A Piece of Heaven by Sharon Dennis Wyeth Page A

blind from crying, I wasn’t so sure they might not mentally drown. It was as if Ma had fallen into a well, a well of tears that she couldn’t climb out of. Her voice had such a faraway sound! When we talked on the phone, I felt as if I were calling down the well to her. If I had had long braids, like Rapunzel, I could have made a ladder for Ma to climb up on. But she wasn’t in a well, and I didn’t have braids, and if I had thrown my braids down to Ma, she would probably have pulled me in with her. I wondered if depression was catching. Sometimes after I talked with her, I felt blue, too. Not exactly as if I were in a well, more as if I were in a moat or a chilly bog.…
    If talking to Ma made me feel bog-like, working for Jackson was like standing on hot, dry land. I never imagined how hard it would be to move a door. There were eight of them stacked up in the yard. It took me one whole morning to move them. Jackson had said that he would help during breaks between singing students, but I wanted to do it alone to surprise him. The hardest part was figuring out how. They were too heavy to lift, that’s for sure. So I had to push each one a little at a time off the top of the stack, and then when I had just enough door hanging over one side, I would tilt it so that it was standing straight up. Then I wiggled it toward the fence, where I would rest it at an angle. I moved eight doors that way and lined them up. But the doors had to be carried a lot farther than that. Jackson had a rubbish company coming at the end of the week. The company had agreed to pick up the doors and some other stuff, but the things had to be out front. I didn’t have to carry the doors down the stone stairs, but I still had to get them along the side of the house somehow. I found the answer in the shed: an old pair of steel roller skates, a board, a hammer, nails, and some wire. I punched some holes into the board with the hammer and nails and placed the roller skates beneath it. Then I threaded the wire through the holes and around the skates, fastening them on to make a rolling platform. I needed a rope to pull it with, but I settled for a piece of burlap bag, which I nailed onto the front. Then, one at a time, I tilted the doors onto the platform and pulled them around the house and out front.
    Meanwhile, through the open windows, I could hear Jackson’s students singing. Not all of Jackson’s students had voices as good as Win’s, the boy with the deep voice that I’d heard a few days before. One boy singing the scales couldn’t seem to find the right note. A girl who sang well low cracked on the high parts. Two students sounded okay, but I couldn’t understand the words to their songs. I think that they were in Spanish or Italian. When I sneaked a few peeks through the glass doors, everybody looked cheerful, even the ones who’d messed up.
    Around noon, Jackson came out for a break. I stood in the middle of the yard, smiling. “What have you done?” he asked, glancing around. “Something’s different.”
    “The doors are gone,” I announced.
    “How?” he asked in surprise.
    I pointed to my platform.
    “You made a moving dolly,” he exclaimed. “Amazing!”
    “I told you I took wood shop.”
    “Great job,” said Jackson. “Those doors weigh a ton. How about a break?”
    I went inside and washed my hands in the kitchen while he made us some sandwiches.
    “How’s that blister?” he asked.
    “Almost gone,” I said, drying my finger gingerly.
    He smiled and shook his head. “I had my doubts about whether you’d be able to handle this job. You’re pretty strong.”
    “My arms and back are sore,” I admitted.
    “Try soaking in a hot bath tonight,” he suggested.
    He spread some peanut butter on four slices of bread. I opened the refrigerator and took out some milk. I’d only worked there for a little while, but I already felt at home.
    “Your mom called me last night,” said Jackson, getting me a glass.
    I