Leota's Garden

  “And it could be my imagination,” she said sweetly. “You know how an old lady gets when she’s lived by herself for a long time. A little soft in the head. Isn’t that right? But there are spiders. Of that, I’m sure.”

  So was he, and that was exactly why he wasn’t eager to go climbing into that infernal space. What else inhabited the darkness up here?

  She rapped him on the thigh with the flashlight. “You’ll need this if you plan on seeing anything.”

  “Thanks.” Stewing, he snapped the light on and moved the beam around the small space. He would hardly call this an attic. He saw a stack of boxes, an old wooden cradle, a wooden apple crate with some empty mason jars inside, and an old birdcage big enough for something the size of a parakeet or a canary.

  “I’d like the boxes brought down.”

  “All of them?”

  “How many are there?”

  “Three.”

  “Only three? I thought there were more. Turn around and look behind you.”

  Corban turned and felt a web across his face. He uttered a single, foul word and made a quick swipe across his face, hoping the eight-legged occupant hadn’t gotten into his hair or fallen into his shirt. No, there it was, racing toward the boxes he was supposed to retrieve. He squashed it.

  “What on earth are you doing up there?” Leota Reinhardt cried out from below.

  “Killing a spider.”

  “How big is it? The size of my dining room table? You’re going to pound a hole right through my ceiling.”

  The flashlight flickered. He swore again as he shook it.

  “Is that the only word you know, Mr. Solsek?”

  “Sorry,” he muttered, realizing what he had said.

  “For someone who attends one of the best schools in the country, you have a very limited vocabulary.”

  “I apologize, Mrs. Reinhardt.” Enough already!

  “That’s all very well and good, young man, but if you’ve broken my flashlight, you’re going to buy me another one!”

  The beam came back on. “It’s still working.”

  “It had better be. Just get the boxes and get down from there before you wreck my house.”

  Corban made six trips up and down. He was panting and sweating worse than he had from the walk up the hill. His leg muscles were beginning to cramp before she finally said, “That’s the one I want.” It had better be. It was the last one.

  He hated even to suggest it. “Do you want the other ones put back up there?”

  She looked him over. “No. I think I’ll look through them first. When I’m done, I’ll just push them into the guest room.”

  “Good idea,” he said, appreciating the reprieve.

  “You can put them away again next Wednesday.”

  “You know what really ticks me off?” Corban told Ruth that evening. “I’ve been over there three times already, and I don’t know bo-diddly about her.”

  “What’s the problem? She won’t answer your questions?”

  “I haven’t asked any! I’m so tired by the time she’s finished using me for slave labor, I forget why I came.”

  “So, what are you going to do?” Ruth said, continuing her exercises. She was sitting on a mat with her legs in Chinese splits and touching her head to her knee. Bounce, bounce, bounce and then swing across to the other leg, touching her head to her knee. Bounce, bounce, bounce.

  “I’m going to go back this weekend and tell her about my report.”

  “Do you think she’ll cooperate?”

  “If not, I won’t waste any more time on her.”

  Over the next two days, Leota opened all six boxes. Each brought memories flooding back. Some were good; some were better off locked away in the recesses of her heart.

  The first box was filled with Christmas decorations. It was a box with twelve dividers, designed for shipping bottles of wine. Over the course of two hours, Leota removed the tissue paper from every carefully wrapped ornament and took out the shiny, beaded garland and strings of lights wound around tissue-paper rolls. She hadn’t put up a Christmas tree in ten years. Christmas trees were expensive these days. One cost as much as her electric bill for a month! Even if she’d had the money, she’d had no way to bring one home.

  The best Christmases had been the earliest ones, when she and Bernard were alone with their children in their own little apartment. What joy to see the bright-eyed wonder in the children’s eyes as they stared at the tree. She remembered evenings when Eleanor would be snuggled in her lap and George cuddled against her as she read stories to them. Those were her most precious memories, for after moving into this house, there had been little time for anything but work. Mama Reinhardt had been quick to take responsibility for her grandchildren.

