Before I Say Goodbye Page 7

  So loosening up Becca would be my first goal. And Dante? Well, I wasn’t sure what was going on with him, but couldn’t he see that Becca was suffocating under all she had to do? Not exactly because of him and the children but because she didn’t put herself on any of her to-do lists. And Travis. I’d seen the way the boy hungered for his father’s attention. Very much the way Dante had hungered for his father’s. Maybe that’s why I recognized it when neither Becca or Dante seemed to notice. Travis was heading for trouble. I knew that in the same way I knew Kyle was heading down a similar road. I couldn’t save her alone. I didn’t even know how to save her. She was slipping toward the same kind of hole I’d fallen into after leaving Dante, and I hadn’t been able to save myself. But Travis, that was different. I might be able to help there. Not for him or for Dante but for my children.

  I’m nothing if not selfish.

  I sighed. When did things become so complicated? When I was young, all I had to worry about was staying out of my dad’s way, making it through school, and planning what Dante and I would do for the weekend. I’d thought that was huge then, but what I now faced every day was off any scale I’d ever known.

  A shift in Kyle’s breathing told me she was awake before she spoke. Had she heard me crying?

  “Mom?”

  “Yes, baby?”

  “I’m not going to fit in, you know. I don’t belong here.”

  “You and Allia seemed to get along okay.”

  “Are you kidding? Did you see the way she dresses? I’m a thrift store reject compared to her. She’s so beautiful. I could never look like that.”

  “You’re beautiful, too, Kyle. In a different way. That’s all.”

  “She’s not gonna want to hang out with me. Girls like her never do.”

  “She’s not like other girls.”

  Kyle rose up on her elbow. “Why?”

  “She’s Dante’s daughter. He was my friend.”

  “So because of that he’ll make her be my friend?” Kyle snorted. “That’s not going to happen.”

  I couldn’t tell her the truth, so I said, “Can’t you just wait and see?”

  “There’s something you’re not telling me. I want to know what we’re doing here. You hate data entry. You liked that restaurant you worked in.”

  I wasn’t ready to have this conversation. “I needed a change. We all did.” I put my arm around her and stroked her hair until she stopped resisting and snuggled closer.

  “Take it a day at a time for now, okay? I promise it will all make sense later.”

  She sniffed. “Okay. I guess. But I’m going to need some new clothes if you’re gonna keep dragging me to that awful church.”

  “I know.”

  “The only thing good about it is that Travis will be there.”

  “In this culture, you can’t date until you’re sixteen. So I’d look for someone closer to your own age.”

  “Sixteen! That’s forever away. Are they like hillbillies or something? Or those religious fanatics like on TV?”

  I smiled. My daughter was creative, I’d give her that. “Not exactly.”

  “Well, I don’t care. I like him.”

  I didn’t reply. No use making things worse. The more I disagreed, the tighter she’d hold to her crush.

  I stroked her hair long after she drifted off to silence.

  * * *

  I took my pills from my purse and gulped them down at the sink. I was having to take the ones for my headaches more often now. I hated how they made me dependent, how they changed my senses. Stupid to think that once I’d taken similar pills for recreation. Another pill from a different bottle followed the first, this one smaller but every bit as necessary.

  Kyle squealed from across the kitchen as she looked in the box of clothes Becca had left. “These are cute. I mean, some are a little boring, but I could put these tops with some cooler jeans or shorts, and these jeans would look good with my white-and-red-striped tank, don’t you think?”

  “I think you’ll look great in all of it.”

  Kyle held up a dress and frowned.

  “Maybe not that.” The dress had a nice blue plaid skirt, but the ruffle around the neck of the attached white blouse looked decidedly juvenile. “Unless we cut off the skirt and put in elastic.”

  “Could you? I like the plaid.”

  I laughed. “I think I had one just like it when I was your age. It shouldn’t be too hard to make it work. I’ll need to buy elastic, though, and I’m not sure we have thread that color.”

  Kyle came around the counter and hugged me. “You’re the best.”

