Becoming Miss Lee

Chapter 34 - The First Of Many

The spring came on warm and welcoming that year. The air got warm and smelled of flowers and the wonderful aroma of fresh new rain. It felt good to spend lazy hours on the porch with Mister Lee while the children played in the grass of the yard. He seemed to begin enjoying his time out there more and more as he aged, and being able to look out over his land seemed to relax him and make him perfectly content with his situation. Joseph would stop by and help out with tasks on the grounds from time to time, never lingering too long, but wanting to help pay off his debt to Mister Lee as best as he could. Mister Lee constantly assured him that he owed us nothing, but Joseph, well, he came from an honest upbringing and no one dared begrudge an honest man. All the same, nothing much happened for months. We were perfectly content with our lives then. It was blissful, with Tom visiting often and the children growing up. Life seemed to be finally going back to the way it had been. I wrote to my friends early in the morning, spent the day with Mister Lee and Miss Anne, and oversaw my children. I could not have asked for a better place in my life to be than right then, when all was right with the world.

Yet, I could sense that something was amiss with Mister Lee. Having retired from Congress completely, I soon realized that he did not seem to be improving in his health. We had all expected, strong as he was, for him to get a little gaunt and then recover, just as he always had when it came to illnesses. Now, at 63 years, we had certainly expected a longer recovery time, naturally, but he only seemed to be getting worse. We had all assumed stress. Stress always took its toll, but once they got away, came home and rested, they got better. They always got better. Now, though, in the flickering light of the Virginian sun, I could see the gaunt lines of his cheek bones and the way that his eyes seemed heavy and dark. His brow, so noble and arched, seemed to sag under a weight unseen and unknown to all of us. He looked tired, and for the first time I realized how old he looked. Never had I seen him look so pale, gaunt, and just tired. He was still regal, still trying his best to be active and involved, but he just could not seem to stay on his feet like he once did. It seemed that even Chantilly could not work its magic on him this time.

Seeing him like that made my heart twinge with fear and a burning realization that he may very well be gone sooner than I could ever imagine. Deep in my heart, I knew he was dying. I always knew. I fought that notion, though. I braced against it, pushed it away into the recesses of my thoughts for another day. Just one day more... Then it would happen. I would forget, then I would see him struggle to climb the stairs, and he would swear under his breath that he could not climb like he used to, or he would stop during one of his walks and lean heavily on his cane, short of breath, and that painful, stinging, awful realization that he was in such poor health would come crashing back onto me like a tidal wave and my heart would twist itself painfully and I would fall back against a wall, behind a closed door, and cry. I hated seeing him like that. I hated seeing it compared to the light haired Virginian delegate of my childhood, tall and regal with a voice smooth like honey and rolling like thunder, seeing that image next to the white haired weak old man that he had become. My tears were selfish and I hated them. I hated how they seemed to come at every time when I desired to be in his company and be strong and brave, just like him. They turned me into a pale, weak thing, the emotional embodiment of what every man believed a woman was. I longed to be strong for him, to hold and support him when he needed me the most, but I was not sure that I was able.

Miss Anne knew and confronted me one day as we shut the doors to the parlor and I moved to sit for one of our sewing sessions. "Bea, if you want to speak of your heart, you can with me." I did not reply or even look up from the bolt of blueberry colored fabric draped across me lap to acknowledge her. "Beatrice, look at me!" The unnatural sharpness in her voice made me start and look up at her. "You do not have to mourn quietly anymore! This is not New York and this is your father! If you ever have need of comfort, you may come to me, always! Do you not think that I do not see you sitting there with your face in your hands weeping every time you help him to his room for the evening or when you see him struggle back to his chair on the porch? Confide your troubles in me or they shall tear you apart from the inside out!" She was practically pleading with me and I could see the tears in her own eyes begin to well up. "You are not the only one who can see that he is dying, Bea..." They overflowed then and streamed down her cheeks in tiny rivulets that she swiped away in frustration and anger. She slid herself into her chair and held one of her hands over her face tersely, her shoulders occasionally shaking and betraying the sobs that she kept so well-hidden from her face. I stood up and moved beside her, sitting down and draping my arms across her shoulders and burying my face into the crook of her neck. She turned to me and wrapped me in her arms so that my cheek was pressed against her collarbone, and there we sat, intertwined and silently crying into each other's arms. She stroked the top of my head softly, resting her chin atop it as I knelt beside her, attempting to keep my tears from running down and staining her dress as best as I could. "You will never have to be in your sorrows silently and alone again. Never again. I swear that to you as long as I live."