Prayers and Lies (39 page)

“Bethany Marie,” she hissed. “You keep your voice down, you hear me? Your mama needs her sleep now. She don’t need you two up here yellin’ at each other.”

She set down the plate and sodas, plopped herself onto Reana Mae’s bed, and held out her arms to us.

“Now, then, you two are going to sit right down here beside old Aunt Belle and tell her what’s goin’ on.”

“Nothing’s going on,” I started, but she cut me off.

“Bethany Marie Wylie, I done changed your diapers when you was a baby—and yours, too, Reana Mae. I know when something’s wrong with my girls, and I damn well know when I’m bein’ lied to.”

So we sat, one on either side of her, eating peanut butter crackers in silence. Finally, Reana Mae said very softly, “It’s all my fault, Aunt Belle. It’s my fault Tracy is dead.”

Aunt Belle said nothing. She just brushed some crumbs from her waist and waited for Reana Mae to go on.

So Reana told her, she told her the whole truth. How she’d called Paul and asked him for help with her math homework. How she’d flirted and kissed him and teased him till he got undressed. How she knew when Tracy would be home to walk in on them. How Tracy’s face had looked when she saw Reana Mae and Paul together.

“Oh, Lord, child.” Belle sighed. “That ain’t good.”

Then I told the rest. About Tracy running down the street and Brian trying to stop her. And about how Tracy threw herself directly at the train.

Then we sat in silence for a long time, until Aunt Belle pulled both of us into a strong, warm hug and said, “Now listen here, you two. It’s time you know the truth. I told Helen and Jimmy years ago you ought to know, but they didn’t want to tell. Not that I fault them, mind you. They thought they were doin’ the best thing. But these lies and secrets have tore this family apart, and it’s time to set it all straight.”

Reana Mae and I stared at her. What lies and secrets?

Belle pulled her ample weight farther up onto the bed and settled herself against Reana Mae’s pillow, leaned against the headboard.

“Bethany,” she said firmly, “go get my bourbon and a glass with some ice. This here is gonna take a while.”

34
Secrets Told

“D
id your mama ever tell you about her daddy?” Aunt Belle asked, after sipping her bourbon for a few minutes.

“Just that he wasn’t very nice,” I said. “And that he drank too much.”

Reana Mae and I were both in our nightgowns, snuggled in on either side of Belle.

“Well, now, I reckon that’s the understatement of the century.” Belle smiled. “Danny O’Shea was purely wicked. He drank like a fish, and when he was good and drunk, he’d beat your grandma and your mama and her little brother. Parker’s his name.”

“I didn’t know Aunt Helen had a brother,” Reana Mae said. “What happened to him?”

“Just wait, child, just wait. I’ll get to that.”

She took a long drink and set the glass on the nightstand.

“Well, ole Danny, now, he was a handsome devil. Tall, dark hair like your mama’s, and slick. Oh, he was real slick. He liked to drink, and he liked to gamble, and he liked his women. Had a whole string of ’em. The cheaper they was, the better he liked ’em. Nearly drove his poor wife to distraction. Olivia, that was her name. Olivia Harte, from down to Hurricane. Now, Olivia, she came from a real good family. Her daddy had a farm, and Olivia grew up knowin’ how to work hard.

“Danny came into town when she was about fifteen years old. He was a salesman, in his twenties, I guess. And he looked at Olivia, and probably he looked at her daddy’s farm, and he wanted ’em both. So he convinced that little girl to run off and get married.

“Well, Olivia’s daddy wasn’t havin’ none of that. He told her she was dead to him, and he never let her come home again. I thought that was right mean, myself. Can’t reckon on how a man could do that to his own child, especially with her bein’ so young. But he was a Christian man, I guess, and he had his principles. Leastways, that’s what Olivia said.

“So now here’s poor Olivia married to a travelin’ salesman. He moved her up to Huntington, where he lived, and got her pregnant right off. And that was your mama,” she said, smiling down at me. “That was poor Helen.

“And then, two, three years later came Parker. Lord, he was a beautiful child. Like Helen, only chubby, with real dark eyes.”

Belle sighed, closing her eyes for a minute.

“But what Olivia didn’t know when she married Danny was, his family had bad blood.”

She paused again, then looked into my eyes.

“You know about bad blood?”

Reana Mae nodded, her eyes wide, but I could only stare in horror. I’d heard of bad blood before, but not in my family … not in Mother’s family!

