Poppies

“Bye, babe,” Pascal waved after Pauline as she hopped out of the car and ran up the stairs to her house. “Call yah later,” he said, humming the wedding song to himself. He smiled and put the car in gear.

  Pauline didn’t stop to respond to him. She couldn’t stomach to look at Pascal at that moment. All she wanted to do was run and hide away in her room for the rest of her life.

  What Pascal had done to her was horrifying. She couldn’t stand the thought of it happening again, and would never understand how anyone could enjoy what she had just done.

  Pauline reached the front door and paused with her hand on the doorknob. Taking a deep breath, she straightened out her clothing and adjusted her ponytail. Strands of her golden hair had come loose in disarray around her pallid complexion. She self-consciously stuffed the loose strands back into the bundle of hair secured in the back of her head.

  She must look normal.

  Turning the knob of the door hesitantly, she walked into the warm kitchen of her parents’ house. The smell of coffee filtered through her nostrils as she looked around the large room in disbelief.

  There, sitting at the table with Jobeth and Alan, were Chad and Joanna.

  They were plainly in a deep discussion, looking as though they always sat together and had coffee as a family. As if the last seven years had never happened and Joanna had never run away and been abandoned by her family.

  “Close your mouth, Pauline, before you catch some flies,” Joanna chuckled, lifting her mug of coffee to her ruby lips.

  “I...I don’t understand . . . “ Pauline said, mystified. She didn’t move a muscle. What was going to happen next in this crazy day? Would Mara-Joy and Alan-Michael show up and ask to play cards with them all?

  “Sit down, Pauline. You look terrible.” Jobeth stood up and pulled out a chair for her daughter to sit down. She went to the counter and got a cup of coffee. Placing it in front of the colorless girl, she sat back down in her own chair and looked at the astounded creature, sternly.

  “What on earth has happened to you?” Jobeth asked, the palm of her hand holding up her chin. She looked across at her daughter, concerned.

  “Nothing.” Pauline lowered her eyes and began to sip her hot beverage.

  “You look a fright,” Jobeth continued eyeing her child suspiciously.

  Pauline turned to Joanna and smiled warmly, trying to avoid her mother’s intense scrutiny. Something had transpired between mother and daughter and she wanted to wash away the memory of Pascal on top of her and focus on the matter at hand. Besides, if her mother interrogated her further, Pauline was afraid she would break down and expose the horrible truth about what had happened that evening.

  “What is going on here?” she asked, forcing a surprised smile. “Ma and I made up.” Joanna placed a warm hand over Pauline’s cool trembling one. Unconsciously, Pauline pulled away, not wanting anyone to touch her.

  Joanna paused, slightly put off by Pauline’s behavior, but when she looked into her young sister’s eyes she could see how happy she was for Joanna, and something else, something she couldn’t read.

  “That is the most wonderful news I could hope to hear,” Pauline said in all honesty. She looked to Alan, who sat beaming with pride across the table from her.

  “Yes, it is. Yes, it is,” he said, shaking his head in disbelief. “Your mother and sister are back on the right track with each other.”

  “I am so glad,” Pauline said, standing up painfully. The full impact of what had happened earlier was starting to course miserably through her. She just wanted to have a hot bath and curl up in bed alone. “But if you don’t mind,” she looked around at the people staring at her, avoiding Jobeth’s eyes, “I think I’ll head off to bed. I don’t seem to be feeling all that great.”

  “What is it, dear?” Alan asked, about to stand up. Pauline raised her hand to stop him.

  “It’s nothing, Dad. I’m just a little under the weather. Please excuse my bad behavior. Just be assured that this is the best news I could have heard. Continue catching up. It has been a long time and you need this time alone. Enjoy.”

  Pauline then stood and walked out the door. They could hear her ascending the stairs to the washroom. Soon after, the sound of water running came from behind the closed door.

  “I should see what is wrong with her.” Jobeth said, standing. Joanna reached out a restraining hand and placed it on Jobeth’s arm.

  “Ma, I think she just wants to be left alone,” Joanna said. There was something in the way Pauline looked that spoke to every inch of Joanna’s marrow, saying, “Let her be for the moment.”

  “Leave her alone?” Jobeth sputtered. “I have left that girl alone one too many times. I think maybe it is time I stepped in and found out what is going on in my children’s lives.”

  “I’m not disagreeing with you, Ma. It’s just . . . something tells me Pauline isn’t ready for a confrontation just yet.” Joanna listened to the sounds of the shower running and felt certain that something had happened to her little sister. But what?

  Alan cleared his throat.

  “I hope it has nothing to do with that rascal,” he said with bitterness in his voice.

  Joanna looked to her father whose face showed the distaste he felt for Pascal. He wasn’t one to voice his opinion when it came to his children. He was one who always let them make their own choices in life, good or bad.

  “You mean Constance’s brother-in-law? George’s brother?” she asked, a little surprised.

  “The very one,” Alan spat out. “I don’t like the devil. Not one bit. The thought of my sweet Pauline with that troll of a man sickens me.” He took a deep gulp from his mug and slammed the cup down onto the wooden table, causing both Joanna and Jobeth to jump.

  “Pauline talks quite highly of him, Pa,” Joanna said, trying to defend her sister’s choice in a mate. Apparently much had changed in the time she had been away. Alan was not a man to say such things about other people. He was the type of man who liked almost everyone. Then again, he hadn’t liked Chad once either, but he had had good reason.

