Amelia, bless her heart, had wrapped her arms around and befriended May, June, and Bernice, strangers, who hardly anyone in the uppity part of Covington spoke to. And Hannah had helped them cope with the shock that sent them reeling when they learned from the new pastor that they were not married to their supposed husbands, and that their children were, for all intents and purposes, illegitimate. In their shock they had sought for someone to blame, to hate, only to find that the then head of the church, the man who had hidden this vital information from them, was dead and buried in the churchyard. Billie had raved, ranted, and threatened to dig him up and scatter his bones, but of course he never did any such thing. Still, after all was said and done, if not for Grace and Pastor Denny cleaning out that dusty old attic, they would not have known, and she would never have had the courage, finally, to leave Billie.

Though she had dreaded remarrying their father, May had done so for the sake of her children, for their legitimacy and legal matters like inheritance, which Amelia had taken the time to explain to her. Yes, she’d done right by her children, and how had they treated her? She had been, and still was, devastated by their anger and rejection when she had told them she was leaving their father. They were grown-up people, two of them with families of their own. Couldn’t they see how miserable her life had been, and still was, with their father?

Amelia had been her friend, had helped her, driven her to the lawyer’s office to start the divorce papers going. Not that she hadn’t been scared out of her mind, but she had held fast to the story Hannah told of fleeing her abusive husband with two small children. If Hannah could do that with small kids to raise and no more education at the time than she, May, had, then she could leave Billie, whom she hated, especially as their children were grown and gone.

Her sister, June, bless her heart, had been supportive. She had lent May the money to pay her rent for a couple of months. That wasn’t easy for June, since her husband, Eddy, was Billie’s older brother, though different from Billie as peas from carrots.

Ida, her mother, had been downright hostile. “You made your bed, you lie in it” was one of her favorite sayings. Ida carried on something fierce and consoled Billie, who drank himself into a stupor and, when he was sober, had nagged June to tell him where May was. But June had held firm and claimed to know nothing about May’s plans or her whereabouts.