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  The woman made a tsk-tsk sound. “Well, you won’t have to worry about that no more, dear. You’ll be safe with us from now on.”

  I turned and looked at her, wondering if what she said was really true. She wore a plain housedress under a faded corduroy car coat and white, cuffed, cotton anklets and sturdy brown shoes with dust around the edges. But her clear blue eyes looked sincere to me, and despite all I’d seen in my life I really wanted to trust her. I needed to trust her. “Thank you, ma’am,” I said.

  Their farm was one of those old-fashioned types where they grew a little of this and that and kept a few hogs, cows, and chickens. About eighty acres, Mrs. Crowley explained as she showed me to my room upstairs. “It belonged to my husband’s father before us, and we’ll most likely pass it on to our son.”

  “You have a son?” I asked. For some reason I’d assumed this couple to be childless, kind of like that Kansas couple, Auntie Em and Uncle What’s-His-Name who took care of poor Dorothy before the tornado whisked her away.

  “Yes. He lives in town with his wife and baby—works at the feed and seed.”

  “Do you have other children?”

  “We did. Our oldest boy, Roy Crowley, Jr., was killed in Vietnam about a year ago—just days before he was to have come home for good.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  She nodded. “Yes, dear, so are we.”

  Downstairs in the living room, Roy Jr.’s photo and medals were displayed on the mantel as something of a memorial to their son. He wasn’t all that much to look at with his short-cropped dishwater blond hair and somewhat nondescript features, but something in his eyes appealed to me, and sometimes I would find myself standing there in front of the fireplace just staring into his face and wondering what he was thinking about now. Now that he was dead.

  The Crowleys were very good to me, and especially patient during those first few days. They treated me kindly but made it clear they expected me to pull my weight around the place as my health returned. After a day or two, Mrs. Crowley wanted to wash my clothes for me. I explained to her that I’d always done my own laundry, but she wouldn’t hear of it, at least not until I was feeling a lot better and she could give me a lesson on how to use her old cantankerous wringer washer. I told her I’d used a wringer washer before, but still she insisted. I remember feeling embarrassed as I handed over my strange-looking and worn items of clothing.

  “Goodness,” she said. “It looks to me like you don’t have nothing but rags to wear, child.” She held up a miniskirt and frowned. “And surely there’s nothing here that you could possibly want to be wearing to school.”

  I just shrugged. At that point in time, with my nose all swollen and discolored, and a large brown and yellow lump on my forehead, I suppose I no longer cared what I looked like or wore to school—or anywhere else, for that matter.

  “Well, we’ll have to do something about this.”

  By the following weekend, my bruises had faded considerably, and Mr. and Mrs. Crowley decided to take me into town to do some errands and shopping. It was the first time I’d seen the town of Snider, and I felt surprised that it was much smaller than Brookdale. An agricultural town supported by the local farms, it had about two blocks’ worth of businesses. Mr. Crowley dropped his wife and me at a small JCPenney store on Main Street and said he’d be back to pick us up around noon. I cringed just slightly when I saw the scanty racks of women’s clothes we had to choose from. This store didn’t even have a junior section. But I could see by Mrs. Crowley’s face that this was a real treat for her—a woman who’d never been blessed with a daughter, suddenly buying school clothes for a girl. “How about this one?” she asked as she held up a flowered dress in somber shades of blue and green.

  I swallowed hard as I glanced over the rack. “It’s nice,” I said in a flat voice. It didn’t take us long to pick out a few outfits (two dresses and a skirt and blouse) and some underthings and socks and “sensible” shoes, which really weren’t so bad considering that “sensible” shoes were coming back into fashion these days. Then we were picked up by Mr. Crowley and treated to lunch at Stanley’s (the town’s only diner).

