Hung Out to Die (15 page)

“What about other things you heard about your mama and daddy?” Luke said. “May and Henry, that is.”

“Nothing from the Toadferns, except one night I overheard Aunt Clara ranting and raving that it was wicked of Mamaw Toadfern to cut me off, blaming me in Mama's stead for my daddy running off. And the Toadferns—except for a few cousins—have had nothing to do with me until this Thanksgiving. But even Sally hasn't ever said anything about my daddy—not that she'd remember anything, either, since she's my age—or passed on any comments from other family members.”

“What about people in town? I mean, we all ended up thinking of Clara and Horace as your parents, but . . .” he shrugged. I knew what the shrug meant. People talk. People judge. People get bored and stir up trouble where there's no need for any.

I told him about that morning's visit from the antique dealers. Then I went ahead and told him about Thanksgiving dinner at Mamaw Toadfern's and about Uncle Fenwick, leaving out the particularly upsetting details about how he'd been both semi-hung and stabbed.

Luke expressed his shock and then, after he'd had a chance to process the news, he said, “You know, the early days for Greta and me were great at this motel. Families came and stayed so they could go over to Licking Creek Lake, especially when it was newly made. There were more businesses and jobs in the area, too, and people came here to visit their families. You don't remember those days.”

I didn't say anything. I'd been born well after those days were over. From the stories of Paradise's old days, by the time I was born, the town had long since peaked.

“We still get families, of course, but . . . well, what I'm saying is Greta and I, to stay in business, we've learned to take seriously ‘judge not lest ye be judged.' To not question who's checking in from around here—and with who, if you know what I mean.”

I knew. I also knew Luke and Greta had a reputation for never gossiping about their customers. The only dirty laundry I ever got from them was, well, actual dirty laundry. Their tight-lipped-ness helped keep them in business.

“Some folks have judged us harshly for that, though. One was your mama and Uncle Horace's daddy.”

I lifted my eyebrows at that. I'd never known my granddaddy on either side of my family—or my Mamaw on my mother's side. These elders had all died before I was born. And, come to think of it, my Uncle Horace never talked about his parents. Uncle Horace was also a man of very few words.

“Your grandfather, Lionel Foersthoefel, was a stern man. Told me many a time at church I should run the sinners out of the rooms. I always just told him it wasn't my place to judge—or to poke my nose into who was meeting who. He was exceptionally stern, and that can have strange effects on children, well after they've grown up. Whenever I saw your Uncle Horace, he seemed quiet and enduring, no matter what was going on around him, and after several encounters with his father, I realized why.”

I nodded, understanding that Luke had just given a perfect description of how my uncle had always approached life.

“And for his much younger sister—your mama—it meant, well, a wild, rebellious streak. Your daddy was a wild one, too—mostly because of competing with your Uncle Fenwick and never quite feeling he measured up. When your mama and your daddy got together, everyone thought that would settle them both down. They'd both broken a lot of hearts and sowed a lot of wild oats.”

Luke paused and looked away. Finally, he looked back at me. He looked sorrowful about what he was going to say.

“Josie, from my experience one of two things can happen when you put two fiery people together like your parents. They can either help calm each other down. Or . . . they can flare up. Combust.”

“And I take it my parents combusted?”

He sighed. “They were so much in love—everyone could see that. But they never quite . . . settled down. There were fights. Things they did to try to hurt one another, to get back at each other. And they ended up hurting a lot of people in the process.”

I set the coffee mug on the table. I could feel bile trying to rise up in my throat. I swallowed, my stomach curling. I remembered how flirtatious Mama had been toward Uncle Fenwick, how annoyed my daddy had looked, how red Uncle Fenwick had turned, how scared Aunt Nora had looked, how angry Mamaw had been. And I remembered Mama's references to C. J. Worthy, Chief John Worthy's daddy and to Lorraine's husband, Roy.

Had Mama had an affair with Uncle Fenwick? Or with other men?