  If I had money, I’d never attempt any sewing, not even a simple hem by hand. I was lucky I even knew how to use a needle.

  Wait. I remembered learning to sew. It had been in the Mia Maid class where we’d made pajamas and frilly aprons. I’d worn out the pajamas, but I still had the apron somewhere. I’d saved it in a box, always planning to give it to Kyle one day along with some other mementos. I shouldn’t wait too much longer.

  “Mom, someone’s at the door.” Kyle’s voice penetrated my thoughts. “I bet it’s those women from church that Allia’s mom said were coming.”

  I put on a cheerful face. “Good. Because you haven’t been much help with unpacking.” In fact, we hadn’t made any headway, except for the small TV James had plugged in all by himself. That morning I’d come in from the tree house, eaten a bit with the kids, run to city hall to see about the water, stopped by the grocery store, and then fallen on my bed and slept for a few more hours. Driving had wiped me out more than I expected, and I had to work in two days.

  I pointed to the box of hand-me-downs. “Why don’t you take those downstairs, and I’ll get the door?” She hadn’t questioned me too closely about where the clothes had come from, and I decided not to tell her. If Allia showed up with her mother today, I hoped she’d keep quiet.

  When I opened the door, Becca, Allia, and Lauren stood on the porch, and behind them stood three other women from the ward. I recognized Charlotte Gillman with her hooked nose and sagging cheeks and Debra Lundgren with the bright patches of blush, both of whom had introduced themselves the day before. The other woman I’d also seen yesterday but I hadn’t caught her name and she didn’t seem familiar. All the women were carrying cleaning supplies and containers filled with food. I didn’t believe in God anymore, but at the sight of the food, I wanted to.

  As I said, I’m nothing if not selfish.

  “Hi,” Becca said. “We’re all here, ready to go.”

  Was it my imagination, or was she a bit cooler toward me today? “Come on in. Thanks for coming.” Very gracious of me since I didn’t want them here. Well, except for the food.

  “You probably know everyone,” Charlotte said, “but let me make the introductions just in case. It’s been a long twenty-odd years. I’m Charlotte Gillman, one of your old Sunday School teachers, as I told you yesterday. This is Debra Lundgren, who was the Young Women’s president during your time but who is now the first counselor in the Relief Society.” Debra still had poofy, shoulder-length brown hair, obviously dyed. Except for a few lines on her face, she didn’t look much different from the way she’d looked twenty years ago. Her makeup was perfectly applied but dated. Practically no one outside the modeling circuit wore blush these days. I guessed both women to be in their early sixties.

  “And I’m Teri Bunk,” said the woman I hadn’t recognized. She had short gray hair tightly curled under, a deeply lined face, pale sunken cheeks, and huge green eyes covered by tiny round glasses. Late sixties or early seventies. “I taught you and Dante in Primary. Such a handful you were. Always with the questions.”

  “Oh, yes, I remember you now.” She’d been thin even then, but her face had been much softer and less lined. The green eyes were the same, w
ith the exact intenseness as when she’d borne her testimony about some principle or another. “Can I carry that for you?” I gestured toward the casserole dish she carried with hot pads.

  “No, no. That’s fine. I remember where the kitchen is. I used to be your mother’s visiting teacher, you know.”

  I hadn’t known that, but she must have come when I was in school in order to avoid running into my dad. Mother would have never allowed him to know that anyone from the Church had been in our house. She might even have kept it from me, in case I let it slip, just as I’d never told her about going to Primary.

  Or maybe she knew all along. Sister Bunk would have likely mentioned me. I frowned. That didn’t go with my memories of my mother. We never talked about the Church. I didn’t know why.

  I’d never know.

  No looking back, I reminded myself.

  “Well,” Charlotte said after everyone set the food dishes on the counter, in the oven, or in the fridge. “Where do you want us to start?”

  I looked around a bit helplessly. Everything needed attention.

