Black Creek Crossing

Chapter 3

YRA SULLIVAN STRAIGHTENED UP, PRESSING HER left hand against the small of her own back to ease the pain. It had begun burning right after lunch, but she’d refused to give in to it until she finished the job at hand.

As the pain had spread from her back into her hips, then down her legs into her knees, she silently repeated Father Raphaello’s adage: “Pain is the reward of work well done.” Until today, she’d never quite understood what the seemingly self-contradictory words meant; after all, how could pain be a reward for anything? But now, as she gazed at the gleaming tile floor of the rectory’s kitchen, the meaning became clear, and she nodded with satisfaction.

There was not a smear anywhere on the bright yellow glaze of the tiles, nor the faintest stain in any of the grout between them. She’d spent the last three hours on her hands and knees cleaning those crevices between the tiles with more than a dozen solvents and bleaches. Sighing, she tossed the old toothbrush she’d used to scrub every inch of grout until every speck of mildew was gone into the wastebasket at the end of the sink. Tomorrow, she would start on the counter, but at least she could stand up for that job.

As she admired her work, the pain in her body began to ease, and she recalled Father Raphaello’s adage again. Though her body ached, her spirit was buoyed by the work she’d accomplished. Then, glancing at the clock, her spirits sank again. It was already five-fifteen. If she didn’t hurry, she wouldn’t have Marty’s dinner ready on time, and then it wouldn’t matter what Father Raphaello might have to say — she’d feel no satisfaction in anything for the rest of the night.

Gathering up the bottles of cleaning solvents, she packed them into the bucket and took them down to the basement. Then she left the rectory, by the outside steps, cutting across the backyard and through a gap in the hedge to the back of the duplex that faced onto the next street. Though the half of the duplex that she, Marty, and Angel lived in was cramped, at least they could afford it. Or they could afford it when Marty was working. When he wasn’t — which seemed to be most of the time lately — she was able to work off the rent by taking care of the rectory.

As she fit her key into the back door, Myra silently chided herself for what she’d just been thinking about Marty. After all, he’d been working for Jerry O’Donnell for three months now, and it looked like the job would be good for at least a year, maybe even a little more.

Count your blessings, she heard Father Raphaello whisper in her head.

But as the key stuck in the lock and she heard the phone ring, words rose in her mind that had nothing to do with blessings at all. She turned away from them before they were fully formed, just as she tried to turn away from all sin, no matter how slight.

She rattled the door, then banged on it loudly. A moment later, through the window, she saw Angel appear at the door that separated the kitchen from the living room. Her daughter hesitated, as if deciding which was more important, the phone or her mother, then picked up the phone, shrugging helplessly to her. A moment later Angel put the phone down on the kitchen counter, came to the door and opened it.

“It’s Aunt Joni,” Angel told her as Myra worked at loosening the jammed key.

Turning the job of getting the key out over to Angel, and glancing at the clock to see how much time she had before Marty came home, Myra picked up the receiver. “Joni? Is this important, or can I call you back?”

“I’ve found a house for you,” Joni Fletcher replied, eliciting a heavy sigh from her younger sister. “Just listen, all right? And despite what Father Raphaello might say, I’m not Satan, sent to tempt you.”

“He never said you were,” Myra said, opening the refrigerator to inspect its contents as she talked to Joni. “But covetousness is a sin, and how many times do I have to tell you that we can’t afford a house?” Finding nothing in the refrigerator that would please her husband, she nudged it closed with her hip. “We’ve got next to no—”

Her eyes fell on Angel then, trying to extract the key from the lock in the back door. “Just a moment, Joni.” Covering the receiver with her hand, she said, “Get the WD-40, downstairs, in the cupboard next to the washer.”

As Angel disappeared down the stairs to the basement, she turned her attention back to her sister. “Sorry, I just didn’t want Angel to start worrying. But we don’t have any money for a house, Joni. You keep finding houses, and I keep telling you — we’ve got next to nothing in the bank, and—”

“But you don’t need much! Not this time! And the house is perfect! It has three bedrooms and—” She stopped abruptly as Myra uttered a brittle laugh. “What, exactly, do you think is so funny about a three-bedroom house that’s only eighty-five thousand dollars?” she asked coolly when Myra’s laughter died away.

“I’m sorry I laughed,” Myra said. “But do you have any idea how many houses you’ve described as ‘perfect’? I think you need some new adjectives. Which, in our case, would be things like ‘cozy’—meaning ‘small’—and ‘fixer-upper’—meaning ‘falling-down wreck.’ ”

“Eighty-five thousand,” Joni repeated as Angel came back up from the basement with the can of WD-40. “And I think they’ll come down. Way down. And we both know Marty can fix anything he sets his mind to, as long as he—” She abruptly stopped again, but the last two words—“stays sober”—hung between the two women as clearly as if Joni had spoken them aloud.

