Ora Shows Up

Leta had been separated from her husband Ora Freeman since July. Although the divorce summons had been delivered to him, there had been no response. She had neither heard from or about him in all that time. Right after she filed for divorce, she and her children Vivian (age 14) and Dale (age 11) moved into an attic apartment of a large boarding house. The neighborhood was filled with a rough class of people, but their small garrett was all she could afford, having no official employment and no financial support from her estranged husband. The situation was a challenge, but with her own resolve and the assistance of her family, she and the children were getting by.

One early October afternoon she and the children had met after school at their usual place a few blocks from their home. (Leta did not like the children to walk alone down their street.) As they continued to their house, Dale was chattering about his friends and day, while Vivian walked with her own thoughts kept private. Every so often, she would comment on her brother’s stream of thought. So would Leta. Mostly, Leta was keeping a watchful eye on the other individuals in their neighborhood. She would smile at the other women with their children or on their own, and occasionally nod to the more respectable men.

“Stop!” she commanded two blocks from their residence.The children froze.

“What is it, Ma?” Vivian asked after a couple of moments.

Leta was looking hard up the street. While she could not be sure of what she saw, she was not going to take any chances. She turned her children in the opposite direction to face her.

“I want you both to go to the library until I come to get you,” she instructed.

“But, Ma!” Dale protested. He had formed some plan of how to spend the rest of his afternoon and had recently begun to express his dismay at spending so much time at the library.

“Do as I say!” she insisted sternly, and after a mment, Dale sighed in agreement. “Go on now.”

She watched her children until they turned the corner. Dale looked back once, but she gestured immediately. He turned and proceeded with his sister.

Leta turned back toward the boarding house, stood up straight, adjusted her hat and pressed her dress with her hands. She took a deep breath and proceeded down the street. When she was a couple of buildings away, she could see him. He must have been sitting on the porch and grown restless. He walked down a few steps toward the sidewalk, looked in the opposite direction down the street and then turned toward her. Of course, he saw her.

She had recognized the truck parked in the street, or thought she had. Somehow her soon-to-be-ex-husband Ora had found her. Her pace slowed as she drew nearer, and he waited.

When she finally reached him, he was standing on the sidewalk between the house and the street. She had forgotten how much taller he was than she, but it made no difference. She would remain firm. Their separation and her certainty in severing their relationship gave her strength.

“Hello, Leta,’ he finally said.

“Good afternoon,” she responded, almost instinctively. At least, she didn’t sound friendly.

“How are you?”

Leta looked at him with disdain.

“What do you want, Ora?” she asked coldly. “Unless you’ve come to tell me that you’ve signed the divorce papers, then we have nothing really to talk about.”

He stepped back in surprise.

 “Leta…” he said in his sweetest voice, almost singing her name. He also opened his arms slightly. She stepped back defensively and put up her hands. Was he going to try to hug her?

“What’s this?” he questioned. “Is that how you greet your husband?”

“You are not my husband any more.”

“As far as me and the law are concerned, I am,” he said. “I want you and the children to come home.”

“What?” Leta was astonished.

“I’m working now. Things are going well, and it’s time you gave up this foolishness and came home,” he clarified.

Leta felt a rage growing within her, the same rage she felt when he made other such declarations, yet never fulfilled the responsibility of them.

“Ora, please,” she said as gently but as firmly as she could, “just sign the papers, so we can both move on.”

His voice grew deeper and more resonant.

“Leta, I know you’ve been with that other man, and I understand why you would do such a thing. But enough is enough. You’re my wife, and you belong home with me. Now where are the chidlren?”

By this time, Leta was gritting her teeth. Her shoulders had tensed, and she had made her hands into fists.

“Ora,” she declared, “for all intents and purposes, I am no longer your wife. The only way I want to see you is at the courthouse. Aside from that, I want you to leave me alone.”

His face turned red, and suddenly she realized that he had been drinking.

“You ARE my wife!” he declared. “You belong in my house, preparing my meals, taking care of me, not whoring around with any Tom, Dick or Harry you meet in a saloon. What kind of message does that send to the children?”

Leta was aware that several neighbors had been drawn to the argument.

“Ora, please?” she whispered. His voice only grew louder.

“You were nothing when I married you,” he continued, entirely disregarding her quiet plea. “A widow with two spoiled children, penniless, unable to take care of yourself, nearly thrown out onto the street. But I took you in. I put a roof over your head. I gave you food to eat and warm beds for you and your brats. And then, what? You up and leave me. You leave my house a disaster. You leave me in debt up to my ears.”

“Ora,” Leta protested, “there was never any money!”

“Bah!” he snarled, “There was plenty of money until you spent it all. You lived beyond your means. You spoiled them children.No matter what I did or how much I worked, I couldn’t satisfy you. You were greedy and selfish.You ARE greedy and selfish.”

“If I’m so horrible,” Leta snapped, “then why do you want me back!”

“Because you’re my wife, for better or worse, and you belong with me. Look at this dump.” He gestured toward the house. “Is this really how you want to live? The wind could blow this place to the ground. Don’t you miss having a real man.”

“I don’t miss you,” she declared strongly.

He reached toward her and grabbed her arm hard.

“Ow! You’re hurting me,” she cried, trying to pull herself away. But he held onto her even tighter. He pulled her to his face, where she could smell his rancid breath.

“You’re going to regret this,” he hissed. “It’s going to get colder, and in that attic apartment, when the temperature drops to freezing, snow is blowing in through the window, and that rinky-dink stove won’t put out enough heat to make toast, then you’re going to freeze your ass off. And then—oh yes, and then—you are going to come begging me to take you back.”

He pushed her away, and she nearly fell.

“You wait and see, Leta. You…wait…and…see.”

With those words, he walked across the street to his truck and a few moments later drove off.

Leta watched him. Her arm ached where he gripped it. She wanted to collapse onto the ground and cry. But instead, she straightened her spine to stand as tall as she could. Long after he was gone, she remained standing. Little did he know that his appearance that day and his verbal attack made her more resolute than she had been previously to be finished with him once and for all.