  “The walls,” Becca said for me. “And probably the ceilings, especially the corners. I brought my vacuum with a long extension, so Allia and I can do those and the tops of the walls. We also brought a ladder, if we need it.”

  “Good thing you’re here, dear,” Teri said to Allia. “I may be a spry old lady, but I don’t think I’m up to vacuuming ceilings.”

  “I’ve never even heard of anyone cleaning a ceiling,” I said.

  Charlotte took a bucket to the sink and began filling it. “I do it with a damp mop. Once a year or so. Not all of it. Mostly to get the cobwebs.”

  “Mom,” Lauren said to Becca, “James wants to go outside to the tree house. Can I go, too?”

  I marveled that she asked. I mean, it was in the backyard. Why did she need permission? I made James ask only if he was going farther than our neighborhood.

  “Sure, sweetheart. Be careful.”

  “Have fun,” I added. Hey, you’re only young once.

  “Here,” Becca said, shoving something into my hand. “A light for your fridge.”

  “Thanks.” I had to work to swallow the sudden lump in my throat.

  They fell to work, my own little cleaning crew. We had to open the windows because of the dust and redo everything several times. Finally, the dust quit flying, and we began to unpack the boxes in the living room. Those went fast simply because I didn’t have much. I’d moved too many times to collect many household items, and I didn’t have money to buy again for each new apartment. We kept what we really needed and did without the rest. In fact, Kyle had more boxes for her room than James and I had for our rooms combined, but she wouldn’t let anyone open them. I wasn’t sure what was inside.

  When the women were finished with all but a half dozen boxes of things I didn’t know where to put yet, three hours had gone by and it looked as though I’d lived in the house for months. Well, except that it was clean.

  Was I grateful? Yes. But I didn’t like feeling that gratitude. I didn’t want to be indebted to anyone, even though I knew they would have done it for any stranger.

  Would I have?

  Once, maybe. But after a lifetime of being used and abused, I’d grown a bit tough inside. I wasn’t prepared for the tenderness I felt for these women. I didn’t want to feel it.

  “Food time!” boomed Charlotte. Though she’d lost a lot of weight since my Sunday School days, she still talked in the theatrical voice that had matched her former bosomy figure. I wondered what had happened to her. Fad diet, an illness, an operation?

  Becca brought out paper plates, cups, and utensils from somewhere, we said a prayer, and the women began dishing up. Becca took plates outside for James and Lauren. I hadn’t been imagining her coolness, though I probably wouldn’t have noticed a difference if it had not been for our warm, laughing exchange on the counter yesterday. We’d been almost friends. Today she was reserved and wary.

  Dante told her about our being engaged, I thought. I wasn’t proud of deserting him, but he’d done it first. What did it all matter to Becca? Twenty years had gone by, and while I’d chosen Utah in part because he was here, I didn’t entertain any thought of reviving our childhood romance. Besides, even if I had, I couldn’t offer him even the tiniest part of what Becca could give him. For that alone I was glad I’d left. Glad he’d left.

  At least that’s what I told myself. There is always that sliver of doubt. Of wondering. But it didn’t control me. I’d done what I’d wanted for most of my adult life, and if I’d stayed in Utah, I would certainly have far more to wonder about than what would have happened if I’d stayed.

  “Nothing like a bit of work to give a woman an appetite,” Debra said, her face flushed beneath the rouge.

  “Not me,” mourned Teri. “I never feel hungry much anymore. I suppose that’s my body’s way of shutting down. Getting ready to pass on.”

  Charlotte clicked her tongue. “Oh, shush, now. You’re not dying. Not any time soon. Besides, so what if you do? Your husband and parents will be excited to see you. And your sister.”

  “Well, it’s just, I haven’t done everything I wanted,” Teri said.

  Debra blinked. “Like what?”

  “Like skydiving. I never got to do that.”

  I laughed. This was too funny. Never in a million years did I think I’d be in my parents’ kitchen talking with three older ladies about skydiving and dying in the same breath. “You ought to do it,” I urged. “I would if I were you.”

