Stepping by Nancy Thayer Read Free Book Online

flashed an unmistakable message: “That’s my daddy . Hands off. Leave him alone. I hate you. I’m going to get you for this.”
    I reeled back from Charlie, thinking I was going crazy. No seven-year-old could think that way, I thought then, not knowing seven-year-olds. I was surely being melodramatic; she was just a little girl, not something out of The Bad Seed . And I still believe she would not have tried to kill me even then. She just heartily wished I would disappear. Failing that, she wanted to hurt me. It was logical; I had hurt her.
    We all gathered around the table and took our places and I waited for everyone to take the first delicious mouthful, and Cathy burst into tears. Within a minute she was into full-scale, uncontrollable sobbing.
    “Cathy, what’s wrong?” Charlie asked, reaching Cathy and taking her into his arms only a few seconds before June lunged up from her seat and around the table.
    “I hate shrimp!” Cathy cried. “Shrimp has sand in it and bones that taste like glass. And I hate that green thing, too. SHE NEVER FIXES ANYTHING GOOD TO EAT!”
    After a stunned silence, with everyone staring at me in anticipation, I said, as calmly as I could, “Cathy, I fix exactly what your mother wrote me to fix you girls.”
    “Mother never makes us eat liver ,” Cathy wailed. “And never yucky old eggs for breakfast. She lets us eat Frosted Flakes or Apple Jacks. And never, never, never shrimp! Never, ever shrimp; it’s yucky, yucky, YUCKY!” Cathy went off into another fit of crying.
    Charlie finally carried Cathy into the other room. Caroline sat miserably looking at her plate, two tears slowly making their way down her cheeks. I later learned that whenever one sister cried the other one did, too.
    June rose, unable to keep the glee from her voice, and said, “I was afraid something like this would happen. I have peanut butter in the car. You do have sandwich bread, don’t you, Zelda?”
    In the face of this woman who actually carried peanut butter in her car I could only acknowledge defeat. I didn’t even have peanut butter in the house . I said yes, I did have bread, and I rose and got it and together we fixed peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for all four children. Eventually Charlie got Cathy calmed down and we all ended up atthe table again. Charlie and Anthony said, “This is delicious,” and June went so far as to say, “Yes, it’s very nice,” but the luncheon had been spoiled for me, and even the white wine didn’t help. I felt that I’d been had. I felt that Cathy was a brat. I felt that those two rotten minutes had somehow magnified themselves to reflect on and spoil the whole summer, certainly the whole day.
    I wanted to tell Cathy to go away, to get out of my marriage, out of my life, off my farm.
    But of course I didn’t tell her that. One can’t, not to a seven-year-old whom your husband loves. And after a long while I learned what I learned again with my own children: no matter how bad it gets with little children, there is always tomorrow, always another chance. The children are captives. They can’t take back their fraternity pin or divorce you or disinherit you and kick you out of the house. They forgive as easily as they fall asleep, and they expect to be forgiven quickly, too.
    I didn’t know that then. I trudged through the rest of the day, and was delighted to see Anthony and June and their children leave that evening. Charlie and I sat outside with Caroline and Cathy, listening to the night sounds: frogs belching, birds twittering, creatures skittering in the bushes to bed, and the valiant whippoorwill serenading us all. I did dishes while Charlie put the girls to bed, and then I reluctantly went in to say good night.
    Both girls looked so small and sweet in their thin cotton nightgowns, with their gold-stamp baby dolls tucked in bed next to them. I kissed Caroline on the forehead, and then Cathy, as I had done every night they had been with us. The air