Mormama

by Kit Reed

  The entry that links him to this family. He is shaking with passion. When he finds it, he shouts. His voice is so loud that he has to jam his fist into his mouth— anything to muffle the noise, which means, control the surge of joy.

  Never mind what went on between myself and the wife after Brucie died in her womb and we put Randolph into her arms. Some days I curse God. On others, I curse myself. Was it a mistake for me to let my wife believe that my most beloved son, the beautiful boy that lovely, lost Sylvia and I created together, was hers? If it had gone otherwise and Randolph and I had met for the first time in the trenches, would he be here with us now? Would we know each other at once, father and son? Would we be different people by the time we met, killer of your father’s heart, reckless blood of my blood? If we met now, Randolph, me wiser and kinder than I was, you matured, both of us freed of our shared past history, would you be here?

  Dearest boy, we could have been best friends!

  Dell is shaken, inside and out. Rattled to the core. Too excited. Can’t think. Can’t. Wants to. Has to try. Try.

  Randolph. This Randolph Ellis would be a hundred years old by now. No, a hundred and change. Nearer a hundred and a quarter, no, closer to fifty cents, he thinks, I could be Dell Duval, née— no, né, he supposes, that would be the masculine, right— now how does he know that? Dell DuVal né God knows what, and if I am Randolph’s son. No. Grandson. No. Great-grandson.

  He calculates, rummaging.

  Great-great grandson. Then I belong, he thinks.

  No. This belongs. Me. In this. At one with the house rising above him. As if it’s expanding to embrace him. Listening.

  Let me in!

  It takes him too long to settle. Dakin’s entry rushed in to fill all the blank spaces in his life. With guilt running up his heels and his future an open question, in flight from things in his past that he can’t bring back and will not name, he has found a place to stand.

  The pieces come together with a snap.

  So that’s who I am. OK! What if this Ran came back? He did, and he had a kid. What if the long-lost son rolled in after his grieving father died? Like, would the angry mother-woman, this Little Manette, be glad to see him or would she slam the door on him? What if he came back and claimed his fortune after both Dakin and the hateful wife were dead? What if this Dakin Ellis Senior rewrote his will before his car ran off the bridge. No time for lawyers or a trip to the family safe-deposit box. He would have hidden it somewhere in the house.

  Energized, he rolls up his frazzled mattress with the journal stashed inside, and begins a list.

  NOTE TO SELF:

  1. Get your shit together.

  2. Find the will.

  3. The one in the wheelchair likes you. Turn on the charm. Take her a present. Candy, or something you can lift off the decrepit corpse of that downtown department store. Kiss her on the cheek, she’ll blush and shiver because from the looks of her, nobody’s done that to her since she was young, before the chair. Hold her hand while you talk to her, old ladies love that, makes them feel cherished, at least a little bit. Play this right and she’ll beg you to let her help.

  4. Shave. Change your shirt.

  CHAPTER 30

  Ivy

  Life is so much, much more interesting now. Last month the twins and I were still all alone together, simmering like tainted meat coming to a boil, the last of our generation left alive. The three of us suffered through meals in near-silence because we don’t have the energy to fight, but now, now!

  I have a gentleman friend, and my wretched sisters don’t know. If we count Little Elena’s boy, and boys do count, there are not one, but two new men in the house!

  Iris and Rose and I have been all alone together for a long, long time. When it’s just us, they never talk to me and they certainly don’t listen. They get me up in the morning and give me oatmeal. Then they put me places, like a thing.

  We have been alone together for so long!

  Nobody comes to visit, although they did come when we used to be girls. Now there is the mailman, there are the meter readers, but nobody wants to have a conversation. They just do their jobs and go. Children don’t stop here on Halloween. No one has left this house in costume since Poor Elena came home to die in Sister’s room. That year she took Little Elena out dressed as a pumpkin in orange crepe paper, with a little green hat, so cute. All the colors ran because that year, it rained on Halloween. We haven’t seen Little Elena since she left for boarding school. I’m just so happy that she’s back!

