The Seary Line (31 page)

“Elise, Elise,” he said, nodding slowly. That reverential calmness had returned. Playfully, he repeated, almost singing, “Oh, Elise. Elise.”

When he placed one of his hands on the crown of her head, began to stroke it, she jumped, leaving strands of her hair knotted in his fingers. “This don't got to–” he started, but before he could finish his self-preserving statement, she ran, leaping over decaying fences, flattened rows in longfallow fields, through shadowy shrubs and open patches of too bright moonlight, ran and ran and ran until her legs stumbled, and she fell, striking the hard-packed dirt on the edge of the laneway.

Far away from Lewis and Marg and Bee and James and Chester, she permitted herself to walk. On the hill behind her, she knew the fire was still smoldering, smoke and flames wavering up towards the inky sky. Distorted sounds of hooting and hollering stayed firmly on her back, pushing her away from the communal joy every other child was experiencing. While bits of her were bruised and burning.

Rounding the road, almost home, she stopped, exhausted. She hadn't the energy to lug herself another inch. Her arms were sealed to her body, legs, adhered to the earth beneath her feet. Through clenched teeth, she said aloud, “Why do I feel so heavy, God. How come I's so heavy? I'm sinking.” She listened carefully. Heard the voice when it came into her head.
You is made of stone, my child. Don't you know that already? You is made of stone
.

There was nothing left to clean. She had run her brush so many times over that single spot, the wood was beginning to complain. Hand (or bare foot) appraising it, she could feel the layers lifting, surface damaged with the soaking and scrubbing.

She moved out of the kitchen and went to Elise's room, stood in the doorway. A lantern, sitting on the nightstand, offered up a weary light, and she could see Elise flopped diagonally on her bed wearing only an off-white quilted robe, skirt and cardigan crumpled in heap in the corner. Her face was turned towards the wall, head resting on folded arms.

“I knows you're there, Mother. I feels you watching me.” Her voice was thick, as though she were pinching her nose.

Stella never stepped forward, and Elise made no invitation. “I weren't trying to hide.”

Sniffing, Elise lifted her head, wiped her nose across her forearm. “Did I say you was?”

Stella glanced about the room, at the wallpaper, faded poppies on twisted vines. She eyed the hooked rug, the thinning bedspread, curtains that needed to be taken down and
washed. Even though Stella had stood in the doorway many times over the past years, she had forgotten to look, forgotten how to see. What a pretty room she had created for her daughter. All so familiar, comfortable. She recalled making the choices with Leander shortly after Elise was born, remembered being delighted when he had an opinion.

“Elise? I'd like to say something to you.”

. . .

“I'm leaving.” Words smacked down. Flattened.

“What? At this ungodly hour?”

“No, tomorrow. First thing in the morning. I'm going to St. John's. To live.”

“To live where? Who in God's name do you know in the city?” Stella sensed her body falling towards the doorframe. “And what with the state of the world? Can't you wait until it calms down a bit?”

“Grace. That's who.”

“Nettie's Grace?”

“I got a letter from her. She told me to come on anytime I wants.”

“You shouldn't let tonight play into such a big–”

“I idn't letting nothing play into nothing. He don't make no difference to me. Not one pinch. They got jobs for women, you knows.”

“Jobs? What do you mean, jobs? What kind of jobs.”

“There's stuff to do there. Really, Mother. They got stuff there that we don't. They thinks in ways we don't.”

“Like what? How do you mean?” Upper arm pressing into the doorframe, hurting a little.

“I can do things, you know. Got no clue what it is, but I's betting I can do something. Aunt Nettie was always telling me I was a good helper.”

Elise sat up now, swung her feet over the side of the
bed, bathrobe gaping. And Stella realized she hadn't looked at her daughter in a long time either. Hadn't noticed the legs and the breasts and the solid shoulders. Mouth pulled out in a pout that never seemed to go away.

Elise cocked her head, stared at her mother. “I wants to own a dress with shoulder pads.”

“With what?” All of Stella's weight was now against the doorframe, and she wondered what her feet were standing on. “You knows we can't afford every whim.”

“'Tis not a whim. 'Tis a small wish. A tiny wish. Almost nothing at all. Is that so wrong, Mother?”

Stella shook her head.

“Well?”

“I don't know what you want me to say, Elise. I was never much one for vanity. I always took what I had, tried not to want more.”

“And that's where we's different.” Feet squarely on the floor, tapping with her toes. “I wants more. Everything is changing, Mother. We don't got to stay in the house now. Strapped to the stove. Having all kinds of babies you don't really want. Women got more worth nowadays than they used to.”

“Your worth don't got nothing to do with a shoulder pad, Elise.”

Head back, sardonic laugh. “I's wasting my breath on you. You got no clue what I's trying to say.”

“Just 'tis not good to want, Elise.”

“Will you stop saying my name over and over again? I can't stand the sound of it. Like a bloody dirty word.”

