The Woods at Barlow Bend by Jodie Cain Smith

loved, I tried to memorize every detail, from the big oak tree in front, to the painted cedar trunks that Daddy had used as columns on the front porch. Daddy had leaned against those columns when he told me he didn’t hurt Momma. Those columns meant that he loved everyone inside the house.
    Those columns also showed our corner of the world how unique my mother was. Momma said that when Daddy built this house, she made him leave the knots on the trunks rather than smoothing out the odd shapes and bumps so that the whole town would know that inside the house were very special, unique people, free from the boring expectations and limitations of our town.
    I stared at our home until we turned left turn off Bowden Street, onto County Road 38, and our little house disappeared from view. I turned back around in my seat, closed my eyes, and sucked down the cry that was welling up in my throat.
    Somewhere along County Road 38, between Frisco City and Grove Hill, Daddy laid out my new life. He quickly confirmed my fears. He needed and required my full attention in the café, which meant going to school was a thing of my past. I had dreamt of going to teacher’s college, but that dream was quickly replaced with an apron and kitchen utensils. He wanted Meg and the boys to finish grammar school, but I was in the ninth grade. I had all the education Daddy required. Paying customers ranked over a high school diploma.
    “Hattie, I don’t need you i n school. I need you at the res’trint,” Daddy told me in a tone that left no room for compromise or argument. “Now, you’ll help me out in the café, and next year, when Meg’s done with eighth grade, she’ll start work, too, and then the boys when they’re done. That’s just how it’s gonna be.” Meg and my brothers slept right through Daddy’s plan for the family.
    By September of that year, we were all settled into our new routines and new home in Grove Hill. I celebrated my fourteenth birthday in the hotel cafe with a cake that I made from strawberries bought at the corner market on Main Street in Grove Hill. Before that cake, I don’t know if I’d ever had store bought strawberries. The hotel was right on Main Street, in the heart of Grove Hill, and seemed to be constantly surrounded by the typical, exciting hustle and bustle of a county seat, but we had no place for a garden. The week of my birthday, Daddy gave me a few extra pennies for strawberries for my cake. He also gave me a new dress made of blue cotton gabardine with tiny pink and yellow flowers on it, from the dress shop two blocks over. It was my first store bought dress.
    Meg , Billy, and Albert left for school every morning at eight o’clock. The school was only a few blocks away from the hotel, but Meg complained daily about getting the boys to school as if she had to wrangle cattle on a drive through the open plains of Texas.
    Meg met her new responsibilities with a frequently expressed sense of martyrdom, “Hattie, you will never understand how challenging the boys can be! Running ahead or lingering behind. By the time I sit down, my nerves are so frazzled; I can hardly concentrate on what teacher has to say. At least Miss Springer understands the extraordinary challenges of my life!” Meg had perfected a flair for the dramatic.
    I did n’t share my intense jealousy of my sister getting to go to school. I was fairly certain that Meg would revel in the idea that she had something I wanted, and there was no way I would give her that satisfaction. I loved going to school back in Frisco City. I found nearly every subject fascinating, except arithmetic. Reciting multiplication tables and practicing long division didn’t appeal to me or challenge me in any way. I raced through our arithmetic lessons, checking my work once before turning in my paper long before my classmates. Those of us who quickly finished those monotonous lessons were given the privilege of selecting a book from Miss Hendrix’s personal