Had Daddy had affairs, too, maybe to get back at her for her infidelity?

Or had she had affairs to get back at him for his infidelity?

Was any of that connected with Uncle Fenwick's murder . . . or why someone had called in a tip that pointed to Daddy as his killer?

“Who all did they hurt?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady. And failing.

But Luke shook his head. “You'll have to ask your mama and daddy about that. Don't know that they'll tell you. I don't know the whole truth, anyway. I just know I heard lots of talk, and saw each of them around here a few times not with each other. After all these years, I'm truly not sure I remember who they were with.

“I'm just telling you, as someone who cares a lot about you, that your mama and daddy can turn on the charm. But together, they can be like fire and oil—one makes the other burn higher and brighter, and people around them get burned. Be careful, Josie. I don't want to put your parents down—they are who they are—but fire doesn't know—or care—who or what it's burning. And I just—”

Suddenly, Luke stopped, his eyes wide. I turned around. There stood Mama, in the doorway, looking angry. How much had she overheard?

But I was suddenly angry, too. “Mama, why didn't you ring the bell?”

She ignored me, glaring at Luke. “Did you know you left the door between the check-in desk in that pathetic excuse for a lobby and your office wide open? And that your voice carries, Mr. Gettlehorn?”

Primly, she added, “I've left the key to our stuffy little room on your counter. Believe me, I won't be recommending this place in the future FleaMart brochures!”

11

Mama did not speak to me all the way from the Red Horse Motel to the tiny Paradise jail, where she visited with Daddy and made sure he was okay. Other than being rattled and whiny, he was. I'd taken the opportunity to go out in the hallway and call Cherry and leave a message asking if she could possibly keep an eye on Mama after we were back from Stillwater.

Mama didn't speak to me all the way up to Stillwater.

In the parking lot, I said, “I have to go to this meeting. You'll just have to come in with me . . .”

“I don't want to. Why didn't you just leave me at your apartment?”

“I told you, I think you'll be, um, safer if you're not alone.”

“I'll wait here.” She crossed her arms.

Right. Like I would leave her alone here at Stillwater, where my cousin Guy and other autistic adults lived. If she got out and wandered into the general meeting room where group activities took place, who knows what she might do? She could upset lots of people . . .

But she looked at me, her eyes wide. “Please, Josie, I'm just really tired. And I need a break from people. I'll take a nap.”

“It's starting to snow,” I said impatiently, gesturing at the windshield to the lazily drifting flurries outside. “You'll be cold. Come on.”

“I have this thick coat,” she said, wrapping her mink more tightly around her. “And there's a quilt in the backseat, I noticed.” Her eyes got even wider. I felt my heart soften.

“I bet you carry it for emergencies,” she said. It was true. My van was, thankfully, reliable, but before it I had a car that broke down often, so I got in the habit of keeping an old quilt in my vehicle. If my vehicle broke down while it was cold, I'd stay warm. If it was hot, I could sit outside on the grass while waiting for AAA without my thighs getting itchy. “You always were a smart girl, Josie. Very smart,” she said.

I know, I know. And yet, I felt myself falling for it. What kid—even a twenty-nine-year-old kid who was abandoned years ago by both parents—doesn't love compliments?

She picked up a book from the stack at her feet—returns I meant to take to the bookmobile the next week when Winnie was back and making her appointed stops.

“Oh, look! An Anne George mystery! Ooh, I just love that series, too,” Mama gushed.

Did she? Or had she just read the author's name off the most recent title I'd checked out—
Murder Boogies with Elvis
?

But then she said, “I just loved the one where Mouse and Sister went down to the condo in Destin, Florida, didn't you?” That did it. My resistance was mostly down. Here was my fifty-something mama, looking like a little girl in her fur, having complimented my intelligence, gushing over one of the most beloved aspects of my life—books—practically begging to be tucked in with a quilt so she could read.

Then she said, in a hushed voice, “And I haven't read this one yet.”

That did it. I trusted her to stay in the van, snug in her fur and quilt, reading.