  Leota carefully rewrapped each ornament and replaced it in the box. She tucked the garland and lights back in their slots and pushed the box to one side.

  The second box was filled with old clothing, and each item made her remember why she had saved it. Her wedding suit; a beautiful, satiny robe Bernard had given her for their first Christmas together; a red dress she had purchased for her birthday while Bernard was in the army. He had sent the money and told her to buy something nice for herself. Mama Reinhardt had been scandalized that she had spent all the money on herself rather than using some of it for her children. Papa had come to her defense, but it hadn’t taken the sting from Mama’s opinion of her.

  Running her hand over the dress now, Leota remembered how angry she had been. Mama Reinhardt had been so resentful of her. Nothing she could do in those days had been good enough. Papa said she didn’t understand, and indeed, she hadn’t. Leota had worn the dress the evening she bought it. She had been so angry, so defiant. When she came home, Mama had been waiting up. It hadn’t been that late—only ten o’clock—but the children should have been in bed long before. Mama told her that they had stayed up because they were worried about their mama. She said she told them there was no need to worry about someone so selfish. Their mother certainly knew how to take care of herself.

  That had been the last straw. She had tucked her children into bed and then come back to have it out with Helene Reinhardt. But as it turned out, her mother-in-law was the one who poured out all her frustration and resentments before Leota even had the chance to open her mouth. Papa Reinhardt intervened and said enough to silence his wife.

  Even then, Mama hadn’t understood everything.

  Leota hadn’t thought the children knew anything about that night. Not until a few years ago, when Eleanor had told her she had discussed it with her psychologist. She had flung that bit of information like a grenade. It had exploded in the living room, its shrapnel wounding both of them terribly. Eleanor thought she knew everything. Oh, how wrong she was, but it would do no good to explain that Eleanor had heard only one side of things. What good would it do to remind Eleanor she had been five at the time and couldn’t have understood all of what she heard, let alone the intensity of the anguish involved? Once Eleanor got an idea in her head, there was no changing it. She was like a pit bull, jaws clamped shut, shaking the life out of something.

  “That was the night you hurt Grandma Helene so badly she never got over it,” Eleanor had accused.

  In a sense, it was true. Once Mama understood why Papa had invited Leota to live with them, she never got over it. Poor Papa. Even after that evening, he continued to walk down to Dimond Park and spend hours there, rain or shine. In the later years, Mama had gone with him.

  Leota looked at the red dress that had caused such a ruckus. It was still brand-new. She had only worn it that one evening. After that night, she folded it up and put it away.

  Next she pulled out an old wool shirt Bernard had worn. She had given it to him for his birthday the first year he had come home from the war. He had worn it for Sunday dinners. She could still see him sitting at the foot of the table, facing Papa. They loved and understood one another. It was Mama who had never completely understood. She didn’t
want to face the fullness of what life had dished out to them. Bitter herbs and sorrow. So much sorrow.

  In the bottom of the box was Bernard’s army uniform. Pinned to it were the medals he had received: the Silver Star, the Bronze Star, and the Purple Heart. He had told her to burn the uniform, but she had tucked it away. She had been proud of him. He had made his stand, not counting the cost. And, oh, what a cost it had been! The memory of what he had told her in a moment of weakness made her shudder. She had asked him once if he had talked about everything with Papa. He said no. Yet over the years Leota had wondered if Papa hadn’t known everything already.

  Some things were better left unsaid.

  As for Leota, she had chosen to close her mind to the things she couldn’t change and move forward. There were too many good things in life to allow things beyond your control to destroy you.

  If only Bernard had been able to think the same way.

