Lily of the Springs (2 page)

I knew that was the truth. Even on the snowiest days, if school wasn’t canceled—and it rarely was—Wallace Thornton prided himself on being on schedule.

Jake leaned across the passenger seat and opened the door. “Come on, hop in. I’ll drive you to school.”

I hesitated. I knew I’d catch heck if word got back to my kin about riding in Jake Tatlow’s Plymouth. But what was I supposed to do? I couldn’t go back home and ask Daddy to drive me in. He was probably already out in the fields with Landry and Edsel.

I knew I’d just
die
if I couldn’t go to school and see all my friends one more time. Tomorrow was graduation day, and we’d all be separating soon, some going off to college, others like me, going to the big city to learn a trade. And Chad! Dear Lord, it just killed me to think about it, but in another week, he’d be heading off to England, of all places, where he’d be spending the whole summer with cousins he’d never laid eyes on.

Jake leaned toward me, his eyes admiring, grin cocky. “Well, are you gonna get in or you gonna just stand there looking like the cat’s got your tongue?”

I cast a desperate glance up the ridge, then before I could change my mind, scrambled into the passenger seat of the Plymouth. I’d barely got the door closed before Jake shifted into first gear and gave it the gas. We flew down the road at 35 miles an hour–way too fast for a dirt road–with me holding tight to the strap above the door as my bottom bumped up and down on the vinyl seat.

“
Lord
, Jake!” I exploded when he reached the highway and slowed to a stop. “Get me to school, but you don’t have to
kill
me doing it!”

Jake glanced down the road heading toward Adair County, and then turned left. “See? Bus is long gone. Good thing you decided not to be so stubborn.”

He floored the accelerator, and immediately the rush of wind made a mess of my hair. I quickly rolled up the window.

“I still don’t understand how it got to be so dad-blasted late,” I muttered, staring out at a pasture of Guernsey cows near a pond covered with kelly-green water lilies.

Jake kept his eyes on the road and didn’t respond. He reminded me of somebody I’d seen recently, the way he was dressed in blue jeans and a snug white T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Then I remembered. Chad had taken me to the Star Theater on Main Street a few weeks ago, and we’d seen this movie with Dean Martin called “Sailor Beware.” Silly movie--forgettable, really, except for this young actor named James Dean who’d appeared in a boxing scene, immediately reminding me of Jake. If Hollywood took a notion to make a movie out of Jake’s life, this James boy would be perfect for playing him.

Look at him. Sitting there so cool and cocky, like he thinks he’s chocolate on a stick!
Jake stared at the road, one elbow resting on the open window frame and his other hand cupping the gearshift with strong, tanned fingers. The way a man would cup…

I blushed at the thought and jerked my gaze away. Lord, what was wrong with me? The things that came into my mind sometimes…well, no decent girl ought to be thinking like that. At the revival meetings last summer, the preacher had ranted and raved about how the devil lay in wait for the weak and sinful of heart, and if I kept thinking about stuff like that, I’d
surely
burn in hell-fire once Judgment Day arrived.

Still, I took some consolation in remembering how I’d pushed Chad’s hand away Saturday night when it had briefly grazed my bosom through my blouse. But even as I’d done so, a tiny part of me had thrilled to the caress. I frowned. Maybe I was just born bad.

Jake cleared his throat, and I realized he’d taken his eyes off the road and was staring at me. He grinned when I met his gaze. “Course, there’s every possibility that my watch might be running about five minutes fast,” he said, then waited for my reaction.

I stared at him. His eyes danced and his grin widened.

“Why, you…” I finally managed to say. “Jake Tatlow, you are so
ornery
!”

He laughed, his straight white teeth gleaming, then looked back at the road.

One thing about Jake--he might be trash, but at least he kept himself cleaned up. Even now, I could smell the spicy scent of homemade lye soap, and maybe even a hint of Pepsodent toothpaste. And he had good teeth—something kind of rare here in Russell County.

