“A woman like you never married?” Ricky opened his mouth in mock astonishment. His mother said he could charm the birds out of the trees without half trying. “Hard to believe.”
“Oh, but it’s true.”
“Well, then, there are a lot of men out there who missed out.” He shook his head and made a tsk-tsking noise.
She giggled. “Just one thing,” she said. “If anyone asks, I’m going to tell them you’re my nephew. I wouldn’t want people to get the wrong idea.”
He winked at her. “Whatever you want, Aunt Lorraine.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
1983
Secondhand Heaven closed every night at six, which meant Kathleen could be back home by six thirty most nights, seven at the latest. Aunt Edna’s house, now hers, was only a block away. An easy walk, even for someone who’d been on her feet all day. In the few months she’d lived there, the place felt more like home than the apartment she’d shared with her husband back in the days when she’d been married.
Ricky had preferred a modern look. Contemporary furniture with clean lines, uncluttered spaces. Nothing on the kitchen counters, very little on the walls. He didn’t read, so he considered books to be no more than dust collectors. He didn’t mind her having books; he just didn’t want to look at them. She gave away most of her collection to the library book sale and kept her favorites in her bottom dresser drawer. At the time, it seemed a small price to pay for love.
He had all kinds of quirks. They could eat only at the kitchen table; otherwise, he said, falling crumbs would attract vermin. Vermin! She’d laughed at first, then realized he was dead serious. Dishes had to be done immediately, towels could be used only once, and their cars had to be kept impeccable, inside and out. Kathleen, trying to be accommodating, went along with whatever he wanted. She thought she was compromising, but in retrospect, it fit the cycle of abuse: his controlling nature and the need for him to make his mark. It was almost as if she’d been branded, along with the house. Property of Ricky Dorsey.
She came to detest the sound of his whistling as he walked about the house. Always some tune she didn’t know, or maybe it wasn’t a song at all. He said he did it without realizing it, but she believed otherwise. It was important for him to stand out, and a man who whistled as he walked up the path certainly did. It gave the neighbors the impression he was a happy and carefree person. If only that had been true.
When Kathleen took a stand and became less responsive to his needs, his moods darkened, and his anger overshadowed everything good in life. After that, the tidy, sparse apartment started to feel less like home and more like a prison cell.
Aunt Edna’s house suited her much better. It was a small two-story brick house with a front porch large enough for two rocking chairs and a table in between. The place was spacious enough for one person and cozy too. Kathleen had arrived with only a suitcase, so the fact that the house was already furnished was a bonus. The house also came with linens and kitchenware and built-in bookcases filled with books. Everything from classics to Agatha Christie to paperback thrillers and the Bible too. Something for every mood. She didn’t miss the fact that Aunt Edna didn’t have a television. Maybe someday Kathleen might feel the urge to buy one, but for right now, she was fine.
The greatest draw of Pullman, Wisconsin, had been its usefulness as a refuge from her ex-husband, but now it was turning out to be her home. She planned on staying indefinitely. She had memories of visiting her great-aunt during her grade-school years. Her memories of Pullman had more to do with going with her parents to feed the ducks in the lake and a visit to the ice cream shop afterward than it did her great-aunt or Secondhand Heaven. On two different occasions, she and her mother had made the drive up when she was older. A girls’ outing, her mother had called it. They’d rented a rowboat and spent the day on the lake, picnicking on a tiny island no bigger than her grade-school playground. They’d also spent time with Aunt Edna during those trips, but she couldn’t recall much about those visits. She wished she’d paid more attention.
Pullman was a picture-postcard kind of town. Big enough to support shops and a movie theater, but small enough that everyone seemed to know everyone else. She got used to being greeted as she walked to work and tried to remember names so she could respond in kind. The mailman pushed a cart and delivered mail right to the house. Aunt Edna had a mail slot in her front door, and the letters dropped right onto the braided rug. The man driving the ice cream truck wore a white hat, and the town barbershop had a revolving red, white, and blue pole outside its front door.