister and the boys at school mocking me.

I snatched the bottle from his hand, sucking the liquid down fast, the gagging as the bitterness stung my throat and left a burning sensation in my stomach. I thought I was going to throw up on Hank’s shoes. I coughed, my face hot, while Hank laughed.

“You okay?” he asked breathless from laughing.

I nodded, still trying to catch my breath.

“We’ve got to toughen you up, kid,” Hank said, draining the bottle.

The man on the stage began to sing and strum a gentle, slow melody on the guitar.

Hank took my hand and I followed him to the center of the bar, feeling unsure of myself. He leaned closer as he turned to face me.

“You don’t have to know too many steps for the slow songs,” he said in my ear, placing a hand on each side of my waist. “We just have to learn how to move together.”

I didn’t know where I was supposed to place my hands for a slow dance, so I looked at all the other couples. I did what the other girls did and hooked my arms around the back of Hank’s neck, which only pulled me closer to him. He looked down at me and smirked, as we swayed to the music.

I’d never slow- danced with a boy, let alone a man like Hank. My heart was pounding as he leaned his forehead down against mine and then tilted his head to kiss me.

“See? Isn’t this better than a movie?” he asked, his lips grazing mine as he spoke.

I nodded and he kissed me again as we danced.

In the truck, his kisses were longer and harder. I knew he wanted more, but I pulled away quickly.

“My parents are going to question my story if I don’t get home soon,” I told him.

I heard frustration in his voice as he turned the key in the ignition.

“Darn those parents of yours, girl.”

He grinned despite the tone of his voice. I felt like a silly little girl and wished I was older, with no parents to rush home to. I wondered how much longer Hank would want to spend time with a child like me.

My question was answered when pebbles started hitting my window again two nights later.

***

The Sunday morning after I went dancing with Hank, Lillian pulled me aside at the end of the service.

“Blanche, your mother just asked me how our Bible study went last night,” she said softly, so no one else could hear her. “She said you told her you enjoyed it very much.”

I couldn’t meet Lillian’s gaze. I immediately felt ashamed.

“Blanche, you know the problem with all this is that we don’t have Bible study on Saturday nights, right?”

I nodded, my hands feeling numb like they always did when I was anxious.

“Can you tell me why you lied to your parents?”

I shook my head.

“I know it was wrong,” I said quietly. “I’ll never do it again.”

I looked up at Lillian, frightened.

“Are you going to tell my parents?” I asked.

Lillian’s eyebrows were furrowed, and I recognized the maternal concern on her face.

“No, honey, I’m not. I’m going to leave that to you,” she said. “But I am going to let you know you put me in a very difficult position. Luckily your mother and I were interrupted because I was not going to lie for you.”

I nodded.

“I understand and I apologize. I’ll talk to my parents today,” I told her, but I knew I was lying. I had no intention of telling my parents anything about why I lied or about Hank.

“I’m glad that’s settled,” Lillian said with a smile. “I am sure you feel you had a good reason for what you did but remember, God has commanded us to honor our father and mother.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said.

“And also know that we have a women’s Bible study every Wednesday and we would love to see you there this Wednesday,” Lillian said.

Somehow, I felt the invitation was more of a directive rather than a kind outreach for womanly fellowship; maybe in exchange for not telling my parents I had lied to them.

Lillian’s expression was somber.

“Don’t forget, Blanche. The Bible tells us that our sin will find us out. I don’t say that to scare you but to remind you that God does not ask us not to sin because he wants to punish us, but because he wants the best – His best – for us.”

My chest felt tight and the numbness in my hands was spreading to my arms.

“Yes, Miss Lillian I understand.”

She hugged me.

“I know you do, and I know you are going to do the right thing.”

I didn’t know how to do the right thing without giving up Hank.

Lillian wasn’t the only one who knew I’d been lying about the Bible study.

“Jeffrey Franklin told me he saw you at the Mountain House with Hank,” Edith smirked, resting her elbows on the bed as she leaned back.

I wanted to slap the smirk off her face.

I tightened my jaw.

“Are you going to tell Mama and Daddy?” I asked.

Edith’s legs were crossed, and her foot was bouncing again. I hated that bouncing foot and the smug look on her face. She shrugged.

“I dunno,” she said. “Maybe.”

I turned away from her to face my desk and snatched up my journal.

“Do whatever,” I snapped, but hoped she wouldn’t.

Edith threw her head back and cackled – it’s the only way to describe the noise that came out of her.

“Little Blanche out partying with a bad boy,” she said. “What would Daddy think of his little bookworm running around with – not a boy – but a man like Hank Hakes?”

I scribbled in my journal, pretending to ignore her taunts.

“Whatcha writing in there? ‘Tonight, Hank kissed me. It made me weak in my knees!’?”

She laughed and I reached towards the bed, grabbing a pillow and roughly tossing it at her face.

She giggled, falling back as it hit her.

“Oh, Blanche, calm down. I’m not telling Mama and Daddy anything. As long as you tell me all about your night out . . .”

“It was just some dancing.”

“You danced?”

“Not well, but yes.”

Edith smiled, startling me as she suddenly stood to give me a hug.

“I’m so proud of my little sister,” she said. “She’s finally having some fun.”

‘A Story to Tell’ Chapter six

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 5 Comments

This is part of a serial fictional story I’m sharing on my blog once a week. Did you know that Catcher in the Rye was actually released as a serial first? I didn’t, until this week. Did you know I never read Catcher in the Rye? Gasp! I know. I’ll have to remedy that ASAP.

You can find links to the other parts of the story below:

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

 

Lisa R. Howeler

One day when I was in ninth grade, I saw Edith sitting outside the ice cream shop next to Eddie Parker on my way home from school. The way she laughed every time he spoke made me roll my eyes. No one was that funny. I couldn’t figure out why talking to a boy made her act like she’d lost part of her mind. I vowed never to give up my brain for the attention of some boy.

