That’s two more, and your PO will let you transfer your parole. You’re missing out on all the hard work. By the time you get there, we’re going to be making the best whiskey in Oregon, and all you have to do is show up.”
She hadn’t told him about Kristen. It didn’t seem fair to mix her tragedy with Pop’s death and Aldean’s excitement about Portland. She knew he would stay if she asked. If she said, Don’t leave me. I can’t live here without you, without her, without anyone , Aldean would stay, but that was a kind of prison, and she knew too much about prison to wrap a cage around him.
“It’s going to be amazing,” she said. “Aldean, you’re going to do it.”
The preacher’s wife hurried up to them with an apron in hand.
“We’ve got the Lord’s bounty of food in the kitchen,” she said, waving a hand in front of her flushed face. “And not nearly enough hands. I thought since you worked at the diner…Aldean, can we steal her?”
In the kitchen, the women talked about what a good boy Aldean was, waiting until his Pops died before moving to the city. A few of the women even patted Marydale on the back and said it was a shame about her mom dying so pretty and so young, bless her, and Marydale’s father, too, although you kind of expected it with a man like that who lived rough for his age.
“They’re with the angels now,” they all concluded with satisfied smiles. “But it’d sure have been nice to have your mother guiding you up, wouldn’t it, Miss Marydale? How many times did you win that rodeo contest?”
They all knew, but she said, “I’m sorry, ma’am, I can’t remember.”
And in some ways it felt like she really couldn’t remember, because it couldn’t really have been her. Instead she remembered the day Gulu had pulled her behind a utility box on the far corner of the grounds. They sat, huddled between the gray metal and the inner fence.
You know what day it is? Gulu had asked, lighting a hand-rolled cigarette with the last match in a battered matchbook.
Marydale had said, No. What day is it? all the while looking around for the guards who would surely catch them.
Last day for you to file an appeal on that case of yours.
What?
Don’t you know about the statute of limitations? It’s run out now. But you don’t mind, do you? ’Cause you didn’t ask for one.
My attorney said I couldn’t get one.
You can’t now.
Gulu had drawn in a deep drag of smoke, the tiny cigarette burning down to an ember. Then she had taken Marydale’s hand, turned it over to expose her wrist, and pressed the ember into her skin.
You’re one of us now, Scholar.
When the reception was finally over, the women urged Marydale to take a restaurant-sized pan of leftover tuna casserole.
“Because you don’t have nobody to look after you out on that farm,” the preacher’s wife said, which prompted another round of how beautiful Marydale’s mother had been and how sad it was that she died so young, leaving Marydale without anyone to take care of her. “But don’t keep the pan. Bring it back,” the preacher’s wife added, as though stealing baking pans was her particular MO.
“I will make that my number one priority,” Marydale said.
The women didn’t seem to hear the bitterness in her voice, and Marydale pretended it wasn’t there as she hugged them, leaning down until she was bent almost in half.
It was after dark when Marydale returned to her house. She bumped the truck door closed with her hip, the enormous casserole in her hands. It wasn’t any heavier than a tray at the Ro-Day-O, but her arms shook. She was tired. The pan smelled of hot mayonnaise and fish. And she smelled like hot mayonnaise and fish. And she had Jell-O on her sleeve. And Aldean was leaving. And the sweet, exquisite moments she had shared with Kristen were as meaningless as a shooting star, just a brief glitter that no one else saw because it existed for only the split second it took to
She hadn’t told him about Kristen. It didn’t seem fair to mix her tragedy with Pop’s death and Aldean’s excitement about Portland. She knew he would stay if she asked. If she said, Don’t leave me. I can’t live here without you, without her, without anyone , Aldean would stay, but that was a kind of prison, and she knew too much about prison to wrap a cage around him.
“It’s going to be amazing,” she said. “Aldean, you’re going to do it.”
The preacher’s wife hurried up to them with an apron in hand.
“We’ve got the Lord’s bounty of food in the kitchen,” she said, waving a hand in front of her flushed face. “And not nearly enough hands. I thought since you worked at the diner…Aldean, can we steal her?”
In the kitchen, the women talked about what a good boy Aldean was, waiting until his Pops died before moving to the city. A few of the women even patted Marydale on the back and said it was a shame about her mom dying so pretty and so young, bless her, and Marydale’s father, too, although you kind of expected it with a man like that who lived rough for his age.
“They’re with the angels now,” they all concluded with satisfied smiles. “But it’d sure have been nice to have your mother guiding you up, wouldn’t it, Miss Marydale? How many times did you win that rodeo contest?”
They all knew, but she said, “I’m sorry, ma’am, I can’t remember.”
And in some ways it felt like she really couldn’t remember, because it couldn’t really have been her. Instead she remembered the day Gulu had pulled her behind a utility box on the far corner of the grounds. They sat, huddled between the gray metal and the inner fence.
You know what day it is? Gulu had asked, lighting a hand-rolled cigarette with the last match in a battered matchbook.
Marydale had said, No. What day is it? all the while looking around for the guards who would surely catch them.
Last day for you to file an appeal on that case of yours.
What?
Don’t you know about the statute of limitations? It’s run out now. But you don’t mind, do you? ’Cause you didn’t ask for one.
My attorney said I couldn’t get one.
You can’t now.
Gulu had drawn in a deep drag of smoke, the tiny cigarette burning down to an ember. Then she had taken Marydale’s hand, turned it over to expose her wrist, and pressed the ember into her skin.
You’re one of us now, Scholar.
When the reception was finally over, the women urged Marydale to take a restaurant-sized pan of leftover tuna casserole.
“Because you don’t have nobody to look after you out on that farm,” the preacher’s wife said, which prompted another round of how beautiful Marydale’s mother had been and how sad it was that she died so young, leaving Marydale without anyone to take care of her. “But don’t keep the pan. Bring it back,” the preacher’s wife added, as though stealing baking pans was her particular MO.
“I will make that my number one priority,” Marydale said.
The women didn’t seem to hear the bitterness in her voice, and Marydale pretended it wasn’t there as she hugged them, leaning down until she was bent almost in half.
It was after dark when Marydale returned to her house. She bumped the truck door closed with her hip, the enormous casserole in her hands. It wasn’t any heavier than a tray at the Ro-Day-O, but her arms shook. She was tired. The pan smelled of hot mayonnaise and fish. And she smelled like hot mayonnaise and fish. And she had Jell-O on her sleeve. And Aldean was leaving. And the sweet, exquisite moments she had shared with Kristen were as meaningless as a shooting star, just a brief glitter that no one else saw because it existed for only the split second it took to