“What do you suppose the meeting is going to be about?” asked Nellie Kaiser, who was sitting next to me at one of the tables in the cafeteria. We each had Styrofoam cups of coffee.

I didn't really want any coffee, but I'd gotten some anyway, mostly just to have something warm to hold on to, something to do with my nervousness. Nellie, whose son was also one of the full-time residents, had already drunk her coffee, and was tearing off bits of the rim of the cup, and making a tidy pile of the Styrofoam shards.

Our nervousness had nothing to do with the caffeine in our cups. Meetings like this at Stillwater were rare. We knew the announcement had to be something important, but we didn't know what.

Stillwater was so important to us and our loved ones. When people hear the phrase—a residential home for adults with autism—the reactions vary. How sad, many say. Can't they be mainstreamed? others say, a little outraged, having read reports of the progress made with children with autism.

But the fact is, the adults at Stillwater have severe cases of autism. Many, like my cousin Guy, who is in his midforties, were children in an era that didn't understand autism nearly as well as it is understood now—not that it is currently a fully understood condition. Living at home with one or two caretakers would be difficult for all concerned—sure, it was possible to do, but would the adults with autism really blossom as they did here?

The answer was no. Stillwater is a special place. It is anything but depressing—in fact, it's one of the most uplifting places I know. The adults who live there are nurtured to be the best individuals they can be, not in spite of their autism, but simply because the leaders of Stillwater understand the residents in their care are, first and foremost, individuals. The autism is never ignored, but it's not the sole focus of how Stillwater's residents' lives are organized.

It's kind of like going with the current, instead of against it, in a journey down a river.

And that's important, because autism doesn't have just one face. In fact, in the United States alone, as many as one and a half million children and adults are thought to have autism. And autism is unique to each person because it's a neurological disorder that presents as a developmental disability on a whole spectrum from mild, moderate to severe. So autism manifests itself as uniquely as fingerprints. Of course, just as all fingerprints have certain characteristics, so does autism—difficulties with speech, with interrelationships, with repetitive behaviors, with eye contact, with change, with motor skills. It's a complex disease, but just like with fingerprints, the loops and whorls of autism are unique to each individual.

For example, my cousin Guy loves to grow things, especially pumpkins. No one knows why. Does it really matter? He is encouraged, with guidance, to work in the greenhouse and gardens of Stillwater.

But he hates the color red. No one knows why. It doesn't really matter. And since no one at Stillwater in particular loves red, the color is kept to a minimum, and he's been taught techniques to follow when he sees red—such as focusing on his breathing. He also has minimal speech, so we communicate with him in other ways, in drawing.

Nellie's son, Stuart, on the other hand, has fairly good speaking skills, although a stilted, repetitive style. So during activities that bring the public to Stillwater—and Stillwater is lucky to be surrounded by a supportive, loving bunch of tiny communities and farms—he's usually the greeter at the annual harvest festival, etc., etc.

And he loves to calculate distances. Somehow he knows just how far it is from anywhere—no one has yet to stump him—to Stillwater or anywhere else. He's fascinated with maps. So he's allowed to study them, only not to be so obsessed with them that he doesn't do anything else.

But he seems to have no comprehension of time. The staff at Stillwater works with him on that.

Although Guy is a much older cousin, he is really emotionally like a younger brother to me. And for Nellie and me and the other parents or caregivers streaming in, Stillwater is like a big old extended family. We come from all walks of life, from nearby and far away, to this place to make sure our loved ones with autism find the shelter and support they need to function as fully as they can—more fully than they would in a traditional institution or even in our homes—and we support each other, calling and e-mailing and sharing laughter and tears. Just like a big old family.

“Have you been following the state budget-cut news?” Nellie asked.

I nodded. “I have. Scary.”

She nodded. We both knew quite well that Stillwater—though funded through private donations and trust funds from families of residents—also needed state funding. Yet, the state was cutting funding to any number of programs for the disabled, elderly, and poor.