When I was a junior in high school I must have forgotten about that day. I wouldn’t say I gave up any part of me for Hank’s attention, at least at first, but I know there were times I threw caution and common sense not only into the wind but into the gutter.

I was surprised by how many nights I was able to leave the house in the middle of the night without my parents hearing me. There were some nights Hank came but I couldn’t slip out because Mama and Daddy were still awake chatting in their bedroom or sitting in the living room watching Ed Sullivan.

On those nights I kneeled at the window and waved him away. He’d take a drag on his cigarette, blow a stream of smoke into the dark and blow me a kiss before he left with a shrug and a smirk. When I could slip away I always made sure I wasn’t wearing shoes and I tip-toed across the floor, skipping the boards I knew squeaked.

The mornings after we met I was always tired, but I knew Mama thought it was because I’d been up late reading.

“When I started singing it made my dad angry and I liked that,” Hank said one night as we sat under the maple. “He never liked anything I did. I didn’t even cry the night he kicked me out. I was glad to finally be free. I was only 16 at the time.”

He flicked a leaf at the ground and stared at it wistfully.

“Where did you go?” I asked.

“I went to live with my grandma at first, but then she died so I found a place in town and got a job,” he said. “I won’t lie that I miss my mama and grandma a bit – at least their cooking, but I’m doing al’right on my own. I can cook a mean can of beans.”

He laughed and I laughed with him.

“I saw you with your mama at church on Sunday,” I told him.

He nodded.

“She asked me to take her so I did. The old man never does anymore. Too busy drinking on Saturday night to get up early on Sunday morning. I’m not much for that religion stuff, but I’ll go for mama.”

I could tell he seemed interested in changing the subject by the way his gaze drifted to the field lit by the dim light of the moon.

“So, what new books you been reading?” he asked.

“I started reading Catcher in the Rye,” I said with a shrug. “Mrs. Libby at the library gave it to me, but I don’t know what I think about it. It’s about this kid who is sort of depressed all the time and rebelling against his parents. It’s kind of new I guess.”

Hank grinned.

“Maybe you’re not sure you like it because it’s too close to how your life is right now,” he said.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I mean – aren’t you rebelling against your parents by being out here with me?” he asked. “Maybe you’re a little like that guy in the book.”

I shook my head.

“I’m nothing like him,” I said. “I’m not that depressed or moody.”

He was smiling at me.

“Well, most of the time,” I admitted, thinking how I had yelled at Edith that morning to stop stealing my clothes. “But I love my parents. It’s just – I don’t know – sometimes they try to tell me what I’m going to be and I don’t like that.”

“They try to live their lives through you,” Hank said. “It’s a parent thing. I was lucky. My dad just hated me. He’s never cared what I did with my life. And Mama is too afraid of Daddy to care much about what I do. I think that’s easier because now I just live my own life. I don’t have to answer to anyone but me and most of the time I don’t even answer to me.”

I looked at him again, watching as he pulled leaves off the tree while leaning against the fence post. He was wearing a white undershirt with a plaid button up shirt over it and a pair of faded blue jeans and black dress shoes. His hair was long in the front. While we talked he pushed his hand through his hair and pushed the longer strands back on his head and I could see his eyes better.

Even though the moon was only a quarter moon and the light by the old shed was dim, I could see how beautiful the shape of his mouth was.  I hated how I wished he was kissing me again. I felt silly and childish at the way my stomach felt like butterflies were alive in my belly as I studied him.

“Why do you care what I’m reading anyhow?” I asked.

“Because I like to know what you like,” he said and shrugged. “I don’t read a lot so I like to know what kind of stories spark your interest. Plus, if you tell me all about what is in those books, then I don’t have to take the time to read them. More time for singing and playing and dancing with pretty girls.”

He noticed my eyes dropped to the ground when he mentioned dancing with pretty girls.

“Now, don’t you worry, little Chatterbox. I’m only dancing for fun. I’d much rather be dancing with you, but you won’t come with me.”

I shifted my weight from one leg to the other.

“You know I can’t –“ I said, softly. “My parents –“

He sighed. “I know, I know. Your parents would blow a gasket. But I don’t get it. What have they got against me anyhow? I’ve never done anything to them. They don’t even know me.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Daddy just said you like a lot of women and aren’t good to be around.”

Hank threw a handful of leaves at the ground and laughed.

“Yeah, I like women. I like a lot of women,” he was smiling and watching me as he moved closer to me. “And right now, I like the woman who is right in front of me.”

I didn’t close my eyes until his mouth was on mine. I loved the smell of him. I loved how his hands felt when they fell to my waist and pulled me against him. I loved when he deepened the kiss and slid his hands into my hair.

“You feel good, Blanche,” he whispered against my ear, his hands slipping up to the middle of my back, then starting to slide down.

I pushed his hands away and stepped back from him.

He cleared his throat.

“Sorry about that,” he said. “Sometimes my hands get away from me. It just felt right to move them there.”

“I know, but I don’t want to – to –“

“And I won’t ask you to,” he said, his finger under my chin, gently lifting my face to look at him. “I won’t. You hear? Not until I put a ring on that finger and the preacher says we’re married.”

Ring? Married? I was surprised by his use of the words. They held a heaviness in them I wasn’t ready for. I still had another year of school and I knew Daddy would never let me marry him.

I nodded silently and he kissed me again.

“Hey. I was thinking. Let’s meet somewhere else one day,” he said, still holding me. “Can you sneak out on a Saturday? I’ll drive us to town and we can watch a movie.”

“I don’t know. What if someone sees us together?” I asked.

“We’ll go in separately. You meet me in the back when the lights go off.”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on. It will be fun. Don’t you want to have some fun once in a while?”

I did want to have some fun. It was time someone had fun besides Edith and the characters in my books.

“I’ll see what I can do,” I said.

“I’ll meet you at the bottom of the hill in my truck about 6:15. Wear your best dress. Tell your Daddy you’re going to Bible study or something.”

