“Yes, straight A’s. She even helps her teachers correct other students’ papers sometimes.”
“I was a good student, too, but not quite that good,” Mrs. Bledsoe said. “What about you?”
“I’m okay. I get mostly B’s. Some C’s,” I admitted.
“You’re both lovely daughters. I can see why your father is so proud.”
Cassie returned with her second helping.
“Oh, that’s too much, dear.”
“Eat what you like, Mrs. Bledsoe. I don’t keep food for leftovers. I like making things fresh every day.”
“Oh.” Mrs. Bledsoe raised her eyebrows and continued to eat. “Wonderful flavor. We get meat loaf in the hospital cafeteria, but it tastes a bit like I imagine cement might taste and sometimes feels like it in your stomach.”
Cassie laughed. I smiled, still amazed at how well we were all getting along now.
Despite Cassie’s insisting, Mrs. Bledsoe didn’t want any dessert and decided to retire to her room, where she said she would watch television until she looked in on Mother. She told us she would check on her a few times during the night.
“How can you possibly get a good night’s rest with so many interruptions?” Cassie asked.
“Oh, you get used to it. It’s not a problem,” she said. “Thank you, girls.” She rose and left.
“She doesn’t seem to be too bad a person,” I said.
Cassie was staring after her. She turned to me slowly, her smiles gone. “Too bad a person? She’s pathetic,” she said.
“What?”
“Would you like her life to be your life? You heard her. She has little or no family, has never been married, has no children, no boyfriend, if you read between the lines. Probably the most exciting thing she’s done is give an enema.” She rose. “I’ll go up and get Daddy’s tray. You clear the table,” she told me.
; When she came down, she didn’t look happy.
“What’s wrong? Is Mother all right?”
“She’s the same, but look. Daddy hardly ate. He told me he was just too nervous to have an appetite, and this is his favorite meat loaf. I was so careful to make it just the way he likes it. You saw how much time and effort I put into it.”
“It’s only because he’s worried, Cassie.”
“I knew he shouldn’t have brought her home so quickly. He’s sitting up there watching her every breath. I hate to see him like that.”
“But it made him so happy to bring her home, Cassie.”
“So? It won’t do anyone any good if he gets sick, too, now, will it? He has so much to do this week.”
“She’ll be lots better tomorrow,” I said.
She paused and looked at me with an expression of disgust that made me shudder.
“What?”
“You had better stop deluding yourself, Semantha. Grow up. She’s never going to be the way she was.”
“What?” My lips began to tremble. “Why not?”
“It was too traumatic an experience. It’s not like she cut herself or had a minor rash or something, Semantha. There was something living inside her that died, and that something died for Daddy as well.”