3

Weeks passed. And with their passing, a routine developed. Each morning, Billy rose at six and went out to the barn. By then the chickens had laid their eggs, and he cleaned up after them, collecting whatever they produced. Then he swept the kitchen and the hallways and swept the stairs. By then it was time for breakfast.

They ate together, in the huge stone-floored kitchen. At night it was the coldest room in the house, but in the morning, after the stove had been lit, there was no warmer place. The table was big, and they filled one end of it, Melinda sitting at the head and the others in the places to either side of her. Billy's place was next to Rebecca's, and it was with Rebecca that he had his first fight. It began when she asked him to pass the sugar one morning.

Billy ignored her, looking down into his cereal.

"I said, pass the sugar," Rebecca repeated.

"You heard the girl," Melinda said, staring down sternly from the head of the table. "She asked you to do something."

Billy sat stone-still.

"You heard her," Melinda said, "now hear me. Pass the sugar like you were asked."

Rebecca didn't wait for him, but pushed her chair back, standing and leaning heavily over Billy to bring the sugar bowl across. On the way she dropped half of the bowl's contents into his cereal.

"Sorry," she said, smirking as she sat down again.

There was utter silence for a moment, before John began to laugh scornfully. Then, carefully, Billy lifted his bowl of cereal and dumped it into Rebecca's lap.

They rolled out of their chairs and wrestled to the floor. The others rooted encouragement to Rebecca. Melinda made sure she was slow in getting up to stop it. Billy held Rebecca about the waist, but she had him by the hair and was yanking at it. Billy finally let out a yelp, letting go of her and rolling over, pushing his arms up to make her loosen her grip on his hair. It didn't work, but he discovered that she winced when he dug into her ribs. She tried to stifle her groan of laughter, but it was obvious that she was ticklish, and before long the fight had turned decisively in Billy's favor.

"That's enough," Melinda said, lording over them when Billy had his opponent pinned mercilessly beneath him, drawing great painful explosions of laughter from her as he dug his fingers into her sides.

After that the ice had broken, and the tight family that was Melinda's opened to admit a new member. Though Billy still held his distance from them, a part of him seemed to have warmed. He began to smile, and whenever he passed Rebecca, in a hallway or outside during chores, he could not help holding his hands out before him and moving his fingers in a tickling motion—which produced a flinching smile from the girl.

The seasons clocked leisurely by. Autumn became winter, winter rounded into spring. Papers were produced somewhere along the line, signed by Billy's mother, giving Melinda legal custody of the boy. When she told him about this, he seemed unmoved—though something in him, something tiny, seemed to stir. There was spring baseball, then summer baseball, and by the end of August, Billy and Marshall were friends, sharing adjoining rooms. Their world settled into a quiet turning, with day leading to night and night leading to month to year. And then suddenly it was autumn again, and Melinda was telling Billy that it was time for school.

She called him to her study, a dark-paneled room with scant sunlight in the back of the house, filled with books and her half-working typewriter and her filing cabinet and more dusty afternoon sunlight.

"They're a nice bunch at school, but they can get a little rough," she told him, "and if they see anything different in a boy, they're liable to get on you. I have a feeling they'll get on you, Billy." She looked futilely for something on her desk, then reached down into her huge bag, finally producing a cigarette. "I won't tell you to be careful, because I know you can take care of yourself. I'm sure you've been through this before. But I'll tell you to be patient. Don't fight back. Try to find your place"—she paused—"like you found it here. I don't know if you've noticed it, but John resents you. He thinks you've taken his place. I've tried to talk to him about it, but he's a stubborn boy."

There seemed to be something else she wanted to add, a coda or elaboration, but she said nothing. She settled back into her chair, running her hands one over the other and stubbing out her cigarette.

"Damned arthritis," she said. "It doesn't pay to be old, Billy. All the pieces wear down. Your body begins to laugh at you. Bodies don't laugh at young people. They laugh at the old, though. It's the price the old pay; they gain in years and knowledge, but the body says, 'Hold on there. Where do you think you're going with all that learning? Ain't much time left to use it.'"  She waved an impatient hand at her own thoughts and drew another cigarette out of her bag, carrying with it a lemon drop, which she handed to Billy. She lit the cigarette and coughed, a light rasp. She let the smoke drift out of her mouth and nostrils. "And cigarettes don't make you any younger.

"By the way, I know you've been sneaking cigarettes with Rebecca during chores, so don't tell me you haven't," she said. "It's nothing to me, except that I wish you wouldn't do it. It's not good for you. I started when I was a little older than you, and every time I smoke one of these damned things now, I can feel it sucking a little life out of me. I suck in the smoke, and when I blow it out, a little of me goes with it. I can forbid you, but I've always believed that when one man lords over another, he'd better only do it in things he's prepared to accomplish himself. I've lorded over you a lot of ways, but since I don't follow my own preaching in this case, I can't do anything but beg you not to do as I do. Can't command, only beg." Again her thoughts slipped into another stream, segueing into a planned tangent. She drew a long puff before going on.

"Have you been happy here, Billy?" She was staring up at the ceiling, but there was nothing but attention in her manner.

Billy answered, without hesitation, "Yes."

"Happier than you've ever been?"

"Yes.”

"Good. You going to continue to be happy?" She was striving for just the right words.

"Do you want me to leave?" Billy asked simply.

Her chair creaked as she leaned her weight down forward, facing him squarely and putting her elbows down on her desk. "No, I don't want that." She gazed into his eyes, looking for what she wanted to see and not finding it.

"I want you to stay here for a long time," she said. She put her hand across the desk, touching him for the first time since the day on the bus. "I want you to be as happy as you ever can be. There's nothing but love for you here. There always will be. I think if you went away today, I'd cry—even more than if Rebecca or Marsh or John were to leave. Sometimes one of my boys or girls does go, and it puts a little hole in my heart, just as if someone had dug it out with a spade. But the hole fills in real soon, because always when they leave, it's to something better, a new home with new folks to bring them up like real parents. My knowing that there's something better for them fills in the hole. But if you were to leave now, or anytime soon, I think the hole would be bigger and I don't think it would fill in." Again she chose her words carefully. "Because I don't think you could be happier anywhere else now, and I get a bad feeling in me that if you were to leave, it would only come to worse for you. I get feelings like that, and they've always been right so far." She took another long puff on her cigarette, then discovered that it was down to the filter and rubbed it into her ashtray. "And the fact that you wouldn't be happier anywhere else than this makes me sad, because—"

Suddenly she drew herself up, letting her mouth close around her thoughts and leaning back in her chair. She was heading someplace she didn't want to go. At least not yet.

"I only meant to tell you," she said softly, reaching out an aching, arthritic hand to put it on his shoulder, "that school can be a tough time. So don't hesitate to talk to me, or Marsh, or anybody about it." She waved a hand at the door and smiled. "Now go give Rebecca a hand out back with the rest of that lawn trimming." She squeezed his shoulder before letting him go. "And don't let me catch the two of you smoking—I can still tear into you when I catch you at it."

As he left the room, she was staring at the ceiling and there was another cigarette in her palsied hand, its thin trail of smoke spiraling upward with her thoughts.