  It’s been terrible. Iris and Rosemary come and go whenever they want, but unless it pleases them to unlock the front door and let Scooter and me roll out, I am relegated to the back porch. The day the men delivered Scooter, Iris plopped me into the seat and washed her hands of me. “There. Now you can stop whining.” Rosemary smiled the way she does, saying, “You can go anywhere you want,” but that isn’t true.

  Rose did have Vincent fix the kitchen door so it opens easily, I think to keep me out of the kitchen while she’s trying to cook. She won’t let me help. She says I get in the way. Lord, I am sick of her boiled dinners and stewed-fruit desserts, but if I hand her the pepper or Poor Elena’s jar of dried-out thyme or The Fanny Farmer Cookbook, if I even say the word onion, she says, “Ivy. Go out and get some fresh air.”

  Yes, I can roll out the kitchen door and park on the back porch where nobody has to see, but I do believe that she and Iris hope that Scooter will betray me and topple us both down the back porch steps to the ground, outside the old laundry room where Teddy died. Imagine, poor Ivy crushed by her fancy electrical chair. She died alone and unseen behind the house, on the spot where nobody comes. I wonder if there will be a party after the funeral. I don’t think so. Who would come? Everybody we used to know has been dead for much, much too long.

  Ah, but now we have the young people to brighten our eyes. Fresh faces. Little Elena and little Teddy. And the other one, that my sisters don’t know about. It is exciting. All this life in the house.

  I’m afraid my sisters are too excited, vying for our young niece’s attention, switching this Elena around just like they did the other ones. They even argue about dessert!

  “This is my kitchen, Iris Worzecka. Do not put those prunes in my fruit compote!”

  “Stop it! It’s Iris Ellis now, and don’t you forget it. I am five minutes older than you are, and I can do anything I want.”

  Look at them doing their little Punch and Judy show. When the boy is around they make fools of themselves, all but playing leapfrog to charm him, and when he will not be charmed, they discipline. Well, let them, for in this contest, the prize is already mine. This new, older Teddy is sweet enough, and we have an understanding, with no need to sit down and discuss the terms.

  We have a secret in common.

  Little Teddy knows what I know, but we will never say so out loud.

  Without having to name it, the child and I are agreed.

  Our secret, my handsome young friend said the time we intersected in the night, and I thought, yes. It was late night or early morning, and he was right here inside the house! We talked, but only for a little bit. I should have been screaming for Iris to rout him with Grandfather’s sword, but he and I knew each other from before. We did, and I was not afraid. The day we met, my nice young man turned Scooter and me so that we could face the sun. When he touched my hand in the night, my heart leapt up. Now, it leaps up at the very thought.

  Our secret, he said before he moved on, and we agreed. It is, and then— dear God!— I think he added, “Next time.”

  Iris and Rosemary. Pfaugh!

  Our secret glitters in my heart, like a wonderful present that’s much too pretty to unwrap. I have a friend in the house. That sweet young man is living right down there in the laundry room underneath the back porch, snug as a bear in a cave. Of course the boy knows. As soon as I heard Teddy Two playing in Biggie’s laundry room, I made him come back up the steps and into the arms of the house.
I told him, “Don’t go down there.”

  I tried to warn without explaining. It’s dangerous! He thought he could fool me, but I knew he wasn’t the only one down there. The day that nice young man first came over the rail to help me, I added two and two.

  Lovely man, but I should warn him too!

  I like the child, how can I not love a curly-headed boy named for my sad, lost little brother, burned to death when he was only three years old? Oh, new child with the curly hair. Why do you try so hard to slick it down? In another life, I would buy a horse for this new Teddy and we could go out riding in Ellis Park, but this is the only life I have and God forgive me for not warning them because dangerous as it is for them, I don’t want this part to end.

  Dear hearts, I need to warn you! I need to warn …

  “Ivy Ward Ellis, did you get out here all by yourself?” Curse you, Iris, you bossy witch.

  “Little Elena helped us.” Scooter and me.

  “You know it’s almost suppertime. What are you doing out here?”

  “I’m waiting for the mail.”

