The Secret Sense of Wildflower (20 page)

“Johnny Monroe had no right,” he says softly. “You need to know that.”

“But Daniel, I shouldn’t have gone out that day,” I say. “It’s my fault.”

“You have the right to go anywhere you want, Wildflower,” he says.

“You don’t have to call me that anymore,” I say.

“What do you mean? That’s your name,” Daniel says.

“It sounds silly, now,” I say, ready to be Louisa May the rest of my life.

“But it’s the name Daddy gave you,” Jo says.

“I know. But nobody has a name like that,” I say.

“Don’t let Johnny do this to you,” Daniel says. “You can’t let him take away your name or your freedom. You’re the same person you were.”

“No, I’m not,” I say. The words feel as true as anything I’ve ever spoken. “I wish I were the same person, Daniel, but I’m not. That girl, Wildflower, died that day,” I add. “She was innocent and naïve and stupid.”

“Don’t say that,” Jo says, looking me squarely in the eyes.

“That’s what Mama thinks,” I say. “Not to mention, I haunt her because I’m like Daddy.”

Jo and Daniel exchange looks.

“Your mama isn’t herself these days,” Daniel says. “But that’s not the point. I don’t care what anybody says, you haven’t done a damn thing that was wrong.”

I pause, grateful for Daniel’s words, and hope someday that I believe them.

“I just wish it had never happened,” I say finally. “I knew I shouldn’t have gone, but I did it anyway.”

“We all do things like that,” Jo says. “We all have regrets.”

I can’t imagine Jo regretting anything, but I let it go, like the stick I throw into the river that rides out of sight on the current. After that, we watch the river for a long time. Then a question rises to the surface like one of the trout in the stream. I take this as a good sign since lately I’ve been more full of fear than questions.

“Why do you think bad things happen to some people but not to others?” I ask. “Mary Jane hasn’t had a single bad thing happen to her in her whole life and probably never will.”

“Damned if I know,” Daniel says. The wisdom of his statement makes me smile, but Jo doesn’t seem to see the humor in it.

“We’ve just got to trust that God knows what he’s doing,” Jo says.

Without Jo seeing, I roll my eyes toward heaven, which I’m not so sure exists anymore.

Jo takes a good look at the bruises healing on my face. “Does it still hurt?” she asks.

“Sometimes,” I say. What I don’t tell her is that the memories hurt more than all these physical things combined.

Since yesterday I’ve been able to see out of my left eye again, and the bruises have changed from red to purple edged in yellow.

The three of us rest on the riverbank letting the sunshine warm us. The church bell rings in the distance, the service over. Coming here feels more like church than Preacher reading from a book and telling us what sinners we are.

“Thanks for bringing me out here,” I say. “I’m glad we came.”

They each give me a hug and afterwards we retrace our steps back to the house. I didn’t lie to Daniel. A part of me did die that night. Despite my belief, I repeat to myself Daniel’s words:
You haven’t done a damn thing that was wrong.
For the first time in days, I feel myself starting to get better. I also feel something new. I feel mad. Really mad. More than ever, I want Johnny Monroe to pay.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

For two weeks I slept in Mama and Daddy’s bed while Mama slept in mine. This was special for a while, but now it feels good to get back to sharing a room with Meg. We are both in our nightgowns and getting ready to turn out the light.

“Are you really going back to school tomorrow?” Meg asks.

“I’ve got to go back sometime,” I say.

“Things have probably died down by now,” she says. “But there will probably be some whispering.”

I’d like to think everything could get back to the way things used to be, but that feels like childish wishful thinking. Lately my stomach has been hurting, too, but not enough to tell anybody. Aunt Sadie is away for the day collecting her remedies and I don’t want Mama calling Doc Lester. As long as I have feet instead of hooves, I don’t want him near me. At least the bruises have faded and I’m sleeping through the night again without waking up and worrying about Johnny hiding in the woods. But I still spend a big part of my day wondering where he is and if he will come after me again.

