Dolores Claiborne

    Instead, there was that little time of peace and quiet and good feelins between them, when she'd go out and watch him work on his old clunkers behind the house, or sit beside him on the couch while we were watchin TV at night (Little Pete didn-think much of that arrangement, I can tell you) ask him questions about his day durin the commercials. He'd answer her in a calm, thoughtful way wasn't used to… but I sort of remembered. From high school I remembered it, back when I was gettin to know him and he was decidin that yes, he wanted to court me.

    At the same time this was happenin, she drew distance away from me. Oh, she'd still do the chores I set her, and sometimes she'd talk about her day at school… but only if I went to work and pulled it out of her. There was a coldness that hadn't been there before, and it was only later on that I began to see how everything fit together, and how it all went back to the night she'd come out of her bed room and seen us there, her Dad with his hand clapped to his ear and blood runnin through the fingers, her Mom standin over him with a hatchet.

    He was never a man to let certain kinds of opportunity pass him by, I told you, and this was just more of the same. He'd told Tommy Anderson one kind of story; the one he told his daughter was in different pew but the same church. I don't think there was anything in his mind at first but spite; he knew how much I loved Selena, and he must have thought tellin her how mean and bad-tempered I was-maybe even how dangerous I was-would be a fine piece of revenge. He tried to turn her against me, and while he never really succeeded at that, he did manage to get closer to her than he'd been since she was a little girl. Why not? She was always tender-hearted, Selena was, and I never ran up against a man as good at the poor-me's as Joe was.

    He got inside her life, and once he was in there, he must have finally noticed just how pretty she was getting, and decided he wanted somethin more of her than just to have her listen when he talked or hand him the next tool when he was head-down in the engine compartment of some old junk truck. and all the time this was goin on and the changes were happenin, I was runnin around, workin about four different jobs, and tryin to stay far enough ahead of the bills to sock away a little each week for the kids” college educations. I never saw a thing until it was almost too late.

    She was a lively, chatty girl, my Selena, and she was always eager to please. When you wanted her to fetch somethin, she didn't walk; she went on the run. As she got older, she'd put supper on the table when I was workin out, and I never had to ask her. She burned some at first and Joe'd carp at her or make fun of her-he sent her cryin into her room more'n once-but he quit doin that around the time I'm tellin you about. Back then, in the spring and summer of 1962, he acted like every pie she made was pure ambrosia even if the crust was like cement, and he'd rave over her meatloaf like it was French cuisine. She was happy with his praise-accourse she was, anyone would have been-but she didn't t all puffed up with it. She wasn't that kind of girl. Tell you one thing, though: when Selena finally left home, she was a better cook on her worst day than I ever was on my best

    When it came to helpin out around the house, a mother never had a better daughter, especially a mother who had to spend most of her time cleanin up other people's messes. Selena never forgot to make sure Joe Junior and Little Pete had their school lunches when they went out the door in the mornin, and she covered their books for em at the start of every year. Joe Junior at least could have done that chore for himself, but she never gave him the chance.

    She was an honor roll student her freshman year, but she never lost interest in what was goin on around her at home, the way some smart kids do at that age. Most kids of thirteen or fourteen decide anyone over thirty's an old fogey, and they're apt to be out the door about two minutes after the fogies come through it. Not Selena, though. She'd get em coffee or help with the dishes or whatever, then sit down in the chair by the Franklin stove and listen to the grownups talk. Whether it was me with one or two of my friends or Joe with three or four of his, she'd listen. She would have stayed even when Joe and his friends played poker, if he'd let her. wouldn't, though, because they talked so foul. Th child nibbled conversation the way a mouse nibble a cheese-rind, and what she couldn't eat, she stored away.

    Then she changed. I don't know just when the change started, but I first saw it not too long after she'd started her sophomore year. Toward the end of September, I'm gonna say.