Bett Norris

Jane, at age eight, was as mysterious, unfathomable, and ancient as the depths of the ocean, as unchanging and immovable, as slow and sure as a sea turtle. It was odd how the mind, when confronted with this child, turned to images of animals and the immutable forces of nature. Jane was aware and accustomed to the attention she generated, though she did not understand, nor care, why she drew such deliberate inspection.

Mary McGhee, aged fifty-eight, was herself long accustomed to the stares and speculation she garnered, and like Jane, never gave thought to the reasons. She knew. Knowing, she still could not resist contemplating the strange, lone child who wandered through their small town, as impervious to the stares and comments as she herself, who had much experience in ignoring the whispers, long years of tuning it out.

These two, separated by fifty years, but connected in their isolation, formed a relationship based not just on shared ostracism and a sense of walking through a world owned by others. Over time they created a bond of mutual respect, a companionship of shared tastes and ideas, a genuine interest in each other. Mary had the pleasure of watching Jane grow into a young person of remarkable perception, though she remained as silent and self-contained as the day of their first meeting, an encounter that shaped the style of a relationship that lasted ten years. Through Miss McGhee, Jane came to see that there might be something that the world could offer her, and she grew to enjoy the time they spent together. Mary grew familiar with the sound of her own voice, as Jane seldom spoke, and their conversations consisted mainly of Mary talking aloud, never sure whether the child heard any of her rambling discourse, until Jane began the habit of responding by written reply.

Jane lived in a world of human loneliness. She recognized that it was created partly by choice. She accepted Miss McGhee as a fellow exile. Mary saw in the child an image of herself when she was young and a partner in an unacknowledged but deliberate withdrawal from the world. As Jane grew older, their relationship deepened and fell into a rhythm and pattern that satisfied some need for both. They never arranged meetings. Jane simply appeared, usually when Mary was on her back porch. In the way of small towns, Mary knew as much of Jane’s family and home life as she cared to know. Jane never spoke of it, and Mary never inquired. They spent their time together reading. Jane had an insatiable appetite for books, which Mary fed as any mother hen with a chick. She sometimes thought of Jane as a bird, with a great open maw stretching for every morsel of knowledge she could reach, swallowing books whole, it seemed to Mary. Spoken words were to Jane simply another form of story to be absorbed and considered. Sometimes days or even weeks would go by before there would appear from Jane a written response to some comment of Mary’s. These essays were delivered in a scrawl and a tone that were never childish, and which over time developed into reasoned and mature opinions that Mary began to anticipate with the same eagerness in which she awaited the newest book or her beloved Sunday Times. The thoughtfulness and sureness of Jane’s work, at such a young age, ceased to amaze Miss McGhee. She came to expect it, indeed to depend on it, as she did her favorite authors. She soon forgot Jane’s age and measured her ideas and the style in which they were framed as that of an intellectual equal.

It was not until some years went by that Mary realized this trick her mind had played, and saw that Jane was now a young woman, and began then to consider the basis and nature of their relationship. Mary could have claimed the affection of a childless, never-married woman for a child who seemed lost and starved for attention. This she refused to do, even though Jane spent more time with Mary on her back porch than she did at home. Mary had only to wake from the long sleep of their evolving friendship to hear the comments their association had caused around the small town. She had then to examine her feelings for this remarkable young woman, formidable in her intelligence and her determined sense of self-imposed isolation, to know that the talk, however unnecessarily vulgar, had some measure of accuracy. She had only to look at Jane, to see the striking loveliness, to honestly admit that however circumspect she was about her own depth of feeling, Jane would not acknowledge a similar need for caution about her own feelings for Mary. If given a choice, Mary knew, Jane would stay with her always.

It was one thing to openly admire the precocity of an eight-year-old, but quite another to retain a frank appreciation for an eighteen-year-old. It was one thing to appreciate the youth, beauty, intelligence, and physicality of another female, and quite something else when there was fifty years between the admired and the admirer. It was one thing to appreciate the unique individual that Jane was, and quite courageous to admit to herself that the appreciation, the admiration, amounted to love. And though it may have been courageous, it was also painful and humbling. Jane, who could not be led, who would not be persuaded, must be made to decide for herself that she must go.

Mary began to carefully, deliberately dismantle their ten year relationship, in a manner as casual and proper as she had conducted it. Jane was far too skilled to commit to a position that must be defended, so there could be no direct assault. Jane had never, by gesture or glance, certainly not by spoken or written word, communicated her feelings. Jane would continue on the same line, in her practiced and comfortable silence, as stubbornly as Grant had engaged Lee’s army. So Mary conducted an argument largely with herself as to the advantages of a higher and wider education for Jane. Jane listened, and as usual, made no reply. She simply waited for Mary to conduct this battle with her own emotions and reason. Jane would either go or stay, and if Mary could not overcome her reservations, then Jane would not try to sway her. She would not plead her case. She held different stakes in this game, and in her mind, she had little to lose but time.