Nancy Pickard - The Scent of Rain and Lightning

She turned to look at Valentine Crosby again. “I think we’ve got everything we came for, if you want to check us out now, Val.”

She squeezed the pale, trembling hand and released it.

Val hurried to do her job, taking in an audible breath as she picked up the first item. She could barely ring them on the cash register. She dropped things, which Annabelle picked up and handed back to her. Byron George hovered over them as if he didn’t know what to do next.

“I’ll call you in a few days, Valentine,” Annabelle said in the same clear, loud voice that she intended for as many people as possible to hear, “to see if you need anything. I hope your neighbors and everybody at your church are helping you out while Billy’s gone. I hope everyone is being kind and thoughtful to you.” She had thought she might say, That’s what my son would have wanted, but at the last minute she couldn’t get the painful words out, and she was also afraid they might wound Valentine terribly. It was better for both of them not to say it.

Annabelle knew how formal and stiff she sounded, and regretted it.

But she couldn’t help it. Getting the words out at all was a victory.

She had wept while rehearsing them with Hugh Senior.

He had encouraged her, coached her, cried with her.

They’d heard of meanness in town, of Valentine and her boy being snubbed, or worse, and they had talked about it and decided mutually that they were the only ones who could put a stop to it.

Valentine broke down and began to cry.

Seeing her, Annabelle did, too.

The two women-wife of a convict, mother of a victim-leaned toward each other over the milk and cereal and embraced. Annabelle whispered in her ear, “You have to eat, Valentine. You’re too thin. You have to keep up your strength for the sake of your son.”

Valentine whispered back, sobbing, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, Mrs. Linder, I’m so so sorry,” while they held onto each other for dear life.

It was then that Annabelle realized that Jody wasn’t clinging to her anymore.

Annabelle broke away and looked around, but didn’t see her granddaughter.

Though she knew it was absurd, she panicked. “Jody!”

And then she heard it: a little girl’s giggle. It was the most beautiful noise she’d heard in weeks, and her eyes welled up with tears again at the precious sound of it. She looked in that direction and spotted Jody standing in a corner of the store beside a card table where a boy was showing her something in a book. Jody pointed to a page and they both giggled.

“Who is that child?”

Valentine turned to see, and she gasped. “Collin!” She abandoned her post and ran toward the children. “Collin, come here!”

The boy and Jody both looked up with surprise on their faces as Valentine grabbed her son’s arm, and pulled him off his chair and away from Jody. “I’m so sorry,” she said to Annabelle as she came back to her counter with her son in tow. “I’m so sorry, Mrs. Linder. He doesn’t know who she-”

Byron George shook a finger in Collin’s face.

“Stay away from that girl,” he said. “You just stay away from her.”

Annabelle was horrified by their good intentions. The boy-a handsome, dark-haired child who reminded her sickeningly of his father-appeared stunned by the grown-ups’ actions and words. He looked back to where Jody was still standing. She wasn’t smiling or laughing anymore. She looked scared, and ready to cry, too. Annabelle saw the two of them look briefly at each other. Then the boy turned back around quickly and stared at the floor without saying anything.

“Please,” Annabelle said, patting the air. “It’s all right.”

She smiled-or tried to-at the child.

He looked at her with wide, somber eyes.

“Byron,” she said, “maybe Livia would like to give Valentine’s son that piece of candy that my granddaughter didn’t want.” Then, as quickly as she could manage it, she completed her transaction with Valentine Crosby, refused Byron George’s offer to carry the bag to her car for her, and gathered up Jody to go.

Grabbing Jody’s hand, she fled from the grocery store.

OUTSIDE ON THE SIDEWALK, they ran into a friend of hers.

“Why does she stay here?” Phyllis Boren said in her blunt way as she pointed into the grocery store. “Doesn’t she know that none of us want her here?”

“This is her home now, Phyllis.”

Her friend looked at her with surprise at her tone.

“I don’t think she has anyplace else to go,” Annabelle added, hoping Phyllis either wouldn’t notice her tearstained face or was so used to seeing her that way that she wouldn’t remark on it. “From what I understand, her family in Scott City won’t have her back. And I doubt she has the money to move even if she wants to.”

“We could solve that problem, Annabelle. You and Hugh Senior just say the word, and I guarantee you I’ll personally come up with her bus fare. It would be better for her,” she added in a virtuous, vigorous tone, “and certainly better for the boy if they started over somewhere.”

“How far away would she need to move, do you think?”

Phyllis didn’t catch the sharp tone in her friend’s voice.

“Far enough that you can’t run into her at the grocery store, Annabelle. Far enough that Hugh will never be tempted to take on Billy’s demon offspring as one of his rehabilitation projects-”

“Demon offspring? Phyllis, he’s just a little boy.”

“He’s Billy Crosby’s little boy, and you know what they say about apples and how far they fall from trees. If none of that convinces you, then let me say this. Val Crosby needs to move far enough away so that her kid and Jody will never cross paths in the same schools.”

Annabelle felt startled, having not thought of that probability before.

“That could happen-”

“Sure. He’s only four years ahead of her. When she enters kindergarten, he’ll be in fourth grade.”

Annabelle glanced down at Jody and saw that she was staring in the window at Collin Crosby, who was back at his corner table, his face determinedly pointed at his book.

“They’re just children,” she said softly.

“Well, you think about what I said, Annabelle.”

“I appreciate your good wishes for us, Phyllis.” She straightened her spine, which it seemed she’d had to do a great deal lately. “But I hope you will spare some kind wishes for that poor young woman and her son as well.”

Grandmother and granddaughter turned without saying goodbye.

They walked back to the Caddy to stow the groceries that nobody in their family would feel like eating.

COLLIN PEEKED UP from his books and saw the little girl was staring in at him from the fancy black car as it pulled away from the curb. He wanted to raise his hand and wave at her, but he didn’t dare cause another fuss. This was where his mom worked. Everything depended on if she kept her job here, because probably nobody else would hire her because of his dad.

Collin felt horrible because of what had just happened in the store.

He hadn’t recognized the little girl, hadn’t known, didn’t mean to-

His sensitive antennae picked up a new conversation going on between the man and woman who were his mother’s bosses, Mr. and Mrs. George. They were talking softer than they usually did when they discussed his father around him, but Collin listened hard and heard most of it anyway.

“That poor child,” the woman said, and for a moment Collin thought she meant him. But of course she didn’t-she was talking about the little girl who’d just been in, the Linder granddaughter, as people called her now. “She used to be so friendly and happy, and now she acts like a chocolate bar would scare her to death.”