Free Eden Hill by Bill Higgs

Evangelical Baptist Church.

    Mavine hated washdays. Even with the help of her shiny new Maytag, it meant a long day. This morning’s snow made matters worse. Instead of drying the laundry outside, she would have to use the indoor clothesline. It sagged in the middle, so she would have to hang her dresses on the ends. Andsomehow, a porch decked with dangling underthings was just inappropriate in a way the line in the yard wasn’t. On top of it all, there were seemingly endless loads of ironing.
    She sighed and turned to the domestic task at hand. Virgil would be home for lunch soon, and she’d need to have something ready for him to eat. Or, like Vee, he could fend for himself at his noon meal. Mavine looked at the basket of dirty clothes, and out the window at the snow that was still coming down. With a twist of the taps she turned on the water, measured some Oxydol in a tin cup, and started tossing soiled things from the wicker basket into the Maytag. Lunch would just have to wait. The laundry certainly wasn’t going to wash itself.
    As the last of the basket’s contents disappeared into the sudsy water, her nose began to tingle from a pungent odor. An acrid, smoky scent. Had she left the iron plugged in after pressing her clean things? Mavine raced up the stairs in a panic.
    The scent was strong as she rounded the landing. When she reached the upstairs hallway, the source was clear. Wisps of gray smoke were curling from beneath Vee Junior’s bedroom door. Mavine flew into the room in a panic.
    “Virgil T. Osgood Jr.! What are you doing!”
    The cigar was fat, brown, and smelly. Vee was startled, wide-eyed, and in serious trouble. Mavine promptly snatched the abomination from the boy’s mouth and, holding the disgusting thing at arm’s length, marched it to the bathroom and dropped it into the toilet. It sizzled as she pushed the handle, hoping it wouldn’t clog the plumbing.
    She took a deep breath and strode back into Vee’s room, where she discovered him on his bed, shoulders crumpled, cowed and contrite. A cigar! How could he do such a thing? With effort, she tried to remain patient and calm.
    “Vee, you know better than this. I’ll decide later on your punishment, but I can tell you this. Your snow day that you were so happy about is going to be a reading day. Frank and Eddie will be riding their sleds without you today.”
    “Aw, Mom.”
    “And just wait until your father gets home.”
    Mavine descended the stairs one slow, deliberate step at a time. Doing laundry could sour even her best mood. It could also set her mind to wandering in places it shouldn’t go. About what was, and what might have been. Maybe it was just the Clorox. And now she had this discipline matter to contend with.
    Mavine paused and scanned her bookshelf, looking for the punishment to fit the crime. She considered reading the classics a positive discipline for Vee. Virgil, on the other hand, usually considered a trip behind the henhouse more appropriate when needed.
    She’d always hoped to become a teacher. An English teacher. Reading and literature had been her best subjects in school. Straight A’s in both. Mrs. Randall had introduced her to the classics, and she’d been smitten from the first day. Mrs. Tandy, the librarian at the little four-room high school, would bring her books from the public library in Quincy. And when the bookmobile came once a month, the appearance of the little white panel truck was the highlight of theweek. Some of the other students had teased her, called her “teacher’s pet.” But she didn’t mind.
    She wanted to go to the teachers college. She wanted to be the next Mrs. Randall.
    And then she fell in love, and the war came. Marriage. A son.
    A son who couldn’t care less about the classics, and apparently preferred stogies to fine literature. Mavine returned to the kitchen and sank into the chair with her head in her hands.

    Virgil’s morning had been busy. By the time he broke for lunch,