When the Bough Breaks Read Online Free PDF Page A

bottle is finally finished, and I can tuck him back into his crib.
    After I've rinsed out the bottle in the scullery, I go into the living room and open the Bible. I turn to the last page to read Mother's name. Just seeing it gives me comfort. Father has added two new entries:
    Albert Carr, died 1901
Millicent (Nelly) Carr, died 1906
Helen Bridges, died 1902
Lillie Bridges Carr, born September 4,1895;
died July 2, 1935
    William Carr, born January 8,1895
Hamish Francis (Frankie) Carr, born March 5,
1897; died 1917
Millicent Helen Carr, born September 10,1922
Hamish Albert Carr, born August 16,1925
Edward Thomas Carr, born June 29, 1935
    Neatly folded in the drawer is a copy of the newspaper dated July 2, 1935.
As if anyone of us will ever need reminding of what happened that morning.
    I creep upstairs again, knowing that in a couple of hours, the busy lonely day without Mother will have to be got through somehow.

“THERE IS NOTHING TO STEAL”
    T he worst thing about Mother's death – there, that's the first time I've used that word – is that she is not coming back, ever. She has not “gone on a journey” – people come back from journeys; nor has she “passed away,” “passed on,” or “passed over.” I hate those phrases people use. Mother is dead, and every little thing I do reminds me of her and makes me miss her more.
    I miss her when I set only three places at the table; when I go into the larder and read the labels on the jams and jellies and pickles we preserved. I wrote the labels for the strawberry jam only days before Mother died. It's been the best strawberry season in years, and strawberry teas have been held all over town since June.
    I miss hearing Mother hum that same old tune I've heard as far back as I remember. I miss her braiding myhair. I miss listening for her to tread on – or to step over – the creaky step on the stairs last thing at night, before she checks on Hamish and me … before she goes to bed.
    Most of all, I miss the sound of her voice: talking to Father, to a neighbor, to the milkman, to us. In the three days since Eddie arrived, he must have listened to Mother speak more words and sing more songs than he'll hear from me in a month.
But he has to hear voices, or how will he learn to speak?
    I wish I was more like Mother. “Do I take after Father?” I asked her once, and she answered, “You are your own self, Millie, my love,” and I have to be satisfied with that.
    Mostly now we eat in silence. I do know how to cook, at least twenty ways of serving up potatoes – mashed, baked, scalloped, or mixed with leftovers in a pie, fried in a bit of lard with onions, made into pancakes, or soup, with or without bones begged from the butcher – and lots of other dishes too. It just takes me more time to prepare meals than it did Mother.
    Every day I plan for us to have a pleasant supper together, all of us sharing our day, the way we used to when Mother was here. But the minute I sit down, the baby wakes and wants my attention, so it's hard to have a conversation about even ordinary things.
    Our vegetables last us right through the winter because Mother tended the garden as carefully as shelooked after all of us. I try to push away the thought that Mother won't be here for Thanksgiving, or for our birthdays.
How in the world can we celebrate Christmas without her?
    The blackberries in the bushes at the end of the street and behind the railway sheds are already turning red. Soon Hamish and I will set off at dawn, before the other kids or the hoboes off the boxcars strip the bushes of their fruit. There's enough for everyone, but we like to go early and fill our pails. Mother won't be at the door to admire the crop when we come home … to make blackberry tart or cobbler for Sunday dessert … to give us a hug … to pretend to scold Hamish for eating too many berries before breakfast.
    Father thanks me after every meal, straightening his chair before returning to the forge.