“All right, E–. All right.”

Elise looked down at her feet, rubbed one with the other, said, “You says 'tis not good to want, but I knows you wants sometimes, Mother. Everybody wants.”

Stella stood straight now, back of her head prickling as the conversation was turning in a spongy direction. “Not I, then. I haven't never wanted nothing I didn't already have.”

“You're lying again.”

“Lying? What a thing to say to your mother.” She folded her arms across her chest.

“How can you live like that? Always telling lies. Is it right lovely grand inside that cocoon? I really hopes it is – you spent your life in there.”

Stella stared at Elise, then closed her eyes. Since her children were born, she had tried to paint the best picture, the sweetest representation of a wholesome existence. Of course it might not have been entirely accurate, but how could she ever share her longings or her failures with Elise or Robert? Burdening them. Surely that wasn't the job of a mother.

And now, here was her only daughter, filled with contempt, accusing her. Part of Stella wanted to embrace Elise, while a deeper part wanted to slap her, tell her just enough to burn away her ignorance.

Stella glanced about the room again, and then at Elise. So unfamiliar, this cheeky girl, tucked inside this familiar room. The two no longer belonged together, that was painfully clear. Stella would not let it sadden her, this progression of life, and she kept her face strong and stable.

“We'll talk about it in the morning, Elise.”

Elise flopped backwards, bare feet slapping the floor, knees spread. Stella lowered her head and closed her eyes once more. Then she turned, repeated, “Yes, in the morning, Elise,” even though she knew they would speak not another word about it.

In the days after Elise left, Stella cleaned the room. Instead of pasting over the wallpaper, she stripped away every layer right down to the naked board. Folded up the bedspread, began in earnest to make a new hooked rug. The room remained blank for months, uninhabitable, and in springtime, Stella decided to replace it all in friendly shades of yellow.

Almost a year later, Robert could be found crouching between two pine trees. Fingers on the earth, he felt rotting humus, twigs, an earthy coolness moving up over his arms. In front of him was a mound of blueberry bushes, empty twigs where berries once resided. He hated this time of year, a time of constant weeping from a sky the colour of stone. A time when trees were still full of dead damp leaves, the weight buckling the branches. He no longer felt a sense of fullness when he stared across the fields. Once a lush green, shuddering in the breeze, they were now barren, only pockmarks remained where turnip and carrot had resided.

A shaft of moonlight illuminated the path directly in front of him, and so as not to be seen, he kept his head low, shoulders hunched. After dinner that evening, he had removed the white shirt he'd worn while working at Crane's Grocery, pulled on his navy wool sweater, made note of the dullness of his grey trousers. He would be invisible to someone strolling down the path towards home. But he needn't have worried. The person he was waiting for was not someone who would search the shadows.

Crunching. Confident steps approaching. And Robert's heart began beating, his eyes blurring. He knew who it was. Jaunting towards him, light on his feet. Lewis Hickey. Tomorrow Lewis would be leaving for St. John's to attend
Queen's College. When he returned, Lewis would be a Reverend, a man who would claim absolute respect in Bended Knee. The very thought of it made the salt fish and balled-up bread churn in Robert's stomach, press at the base of his throat.

Though he tried, Robert couldn't let it go. Only vaguely did he recall when Elise walked away from the smoldering mound of dried stalks about a year ago. Deafened by his own hooting and hollering, he barely realized that someone had been burnt by an exploding potato. He never thought to offer a hand.

And while he laughed, bit into burnt potato skin, spit it to the ground, his sister slipped away. He blamed himself, of course. He should have kept a closer eye on her. Protected her. Taken steps to ensure her name never emerged from the mouths of the local boys. But he hadn't. And the last time he saw her, her eyes were so swollen, they looked like winded sails. Her mouth was bruised, and when she lifted her hand from her knee, Robert saw the bloody mess beneath. She would barely look at him, and he could barely look away.

In the weeks that followed, Robert heard the snickering, the boasting. He witnessed the nudges, the appraising swipes of a sweaty palm across a soft-bristled chin when they spoke of her. He overheard one boy telling another that Easy Elise was “quick to get on her back.” Someone said she did whatever was asked of her for a few cigarettes. A paper bag holding a handful of peanut butter kisses. She was stupid. And nothing was better than a stupid broad who didn't know if her skirt was meant to go up, down, or sideways. Too bad she had to up and leave. Ruin the good times before the rest of them could have a go.

Lies. All of it lies. He knew his sister well. She was not
perfect, no doubt, but she was not this person they described. She had her own way, and most folks wouldn't understand it. More than once, she only pretended to deposit her collection money in the wooden plate at church, and instead, bought him Captain Marvel adventures. At Christmas, she always encouraged him to gobble down his apple and then taunted him with her own, still shiny, red, untouched. But in the end, she would share. She always did. In the end.