I laughed softly because I knew Daddy would believe me about the Bible study, but then I felt guilty about even considering lying to my daddy.

“I’ll try,” I said as he kissed my neck.

“I can’t wait,” he said. “Now get your butt back inside before your parents catch us and your daddy shoots me.”

His hand slapped my bottom as I turned to run toward the house. I looked over my shoulder and smiled. He was smiling back.

I’d never felt so alive.

Fiction Friday: A Story To Tell Chapter Five

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 6 Comments

Welcome to Fiction Friday, where I share a piece of fiction I’m working on.  Right now I’m in the middle of sharing a story I’m developing into a novel.
IF you haven’t been following along, or need to remind yourself of the previous parts of the story, I’ve provided links to the other parts below:

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Don’t want to click from chapter to chapter? Find the book in full on Kindle HERE. 

 

Lisa R. Howeler

I loved the smell of books. I loved the feel of them in my hands. My favorite place to be, if I wasn’t in my room reading, was in the library, curled up against a bookcase in the fiction section. I fell into new and mysterious worlds when I was reading. My boring life faded away into someone else’s adventure. I spent so many days wishing the boring away.

Edith didn’t like to read. She found her excitement in the real world. We were the complete opposite for so many years. She liked her dark hair to be curled and each curl to be in its place. She liked her clothes to be the latest in fashion and to hug her curves, but not too close, so there was at least a little left to the imagination of the boys who watched her when she walked by.

She was confident and frequently had a smart or a flirty remark on the tip of her tongue.

I was the quiet, sometimes painfully shy younger sister she and her friends didn’t know how to talk to. I give Edith credit, though – she tried her best to pull me forward in life, encouraging, or rather nagging, me to experience more than a simple story in a book.

“Daddy, can Blanche and I go to the matinee while you finish your paperwork at the office?” Edith looked at Daddy and batted her eyes, chin on her folded hands.

Daddy didn’t always fall for Edith’s little eye flutters but on this particular day he must have decided she looked a lot like the little girl he used to bounce on his knee because he agreed.

“I’ll drop you off at 2 and you’d better be out front when the movie ends,” Daddy said.

Edith and I agreed.

“And what’s playing anyhow?” He asked.

“‘The Harder They Fall,’ with Humphrey Bogart,” Edith told him.

Daddy was a big fan of Humphrey Bogart. Edith knew he’d have a hard time saying ‘no’ to letting us see Boggie.

“I like that Humphrey Bogart,” Daddy said from behind his newspaper. “He’s a man’s man.”

And he was a man’s man that day on the big screen too. I couldn’t take my eyes off him but Edith’s eyes were on Jimmy Sickler a row over from us, sitting with Annie Welles. I couldn’t read the expression on Edith’s face. It seemed to switch back and forth between angry and hurt.

“I loved it. What did you think?” I asked Edith at the end as we filed to the front of the theater to wait for Daddy.

Edith shrugged.

“It was okay, I guess.”

I knew she’d missed half of it watching Jimmy and Annie.

“Hey, Edith.”

Jimmy’s voice made my sister look up sharply and I saw fire in her eyes. I only liked drama in my books and wished I wasn’t standing between them. Edith’s gaze trailed to Annie standing next to Jimmy, patting her hair into place. Her tense expression quickly softened and she smiled.

“Well, hello, James,” she said sweetly. “Did you two enjoy the movie?”

“We did,” Jimmy said. “Thanks for asking. You’re looking nice this afternoon.”

He turned his attention to me. “Hey there, Blanche. Some sister time, huh?”

His smile was sweet. I always thought Jimmy was one of the most polite boys Edith went out with. His brown hair was always combed neatly to one side and his bright blue eyes were captivating.

I nodded and smiled.

“Did you like the movie?”

“I did. I like Humphrey Bogart a lot.”

I knew I had no idea how to talk to boys and looked at the sidewalk to avoid Jimmy’s gaze, hoping he wouldn’t ask me anymore questions.

I could see Daddy’s Oldsmobile coming down the street toward the theater.

“You two have a good day,” Edith winked at Jimmy and her voice was even sweeter than before, almost too sweet, like sugar on top of a sugar cookie.

She leaned close to Jimmy, hand on his shoulder, mouth close enough to his ear to graze his skin and whispered. I could see Annie’s face just beyond Jimmy’s left shoulder. Her dark red lipstick made her pursed lips look like a cherry on its’ stem and her eyelids were half closed in a furious glare.

I cringed inwardly at Edith’s embarrassing display.

Jimmy’s cheeks and ears flushed pink and he looked as embarrassed as I felt. Edith’s hand slid down his bare arm as she backed away and then a slight smirk tilted her lips as she glanced at the stewing Annie.

Jimmy reached his arm back to pull Annie close to him, his jaw tight.

“Good to see you ladies,” he said curtly as he stepped past us.

Edith’s smile had faded into a scowl and by the time we slid into the backseat of the car the scowl was fading into obvious hurt.

“Good movie?” Daddy asked.

“Oh yes! You’ll love it,” I told him. “You should take Mama next weekend.”

Daddy and I chatted about the movie while Edith sulked, one leg crossed over the other, her foot bouncing and her arms folded across her chest. She snapped the door open and slammed it closed when we pulled up to the house, stomping up the front steps.

Daddy raised his eyebrows and looked at me questioningly.

I shrugged.

“Boy troubles,” I said.

Daddy shook his head. His eyebrows furrowed slightly into a scowl

“That girl and those boys.”

Now it was his turn to look sour as he climbed out of the car.

“I don’t know why I even go out with the boys around here,” Edith said when I walked into our room. She tossed her sweater on her bed. “They don’t really like me. They don’t really want to know me or what I think or what I feel.”

She flopped back on the bed, laying on her back and starring at the ceiling.

“What do you mean? All the boys love you,” I said, confused.

“They don’t love me. They love what I give them,” Edith said.

I saw tears in her eyes.

A chill cut through me.

