Free The Widows of Wichita County by Jodi Thomas

soon as possible. It’s not healthy to keep them around making you sad and all. Bill could probably wear some of those golf shirts on his Saturday runs. They’re not real strict about the uniform then.”
    â€œHarry is J.D.’s shoe size,” Paula interrupted. “Don’t go giving his shoes away until Harry tries them on. We’ll be over first thing tomorrow, too.”
    Helena closed her eyes, thinking of something J.D. used to say. “Even the bottom of the gene pool rises after a rain.” It must have flooded the day she conceived. Though she loved her daughters dearly, they were a trial. Paula forever bossy, Patricia forever needy.
    Both always wanted to help her. They meant well, but Helena hated discussing decisions that were hers to make. J.D. understood that about her. She was a woman who knew her own mind and did not need to take a poll to determine her actions.
    â€œWhat are you going to do with all those hats he’s got?” Patricia shook her head. “They’re not even proper to give the Salvation Army—the ones he wore in the Marines. You know, the ones he always made us call ‘covers’ instead of hats.”
    Paula snorted a laugh. “Can’t you just see the homeless wandering the streets wearing a colonel’s hat? And the old things he wore to watch birds wouldn’t be fit for fishing.”
    Helena had had enough. She headed toward the door.
    Like puppies hearing the paper being rolled, both girls looked suddenly guilty. “We’re sorry, Momma,” they chimed. “We didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”
    Both opened their arms to hug Helena, but then decided it would be safer to hug each other. Between ample bodies and ample breasts, they looked like huge Humpty Dumpty toys trying to dance but only succeeding in wobbling.
    â€œI’m really going to miss the old guy,” Paula cried on her sister’s shoulder. “He wasn’t so bad once we got used to the sin of Momma marrying him.”
    Paula never missed a chance to remind Helena that she and J.D. were first cousins. Everyone in town seemed to have forgotten except “One-track Paula.”
    â€œI’ll miss him, too,” Patricia added, but from the confused expression in her eyes, she couldn’t remember any sin. “Even if I didn’t understand what he was talking about half the time. He was always naming some place I never heard of like it was important and I should drop everything and go home and look it up on a map.”
    â€œGood night, girls.” Helena held the door open as her offspring hurried out. They were her flesh and blood. The only part of her that would live on in this world. But they did not hold her heart. No one had until J.D.
    Both daughters stood on the front step when she spoke again. “No one…I repeat, no one, touches J.D.’s things.”
    They looked at her as if they felt sorry for their mother’s inability to face the facts.
    Helena tried to keep her anger in check. “If either of you do, you will never be welcome in this house again.”
    â€œOh, Momma, you don’t mean…”
    â€œI mean every word. J.D.’s things stay untouched.” Helena closed the door, wishing she could talk to her daughters without getting angry.
    She walked slowly up the staircase to the bedroom that had been hers and J.D.’s for over ten years. His things surrounded her. Welcomed her. She closed her eyes and relaxed for the first time since the call from the hospital.
    His robe hung on the door, his reading glasses were on an open book, his running shoes lay between the chairs by the window. He couldn’t be gone. She could still smell him near. Still feel the warmth of his gaze watching her. Sometimes when they were sitting side by side, paying no attention to one another as they read or watched the birds, Helena would match her breathing to his. If she were still enough she