House Divided Read Online Free Page A

like that? I didn’t understand. The tears began to
flow. He tried to wipe them away, but I wouldn’t let him. I didn’t want him to
touch me.
    He stood up, but before he left, he looked
down at me. “I love you, Miss Ellie.”
    How could he? I just stared up at him
blankly.
    “Don’t worry, Ellie, you don’t have to say
it back. I love us enough for the both of us.”
    In anger, I threw his stupid gift at him,
and he caught with his wide receiver hands. He turned silently, but before he
left, he reached into his pocket, pulled out a tiny wrapped box and placed it
on the sofa table before he walked out of my life forever.
    As soon as he walked out the door, I fell
apart. My aunt wasted no time in coming to me. She sat on the floor and held me
and stroked my hair. I kept waiting for her to say I told you so, but she never
did.
    “I’m so sorry, Aunt Lu,” I repeated over
and over. 
    “Shhh, sweet girl,” she said as she held
me tighter.
    Until that night, I had never understood
how my aunt could hate the Jacksons so much. She hated them so much because she
had loved Isaac, and her friend Elizabeth. That night, I understood her
perfectly.

Chapter
One
     
    10 Years Later
     
    I looked at my bedside clock; it read 3:36
a.m. Who in the world would be calling me at this unseemly hour?
    “Hello,” I managed to say scratchily. It
was the best I could do this early.
    “Oh, Miss Ella, thank goodness you’re up.”
    I was up now , especially since I
recognized the voice. No one called me Miss Ella anymore. Panic quickly set in.
“Doris, what’s wrong?”
    I could hear the tears in her voice. “Miss
Ella, it’s your aunt. We think she had a heart attack.”
    Please, God, please don’t let her be dead.
    “She’s at St. Vincent’s in Birmingham, she’s asking for you.”
    Thank you, God.
    “Tell her I’m on my way.”
    I quickly dressed and threw together a
suitcase, just in case. Atlanta was only three hours from Birmingham, but I
didn’t know what waited for me on the other end. I knew if she was in Birmingham, it was serious; if not, she would’ve been at Kaysville General.
    As I opened the door to my garage, a blast
of cold air hit me. Though it was December, it was unusually cold for Georgia.
I thought maybe I should run back in and get my long wool coat, but I
rationalized that I would either be in my car or in the hospital, and I just
wanted to get to my aunt. I threw my suitcase in the back and jumped in my
newly-purchased BMW. It was a gift to myself for my latest book, Aunt
Calliope and Jane in London , reaching number one on the New York Times best
seller list for Children’s Picture Books. The thought made me tear up. My books
were based on my adventures with my Aunt Lu as a girl, and now she was lying in
a hospital bed. I didn’t know what I would do if I lost her. She was the only
person who ever really loved me.
    I hit I-75 and tested the limits of what
my new car could do. The salesman at the car dealership was right, she was fast
and smooth. I hit the Alabama border before I knew it. I hated being back in Alabama,
I usually avoided it at all costs. I felt like everywhere I turned in that
state, there were reminders of things I didn’t want to remember. Of course I
still saw Aunt Lu all the time, but it was usually in Atlanta or in some
tropical location on vacation. I hadn’t been to my childhood home since I
graduated from high school. Aunt Lu agreed I should leave and never come back.
She said Kaysville had a way of sucking the life out of people and she didn’t
want that for me. I’d asked her several times to move in with me, but her
excuse for never accepting was that she was old and set in her ways, but I
think she wouldn’t because it would be like saying the Jacksons had won, and
she wouldn’t ever let that happen.
    Oh the Jacksons, that’s one name I wished
I could forget. Everything about Alabama reminded me of them, especially a
particular Jackson. If only I would have