The Light Through the Leaves(6)

“The boys told me what they do in their so-called Sunday school. Learning about Buddha, Jews, Muslims . . . Jasper even has a picture of an elephant god in his room! This is not a ‘church.’ It’s more like a cult!”

“You’d better not be telling that to my children. Jonah and I decided this together. We want them to find their own way with spirituality.”

“Don’t involve Jonah in it. It was your idea, and you know it. If he’d married a Christian woman, those children would know Our Lord Jesus Christ as their one and only Savior!”

Ellis supposed that was true. Raised by parents with implacable beliefs, Jonah had learned to go with the flow. If he’d married a woman with strong convictions about her children attending church—or synagogue, mosque, or temple—he’d have let her take them. His feelings about organized religion were ambivalent, and he was used to being steered.

“Don’t you see what you’ve done?” Mary Carol said.

Ellis certainly saw what she’d done. She saw it a hundred times a day. A little baby in a car carrier all alone in a forest.

“This terrible thing happened because you have no faith in the only God that can keep those babies out of Hell! Because you steered Jonah into your impiety! God took your baby to punish both of you.” Tears, real ones, swelled in Mary Carol’s eyes. “God is punishing me, too. And my husband. We should have tried harder to stop our son from marrying you. We’ll never see our only granddaughter again. What she suffered in life or death will forever torment us. We’re all going to be punished for the rest of our lives!”

Ellis could scarcely breathe.

Mary Carol’s blue eyes blazed with anguish. Ellis had never seen her reveal raw emotion so openly. But her mother-in-law quickly turned away, weeping as she returned to the boys.

When Ellis entered the kitchen, River and Jasper looked at their mother as if she were an evil witch. What else could transform their iron-willed grandma into that blubbering mess?

“It’s okay, Mom. I don’t mind going to church with Grandma,” Jasper said, playing mediator. “She said we have to pray for Viola to bring her back.”

“That won’t bring her back,” River scoffed.

“River! Have faith!” Mary Carol said.

“Why?” he said. “I don’t want her back. I hated her.”

“She’s your sister!” Ellis shouted. “How could you say that?” Silver dots filled her eyes. She lunged at a chair to slow her fall, but her head hit the side of the table, knocking her into darkness.





3


Jonah strode into the bedroom with her new prescription. Some kind of sedative. He sat on the side of the bed, holding out a pill and a glass of water.

“I told you I’m not taking that,” she said.

“The psychiatrist said you have to sleep and start eating. You have to reduce the stress.”

Ellis looked into his eyes. “A pill can’t fix what I’m going through, and you know it.”

The coldness of his gaze made her want to cry. But she tried to understand. He was grieving for his daughter as much as she was. And she was the one who had left their baby in the forest. The media certainly hadn’t left out that part of the story: Senator Bauhammer’s Granddaughter Taken When Mother Leaves Her in Forest.

Ellis tried to imagine what it was like for Jonah to go to the law firm every day. What could his coworkers say to him when his own wife had lost his baby? Maybe they avoided him because offering sympathy was too awkward.

Jonah held out the pill. “You have to take it. What if you’d passed out while you were driving with the boys?” He gestured with his chin at the bandage on the side of her forehead. “They said you’re lucky you didn’t hit harder.”

“I controlled the fall. I was only out for a few seconds.”

“My mother said it was longer.”

“She’s only saying that to justify calling 911. She shouldn’t have done that!”

“You fault her for that?” he said, an incredulous tone seeping through.

“Yes! Don’t you see? She’s trying to make it seem like I can’t handle my house and kids. You need to make her leave!”

“The boys told me everything that happened. You yelled at River. You made my mother cry. You threw the lunch she’d made into the garbage. Who’s the villain in this story, Ell? You or her?”

“Oh my god! Did you call me a ‘villain’?”

And he’d just come from Irene’s bed. Ellis was sometimes certain she could smell his lover on him, a scent that hung over him like a cloying cloud.

His expression softened when he saw her tears brimming. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have used such a strong word.”

“What word would you use?”

“I’m just saying, she had every right to call 911. You were acting irrational, you passed out, and your head was gushing blood. The boys were terrified.”

“She scared them more by calling the paramedics.”

His blue eyes went cold again.

“She’s making everything worse. Did you know she’s taking the boys to her church tomorrow?”

“So what? Maybe they need the comfort of church right now.”

“They have a church! I decide what my children need. I’m their mother. Do you remember that, Jonah? I’m their mother!”