Staying Fit
Illustration by Nick Matej
21
“Beautiful property you have out here,” the reporter said.
Aubin Pavegeau limped toward the small cabin that was going to be the reporter’s home for the night. A beautiful chocolate-colored dog raced ahead of them, and two goats bleated from a pen behind the main house. “Thank you. My wife and I built it shortly after we were married.”
“I haven’t had a chance to meet her.” He dodged a chicken in his path. “Has she had any contact with the blackbirds?”
“If you ask my daughter Summer, she has. But you won’t be meeting my Francie. She died some six years back.”
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“I’m sorry. Was it an accident?” He winced as soon as the words were out of his mouth. “You don’t have to answer that—it was rude of me to ask.”
“It’s okay,” Aubin said. “It was a car wreck that killed her. But most days, it feels like karma.”
Natalie
It was a bit after seven o’clock when someone knocked on the door. I quickly crossed the room before whoever knocked did it again. Despite my best efforts to keep her awake to go to the movies tonight with Mama and Daddy, Ollie had fallen asleep early. Rather than subject them to her temper when she was sleepy, I’d put her to bed. There would be plenty more movies.
In the quiet, I’d been researching how to start an online shop, and had been pleasantly surprised to see that it was doable.
Very doable.
With a growing bubble of excitement, I thought I might just give it a go. A boutique of my own.
It was a goal I never even knew I wanted, until Faylene had planted the seed that day in Hodgepodge.
And then … I found I wanted it more than anything. Creating and sewing and running my own business sounded like a dream come true.
My bubble popped when I saw through the window next to the door that it was my mother on the porch. A tote bag dangled from her arm, and a big box that had a wrapped plate on top of it was in her hands. How she’d managed to even knock was beyond me.
Looking toward the heavens, I said, “Really? Now?”
Then I realized what I was doing—adopting Mama’s method of coping—and I immediately vowed never to do it again.
Reluctantly, I pulled the door open. “Mama, it’s late, I’m not feeling well, and I was going to bed soon ”
She walked past me into the house, tossing a questionable look at my pajama shorts and tank top. “I won’t stay long. Your father is taking a nap before the movie showing, and I thought it was a good time to stop over.” She glanced around. “Is Olivia Leigh already sleeping?”
I closed the door. “She is. I think she’s going through a growth spurt. She fell asleep while eating her spaghetti, so I cleaned her up and put her to bed early.”
“Have you eaten?” Mama asked, setting her load on the coffee table, and then picking up the plate on top. “I fixed you a plate of fried chicken and potato salad in case you’re hungry. There’s a slice of chocolate fudge cake there too.”
I took the plate from her hands and felt a catch in my throat. “I ate with Ollie, but thank you for this. It’ll be nice to have tomorrow.”
“Are you feeling any better?”
I could still feel the headache pulsing near my temple, but pulsing was a sight better than pounding. “Much better. I’m sure I’ll be fine tomorrow.” I put the plate in the fridge, peeked in on Ollie, and said, “Has Daddy been feeling okay? Seems he’s sleeping a lot lately.”
Mama sat down on the couch. “He says he’s fine.”
“But?”
Mama worried a button on her sleeve. For a moment, I thought she wasn’t going to say anything else, but then she said, “He hasn’t been himself for a few months now. I keep nagging him to go for a checkup, but he’s a stubborn old coot. What else have you noticed?”
“He’s tired. He’s not eating well. He winces in pain when he bends over or lifts something heavy.” I sat in an armchair and tucked my legs beneath me. “Do you think it’s something serious?”
Shadows swept across Mama’s ice-blue eyes, darkening them. “Hopefully it’s just old age. We’re not getting any younger.”
Your daddy is dying. “Hopefully.”
“I’ll try harder to get him to go to a doctor.”
“Me, too,” I said. “Power in numbers.”
Fireworks went off in the distance, a series of loud popping noises. Around here fireworks generally started a good week before the Fourth of July and lasted a good week afterward. It was my belief that people just liked having a reason to blow stuff up.
“I brought over that fabric from Patsy”—she motioned to the big box—“and something else I wanted to show you.”
Apparently Mama and I had differing opinions on what not stay ing long meant. It seemed to me she was here to stay for a while. I should have known this would happen, after she had done the same thing earlier at the café. “Do you want something to drink? Coffee? Tea? Iced tea? Iced coffee? A Coke? I have all the caffeinated beverage groups covered.”
