Detours (23 page)

Mary looked up at Ellis as though the words were gibberish. “What?”

“Let’s get you home.” She helped Mary to her feet. “Gloria and Naomi are on their way, so we don’t want to keep them waiting.”

“Nat?”

“She doesn’t know what’s happened, but she’s asking lots of questions about why everyone’s trying not to cry.”

“What am I going to tell her?”

“The truth, love. The sad, awful, unchangeable truth.”

∗ ∗ ∗ ∗

“I don’t believe you!” Natalie screamed. “I don’t believe you! You’re mean and horrible, and I hate you!” She pounded her fists on her mother’s chest. “My daddy is not dead. You’re just saying that so we don’t have to live here in Clarkesville. You never wanted to come here, and now you’re telling lies so that you can take me away from him.”

It took all of Saturday afternoon and most of Saturday evening to calm Natalie to the point that she stopped shouting epithets at Mary. Wisely, Gloria asked her pediatrician for a mild sedative they could give the child. Even after she fell into her intermittent, drug-assisted slumber, Natalie alternately clung to her mother’s neck and rallied enough to rant and rail and tell her she hated her.

Bad as things were on Saturday, Sunday was worse. Natalie’s anger and disbelief were replaced with sullen unresponsiveness. She showed an occasional flicker of interest in Sam and Swiffer, but humans were all beyond worthless, and she’d have none of their succor, pandering, or feeble attempts at compassion.

Mark dropped by late Sunday evening to tell Mary that the Kimbroughs had arranged for Nathan’s funeral to be held Tuesday morning at Hill’s Crossing Baptist Church.

“We still think of you and Nat as family,” Mark said to Mary, tears brimming in his eyes. “We hope you’ll sit with us up front for the service.”

Ellis watched from the adjoining room as the former in-laws embraced and cried shared tears.

Mary drew back from Mark and managed to choke out a question. “How’s your mama holding up?”

“About like you’d expect. Daddy’s been a rock for us all.” Mark hugged Mary again. “You let me know if you need me for anything, hear?”

“I will. Thanks. And give my love to your mama and daddy.” Mary rested her hand on Mark’s back as she accompanied him to the door. “I’ll see you at the church on Tuesday.”

Ellis caught a glimpse of the sun, still sitting above the horizon as Mark stepped outside. Bad things should only happen on ugly, dreary days, Ellis decided. How could any of them ever again feel good on a sunny summer day?

∗ ∗ ∗ ∗

“Thank God you’re here, Ellis. I couldn’t have gotten through this weekend without you.” Mary, fully-clothed, lay in Ellis’s arms, trembling. “I still can’t believe he’s dead.”

“I know what you mean. I only met Nathan a couple of times, but I liked him. He was a great guy.” She rubbed Mary’s back reassuringly. “A great dad.”

Mary started to cry again. “My poor baby. She’s going to have to grow up without her father.” Sobs shook her body. “It was hard enough trying to raise her with Nathan’s help. Now what am I going to do?”

“Let’s not think about that right now. We need to focus on getting through the next few days. We can’t afford to look further than tomorrow or the next day.” Ellis wrapped her arms more tightly around Mary’s shivering form. Hard to believe anyone could feel chilled on a night when the thermometer still read eighty-eight degrees at nine o’clock.

Mary struggled to hold back another flood of tears. “I mean it, Ellis. There’s no way I could have survived yesterday and today if you hadn’t been right here with me. Thanks for agreeing to stay through Tuesday. Nat and I really need you.”

“I’m happy to do what I can, but I’m worried my being here will ultimately make things worse for you—because of your family, I mean.”

“Screw ’em,” Mary said. “The only reason I moved up here was so that Nathan and I would have an easier time sharing custody of Nat. Now that he’s gone…” Her voice faded. “Gone, Ellis. Nathan is gone. Gone forever.” There was no stopping the tears. “Promise me you’ll stay with me, Ellis. Promise.”

Ellis stroked Mary’s tangled hair. “I’m here, babe. I’ll always be here.”

