Seeds of Yesterday (Dollanganger 4)

Melodie put Darren in the large cradle Chris had found in an antique shop and had refinished so it looked almost new. With one foot she rocked the baby as she glared hard at Bart before once again gazing pensively into the roaring fire. Seldom did she speak, and she showed no real interest in her children. Only negligently did she pick them up, as if for show, as she showed no interest in any one of us, or anything we did.

Jory shopped by mail for gifts that were delivered almost daily to surprise her. She'd open each box, faintly smile and say a weak thank you, and sometimes she even put the package down unopened, thanking Jory without even looking his way. It pained me to see him wince, or bow his head to hide his expression. He was trying--why couldn't she try?

Each passing day saw Melodie withdrawing not only from her husband but, much to my amazement, also from her children. Hers was an indecisive love, without strong commitment, like the frail flutterings of moth wings beating at the candle flame of motherly love. I was the one who got up in the middle of the night to feed them. I was the one who paced the floor and tried to change two diapers at once, and it was I who raced down to the kitchen to mix their formula and held them on my shoulder for burping, I who took the time and trouble to rock them to sleep as I sang soft lullabies while their huge blue eyes stared up at me with fascination until they grew sleepy and with great reluctance closed their eyes. Often I could tell they were still listening from their small, pleased smiles. It filled me with joy to see them growing more and more like Cory and Carrie.

If we lived isolated from society, we did not live isolated from the malicious rumors that the servants brought home with them from the local stores. Often I overheard their whispers as they chopped onions, green peppers, and made the pies and cakes and other desserts we all loved to eat. I knew our maids lingered too long in back halls and deliberately made our beds when we were still upstairs. Thinking we were alone, we'd let out many secrets for them to feed their gossip.

Much of what they speculated on I speculated on as well. Bart was so seldom home, and sometimes I was grateful for that. With him out of the house, there was no one to create arguments; Joel stayed in his room and prayed, or so I presumed.

It came to me one morning that maybe I should try the servants' tricks and hang out near the kitchen .. . and when 'I did, our cook and maids filled my ears with knowledge gained from those in the village. Bart, according to them, was having many affairs with the prettiest and richest society ladies, both married and unmarried. Already he'd ruined one marriage that just happened to be one of the couples that had been on his Christmas guest list. Also, according to what I overheard, Bart often visited a brothel ten miles away, not within any city's limits.

I had evidence that some of those tales might be true. Often I saw him come home drunk and in mild, happy moods that made me wish, regretfully, that he'd stay drunk. Only then could he smile and laugh easily.

One day I had to ask. "What are you doing all those nights you stay out so late?"

He giggled easily when he drank too much; he giggled now. "Uncle Joel says the best evangelists have been the worst sinners; he says you have to roll in the gutter filth to know what it's like to be clean, and saved."

"And that's what you're doing all those nights, rolling in the gutter filth?"

"Yes, Mother darling--for damned if I know what it's like to feel clean, or saved."

Spring approached cautiously like a timid bluebird. Blustery cold winds softened to warm southern breezes. The sky turned that certain shade of blue that made me feel young and hopeful. I was often out in the gardens raking leaves and pulling up weeds that the gardeners overlooked.

I couldn't wait to see the crocus peek from the ground in the woods, couldn't wait to see the tulips and daffodils and watch pink and white dogwood blossoms spring forth. Couldn't wait for the azaleas everywhere to make my life a fairyland of many delights, for the twins, for all of us. I'd look up and admire the wonder of the trees that never seemed depressed or lonely. Nature--how much we could learn if only we would.

I took Jory with me as far as he could easily guide his sturdy electric chair with the huge balloon wheels that climbed most gradual grades. 'We've got to find a better way to get you deeper into the woods," I said thoughtfully. "Now, if we laid flagstones everywhere, they'd be very lovely, but if they freeze in the winter they'd poke up and could possibly snag your chair and tip you over. As much as I hate cement, we'll have to use that or blacktop. Somehow I like blacktop better, what about you?"

