What’s happened so far:

In Part 1, Lucy finds Jennie has been banished to her room for predicting the future, something her minister uncle considers possible demon possession.

Lucy continues with what happened next:

Ella was right. I sat hugging her and wishing I could hug Jennie too. Both needed comfort, and none was available in this house. If only we could have gone with Aunt Hannah, but that wasn’t possible.

For the hour allotted to me for visiting, I sat quietly with Ella. We said little, just huddled together, our arms around each other, watching sunlight filtering through lace curtains blowing in the wind.

On my way back to Aunt May’s, I stopped at the hotel and went around to the stable. Jake was there, pitching hay. He smiled as I entered, but his face became somber as I grew closer.

“What’s happened?” he asked.

I rubbed my cheeks. “What makes you think something has?”

He set the pitchfork aside and came to stand in front of me. He touched my face. “You’ve been crying.”

I didn’t want to tell him about Jennie’s plight, so I told half the truth. “I miss Aunt Hannah and being with my sisters here at the hotel. Visiting isn’t the same as being a family together.”

“I guess not.”

I remembered then that Jake’s parents were dead. His father had hoped to get rich in the gold fields near Denver. His mother died on the way there, and when his father didn’t strike gold and ended up busted, they headed back east, only for his father to die on the trail. Jake had almost died too when he wandered away from the train and a man who was supposed to be his father’s partner left him in the sun without water. Delia and her friends had found him and brought him with them to Westport where Aunt Hannah had given him a job. He was an orphan, just like me and my sisters.

Well, not just like. Pa was still alive, but all he cared about was his new wife and the children he was having with her. Our brother Ambrose had told us how Pa accepted her saying we had bad morals because we inherited a weakness from Ma and Aunt Hannah had taught us to be suffragists and no man would want to marry any of us. It served Pa right that his newest child, my half-sister, was a girl.

“What is going on here?” Aunt May’s shrill voice broke the stillness.

Jake’s hand fell to his side, and I swirled around to face her. “Nothing,” I said, glad for the dim light which hid the flush that warmed my cheeks.

“Nothing? You sneak off to see this boy when you are supposed to be visiting your sisters. That won’t be happening again. Come along, now!”

“I did go to see them, but Jennie is being punished and isn’t allowed visitors. Ella was so sad we couldn’t even talk. We just sat.”

“I hope you prayed while you were sitting. If you didn’t, I’ll give you ample opportunity when I get you home. Come along.”

She spoke to me like I was a child instead of almost a woman. Why was it that you were a child when people wanted to make you do what they wanted, but you were an adult when they wanted you to work or wanted to marry you off and get you out of their way?

Next Week:

I hope you are enjoying the “Life with Aunts” blog series. I’ll be posting Part 3 next week. In the meantime,

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Uprooted

by Hazel Hart

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