Free Every Day After by Laura Golden Page B

his head again. He thought I was wrong, but I knew I wasn’t. We sat on the curb in front of Powell’s Café and began tracing circles in the dirt with the toes of our shoes. Dust puffed into the air.
    “And anyway,” I said, trying one more time to convince him, “hasn’t anybody ever told you that sometimes people aren’t what they seem? If Daddy’s told me that one time, he’s told me a million.”
    “Well, I reckon he’s right about that. There’s lots of folks around here who ain’t what they seem. Did ya know Mr. Reed was married once?”
    Crabby old Mr. Reed married? Something about that picture didn’t fit. “He couldn’t have been. Who’d have married him?”
    “I don’t know who she was, but she was real pretty. I saw a picture of them together. It was sitting on a tablein Mr. Reed’s front room. He left me in there to go get my pay for the week. The man in the picture wasn’t as skinny or wrinkled as Mr. Reed, but it was him—just a younger him.”
    “I wonder what happened to her.”
    “Well, when he came back he caught me staring at the picture, so I asked him about it. He picked it up and studied it. I’d swear I saw his chin quivering like he was about to cry, but maybe it was just his age. He kept on looking at the picture and told me that lady had been his wife. She died in childbirth not two years after they were married. The baby died less than a day later. Couldn’t breathe right. He said he reckoned he hadn’t talked about it to anybody in years. I asked him why he was all right with talkin’ to me. Just like that, he stopped studyin’ the picture and started studyin’ me. He said he reckoned it was for two reasons: first, he knew I understood what it’s like to lose someone you love, and second, I remind him of the little boy he might’ve had.”
    The gears in my brain were turning fast, trying to put everything Ben was telling me together. “Mr. Reed had a son?”
    “ ’S what he said.”
    We sat for a while just thinking. Mr. Reed having a son once must’ve interested Ben for the thought of it to keep him quiet longer than five minutes. It interested me too. It was strange, and it proved the point I was trying to makeabout Dr. Heimler: people aren’t always what they seem. Sometimes they seem worse than they are, sometimes better. But the trouble is you never can tell who is who. And that is why, as far as Dr. Heimler went, for Mama’s sake, I’d have rather been safe than sorry.

  Ten  
    A Loyal Heart May Be Landed Under Traitor’s Bridge
    I held my breath all week long, waiting on a visit from the doctor. The way Erin flounced around me at school, you’d have thought he’d started on his way over five years ago. Of course, I guess her winning the sixth-grade extra credit on Wednesday gave her another reason to flounce. I let her believe she’d gotten the best of me for the time being. I thought it’d soothe her enough so she’d leave me alone for good.
    When Saturday finally rolled around, with its cloudless sky and soothing warmth, Dr. Heimler still hadn’t shown. I breathed a deep sigh of relief. I figured he’d been so busy he’d forgotten about Mama. I figured wrong.
    I’d just finished hanging the last of the clean clothes out on the line when I spotted that all-too-familiar blue Buick coming up the drive. I grabbed the laundry basket and took off to the back porch to stand with Mama. I prayed he hadn’t seen me take off across the yard. Theroar of the car’s engine grew louder as it approached the front of the house. Then came a shrill squeak from the brakes and the engine went silent.
    For a moment, I could only hear the rhythmic rocking of Mama’s chair and the rapid drumming of my own heart. In the quiet, both seemed louder than a marching band. One sound I could do nothing about, but the other I could. I gripped the back of Mama’s rocker to stop its movement.
    I pictured the doctor’s long body leaving his Buick. The slam of a car