Ella sat at the kitchen table, listening to the chickens settling down in the coop as the sun set. She looked down at the bible in her lap, and fingered the softness of the worn pages. The book had been a wedding present almost eight years ago.
It was Mother's Day, and she'd known since this morning's sermon that she'd have to come back to the preacher's text, before the day was done. The bible fell naturally open in the center, partially because of the way it was bound, with the parchment pages in the middle for the family tree, but mostly because Ella loved the psalms and proverbs. She leafed to the passage, trailing a finger down a page until she found what she was looking for:
The wise woman builds her house, But the foolish one tears it down with her own hands. The fourteenth chapter of Proverbs, verse one.
Closing the bible in her lap, Ella leaned forward and placed her elbows on the table, her head in her hands. She sat there for a long while, listening to the wind making the porch swing creak, until the fading light bled the kitchen into darkness.
She felt paralyzed, frozen in her chair, strung taut between two choices, one seeming just as terrible as the other. To stay…to go…
It was impulse that made her decision for her, spurred on as she was by the sudden whinny of the horse in the barn. Lighting the oil lantern, she tiptoed to the door of the side kitchen, then soundlessly padded, barefooted, to the edge of Elmer's bed.
Cautiously, she bent over him, until she was certain that he was fast asleep. Sweat beaded on his forehead—the laudanum, no doubt, as it wasn't a warm night, this early in May. Ella fastidiously but carefully rearranged his leg on the pillows, checking to make certain that the sheet rag aligning the limb with the end of the bed frame was securely fastened. Satisfied, she straightened and studied him. He'd lost weight in his face in the past two weeks, making him look younger and more handsome. More like the Elmer she'd married, but then again, she certainly looked different now. She bent to kiss him on the forehead, then stopped and shook her head. It just wasn't right, not now.
As she made her way up the steps to the second story, she noticed that the wind had picked up even more, rattling the sitting room screened door in its grooves. She hoped it would rain…but no thunder. Thunder might awaken the baby. She moved down the hall towards the wash room, stopping at each doorway to cast a careful eye over the children in the three rooms: all peacefully sleeping. In Ella and Elmer's bedroom, the baby in her crib needed covered, and she held her breath as she did it, but the child didn't even stir.
In the small washroom, Ella lifted the porcelain pitcher and tipped it to fill the basin on the stand. Shrugging out of her ill-fitting house dress, she let it fall to the floor, then lifted her camisole over her head. With her underwear finally off, she turned and faced the mirror in its brass floor stand, watching herself as she pivoted from side to side on the balls of her feet, then stood still and critically inspected her reflection.
She grimaced at what she saw. Twenty-four-years old and she already had the beginnings of a paunch, the product of bearing five children, one after the other (the last one a baby dead just three months ago from pneumonia). Cupping her breasts with her hands, she stood on tiptoe and sucked in her belly, which made her look marginally better. She let out a deep breath, then reached up to undo the pins in her hair. As it cascaded down in wavy clumps, she breathed, barely audibly, "A woman's glory is her hair." Or so the bible said. She rather found it a nuisance, and had had wild urges recently to chop it off short, but this just wasn't done—what would people say?
Rubbing the hard, homemade soap on the rag, she began to clean herself, for now ignoring the mirror. She scrubbed her face till it shone, then under her arms and between her legs, ending with her feet and toes. Unfolding the nightgown waiting for her on the chest of drawers, she slipped it on and let it fall to mid-calf. Now she looked in the mirror once again. Only a slight improvement.
Catching up the comb, she worked the knots and tangles out, until her face was framed by the waterfall of dark brown hair. As she reached for the lantern on the hook, she hesitated and turned back. Taking the bottle from the shelf, she coated her hands with the fragrant rosewater, then ran her fingers through her hair. An extravagance, she knew, as this wasn't Saturday night, but a special occasion (the thought made her smile, almost grimly) all the same.
Ella knew the stairs well, and stepped to the sides of the rubber treads to avoid the cracks and creaks that they made. Once in the kitchen, she donned her barn shoes, then silently trod through the mud porch and out through the back door.
Lifting the lantern high, she followed the path up the hill to the barn. The wind whipped through her hair, blowing her gown up around her knees. She squinted at the horizon, barely visible now, as the moon was covered by fast-moving and threatening clouds. The air smelt of newly mown grass and impending rain.
Just at the barn, she heard the quiet groan of the door as it was opened from the inside. She could see him standing there, watching her as she climbed the last of the path. His face remained hidden until she lifted the lantern again to maneuver the bales of hay stacked at the sides of the door, but even then she couldn't see his features fully.
Stopping to stand beside him in the doorway, she shivered as he slung an arm around her. Together, they looked out at the turn in the weather.
"Storm's coming," he said close to her ear.
***