  “Ridiculous!” Charlotte said. “She’ll break all her bones.”

  “Maybe, but she’ll know what it’s like to go skydiving. It’s not as if she can do it after she’s dead.”

  “Well, we don’t exactly know that,” said Debra. “Maybe heaven has something better than skydiving.”

  “Star diving?” suggested Teri, lifting her wrinkled hands and arcing them as though diving into water. Charlotte laughed, and the others joined her.

  Whatever they wanted to believe was fine with me, but I still thought Teri should do it now and not wait for a future that might not exist. That probably didn’t exist. I didn’t think there were any laws against seventy-year-old women going skydiving.

  Becca came back in then and called down the stairs to where Kyle and Allia had disappeared. “Girls, we’re eating!”

  Leave it to her to think of telling them. I’d always been of the opinion that children would eat when they’re hungry and didn’t need prodding. If they ate lying down, in the car, or in a bathtub at odd hours, that was okay. How did Becca stand on the issue? Did she force kids to the table at each mealtime? Did she hover over them to make sure they ate their peas?

  If she did, maybe that wasn’t a bad thing.

  Kyle and Allia came up the stairs. “Can we go shopping now?” Allia asked Becca.

  “Sure. After we eat.”

  Kyle cast me a pleading look, but I wasn’t about to invite myself along. I didn’t have the kind of money they did. Better to visit the second-hand stores ourselves. I wondered if Allia had seen what was in all of Kyle’s boxes.

  The other women were already finishing. “You keep the rest of this casserole,” Teri said. “I won’t be able to eat it all myself. Bring the pan to Relief Society when you’re finished.”

  “Thanks.” My kids weren’t picky, and the chicken and broccoli casserole was rather good.

  “We’ll leave everything.” Charlotte put an arm around me. “That way you won’t have to worry about cooking for a few days. We’re so glad you’re back, Rikki.”

  “That’s right. Call us if you need us,” Debra added. “I brought you a ward list and highlighted our names. I didn’t see a phone here, though.”

  “I have a cell phone.” It was the one luxury I allowed
myself.

  “What’s the number?”

  “It’s probably long distance,” Teri put in as all the women jotted down the number. “You should ask for a local number, so those of us who don’t have cell phones can get a hold of you.”

  “Good idea.” I wouldn’t be around long enough to need the change, but I couldn’t tell her that now. Besides, just because I’d gone to church yesterday didn’t mean I wanted to get all cozy with these ladies.

  “I’ll tell Lauren we’re going,” Allia said, taking her plate of casserole and vegetables with her to the kitchen door.

  “She could stay, if you wanted,” I offered. “They play so well together.”

  Becca shook her head. “I wouldn’t dream of intruding. You have enough to deal with getting settled. Besides,” she added as I opened my mouth to protest, “I need to get her a few more things for school.”

  Decision rendered, Allia moved out the door but without letting the old screen bang shut behind her as I always had. Kyle stared after her for a moment and then clomped down the stairs, taking nothing but a roll and a handful of chips with her. Becca didn’t say anything about her leaving without real food, and I almost wished she had.

  I walked the ladies to the door. I could hear Becca in the kitchen putting things away. As I returned to the kitchen, she hung the dish towel on the oven handle, picked up her vacuum, and started to move past me.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  She shrugged. “They really enjoyed themselves. Thank you for letting them come.”

  Becca was polite, I’d give her that.

  “Look,” I said. “Is something wrong?”

  Becca bit her lip. Her face seemed pale against the shiny length of dark hair that seemed almost black in the sparse light coming through the small windows. “I’m just thinking that you don’t seem the type to be happy in this town among these people.” She dropped her eyes before continuing. “I know about you and Dante, and I’m wondering if why you’re here has something to do with my husband.”

  There. It was out. I’d hoped not to challenge her this way.

  “Don’t worry one more minute about that, Becca. I promise I don’t want anything from Dante, except as a friend,” I said. “And a bishop.” That ought to be okay, given her faith.