We lost a lot at the Follises, but we didn’t lose everything.

We lost the money from our allowance that Mrs. Follis kept for us in a jar on top of the refrigerator, but we wouldn’t have had all that money anyway if Mrs. Follis hadn’t said that we should stop frittering away the dollar a week Mama sent us and start saving up instead for a nice present for Mama when she got out of the hospital.

So instead of lining up all the candy I could buy for 25 cents, a nickel Snickers bar, a big Baby Ruth for a dime, a nickel pack of gum and the rest penny candy, tootsie rolls and jaw breakers, and thinking how I could make it last the whole week. Instead of that, all of us watched the dollars pile up in the jar on top of the refrigerator and thought about what we could buy for Mama with the money we had saved so far and what we could buy by the time she came to the Follises to get us. The jar getting fuller and fuller, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen dollars. A box of chocolates, a necklace, a new purse, a new dress.

The Monday morning after it was seventeen dollars, Mrs. Follis’s voice from the kitchen, "Sandy, get up. It’s time to get ready for school."

In the kitchen my brother, Bobby, and Bobby Follis already sat at the kitchen table on the bench next to the wall, so I sat on the bench on the other side. The bare kitchen light hung down over the table and lit up the right side of Bobby Follis’s face and the left side of Bobby’s face. Bobby wore his plaid shirt and leaned his elbows on the slick vinyl tablecloth of red and white squares. Mrs. Follis stood at the stove stirring the oatmeal still, but our bowls and spoons and milk were already laid out on the table. Bobby Follis tapped his spoon against his glass full of milk but Bobby just sat with his chin in his hands and waited.

Mrs. Follis scraped the wooden spoon along the side of the pan. She turned away from the stove so the bulb over the table lit up her face and she said, "Did you happen to hear anything last night in the middle of the night, Sandy?"

I said, "No, I didn’t hear anything, " and wished that I was on the side of the bench that was against the wall so I could lean back and rest a little more while I waited for breakfast.

"Oh," Mrs. Follis said, "Sleeping down here, I thought you might have." She lifted the pan of oatmeal off the stove and walked over to the table.

Bobby lifted his chin out of his hand to see Mrs. Follis, "What would she have heard?"

Mrs. Follis lifted out a big lump of oatmeal with the wooden spoon and plopped it into Bobby Follis’s bowl. She banged the wooden spoon on the side of his heavy white China bowl to get the rest of the lump to drop. The oatmeal hung from the spoon and finally dropped into the bowl before Mrs. Follis answered. "There was a loud noise in the kitchen like somebody banging around, like they were opening up the cupboards and moving dishes around. I would have thought it would wake up anybody sleeping just in the next room, but I know Lindsay and Andy can sleep through almost anything."

She dished up another big spoonful of oatmeal into Bobby’s bowl. "I came downstairs to see what it was but when I reached the kitchen there was no one there, just one of the cupboard doors open that I thought was shut last night. I looked out the window," Mrs. Follis pointed the spoon in the direction of the window over the sink, "but all I saw was moonlight shining on the frost on the ground. It was probably lucky for me that the robber had already gone. Who knows, he might have had a knife and slit my throat."

Bobby Follis poured some milk on his oatmeal and stirred it with his spoon. "How can you be sure it even was a robber then," he asked. "Maybe a squirrel got in somehow, and made the noise. Maybe you even dreamed it. Someone could have opened that cupboard door after you saw it last."

Mrs. Follis nodded and pressed her lips together. She said, "You know, that’s just what I told myself must have happened last night, but then when I came into the kitchen this morning I noticed that jar is gone."

Bobby had a spoonful of oatmeal on the way to his mouth, but he set his spoon back down in his bowl and looked up at the top of the refrigerator.

Did she mean our jar? I couldn’t see it but it might just be pushed back too far for me to see. Only Bobby’s face said that there wasn’t any jar on the top of the refrigerator.

Bobby Follis said, "What jar?"

Mrs. Follis said, "Why the jar with Bobby and Sandy and Lindsay and Andy’s allowance in it." Mrs. Follis reached over the table and put her hand on Bobby’s shoulder. "I’m awfully sorry, honey. Of course, if I had the money I’d make it up to you, but I just don’t. I’m afraid it’s gone."

Mrs. Follis took her hand away from Bobby’s shoulder, dished up my oatmeal and put the pan back on the stovetop. She ran a pan full of soapy water for dishes like nothing had happened.

No necklace, no purse.

Bobby put the spoonful of oatmeal into his mouth. He tried to swallow, his throat muscles gulped, but it wasn't going down. I felt the oatmeal lump in my own throat, even though I hadn't started eating.

"Do you have another jar?" he asked Mrs. Follis.

"Sure I do," Mrs. Follis said, "Do you want to start saving again?"

"Yes," Bobby said, "But this time I’ll hide the jar. No robber is going to find it again."

*

We lost the Easter clothes that Mama sent for Easter.

That happened in the summer time when the Follises held an auction in the barn every Saturday night. Mrs. Follis said our Easter clothes were stored up in the loft of the barn and someone must have got up there during the auction and stolen them.

