As Bright as Heaven(52)

I’m so very sorry Charlie is ill, but I’m not sorry Dora Sutcliff couldn’t take Alex when Mama came down with the sickness. Alex doesn’t know her. She’s a stranger to him. It’s us who feel like family to him now.

Uncle Fred seems to have forgotten that three days ago he said that Alex had to go. Or maybe when he found out Charlie Sutcliff had the flu he realized our house is as safe as anywhere at the moment. I don’t care what his reason is for not demanding to know why Alex is still here. If Evie tries again to send Alex away, I’m going to take him and board the first train to Quakertown. He and I can wait out the flu in the curing barn among the leafy tobacco dresses. I dare anyone to send us back here if it comes to that.

Alex has just made a little cooing sound, and now he’s smiling at me, breaking the seal he has on the nipple of the bottle. A bit of milk dribbles down his chin. It’s like he knows I am thinking of him.

“You’re mine,” I whisper to him, and he smiles wider as I kiss his forehead. I let my mind pretend that I am eighteen, not thirteen, and I’m married to someone kind and brave like Jamie Sutcliff and Alex is our child. We live in a big house in the country with lots of apple trees. And there is no war and no flu.

Willa’s voice above slices into my imaginings. She is calling out for Evie to come to take her to the toilet. I can do that for Evie. Alex is fed and has a clean diaper, and Evie’s been up all night with Mama. I don’t think Willa is in danger of giving the flu to anyone anymore, but she still can’t walk more than a few paces without help.

I make a cozy place for Alex on a blanket by the hearth, surrounding him with toys and the fronts of picture books that I set up against the side of the bureau drawer I’ve been using for his crib. He likes all the pictures on the book covers. He kicks his legs and tries to punch the pictures with his little fists. He thinks they are real and that if he just tries hard enough he can pluck them off.

At the second-floor landing, I see that Evie has just emerged from Mama’s room. The door is partially open and her hand is still on the knob. Evie pulls down her mask. She looks terrible.

“What are you doing up here?” she says.

“I can help Willa to the toilet. I’m sure it’s fine now if I go in. You can go back to bed if you want.”

Evie opens her mouth to answer me, and I bet she’s going to send me back downstairs, but it’s Mama’s voice that fills the little stretch of silence between my words and Evie’s.

“Maggie.” I know it’s Mama’s voice, but it sounds so strange. Like an old woman’s. Like a scary witch’s.

Evie turns toward the sound, and her eyes fill with tears.

I don’t know that voice and I take a step away from the door. Evie lays her hand on my arm as if to stop me from running away.

“Maggie,” Mama says again, in a whispery growl.

I look up at Evie.

“Just stay by the entrance,” she says.

And then Evie crosses the hall to Willa’s room.

I take a step toward Mama’s door and then another one. I push it open, and as my eyes adjust to the dimness, I see that Mama is propped up with pillows. Her hair is slick with sweat, and she’s as pale as Alex’s dead mother. Her skin is splotched with dark spots that look like berry stains. I cannot take another step.

She turns her head toward me and raises a hand. “Don’t come any closer, Maggie.” Mama’s voice floats across the room to me like fireplace smoke. I don’t think she realizes I am frozen where I stand by the sight of her. Something heavy is swelling inside me, ballooning like bread dough. It feels like fear, and yet it’s bigger than fear.

“Are you feeling better?” These words tumble out of my mouth because I woke up thinking she would be. She should be. But I don’t think she is. I don’t think she is feeling better.

“Maggie, listen to me,” Mama says, and then she coughs into a handkerchief spotted with something dark. I don’t want to think about what has made those marks.

“Maybe you should rest, Mama.” The heavy thing inside me wants to push me out the door and back down to the sitting room where Alex is cooing and kicking and trying to grab happy pictures off the covers of books.

“Listen.” Mama takes away the cloth from her face. “You did the right thing, Maggie. That baby . . . he would have died if not for you. You did the right thing. I should have told you that the first day. I’m sorry. . . .”

Her words fall away and a barking cough takes their place. I can’t think of a thing to say. I want to reply, “It’s all right, Mama. I’m not mad at you. You don’t have to say you’re sorry.” But it’s like there’s a door at the back of my throat where the words get out and it has just slammed shut.

“Tell your papa I said that,” she says. “Tell him I want the baby to stay. I want him to be ours.”

Why can’t you tell him? These five words just won’t come. I think them but I cannot say them.

“I want you all to raise him and care for him and never let him think for a moment that there was a time when someone did not love him,” Mama says. “All the love you still hold in your heart for Henry, you give it to that little boy. Will you do that?”

Tears are spilling down my cheeks. I want to say yes. I want to say, “Stop talking like that!” Nothing gets past that door in my throat except a sob. Just one.