  The next two boxes were filled with children’s toys, games, and books. She set the items out one by one: a cigar box full of cowboys and Indians; a denim sack of Lincoln Logs; a homemade doll in a flour-sack dress, with embroidered hem and sleeves; an envelope full of jacks and a ball; a checkerboard and a box of checkers; a tin of used watercolor paints; a can of used crayons; and a number of old, worn books—including George’s favorite, Kidnapped. She had put these things away as George and Eleanor had outgrown them, hoping one day she would take them out once again for her grandchildren to enjoy. She had imagined holding her grandchildren in her lap and reading to them.

  She looked through the books: the first edition of Curious George, an old discolored booklet from Montgomery Ward titled Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, a dog-eared collection of fairy tales, Robert Louis Stevenson’s A Child’s Garden of Verses, and The Wizard of Oz. Stacking them again, she placed them back in the box, once more packing away the lost hopes and broken dreams.

  Doesn’t every young wife imagine a life of fulfillment and joy? And then reality comes barging in, and she has to do what’s necessary and right for the time. No one can see ahead to what comes from circumstances. Life is filled with trials and tribulations.

  “Take heart, beloved. I have overcome the world.”

  I know, Lord, but You’re up there in heaven, and I’m still down here. You lived thirty-three years on this earth. You know what it’s like. And here I am, over eighty. I’m tired of it. The first twenty were wonderful, and I thank You. If I didn’t have good times to remember, what state would I be in? But You must know, Lord, the last sixty-plus haven’t been much fun.

  She thought of the Old Testament people who had lived hundreds of years. What a daunting thought.

  The fifth box held a jumble of personal mementos from Mama and Papa Reinhardt and the children. Mama had been good about helping Eleanor keep special mementos from her school years in homemade scrapbooks. She used cardboard from the heavy boxes she got for free from the grocery store. Papa would cut them for her, and she and Eleanor would glue magazine pictures over them. The front of one was a collage of Hollywood movie stars. Inside it were essays Eleanor had written, party favors from school dances, programs from events she had attended, and school pictures. Another album was papered with pictures of places to see, such as the Grand Canyon, the California redwoods, Oregon beaches, the Rocky Mountains. Inside that scrapbook were mementos from George’s school years.

  There had once been pictures of relatives, but they were all gone now. The few pictures left were of the children during their school years. All the remaining pictures Leota had of her family were sitting on the mantel. She only had three pictures of Bernard. The one taken on their wedding day hung in her bedroom. The second was of her and Bernard with George as a toddler and Eleanor as a baby. The third was of Bernard in his uniform. It had been taken and sent home to her when he graduated from boot camp. She had given it to his parents, and they had displayed it proudly on the mantel until he came home and told them he wanted no reminders of the war. Mama had put it away after that. She didn’t even hang it on the wall in the little apartment behind the carport. When Bernard died, Mama had placed the picture on top of her television set where she could see it every morning, noon, and night of her last ten years of life.

  Tucked in the box among the collection of mementos was an old shoe box. Leota untied the pink ribbons and lifted the lid. Inside were letters from the old country that Mama Reinhardt had saved. They were written in German and beyond Leota’s comprehension. Yet, when Mama Reinhardt had died, Leota couldn’t bear to burn them or throw them away. If Mama Reinhardt had cherished them enough to save them all those years, who was she to discard them? They were neatly organized in small bundles and tied with slender pink silk ribbons. One bundle for each year, starting in 1924—the year after Mama and Papa Reinhardt had immigrated to the United States. There were no letters after 1940.

  Leota wondered what the letters said. Perhaps she should destroy them, yet the thought bothered her. The shoe box of letters only took up a little space. Maybe someday a relative would learn to read German and decipher them. Then again, maybe that wouldn’t be such a good idea.

  She knew what Bernard would have wanted.

  She weighed the box in her hands. Lord, what should I do? Our family history may not be pristine, but it’s ours nonetheless. What risks are involved in saving them? Who might be hurt by what they contain? And if I did burn them, how much of who we are would go up in smoke?

  Sighing, Leota set the box aside. She didn’t know what to do about the letters. She would think about it for a few days and then make up her mind; if she couldn’t decide, it would be left to someone else to figure out. Let Eleanor or George burn the past if they so chose.