  “Idiot. It’s already been!”

  “Did anything come for me?”

  “Has anything ever? Ivy, get a grip!” My, Iris is in a terrible mood. She and Rose have been squabbling ever since the day our Little Elena took Rosemary out in her car.

  “Why, my grip is very strong.” I often turn off the motor and move Scooter with my bare hands. It’s quieter, and my sisters never know.

  “It’s a neologism, stupid!”

  “You and your TV slang.” If I wanted to, I could make Scooter push my sister down the front porch steps right now.

  Sly Iris, she bends down to ask, “Has Rosemary been talking about me?”

  Trapped as I am on Scooter, seated so close to the floor that even children look down on me, old as we are, all three of us, I am still the senior member in this house. A sage. To be consulted in every emergency. “I’m sorry, I’m sworn.”

  “To secrecy.” Iris groans. “Understand, this is a very special case.”

  The twins used to fight and kill each other daily while Mama was alive, before I lost the use of my legs. They tangled like a fury of tiny tigers, each bent on gaining control. Do I want to take sides? Should I fall into the old pattern and listen, collecting information from each, which is how a woman in a wheelchair gains power? Yes. “Of course,” I say, and she does her best to smile. The fool has volunteered nothing, so I prod. “Go on.”

  My younger (younger!) sister’s stern face is a kaleidoscope now, going this way, that way, each feature trying to settle in the right place. Wait long enough, and Iris will find a clever way to make me want to take her side. At last! “She’s enlisted Little Elena in this terrible scheme of hers,” she says. “To take all of our jewels and set fire to the house!”

  Now, how should I respond? It would be tiresome to say, “There there.” Currently, our fury of twins is in a rage, so I won’t have to say anything— unless I want to. At my sister’s back, Rosemary is lurking behind the half-open front door. The girl is blind as a bat, but with ears so finely tuned that she can pick up the sense of any conversation from twice the distance of our long porch. In a minute, Rosemary will storm down on Iris and yank the scene out of her contorted, flying hands. Four. Three. Two.

  Rosemary streaks out the front door. “Lies, you duplicitous, vile woman. Ivy, don’t listen to her!”

  “Rose is a liar, Ivy. Don’t believe a word she says!”

  Punch and Judy. They’ve been this way since the day they were born!

  Predictably, they tangle, spitting, “Take this, you,” “Take that,” sawing back and forth, back and forth, two old ladies, the Ellis girls, back-and-forthing their way across the porch and into the front door without a thought for me, taking their argument deeper and deeper into the house.

  Finally.

  Waiting, I scheme.

  We have to talk about it some time. I have to warn my new friend that this house is not safe for him, but how can I do that and keep him nearby, so we can keep on having these sweet talks?

  If only he’d come! Come talk to me now, dear friend. You are the only bright light in this endless life of poverty and contention, although I am rather fond of the new Teddy too.

  If he does come, how can I warn him and still keep him close? How can I tell my nice new friend that I pray will come along and talk to me here in the gathering dark— how can I tell him that he’s laid down his bed on the very spot where my little brother died, that he’s in danger, and we must go?

  I have some money. After I got hurt, Papa brought me a twenty-dollar Liberty Gold Eagle every time he visited my room, and I kept them all. There is my jewelry, some recent, some heirloom, all part of my inheritance after Papa passed away, and I came into a bit of money from Great-Aunt Lydia, so that although this monstrous house keeps us all poor and dependent on the stipend Papa settled on me and whatever is left of Little Elena’s bonds, I have something to bring to the feast.

  I happen to know that our old houseboat is still moored out there on the banks of the St. Johns River. Vincent told me, and I do believe it would be a safe retreat.

  For his own safety, I know we should save the boy, but it would be a shame to steal him away from his mother, and three would be a little … I believe in any circumstance, three is a crowd and if Little Elena came with us, that would make four, many too many to live comfortably on Papa’s boat, although if he insists, together we will find a way.

  Come find me here, dear stranger. I’m waiting in the spot on the porch where you and I first met. Come and sit next to me here in the dark while I find the words to make you see, and the right words to help you believe.