He laughed at my silliness. "Red bricks, Mom. Brick walks are so colorful, and besides, this chair of mine is a real marvel." He looked around, smiling with pleasure, then tilted his face so the sun could warm it. "I only wish Mel would accept what's happened to me and show more .interest in the twins."

What could I say to that, when already I'd had it out with Melodie more than a dozen times, and the more I said the more resentful she grew. "This is MY life, Cathy!" she'd shouted. "MY LIFE--not yours!" Screaming at me, her face a red mask of fury.

Jory's physical therapist showed Jory how to lower himself to the ground without so much effort, and then he taught Jory how to get back into his chair without assistance. And all so Jory could help me plant more rose bushes. His strong hands used the trowel much better than mine.

The gardeners eagerly taught Jory how to prune our shrubbery, when to fertilize, how to mulch and with what. He and I made gardening not just a hobby but a life-style to save us both from going crazy. The greenhouse was enlarged so we could grow exotic flowers, and in there we had a world of our own to control, full of its own kind of quiet excitement. But it wasn't enough for Jory, who decided he had to stay in the arts in one form or another.

"Dad is not the only one in this family who can paint a hazy sky and make you feel the humidity, or put a dewdrop on a painted rose so real you can smell it," he said to me with a broad smile. "I'm growing as an artist, Mom."

Even with Melodie in the same house, Jory was making a life without her. He fashioned slings to his chair that fitted over his shoulder so he could carry his twins with him His delight to see them smile when they saw him coming touched my heart, just as it drove Melodie from the nursery. "They love me now, Mom! It's in their eyes!"

They knew Jory better than they knew their mother. They gave her void and somehow pitifully hopeful smiles, perhaps because her expression was so blank and thoughtful when she stared at them.

Yes, the twins not only

loved and knew who was their father, they also trusted him fully. When he reached to pick them up, they didn't flinch or fear he'd drop them. They laughed as if they knew he'd never, never drop them.

I found Melodie sulking in her room, really thin now, her once beautiful hair dull and stringy. "It takes time, Melodie, to develop motherly instincts," I said as I sat down unasked and, apparently, unwanted. "You allow me and the maids to wait upon them too much. They don't recognize you as their mother when you stay away. The day you see their small faces light up when you come in, and they smile from the happiness they feel to see you, their mother, you'll find the love you're searching for. Your heart will melt. Their needs will give you something nothing else can, and never again will you feel anything but an all-encompassing love for your children, when they love you, and you love them."

Her faint smile flashed bittersweet and was quickly gone. "When do you give me the chance to mother my children, Cathy? When I get up in the night, you are already there. When I rise early, you've already bathed and dressed them. They don't need a mother when they have a grandmother like you."

I was stunned by her unfair attack. Often I lay on my bed and heard the twins cry and cry before I got up to tend to their needs. In torment while I waited and waited for Melodie to go to them. What was I supposed to do, ignore their cries? I gave her time enough. Her room was across the hall from theirs, and mine was in another wing.

She apparently saw my thoughts, for her voice came almost like the hiss of a venemous snake. "You always come out on top, don't you, mother-in-law? You always manage to get what you want, but there's one thing you will never get, and that's Bart's love and respect. When he loved me--and once he did love me--he told me he hated you, really despised you. I felt sorry for him then, and sorrier for you. Now I understand why he feels as he does. For with a mother like you, Jory doesn't need a wife like me."

The next day was Thursday. I felt heavyhearted to think of all the ugly words Melodie had screamed and hissed at me yesterday. I sighed, sat up and swung my. legs off the bed, slipping my feet into satin mules. A busy day ahead since this was the day all our servants but Trevor had off. On Thursdays I was like Momma had been, preparing myself for Friday, coming fully alive only when the man I loved strolled through the door.

Jory was quietly sobbing when I entered his room with the freshly bathed and diapered twins held one in each of my arms. In his hands he loosely held a creamy long sheet of stationery.

"Read this," he choked, putting the paper on the table beside his chair before he reached for his children. When he had them both in his arms, he bowed his face into the soft hair of his son, then his daughter's hair