  I expressed my appreciation to both of them for taking me in and buying me the clothes and everything, at the same time hoping desperately that I’d be able to stick it out with them without freaking out and running away or something equally stupid. And I kept telling myself that I could and should change myself as an act of self-preservation. Somehow I had to make what seemed like a bad movie—or maybe just the opening scene in The Wizard of Oz—work. And if I was lucky, I’d someday be able to click my heels together and find my way back home—to a real home and real family—wherever that might be.

  “Your social worker tells us that you’re a hard worker and a good student,” said Mr. Crowley as he sipped his coffee.

  “Yes, and Mrs. Johnson said you’re a good artist and a good musician, too. And I’ve seen that guitar you’ve got,” said Mrs. Crowley. “But I haven’t heard you play once. Don’t you like to play no more, Cassie?” They’d taken to calling me Cassie, which like everything else felt strange and foreign, but somehow fitting in this new life I’d so recently slipped into.

  “I don’t know.” I took a sip of my chocolate shake, surprised that it tasted better than the ones I’d made at the Dairy Maid.

  “Well, you’ll be starting school on Monday, and maybe that’ll help cheer you up some,” said Mr. Crowley. “Being round kids your own age, and all.”

  Mrs. Crowley laughed. “Yes, I s’pect it ain’t easy being with a couple of old folks like us.”

  “No, no,” I said. “You guys are great. I guess it’s just a lot to get used to all at once.”

  She gently patted my hand. “Well, just you take your time, then. Get used to things slow and easy-like.”

  I wore the navy blue skirt and light blue blouse to church the next day (the least objectionable of yesterday’s clothes purchases). Everyone seemed to know everyone in the little country church, and people came over to greet the Crowleys and meet me when the service was over. And it had been a nice service too, quiet and dignified with no yelling or accusatory finger-pointing from the pulpit going on.

  But my mind had difficulty focusing and holding on to the preacher’s words. More and more, it seemed my thoughts were sort of jumbled and scrambled, and I felt seriously worried that my daddy’s recent blows to my head might have permanently damaged my brain some. And since intelligence was still important to me, this possibility concerned me a lot. To think, I’d been so careful to avoid things like alcohol and drugs to preserve my faculties, but more than likely what little sense I’d possessed had been knocked out of me at the tender age of fifteen. Like most things in life, it just didn’t seem fair.

  After church, the Crowley’s younger son, Tim, and his wife and baby came over for supper. I liked his wife, Suzy. In fact, she didn’t seem all that much older than me, and she immediately began joking with me about the tragic shopping conditions in Snider, scandalized that her mother-in-law had actually taken me to that “sorry JCPenney store” to get school clothes. “You should’ve called me, Mom,” said Suzy. “I’d have driven Cassie over to Dayville and done some really good shopping there.”

  “Well, I s’pose we could take all those things back,” said Mrs. Crowley uncertainly.

  “Oh, that’s too much trouble,” I said, feeling sorry for the older woman.

  “Well, sure, why not?” said Suzy. “I could leave little Timmy with my mom and go pick Cassie up from school tomorrow and then we could take those old-lady clothes back to Penney’s and get her some new things.” So it was settled, and Mrs. Crowley didn’t even seem to mind—not too much, anyway.

  Suzy picked me up after school the next day as promised. “How’d your first day go?” she asked as I climbed into her car.

  “Okay, I guess.” I slumped down into the bucket seat, longing to disappear from the planet altogether.

  “That bad, huh?”


  I glanced over at her. “How’d you know?”

  She laughed. “Well, it wasn’t that long ago I was going to school there, and I know how it is with new kids. And I don’t s’pect it helps any that your face looks like you got hit by a truck.”

  I reached up to touch my nose, no longer so badly swollen, but still discolored some. “I guess not.”

  “But I also remember that kids forget stuff and things can change. So maybe if you just hang in there, everything will start to look better before long. And you’ve only got about six more weeks of school, anyway. Things might look a whole lot different by next fall.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, I suppose so.”

  Suzy took charge of our little shopping expedition, and to my surprise I found myself actually relaxing a little and almost having fun. She reassured me that her in-laws were really good people, just a little stodgy and old-fashioned.

