* * *
You told me of Claudia and how you cared for her when your mother was too ill.
* * *
I remember you telling me of your sister’s every little accomplishment and how they felt like yours too. When she did well on her English exam, when she treated your brother’s broken arm, how she snuggled with you on Sunday morning.
* * *
And most of all, I recall the night we spun the globe instead of the wheel. We spun it, picking all the places we wanted to travel to someday. I showed you my favorites, told you my plans. “We’ll go to the Amazon and find treasure.”
* * *
“We’ll go to Paris and see the Moulin Rouge,” you said.
* * *
“We’ll travel to China and walk along the Great Wall.”
* * *
“We’ll go to Vienna and hear the orchestra.”
* * *
“We will do it all. We will travel the world.”
You placed your palms on the globe, I covered your hands with mine, and we kissed over the world.
* * *
All those stories you shared, I keep in my heart, locked tightly in a secret compartment that belongs to you. When we reunite, you can tell them to me again, and they will never grow old.
* * *
For I know we will reunite.
* * *
I never doubt that soon, soon, I will find my way back to you and give you the life you deserve.
* * *
Only ever yours,
Edward Wilkinson
(It’s a good banker name, no? It sounds so official. Soon, I will be Edward Wilkinson, industrialist, and perhaps, after hours, a midnight rider who gallops on horseback through the circus to steal away his girl for a lifetime of new adventures.)
Dear Edward,
* * *
A midnight rider? Ooh. Now, I am intrigued.
* * *
Tell me more about this horse and this plan. I love a good escape. Will you hoist me on the horse, and shall I wrap my arms around your waist as we race away under a starry sky, no one any the wiser?
* * *
Or will you storm into the big top, ride past, and lasso me from the wheel of death right before a blade slices me? It will be a story told for generations, of course. The intrepid knife-thrower-turned-banker-turned-midnight-rider who rescued his woman from the clutches of an unsavory ringmaster? I can picture it now.
* * *
We’ll change our names.
* * *
We’ll start a new life.
* * *
We’ll begin a brand-new adventure.
* * *
You and me.
* * *
And we’ll make sure Claudia is taken care of. We’ll make sure my family is safe for all time.
* * *
That will be our great escape.
* * *
Ah, that will be the bedtime story I tell myself tonight.
* * *
For now, I sit in front of the mirror, applying my makeup, turning my lashes long, my face pancake white, my lips red.
* * *
I brush my hair.
* * *
I tie a red ribbon in it, for I no longer wear pink. I am only the Pink Ribbon Girl with you. With him, I am the Woman in Red, and I long for the day when I can shed that identity and leave this servitude behind.
* * *
Yours now and forevermore,
Greta Drumansky
(The woman who longs to be in pink again.)
December 1922
* * *
My Dearest Greta,
* * *
The time is coming. Please know I will be there, and you will never have to worry again.
* * *
P.S. It’s been so long since I’ve seen you. What if you don’t remember what I look like? How I kiss you? What if you no longer love me? These are the things I worry about when I can’t sleep.
December 1922
* * *
My Dearest Edward,
* * *
You are a silly man. Do you think I love you for your face? I love your heart. Your big, beautiful heart. I love your iron will. It cannot be broken. I love your steel determination. Most of all, I love your soul, and when I see you again, I will fall into your arms and kiss you so madly, the world will wink off. It will be you and me, and it will feel like we are the only ones alive.
* * *
Until then, I will be thinking of you.
January 1923
* * *
My Dearest Greta,
* * *
I will see you next month. To say I cannot wait would be an understatement. I feel like a soldier must when returning home after years away. You are my home, and I’m returning for you. Wait for me.
* * *
It’s you. It’s always been you.
* * *
P.S. It’s always been you.
Dear Children,
* * *
We knew you could do it. We knew you’d know exactly what was near the boards. Of course you know how close we are to the Caribaldis. We are like a family, all of us. But the life debt? It’s so silly. Who believes in life debts? You see a friend drowning, you help him. Jack always thought there was more to it—to your father saving his life when they were only children. But you don’t save a life to extract a debt. You save a life because it’s the right thing to do.
* * *
Jack, though, was determined to give back. To repay a debt that was not due to the dearest of friends. Ah, to have friends like that . . .
* * *
Well, you know the ending. We were all eventually reunited and remained the best of friends.
* * *
Along with a certain someone else. Your Aunt Claudia.
