For Time and Eternity (14 page)

While Marion and Tabatha finished the dishes, Joanna took the baby and ushered my girls and the toddler upstairs to wash up and get ready for a day at the market. Rachel, meanwhile, took a large, square basket from a hook on the wall and began to pack it with loaves of bread wrapped in clean tea towels, jars of jam, and a ball of butter.

“We’ll take this to Evangeline,” she said. “And some of those cookies from last night.” She continued rummaging through the cupboards, taking out all kinds of jars and packages and sacks cinched with ribbon, moving with a sense of purpose that defied the watchful eyes of her sister wives.

When all was tucked in and covered with a cheerful square of bright red flannel, she took my plate—scraped clean—over to the washbasin and summoned me to follow her into the front parlor, where she had “just a few things to tend to.”

The full light of day showcased the parlor in all its splendor. Lush red upholstery on the sofa and high-backed chairs, raised red velvet on the wallpaper, intricate floral design on the carpet. I stood at the window and looked out to the well-groomed, busy street. Each of the homes probably had a parlor just like this one. Households just like this one, and I thought,
This is what Nathan wants.

Rachel sat behind me at a small mahogany writing desk, her pen filling the room with a scratching noise as she composed a note on a piece of thick, cream-colored stationery.

“Do you have anything to post?” she asked. “The mail’s running next week.”

I’d composed a letter to my parents, telling them of both the impending birth of our third child and the sad news of losing him so soon. Perhaps if they knew about my unhappiness—if they could picture their daughter so far away and lost and hurting—their own hearts might soften toward me.

“It’s upstairs,” I said, letting the lace curtain drop against the glass.

* * *

Walking along the sidewalks of Salt Lake City with Rachel felt like being an attendant to a queen. She held her head high and regal, dipping it to say good morning to every third person we passed. I was right beside her, and occasionally the return greetings were extended to me, but for the most part I was more like a rumpled shadow, half a step behind, carrying the regal basket packed for the poor.

I never ceased to be amazed at the changes in the city each time I visited. More streets, more stores, more people. On that day I noticed women shopping in pairs—or even threes or fours—with passels of children in tow.
Sister wives,
I thought, and I scrutinized each one, looking to see if I could recognize any spark of friendship or affection. Most wore an eerily identical serene expression, like a polite mask they’d wear to church instead of to a dry goods store.

By the time we arrived at Evangeline’s home, my nose felt as frozen as the smile on my face, though we’d probably walked less than a mile. The houses on this street were markedly different from those where Rachel lived. No picket fences or wide walkways here. These were simple, unadorned one- or two-story buildings, constructed with an unsettling uniformity. Of course I’d visited Evangeline before, when her father was alive, but those visits had been in the spring and summer, when window boxes planted with bright flowers lent a cheerful air to these modest structures. Now, in the end-of-winter bleakness, they appeared uninviting. When we reached number seventy-one, I noticed Rachel’s deep breath and squared shoulders before she raised her leather-gloved hand to rap smartly on the door.

Even given reports of Evangeline’s dire circumstances, nothing prepared me for the girl who opened the door to us. I say girl because that’s how Evangeline always remained in my mind, even though we were the same age. Perhaps it was because she’d been so devoted to caring for her father and younger brothers that she’d forgone the responsibilities of marriage and children. Or maybe her looks—bright red hair and freckles—gave her an aura of perpetual youth. Whatever the case, Evangeline had always been some form of the cheerful, exuberant girl I’d met in the clearing by the river all those years ago.

Until today.

Every last drop of that girl was gone, soaked up by something within, drying her up until only this shell with a shock of unruly red foam remained. Her face was drawn to a point, her lips cracked at the corners of her mouth. Her eyes darted between the two of us in momentary feral fear before she stretched her face into a thin, tight smile and opened her door wide.

“What a lovely surprise! Come in, girls; come in.”

