Nine Days in My Mother in Law’s Sewing Room
We were going to be short, and behind, and eating a lot of macaroni until my check came on the fifteenth.
Friday came. Friday went. I checked the account at noon and at three and at six and at nine.
Four hundred and forty dollars, then forty dollars after I wrote Mr. Weber his check. Nothing from Linda. No phone call. No text.
Nate called her at eight. She didn’t pick up. He set his phone face down on the kitchen counter and stood there looking at it like it might explain something.
That was the night I decided. I was lying in bed listening to the furnace kick on and off and to June fussing in her sleep in the crib at the foot of our bed.
I kept thinking about the words. It’s still partly my account.
If it was still partly her account, then it was partly her rent. And if our rent money was paying for her roof, then it seemed only fair we should sleep under it.
I sat up in bed. Nate was awake too. He usually is when I am.
“I’m going to move us into your mom’s house,” I said.
He didn’t say anything for a long time. Then he said, “For how long?”
“Until it comes back.”
I heard him breathe out through his nose, the way he does when he is trying not to laugh at a bad moment. “Kait. Three kids.”
“And the dog,” I said. “And the portable crib. She has that sewing room. It’s the only spare room she has. We’ll fit.”
“She’ll hate it.”
“I know.” I lay back down. “I won’t be ugly about it. I won’t say one unkind word to her. I’ll cook and I’ll clean up after us. But she’s going to see where that money was going every single morning when she pours her coffee.”
He was quiet so long I thought he’d gone to sleep. Then he reached over and found my hand under the quilt.
“I’ve got a shift in the morning,” he said. “Loading out corn for the train. I’ll be done by six. I’ll bring the mattresses.”
That was Nate’s answer. He didn’t argue with me and he didn’t make a speech about it. He just told me when he’d be there and what he’d carry.
Saturday was cold and bright and still, the sky so pale it was nearly white over the wheat fields outside town.
My sister Amy came and took June for the afternoon so I could make trips without a baby on my hip.
The big kids thought it was the greatest thing that had ever happened to them.
“We’re going to live at Grandma’s?” Hailey said. She was seven and had lost both front teeth that month, so it came out whistly. “For how long?”
“For a little while.”
“Can Biscuit come?”
“Biscuit is coming.”
Owen, who was four, ran in a circle around the living room shouting, “Camping! Camping at Grandma’s!” and Biscuit ran in a circle after him with her ears flapping, baying that sad, cheerful beagle bay of hers.
I want to be clear about something. I did not tell my children anything bad about their grandmother.
To them, this was an adventure. Grandma’s house had a candy dish and a cuckoo clock and a room full of fabric. Of course they wanted to go.
I packed one suitcase for each of us, a laundry basket of diapers and wipes, two boxes of cereal, Owen’s blankie, Hailey’s school backpack, the dog bowls, and the folded portable crib in its blue bag.