The Family Tree Read Online Free PDF

told us. But she did, didn’t she?”
    Dora sat back down. “Yes. I don’t think she meant to, but she did. You knew she was on drugs?”
    “We were only a year apart, Dory. When Grandma died, you were up to your neck being a cop all day and taking care of the house and us all night. Sure, I knew she was on drugs. I used to beg her to stop, but she said it made everything easier. It didn’t, really. It just made everything disappear.”
    “You should have told me, Pol.”
    “You had a lot on your plate. I figured you’d done enough, all those years, and then after Gran died, staying there to take care of Milly and Jimbo and me.”
    Dora fretted. Polly should have told her. Maybe…if she’d known. Oh, if she’d known, what? Her mind squeezed tight, the way it sometimes did, shutting grief away. Shutting the pain out, refusing to let the emotions strangle her, making herself go on. Not unscathed, but capable.
    “That’s what the good Lord gave us repression for,” Grandma had often said. “So we can put the grief and anger dogs in their kennels and go on with our lives. If we let the dogs run, they’ll follow the trail until they drag us straight to destruction.”
    “Whenever I remember Milly, I think maybe some people are survivors and some aren’t,” Dora commented, holding herself very still. “Seeing the things I do every day, I think sometimes it’s better if we just let the nonsurvivors go. They don’t enjoy life. They suffer through it, being angry all the time, hating people, grieving over things, and everyone who loves them suffers right along. They’re like a fish out of water, flapping the whole time, from this disaster to that disaster, and we flap with them, feeling the air burning our gills, getting drier and drier with the pain. Better if we let them go.”
    Polly frowned. “Oh, that’s hard, Dory.”
    She nodded solemnly, spoke through her teeth. “I know it is, Pol. It’s just a feeling I get. I know it doesn’t sound nice, but if they were animals, suffering that way, we’d put them out of their misery.”
    “You may be right. Milly was never happy. She was like Daddy, from what Grandma used to say.” Polly looked up and spoke, as though to no one in particular. “But you’re not that happy either, Dora. And I don’t think you will be if you stay married to Jared. Why did you marry him in the first place?”
    My God. Everyone wanted to know why she married him. Including herself!
    She half giggled, shaking her head. “Oh, Pol! Youkids were all gone, and I’d sold the farm. And during the day, on the job, I was okay, but at night, when I tried to sleep…” How to describe that feeling, finding herself caught in an undertow of memory, thrashing around, trying to get something solid under her feet? “Jared asked me to marry him and share his house down the street. He said we were mature adults, we’d be able to design ourselves a comfortable life. And I thought, well, why not?”
    “You didn’t love him!”
    “No. I’ve…I’ve never loved a man, not like that.”
    “You were afraid it might be your only chance, weren’t you?”
    Dora flushed. “That’s probably true.”
    “Okay. I can understand that. But why in hell have you stayed married to him?”
    Well, why not be honest? “He’s never pleased about anything, Pol, but he is easy to keep contented. He lives by rules; all I have to do is remember them. And I’m comfortable.”
    “But Dora, God, you deserve more than that! You must know there’s something missing! What’s the matter? Are you afraid if you admit it, you’ll have to do something about it?”
    “Like go look for it? Aren’t half the women in the world looking for ‘it,’ whatever ‘it’ is? Good sex, real romance, love and lust and ecstacy, pink clouds in the skies and violins in the shrubbery. Trumpets, trumpets, madly blowing! Thumpety-thump on the bedsprings. Wasn’t living with Mama and Daddy enough of that!”
    Polly laughed,