∗ ∗ ∗ ∗

Ellis knocked off at noon on the last Saturday in August and headed north. As she pulled into Mary’s yard in the heat of the day, she spied Mary in the garden beside the house. Ellis and Sam ambled across the lawn. Mary was trimming spent blooms off her marigolds. “Want some help?” Ellis asked.

“Thanks, but no. I need to do something I feel competent at. Heaven knows I’m a failure as a mother these days.”

Ellis heard the frustration in Mary’s voice. “When I was here last weekend, Natalie seemed like her old self.”

“That’s exactly the problem. One minute she’s my happy-go-lucky kid, driving me batty with her endless interruptions, and the next, she’s so withdrawn and unreachable I worry that she’s never going to talk to me or anyone else again.”

“It’s been a tough summer for both of you. Maybe she needs a little more time.”

“Tough summer is an understatement. Most of my relatives and many of my friends gnaw on me every day about how I need to start bringing Nat to church so that she can get over her father’s death.” The hitch in Mary’s voice prompted Ellis to step into the garden and kneel beside her. “Don’t you dare say anything sweet to me, Gretchen VanStantvoordt. I’ve gone two whole days without crying, and I don’t want you ruining that for me by reminding me how patient and supportive you’ve been.”

“I promised I’d always be here for you.”

“You did, and you have. You’ve been up here every weekend since Nathan died. I know you’re short-changing your clients to spend time with Nat and me. I don’t tell you often enough how much it means to me.” Mary took off her glove and touched Ellis’s face lightly. “You’ve been a godsend.”

Ellis rubbed a clod of dirt between her fingers. “I wish I could do more.” She let the dirt sift through her fingers. “Did you take Natalie to therapy this week?”

Mary rammed her garden shears into the ground. “Yeah, for all the good it’s doing. On the drive home, she told me I should stop wasting my money.”

“That sounds like your daughter.”

“Doesn’t it? She said she was tired of having pretend conversations using dolls as her family members.”

“Does the therapist ever tell you what she makes of whatever Natalie says in those conversations?”

“Only that she’s a typical little girl who misses her dad and wishes that grown-ups would stop telling her how she should feel.”

“So will you keep taking her to the therapist?”

“Probably not. School will be back in session next week. I don’t want to embarrass her by pulling her out of classes to go see—as she calls her—the lady with all the goofy dolls who always asks the same dumb questions. It looks to me like Nat’s having more good days than bad ones, so maybe the worst is over, although you couldn’t tell it by her behavior today.”

Ellis stood and shook the kinks out of her legs. “What set it off?”

“She wanted to go to Wal-Mart, but I told her I needed to work in the garden this morning and that we’d go this afternoon.”

“Why did that upset her?”

“Her comment as she stormed into her room was that she and Daddy always went to Wal-Mart Saturday morning.”

Ellis pulled Mary to her feet. “Funny that she went all summer without that being an issue.”

“Probably because all the other Saturday mornings, she and I went to Wal-Mart. It was something to do while we waited for you to get here Saturday afternoons.”

Ellis stepped back onto the lawn. “Do you think it would help if I talked to her?”

“Feel free to try, but be sure to have your protective shields in place.” Mary dusted her hands on her pants as she joined Ellis. “And I really do need to run to Wal-Mart for some mulch and fertilizer. I should have gone this morning, and we could have avoided this whole drama.”

“If the horse doesn’t stop running, he might win the race. If you’d gone, something else might have triggered a memory for her. There’s no way to know.” Ellis looked toward the house. “I’ll see if I can talk her into going on a Wal-Mart run with me.” She crossed her fingers. “Make a list of what you need.”

Mary blew Ellis a kiss and went back to her garden.

∗ ∗ ∗ ∗

“C’mon, Natalie. You know I don’t know my way around up here.” Ellis poked her gently in the ribs. “I need you to come with me and tell me which roads to turn on.”

“Don’t want to. I’d rather stay home.”

“I tell you what. If you’ll come with me so that I can pick up the stuff your mom wants me to get for her garden, I’ll buy you the new Taylor Swift CD.”

“I’ve already got the songs on here.” Natalie shook her iPod in Ellis’s general direction.