“Well, Danny’s mama, her name was Myra, she was the first one I know about for sure. Though I hear tell Myra’s granny had the bad blood, too. I heard lots of stories about her, too. But Myra, that one I can tell you about for sure.

“Myra married Michael O’Shea, you see. Michael ran a ferry service on the river. He was a good man, Michael. I knew him a lotta years, and he was a real good man. Did the best he could by his family. Worked hard, read the Bible. But he was a joker, too. Liked a good joke. Kinda like Brother Harley that way.”

“But, Aunt Belle,” I interrupted her. “I thought Mother’s grandparents were named Michael and LucyAnne.”

“Well, you got it partly right. LucyAnne was Michael’s second wife. And she’s the one that was so good to Helen. Took her in just like she was her own daughter. Helped make Helen’s wedding dress, when Helen married Jimmy.”

She sighed, smiling. “LucyAnne was a real good woman. But she wasn’t Helen’s blood grandma. Danny’s mother was Myra. Myra McCoy O’Shea. And she was … well, she was touched in the head. No two ways about it. She had bad blood.

“Ole Myra, why, she beat her boys black and blue. Beat ’em for nothin, just ’cause she felt like it. She drank whiskey and smoked a pipe and she swore like a sailor. Not at first, of course. When Michael first married her, I guess she was right enough. But after her boys was born, she was possessed by the devil hisself.

“I heard one time she took Danny and strung him up by his feet in the barn ’cause she couldn’t find her pipe. Left him hangin’ there for hours, till Michael came home and cut him down. The boy was halfway dead, they said. She strung him upside down and beat him with a horsewhip till he bled near to death.

“Another time, she took them out on the ferry, her own two sons, when they was just little ’uns, and threw ’em both into the water. They’da drowned if their daddy hadn’t come just in time.

“And she just got worse as she got older. She used to stroll down the road stark naked sometimes. Naked as a jaybird! Folks on the river called her Crazy Myra, but someone always brought her home when she did that.

“Well, finally, she went too far. She shot her younger boy. Elbe was his name. Shot him right in the back with a shotgun. No particular reason she could give. She just shot him, then sat herself down and drank whiskey.”

I shook my head, trying to take it all in.

“So,” Belle continued, “they put her away. Put her in jail for murderin’ her own child. And she died there, a year or so later. She hanged herself. That’s when Michael married LucyAnne. And LucyAnne was a good woman. She loved Michael and she tried to take care of Danny, too. But Danny, well he had the same bad blood.”

She shook her head darkly.

“Danny strangled a boy one time ’cause he didn’t like the way he was lookin’ at him. Michael got him off that time. Paid the sheriff some money, told him Danny was in a sorry state, on account of his mama’s death. Paid the dead boy’s family something, too. But Danny had the blood.

“So now Danny marries Olivia and they have Helen and Parker. But Danny, he’s drinkin’ heavy and he loses his job. So he drinks some more and he beats his family. He keeps gettin’ jobs, mind you, ’cause he’s so danged handsome and slick. But he can’t keep ’em, ’cause he’s such a drunk.

“So poor Olivia, she sends the babies away. Sends Parker down to Georgia, to stay with a cousin. And she sends Helen to stay with Michael and LucyAnne on the river. That’s when Helen and Jimmy met, you see.”

She frowned slightly. “I was against the marriage at first, on account of the bad blood in Danny’s family. But what could I do? Jimmy loved her true, and Helen … well, there’s not a bad thing anyone can ever say ’bout Helen. She’s as good as the day is long.”

“What happened to Parker?” I asked.

“Poor Parker, he got the bad blood, too. He stayed down in Georgia for a long time … years, I guess. Olivia kept him down there till Danny had left for good. And when she got him back, he was … odd. Just odd, that’s all. He couldn’t hardly talk. He mumbled and sometimes he’d holler, but he never made any sense. And he had that same devil’s temper. Killed a cat one time, just for fun. Beat it to death with a rock. That about killed poor Olivia. She loved little animals.

“But she kept Parker with her till she died. He ain’t never worked at all. Can’t get a job. Still can’t hardly talk. And still just as mean as a snake.”

“He’s still alive?” I asked, surprised.

“Well, yes he is, darlin’. He lives in a hospital down to Georgia, a hospital run by the state, where he can’t hurt nobody. He’s been there since poor Olivia died. I pay for it, of course. I told Helen when Olivia died, I said, ‘You’re my family, just like Jimmy is. And family takes care of their own.’ Yes sirree, I pay for ole Parker to stay in that hospital.”

