Norah
Dear Violet,
I’m waiting to be arraigned and then I will know more about how soon I can come home. I asked for this piece of paper and a pen so I could write to you, to let you know I’m OK and to tell you not to worry. (Even though I know you will anyway.) I am thinking of you constantly, thinking of all I need to tell you, and worried about how confused and scared you must be.
There is an explanation for all of this, and I’m sure you’ll want to hear it. I’ve asked Mr. Sheridan not to tell you too much, as I want you to hear everything from me. I’m sorry for all of this. I thought I could keep you from it, but I failed. I will come home to you as soon as I can. But in the meantime, be good for the Stricklands; they were so kind to take you in. And know you’re in my heart every, every minute.
I love you,
Mom
Polly
She was in the middle of the animal rescue banquet, manning the station she was assigned, ladling steaming sauce over undercooked pasta while trying not to splatter it on the clothing of the attendees, when her phone sounded from her purse, tucked just underneath the table over which she was standing. She resisted the urge to put down the ladle and fish out the phone. She knew it would bug her till she found out who it was that had called. Across the room she spotted Calvin making his rounds, glad-handing the men and charming the women, talking them out of their money just as sure as he had gotten hers out of her. At least tonight his efforts were going toward a good cause.
It was a full fifteen minutes until there was a lull in the hungry crowd and she could look to see who had called. But all she saw was an unfamiliar number. Probably a sales call, she thought. Nothing she needed to worry about. But then she saw the notification that whoever called had left a message. She wondered if it was someone from the bank, responding to her concerned inquiry about Calvin that afternoon. Dwight, her personal banker (as he called himself), was out, but the girl who took the call promised he’d get back to her as soon as he possibly could.
Maybe the unfamiliar number, she thought, was Dwight’s. She pressed the right buttons to play the voicemail.
The male voice on the recording was vaguely familiar, a voice from the past, as they say. But not Dwight’s. “Hi, Polly,” the caller said. “Not sure you remember me since we haven’t seen each other in probably, what, fourteen years? Anyway, a long time ago, I was your son-in-law.”
Here, he cleared his throat. Polly’s heart began to pound. Allen? she thought. Why would he be calling her?
“Anyway, I realize you’re not in touch with Norah much more than I am, so you probably haven’t heard that she was, well, uh . . . she was arrested this morning. You can, uh, well, you probably should just google it to learn more about why. Anyway, I might need some, um, help with Violet while Norah’s away. You see, I travel and I—”
The recording cut off, leaving Polly to stand there holding the phone in disbelief, scanning the room for a familiar face, someone she could beg to take over her station so she could call her ex-son-in-law—that loser—back. Sometimes the extent of her estrangement from her daughter and granddaughter hit Polly with full impact, and this was one of those times. She worried about what was happening to poor Violet if Norah had been arrested.
She recalled the sight of Norah walking back and forth in that ugly striped terry-cloth robe of Allen’s, her hair in matted hunks, her eyes bleary, holding a mewling newborn Violet to her chest and lamenting her choice to become a mother. “I’m not going to be any better at this than you were,” she’d said. Polly regretted not doing whatever she could to stay in Violet’s life, even if it meant going against Norah’s wishes. It wasn’t that child’s fault that things were so broken between her and Norah. She should’ve fought harder to know her granddaughter.
Calvin appeared at her arm. “You look upset, darlin’,” he said, laying on that country-boy drawl that some found charming but she knew was fake. The truth was, Calvin had been born and raised in Pennsylvania and ended up in the South by way of Fort Bragg just before he was discharged. He’d been pretending to be Southern ever since, forgetting he wasn’t and hoping everyone else did, too. Calvin was a chameleon—he changed according to whatever his habitat required. She had learned this in the three years since she had married him.
Sometimes, in quiet moments, Polly debated which of her five husbands was the biggest mistake she’d made. It was always a close call as to whom, but lately it had been Calvin because he had lied to her (though they’d all done that in one way or another) and stolen from her. And because he was the one she was currently saddled with. If she wasn’t careful, he was going to make off with every bit of her nest egg, as she called it, the proceeds of the only good investment she’d ever made. Thankfully her financial decisions had been better than her marital ones.
“I’m fine,” she said. Calvin wasn’t the only one who could lie in their relationship. But she only lied when she really had to, and this was one of those times. She’d never told him about Norah or Violet—no sense mentioning people he was never going to encounter, she’d figured at the time. She wasn’t going to tell him now, all these years later. And certainly not in the middle of the animal rescue fundraiser. “I’m just tired of standing up. I’ve got a blister on my little toe, and my arm is sore from dishing out all this pasta sauce. Do you think you could take over for just a minute? Maybe let me run to the restroom and freshen up a bit?”
She gave him her sweetest smile, the one that she used to think he loved. It wasn’t until after the “I do’s” that she had realized what he’d loved about her had nothing to do with her smile, the color of her eyes, or her calf muscles (things he told her back then) and everything to do with her money. Calvin aspired to a certain lifestyle, and Polly was his ticket to ride. He’d never said that, of course, but she’d figured it out pretty quick. She just wished she’d figured it out before he charmed her into marriage and his right to half of all her assets. Her biggest concern now was the money he didn’t know about.
That was another thing she pondered in her quiet moments: How can I get away from this one? The others, thankfully, had left before she ever had to run them off. Calvin, it was clear, had no intentions of going anywhere. As he turned his attention toward a woman there to say hello, she saw an opportunity. She thrust the ladle into his hand, whispered a syrupy “Thank you, honey,” and scurried away, still gripping the phone in her clenched fist. Polly stepped outside into the darkness and took big gulps of air as she waited for her heart rate to slow.
She glanced around to make sure she was alone before pulling up Google and entering her daughter’s name: Norah Ramsey. She’d kept Allen’s name so she and Violet would have the same. “I won’t be like you and marry someone else and take his name so my daughter always feels left out,” she’d said. Norah had always known how to hit her where it hurt, laying bare Polly’s mistakes and weaknesses in that undeniable way of hers. That was why when Norah wanted to stop speaking, Polly had agreed it was a good idea. She’d allowed the distance, telling herself Violet would never miss what she never knew.