Read Online Two Shades of Morning by Janice Daugharty - Free Book Online

counter and sliced tomatoes into thick red pinwheels. Daddy stamped up the back doorsteps, scrubbing his feet along the hall, and stopped in the kitchen doorway with a grand gesture—once-powerful arms outstretched and face beaming with cheap surprise. “Natalene, what’s that youngun doing dragging back here everytime I turn around?” he teased. “I thought we’d got shed of her.” I got up to kiss him. Modestly, he offered his sweaty shaved cheek, holding my shoulders to prevent contact with his body. Intimacy in our household had its limits. But we all behaved as though I lived a thousand miles away and had finally come home for a visit. We repeated the ritual yesterday and we’d repeat it tomorrow.
    Another repeat: “Dinner smells good,” he said. “What’re we having?” Though he knew full-well that Mondays brought leftovers from Sundays.
    He washed up at the kitchen sink, lathering his hands and arms and splashing great hands full of water to his vieny, sunned face, while Mama scurried for a paper towel to keep him from drying on her dishtowel.
    “Well, what’s your old man up to this evening?” he asked, drying his arms and frowning at the rattley paper.
    “Working,” I said—what I knew to say, especially on Mondays, even if P.W. had gone fishing.
    Noisily Daddy scraped back his chair and sat, walking it to the table, and Mama presented him with a tall glass of iced tea, then went again to the counter for the others. Aunt Birdie crept over with her circular arrangement of tomatoes and lowered the platter to the table.
    “Daddy, turn thanks,” Mama said, standing with her enlarged hands on the back of her chair.
    “Lord, we thank you for this food we are about to receive and for the hands that prepared it. Bless it to the nourishment of our bodies. In Jesus name I do pray. Amen.” Immediately, he began eating.
    I waited for a few minutes before I asked, “Daddy, what do you think of our new church member?”
    “Which one’s that, punkin?” He pushed peas to his spoon with a wedge of cornbread.
    Nobody but Sibyl had joined our church in at least six months. “Sibyl,” I said, “you know, Robert Dale’s wife.”
    “Oh, yeah. A fine looking woman.”
    “She’s got her ways,” Mama said. “Have some pot roast, Birdie.” She passed a platter of indistinguishable hunks of browned beef and potatoes.
    “Believe I will.” Aunt Birdie picked in the hash for meat. “Y’all big buddies, I reckon?” Daddy said.
    “Not really.” I searched Aunt Birdie’s freckle-clustered face. She was a blank. “Sibyl’s kind of hard to get to know. She’s got some kind of rare blood cancer.”
    “Them two go together?” he asked absently.
    “Sir?”
    He raised his voice. “Sounded like you were saying you couldn’t get to knowing her cause she’s got cancer.” “No sir, I meant...”
    “Dying ain’t rare,” he said. “Pass me another piece of cornbread, thank you, ma’am.” He said the first part to me and the second part to Mama, never looking up, and each of us took what was ours.
    “No, Daddy,” Mama chipped in. “Earlene meant Sibyl’s curious.”
    “Oh! I don’t know nothing about that. A fine-looking woman.”
    I couldn’t resist it. “What about her wearing that old dress on Easter?”
    “I didn’t notice nothing wrong with what the lil ole thing was wearing.” He stared up at me suspiciously.
    “Why, Earlene Claire Colson!” Mama said loudly, ready with a sermon. “You’ve had better raising than to pick on what somebody wears to church.” Her narrow shoulders hiked. “Making fun of people’s unbecoming, young lady. Isn’t it, Daddy?”
    He grunted, hunched over his plate.
    Aunt Birdie was watching me, her eyes scornful. Of me? Of Mama and Daddy? Of Sybil? “Pass me one of them pickled peaches, sugar,” she said.
    I passed the shallow dish of rolling amber peaches and held it for her to fork one, then watched her pin it down with her finger and pare crescents