Promises to Keep - Ann Tatlock [82]
I wanted to ask her all these questions, but I didn’t say a word. Because if she didn’t even know his name was Alan and not Nelson, how could she be expected to know anything about him at all?
“Look, honey, you got to make up your mind because I need to shut the door. I’m letting all the cold air in.”
I took one step backward, then turned and started to run.
“Well, all right, honey,” Darlene called after me. “Maybe next time.”
I didn’t look back. There had to be a safe place ahead of me somewhere, if only I could run far enough to find it.
chapter
35
Two days later when the doorbell rang in midmorning, I opened the door to find Mara standing on the front porch. She was wrapped up against the cold in a long woolen coat and knitted cap; only her eyes stared out from above the scarf circling her face. For a moment neither of us spoke as I stared into those unblinking eyes, those two dark pools of something bittersweet.
“Did you see him?” I asked.
She nodded. Tears rose up out of the depths of the pools.
I looked back over my shoulder to see whether Tillie had left the kitchen, but she hadn’t. Mom had already gone to work. I motioned for Mara to come in, and I shut the door behind her. She slipped out of her boots first, then untangled herself from the massive coat. She pushed the hat and scarf into one sleeve, and tossing everything onto the couch in the living room, she followed me upstairs to my room.
We positioned ourselves on the beds, cross-legged. I waited. After a moment she lifted a hand to her locket and said, “He doesn’t look like this anymore.”
“What’s he look like?”
“Older. His hair is turning gray.”
“That’s an old picture.”
“Yeah. It was taken before I was born. It’s more than twelve years old.”
“People change a lot in that many years.”
She nodded. “Yeah, they do.”
I waited another minute. When she didn’t go on, I said, “Well, what was he like?”
“He was like . . .” Her voice drifted off as she squeezed the locket. “He was like . . .”
“Yeah?”
“He was mostly like I imagined, I guess, except for looking older.”
I could feel myself frowning. “That’s good, isn’t it?”
She pressed her lips together and squeezed her eyes shut. After taking a deep breath, she looked at me and said, “I was so scared, Roz. I’ve never been so scared.”
I nodded. I understood.
“All the way up there on the train, I thought I was going to be sick,” she went on. “I held on tight to War and Peace with both hands until the cover was all sweaty. I couldn’t read. I couldn’t do anything but look out the window and wonder what was going to happen. When we got to the station in Chicago, I felt all weak, and I didn’t think I could even walk off the train. So I held on to Grandpa’s arm real tight, and I think he knew how scared I was because he kept saying, ‘It’ll be all right, child. It’ll be all right.’ ”
She took another deep breath and wet her lips with her tongue. “When we got off the train, the station was crowded with people everywhere. I kept looking around, but I didn’t see anybody that looked familiar. Then finally Grandpa said, ‘There he is now, Mara. See him?’ I looked around and didn’t see him, but I saw a man coming toward us, a tall white man wearing glasses and a hat that covered his hair. I didn’t see anything about him that looked like the man in the photo.
“You know, it’s funny, Roz, but I’d always pictured myself running into Daddy’s arms and giving him the biggest hug he ever had in his life. But when I saw him and it was real, I couldn’t do it. When he was still a little ways away, he took his hat off and kind of smoothed his hair down and then nodded at Grandpa like he recognized him. They knew each other from before, you know, back when Mama and he . . . well, you know.
“So he came up to us, and he shook hands with Grandpa