“Ezra and I went up to the lake house the other night.”
“So things must be moving right along,” Mama says, her smile teasing.
“Things were moving right along.” I grimace. “They may be grinding to a halt, but that’s another issue. When we were there, I found that star of David charm Mrs. Stern used to wear.”
Mama’s hands go still under the water, and her whole body seems to freeze. Slowly her hands start moving again, but she doesn’t speak. So I do.
“Ezra didn’t remember his family ever going there, so he asked Mrs. Stern about it.”
She turns her head, stares at me for long seconds. “And what did she say?”
“Ezra didn’t tell me everything, but she said she was there with you,” I say, rushing my next words, feeling on the edge of a knife I can’t see. “I said you would have girls’ trips sometimes with your friends, and it must have been something like that.”
I pause, swallow, wait.
“Was it something like that, Mama?”
For a second, I think she won’t answer, won’t even acknowledge my question. Then she turns the water off, dries her hands on a dish towel nearby and faces me.
“No. It was just Ruth and me.” Defiance and dread vie in Mama’s eyes. “The reason I was so sure Joseph never had an affair with Ruth is because I did.”
“W-w-what?” For once I don’t care that I stuttered. What she’s saying is incomprehensible, but as echoes from that night taunt me with the truth, makes so much sense.
Damn you, Ruth!
Let me explain.
You can’t explain this!
“It was a hard year,” Mama says, looking down at her hands, caressing the small diamond Daddy gave her when they married. She always refused his offers to upgrade. “Your father was busy, working, gone all the time. So was Al. It’s no excuse. Ruth and I just…we were there for each other. I never would have thought…”
She shrugs. “It happened. I let it happen. The day Joe died was the hardest of my life. The day he found out about me and Ruth was the second.”
I’m dumbstruck. Congealing in my shock and clenching a cluster of string beans in my fist.
“I broke his…” Tears trickle over Mama’s cheeks. “I broke his heart and it took years to mend it. I wasn’t sure I ever could. He didn’t leave. He was somebody by then in his own right here in Atlanta. Maybe he was concerned about appearances, but that wasn’t your father. I like to think he didn’t leave me because he couldn’t stand to live without me. Loved me so much he had to figure out forgiveness.”
The kitchen, Mama’s confessional, is completely quiet. Even the refrigerator holds its breath while she gathers her thoughts and I gather my scattered wits.
“We didn’t plan it,” Mama says. “But she was miserable here and missing her family. I was resentful, felt like I was carrying all the load with your father gone so much, and I missed him. Missed being…touched, seen.”
Mama huffs a short breath.
“We were careless when we went to the lake house. Stopped to grab something from the corner store up there. Al found the receipt, asked questions…” She gives a sad laugh and shake of her head. “Ruth is a terrible liar.”
She hasn’t looked at me while she told the story, but now her sad eyes find mine. “Love is not a tidy thing, Kimba. It can’t ever be perfect because none of us are. Someone at some point will make a mess. The test of that love is how you clean it up. Your father stayed and we cleaned it up together.”
Mama turns back to the counter, snapping string beans again.
“I’m glad you were able to stop Serena Washington,” Mama says. “That night, the four of us agreed we would never tell. We all had things to lose. This would be a scandal now. But then?”
Mama bends a meaningful look on me. “Back then? Our lives would have been ruined. I would have told the world what I just told you if it meant clearing your father’s name, though. For Ruth’s sake, I’m glad we won’t have to.”
I have questions but asking them would feel like defiling an offering Mama made freely. She told me what she thought I should know, and that’s good enough for me.
“I hated losing her,” Mama says, smiling. “As a friend. We knew what happened between us was a mistake almost before it started, but sometimes when you’re lonely and hurt, you’ll try anything to feel better.”
“Thank you for telling me.” I swallow my curiosity and shock. “I think… I suspect Mrs. Stern told Ezra, too.”