Clara never let him.
Their son Jonah came three years later.
He entered world loud.
Stayed loud.
Eliza watched everything.
Jonah touched everything.
Silas tried building higher shelves.
Jonah climbed.
Clara said:
“Your blood.”
Silas said:
“He has your opinions.”
“He’s two.”
“Exactly.”
The cabin grew.
First second room.
Then loft expanded.
Then storage lean-to became proper kitchen.
Silas complained.
“I lived here twenty years with one room.”
Clara replied:
“You also lived with one chair.”
“I had two.”
“One was broken.”
“It held coats.”
“That is not chair.”
“It had chair shape.”
“Silas.”
“Fine.”
He built more.
The children grew up assuming their mother’s room was normal.
They knocked.
Everyone did.
When Eliza was seven, she asked:
“Why does Mama have own room?”
Silas answered:
“Because Mama wants one.”
“That’s all?”
“Yes.”
Eliza thought.
“Can I have?”
Silas looked at Clara.
Clara smiled.
“Build another.”
Silas groaned.
By the time both children were teenagers, the mountain cabin had become a house.
Still rough.
Still timber.
But full.
Books.
Tools.
Blankets.
Mud.
Visitors.
Dogs.
Arguments.
Food.
Silas sometimes stood outside and stared at it with suspicion.
Clara asked once:
“What?”
“It got big.”
“You kept building.”
“You kept asking.”
“Whose fault?”
He looked at her.
“Yours.”
“Correct.”
Ephraim Whitmore’s life did not become easy redemption.
Clara was grateful for that.
Easy redemption would have been dishonest.
He tried.
Then failed.
Then tried.
The first year after Clara married Silas, Ephraim remained sober eleven months.
On the twelfth, he disappeared into saloon.
Harlan found him unconscious behind freight shed.
Clara received word.
She rode down.
Saw him in Harlan’s back room.
He looked at her through swollen eyes.
“Go away.”
Clara sat.
“No.”
“You came to judge?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“I don’t know.”
Ephraim laughed bitterly.
“That’s honest.”
He turned toward wall.
“I’m not worth this.”
Clara felt anger.
That statement was another form of selfishness.
She said:
“You don’t get to decide what I think you’re worth either.”
He looked back.
She continued.
“You spent years deciding for me.”
“Stop.”
Ephraim’s face crumpled.
“I’m tired.”
“So am I.”
He cried.
Clara sat.
Did not promise recovery.