“What do you mean what you give them?” I asked nervously.

Edith blew her nose into her handkerchief and folded her knees up against her chest.

“Edith…you aren’t giving those boys – I mean, you’re not really…” I felt sick to my stomach.

Edith had her head on her knees and wouldn’t look at me.

“Not everything,” she mumbled. “Just enough to keep them coming for more.”

I sat on my bed and didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t sure what “just enough” was and didn’t even want to know what “more” was. Mama said I didn’t need to know what men and women did when they were alone, besides kissing, but I’d heard a lot what “it” was at school, in books, and from Emmy, who had an older brother.

“Why do you need them to like you so much?” I asked softly.

Edith shrugged. “I don’t need them to like me, but I like them to,” she said. “It’s nice to be adored and paid attention to, you know?”

“Mama and Daddy love you and – “

Edith snorted. “Please. Daddy likes you more than me. You’re smarter and do better in school and he knows you’ll do something with your life. I’ll just be a hairdresser.”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s not true. You can be whatever you want to be. Times are different than when Mama was a girl,” I said. “Besides, Mama thinks I’ll just stay home and be a housewife. She doesn’t think I can be anything else.”

Edith wiped the tears off her cheeks with the back of her hand.

“You’re going to be more than a housewife. Don’t you let them tell you what you can be,” she said. “I’m just not good enough to be anything other than someone who cuts hair and files nails and I know that. And by the way, getting attention from your parents is way different than getting it from a cute boy. Someday you’ll understand that.”

I laid on my side on my bed and leaned on my arm.

“Are you and Jimmy even going steady?” I asked.

Edith laid there in silence for a few moments and sighed.

“I don’t know. We’ve never discussed it. But – I guess I thought we were. I guess I didn’t realize how much I liked him until I saw him with that silly Annie Welles. I just thought – I guess I thought if I reminded him what I could give him that Little Miss Prude won’t he’d want to forget about her.”

Edith wiped her hand across her face.

I flopped back on my bed on my back.

We both laid there for a few moments in silence.

“There’s nothing wrong with being a hairdresser,” I said finally. “They make women look pretty and they get to gossip all day.”

Edith laughed softly, sat up, and drew her hands down over her hair to straighten it.

“Well, those are two things I enjoy so maybe it won’t be so bad,” she said and smiled.

I sat up to look at her.

“Maybe Jimmy’s different than the other boys, Edith. Maybe he doesn’t only want one thing.”

Edith rolled her eyes and slid the record player from under her bed.

“All boys want that one thing from girls. Another lesson you’ll learn as you get older.”

She paused as she lifted a box of chocolates off her nightstand.

“Blanche? You know you don’t have to give it to them right?”

“Give them what?” I asked feigning innocence.

“You know what, Blanche. Don’t play games with me. You’ve got more going for you than I do. You don’t have to – well, you know – there’s a lot more reasons for a boy to like you.”

I touched her hand and she looked at me.

“There are a lot more reasons for a boy to like you too, Edith,” I said.

She looked away from me, and smiled a little as she shook her head.

“You’re too nice, Blanche.”

She placed a Frank Sinatra record on the turn table and we ate chocolate and spent the rest of the afternoon talking about boys we thought were cute and the newest fashions she’d read about at her beauty classes.

It took her mind off Jimmy Sickler and Annie Welles and my mind off my sister basing her worth off what a man thought of her.

“I’ll never be like her,” I told myself, not knowing then that we often become who we don’t want to be.

‘A Story to Tell’ Chapter Four

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 5 Comments

This is part of a continuing fiction story I’m working on.

You can find the other parts of the story at the following links:

Part I

Part II

Part III

Don’t want to click from chapter to chapter? Find the book in full on Kindle HERE. 

We spent Sunday mornings in church and Sunday afternoons sitting on our front porch, taking naps or, if it was summer, swimming at the pond behind the church. On the last Sunday od month there was a church picnic and Mama, Edith and I made pies to take to it.

I sat next to my parents each Sunday, in a hard, wood pew, trying my best to pay attention to the pastor. Edith dressed her best to make sure all the boys had their attention on her instead of the sermon. Most Sundays it worked and I had seen many backs of heads slapped when mothers or girlfriends had followed the gazes from some distracted male to my sister adjusting her skirt or fanning her clevage with the bulletin.

The first pastor I remember hearing at the church spoke more of damnation than hope. I was sure Pastor Stanley must be 100 years old and sometimes I wondered if he would die from all the yelling he did. It wasn’t the yelling that took him, but he did finally pass away, ironically quietly and peacefully in his sleep, next to his saint of a wife.

“Your sins will lead to your dastardly end!” Pastor Stanley used to shout from the pulpit, sweat beads on his forehead, even in the winter. “The wages of sin are surely death! Death! Is that what you want for your future?! Repent or your soul will be damned to the fires of hell!”

Pastor Stanley may have died peacefully but he lived angrily.

I knew he was speaking the truth in many ways, but it was the way he spoke that made me feel like God was an angry God, watching and waiting for us to fail and fall on our faces so he could cast down punishments from the sky.

The next pastor who filled the pulpit had a different mindset about who God was.

“God is a forgiving God,” Pastor Frank told us one Sunday. “Is he happy when you sin? No. But is He ready to welcome you back into his loving arms when you ask for His forgiveness? Yes. There is nothing you can do that will ever separate you from the love of your God and His son, your savior Jesus Christ.”

Pastor Frank would make his way to the back of church once we were dismissed and do his best to shake the hand of every person in the congregation as they left, asking how they were and offering to help when he could. His wife was Lillian and she was beautiful. She had long black hair that hung straight down her back, almost to her rear, usually kept it in a tight braid. I marveled at the braid, wondering how she weaved it on her own or if maybe Pastor Frank braided it for her. Lillian’s skin that was the color of coffee with cream.