“It’s all right, Joni,” Myra said as the silence threatened to get uncomfortable. “We both know what you were going to say. The sad part is, you’re right — not only about what you said, but what you didn’t say too. If he really wanted to, Marty could fix up the worst house you could find.”

“Myra, I’m telling you, this is the house!”

Myra paused as the words sank in. Joni had been calling her about houses for almost a year now, and she had actually gone to look twice. But the houses they could afford — assuming they could qualify for any kind of mortgage at all — were even worse than the duplex they were living in now. And the ones that Joni had described as “perfect” had always been so expensive that Myra hadn’t even bothered to go see them, certain they would only make her feel envious.

“It can’t hurt to look,” Joni said, as if sensing Myra’s reluctance, and Myra wondered how many times her sister had spoken those exact words to hesitant buyers, only to sell them houses a few hours later, whether they felt they could afford them or not. It wasn’t just persistence that had made Joni the most successful agent in her office; she also had an uncanny ability to sense exactly what a customer was looking for, and then find it for them.

“I don’t know,” she sighed. “It just seems like it’s not the right time.”

“It is the right time,” Joni Fletcher assured her. “I always know these things. I have a sixth sense about them. And I know this is the right house, at the right price. And I’m telling you, this one’s perfect for you. It’s not huge, but—”

“I’ll think about it, all right?” Myra broke in, knowing that once her sister got started, she could go on about a house for ten or twenty minutes. “I’ve got to get Marty’s dinner ready.”

“Okay,” Joni agreed reluctantly. “But if you don’t call me in the morning and tell me when you’re coming, I warn you — I’ll drive you crazy!”

“As if you don’t do that already!” Myra shot back, and hung up before her sister could get in another word.

She was rummaging in the pantry for something that might pass as dinner, and wishing for once she’d ignored her conscience and splurged on some steaks for Angel’s birthday, when she heard her daughter utter a frustrated yelp. “Can’t get it out?” Myra asked, not turning around.

“I–I broke it off,” Angel stammered, her voice quavering. “Daddy’ll—”

Abandoning the pantry, Myra hurried to her daughter and took the broken end of the key from her. “Your father won’t do anything at all,” she promised. “I’ll just call a locksmith and…” Her words died away as she saw that Angel’s body was shaking and tears were streaming down her face. “For heaven’s sake, Angel, don’t cry! It’s only a broken key — it’s not the end of the world.”

“It’s not that—” Angel began, her voice catching on a choking sob. “It’s just—” Her voice caught again, then she threw herself into her mother’s arms and her words tumbled out in rushing torrent. “I can’t do anything right! And I don’t have any friends, and I’m fat, and I’m ugly, and I hate everything about my life! I just hate it!”

“You mustn’t talk that way,” Myra told her, holding Angel away so she could look into her eyes. “You’re not fat, and a great many people love you.”

“Who?” Angel demanded, her voice muffled as she again pressed her face to her mother’s breast.

“I do, and your father does, and Aunt Joni and Uncle Ed, and—”

“They’re my family,” Angel moaned. “They have to love me. But the kids—” She stopped abruptly, and Myra felt her stiffen, as if she’d suddenly decided she didn’t want to say any more.

“What about your friends?” she asked. “Did something happen at school today?”

Angel pulled away from her mother, shook her head, and wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater. What good would it do to try to tell her what had happened when her mother didn’t understand that she didn’t have any friends?

“What is it, Angel?” Myra pressed. “It’s all right — you can tell me. I’m your mother.”

But Angel only shook her head again. “Nothing happened,” she insisted. “I just feel like—” She fell silent, then shrugged. “I’ll be okay.” But as they heard the front door slam, followed by Marty Sullivan’s slurred voice as he shouted for Myra, Angel bit her lip. “I’ll set the table,” she said, and by the time her father staggered into the room a moment later, she was already pulling the silverware out of the drawer next to the sink.

“I quit,” Marty Sullivan announced, his face red and his voice thick from the half-dozen drinks he’d had before he came home. “Won’t work for that son of a bitch O’Donnell anymore!”

As her husband’s words echoed in the kitchen, Myra Sullivan’s heart sank.

Once again, her husband was drunk.

Once again, her husband had been fired.

And this time she doubted there would be a new job, because she was fairly sure Jerry O’Donnell was the last man left in Eastbury who would give Marty Sullivan a chance.

Maybe, after all, it was time to go talk to Joni.