Rachel paused over the threshold to bend and receive a welcoming kiss, and when my turn came, I followed suit. Her lips were dry and rough against my cheek, and I couldn’t ignore a distinctive sourness about her as I bent closer.

We walked into a modest front room, curtains drawn against the winter sunlight. A threadbare sofa and two wooden chairs anchored a worn rug. A small porcelain dog sat on the mantel above a small, dark fireplace.

“Goodness, Eve,” Rachel said, “it’s as cold in here as it is outside.”

“I lit a fire this morning. It’s just burned out.”

“Well, would you light the stove?” She headed into the kitchen. I automatically followed. “I’d like to put some water on.”

“No, Rachel.” Evangeline sounded like a woman on the brink of losing control in her own home. “I need to be frugal—”

“I’ll send Tillman over tomorrow with some wood,” Rachel said over her shoulder. Without missing a step, she strolled into the kitchen and instructed me to set the basket on the table. This room had a little more cheer, with a bright rag rug and a collection of blue glass bottles lining the windowsill. Making herself at home, Rachel began to put away the contents of the basket, placing the loaves of bread on the shelves of the empty pie safe and stacking the jars of pickles and preserves on the shelf above it.

“Thank you so much,” Evangeline said, giving tiny adjustments to each item after Rachel put it away. “I wasn’t sure I’d be up to baking this week.”

I looked around the meager kitchen and wondered if she had the ingredients to make even a single loaf of bread. The hunger in her eyes and the gauntness of her cheeks fueled my doubt, but I said, “How nice, now, that you won’t have to.”

“Oh, Camilla,” Evangeline said, newly noticing that I’d walked into the room. “I haven’t seen you since the baby. How are you?”

She held out open, thin arms to me, and what could I do but walk into her fragile embrace. Her hair scratched at my neck, and her voice rasped words of comfort. As I looked over her shoulder, I saw Rachel rummaging through the basket once more, which puzzled me, because we’d already put away everything we’d packed. Then I saw that she wasn’t going through the basket itself but was reaching under the large square of linen that lined the bottom. From there she pulled a small, flat box I didn’t remember packing.

“What is that?” I asked once I’d been released from Evangeline’s clumsy embrace.

“Evangeline doesn’t approve,” Rachel said, squinching her nose. “And for that matter, neither does my husband or the sister wives or just about anybody in this entire place.”

“Not to mention the prophet,” Evangeline said. “Or Heavenly Father.”

“And I say
bother
to all of them,” Rachel replied. She lifted a bundle of linen out of the basket and unwrapped it to reveal a small copper kettle, and then I knew what was in the mysterious flat box.

“Tea!”

“Shhh.” Rachel and Evangeline both held their fingers to their lips, though for Rachel, at least, the warning was in jest.

“You know it’s forbidden.” Evangeline crossed her spindly arms.

“Forbidden,
pshaw
. It’s discouraged, if anything. Looks like somebody needs to go back and read her Word of Wisdom.”

“You know very well I’ve studied the
Doctrine and Covenants
as much as anybody. I know exactly what it says: ‘Hot drinks are not for the body or belly.’”

“Oh, spare us the sermon, Evangeline.”

Throughout the conversation, Rachel continued her preparations—lighting the stove, pouring water from the pewter jug into the copper pot—a scene both achingly familiar and strange. I hadn’t touched tea or coffee since leaving home. At first I thought it was merely a case of rationing on the trail, but when we arrived, when we had our home and the means to stock a pantry and kitchen, Nathan wouldn’t have it in the house. Now Rachel reached up to the top shelf in the cupboard and took down a single cup. After a brief hesitation, she reached down a second, dangling it by its handle and looking at me questioningly. Without thinking, I nodded, already anticipating the comfort of feeling the warm cup in my hand.

“Disgraceful,” Evangeline said, pulling out a chair and dropping herself into it.

“I brought sugar.” Rachel produced a small paper packet. “But no milk. Can you spare us a little milk, Sister Evangeline?”