Some of the people in our community called her a not-nice word behind her back, but I never did. My mama wouldn’t allow that word in our house and even if she had I never would have used it. The word sounded dirty and Lillian wasn’t dirty. She had perfect, straight white teeth and bright blue eyes, set off by her darker complexion. Mama said Lillian was from somewhere called Jamaica, which I had only read about in books at school. Pastor Frank had met her there when he was a missionary. I didn’t care where she came from. I cared that when she spoke to me she cared about what I had to say.

“Blanche, you look so pretty today,” she told me one morning as I shook her hand after the service “Is that a new dress?”

I nodded. “Mama made it for me.”

“Well, she did a fine job,” she said.

I loved her accent, the way it sounded exotic, like the voice of someone who had experienced adventure.

“Thank you,” I told her.

“I can’t believe you’re going to graduate next year. I did get that right, didn’t I?”

I nodded again.

“It’s going to be such an exciting time for you!” she said and hugged me close.

I was glad she was excited, but I didn’t even know what my future was going to be. I felt more apprehensive than excited.

“Of course, you have plenty of time before then,” she said quickly. “This next year of school is going to be the best one yet – proms and graduation and memories to be made.”

I didn’t bother to tell her I probably wouldn’t go to prom. I wasn’t the type of girl boys asked to proms.

Out in the sunlight the food was already being set up on the tables by the ladies of the church.

“What’s that boy doing here? I’ve never seen him in church,” Stanley Mosier said as he looked across the field near the pond while we ate watermelon, sipped fruit punch and watched the children chase each other in the high grass.

I looked up, a piece of watermelon in my hand, and saw Hank standing under the weeping willow by the pond with an older woman’s arm hooked in his.

“He’s here with his mother,” John Hatch said, lighting a cigar. “His father kicked him out a few years ago, but she asked him to come with her today, I guess.”

John’s wife Barbara snatched the cigar from his mouth and shot him a disapproving glance.

She silently mouthed the words “not at church,” as she tossed the cigar to the ground and crushed it under her heel. John watched her with a bewildered expression.

Edith propped her elbow on the picnic table and her chin on her hand, lifting one eyebrow, like she always did when she was about to be mischevious.

“Why’d he get kicked out?” she asked John.

“Wrecked his dad’s car, for one,” John said. “He was drinking. He was about 16 at the time. After that he was always getting into trouble one way or another. Getting kicked out only seemed to make him worse, in some ways. He’s been working at the mill. Lives in an apartment over the Cranmer Funeral Home. Seems to show up at work at least – unless he’s been at a dance the night before. He travels with that band of his. Thinks he’s a regular Hank Williams or something.”

Edith looked at me as she said in a sickly, sweet tone, “Well, anyone is redeemable. Aren’t they, Mr. Hatch? Isn’t that what the pastor just preached on?”

John had his back to her, scowling slightly at Hank and his mother, thinking.

She fluttered her eyes at me and smiled. I glared at her.

John nodded and turned back to face us.

“Yes, you have a point there, Edith. Let’s hope he repents and makes a turn around,” he said.

“If he doesn’t we might have to have the sheriff dig his dead body out of the pond one day,” Stanley Mosier said, shaking his head as he reached for another piece of chicken. “A path of destruction like that only leads one place and it’s nowhere good.”

I grew up a Daddy’s girl in a lot of ways. I loved Mama but I was Daddy’s special girl. We both loved baseball and Abott and Costello and, of course, reading.

When I was real little he read me classic books before bed.

“Porthos: He thinks he can challenge the mighty Porthos with a sword… D’Artagnan: The mighty who? Porthos: Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of me,” he read one night, with me snuggled under the covers, eyes wide as I held on to every word of the Three Muskateers and waited to find out what would happen next. “D’Artagnan: The world’s biggest windbag? Porthos: Little pimple… meet me behind the Luxembourg at 1 o’clock and bring a long wooden box. D’Artagnan: Bring your own…. And – well, well, look at the time. You have school in the morning so we will have to finish this tomorrow night.”

“Daddy!” I cried. “You can’t leave me hanging like this!”

“It’s never a bad thing to have something to look forward to in life,” he’d tell me and lean over, kiss me on the forehead, and then stand with a grin on his face. “Sleep tight, Blanche and don’t let those bed bugs bite.”

“Bed bugs? We have bugs in our beds?”

He laughed, a big hearty laugh that came from somewhere deep and free inside him. Daddy was a big man, tall, his belly protruding over his belt, yet his face slimmer than other men who carried the same weight. He wore bifocals when he read, looking over them, down his nose if he looked at someone while reading.

“It’s just a figure of speech, little one,” he told me.

“What’s a figure of speech mean?” I asked.

“It’s something people say a lot – now stop stalling with all these questions and go to bed.”

Mama was a reader too but she read romances and mysteries, books Daddy teasingly called “trash literature.” Daddy read more “classic literature”, as he referred to his collection of Dumas, Dickens, Elliot and Tolstoy.

As a teen I started to miss those special times with Daddy.

When I started developing – as in breasts and all that goes along with physically growing up- I think Daddy just didn’t know how to talk to me anymore. I didn’t grow up top the way Edith did, but it was enough for Daddy to start looking at me differently. It was like he thought I was a different person inside because I looked different on the outside. I wasn’t different, though. I was still Blanche. I simply didn’t know how to tell him or show him I was.

Sometimes he’d still read to me while we sat together in the family room, after my homework was done, a passage here or there from Hemingway or Steinbeck, even though we both agreed Steinbeck wasn’t our favorite.

When Daddy started going to church more he read to me from A.W. Tozer. The living room was dimly lit by a lamp next to his chair as he read , a fire crackling in the fireplace. His pipe was lit and smoke curled up from it where it sat in the dish on the table by the lamp.

“The yearning to know what cannot be known, to comprehend the incomprehensible, to touch and taste the unapproachable, arises from the image of God in the nature of man. Deep calleth unto deep, and though polluted and landlocked by the mighty disaster theologians call the Fall, the soul senses its origin and longs to return to its source.”

