Chapter 12

I went into the library, as soon as I got off of the phone with Brenda. I waited for Mrs. Parsons to come back downstairs like she had promised she would. My thoughts were centered not so much on the questions I wanted to ask her, but on the more general idea of me finding a way to fit in. I hadn't fit in very well at the orphanage. The sisters had told me many times that it was because I refused to make any attempt to. They were right. I hadn't wanted to fit in there. Here, it was an entirely different story

I recognized enough to understand that it was as much a case of me pulling away from them as it was them not being a good fit for me. I had always assumed that I couldn't let any part of my shield down with the sisters, else they would take advantage of it. All of the nuns had a greater loyalty to their religion than they did to any of the kids at the orphanage. If you let yourself have any kind of feelings for them, they'd use those feelings against you, trying to get you to swallow their religious beliefs.

When Mrs. Parsons walked into the library, I stood up for her again. She had taken longer than the hour she'd said, but she looked much more like her normal self again. Her hair was all in place now, and she had put on some makeup to make her skin color look healthier. She closed the library door behind her, insuring that we would have some privacy for our talk.

"Kenny, before we begin discussing those matters you earlier spoke of, I believe I should apologize again for appearing at the dinner table in such a state of disarray. Your summons caught me off guard, and I was totally unprepared. I have known, for some time now, that I wouldn't be able to keep you from an awareness of my use of alcohol. Certainly not entirely, as evidenced by what has occurred tonight. Even though it was obvious that I'd been drinking, I don't want you to get the wrong idea about it. I get my melancholia first, and it's only after I'm indisposed by that condition, that I find it helpful for me to drink. I do it as a form of self medication, to lessen the feelings of dark despair that I suffer from. The drinking helps me to sleep, something I find very difficult to do when suffering from this condition. It also seems to cut down on the length and severity of my melancholia."

"I don't think you owe me an apology, Mrs. Parsons. I owe you one for bothering you when I knew you weren't feeling good. It was just that I have this problem. I said it was with these two girls, but now I think it is really just the same problem I have with everybody. I don't trust anyone."

"I understand. If it helps any, most of us have the same problem to a greater or lesser degree. Trust becomes difficult when it has been repeatedly betrayed. Was your trust betrayed, Kenny?"

"I've never had any trust. I don't know why. Maybe it was just the orphanage, but I learned at a very young age not to trust anyone except myself. I grew up expecting people to try to force me to do what they wanted. They didn't care about what I wanted."

"Don't you accept that they were acting in what they believed was your best interest?"

"No, because I'd tell them what I wanted, but they kept telling me I had to do what they wanted. They said that God wanted it that way."

"There are rules that we all try to live by, Kenny. Some are established through religious beliefs, some from government edict, but most are compromises that society has ordained, to ensure levels of acceptable conduct, in order to provide for a fair and safe living environment for all of us."

"I know most of those rules, but that isn't what I meant. Part of it was the religious stuff, but a lot of it was just them wanting me to obey their orders without question, blindly. They wanted me to admit that they had the right to control my thoughts as well as the things I wanted. I don't like being controlled by other people."

"Give me an example."

"Spending two hours everyday studying religion with the sisters in the school, instead of spending that time learning real subjects."

"Religion is a very real subject to the nuns, Kenny. It is the foundation of their life's calling."

"Yes, and I don't mind them studying it. I didn't want them to make me study it, but they did anyway."

"They were attempting to teach you an understanding of a moral code, one that you could use to build a good life for yourself. For many years, the only education most people received was through the Church."

"I sat there and listened, at least at first I would, but, after awhile, I already knew what they were teaching us. It was always the same message. God came first, and then the priests and the nuns, then any other adults, and we came last. I didn't want to always come last, and I didn't want to have to keep dealing with people who believed that was how it was supposed to be."

"Do you feel that you are last here, Kenny?"

"No. In a way, that's what is causing me such a big problem. I'd worked out a way to deal with the orphanage. It wasn't perfect, but it worked all right for me. Since I've been here, you've all treated me really good, better than I deserve. I'm always afraid now, afraid that someone is going to figure out that I don't deserve any of this, and they'll take it all away. I'll have to go back then, back to things being the way I was used to. When you've never had anything, you don't worry about losing it."

"Why do you think that? Has anyone here ever said anything like that to you? The decision on whether you stay or leave rests solely with Bunny and me, Kenny. I know that when Bunny brought you here, it was to try to give me something to look forward to. An interest to keep me from dwelling overmuch on my emotional condition. Thomas might not understand me, but Bunny always has. He knew that I needed someone to care about, especially now that it appears that I'm to be divorced soon. In picking you, I think Bunny made a really good choice, for the both of us. I can help you, Kenny, help to make your life better, more enriched. Your being here with me, helps me, it enriches my life as well. You will always have a home here with me, Kenny, as long as you choose to stay."