“Darlin’…” He threw me a quick glance. “Got news for you. It’s
fun
to be ornery.” He gave me a slow smile that made me all hot inside like my body was a pot-bellied stove and somebody had tossed a big hunk of coal into its flames. Was this how Mother felt when she had one of the “hot simmers” she sometimes complained about?

“Tell you what, Lily Rae. Get rid of Nickerson, and go out with me. I’ll teach you a thing or two about being bad, and you’ll
never
want to be good again.”

My face grew hot, and I looked away from him in confusion. “Just drive me to school.”

His mocking laughter rang out. Clearly, he was having fun at my expense. Clean or not, Jake Tatlow lived up to his family’s reputation of hillbilly trash. From the time I was knee-high to a grasshopper, I’d heard the name Tatlow being talked about in ugly terms around the county. For years, I’d thought
tatlow
was an adjective that meant dirty and filthy and worthless. It wasn’t until I’d played with a young boy named Jake down by the creek for an entire summer that I found out Tatlow was his last name.

And that was after Daddy had caught me playing “house” with him on a sultry afternoon in August. I’d been serving “my husband” one of my famous mud pies just after he’d returned from killing a whole tribe of wild Indians when Daddy appeared out of the woods, his eyes burning like two hot coals. In his callused, work-hewn hand, he held a long, vicious-looking switch that I knew had been cut from the hickory tree at the back of the house. I’d learned my lesson that day, and from that time on, I’d done my best to steer clear of any of the Tatlows, especially Jake.

So, what on earth had possessed me to accept a ride with him this morning? I tried to tell myself it was because it was the last day of school, and I’d believed I’d missed the bus! I
had
to get there! We had rehearsal for graduation this afternoon, and I had to know what to do, didn’t I?

But my cheeks were still hot, and even though I didn’t dare turn my head and look at Jake again, I was so very aware of him, sitting there next to me.

Maybe I am bad
. Maybe it was the very fact he was forbidden that made me so fascinated with him. How else could I explain the way I felt when he pulled up in front of Russell Springs High School and waited for me to get out?

Disappointed…and wondering why the trip into town, which usually seemed to take an eternity, seemed this morning to be
way
too short.

Great-Aunt Ona’s Chocolate Oatmeal Fudge

1 stick margarine

½ cup milk

1/3 cup cocoa

2 cups sugar

1/3 cup peanut butter

½ teaspoon vanilla

3 cups rolled oats

Melt margarine. Add milk, cocoa and sugar and boil one minute. Remove from heat. Add peanut butter, vanilla and oats. Drop from spoon onto waxed paper.

I
took the starched and ironed red polka-dot dress out of my wardrobe and laid it carefully on the bed where my sister, eight-year-old Norry sprawled, her brown eyes saucer-like. She was curled up on her side, one hand cupping her narrow chin. Dark sausage curls tumbled to her thin shoulders against a lace-edged nightgown.

“Oh, Lily, it’s beautiful,” Norry said. “You’re going to look just like Liz Taylor tonight.”

I smiled at my little sister and sat down in a reed-woven chair opposite the vanity dresser, eyeing myself in the mirror. “Oh, yeah. Liz Taylor with brown eyes, right?” I joked.

Yet, I couldn’t help but be pleased by Norry’s remark. After all, I
did
look like Liz Taylor. That’s what a lot of people said, anyhow. I gingerly touched my bobby-pinned curls. Still damp. That was okay. I had hours yet before I had to get ready.

Somehow, I’d managed to get through a simmering-hot graduation this morning in the high school gym. And only Landry and Edsel had been there to watch me receive my diploma. Twelve-year-old Edsel had done his best to try to make me laugh as he crossed his eyes and stuck out his tongue in a grotesque imitation of “Radar Men from the Moon” which he’d seen at the Star Theater a few weeks ago.

Next to him, Landry, at 20, was as sober-faced as a preacher giving the eulogy at the graveside of his beloved mother. There had always been a special bond between me and Landry, forged years ago when it was just the two of us living in the little house in Opal Springs, long before Edsel, Norry and Charles Alton arrived.

