“I won’t take no for an answer. Join us for supper. I got enough food here to feed an army. Katie, go back in the porch and get that extra chair for Mommy. Maggie, come sit down for dinner,” Angela said and buckled Lily into her plastic highchair, the cushion sagging from years of use, bits of dried cereal clumped in the crevices.
Wanda’s brown eyes, transparent and light as almond skin, brightened as she sat down and lunged toward the big plate of food placed before her.
“Where’s Daddy?” Maggie asked.
“He’ll be home soon.”
Wanda spooned mounds of cabbage, thick carrots, and fluffy white mashed potatoes in her mouth. She tore at the salt beef and spooned bits of potato and carrot into Susie’s mouth. After her third plateful she rose to put her plate in the sink.
“That was some good. Do you need help with the dishes?”
“No, go on home, your man might call.”
“It hasn’t stopped raining,” Wanda said and pulled back the kitchen curtain. She flushed and lowered her head. “You can see right into my kitchen.”
Angela’s fork stopped in midair. “Can you? I hadn’t even noticed.”
“Well, I better go, thanks again for supper,” Wanda said and hurried out of the kitchen, head held high.
As Wanda crossed the yard, she cried for the shame of it, the shame of having nothing. Pete had been out of work for so long, she could no longer bear it. They once had everything, when the mine was prosperous. They were the envy of the province, the town to live in, and she was the happiest girl around with a man like Pete on her arm. “And now, look at the lot of us, in some state,” she whispered. The nerve of Angela, pitying me like that, like this family is in some sort of habit of collecting the pogey, she thought and hurried through her front door, avoiding the downpour. “We’ll get a job, won’t we love?” she said and hoisted Susie from her hip, held her in front of her face, cooed and kissed her cheeks. “We’ll move far from here, far from anyone who knows what we’ve been through the last few months, yes, my love, guaranteed, all will be lovely grand.”
Long past supper, Angela’s children were in the backyard playing contentedly in the rain: little yellow jackets, hats, and boots their sunlit armour protecting them from the spit of the wrenching clouds. Angela sat in the easy chair sipping tea, fingernails drumming nervously on the edge of her porcelain cup. The clock ticked loudly in the kitchen. Jack’s limp supper was on the table, sealed with steam-filled aluminum foil. Angela went to the back door to check on the children. She tripped over the doormat, damp with the rain Maggie carried in on her ceaseless quest for cookies. A corner of a piece of paper caught her eye. She knelt down to retrieve it, certain it was merely a corner from a colouring book. She crumpled it and brought it to the trashcan. At the last second she saw the Azco Mining Company logo. Her heart constricted and her hands flew to her open mouth. In that second she knew it had happened. The girls at the hairdresser’s were right. Her temples throbbed and a blaze of silver fired across the nerve in her eye. It pulsed and jumped, blurring her vision. A migraine. She was having a migraine. She cautiously opened the letter. Two weeks, it said, Record of Employment forthcoming, recommendation letter available if required.
Why didn’t he tell me? How long has he known?
The anger in her heart rose and settled just as quickly. She knew she’d have to take charge. She went to the window. Outside her two daughters stomped in puddles the colour of milky tea. She thought of Susie across the lane, drinking sugar in her milk bottle.
Susie won’t have a tooth in her head if she drinks any more sugar in her milk. I won’t let that happen to my children. How could a father let his children starve if there are jobs on the mainland? How hard can it be to leave home? I won’t let Jack do that to me, no matter how earnestly he clings to this old rock. He’s as soft as a snail inside that barnacle of a battered hard. But the strength of the grip he’s got on home, I never heard tell of a man so sentimental before. But I’ll crack him. I’ve got to. Someone’s got to speak sense in this family. She sighed heavily.
The front door opened and a biting gust of cool air rushed in like the smack of a wave from the ocean.
Jack entered the living room, his hair awry, muck on the cuffs of his jeans, a smear of dirt on his collar, his mouth tight. He lowered his head and walked straight to the window.
“There’s nothing like rain. Sometimes that’s all you need, a bit of fresh air and clean water, nothing fancy, just the simple things.”
“I know what’s going on.”
“Look at those clouds, moving so quickly across the sky, heading west.”
“What are we going to do now?”
He stared out the window and slowly turned to her. “We’re going to stay here, of course. I’ll find another job in one of the communities nearby, close to home —”
“We can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because there’s nothing left here anymore.”
“There’s got to be something somewhere —”
“We’re not staying here. Pete is in town right now looking, and Wanda —”
“I won’t let that happen to you.”
“Then take us to the mainland.”
“I won’t. I can’t. Don’t ask me to do that.”
“We have children to think about.”
A second of silence hovered. The children.
They hurried to the back door. The yard was empty. Jack put on his shoes and followed a few little footprints in the mud heading toward Main Street. He foraged his way through the mud puddles in the back lane and made his way to Pebble Drive, which bisected the clapboard homes from the school, church, and library on top of the hill. Jack waited for a few cars to pass. All of the drivers waved and honked at him, slowed down and teased him by pretending not to let him pass. Jack smiled and played along, waved and gestured as he thumbed his nose at his co-workers. When the few cars had gone by, he ran nervously up the incline just as two little yellow coats with flapping arms and faces obscured by big floppy hats disappeared down the slope of the small ravine.
He ran after them and yelled at them to come back right now. They turned in unison, small mouths agape with pleasure, wide eyes framed by moist eyelashes. They ran the few feet over to him and grabbed his legs, their yellow raincoats and hats dribbling water on his blue jeans. He knelt down and encircled them.
“Where were you going?”
“To find the gold the end of the rainbow,” Katie answered and pointed at the arc in the sky.
“Can we go get the gold?” Maggie asked.
“Oh my darlings, there’s no —” Jack said, sighed, and lowered his head. He lifted his gaze to meet their innocent yet expectant eyes. “Of course there’s gold at the end of the rainbow, plenty of it, especially for little girls just like you, but the rainbow chooses who gets the gold, and when the rainbow falls over your house, it’s all yours.”
“Really, Daddy?” Maggie asked and watched him with tear-filled, accusatory eyes, her tiny lips pouting doubtfully.
“Yes, of course.”
Refusing to be soothed, Maggie continued to cry. She wanted the gold right now. Jack picked her up and held her tightly in one arm. He grabbed Katherine’s hand.
“Someday the gold will be all yours, I promise. But right now, Mommy is worried about you, and it’s time for your bath.”
Maggie curled into his chest like a water-drenched weed. He crossed the street, and