“Okay, then you can pick something else. If you stay in your room much longer, you’re going to turn into a piece of furniture.”

“So?”

“So then I’ll have to rub you down with lemon oil and use Swiffer to dust you.”

Natalie almost smiled. Ellis pressed on. “And depending on which piece of furniture you turn into, I might have to have parts of you reupholstered or have casters put on your feet.”

“Or buy me a headboard,” Natalie offered, spreading her arms wide as she sat on her bed, which was pushed up against the wall.

“Yeah, and get you some fitted sheets and a matching bedspread.”

Natalie was quiet for a moment. “I guess I could ride along.”

Ellis tugged on Natalie’s honey blonde hair. “I’d like that, kiddo.”

Natalie stood up and gave Ellis a hug. “Can I get the Kellie Pickler CD?”

“Are you sure you don’t want Britney Spears?”

“Oh, Ellis, nobody listens to her anymore.”

“Whatever you say.”

Natalie slipped her hand in Ellis’s and held it all the way out to the yard where Mary slaved over her tomatoes and okra. Sam snoozed contentedly in the shade of a nearby tree.

“Got your list ready for me?” Ellis asked.

Mary looked up and smiled. “All I need is six bags of shredded mulch, the biggest bag of Miracle-Gro they’ve got, and a can of aphid spray.” She used her glove to mop her brow. “Let me get you some money.”

“Don’t bother. I’ll just put it on your tab,” Ellis said.

Natalie dropped Ellis’s hand and scurried over to give Sam a quick rubdown.

“We’ll probably run some other errands while we’re out,” Ellis said. “See you in an hour or two.” Ellis opened the passenger door on her truck and waited for Natalie to climb in. Sam lumbered over nearer Mary and flopped on the ground. “Take good care of my dog while we’re gone,” Ellis said as she walked around the truck.

“I will. And you take good care of my little girl.”

Ellis was delighted to hear some animation in Mary’s tone, a quality sorely lacking when they’d spoken earlier.

Natalie rolled her eyes. “I’m not a little girl,” she said softly as Ellis started the engine. “I’m almost an orphan.”

“You’re a long way from being an orphan, toots,” Ellis said, hoping she sounded convincing. She pulled out of the driveway onto the road. “You’ve got your mom and your Gramma Anna and your other grandparents. And don’t forget your Uncle Mark and your other aunts and uncles.”

“Yeah, but I don’t have a dad.”

Ellis reached across the console and squeezed Natalie’s arm. “That sucks. I know how you feel.”

“Nobody knows how I feel. Sometimes it’s like I’m watching a sad show on TV, but then I remember it’s really what’s happening to me.”

Quite an insight from someone not yet ten, Ellis thought. She tried to recall how she’d felt when her dad died four years earlier. Nothing much changed in Ellis’s world. She was long gone from home and hadn’t had a meaningful interaction with her father in longer than she could remember. But when Nathan died, every planet in Natalie’s galaxy spun out of orbit.

“You’re right, kiddo. I don’t know how you feel. If you want to tell me, I’d like to know, though.”

Natalie looped her finger around several strands of her hair and twisted it into a tight spiral. She drew it across her lips and chewed the ends before answering. “I feel like God is a big meanie and Gramma Anna is a great big liar.”

“I guess you think God is mean for letting your dad die, right?”

“Well, yeah.”

“Why do you think your grandmother is a liar?”

“Because she says everything God does to us is for our own good and that if I’d pray to Jesus, he’d make me stop missing my dad.”

“And have you been praying?”

“I prayed as hard as I could, but it didn’t help at all. Gramma always says Jesus is our best friend, but I don’t think he likes me very much.”

“Because you still miss your dad?”

“Uh-huh.” Long pause. “And I prayed for other stuff I didn’t get, too.”

“Really? What other stuff?”

“I probably shouldn’t tell you.”

“You can if you want to.” Ellis decided against going directly to the Cornelia Wal-Mart and instead headed for a covered bridge Mary had shown her on one of her early visits to Clarkesville, back before the world was wrenched into total chaos by Nathan’s death.