It was difficult for me to swallow after she said that. There was a lump in my throat at least as big as a golf ball. I had a home! She didn't qualify her words in any way. There wasn't a long list of rules I had to obey in order to keep on living there. I didn't have to earn it, she had simply given it to me. I wanted to jump up and hug her, thanking her over and over again for accepting me like she had. Instead, I sat in my chair, unable to muster up the words to express the overwhelming gratitude I felt. I couldn't even keep looking at her, because my eyes were tearing up, and I didn't want her to see me crying. I looked down at my hands in my lap, silent, but still shouting a thousand thank yous out into heaven, or wherever it was that the nuns told us kids that our prayers always went. I finally managed to get my emotions back under control. I wiped my eyes with my hands and took a deep breath.

"Thank you. I've never had a home before, only a place to stay." When I looked up at her, she was crying too. "There's something else I need to explain to you. I don't know how to act around people I care about. I've never needed to learn that, except maybe with Marie. I need for someone to show me how to do that. Especially around you, Mr. Parsons and Mr. Chalmers. I get along all right with Hans and Gerta, but I have problems sometimes not knowing how to act around any girls, even Bea. I keep messing things up by the things I say to Brenda and Bea. It's mostly this problem I have with thinking everyone is out to control me."

"Kenny, there are different types of controlling. One type is simply guidance. If Hans gave you directions on getting to your new school, he wouldn't be controlling you, simply offering guidance on the best way to go. Guidance is a form of control, as is suggestion and advice. If I asked you to go in the kitchen to inform Gerta that I wish to dine at seven thirty, is that controlling you?"

"Not unless I told you I didn't want to go. If you insisted after, telling me I won't get any dinner if I don't do it, that would be you controlling me."

"Suppose, after your school year begins, I tell you to complete your homework before watching any television? Suppose also that you have a program that is on that at that time, a program you want badly to view. What would you do in that case?"

"If it was your rule, I'd follow it. If it were a special television program, or one I was watching as part of my school studies, I'd tell you about that and ask you to make an exception."

"And, if I still refused to make that exception for you?"

"I'd go finish my homework. I might still resent it, even though I had followed your rules."

"I'm afraid you're really talking about a contest of wills, rather than control issues. I too am willful, as is Bunny. Thomas has become increasingly willful as well. He came to it right after Daddy died. This was the first time he was able to assert himself with both Bunny and me. Neither of us possessed any of his skills and experience for managing the company. He used that situation to force us to bend to his wishes. He continues to do that to this day. One such exercise of that bending is the current proposed merger. Bunny and I never wanted to sell the company, it was all Thomas."

"Mr. Chalmers said it was necessary, for competitive reasons. He said it was too difficult for a weak company to survive. He also told me that Mr. Parsons had done a terrific job with managing the company."

"Because he listens to what Thomas reports to him. My father never ran into any difficulties he couldn't handle, not while he lived and managed the company."

"Mr. Parsons works awfully hard. I'm sure he does the best he can."

"I'm sure he does. The best that he can for himself. After the merger, Thomas will be a very wealthy man. Every year since daddy died, we've had to cede a small percentage of our ownership interest to him, as payment for his services to the company. He will cash out his ownership position with the merger, in addition to remaining in control of my father's company. That is the real reason for this merger."

"Is that the reason why you oppose it?"

"I've never opposed it. I might have my own ideas about the real reasons for it, but I can't deny that Thomas has negotiated a handsome price for the company. I'm sad that forty years of having the company within the family is coming to an end. If Thomas and I had our own children, then I would have been opposed. As it is, we all have only Thomas to turn to for management of our business interests. Without him, who knows what would happen to all those hundreds of people that depend on us for their livelihoods? Now, even if something happens to Thomas, the company will be able to carry on."

"Why are you divorcing him?"

"He doesn't love me. He never has. The situation with Beatrice was the final insult to me. A man doesn't comport himself like that, certainly not in his own home, and not under the same roof he shares with his wife."

"I don't know anything about that. I know he always worries about you, and he asked me to try to help you feel better when he is gone. He even said he wants all of us to play golf together again, after the merger."

"He said after the merger? Are you sure he said after?"

"I'm sure. He said he was looking forward to it. He also said he was very fond of you."

"He didn't! Don't go making things up just to try to make me feel better."

"Those were his exact words, "I'm very fond of Bertie". It was while the two of you were fighting too."