But I didn’t lose my stuffed tiger or my favorite doll because I gave those away to the girl whose mother was dying.

I never actually met the girl whose mother was dying. Mrs. Follis took Lindsay and me along once when she visited the woman who was dying. Only Mrs. Follis told us to wait in the car so we wouldn’t disturb her. We hoped the girl would come out and talk to us or maybe we could get out of the car and play chase in the yard because it was cold just sitting there, but the girl never came out. We couldn’t blame her when her mother was dying like that.

Mrs. Follis came back out to the car and told us that the dying woman wanted to be baptized Catholic, but her husband said, "Over my dead body," and wouldn’t let the priest in the house. Mrs. Follis wondered what would happen to that child when her mother was gone and she was left with her heathen father to raise.

So when Mrs. Follis came to me and Lindsay and told us that it was the girl’s birthday and she wouldn’t get any presents at all unless we gave her some of our toys, I wanted to give something to the girl whose mother was dying and whose father wouldn’t let a priest in the house.

At first I thought that I could give her the new baby doll that I got for Christmas. She would like the new baby doll. It was a nice doll, but it wasn’t my best doll. Then I knew that the little girl whose mother was dying needed my best toys. She needed my favorite baby doll, the one I got when I was really little, the baby doll who had to go to the doll hospital once I’d had her so long, the one with the big painted blue eyes, that didn’t open and shut like the eyes of the new baby doll but just stayed open, and with the molded plastic hair. The one I loved the best.

The little girl whose mother was dying needed my favorite stuffed tiger that I slept with every night, the one that was almost as old as my favorite baby doll. My tiger would stay with the girl when her mother was gone

Mrs. Follis looked disappointed when I gave her my toys but I knew the little girl would like them because they were the best.

We lost a lot at the Follises, but I didn’t lose my best doll, didn’t lose my favorite tiger, because I gave them away.

*

August, and Mama was coming, coming soon, Mrs. Follis said, two more weeks.

With Mama just coming out of the hospital, Mrs. Follis said, she wouldn’t be so strong. It would be hard for Mama to stand up to do a lot of ironing. But guess what, coming in to the auction to be auctioned off was a clothes press and if Mama had that she could sit down in front of it and just feed the clothes in between two rollers and the clothes would come out nice and pressed. Normally the clothes press would be much

Normally the clothes press would be much more expensive but Mrs. Follis thought she could persuade the owner to let it go for the thirty two silver dollars and the other twelve we’d saved again from our allowance, 44 dollars altogether.

It would be such a nice present for our mother and make sure she didn’t land right back in the hospital again trying to do too much when she wasn’t that strong.

A box of chocolates, a necklace, a new purse, a dress.

A clothes press was not the present I planned for Mama.

But according to Mrs. Follis that clothes press would be just the thing to keep Mama out of the hospital. She told us about it again and again.

"What do you think?" Bobby asked me.

"I don’t know," I said, "but I don’t want her going back to the hospital."

We were on the porch, where we went to talk away from the Follises, Bobby slipping away from Bobby Follis more and more, more my brother again, not one of the Bobbys, now that Mama was coming soon. Bobby talked to me again like he had back in Springfield. In Springfield he told me about Janie with the golden hair. He got me to call her on the phone and tell her to look in her desk, there'd be potato chips in her desk the next day at school.

Bobby scrunched his eyebrows down like he did when he was thinking hard and wrapped his arms around his knees. "I don’t know," he said, "I don’t know about nervous breakdowns."

Bobby sat up straighter, lifted his head. "We’ll say yes," he said, "when Mrs. Follis asks us again we’ll say yes. We’ll get the clothes press."

He was right. I breathed a deep breath. "Yes, I said, "Let’s get the clothes press."

But Mrs. Follis didn’t ask us again before Mama came two days early.

Bobby and I out on the back porch again after swimming, to stay cool as long as we could and to think about Mama coming. Andy and Lindsay there too so our first look at Mama was through the criss cross wires of the screen door, criss crossing in front of Mama, some of the criss crosses lost in the sun glare on the screen, some of Mama lost in the bright glaring sun, but enough left so we saw it was Mama.

"Mama," Lindsay shouted and Mama was there, Mama’s hair a little different, she wore a dress I hadn’t seen before, plain lavender. Mama pushed the screen door, looking through it as she pushed. The screen door squeaked as it swung open. She stepped through the doorway onto the porch and it was Mama, the same as when she left us with the Follises.

Andy said, "Mama," too, and I would have gotten up to run to her, but I was already running, along with Andy and Lindsay and Bobby. Mama hugged Andy and Lindsay both together, then Bobby, then me. She sat down on the porch steps. Andy got into her lap and Lindsay held onto Mama’s knee. Bobby and I sat down on the steps on either side of her.

The lavender dress was soft against my leg. The smell was fresh laundry and Mama's soap. The sun was warm between the hard of the porch steps and the soft of Mama's leg.

Nobody talked for a long time.

