Free In the Company of Crazies by Nora Raleigh Baskin

Simone stepped forward as if he had something to say about that, but Gretchen raised her hand like a traffic cop.
    Tommy and Carl looked at each other and then smiled. “Yup,” they both said.
    The fireplace crackled. Gretchen leaned forward in her chair, which was really so much bigger than she was. She lowered her voice.
    “Do you think it is really very important to me that you were smoking a cigarette?” she asked. “Do you think you are the first or will be the last teenage boys to think smoking a cigarette is a cool thing to do?”
    Tommy and Carl looked confused about how exactly to answer that. In normal circumstances it would be advisable not to answer, but this was Gretchen, and not answering was not an option.
    “No,” Tommy started slowly.
    “Uh, no,” Carl agreed.
    Gretchen leaned back again. She pulled her sweater around her. She closed her eyes a moment, but everyone knew she wasn’t done. When she opened them again, she began. “But to throw a lit cigarette into a ravine of dry leaves. Next to a barn.” She took a breath. She shook her head as if she was thinking of the possibilities. “Next to my barn.”
    Carl and Tommy both dropped their eyes. They knew they were finished.
    “My husband built that barn,” Gretchen went on. “Many years ago.”
    I had never heard Gretchen or anyone speak about a husband. I hadn’t seen anyone who might be a husband. The only men at Mountain Laurel were Sam and Mr. Simone. It was hard to imagine Gretchen as someone who had ever been young, let alone married and in love. Harder to imagine someone in love with her. But I guess she was, and I guess whoever had built this whole place and even planted those pine trees up on the hill had done it with love. Gretchen and her husband had probably dreamed of watching the saplings grow into a forest. Maybe they dreamed of growing old together and sitting in this living room, just the two of them, with the fire keeping them warm.
    I looked around the room. But it sure didn’t turn out that way, did it?
    “Never,” Gretchen said suddenly. “Never again will you be so thoughtless and selfish as to jeopardize this land or this house or anything or anyone here. If you want to smoke, smoke. I can’t stop you, either of you. Nobody can stop you if you want to continue such a dirty, foolish habit. It will be your choice. But not here. Not in my house.”
    Gretchen stood up. She looked tired. As soon as she left the room, Carl and Tommy took off. Mr. Simone let out a deep breath. He nodded to Karen, who simply nodded back, and then he left as well.
    * * *
    “Did Gretchen’s husbanddie?”
    Karen and I were peeling carrots. Gretchen said everyone at Mountain Laurel was expected to contribute by way of regular chores and duties, but I had a feeling she had just made that up on the spot. Gretchen was real good at coming up with longtime rules and procedures whenever anyone looked like they were wandering, even for a second.
    I suppose I had been wandering. The next thing I knew I was peeling carrots with Karen. Maggie had left a list of predinner preparations.
    “Yes,” Karen answered. “Just a couple of years ago. They were married forty-nine years and were still in love. It was very sad.”
    It was hard for me to feel anything right then. I couldn’t get the image of a bossy, cranky old woman out of my mind. Maybe his death had changed her. Maybe she had once been more lovable.
    “He was the complete opposite of Gretchen,” Karen went on. “He was silly and easygoing. He was always making jokes that made Gretchen laugh when she didn’t want to.”
    Guess not.
    “I cared for him very deeply. After I got divorced, Gretchen and Peter became family to me. They offered me a job and a place to live. I’ve been teaching here ever since.
    “When was that?” I asked.
    Karen stopped what she was doing to answer me. She put down her knife. So I stopped to listen.
    “Seventeen years ago,” Karen said after a while, as if