Prodigal Summer - Barbara Kingsolver [54]
Both women jumped at the sound of a crash and breaking glass from the porch. Lusa started for the door, but Jewel stopped her, holding up a pair of tongs. “You take the jars out of the canner and get the syrup boiling. I’ll be back in a jiffy.”
Lusa could hear Jewel scolding and both kids crying or whining on the porch. She tiptoed to look out the high window over the sink. “Jewel,” she called, “if it’s those jars of green beans, it’s a good riddance. They’ve been out there since I moved in.”
There was no answer, and from this angle she couldn’t see Jewel or the kids but could hear a smack and a wail. “That is no way to treat your little brother,” she heard. “You keep this up and you’re wearing a dress tomorrow. I mean it.”
Lusa frowned and turned to the stove. She measured equal parts sugar and hot water into the pot, hoping three quarts of syrup would be the right amount to cover five quarts of raw-pack cherries. She should put in something acidic to lower the pH, for the canning, but she didn’t have any lemon juice. Would vinegar work? She added one tablespoon, a wild guess, then took up the tongs to lift the sterilized jars from the water bath. She lined them up on the counter, a raft of widemouthed birds begging to be fed.
“It was the green beans,” Jewel sighed, coming inside. “I got all the glass. I told them to clean up the rest and throw it out by the creek, and then go play in the barn or something. I don’t care if it’s raining; they won’t melt.”
“That’s fine. Truly, I’m glad about the beans. I’ve been scared to eat them and scared to give them away. My luck, I’d kill somebody of botulism.”
Jewel reached under the sink to shake a dustpan of broken glass like wind chimes into the trash. “She’s going to be my death, if I don’t kill her first. Lowell’s a handful, but he’s just little. Crystal Gail’s something else. It’s time for her to be growing out of this stage, which she’s been going through since the day she was born. What?”
Lusa realized she must look comically confused. “Crystal?”
“Crys. Oh!” Jewel laughed, waved her hand. “You thought she was a boy. You and everybody else. When she started kindergarten, the teacher refused to let her go to the girls’ bathroom until I rushed down there with her birth certificate.”
“Oh.”
Jewel looked earnest. “Don’t think it’s because of Shel leaving, some child-of-divorce thing. She’s always been this way.”
“I don’t think anything about it, Jewel; I just didn’t realize.”
“You can’t imagine. It’s been going on since she was a baby. Her first word was no, and her second was dress. No dress. No dolls, no pretty hair bows. I gave in on that haircut because she was cutting it herself. I was afraid she’d poke her eyes out.”
Jewel looked so vulnerable, Lusa could practically see the veins through her skin. She wanted to hug her, to trust her completely. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “I’m just glad you told me so I won’t keep using the wrong pronoun. I can’t believe I’ve known that child a year and nobody ever set me straight.”
“You and Cole only ever had eyes for each other, honey. You hardly came to family things anyway, and if you did, it wasn’t to look at my crazy mixed-up daughter.”
“Ouch,” Lusa said, burning her hand slightly on the rim of a jar. “She’s not crazy, don’t do that to yourself. I wouldn’t worry about it.”
“You would if you were her mother. You’d worry yourself sick. She’s about half the reason why Shel left. He blamed me—oh, Lord, did he blame me. He said I was making her a little homo by letting her wear jeans and cut her hair like that. And maybe he was right. But it wasn’t my idea. I’d like to have seen him try and get her into a dress. That’s what I told him: You try putting panty hose on a tomcat!”
Jewel and Lusa looked at each other and laughed.
“And anyway,” Jewel asked, a little shyly, “isn’t a homo a man?”
“Jewel, she’s just a tomboy. I was exactly