Sometimes the passages Daddy read to me made me think too much and no matter how much I thought about it, I couldn’t make sense of it. There were a deep thoughts in what he read but I was just too distracted by adventure and romances to focus on them.

Daddy was an accountant, working in a dingy office in the town 20-minutes from our house. Cramner & Robins Associates Inc. opened before I was born when he and Franklin Cranmer, a distant cousin of his, started the business. They opened the office soon after Daddy returned from a college two hours from home, a degree in one hand and Mama’s hand in the other.

For Daddy working with numbers came easy. Numbers were how he made a living but words were what made him feel alive. Some days he worked long hours and we didn’t see him until right before we went to sleep, but other days he came home around 5 and we all sat together for dinner. Mama said it was important for us to sit at the table and tell each other about our days.

“How was school today?” Daddy would ask Edith and I, because parents only seem able to ask their children about the child’s least favorite experience in life.

Edith usually shared about a person she had met, a new boy at school or a sweater she wanted to buy. I almost always shared about a book I was reading, a new author I’d discovered, or what I’d learned in history class.

“You’re too worried about those boys,” Daddy would say to Edith, looking concerned, the concern growing as the years went by.

“Oh, Alan, boys are something all girls talk about at this age,” Mama would say, smiling across the table at Daddy. “I was no different when I was Edith’s age. I know I chatte: about you to my parents after we met that day in class.”

Daddy blushed when Mama talked about how they met and Edith and I would smile across the table at his obvious discomfort.

“Well, I just – it’s just – I mean we need to meet some of these boys you are always talking about,” Dad stammered a little, looking at Mama as if to say “Don’t try to throw me off my game by flirting, Janie.”

After dinner Mama would go sit on the front porch and soon Daddy would follow. They sat together on the wooden swing, whispering and giggling like teenagers. Edith and I, inside doing our homework, looked at each other and giggled when we were younger, but when we were older we rolled our eyes and made gagging noises.

Mama was always sure to have a hot meal ready for Daddy when he walked through the door, even if he came home late.

“He’s supporting this family; the least I can do is provide him a hot meal at the end of the day,” she told me more than once.

On the late nights, she and Daddy ate alone at the table. Daddy shared what had delayed him at office – usually a difficult customer or a new client who would bring more business.

Mama wore her dark brown hair in a bun on her head, no matter if she was home or out. I almost never saw her with her hair down. She went into her room at night with it up and woke up before us all, twisting it and pinning it in place again before the rest of us saw her. The only time Edith and I saw it flowing across her shoulders and back was if we were sick or had a nightmare in the night. She’d rush in, her hair flowing behind her, scoop us into her arms and take care of our needs, never complaining that she was tired or frustrated.

Her voice was soft and smooth as she sang in the darkness.

“I come to the garden alone

While the dew is still on the roses

And the voice I hear, falling on my ear

The Son of God discloses

And He walks with me

And He talks with me

And He tells me I am His own

And the joy we share as we tarry there

None other has ever known”

Mama always wore dresses, even when she was digging in her flower beds or Daddy’s garden. Her day started at 5 a.m. every day. She made Daddy’s lunch, brewed him coffee to take with him to work in a Thermos and then she made breakfast, always fresh – eggs from the chickens out back (the only farm animals we had even though we lived in between a row of farms), slab bacon or breakfast sausage from a local farmer and toast made with bread Mama cooked herself while we were away at school or work.

She washed clothes in a basin, rinsed them in a deep sink in the laundry room, dried them on a line out back, or if it was raining they were dried on wooden drying racks around the house. She ironed everything – shirts and dresses and sheets and even towels. She made a full dinner every day, even Sundays after church. She washed the dishes and put them away every night before bed. She scrubbed the floors and washed our bedding once a week.

She was more than I could ever be and I knew it. Maybe that’s why it worried me when she had suggested that I’d be just like her one day. I knew I could never be as good at her at keeping a household and a family together, but I also knew I could never be content only doing what she did.

Fiction in Progress: A Story to Tell Part III

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 6 Comments

This is part III of a fiction story I’m working on called “A Story to Tell”.  You can find Part I HERE and part II HERE

Don’t want to click from chapter to chapter? Find the book in full on Kindle HERE. 

 

Mama went to quilting club in the church basement on Tuesday nights. She usually took me and if Edith wasn’t in class she went too.

I didn’t like to sow. I wasn’t any good at it and often pricked my finger on the needles.

“So, Blanche. What do you think you’ll do after graduation?” Millie Baker asked me as she pulled the thread through her quilt piece.

“I really don’t know,” I answered honestly.

I hadn’t thought of what I’d do after graduation. It was a year away and I was just trying to survive my junior year. The only thing I liked to do was read and write but I couldn’t make a living reading and I’d never shown anyone anything I’d written before.

“I think she’d do well as a secretary,” Alice Bouse said with a smile. “She enjoys writing and I could see her typing away on a typewriter pretty easily.”

Fran Tressel nodded approvingly.

“I could see her doing that as well,” she said. “She’d be personable and easy to talk to.”

Other women around the circle nodded and murmured in agreement, talking about me as if I wasn’t there or have my own mind to make up.

“It’s not a bad profession,” Jan Spencer said with a grin.

Jan was the secretary for the school district superintendent and the rumor was she was paid generously for her work. I chose to ignore other rumors about Jan’s close friendship with the assistant superintendent, one that his wife didn’t appreciate.

“And just remember, hon’ there is no rush on gettin’ married,” Betty Bundle said, chewing gum and randomly licking her finger so she could pull apart fabric to stretch out and cut for her project.

Betty’s dirty blond, bleached hair was always piled on top of her head in a messy bun and her earrings were so big they looked like golf balls hanging from her ear lobes. She was a waitress at the local diner and she didn’t have every Tuesday off but if she did she was at sewing club, making me feel like I wasn’t alone with my lack of sewing talent.

“She doesn’t need to worry about that. She isn’t even dating,” Mama said.