  “Pauline, bless her angelic soul,” Alan sighed, “is not always the quickest draw.”

  “Alan!” Jobeth reached out and gently slapped his arm. “How could you say such a thing?”

  “It’s true, Jobeth, and you know it,” he looked from Jobeth to Joanna to Chad. “Don’t get me wrong, she is the sweetest girl . . . a special child . . .” He looked to Joanna, apologetically. “I have never played favorites with you children. I love you all equally, but Pauline is the one child out of all of you who has never asked for anything. Never demanded anything of us, and has gone unnoticed the most.”

  “Pa--” Joanna began, ashamed. She had demanded her mother’s attention and when she didn’t get it, she turned their lives upside down. Even though she and Chad were deeply in love with each other, it had all begun because Joanna wanted to hurt Mara-Joy for all the affection she got from their mother.

  “No, listen, Joanna. It’s time I said my piece. Mara-Joy has always been a large focus in this family and now you know the reasons why. She brought your mother and me together when we wanted to be together but were afraid.

  You came along and you were our first birth child. There was always a rivalry between you and Mara-Joy since the day you were born. I saw it right away when the two of you were little girls and it was not always one-sided. I have to say a lot of it was two-sided. You two girls were always trying to hurt one another and it was exhausting on the rest of the family. Your mother defended Mara-Joy and I defended you.

  “When Constance was born, she was our third child and also a girl, but not just any girl, she was a genius. So smart was that child, she could have been anything.” Alan looked a little misty-eyed as he thought of Constance.

  “She is something, Alan,” Jobeth said. Joanna could feel that this was a conversation Jobeth and Alan often had.

  “She’s not what she could have been. She wasted all that talent, all tha
t brain--” Alan’s neck began to turn red under his collar. He twisted his head trying to compose himself.

  She is a wife and mother. There is no shame in that.” Jobeth said softly, her eyes lovingly caressing Alan’s temper.

  “But she could have been more.”

  “Could have, should have. We have a beautiful grandson and another grandchild on the way.” Jobeth touched Alan’s arm. He nodded and placed a hand on hers, giving it a light squeeze.

  “No point in looking at what could have been,” he said.

  “That’s right.” Jobeth replied, proud of how Alan kept his disappointment at bay.

  “Anyway,” Alan said, looking back to Joanna and Chad. “When we had our fourth child and she too was a girl, well,” Alan smiled to himself, “I could have had a dozen girls and it wouldn’t have bothered me. All you children were such a blessing. Never in my wildest dreams as a child did I imagine having Jobeth as a wife and wonderful children of my own. My childhood was so terrible; I just wanted my children to have all the joys in life I had been deprived of.”

  “You did do that, Papa,” Joanna said, full of emotion. How she loved this big strong man sitting across from her. He was the first man she had ever loved and she would always love him. “You were the best father a girl could ask for.”

  “Well, I don’t know about that. When Pauline was born, you other children were so,” he tried to think of the right words to express himself with, “full of piss and vinegar.”

  Joanna and Chad suppressed chuckles.

  “That much is very true,” Jobeth said, standing up and fetching the coffee pot. “The three of you were quite the handful. We weren’t prepared for it one bit. Our only experience with girls was Shawna and she was so grateful for a normal childhood she never gave us any trouble. So we were unprepared for you girls.” Jobeth couldn’t help but laugh quietly to herself, remembering her years with Shawna and later with the other children.

  “Yes. You and Mara-Joy were always up to something.” Alan continued, “Usually trying to demolish each other someway or another. Constance was always busy studying things . . . everything. We always had to help her out of messes she’d somehow gotten herself into while exploring. But Pauline, we never had any problems with her. She just went with the flow, trying not to get in the way. She was mild-mannered and easy-going.

  “It took nothing to please her, because she expected nothing in the first place. She knew all the attention was needed on her older sisters and she didn’t care. How could she, she didn’t even realize she was supposed to be jealous of the three of you. When Alan-Michael was born, she lost the position of being the baby of the family. She was the second-to-last child in a household filled with all girls except one, the child born after her.

  “Even this, having a baby brother after so many girls, didn’t seem to faze Pauline. She was too innocent and tender-hearted to get filled up with jealousy over any of you children.”

  Joanna cleared her throat and shifted her eyes uncomfortably.

  “What are you trying to say, Pa?”

  Alan looked at his daughter and shook his head.

  “Any one of us would have felt left out if we were her, but she didn’t. Why is that?”

  “I don’t know,” Joanna responded, feeling a little guilty. She hadn’t realized how self-absorbed she was growing up. How her and Mara-Joy’s bickering had affected everyone in the house beside herself.

  “I do,” Alan announced, placing his hands firmly on the table. “She is a rare and pure creature. She isn’t jealous or envious because she doesn’t know how to be. She only knows how to love--and love she does, openly and honestly. She wasn’t envious of you children because she loved all of you and to be jealous would have been to be negative towards the ones she cared for. She doesn’t know how to do that. She can’t do that. I love Pauline, but she has the mind of an innocent child and she always will. I’m afraid that naiveté will be fully exploited by that cad Pascal.”

  “How so, Pa?” Joanna asked, feeling slightly ashamed. She didn’t have the same abandonment of self that Pauline did.

  “I’m afraid she’ll respond to that bastard from her heart because her mind doesn’t know any better.”

  Chapter 41 —