Bobby said, "We planned to have a present for you when you came, Mama."

Mama brushed Bobby’s hair back with her hand, "That’s okay."

Bobby said, "We were thinking of a new dress and shoes."

"Or candy," Lindsay said.

"We have $44 dollars saved counting the silver dollars Daddy brought us," Bobby said.

Mama's eyes went to something out in the yard when Bobby said 'Daddy,' but they came right back to Bobby.

Bobby turned on the steps so he was facing Mama.

He said, "But Mrs. Follis said it would be hard for you to iron, that you wouldn’t be strong after coming out of the hospital. She said we should spend the money on a clothes press for you so you can iron sitting down. The Follises have one for their auction. Would that really be a good present for you, Mama?"

Mama's leg had gotten tighter but now she breathed a long breath and her leg relaxed. Mama loosened her arms from around Andy so just her hands held him lightly on his stomach. She said, "Do you know what I’d really like, what would be a really good present?"

Bobby moved closer to Mama and said, "What, Mama?"

Mama said, "That money would be just about enough to buy you all some new school clothes, and that would be a really big help to me if we could use it for that. Would that be okay with you?"

Bobby said, "Sure, Mama, if that’s what you want. But won’t you get tired doing the ironing?"

Mama lifted Andy up a little further back on her lap and said, "Oh, don’t you worry about that. I’m a lot stronger than Mrs. Follis thinks I am."

*

Two days later Andy sat in the front seat of the blue Plymouth next to Mama driving. Lindsay, Bobby and I in the back seat where we could see Mama, her arms on the steering wheel, and out the back window, the big orange U-Haul trailer rolling behind.

We were surrounded by evergreen trees on either side of us on the mountain road, trees on the mountain slanting above us on the right, slanting away from us on the left. Dirt and pine needles and green all around us, the sun splashing bright through the branches and shadows every so often, and Mrs. Follis far behind, all the Follises far behind.

For a long time we couldn’t see anything up ahead except a small part of the highway before it twisted out of sight, and other cars that drove towards us on the other side of the road.

Then everything opened up, the road up ahead made a large half circle, going to the right then curving back left. In the middle of the half circle the ledge dropped away and way far down was a river and fields and several spots of smaller trees.

Everything was brighter.

The trees stood out separate against the sky. At the tops their thin trunks were blown over far to one side. They snapped back straight as the wind let up. But an instant later the tree tops whipped back and forth slingshot like before the wind bent them steadily forward again.

Then there was nothing but Mama’s arms, holding the steering wheel, gripping it so hard her knuckles were white and all the muscles of her arms were tight. The steering wheel kept twisting to the left, the car, the blue Plymouth, moving over to the opposite lane and Mama turning the wheel back and pressing her foot on the brake.

So far there were no cars coming towards us.

Out the back window the U-Haul trailer moved to the right as the steering wheel moved left, then stopped and started back left as Mama got the steering wheel turned enough to move the car back in its own lane, but the U-Haul trailer kept going left, over to the other lane of traffic, over close to the ledge, and now the steering wheel turned right, and Mama, stronger than Mrs. Follis thought, held it, turned it back left.

So far no cars coming .

The U-Haul moved to the right.

Mama stopped the steering wheel turning left.

The U-Haul jerked left again. The U-Haul tipped as it slid left then tipped completely over on its side. It blocked the lane on the left, but stopped sliding before it reached the ledge. The blue Plymouth, stopped too. I slid against Lindsay and she slid into Bobby up against the door. The steering wheel stopped moving. For a minute, Mama’s arms, stronger than Mrs. Follis thought, still held and turned the steering wheel. Then Mama stopped and laid her head down on the steering wheel.

Mama lifted her head and looked at Andy then at each of us in the back seat, like she was counting us.

Then she looked outside at the trailer, at the corner of it right up next to the ledge.

If I looked away up at the trees the wind still whipped them around, but down here on the road while Mama looked through the back window at the trailer flat on its side, one corner a few inches from the ledge, everything was still.

No cars were coming from either direction.

No cars did come, not for several minutes, until a policeman came on a motorcycle from behind us, and put flares all around the trailer.

The policeman didn’t write Mama a ticket because there was no way she could have known about that wind coming up so fast and so strong. The policeman stayed to direct traffic until the tow truck came and lifted the U-Haul trailer back upright. As far as Mama could tell there was no damage done.

We lost a lot at the Follises but we didn’t lose everything. We didn’t lose the U-Haul trailer over the ledge, because Mama, stronger than Mrs. Follis ever thought, kept the steering wheel straight. It wasn’t long at all before we were on our way again in the blue Plymouth, the orange U-Haul with all our furniture behind us, the money for our school clothes in Bobby’s pocket.

We lost a lot at the Follises but we didn’t lose everything. We didn’t lose the U-Haul trailer over the ledge, because Mama, stronger than Mrs. Follis ever thought, kept the steering wheel straight. It wasn’t long at all before we were on our way again in the blue Plymouth, the orange U-Haul with all our furniture behind us, the money for our school clothes in Bobby’s pocket.