  Before she put the lid back, she noticed one long, brown envelope tucked lengthwise in the box. She took it out and turned it over in her hands. It had no markings on it and was unsealed. Opening it, Leota took out some official-looking documents. Spreading them out, she read them. Mama and Papa Reinhardt’s naturalization papers! Both had passed their test before a judge and become American citizens in May of 1934.

  It was no accident that these papers were in with the letters from Germany. “Oh, Mama, you were pulled between two worlds, weren’t you?” Yet, it was a message, too.

  Leota folded the papers carefully and tucked them back into the envelope. She wrote on top, “Naturalization Papers for Gottlieb and Helene Reinhardt.” She placed the envelope on top of the letters, so anyone opening the box would see it first. Then she replaced the lid, retied the ribbons, and set the box aside. She didn’t need a few days to decide after all. She would keep the letters.

  The last box was filled with her own keepsakes. She had weeded them out the last time she went through this box. It had been the month after Mama Reinhardt had died and she had tucked some of her things away in the attic. She held a bundle of letters from Bernard while he was away at war, and took out another of cards he had bought for her over the years for her birthday and Mother’s Day.

  For the rest of the day, she read them. Some made her weep, especially the ones from the war. Bernard had been so full of life and fun when she met him, but the youthful optimism and enthusiasm had quickly given way to the realities of war. She read until midnight, when she became too tired to continue, and left the remaining letters and cards on the dining room table to finish the next day.

  There were fifty-three letters in all. She could hear Bernard speaking to her as she read them, the young Bernard, so full of passion and hope for the future. She read every single one of the eighty-nine greeting cards. Each had a note written at the bottom. All my love, always, Your Bernard . . . I couldn’t have made it a day without you. . . . You are the light of my life. . . . Ever yours by the mercy of God . . . All my love . . . All my love . . . All my love . . .

  Someday perhaps her children would read them. Perhaps then they would understand. These were her proof that Bernard Reinhardt had always loved her, even through the
years of heavy drinking and the bouts of deep depression and silence.

  Oh, Lord, in that day, let the accusations against me be put to rest. Let my children’s eyes be opened so they will see and finally understand some small part of why things were the way they were. They don’t have to know everything, Lord. Not so much that their lives will be shattered. Just let them know enough to put their sour feelings about me aside and count their blessings. I did the best I could with what I had.

  Carefully stacking the letters in order, she bundled them again.

  For now, she supposed Eleanor would continue to cling to her own view of the past. She would hold on to the tattered crazy quilt of experiences stitched together by her own fertile imagination. Bits and pieces of conversations, things she had been told or overheard—fragments of truth, but never the whole of it.

  Stand back, Eleanor. Stand back and take a good look.

  Leota stacked the letters, retied the ribbons, and went through the rest of the things in the last box. What other treasures might she find? She took out a beaded evening bag, a lace collar with pearl buttons, a prayer book with a worn, leather cover, and the portfolio of Great-Aunt Joyce’s drawings. She would go through them later with Annie.

  Near the bottom of the box, she found three white hankies wrapped in tissue paper. One was edged with lace, another with tatting, and the third was beautifully embroidered with forget-me-nots. Her mother’s work. So fine. She had never been able to bring herself to blow her nose in one of them, the mere thought seeming almost sacrilegious. Leota thought about Annie as she took each hankie out and admired it. As an artist, her granddaughter would appreciate the time and effort that had gone into making these lovely things. It was right that she have them.

  On the bottom of the box were two sets of clothing. One set had belonged to George when he was a toddler: a pair of worn jeans with holes in the knees; a blue-, red-, and green-striped shirt; a cowboy hat; and a pair of boots. The other set belonged to Eleanor: a blue dress with tucks and gathers, pink ribbons stitched around the bodice, and white embroidered flowers on the collar and hem. Mama Reinhardt had made it.