She paused to drink from her glass.

“So you see now, there’s bad blood in Helen’s family. Her grandma and her daddy and her brother, too. So we was always real concerned about her kids, you know … about you girls. Her and me, we always watched real close, lookin’ for signs of the blood. Now Jimmy, he just laughed at us. Told us there’s no such thing as bad blood. But your mama knew there was.

“And we worried ’bout poor Tracy. We worried even when she was a little thing. Her fits just weren’t right. You know that, Bethany. She had her Grandpa Danny’s temper. Course, she held herself together for a while, I’ll say that for her. Your mama and daddy loved her and tried to raise her up right, and that’s why she could. But in the end, that bad blood was in her veins. Ain’t nothin’ anyone could do about it.”

She looked at Reana Mae then and took her chin in her hand.

“Ain’t nothin’ you did, and nothin’ you coulda done, to make her do what she did. Tracy had the O’Shea blood, like ole Myra. Sooner or later, she’da done it, or worse. And it ain’t your fault.”

Then she turned to me.

“Nor your fault, neither,” she said firmly.

We sat in silence for a while, letting it all sink in. Finally, I asked what I’d been wondering.

“Do I have the bad blood, too?”

“Lord, no! You ain’t got it any more than Helen does.”

“But if I have a baby, will she have it?”

“Well, now, Bethy, that I don’t know. I just don’t rightly know.”

She shifted uncomfortably, then said, “I know Helen and Jimmy already told Nancy about it. They told her before she got married. Said they thought she ought to know the truth, just in case.

“And you, too,” she said, turning to Reana Mae. “You got to know, too.”

Reana looked at her in confusion. “But I ain’t related to Helen’s family. I’m only related through Jimmy.”

“Well, now.” Belle shifted again. “That’s where you’re wrong, Reana Mae. That’s where you’re dead wrong.”

We both stared at her, not understanding.

“It’s your grandpa.” Belle sighed, looking down at her hands.

“You mean Ray?” Reana asked. “But Ray’s not related to Helen.”

“Not Ray, child,” Belle said. “Your other grandpa … Jolene’s daddy.”

“You know my mama’s father?” Reana Mae whispered. “Why didn’t you never tell me? Why didn’t you tell Mama? She always wondered, you know. She always wanted to know who her daddy was.”

“Well, we thought it best not to tell.”

“We who, Belle? Who else knew?”

“Helen, honey. Helen and Jimmy knew, and they told me.”

“But why didn’t they tell Mama? Why didn’t Aunt Helen never tell her?”

“I expect she didn’t want to cause Jolene no more pain. Helen always looked out for Jolene, you know. Loved her like a sister, really. And she surely didn’t want to cause her no more pain.”

I leaned forward slowly. My head ached, but I could see it now, like a puzzle coming together piece by piece. Why Mother had always loved Jolene so—like a sister, Aunt Belle said. Why she had taken Reana Mae in. Why she cared about them so much.

“It was Danny,” I said. “Danny was Jolene’s daddy.”

“Aunt Helen’s daddy?” Reana Mae said, puzzled. “Danny, who is Aunt Helen’s daddy, is my mama’s daddy, too?”

“That’s right, Reana Mae.” Belle nodded solemnly. “Danny O’Shea was a bad man, and he done some real bad things. But what he done to your Grandma EmmaJane … well, I guess that was just about the worst.”

“That’s right.”

We all jumped. Mother’s voice carried soft but clear across the room. None of us had heard her come up the stairs.

Her face was white and her eyes glistened, but she seemed calm. She walked to the bed, sat down, reached for Reana Mae’s hands and held them tightly in her own. “Your grandfather was my father. He met EmmaJane when she was just sixteen, and he got her pregnant.”

“Your daddy had an affair with my grandmother?”

“It wasn’t an affair, Reana. It was rape. My father raped Emma-Jane.”

Reana Mae stared at her.

“When I was fifteen, my father had been out of work for almost a year. We were living in Charleston, and he was drinking a lot, all the time really. He’d come home almost every night drunk and loud and mean. Mother was worried about Parker and me, so she sent us away. Parker went to Georgia, and I went to stay with my grandparents on the river. They knew about his drinking, and they tried to help Mother as best they could.

“So I moved to the river and helped out in the boardinghouse. I didn’t even go home for Christmas. I worried about Mother all the time, but I couldn’t write to her, because she didn’t want Daddy to know where I was. It was the loneliest time of my life.