"It sounds to me like you talk with him more than I do. He spends all of his time here working in the study. I hardly see him."

"As soon as you left the table on Sunday, he went back into his study, not even one minute later. He tried talking to you at dinner, but you kept getting mad at him. He talked about wanting to play tennis with you again. It was you that turned the conversation to the merger. It sounded like you were accusing him of being happy that your father died, even after he said he missed him."

"He changed when Daddy died, changed in the way he treated me. It seemed like he was just waiting, so that he could take over the company."

"He sounded to me like he got along real good with your father."

"Oh, he did. They were perfectly suited to each other. They had the business in common, a shared interest that Bunny and I could never compete with. Daddy treated Thomas like his own son. He wouldn't have liked seeing how things turned out after he died."

"I think we both have problems with trusting people. I need you to tell me what to do with Brenda. She keeps trying to use "the power" on me."

"What power, Kenny?"

"You know, "the power". She uses the fact that I like her to try to get me to do what she wants me to do."

"Are you referring to her using her feminine wiles to bend you to her wishes? Is this the power you are referring to?"

"She talks about things, then when I start talking about them too, she pretends to be angry with me, or else afraid of me."

"I'll need an example."

"Bea can explain it a lot better than I can. She's the one who told me about "the power". Bea thinks its only about sex, but she's wrong. I think 'the power" is anything that you have that someone else wants. Sex is almost all that Bea has to use."

"You're too young to already be aware of these things, but you are right. Bea has shown a willingness to use her power too. We all use something to get our way."

"Do you use your illness that way, as your "power"?" Mrs. Parsons stared at me. She almost said something, two or three times, but each time, she stopped before she spoke.

"What an extraordinary question, Kenny. It is a question that deserves an answer. Yes, I suppose I do use it that way. But, not often, and usually, when I have no other means to get my wishes granted. I don't have Bea's feminine advantages, so I am reduced to using what I do have. I don't know if my answer satisfies you, but it is as honest as I can make it."

I was thinking of another question to ask when there was a knock at the library door. I got up from my chair and answered it. It was Gerta with two sausage sandwiches. There was a glass of milk for me, and a beer in a glass for Mrs. Parsons. The sausages were hot, giving off steam, and they had been sliced lengthwise to fit on the bread. there were two pickle slices on each plate, and a side order of sauerkraut alongside each sandwich. It smelled really good. I took the tray from a smiling Gerta, and then closed the library door. I noticed Bea back in the living room, looking over at Gerta and I. I smiled at her while I thanked Gerta for the sandwiches and drinks.

"Gerta is using her power with food to try to make us both eat something. It's going to work with me."

"Are those sausage sandwiches? I love sauerkraut and sausage. Look, she even sent me a glass of beer to wash it all down with. I'm getting my appetite back just from the smells. I guess that means that Gerta's power works with me too."

We each sat in our chairs, Mrs. Parsons had her plate balanced in her lap, the beer glass on the table next to her chair. I had the serving tray in my lap, being careful not to spill my milk. We ate together, even though I'd finished having my own dinner an hour and a half before. The sandwich was very good, but I didn't care that much for my sauerkraut. I did like the pickles, even though they were very sour. When I was finished, I got up to put my tray over on another chair, figuring I'd take everything back to the kitchen when Mrs. Parsons was finished eating.

"Kenny, why didn't you eat the kraut? It's really good when you spread it on the sandwich."

"I didn't care for it. I'll eat it though, if you want me to?"

"No, you had your chance. Bring it over here and I'll eat it. Gerta would have both our heads if we left any sauerkraut on our plates. She claims it was her ancestors who invented the recipe for the original sauerkraut." I went to retrieve my plate and brought it to her. It took her about five times as long as it had taken me, but she finished everything on her plate, plus my leftover sauerkraut. It was the most I'd ever seen her manage to eat at one sitting. So far, getting her to play golf again, and getting her to eat more often, were the only two things I could point to as improvements that I'd helped her with.

"Mrs. Parsons, do you feel better because you ate something, or did you only eat because you felt better?"

"A little of both, plus, I know that Gerta must have gone to a lot of bother to create one of my all time favorites in order to tempt me into eating. With her going to all that trouble for me, I felt an obligation."

"Is that the same reason you came down to dinner when I asked?"

"No, Kenny, not exactly the same. Knowing that you were troubled by something, and having you say that you needed me, this was something I couldn't refuse to attend to. There is a strong connection I feel with you. I've remarked on it to both Thomas and Bunny. I can only imagine that it is similar to the bond any mother feels with her child. Although it is still early in our relationship, I already feel this strong connection."