* * *
Can you believe my sister married my husband’s best friend? It was like a dream, the four of us, together.
* * *
But dreams are not won easily.
* * *
Love is not merely for the plucking, like flowers in a field.
* * *
Love must be worked for.
* * *
Like the night your father came for me. I want to tell you it was easy. But nothing worth having is.
* * *
Do you want to know the final chapter of the story? If you do, then you must go to the site of our last show together. You will find it there, but it’s not what you think. It might seem like a grand chronicle, but it’s not a tale of our ride by the silvery light of midnight, nor the story of our daring great escape.
* * *
It’s something else entirely.
* * *
Love,
E & G, most affectionately known as Mom and Dad
29
Presley
“Well. Looks like you found something you want to buy.”
My skin prickles as I gulp, caught red-handed.
“Yes,” I say, my voice strong, masking the holy shit underneath. Because, hello, I’m holding a letter that was tucked into the hairbrush.
Tucked into the hairbrush.
A wave of understanding sloshes over me, and I reach for the shelf to steady myself as it hits.
I’m not holding just any hairbrush.
This is Greta’s hairbrush. She used it the night she wrote one of these letters. Wonder surges through me like sunlight. This is the brush she was using when she was prepping to perform. This very object tells their history.
This is why I do what I do. I’m like an archaeologist, uncovering the stories of people long past, and I’ve never felt so connected to a thing before. My heart expands, aching to tell the tale of this object. Longing to write about the precious artifacts of their love.
But right now, I’m in a shop in the theater district, with something in my hands that shouldn’t be there.
Pat Caribaldi stares at me over chunky glasses, narrowing his eyes. “Huh. Seems you found som
ething. What have you got?”
Hunter clears his throat, squares his shoulders. “We found some letters in the hairbrush.”
Pat chuckles loudly, like that’s the height of tomfoolery, like we can’t possibly have said that. He reaches for the letters. “Let me see that.”
“They’re very old.” A motherly protectiveness tears through me, and I clutch them close to my chest. These feel like mine. I must keep them safe.
He sighs, rolling his blue eyes. “Miss, I’m very old. You think I don’t know how to handle something ancient?”
“I didn’t mean anything impudent by it,” I say, but I still don’t want to relinquish them.
He pats one of his shoulders, then the other. “Every day, I handle this here old body. Every day, I go to work. Every day, I know exactly how to treat things with care. Now let me see.” He thrusts out his hand, waggling his fingers, making it clear I need to give up the booty.
Uncurling my fingers feels a Herculean task.
Somehow I find the will, and I let go, handing the letters to him like a child forced to relinquish her favorite Princess Leia figure.
He sets the letters on a shelf, mumbling to Martha as he gingerly folds them up like precious origami art. “Damn young people. Bet they can’t fold a map either.” He chuckles to himself, smiles at the skull. “Bet you knew how to fold a map. But these days? Everyone relies on GPS and texts. No one even sends a letter.” Once he finishes, he tucks the pages away in the brush again, clicking it shut, a cupboard sealed once more.
Holding the brush to the dim light, he regards it as if it’s Aladdin’s lamp, full of mysteries and wonders. “This is the best one. Come to think of it,” he says, stopping to scratch his jaw, “it shouldn’t be out here for sale. You can’t buy this one.”
We can’t record the letters for possible use on the show, and we didn’t even get to take a photo of the letters for personal reference this time, and I’m desperate for another hit of their love story. “But what about the letters? The letters in there. Do you know Edward and Greta’s love story?”
A scoff the size of the Empire State Building flies from his mouth. “Do I know it? What do you take me for? Some sort of fool? Of course I know it. Of course I’ve heard it. And of course I get it. Now, are you here to buy or just to blabber on about love letters? Because the letters aren’t for sale.”
“Did their children ever find them?” I ask. “Did they get to see this story Edward and Greta wrote for them?”
Pat cocks his head, scratches his jaw. “Now that’s a damn good question.”
“Do you know the answer?” God, I hope the children found them. I hope they understood what their parents went through to be together.
“I know lots of answers,” he says with the same twinkle in his eye that was there when he opened the door.
But in a flash, it’s gone, and he’s waving a hand dismissively. “I don’t have all day. I have things to do, places to be. I have a date with my wife, Janice, tonight, and I need to get ready for it. Even old men still take their women for a night on the town. Are you going to buy something? That moon-pie sign is awfully nice,” he says with a you should buy it now grin.