My face felt hot. It was true, but there was no need for her share it with all the women in the sewing circle.

“No? A cute little thing like you? I can’t imagine why you don’t have the boys falling all over you,” Betty said holding a stretch of fabric up in front of her and scrunching her face in disgust at the mistake she’d made.

The women were busily sewing, some at machines, some by hand. Millie was shaking her head at the mistake she’d made in her quilt block.

“It’s just not like it was when we were young,” she said. “Young girls today have some time before they have to find a husband and start having kids. Don’t be like that Jenkins girl, Blanche.”

There were a few clicks of the tongues and “mmhmms” from the gathered women.

“I don’t even think she’d turned 16 when she had that baby,” Alice Simms said. “Her whole life had to be put on hold. Just a shame. And now she’s just popping them out like candy.”

“What’s she up to now? Four? Good grief. She’s just ruining her figure,” Doris Landry said with a snort.

“Well, at least she loves them,” I said.

I looked around the room worried about the reaction I would receive from such a comment during a full on complaining session. I didn’t usually speak out but it came out before I’d even fully thought it through. A few of the women glanced at me in surprise. The rest simply nodded as they knitted and sowed, showing they agreed with what I’d said.

“I mean, she cares for them. And they seem to love her too,” I said softly, looking back at my disaster of a project. “I’m sure it’s not easy but – well, maybe it’s worth it at the end of the day.”

Betty winked at me.

“That’s a good point, Blanche. It really is,” she said. “She seems pretty happy – even with starting so early and with that Billy Tanner not giving her much of a life with his job as a farm hand.”

A few of the other women nodded in agreement while some scowled disapprovingly at the mention of Billy. They seemed pleased to push the blame on Billy for the situation now instead of Annie.

“I was 15 when I had my first baby,” 80-year old Jessie Reynolds said quietly from the rocking chair at the end of the row of women. “but that was a long time ago. I was a baby with a baby. That’s the way it was done back then. It wasn’t too shocking for a girl to get married at 14. Our parents couldn’t always afford to take care of us and if a good man could, then we were married off.”

“I would not have enjoyed living back then,” Emily Langer said with a shake of her head. “I can’t imagine being married off to some dirty old man.”

“My man wasn’t dirty at all,” Jessie said with a small laugh. “He was the sweetest man I’d ever met. But I’m sure there were many marriages that weren’t as pleasant as ours.”

Jessie looked at me.

“Blanche, honey, you’re smart. You know that and we all know it. You don’t have to rush into family right away,” she leaned forward, put her hand on mine and smiled. “You take your time. Find a career that will make you happy and see what the world is all about before you rush into getting married and having babies, okay?”

I nodded. I didn’t want any kids right now or maybe even ever. I’d never even babysat one and didn’t like the smell of them. Not only that but their noses were always runny and sometimes they puked for no reason at all.

“Oh, Blanche is probably going to stay home with me for awhile after graduation anyhow,” Mama said. “She can help me at home until she decides on a man to marry. I think she’ll be a housewife, just like me.”

Mama smiled at me and I didn’t know whether to smile back or not. I tried to smile and then looked back at the quilt pieces on my lap and wondered if I really wanted to be just like Mama – an obedient wife who spent most of her days cooking and cleaning and her nights volunteering for the church rummage sale or at the sewing and quilting club.

I didn’t want to rush into a marriage, but I also didn’t want to be stuck in this town my whole life. A career that would take me to adventure sounded good to me.

I felt a bit of annoyance as well at the idea that Mama had already planned my life out for me and the rest of the women seemed to want to do the same. It was my life anyhow. What say did they have in it? I pushed the needle in and out of the fabric aggressively as I thought and then mumbled a curse word under my breath when the needle dug into my fingertip again.

“What’s that, Blanche?” Jessie asked.

“I was just telling my thread and needled to cooperate,” I said forcing a smile.

I sucked the blood off my finger and vowed to find a way to get out of sewing group the next week.

*******

It was a warm, sunny Saturday afternoon in May when I saw Hank again. I hadn’t seen him in four months. Mama wanted me to pick up milk and eggs at the supermarket for her while she looked for material for a new summer dress at Missy’s Sew and Fabric across the street.

The wide aisles of the small, family-owned supermarket were almost empty and I shivered in the refrigerator section. When I pulled the milk off the shelf and turned around, I gasped at the sight of him standing in the aisle, hat tipped back, a toothpick in one corner his mouth and a few strands of light brown hair laying across his forehead. He grinned and took the toothpick out of his mouth. His green eyes were bright with amusement.

“Hey there, Blanche,” he laughed as he spoke. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

The one corner of his mouth tilted a little higher than the other when he smiled

I hated the way the sight of him made my heart pound in my chest, how the sight of that crooked smile made my knees feel weak. I hated that I noticed again how beautiful his eyes were. I knew my face had flushed pink under his gaze.

I stepped around him without responding, too embarrassed to speak, knowing Daddy wouldn’t want me to, but he followed me to the eggs.

“Making a cake?” he asked.

“No,” I kept my eyes on the eggs, on the floor, anywhere but on him.

“I’ve been thinking about you,” he said.

I’d been thinking about him too but I didn’t want him to know that.

“When can I see you again?” he asked.

I didn’t answer but still he followed me.

“Can I swing by tonight?”

He kept talking as I walked, trailing behind me. “I’ll throw a rock at your window. If you want to see me, come out so we can talk.”

I hurried to the cashier with my heart pounding and a rush of butterflies in my stomach. I tried to tell myself I wasn’t excited that he wanted to see me. I tried to tell myself I didn’t care.

When the rock hit my window that night, I laid there for a long time with the moonlight pouring in on my bed. I did want to see him, but I remembered what daddy had said. What if it all was true? If it was true then why was Hank picking me to talk to? I wasn’t special like all those other girls.