  “Maybe that’s what I need,” I said, only partially realizing the truth at the time. “I just hope I don’t let them down.”

  “Well, just work hard and don’t act too disrespectful, and everything should be fine.”

  And so I did. And somehow I managed to make it until the end of the school year without embarrassing myself too badly. Well, other than being relatively stupid when it came to simple things like caring for and feeding livestock, but the Crowleys (and their animals) were patient with me. When Mr. Crowley read my report card (whether it was the mercy of my new teachers, or being in a smaller school, I had somehow maintained my four-point average) he was so pleased that he took the three of us out for dinner, something they almost never did. And that evening, they invited me to call them Eunice and Roy, and in some ways we were feeling almost like family.

  Nine

  Looking back now my time spent living with the Crowleys, even though it was brief, seems like a much-needed vacation from the troubles of my strange and crooked little life. And it was a complete departure from my wild and wicked ways that could’ve led me who knows where. For the first time ever, I almost felt like a normal girl.

  Almost.

  Perhaps the only thing that disturbed me much during that era was my unwillingness to pick up my guitar. For some reason, whenever I looked at my poor old Martin guitar, I thought of my daddy and a lifestyle I wanted to put completely behind me. So finally I just tucked the sorry instrument into the darkened back end of my narrow little bedroom closet and spent my free time sketching pictures or reading from the Crowley’s large selection of Reader’s Digest condensed books. I don’t know how many books I read “just part of,” but it bothered me some. Maybe it just seemed too much like the way I had lived my life in the past years.

  During that summer, one of the happiest of my youth, I went to church gladly and regularly, and surprised myself and everyone else by going forward after the salvation sermon one hot and humid Sunday when I’m sure everyone else would’ve just as soon heard the benediction and gone on home to their cold ham and potato salad. I’m still not sure that I knew exactly what it was I was doing, or even if it really “took” at the time. But the following Sunday, I was baptized down at the river with three other young people, and then we had ourselves a big celebratory picnic.

  To this day, I can still recall that wonderful, cleansing feeling as the chilly, albeit muddy, waters washed over my head. When I stood up, I truly felt like a brand-new person—inside and out. And I don’t think it was all my imagination, either—I truly believe that God got ahold of me that day.

  After we got home, I briefly considered calling up Joey Divers to tell him the good news. But I didn’t. I think part of me was still enjoying the luxury of leaving all my past back there in Brookdale and everything and everyone right along with it. I had become Cassie of the Crowley farm down High Banks Road—that nice girl who gets the best grades in Snider High’s sophomore class and gladly goes to church every Sunday. Why mess with something that was working?

  Eunice and Suzy put together a nice little birthday party for me when I turned sixteen, inviting friends and relatives and young folks from church. I wore a pale blue dress (hand sewn by Eunice) and flat sandals. Eunice and Roy surprised me with a brand-new Bible. They spent a lot of time reading their old, worn, leather one, and they thought I might like one of my own, after being baptized and all. I still have a faded Polaroid photo that Tim took of me at that party, holding a broad pink cake with wobbly blue letters that read: Happy 16th, Cassie! It was a happy time indeed.

  But all this goodness came to a swift halt one sultry afternoon shortly after my birthday. Roy was out in the west field, preparing the soil for winter wheat, when he ran his tractor just a little too high on the small hill that bordered their farm—the very thing that Tim remembered his daddy had always warned him about when he plowed that field. The old John Deere tractor hit a bump and just rolled over sideways, pinning Roy underneath. Killed him instantly, the doctor reassured us later. We didn’t even know it had happened until suppertime when he hadn’t returned to the house on time.

  “Run out and see what’s keeping Daddy,” said Eunice as she set a plate of fried chicken on the table.

  I remember the sky was a strange shade of yellow that evening—kind of like tobacco-stained teeth. I figured it had to do with the high humidity and heat plus the dust in the air, but it gave me an eerie feeling just the same. And the closer I got to the west field, the more I began to sense that something was really wrong.