The next morning I get ready for school like nothing has changed. Mama makes oatmeal with molasses in it and wraps me up a meatloaf sandwich to take for lunch. Daddy used to say that Mama’s meatloaf sandwiches would give a condemned man something to look forward to. That always made Mama smile. But I am not about to mention it now. I don’t want to haunt Mama anymore than I have to.

Meg caught her ride with Mr. Appleby earlier that morning, and when I reach the bottom of the hill Jo and Amy are waiting to walk me to school. In the last weeks, my sisters have gathered around me like guards surrounding the British crown jewels that Daddy read us a story about when we were younger.

When I walk through the doors at school, all eyes are on me. Mary Jane is already there and her face lights up like it is Christmas and the 4th of July all at once.

“I’m so glad you’re back,” Mary Jane says.

I sit at my desk. “I’m glad to be back, too,” I say, which is partly true. For some reason, school doesn’t seem as important as it did before.

“You act different,” Mary Jane says at lunchtime.

“I feel different,” I say.

We trade half of her egg salad sandwich for half of my meatloaf one. She is definitely getting the better end of the deal. The Bronson brothers, Kyle and Mark, look at me and whisper. I pull on my dress wondering what they’ve heard.

I feel sick at my stomach again. While Mary Jane and I eat in silence, she looks at me like I’ve become a stranger. In a way, I have.

Two weeks pass and my appetite doesn’t return. Mama makes my favorite, chicken and dumplings, convinced I need to get some meat back on my bones. Our chickens are in a pen to the side of the house, near the old shed, so the foxes can’t get to them. They have a coop where Mama collects eggs from the hens. She wrings their necks with one, quick whip. Even though fish guts don't bother me, killing chickens is something I can’t bear to do, and luckily she doesn’t make me.

Nobody has seen Johnny in weeks and his family has deserted him. According to the Katy’s Ridge grapevine, Arthur Monroe has left Katy’s Ridge to stay at the Veterans Hospital in Nashville and Melody went to live with an aunt in Louisville, Kentucky, where she has a chance at a better life. Meanwhile, I cling to the belief that Johnny is long gone like Daniel and Sheriff Thompson think.

The next day after school, Daniel meets me to walk over to Aunt Sadie’s to get some chamomile tea to settle my stomach. Max runs down the road to meet us. He barks until he recognizes us and then wags his tail in wide circles. Max’s eyesight isn’t that good anymore so he relies mostly on scent. His hair has turned gray like an old man’s. Sadie serves him up one of her potions every night, mixed with supper scraps, which probably keeps him alive longer than most dogs his age.

Aunt Sadie waves when she sees us. She is preparing her garden for the cold weather to come. Winter knocks hard on the door of Katy’s Ridge, but today has been warm, inviting people outside to get a few things done. I have not minded winter so much this year. If Johnny is hiding in the mountains, I want him to have every opportunity to freeze to death.

Sadie stands and hugs us both. She studies me, looking deep into my eyes, as if I am a patient of hers that requires a diagnosis.

“I was just going to put on some cider,” she says. “Would you like some?”

I say, yes, but Daniel says he has to get back to Jo. He hugs Aunt Sadie and says his goodbyes. “I’ll be back for you in an hour or so,” he says to me.

I nod, grateful that he is so protective of me.

After Daniel leaves, Sadie gives me another hug like I could use an extra dose. Then we go into the kitchen where she serves me a mug of cider. She makes apple cider with secret ingredients in it that she promises to pass on to me someday. With mugs in hand, we go back and sit on her porch swing. Then we take sips of the warm brew.

Max claims a worn spot in the flowerbed below us. His panting looks like a wide smile. Sadie doesn’t scold him out of her flowerbeds anymore since he’s good about staying in the one spot.

I sit quietly, something I do a lot these days. I want to confide in Sadie but ponder the words I might use. Meanwhile, Sadie studies me like I am a storm forming over the mountains. We take turns swinging the porch swing with one foot, letting the squeaking metal serenade us. It sounds like the crows in Nathan’s fields calling to each other after the crop is in. Their squawking conversations are loud enough to hurt your ears.

