Olivia pulled her arm away and thought, This old bat is going to make me homesick for the busybodies in Five Rocks.
“It’s always such a shame.” Iola reached to squeeze Olivia’s arm again.
“Every time a woman bleeds, it’s a child lost to Jesus.”
Olivia’s face was blank as she listened to Iola’s long lecture, impatient for her
nosy neighbor to be gone. But when Mrs. Stubblefield finally took her leave, Olivia went back to feeling lost and alone.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
All the following week Olivia moped. She could feel Mourning’s eyes on her,
watching. Worrying. She no longer hummed while she worked or begged
Mourning to play camp songs in the evening. She went to bed early and rose late, but was always tired.
One morning she woke with a good excuse to lie in. She felt weak and shaky,
sticky with sweat, but told herself it was only the unusual weather they’d been
having – unbearably hot during the day and cold at night. The dank smell of the
cabin, combined with the unpleasant odor of her body, made her feel worse.
Faint strains of Mourning’s deep voice drifted in:
The birds without barn
Or storehouse are fed,
From them let us learn
To trust for our bread
Hearing Mourning sing a hymn usually aroused her curiosity about his
religious convictions. That morning the only thing on her mind was how she was
going to get out of bed. She staggered to the door and saw Mourning behind the
plow, heading toward the back section of the farm where he planned to put in winter wheat. Still in her chemise, she braced herself against the outside wall of
the cabin before she struggled to the woodpile for kindling and firewood. Once
she had a fire going, she collapsed back onto the bed and lay listening to the birds.
Then her stomach cramped and she fled to the outhouse. Afterward she stood
by the water barrel, gripping its rim with both hands and garnering the energy to
wash up and take a few sips of water. Feeling slightly better, she went in and pulled on her clothes, mixed up dough for bread and left it to rise, and trudged
down to the tub by the river, carrying a bucket filled with dirty clothes. She started scrubbing a shirt against the smooth boulder she used, but suddenly
doubled over and vomited into the river. Then she crawled a few feet upstream
to rinse her mouth and face. The cool water made her shiver and the ache in her
bones told her she was good and sick. She turned and dragged herself back up the hill to bed.
Later she forced herself up, first to stoke the fire and then again to put the bread in the kettle to bake. Then she lurched out to the yard, threw up violently,
and stooped to paw some loose dirt over the mess. She splashed water from the
barrel over her face, blew filth out of her nose, rinsed her mouth, and went back
inside, carrying one empty bucket and one filled with water. She sprawled on the bed, the usually tantalizing smell of baking bread causing her stomach to turn.
Not many minutes passed before she had to get up and vomit again, and then again. Each time there was less in her stomach and it began to feel as if she were
going to spit out internal organs. By the time Mourning came in for something to
eat, Olivia was lying on the bed like a rag, soaked in sweat. He stood hesitantly
in the doorway.
“Livia? You ’sleep? You all right?”
