The Hope of Hattie Phelan: Volume I

27

Essie

Essie invited us to another quilting night, and I was determined to do better. Though I had the basics down with sewing, I struggled with making it pretty.

I pricked my thumb again to my own discomfort. With a sigh, I sat the needle down to look at my thumb, though it seemed to be fine. I was just so overwhelmed and angry at a lot of things, like how Constance was a constant reminder in my life and how she would become even more present if she courted my cousin. She would be family.

"Are you all right?" Essie whispered to me with a nudge, snapping me from my thoughts.

"What do you mean?" I asked, looking at the girl sitting beside me as we quilted. Her intense grey eyes looked into mine as she seemed to stare into my soul.

"You keep huffing."

"I'll be fine," I lied as I looked back down at my horribly stitched row. Sucking in air through my teeth, I cut the thread to redo the stitches to make them more even.

"All right," Essie said, glancing over at me once more before returning to her stitching.

Throughout the night, Constance was trying to talk with me, but I kept shoving it off as much as I could without being too rude. I didn't understand why she wanted to talk to me after all she had done to me. Hadn't her taking my father's place on the train been enough? Hadn't her being a part of my life for the past couple of months been enough? No. She decided she would get Bernie to fall in love with her and wish to court her. Not only that, but she also wanted to drag me along to help her.

When we were finished with our quilting night, I was quick to pack my things, but Nancy and Constance were taking their time talking with people. I watched Constance as she went about the room being able to easily greet the other girls and hold a conversation with them. With anger welling up within me, I exited the room since I didn't want to be in there longer than I had to. I sat my sewing box on the small table in the hallway as I grabbed my coat off the rack, shoving my arms into the sleeves.

I was getting angry to the point of tears, and I didn't know how to stop it. Of course Constance would be good at making friends here too. I struggled to hold conversations with people, but she seemed closer to the other girls than I was—and I was their age. I let out the shaky breath I was holding before throwing my scarf around my neck.

"Hattie, you're not all right," Essie said from behind me.

Shocked, I turned to face her. I hadn't wanted anyone to see my frustration. "I'll be fine," I said again, though this time I did not believe it myself.

"Let's go outside on the porch," Essie said, quickly putting on her coat as we went out the door. I followed her as we walked to the other side of the wrap-around porch. "What is wrong, Hattie?"

"I—" I paused as tears threatened to spill. I didn't want to cry, but I felt the anger rising up in me and I couldn't contain it. I had to let it out. "Constance is always stealing everything away from me."

I explained to Essie how Constance had my father's seat on the train, how she lived with my new family, was facing a possible courtship with my cousin, and was making all the same friends and doing a better job at it than I was. I let it all out—the anger, the frustration, the bitterness—all of it. And Essie just stared at me, her coat half on as she stood in the cold.

"Are any of those things her fault?"

"What?" I asked, shocked at her response. I had half-expected Essie to side with me yet here she was challenging me. I felt stuck and hurt. Did Constance have Essie wrapped around her finger as well?

"Were any of those things Constance's fault?" Essie repeated, crossing her arms as the cold breeze swept her ginger hair across her face. "It was your father's decision to give her his ticket; she had no other place to go but to live with your family. She can't control who likes her, but she can control how she treats people and that's why she is doing better than you in making friends."

"You're siding with her?"

"I'm not siding with anyone," Essie said, shaking her head. "I'm giving you an alternate perspective. The truth. You are bitter and are struggling with feelings you haven't dealt with. You need to not only forgive her for these misplaced 'sins' but also apologize to her for being so rude."

"I don't understand why you'd side with her!"

"Is it her fault that your father gave up his seat?" Essie asked, getting stern for the first time since I knew her. I took a step back in shock.

"Well, she was sick—"

"Hattie, listen to yourself!" Essie said in a low whisper. "You are putting your bitterness of the circumstance on Constance unfairly, and you need to repent of it. Turn to God on this! He would not want you treating your sister-in-Christ so ill."

"But God is the one who did this to me!" I said through my teeth as tears threatened to spill. "I don't have a mother or brother, now I don't have Da, and I'm stuck with a constant reminder of his absence. It feels like God is playing a sick joke on me and adding to the raging thoughts in my head. Then I come here, but I still feel so overwhelmed and burdened, and it feels like God is just laughing at me from above as I constantly struggle with the loss of family."

"God wouldn't do that, Hattie," Essie said, face softening. "He wasn't the one who took your family away from you. The devil is the one who steals and destroys lives, but it is God who is there through it all."

"It doesn't feel like it," I said, exhaling fervently. "Where has He been in all of this?"

"He has been there the whole time, but He's just waiting for you to turn to Him."

"I turned to Him when I needed Him most and He let me down."

"Maybe you thought it was when you needed Him most and you actually need Him most now."

"I think that I need to go," I said, walking off as tears trickled down my face, anger swallowing my heart whole.