I’d been glad my brothers had made it, but I’d sorely missed my parents.

They’d taken my little two-year-old brother, Charles Alton, to old Dr. Scudder in Jamestown this morning because last night had been the worst one yet for the poor little thing. Up all night crying and feverish and vomiting like there was no tomorrow. But even not having my parents there wasn’t the worse thing about graduation. Chad and I had had a huge fight last night, parked out at Rock House Bottom—over the same old thing—because I wouldn’t go all the way with him. He hadn’t even spoken to me at graduation, and the one time I’d caught his eye, he’d looked away. The rat! Well, I’d see him tonight, and he’d be singing a different tune because I was going to look so daggone good, he’d be falling all over me.

I glanced at Norry’s reflection in the mirror. “I’d
rather
look like Marilyn.”

Her laughter reminded me of Tucker Creek in high summer as the water gurgled over the flat slabs of rock just above the swimming hole. “Lord forbid!” she said, still giggling. “Mother and Daddy wouldn’t let you out of the house if you looked like Marilyn!”

I grinned, glancing at her. “Well, it’s obvious you’re getting back to your ornery self, Miss Smarty-Pants.”

I still felt ashamed of myself for thinking she’d been playing possum yesterday. The poor thing had been really sick last night. Thank the Lord she was on the mend; I just wished Charles Alton was, too.

Mother and Daddy hadn’t returned from the doctor when we got home from graduation. Here it was, near four o’clock, and we hadn’t heard a word from them. What the
dickens
was taking so long?

I got up from the chair. “You hungry, Norry? How about I heat up some of this morning’s biscuits? We’ll have ‘em with butter and molasses.”

Just as we reached the threshold of the kitchen, a knock came at the front door. “
Yoo hoo
, Lily
Rae
!” a high-pitched feminine voice called out. “It’s me, Sylvie Lou.”

I frowned. What, for Pete’s sake, was Sylvie Lou Blankenship doing here? I headed for the door. “It’s open. Come on in!”

The door opened, and a large woman with salt-and-pepper hair stepped inside, wearing a flowered housedress under an apron soiled with what looked like blood. Killing chickens for Sunday supper, I suspected.

“Excuse my appearance, child.” Sylvie Lou rubbed restless, knobby hands down her stained apron. Her gaze darted nervously around the room. And that was when I felt the first stirrings of uneasiness.

Sylvie Lou was our nearest neighbor, living just down the road a piece. She was a widow-woman who kept mostly to herself. Friendly enough, but not the kind of person who made a habit of dropping in on folks to share a cup of coffee and some gossip. And did she always have that pinched look on her face, or was something really wrong?

My stomach muscles tightened. But before I could say a word, Sylvie Lou spoke again, “Your papa just rang and told me to get you a message.”

Sylvie Lou was one of the few neighbors here on the ridge that had a telephone. The news that Daddy had called her made my feeling of doom grow stronger. He hated using “them new-fangled telly-phones” and just didn’t, if he could help it, so I knew things must be serious, indeed, to make him call Sylvie Lou.

“Is it Charles Alton?” I asked, holding my breath.

The old woman’s face softened. “Yes-um. The baby is real sick, Lily Rae,” she said quietly. “They’s up in Louieville Hospital. Old Doc Scudder in Jamestown couldn’t figger out what was ailing the child, so he sent them up to Columbia this morning. And them doctors up there sent them on to Louieville. Your daddy says it’s no telling how long they’ll be up there, and for ya’all to come stay with me until they get back.”

Oh, Lord, no
! Why, I’d up and
die
of boredom if I had to go stay at that widow-woman’s dull old house. Nothing to do there at all! Why, she didn’t even have any good magazines laying around, like
Photoplay
and
Movieland
, just boring old religious ones, or maybe, once in a blue moon, she’d have
Look
or
Collier’s
.