  When I saw the overturned green tractor, my eyes filled with tears, and I began to run with all my might through the soft, rich, upturned soil. But as soon as I saw him, lying there lifeless with both eyes still open, I knew I was too late. I can’t really remember all that much after that—how I got back to the house or told Eunice the bad news. The rest of that day just sort of blurs in my memory now. I think God is kind to us in that way—the way our memories mercifully fade into oblivion when something horrendous happens. Sort of like a protective amnesia.

  Eunice was never the same after that. The woman I’d thought was the definition of strength itself just went totally to pieces after losing Roy. She’d lost Roy Jr. the year before, and losing her husband was just too much for her. I tried to comfort her as best I could, but it was almost as if she didn’t know me anymore. And I suppose since I was such a recent addition to their family, in her eyes it may have seemed as if I’d never been there at all. I tried not to feel too hurt over that. And I know she meant me no harm.

  At first Suzy and Tim talked about having me come live with them, but I worried it was more Suzy’s idea than Tim’s. They were going through a struggle of their own just then, with Tim feeling they should move out and take over the farm and Suzy determined not to give up her sweet little house and life in town. Finally, Mrs. Johnson (the lady from the county) made the decision for us with one short phone call. “Based on your successful adjustment with the Crowleys,” she explained to me, “I’ve found a very nice family back in Brookdale who’d like to take you in.”

  Within the same week, Tim sold the farm and Eunice went down to Florida to stay with her sister Louise. And as I packed my bags once again, I wondered whether God was real or not.

  I wanted to pray, and I really tried, but the words just wouldn’t come out sounding right. What I really wanted to say was: Hey, God, how come you let this happen? Why did you have to go and let Roy die just when things were getting good for me? But I suspected that would be disrespectful and rude, not to mention selfish. And, thinking I was able to intimidate God, I kept my thoughts and my doubts to myself.

  As I dragged my dusty guitar out from the back of the closet, I discovered my old paisley canvas bag, the one my grandma had gotten me at the Goodwill. I unzipped it to find it stuffed full of all my old clothes—the ones I’d scavenged from thrift shops and re-designed and decorated and then discarded when I’d come to live my new life with the Crowleys. On top of these strange-looking pieces, I now laid the new Bible that Eunice and Roy had given me for my sixteenth
birthday. I felt it might be better off there for the time being.

  Suzy took a break from packing up the Crowley’s belongings and sat with me on the front porch as we waited for Mrs. Johnson to pick me up. “Sounds like they’re real nice people,” she said with her ever-positive outlook. “And you’re such a good kid, Cassie. I can’t imagine how things shouldn’t go just great for you from here on out.”

  I nodded mutely, not entirely convinced, but wanting to remain strong. “I guess so. I just feel a little worried about going back there—to Brookdale, I mean.”

  “But you’re a new person now, Cassie.” She grabbed me by the shoulders and looked right into my eyes. “Why, just look at you—you’re beautiful—on the inside and out. You’re smart. You’re a good girl, Cassie. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.”

  I nodded again, this time trying to hold back tears as I ran my fingers up and down the dusty frets of my guitar. More than anything else right then, I wanted her and Tim to change their minds about everything. I wanted Suzy to say: “Don’t worry, Cassie, we’ve decided to keep the farm, after all, and we want you to live out here with us. You’re a part of our family and you always will be.” But of course those words never came. And I remembered how my grandma used to say that “charity begins at home,” and I guess the Crowleys needed to be taking care of themselves right now, not looking out for someone who wasn’t even kin. But oh, how I wished I were kin.

  It wasn’t long before that familiar dusty station wagon pulled into the driveway, and Suzy helped me load my guitar and bags into the back (I now had two suitcases besides the old canvas bag) and then we hugged, with tears. “You just call me if you run into any trouble, Cassie.” She looked me in the eyes again. “I mean it. You hear?”

  “Yeah, thanks,” I muttered as I climbed into the station wagon.