Hunter doesn’t hesitate. “Sure. We’ll take it.” Hunter dips into his wallet, fishing for bills.
“Smart man,” Pat says, then gives him the price for the sign. “You seem like a smart man.”
Hunter cocks an eyebrow. “A few minutes ago, I seemed stupid. Now I’m smart?”
Pat winks. “I guess we’ll see.”
Hunter hands him the money, and when Pat heads for the register, desperation grips me one more time. I need answers. I can’t leave without them. “Do you know where their last show together was? Greta and Edward? We need to find out. It’s important.”
An ancient drawer in an antique register groans open as Pat glances back. “Why is it important?”
“We need to go there. We have to find the final letter.”
“You have to?” he asks.
It will feel like death if I don’t find the next letter. The death of their love story. “I do,” I insist.
Hunter slides a hand around my waist. “We do. It’s necessary. Can you help us, Pat?”
Pat counts the change and hands it to Hunter, who surely doesn’t care right now about the change or receipt he stuffs into his wallet. “Last show, you say?” Pat says. “Edward Valentina? The great explorer? Founder of the Exploration Society?”
“Yes.” If it sounds like I’m begging, it’s because I am.
“The businessman whose investments funded his explorations? He had a last show?” The arch in his gray eyebrow screams skepticism.
Then it hits me. He might not know. We didn’t know they were performers. No one knew. That’s the secret part of their history. “You haven’t read the letters?”
Pat doesn’t answer me, he just scoffs again, like he has a surplus of scoffs to throw around. “The man who traveled to the Amazon? The woman who was a patron of the arts? Who loved going to museums, theater, and the ballet? You think they were performers too?”
A patter of laughter comes next. He’s not laughing with us. He’s laughing at us.
“They were,” Hunter says, coolly confident in the face of Pat’s doubt. “They were secret circus performers. They kept it hidden, and we’re following the letters they left behind. Corinne knows we are.”
“Ooh, secret performers. Next thing you know, you’ll be telling me they found buried treasure.” He shakes his head. “Listen, kid. Some things are just folklore. Thank you for coming in. I hope you enjoy the moon-pie sign. Maybe you’ll find a secret compartment in it.” Gesturing to the door, his hands signal vamoose as his lips say, “Have a great day.”
30
Hunter
This moon-pie sign must have a secret hatch somewhere.
Outside the shop, I inspect it closely, studying every square millimeter.
News flash: there is no secret compartment.
“Damn. I was sure a letter would fly out of the sign,” I remark dryly.
Presley bumps her shoulder against mine. “You know what Freud said. Sometimes a moon-pie sign is just a moon-pie sign.”
“Hmm. But is it?” We walk down the block, past the Firelight PlayHouse. “There has to be something about this sign, what with the way he was dropping hints.”
“Like the brush. It was like he wanted us to find it. Don’t you think?”
“Yes. He definitely wanted us to find it. And he disappeared once we had it. Then he came back out, all piss and vinegar.”
“And he said he knew their love story, Hunter. But he wouldn’t say if he’d read the letters. And then he just wanted us gone.” She holds her hands like a scale to be balanced, tipped one way then the other. “But at the same time, he absolutely wanted you to buy this moon-pie sign.”
“Like moon pie is a clue.” I stare at every angle of the sign, but I can’t riddle this five-cent sign. There’s nothing on it, nothing in it, nothing here but an illustration of a moon pie. “It’s official. I’m nominating Pat for the most curmudgeonly eccentric I’ve ever met.”
“Of all the people you’ve met in all the years, he’s worthy of that accolade?”
“He’s up there, wouldn’t you say?”
“He’s definitely salty. But perhaps spending all day with dusty taxidermy mice and spiders in amber has that effect. I was sure he was going to say, Now you whippersnappers get out of my shop.”
“But he was weirdly dropping hints with his little suggestions and specific words, and then all of a sudden—bye-bye, see you later.” We turn into the alley that cuts between Forty-Third and Forty-Fourth. There, I hoist the sign above my head like a mirror in the desert, catching the light. “Oh great sun, please reveal unto us the secret trapdoor inside this flat metal sign.”
Presley imitates me, turning her voice into a booming call to the gods of secret compartments and trapdoors. “Or please just send us a case of moon pies.�
��
She lowers her arm as I lower the sign and tuck it under my arm. “You’re making me sad and hungry. I haven’t had a moon pie in ages.”
PS It's Always Been You Page 19