Mama said, “Do you have any gin? It’s been a long week.”
I couldn’t hold back a laugh—it had been the last thing I’d expected her to say. “No gin. How about wine?”
“White?”
“Coming right up.”
I found two glasses in the cupboard and pulled the wine bottle from the fridge. I poured, and carefully carried the glasses back to the living room, the wood floor creaking beneath my bare feet. If Mama had noticed my lack of footwear, she didn’t point it out. She had better manners than I did.
“This is good,” Mama said after taking a sip.
“It should be—Daddy picked it out. He gave it to me when I moved in. A housewarming gift.”
“It was probably more of a dealing-with-your-mama gift.”
“Maybe so,” I said as I took a sip.
“It’s rather amazing it hasn’t been opened before now.”
I laughed again, wondering when I’d last laughed like this with her. I couldn’t remember a time. “This is the second bottle—Daddy gave me two.”
Mama shook her head in amusement, and then set her glass on a coaster. She pulled a three-ring binder from the tote bag. “I was going through some of my old designs and thought you might like a few of the patterns. There are baby gowns and dresses, john-johns, shirts. Take what you want, if any. There are pictures of finished products to go along with the patterns.” She handed the binder to me.
Flipping through the pages, I sat in awe as I took it all in. “These are incredible. I don’t remember you making any of these things.”
“I made most of them before you were born. I lost most of my passion for sewing when AJ died, but some of it has come back over the years. Not nearly like it used to be, however. Seeing what you’ve been doing recently is helping reignite that love. Suddenly, I want to create and design again. You see, I lost myself when he died, too,” Mama added softly.
She didn’t need to tell me. I knew. Oh, how I knew.
“In making all these life changes, I hope to find myself again, Natalie. A better me.”
I also couldn’t recall a time when Mama and I had sat and talked like this, sharing concerns and feelings. I didn’t find it as awkward as I thought I would. “I like the changes so far. It’s been good to see glimpses of the old you again.”
“I wish it hadn’t taken me so long to realize how lost I was. It wasn’t until I saw Anna Kate that I realized how far I’d wandered. Here, hand that over, will you please?”
It made sense to me that in order to find herself, Mama had needed to find a piece of AJ first. She’d found it through Anna Kate.
I passed back the binder. Mama flipped to the second page and set it on the coffee table. “This is the very first dress I ever designed, long before AJ was born.”
I leaned forward to take a look. It was a darling pink and tangerine dress with the barest hint of gray detailing and delicate puff sleeves.
“All my life, I wanted to be a mother and to have a family. A big happy family. Four girls, four boys. A family of ten sounded just right. I had it all planned out in my head, certain it was going to happen. Which only goes to prove that I don’t always get my way.”
Good Lord, was she cracking a joke? My mama?
I realized with a start that this new mother of mine was going to take some getting used to.
She tapped a picture. “I made this dress for my first daughter, sure I was going to have a girl straight off.”
I tried to imagine having seven siblings and couldn’t fathom it. Couldn’t imagine having any sibling, really. After all, I’d been raised as an only child, for all intents and purposes.
“It wasn’t to be, of course. I struggled to conceive AJ, and Daddy and I tried for years after he was born to have another child ...before we eventually gave up trying. So I spoiled AJ rotten. Absolutely rotten. I gave to him all the love I’d set aside for the big family I’d always wanted ... I had the perfect little family, and tried to be happy with the blessings I had, but I never quite felt fulfilled. Then you came along. Perfect you, the prettiest baby you ever did see, with those big brown eyes and bow lips. We took you home from the hospital in that pink and tangerine dress.”
“You’d kept it all that time?”
“Of course,” she said simply. “In my hope chest. With your arrival, I had it all. I’d never been happier. But then AJ was taken away, and my perfect family was destroyed.”
“Mama,” I said, a plea to make her stop talking right there. “Stop. Please stop. I don’t want to hear any more.” It wasn’t likely to change a damned thing. There was no changing the fact that AJ was gone or how she’d treated me for most of my life. “What’s done is done. Let’s leave it in the past.”
Her voice frosted over. “No, Natalie. It’s time I’ve spoken up.”
