He licked his lips. “I...I just wanna be useful. I know you don’t like any 'f us being idle.”
“Being idle does little good fer anyone.”
He nodded and stepped away. “S-sorry.”
His father raised a brow. “I...I do not understand where this, this proactiveness is comin' from,” he sighed, placing a hand against his forehead. “It just feels very, very out ’f character fer you. Are you feelin’ all right, Benjamin?”
Ben withheld a groan, his eyes fixed ahead. “If I want t’ be useful fer you – ”
“I understand the reasonin', but I do not – ”
“Papa, please, – ”
“I’ll think it over,” he said, returning to his desk. “’nd tell you my decision at supper.” Mr. Price waved his hand, gesturing him away. “You may leave.”
Eyes dropping, Ben sighed and turned, heading back into the staircase hall. As soon as the study door closed, he turned to the front door, afternoon light bleeding through the transom window, illuminating the speckled dust floating through the air. His breaths steady, defeat washing through him. Helplessness. Resignation. He would not see her, and his heart broke at the thought.
His eyes dropped. They burned, throwing his arm over them.
He deserved this, though. Something inside him told Ben that. He was not worthy of her time.
Ben clutched the pressed penny sitting heavy in his pocket. Moving to the storage under the staircase, he placed the coin with the other letters before sighing again. Ben could not have it with him; it would only remind him of his failure, his promise engulfed in flames, to finally see her.
He moved on with his day, keeping the coin with him as punishment.
By supper, the dining room curtains pulled open to allow for the last of the summer light, the room still singeing with a coldness, Mr. Price nodded his head toward his second-eldest son. “You’re free to go t’ Mill Creek if, and only if, you can also run some errands fer Mother.”
Ben nearly dropped his fork. “I – what?”
“Need I repeat myself, Benjamin?”
“What?” asked Frances, eyes narrowed.
Theodore placed his spoon down. “What’re you talkin’ about?”
“Benjamin offered t’ fetch the dyed cotton from Mill Creek tomorrow,” Mr. Price explained, bringing his fork to his lips.
“After discussing it,” Mrs. Price continued, eyes away from her husband, turned to her children, “we have decided that it would not be an issue. However, I do have some things I need you to get while there, as well.”
“Can I go, too?” asked Douglas.
“Me, too!” said Beatrice. “I’ve never been t’ Mill Creek! What’s it like?”
Ben gave no time to explain.
“Why does he get to go?” asked Frances. “Why not I?”
“You will be entertaining your grandparents tomorrow when they arrive,” added Mr. Price. “Grandmother requested it specifically.”
“Mother,” she whined.
“What about me?” asked Theodore. “Why didn’t you consider me?”
“Benjamin made the point of you being too reliable t’ leave the shop.”
Theodore’s cheeks flushed slightly, even in the dimming light. His brother’s expression remained of apparent discomfort. “I – but Papa – ”
“I’m not going t’ explain this further,” he said. “Your brother said it best himself; he is expendable the next few days.”
Ben cringed at the words. He clasped his hands in his lap a little tighter.
“The matter’s settled. I’m not discussin’ it further,” his father said, resuming eating.
Slowly, Ben’s sibling’s eyes moved off him and returned to eating. A pall had settled.
Beatrice tapped her brother’s shoulder. “Tell me all about Mill Creek when you get back, okay? Promise me.”
He cracked a wary smirk. “I – of course, Bea.”
“Me, too,” insisted Douglas.
Ben nodded. “Y-yes, I – yes.” His answer seemed to satisfy his younger siblings as they returned to eating. He stared down at his plate, unable to breathe fully. His eyes grew misty, and he chuckled, surprising several of the table’s occupants. Ben wiped them with shaking hands; why they shook, he was not sure. He stood. “I...s-sorry, Papa, but I wanna make sure the inventory is up-to-date before I leave tomorrow.”
His father watched him before closing his eyes and sighing. “Leave your plate. We’ll take the scraps.” He shook his head. “So wasteful.”
“August,” Mrs. Price snapped. She turned to Ben. “Leave your plate. We will give them to the Sullivan’s pigs. Go.”
He nodded, wasting no time to leave the house and feel the cool night air. As he walked towards Broad Street, he stepped a little faster, breathed a little easier. His eyes low and ever sparkling from the surprised tears, Ben could not help the weary smile growing across his face; he looked up. Trees whistled in the distance, the sky a splattering of pinks and purples and blues. Broad Street glowed in the distance underneath the gas streetlights, each light a firefly.
Ben let out a shaking breath, an unstifled laugh to the sunlit heavens. He plunged his hand into his pocket, feeling the cold metal of the elongated coin between his fingers.
There he stood for a few moments more, reveling in the summer night’s breeze, before heading off towards the general store.
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