I wasn’t even pretty. My brown hair frizzed in the humidity unless I kept it tied back in a pony tail. My skin was almost always pale, except the dark circles that seemed to always show up under my eyes in the spring. I was scrawny and my hips seemed to just fall in a straight line, unlike Edith’s that curved seductively and made every dress look attractive on her. If all that wasn’t bad enough, I wore thick black glasses when reading or at school.

I rolled to my side, my arms under my head, squeezing my eyes closed tight, thinking.

What if daddy saw me sneaking out into the darkness? I knew he’d be furious. And what if I fell for Hank and then found out it had all been a joke he’d set up with his friends so he could make fun of me? I wrestled with my thoughts in the darkness, opening my eyes, staring at the blue glow of the moonlight casting a patch of light on the rug on the floor by the window.

I heard the clink of another rock against the window and looked at Edith. She was still asleep.

I tiptoed to the window, looking out at him looking up at me, waiting. He grinned and waved from the side yard, standing next to mama’s rose bush. I took a deep breath and decided to quickly find out what he wanted, then run right back to bed.

I raised myself on my tip toes, moving slowly across the floor, past Mama and Daddy’s closed bedroom door, pressing my back against the stairwell wall to avoid steps I knew would creak under me.

Hank took my hand as I stepped off the porch, leading me across the yard and down through the field to the maple tree before he spoke.

“Hey, girl, I knew you’d come out,” he said with a small smirk, still holding my hand as he turned around.

“I don’t know why you’d even want to talk to me,” I said softly.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m not anyone special.”

“You’re special to me,” he said. “I like you. You’re sweet, smart, and I know if we start talking you’ll open right up to me – like a rose in bloom.”

My hand felt small and sweaty in his.

“I want to know more about you,” he said, squeezing my hand. “Like what do you want to do when you get out of this town? What do you do for fun? You ever been to a movie? I know you don’t dance but do you ever want to?”

He was talking softly, standing close to me. I heard genuine interest in his questions. I shifted nervously and cleared my throat.

“I ..uh…I like to read,” I said, feeling stupid, kicking at the dirt with my shoe, head down. “I like movies – like anything with Ingrid Bergman or Cary Grant. Sometimes Daddy takes us to the theater. I don’t know about dancing. I’m not good at it.”

“How do you know you’re not good at it if you’ve never tried?”

I shrugged.

I decided I should try to be polite and ask him a few questions as well.

“Where’d you learn to play guitar like that?”

“From my uncle,” he said, letting go of my hand and searching the front pocket of his jacket for a cigarette. “He was in a band and showed me how to play when I was just a tot.”

He leaned against the tree, lighting the cigarette. The spark of the flame lit his face briefly and I felt my heart pounding faster as I caught a glimpse of his eyes, his lashes dark and long.

“ I feel free when I play, you know? I don’t have to make anyone happy,” he said. “I just have to play that music and let it take me out of my head and out of that room and out of this crappy little town.”

He folded his arms across his chest, watching me.

“What about you, Chatterbox?” He asked. “You don’t want to spend your whole life here, do you?”

I knew I didn’t want to always live in this village, in the midst of farms and not much else, but I didn’t feel like I could say it. I wanted to go to all those places I read about in my books at night, huddled under the covers with a flashlight. I’d never told anyone about my dreams and I wasn’t sure I wanted to.

“Come on, now, be honest with me,” he said. “There is more out there for you isn’t there? I’ve heard about you from my little brother and his friends. They say you like to read. What do you read about?”

I looked up at him and wondered why he wanted to know anything about me.

“I read about places far away,” I heard myself blurt out the words and realized no one except Emmy, and maybe Mama, had ever acted interested in what I thought. “I read about adventures far away. I love anything with a good story and maybe a –“

My gaze fell to the grass, glistening silver in the moonlight.

“A good romance,” I said, embarrassed I had admitted my affection for romantic stories in front of someone who probably knew more about romance than I ever would.

Hank laughed softly and blew a long trail of smoke into the darkness.

“I like a good romance,” he said, smirking and looking me up and down .

I felt my face grow hot under his gaze. I shifted my weight nervously from one foot to the other and twirled a strand of hair around my finger.

“Why you looking so shy, Chatterbox? Hasn’t any boy ever acted interested in you?”

I shook my head.

“No. Never.”

“Well, they must be blind. Those boys are missing out and they don’t even know it.”

“I’m a nerd.” I shrugged. “I don’t dance and I don’t flirt and I don’t dress all up like Edith and those other girls.”

He laughed then remembered he was supposed to be quiet and glanced quickly at the house. After a few seconds of watching the dark house to make sure no lights came on, he grinned at me.

“All those other girls are just putting on an act,” he whispered. “ Don’t you let them intimidate you. Besides that might be what little boys look for in a girl but it’s not what men look for.”

He tossed the cigarette down and stepped closer to me.

“You’re a pretty little thing, Blanche,” he said softly. “Don’t let anyone tell you you’re not. Shoot. I couldn’t take my eyes off you at the dance that night.”

He pushed my hair back from my face and I looked up at him.

“I still can’t,” he said softly.

My muscles tensed as he cupped my cheek in his hand. I wanted to run away and hide but I wanted to stay right where I was at the same time.

I closed my eyes and felt the warmth of his skin against my cheek. I kept my eyes closed as I felt his mouth graze my forehead and then my cheek and then my lips. He pulled back slightly then leaned close again and covered my mouth with his, gently, as he slid his arm around me and pulled me against him. The kiss lingered for a few moments before I felt panic rush through me.

I pulled away quickly and shivered.

“I have to go inside now. Before my parents – “

He was watching me with a smile and my heart was pounding.

“Can I see you again?” he asked.

“Yes. I mean no. I mean – I don’t know.”

The grass was moist with dew as I ran back toward the house and gingerly opened the front door so I wouldn’t wake anyone. Upstairs I slid my shoes off and crawled into bed, still in my dress. I pulled the covers around me and tried to stop shivering. When I closed my eyes I could still feel his arms around me and his lips against mine.