Chapter Twenty-Five
Veda and Red were living with his uncle until they could afford a house of their own. Since they were both working, it was just a matter of time until they could save enough money for a down payment. They had come over for dinner and made their announcement as Lila was bringing out the dessert (a beautiful yellow cake with white icing). Veda blushed and said, I guess I won’t be able to work for much longer.
Lila looked at her belly but couldn’t see any difference. How did Veda know she was pregnant?
John cleared his throat and said, We have some news too.
He turned to Veda and said, Since Lila is getting married, your mother and I have decided to move. You and your husband can move in here. Lila should stay until the wedding and then the house will belong to you.
Red said, That’s very generous, but I can take care of my wife. We’re looking at houses in the neighborhood and nearly have enough money saved.
Hazel snapped, Don’t be stupid. This will give you a proper home for my grandchild and you can use the money for something else.
They all ate their cake in silence. Their parents never explained why they had decided to move, but Lila suspected that her mother was the driving force: she hated living in the city. They also never explained their decision to give the house to Veda and Red. Cecil and Gladys were living upstairs at Lyle’s house and were expecting a baby too…why not them? Why not herself? She had no idea where Earl might want them to live, but his parents lived in La Crosse, and it was reasonable to think he would return after his service. Maybe her parents were worried that he wouldn’t survive or would not want to inherit their house.
Lila wrote a letter to Earl and told him about the plan. Lyle and Cecil were going to help her father build a new house out in the country. He had purchased a small plot of land between La Crosse and Onalaska—enough to have a big garden and some distance from neighbors, but not enough to farm for a living. It was a short letter; she didn’t love Earl and had no idea what to say. Hope you survive the war? She hadn’t received any letters from him—she assumed life in the Navy was keeping him busy. Spontaneously, she decided that she would also write a letter to Lloyd. Could prisoners receive letters? She wasn’t sure but imagined how much it would cheer Lloyd up to receive a letter from her.
February 3, 1942
Dear Lloyd,
I was so sorry to hear about your arrest. I don’t know if you will get this letter, but I miss you and think about you every day. Veda is having a baby. My parents are moving out into the country. Life is boring without you. I go to work, and I come home and do more work. I miss our walks together and your funny jokes. Maybe you will learn some new jokes while you’re away.
Love, Lila
She put on some lipstick and kissed the bottom of the letter by her name. Later that week she went to the post office to buy stamps. She addressed the envelope to Lloyd Slaback, Waupun Prison
and slipped it into one of the mailboxes. Would that be enough? She had no idea but resolved that she would write to him every week.
One day while she was at the post office she bumped into her former classmate, Myrtle Johnson (now Mrs. Carl Schneider). Myrtle noticed the engagement ring on Lila’s left hand and squealed, Ooh, Lila, I’m so happy for you! Who is the lucky man?
Lila was still holding a letter addressed to Lloyd and hoped that Myrtle hadn’t seen the name. Lila blushed, and Myrtle squealed again and gave her a hug.
His name is Earl and he’s in the Navy.
Myrtle said, Well that’s a coincidence, Carl just left a few weeks ago to join the Navy. That makes us practically sisters! You should come over for tea…we have so much to catch up on.
Unable to think of a good excuse, Lila said, Sure, that sounds lovely.
Myrtle wrote her address and phone number on the back of a stray envelope and handed it to Lila. Don’t be a stranger. I’m bored to tears keeping house while Carl is away.
Lila promised that she would drop by on her next day off. They had never been close friends, but it would become one of the most important friendships of Lila’s life, giving her options when she thought there were none left.
As soon as the snow melted, Lila’s father and brothers began building her parents’ new house. Lila moved her things upstairs so Red and Veda could have the small bedroom. As soon as her parents moved, they would shift to the larger bedroom and Lila could have the small one again. It was embarrassing to be almost twenty years old and sharing a room with your brother, even if it was just temporary. Lila nailed three sheets to the rafters to make a little bed chamber and told Looy that she better not catch him snooping.
Oh yeah, so what if I do?
Lila snarled, Do you really want to find out?
Looy ran off saying, Oooh…I’m really scared,
but he was thirteen and just as embarrassed to be sharing the room.
Veda was now visibly pregnant. Although she insisted that she was just pregnant, not sick,
Hazel demanded that she take it easy. The two of them started going through the house, making decisions about what to move and what to leave. Veda and Red had clothes (of course) and had received some household necessities as a wedding gift—towels, sheets, pots and pans, etc.…Aunt Hattie had given them a small, but very beautiful set of china. Red’s father had given them a little money. He also made a cutting board that so was smooth and lovely; Lila didn’t see how Veda would ever stand to use it for its intended purpose. Hazel said that they would leave most of the furniture. In the attic, they still had Looy’s cradle. Oh, that will be perfect when the baby arrives,
said Veda. As Lila continued doing most of the cooking and cleaning, Veda made diapers and clothes for the baby using Hazel’s treadle sewing machine.
The house was getting busy again. Veda’s friends organized a baby shower and asked Lila to make the desserts. A steady stream of acquaintances dropped in to tell Hazel how sorry they were to see her go. She loved the attention and treated Lila like a maid, Go fetch us some sandwiches. Take these plates to the kitchen. Go get Mrs. Taylor’s jacket from the bedroom.
It was so much work that she started to think about quitting her job with Mrs. Davis. Cleaning and cooking around the clock was taking a toll on her knees and back.
Notes
Although my sister is a little younger than I am, she was the first one to get pregnant. Like Lila, I wondered how she knew. She didn’t look any different.
In 1949, Lloyd married a woman named Lilah who had been married at least twice before. It took months for me to realize that Lilah Slaback in the phonebook was not my
Lila.
In this chapter, we are reintroduced to Myrtle Johnson (now Myrtle Schneider), who is thrilled to be married and wants the same joy for her friend, Lila Slaback. Family members have described Myrtle to me as Lila’s best friend,
but I wonder if they felt equally committed. Before I wrote this book, I had no idea that they were classmates in high school. When did they first become friends? As an adult, I have realized that friendships can easily grow and shrink in importance. As a child, I knew Myrtle as Grandma Schneider.
I knew what she was like as a person and can still imagine her voice in my head.
Like Lila, my parents moved out of my childhood home when I was twenty, just after I got married. I had lived there since I was a toddler and I found it really unsettling to lose my home
(even though I had moved out and did not intend to live there again). The moving process brought up all kinds of difficult feelings surrounding what to keep or get rid of and who should have it (me, my sister, or my parents).
For more information, see Jennifer L. Adams1, David Celani2, and Sheila Isenberg3.
An Autoethnography of Letter Writing and Relationships Through Time: Finding Our Perfect Moon (New York: Routledge, 2023).↩︎
Leaving Home: The Art of Separating from Your Difficult Family (New York: Columbia University Press, 2011).↩︎
Women Who Love Men Who Kill: 35 True Stories of Prison Passion (New York: Diversion Books, 2021).↩︎