“I notice you’re not brazen enough to do this in your own house. You come sneaking into mine.”

“Tillman wouldn’t have it. And those others—”

“Oh! I get so tired of listening to you complain about your life, Rachel. Why, if I had—”

“Stop it, both of you.” The stove was just beginning to warm up the room, and I couldn’t bear the coldness of their snapping. “Can’t we just enjoy an afternoon together? with friends? Don’t you see what a luxury that is?”

Evangeline looked down, pouting, and Rachel continued spooning tea.

I sat in the chair opposite Evangeline and reached across the table to touch her hand. My fingers could have encircled both of her wrists at once. “I remember once, not long before I met both of you, spending an afternoon with my mother, drinking tea and reading the Bible. I remember feeling so grown-up. So much like a lady, I . . .” Words lodged in my throat as I forced down the memory. It seemed cruel to force such an image on Rachel, who had never known a mother, and Evangeline, who had never tasted such a ritual. But most of all, it seemed cruel to me, to think about how I’d walked away from that life and wandered into this one that was beginning to twist my soul.

“When I was in the orphanage,” Rachel said, joining us, “once the girls turned twelve, we would get to have tea with one of our teachers every other Saturday afternoon. My poor brother was already out living on the streets, working where he could, and there I was, sipping hot tea in a parlor. I told him about it once when he came to visit. I cried and cried, feeling so guilty. But do you know what he told me?”

“What?” I asked, curious. By now there was little I didn’t know of Nathan’s childhood.

“He told me that when I grew up, I’d have a china tea set and a parlor and I’d have tea with my lady friends every day.”

“And think how empty that life would be,” Evangeline said.

“Don’t say that.” The lump in my throat dislodged, allowing me to jump to Rachel’s defense.

“I just meant—” she turned to Rachel—“that was before. If you had achieved that, you wouldn’t know the revelations of the prophet. You might have some temporal comfort, but what about your eternity?”

“I refuse to see the connection,” Rachel said, and her tone ended the argument.

By then the water was boiling, and she busied herself getting the tea to steep, working with her back squarely to us. While the little kitchen grew warmer with the heat from the stove, it grew colder with silence. The next sound was that of tea being poured into a cup. And then another. Evangeline remained stony, her thin lips and brow equally furrowed. Rachel picked up her cup and formed her lips into a pretty O to cool the surface. I merely stared at mine for what seemed an eternity, watching the steam rise and dance above the rim. But a longing to taste it consumed me. I wrapped my hands around the cup, comforted by the heat, and bowed my head.

Surely, Lord, my soul means more to you than this.

Finally I lifted the cup to my lips and took a sip. It was hot—wonderfully so—and I did not let it linger on my tongue. Instead, I swallowed quickly, relishing that moment it balanced at the top of my throat before winding its way down, leaving a heated trail of bitterness tinged with sweet.

I must have sighed or made some sound of contentment, because Rachel sent me an indulgent smile and said, “Good, isn’t it?”

“You two make me sick,” Evangeline said, but I could tell her anger had softened.

“Do you know what would be nice?” I asked, overwhelmed with the memory of the last time I’d had tea with my mother. “Let’s read a little Scripture together.”

Rachel rolled her eyes, but Evangeline declared it a fine idea and started to jump up from the table. I grabbed her hand, refreshed by how cool her skin felt against my palm. “Bring a Bible.”

“All right.” But she didn’t sound happy about it.

Once she’d left the room, I leaned close to Rachel and whispered, “Is this why you brought me here? To sneak a cup of tea?”

“Don’t be silly.” She took another dainty sip. “But it is delicious, isn’t it?”

It was, and I responded by taking another satisfying gulp. “Why
are
we here?”

“Are you happy with Nathan?”

“Of course I am.” But the question shocked me so, I sloshed my tea and had to set my cup down to slurp what I’d spilled on my hand.