vocal cord. He said they could operate, but she might not ever speak again. So the cysts stayed. They caused no harm other than making her sound like she was always hoarse, for the rest of her life.
But Jesse never asked about her voice, which had pleased her at the time. They started going on double dates with Ruth Sisk and Bill Mowers. Sometimes they went bowling or on picnics to Dublin Gap. Usually, the foursome caught a movie. The first time Ada and Jesse kissed was on a bench at the drive-in theater, From Here to Eternity playing. She had loved that kiss scene on the beach, even with the wedding ring, even though she knew it was wrong. But in the car, Ruth wouldn’t shut up, so they found a picnic table on the side, under a tree. The big picture loomed over them. They couldn’t hear it, since they were away from the car speaker, the actors speaking without sound. Jesse leaned over to kiss her on the cheek, but Ada turned and met his mouth. She wanted to taste. She was glad she did.
They double-dated for six months before Daddy allowed her to see a movie with just Jesse. Afterward, Jesse took her for a sundae at The Treat. While they ate, he fidgeted and glanced out the window. Soon, three girls came in, one wearing a Chambersburg varsity coat. Ada didn’t recognize them, wondered what they were doing here far from their town. Jesse tried to ignore them, but Ada could tell he watched out of the corner of his eye. After they ordered, they walked into the dining area, and the one with the jacket said, “Why, hey, Jesse. Imagine meeting you here.” She batted her eyes and ignored Ada. The varsity jacket was blue and white and obviously belonged to a football player. “I just love this jacket,” she said. She looked at Ada then, and that’s when she noticed the name on the jacket—Shupe. Her stomach rolled, and she calmly put down her spoon. The girl laughed and finally spoke to her. “Oh my, I see you didn’t know. He’s really my boyfriend.”
Ada slid out of the booth and started walking. Her homeplace was fifteen miles from Shippensburg, and she was bound to walk all of it that cold spring night. Jesse ran after her, yelled that it wasn’t what it looked like, but she ignored him and marched on, the cars busy on Route 11. He disappeared for a bit, and Ada thought he had gone back to her, whatever her name. But no, he soon came up beside her in his car. Ada wouldn’t stop, so he yelled across the seat, out the window. “She’s my ex-girlfriend, Ada. She never gave me back my coat.” Ada didn’t believe him, remembered him wearing it at the Halloween party. “We broke up right after that,” he explained.
It started raining, hard, so she got in his car and sat as far from him as she could. He talked, said her name was Tammy, said he never loved her. All Ada said was “Take me home.” At the driveway, she didn’t even let him pull in. Her last words were “Don’t ever call me again.” She ran through the rain and up the stairs to her bedroom, where she finally cried.
Even now, a year later, she spat out the bitterness like that first unripe berry.
LATER that afternoon, Ada found her father and Uncle Mark holding Star, the burned cow, for the vet to examine. The men had Star pinned in a makeshift stall, her head tied so tightly to a post she could hardly move. She tried to kick, so they leaned heavy against her. The stench of burned flesh hung over them.
Dr. Blake had a white handlebar moustache that wiggled when he talked. “Easy now,” he said to the cow. He placed huge swaths of bandages over the worst burns on Star’s back. The gauze darkened and soaked up the seeping fluid. “Brace yourselves. This’ll get her riled.” In one quick jerk, the vet ripped off the bandages and all of the cow’s scabs. Star stumbled. She arched her spine and bellowed so loudly that for a moment Ada was back in the burning barn with all of the other cows. She had to look away.
“Have to get the scabs and dead tissue off,” Dr. Blake shouted over the cow to her father, “for the new skin to grow.” He wadded up the soiled gauze. “Need to do this every day. Then you need to lather this ointment on and cover it again for a day. I can do this, or you.”
Uncle Mark calmed the cow while her father walked with the vet to his car. From the trunk, Dr. Blake pulled medicine and more gauze, and Peter listened as the doctor talked for a long time. Then Peter handed him some bills, and the vet drove out the lane.
Her father turned to Ada and his brother-in-law. “Dr. Blake just lectured me on what he called our useless voodoo. Said it was a waste of breath. To not even bother with powwowing. Said we better make sure we give her these pain pills.”
Peter shook the bottle. He held it at a distance like he didn’t know what to do with it.
Finally, he faced Uncle Mark. “Should we put her down?”
Uncle Mark held up his hand and turned his back.
Peter fell silent, as Uncle Mark moved his hands above the cow’s back. It took him a long time to whisper over the whole raw area. As he did, Star stopped bellowing. Her spine eased out of an arch and her eyes closed. Soon she breathed in a series of long, slow sighs.
“I guess not,” Peter rubbed his face.
Uncle Mark shook his head. “No, we’ll get her fixed up. The vet’s right about taking her bandages off every day, but you don’t need to give her that pain medicine. The Lord will take care of that.”
They released the cow and watched her trot into the meadow with the others. A few of the cows smelled her back, and one tried to lick it. She kicked and galloped down to the stream to stand under a walnut tree by herself.
Her father turned to other chores, leaving Ada and Uncle Mark. “How are you doing, Ady?” Uncle Mark asked.
“Fair to middlin’,” she tried to joke.
Uncle Mark gazed at her longer than usual, and Ada had to look away. The two stood in silence, watching Star.
“Have you checked Mama’s hands?” she asked as they turned to walk.
Uncle Mark nodded. “I changed her bandages this morning. For what she’s been through, she’s doing well.” He opened his pickup and settled in the seat. “She’s starting to heal,” he said as he leaned out the window, and Ada knew the rest of his sentence—“The question is are you?” Uncle Mark would never be so direct, and yet, for a moment, his gaze was. He started the truck and threw up his hand in a wave as he drove out the lane.
Under the ember of the sun, Ada stood alone. Uncle Mark, her quiet uncle, had touched her deepest fear. And she didn’t know her answer.
Cicero
There’s a part of every bird that wants to help. Hell, you sit on those eggs day and night for weeks just waiting. Keeping them warm and dry. The rain and snow drenching your back. You turn them every day. Maybe you murmur as you do it. Maybe you say, hurry up, why don’t you?
Then one day a little stirring, a wobble that tickles the belly. Another follows, and a third. And a few days later, you have to just sit nearby to wait and watch. Or if you’re like me, you fly to a limb where you listen but don’t have to watch.
By god of all roadkill, wouldn’t it be grand to remember what it was like inside that egg? All smooth and white and warm. How it glowed in the sun. That must’ve been something.
I’ve watched enough now to know I’m damnsure glad I don’t recall hatching out—all that pecking to tucker you beyond tiredness. Sometimes I wonder why we don’t just stay in that perfect little egg. But then we’d never learn to fly, and by god, what’s life if you can’t fly?
So I listened. Loot listened and watched. This was our first nest together. We were nervous as any first-time parents,