  Let me tell you about little Teddy and the circumstances on that terrible day. Let me tell you how my sweet little brother died, and let me tell you about the other men who have lived and died in this house on May Street, and then, my secret friend who is so very important to me, and then …

  Mormama and Tillie were taking the girls to Ellis Park in the pony cart, and I knew that as soon as we left May Street, Tillie would let me take the reins. I begged to go, but when I came downstairs in my prettiest frock, Mama flew off at me. “You can’t go, young lady. Think of poor Everett, staying back all by himself.”

  I never liked Everett, and all his long life in this house, Everett despised me. He was born sickly, but I am a cripple because God punished me.

  I said, “I hate Everett, Mama.” Quiet, Ivy. It’s a sin to hate. “Besides, I have to help Tillie hold the pony.” Nonsense. Come and help me entertain your poor sick brother, you selfish girl. I started to cry. “I’m not selfish, Mama, I’m not!” The more I sobbed, the more Mama poked my fat belly and pinched my fat cheeks to make me laugh and forget that I had to stay back and help her with that great big baby, it hurt! I screamed. Mama lashed out. You love horses so much, my girl. Go out to the stables and help Vincent clean up the … I saw my mother wince. She would never say the word.

  She spat out the rest like an enduring curse and yes, it has followed me. That will teach you to beg. She dispatched me to the carriage house to help Vincent muck out the stalls. When it happened, Vincent and I were out in the alley, near enough to hear the screams but too far away for Vincent to reach him in time. I was holding the lid to the bin while Vincent dumped the manure.

  Is it my fault, then, for leaving poor Teddy alone in the house with nothing to do? Did I really think that Mama noticed or cared what he did or where he went? Forgive me, God. I was careless, careless. Is that why You let Dakin Junior’s horse rear up and fall over backward on me the night I ran away? Was that my punishment?

  If that nice young man does come and I do tell him these things, as well as several others about the fate of men who have moved into the distinguished, deadly home of Manette Ward Robichaux Ellis, will he pat my hand and say it’s just my imagination, or will he see the danger and take me out of here?

  I want, I yearn for my handsome
friend to lift me out of Scooter and carry me off with him, away from this awful place. Then, please God, oh then I will help my young love to find his future in some new town where I can be happy, and he will be perfectly safe.

  CHAPTER 31

  Theo

  So I escaped because old Aunt Ivy accidentally broke a bottle before lunch. She was afraid to tell them because she hates it when they get mad, so a spear of broken glass pretty much trashed Aunt Iris’s foot. She was so pissed off at Aunt Rosemary for not sweeping up the mess that she didn’t even thank her for bringing towels to stop the blood. It kept bleeding anyway, so Mom had to drive them both to the ER.

  Aunt Iris claimed she needed Rosemary to sit with her in the back and keep her finger on the pressure point even though by that time the bleeding had stopped, but Aunt Rosemary said, sort of by-the-way, “It’s better now, I think I’ll stay back and watch General.”

  Then Aunt Iris got all bent. She said Mom and I could get her out front and into the car, you know, living crutches, but she needed Rosemary to walk her in to the ER while Little Elena parked, and when she squawked Iris added, besides, somebody had to save her place in line while she went to the toidy— the toidy?— because there was zero time for her to limp into the downstairs one here and do what she had to do right now because this was an emergency, but that wasn’t the real reason either.

  I never saw one of these stringy old ladies leave 553 without the other one, well, except for that one time. Mom says they’re both paranoid. Like, scared to leave each other alone in the house, e.g., if twin one left twin two alone in the house, she’d either spill all her secrets or run upstairs where Ivy can’t go and grab all the valuables and take off in a taxi for parts unknown. Either that or she’d spend all day setting nasty traps, like planting marbles in the big mahogany staircase or prying up boards on the back steps so her twin would wipe out next time she went downstairs. Or she’d sneak strange men into the house and do God knows what with them. This makes zero sense to Mom or me, but, hey. They’re gone, so, great!