The wind picks up. I pull my frayed coat closer to my neck, buttoning the top button that Mama replaced the night before. I am always losing the top buttons of things, just like Daddy.

“If you’re cold we can go inside,” Aunt Sadie says.

“I am a little bit, but I like it out here,” I say.

The squawking metal hooks announce what I’m about to say.

“Aunt Sadie, if I talk to you about something will you promise not to tell anyone? Especially not Mama.”

“Of course, honey,” Sadie says. She takes my hand and squeezes her promise into it.

I pause. “My insides don’t feel right,” I say finally.

“Describe to me what you mean,” she says, her face as serious as any doctor’s.

“My stomach feels queasy a lot, except for no reason. It’s not like I’ve been sneaking pieces of Mama’s pies or anything.”

We sip apple cider. Its secret ingredients help settle my stomach. Sadie nods like she’s consulting the dictionary of ailments stored in her memory and then stops the swing.

“Are you still having your monthlies?” she asks.

I think back to the last time I washed out the cloth pads Mama made me. It was my birthday, a good six weeks before. “No,” I say.

I don’t like the expression on her face, which reveals both concern and sadness.

“What is it?” I ask.

“It could just be the trauma,” she says.

“The trauma?” I don’t even know what a trauma is, but it doesn’t sound good. To see Sadie so serious worries me.

“I know we haven’t talked very much about that day,” Sadie says.

“Nobody has,” I say.

“Well, that’s not a good thing,” she says. “I guess we haven’t known what to say. What happened to you was just so horrible, honey.” She pats my knee, as if she remembers every bruise. “But still that’s no excuse.” She pauses. The blue-gray of the sky is mirrored in her eyes. “Country people gossip like blue jays when something happens to somebody else, but when it hits close to home they don’t know how to talk about it. I knew that, and I did it myself.”

“It’s okay,” I say. “I haven’t known how to talk about it either.”

“Honey, I need to ask you a very hard question,” Sadie says.

I don’t like hard questions and feel queasy again, but I tell her to go ahead and ask.

“Did Johnny do anything to you that you haven’t told us?”

“What do you mean?” I ask, but I know exactly what she’s referring to.

Max comes up on the porch and puts his paws on my lap.

“Good boy, Max,” says Sadie. “He always knows when he might be needed.” We pet him and he gets down and takes up his new nap place near my feet.

I think the worst: that because Johnny messed with me I’ll be joining Daddy in the graveyard after all because Johnny has given me some disease that kills people.

Sadie stops the swing and turns to face me. “Did Johnny take advantage of you, honey?”

Tears rush like a flash flood down my cheeks, leaving no room to turn back. Aunt Sadie squeezes me tight. The dam in my memory bursts open and I tell her everything. I tell her about how I told Mama I was going to the river but I really went to the graveyard. And how the secret sense told me not to go but I ignored it. Then I tell her about how Johnny was there at the graveyard and how he spit tobacco juice all over Daddy’s grave marker. I tell her about running for my life and almost making it to the footbridge but then Johnny catching me instead. I tell her about him beating the living daylights out of me and then taking Grandma McAllister’s necklace. Then I tell her about what else he did to me that I swore I would never tell another soul. At this point, Sadie is crying, too. Big tears that slide down her cheeks and collect like raindrops on her shoulders.

“Johnny called me Ruby when he was messing with me,” I say. “He cussed at me for killing myself. What he did to me must have been the same things he always did to her. That’s why she killed herself, Aunt Sadie. Johnny hurt her, too.”

Sadie listens to me as if hearing me out is the most important thing she might ever do.

“And the baby Ruby carried to her grave, Aunt Sadie, it must have been Johnny’s. It had to be.”

Sadie holds me firm, like an injured bird that might flitter away. She rocks me in her arms while the truth settles in. A bright red and orange horizon settles behind the ridge. I begin to cry like I cried at the river the day Daddy died. I didn’t think I’d ever cry like that again. But I do. I cry for Ruby. I cry for the girl I used to be. I cry for all the girls that have ever been made to do things against their will. And I cry for the baby that possibly rests below my heart.