Bastard Out of Carolina - Dorothy Allison [61]
“Sounds special to me, sounds nasty. The whole bunch of them make my bones hurt.”
“Oh, Ruth. I don’t know.”
I put my head against the screen and waited.
“Glen’s had so much trouble, been through so many jobs. An’t many people would take him on at all at this point, and God knows, he’s trying so hard. He’s out of the house at dawn, don’t get home till after sundown, goes in on weekends to do maintenance on his truck. He wants to do good, he wants to prove himself. He acts like a different man.”
“Well.” Aunt Ruth sounded less sure of herself than Mama did. “He ask about Bone?” There was a pause. I put my teeth on the rim of Mama’s glass.
“He an’t mentioned her once since she came over here.” Mama’s voice had dropped even more. Now it was a whisper.
“He’s good as gold with Reese. But it’s like he don’t even remember Bone, like she was run off or dead, somebody we’re not supposed to mention at all. I tell you, Ruth, I don’t know what to do some days.”
“Doesn’t sound like you have a lot of choice, honey.” Aunt Ruth’s voice was kind but firm. “You knew when you went back what the problem was. I can’t say whether he’s a good or a bad man. I know you love him, like I know I don’t much care for him myself ...”
“Ruth ...”
“No, listen to me. I an’t gonna tell you to leave him. He’s your husband, and it’s clear he thinks the sun rises and sets in your smile. I an’t sure whether he’s crazy jealous of Bone like Granny thinks, or if it’s something else. But he an’t never gonna be easy with her, and she an’t never gonna be safe with him.”
“He does love her. I know he does.” Mama’s whisper was fierce.
“Maybe. Still, I look at Glen and I can see he an’t never been loved like he needed to be. But the boy’s deeper and darker than I can figure out. It’s you I worry about. I know the kind of love you got in you. I know how you feel about Glen. You’d give your life to save him, and maybe that’ll make it come out right, and maybe it won’t. That’s for God to fix. Not me.”
“Ruth, think about what you said about him. Anybody can see how Glen got bent, what his daddy’s done to him. I an’t never seen a boy wanted his daddy’s love so much and had so little of it. All Glen really needs is to know himself loved, to get out from under his daddy’s meanness.”
My teeth ached with the cold from the ice in Mama’s glass. I knew I should push through the door, let them know I could hear them, but I stood unmoving, listening to Mama.
“You never saw him when he used to come down and wait for me to get off work at the diner. That was when I started to love him, when I saw him look at Bone and Reese with his face so open I could see right into his soul. You could see the kind of man he wanted to be so plain. It was like looking at a little boy, a desperate hurt little boy. That’s when I knew I loved him.”
“Oh, Anney.”
I pushed the door open with my foot and stepped through. Their heads turned to me, Mama leaning forward on her chair close to Ruth’s bent neck, Ruth looking paler and more worn than when I had gone into the kitchen.
“Took you long enough.” Aunt Ruth’s glance was too intent.
“I sliced the lemon the way Mama likes. You can see right through those slices.” My face felt frozen. I gave Mama her glass and went back to the overturned bucket and the broken mass of roots. I tore one half free and dumped it back in the bucket and then just as roughly started breaking out four equal sections of roots and top growth. As I worked I kept my face down, my eyes on the plant.
“I was telling your aunt Ruth that Daddy Glen’s started a new job over at the Sunshine Dairy. He’s real pleased about going to work for his daddy, and it looks like this job is going to work out pretty good.”
“That’s good.” I shook dried dirt free from one clump of roots and then set the mass down in the damp mix in the earthenware pot. “You want me to use that braided cord to hang