Page 113 of The River We Remember

“That’s right,” she reminded herself. “Can I fix something for you to take to eat?”

“Grandma already made us some sandwiches.”

“Oh. Good,” she said.

He tried to walk past her, but she stopped him, leaned down, and kissed his forehead.

“Jeez, Mom, I’m not going away forever. It’s just an overnighter.”

“Be careful,” she said.

“You know I will.”

He bounded down the stairs and outside, and she returned to her bedroom and her preparations for an evening she’d begun to dread.

The knock at her front door pulled her from her dreary thoughts. It was still too early for Brody, and she considered simply ignoring the visitor, whoever it was. But the knock came again, insistent.

Felix Klein, she thought wearily, and descended the stairs and opened the door.

On the porch stood Garnet Dern.

SCOTT FELT A little guilty about the way he’d secured his mother’s permission to spend that Sunday night away from home. She’d clearly been distracted, and he’d purposely asked her in a moment when she seemed completely lost in thought.

He met Del at the Rialto Theater, where they changed the marquee to reflect the next week’s new film, The Vikings. He and Del had seen the trailer, and both boys thought it looked like a great movie, full of strong, dirty men and lots of sword fighting. It starred Kirk Douglas and Tony Curtis, and when the big Viking ships filled the screen, Del had leaned to Scott and said, “Fuggin’ cool.”

When they’d finished their work at the theater, they mounted Del’s motorbike. Scott shouldered his Boy Scout backpack, in which he’d put his sleeping bag, flashlight, and the sack with chicken salad sandwiches, apples, and cookies his grandma Ida had prepared for their dinner. He’d tied Del’s rolled-up blanket on top. They took off for Fort Beloit as the sun hung on the horizon, a tired, bloodshot eye ready to close for the night.

Fort Beloit stood at the river’s edge just south of town. It was a re-creation of an enclosure that had been used to protect families just prior to and during the Great Sioux Uprising of 1862. Scott had been inside so many times that it had lost its allure for him. Attached to it, however, was a campground where tourists could spend the night in tents or park their Airstreams and where, on occasion, his Scout troop had practiced their camping skills. The Petersons, who owned the property and ran the attraction, said they wouldn’t mind if any of the Scouts wanted to throw out a sleeping bag there beside the river, so long as a site was available. On that Sunday evening, there was plenty of room.

They picked a spot overlooking the river a safe distance from anyone else, bought Cokes at the little concession the Petersons ran, and ate the dinner Ida had prepared. Scott wanted to ask Del more about the true nature of their outing that night, the possibility of actually seeing a naked woman, but he didn’t want to appear too eager. He knew this was something that his mother, if she’d had the slightest inkling, would have disapproved of absolutely. In truth, he was a little ashamed of himself for being so ready to be involved in something that seemed not at all in keeping with the “clean and reverent” part of the Boy Scout Law. But he’d been unable to get rid of the image of the bare slopes of Mrs. Dern’s breasts and the lacy white cups of her bra. That single glimpse had engendered a kind of hunger inside him that begged to be fed.

“MAY I COME in?” Garnet Dern said.

Angie stepped back and let her enter. She closed the door, and the two women stood in the simple living room, facing each other across a space empty of any decent purpose Angie could imagine. She didn’t allow herself to look at the two journals the other woman held in her hands. Instead, she gazed into Garnet Dern’s unreadable eyes.

“Brody was at the farm this afternoon,” Garnet said.

“Like every Sunday,” Angie said, because everyone in Jewel knew that.

“We had a long talk,” Garnet said.

“I’d guess you did.”

“Why did you write it down? I mean all of it.”

“Because it was the truth. Or the truth of my experience anyway. I thought maybe it would help me understand.”

“Has it?”

“I work on that every day, Garnet.” Angie didn’t really know the woman with the damning journals in her hands, and because she was afraid and defensive, she let fly the one truth about Garnet Dern that she did know. “You’re in love with Brody.”

Garnet looked surprised, then another look came into her eyes, a look that communicated fear, and in that instant Angie knew the whole truth.

“How long has the affair been going on?” she said.

Garnet’s posture changed. She moved to clasp her hands protectively over her chest, but the journals got in the way. “I never…” she began.

“How long?” Angie said in a hard voice.