The Boarder

My father, a monster of a man, was killed late one night outside our backyard shed, and his murder was never solved.  The sheriff, who identified the murder weapon as the blood-spattered shovel found beside the body, eventually put it down to death by assailants unknown, perhaps burglars who struck him down when he confronted them.  It never occurred to him that poor folks like us had nothing to steal.

Regardless, my father’s death went unlamented, especially by my mother and me.  In fact, within weeks of his burial, my mother had regained the blossom and smile that had been so long absent from her pretty face.  And my life had changed, too.

Despite his brutish ways, my father had been a hard worker, and we’d soon started to miss the weekly paycheck.  My mother, a seamstress with a faithful clientele, began to think about a second job to make ends meet.  I worked after school and on weekends at the local pharmacy, but my mother never let me forget my studies were the most important thing.

“Schoolin’ is what’ll keep you from endin’ up like me,” she used to tell me.  “Stuck in a dead-end town with a no-account man.”

As luck would have it, however, one of my teachers was looking for a place to live after her current rental accommodations were sold.  Miss Curtis taught English literature at the high school, a subject in which I obtained my highest grades, probably because she was my favorite teacher.  When I told my mother about her situation, and after I arranged for them to meet, my mother decided to rent the spare bedroom, the one below mine.

Our boarder was a delight, and not only because of the money she brought in.  She helped with food preparation and tidy-up, made a point of cleaning the bathroom we shared, and helped me with my studies, even in other subjects.  She shared my mother’s love of gardening, and soon had the shed tidied after my father’s neglect.  She loved to read aloud of an evening, finding an avid audience in my mother whose own education had been lacking.

“You best pay attention to Miss Curtis at school,” she took to reminding me.  “That woman is purely the best thing could’ve happened to us.”

My mother began to pay attention, too. Within a short time, her long hair was properly fixed at dinner, her face was attractively made-up, her blouses were neatly ironed, all in keeping with how Miss Curtis presented. My father had never noticed such things, and my mother had grown used to neglecting her appearance.

He’d been aware of my appearance, however. I had begun to develop after my fourteenth birthday, and I’d found the newfound notice flattering at first. He was always fixing something in the shed, or trying to, and I would sit and watch, happy to have the attention he never paid my mother. But after awhile, I became uncomfortable with the liberties he began taking—touching and holding me in ways that felt disturbing, telling me how precious I was, warning me I had to keep our special relationship a secret. One night shortly before he died, he’d actually begun to undress me, only dissuaded from his intentions by the fact that I was, in his words, in a monthly state.

I had no one to turn to for help, not my friends, certainly not my mother. In fact, I felt betrayed by my mother who, to my mind, had abandoned me to the husband she could no longer please. And although secretly smitten with Miss Curtis, I could never have shared something like that for fear she’d turn against me. And so I acted.

Everything changed after my father died and Miss Curtis moved in with us. A slender woman with alabaster skin, she seemed aloof from her mostly-male colleagues, but favored her students with a dazzling smile whenever we pleased her, something I tried mightily to do. I was the envy of many classmates when she became our boarder.

After a month or so of the new arrangement, however, I detected a change in the relationship between her and my mother. They seemed more intimate, and I’d often find them in conversation, heads close together, when I entered the parlor unexpectedly. Or I’d see them in the garden, planting and re-planting flowers and shrubs, laughing gaily, even hugging one another. And they spent a lot of time in the shed, as well, away from prying eyes, supposedly cleaning and putting away the tools.

I was taken aback at first, not by the signs they seemed to like one another, but by the fact that I felt excluded.  Confusion and a touch of regret were born in my bosom.  It was I, after all, who had brought Miss Curtis into the picture in the first place, and it was I who wanted  and deserved her attentions.  It wasn’t fair that my mother should stand in my stead.

Not until I heard them laughing quietly in the bedroom below mine one night did the anger take root.  For some time, I’d been conjuring dreams of being alone with Miss Curtis myself—like my father had with me, but not gross and repellent like him.  Where he had been unshaven and rough, Miss Curtis was soft and gentle, and I was trying mightily to convince myself she would reciprocate my affection.  Although unsure how such a relationship might work, or even if it could, I nevertheless resented my mother butting in, betraying me again.

But she did, and when July rolled around, she told me they had become, in her words, very close. Lovers, in fact. Miss Curtis would not be going home for the summer, but would instead be moving in permanently with us, no longer a boarder but a part of our family. And with that news, my mother hugged me, and then Miss Curtis hugged me, too. I didn’t want to let go of my teacher—not then and not later—and the two women were delighted at my apparent joy with the news.

In the middle of August, two nights ago, my mother was killed outside our backyard shed, and an investigation has been opened.  The sheriff, who identified the murder weapon as a blood-spattered trowel found beside the body, has been more than solicitous toward me and Miss Curtis, both of us crying copious tears over our loss—hers genuine, mine less so. He thinks the killer might be someone who came to rob a house full of women he thought might be easy pickings.  It still hasn’t occurred to him that poor folks like us have nothing to steal.

I know I’ll miss my mother, but another betrayal left me little choice about having to do it again. I’m taking comfort for now in Miss Curtis’s arms, and she in mine, and that’s all that matters.

And there’ll be no more boarders.

_{© J. Bradley Burt 2022}