My dearest son,
I hope to visit you next month. Mr. Sheppard is going to Jackson and offered me a ride. Your baby sister is doing well enough to travel. The home is good for you, and Miss Steward told me they would be taking all you boys to the zoo once the weather clears. Won’t that be nice? Knowing you and your brothers have plenty to eat makes our sacrifice worth it. Stay strong for your brothers. They need you.
With love,
Mother
I turned the letter over. No dates. No names. Who were these people, and where did the mother send her son? Why didn’t she keep him?
Why didn’t my mother keep me?
More questions without answers. I put the letter on the floor next to the typewriter and glanced back at the sewing machine. I had to be missing something. I leaned closer to examine the top. A smaller piece of wood sat on top of the larger base.
Interesting. I put my fingers on the edge, and the piece lifted up. About two feet long, the wooden top hinged off to the side, revealing a small, black sewing machine hidden inside. It wasn’t missing after all. It’d been cleverly folded inside this inner compartment. I just needed to figure out how it unfolded.
I examined the opening. Another flap of wood at the front of the compartment folded back on a set of long hinges, widening the hole. Bits of old wood and dust fell free as I gently lifted the heavy sewing machine on rusty hinges from where it hung in the middle of the opening. Holding the heavy metal contraption upright with one hand, I dropped the front flap back into place, locking the sewing machine into an upright position.
The piece converted from an end table to a functioning piece of machinery with a side wing likely meant for spreading out the fabric. The heavy metal, though a bit rusty in places, was still a smooth black with a gold leaf floral pattern painted around the bottom edge. It had a wheel at the back, and, when I turned it, the needle still moved up and down.
How did the pedal work? I dropped down and looked underneath the wrought-iron bottom. If I turned the big wheel on the right side of the foot pedal, the pedal rocked back and forth.
Sewing machine mystery solved. But still nothing from Ida other than the handwritten letter I couldn’t be sure fit into this puzzle. Now what?
I looked closer at the wooden casing, noticing something I hadn’t before. Four drawers, missing the knobs and therefore blending in, sat two on each side. Inside the first drawer, a small green box held accessory parts for the machine. Buttons and scraps of material filled the second drawer on the left side. In the right side, the top drawer held more of the same along with some folded scraps of old newspaper from the 1980s, all folded into identical triangles. Weird.
I scoured them for something important, but it didn’t seem like anything in particular had been saved. Nothing but random advertisements, local happenings, and a few obituaries. I folded the edges back into the triangle shapes and closed them back inside.
The final drawer contained another letter. I half-expected it wouldn’t.
The crisp white page contained the same bold font as Ida’s first letter.
My dearest Casey,
This sewing machine is one of our family treasures. It was given to my mother in 1901 as a wedding gift from her parents. This old machine has stitched together countless garments and quilt patterns over the years. Though I started using the electric version in my older days, this Singer is well built and sturdy. It’s stood the test of time.
Just like this family.
You may think you are not truly one of us, but you are. Our history is your history. Today, we will start on that quilt. Upstairs you’ll find an old cedar chest. Inside are bits of material. In the old days, women would save shirts or dresses and cut them into smaller pieces to turn something that was old and worn out into something new and beautiful.
You may think that your life is in pieces. Maybe it is. But you can take those pieces and stitch them together. In the end, you’ll have something even more beautiful.
This first step is going to take time. Let it. Go through my material or find your own. Pick pieces that mean something to you. Then stitch the memories together. One square will become two, and two will become twenty.
With love,
Mamaw
I stared at the letter, tears pricking my eyes. I’d never called my biological grandmother anything but Ida. Mamaw felt much more intimate. I folded the paper and stuffed it in my back pocket. Ida wanted me to make a quilt? With a foot-pedal sewing machine?
Impossible.
3
Stitching Memories
Snooping in a person’s private sanctum took the gold in ultimate trespassing. I hovered at the threshold of Ida’s room, reluctant to take the final step.
But I was out of options. I’d already searched the parlor, the living room, the library, the kitchen, and the dining room. I’d explored the three other bedrooms, and I knew there wasn’t a chest in my room. I stared inside at the perfectly made bed and picked at my ragged cuticles. It had to be in here. I’d looked everywhere else.
Ida’s room still smelled like her. Like lavender and gardenias, warm cookies and life. The ache in my chest grew. How much worse would this have been if I’d known Ida since childhood? Or maybe the opposite. If I’d had years of memories to temper the pain, would it ache less?
Grief stole joy either way. Too many memories and loss crippled the heart. Not enough, and the regret laid siege. I gripped the doorframe, letting my eyes roam over the treasures inside. Pictures of Ida and her late husband, Reggie, a war hero and Army Air Corps engine mechanic, sat in matching frames on her mahogany dresser. Trinkets from around the world filled a glass display case in the corner, and, on the far wall, a quilt with little triangles.
Brightly colored, it hung from a long rod near the ceiling like an old tapestry. I leaned in and squinted, trying to get a better look. Small bits of fabric—shaped like the folded pieces of newspaper from the sewing machine—created a larger wreath pattern.
The quilt drew me closer, forcing me to break the barrier and cross into Ida’s sanctum. My bare feet squished silently on the thick camel-colored carpet. I edged around Ida’s four-poster bed topped with another patchwork quilt and too many pillows to count.
The trunk sat squarely at the bottom of the quilt hanging on the wall as though the two went together. I eyed the trunk, but my gaze returned to the quilt. Most of Ida’s creations topped the beds or sat folded in the hall closet. Why had she hung this one on the wall?
I traced the colors around the wreath, now able to make out something very odd. Some of the triangle pieces were cut from various patterned fabric. But others were white.
And covered in writing.
Written in a perfect script, the white triangles contained names and dates. Those connected to other bits of white tattooed with the same perfect script. I lifted up on my toes and started at the top of the wreath. The top contained two names, Elizabeth and Fredrick Macintyre, April 27, 1849. Split down from each side, other names and dates must have followed a family line. I scanned until I found her name near the middle of the wreath on the right side. Ida and Reginald Macintyre, December 22, 1951.
The next line underneath it punched me square in the gut, knocking my breath out just as Billie Ann Warren had in the fourth grade when I’d refused to give her my lunch.
Mike and Haley Macintyre, December 23, 1983. My parents.