"Hurry and get well," I told him.
Roy remained behind with him. and Daddy and Mommy and I returned home.
It had never been so wonderful to set foot in my own house, my own room, to breathe the air, to see the flowers and the lake and hear Mrs. Geary's lecture about being foolish. I even enjoyed her pressure to make me eat everything, every single drop. Of course. I couldn't. It took a while for my appetite to return. but I had no doubts that it would.
Mommy hovered around me even more than usual. It was funny. I thought, how now she was the one nervous about my health, my illnesses, my every cough and sneeze. Roles had been reversed, at least for a while.
My grandparents came to visit. Even Aunt Alison showed up and looked genuinely impressed. When everyone left us, however. she told me she was impressed for different reasons.
"I never thought you had the guts to do something like that. I always thought you were a Daddy's littlegirl."
"It doesn't take guts to do something stu
pid. Aunt Alison." "Just think of it as an adventure." she said. "That's what I do."
"Are you happier because of that?" I shot back at her.
She glared at me for a moment.
"You know, you're just like your mother," she said.
"Thank you."
"Oh forget it," she cried, throwing her hands up and changing the subject to tell me about this young doctor she had met and begun to date.
When I asked her if she loved him, she thought a moment and said. "I wouldn't know if I did.'
She looked very sad and for the first time. I think I truly felt sorry for her. It was almost like never being able to taste anything or hear beautiful music Or smell the flowers in spring. She was incapable of being truly, deeply happy. She was being honest. She wouldn't recognize love. Something was missing and she knew it and mourned it and was bitter because of it.
Mommy had lost the use of her legs, but she wasn't nearly as bitter or unhappy, I thought.
Yes, thank you. Thank you for comparing me to her. I concluded.
When Harley returned, he was supposed to take it easy, but he was restless and didn't sit still or relax.
"I did enough of that in the hospital,'" he complained when everyone chastised him.
Uncle Roy tried to be gruff again, but his confessions and his revelation of love seemed to have taken the hardness out of him and Harley knew it. All he would do is smile at him.
"The boy's stubborn through and through." Uncle Roy told Mommy. "Headstrong, even after all this. He didn't learn a thing."
"He's more like you than you care to admit. Roy Arnold," Mommy told him. "There is something stronger than blood."
He looked at her.
"And what's that. Rain?"
"Love," she said. "Love."
Their eyes locked. How many, many memories flowed between them-- good ones as well as all the bad, all the straggles, all the tears and vet all the smiles, for there had to be happy times.
The way they spoke about Momma Arnold clearly made me think that was so.
The last days of summer were upon us quickly. Harley had been granted admittance to another college, one in Rhode Island. It was a four-year school and it had the program in architecture he wanted. He and Uncle Roy asked Daddy's advice and together they all agreed Harley would attend.
My heart was asked to be so many things the day Harley left for school. It was asked to be full of pride for him, to be happy for him and his
opportunity, but it couldn't help thumping with sadness. We wouldn't see each other for a long time.