Right Where You Left Me

by Calla Devlin

  I blow through one roll, then two. By the time I have everything back in place, Mom hasn’t come home yet. I’ve never felt so alone in the house.

  I’m shooting out of order, putting Father Frost’s gift before the abandonment in the snow. I needed privacy in the attic, time to go through Lena’s things. Mom wouldn’t understand. The mere sight of me opening those bins would cause her pain. The attic isn’t off-limits; it’s just tucked away, always there but never opened. Dad ventures up for Christmas decorations, and other than that, the door remains closed.

  When I was little, three or four, I thought Lena lived up there. I’d hear Mom crying through the ceiling. Sometimes, when she needed to be alone, she’d climb the ladder to be close to Lena’s things.

  In the kitchen, I pull out sugar and chunky gray salt and flour, dumping them on the butcher block. I empty the ice into the sink and bash it with a rolling pin, reducing cubes to crystals. This is how Mom finds me, a violent maniac with a rolling pin. I’m pink and flushed and sweating from the effort.

  “What on earth are you doing?”

  “Art project,” I say. I’m covered in flour. I need a shower.

  Mom surveys the kitchen, looking even unhappier with me. Like that’s possible. “You’re cleaning this up.”

  “I know.”

  “Now,” she says. She’s possessive about the kitchen. Territorial. I know better, but I didn’t expect her home so early.

  “Why aren’t you at the bakery?”

  She hands me a plate. Piroshki.

  “Thanks. I’m starving,” I say.

  “I assumed you would come downstairs.”

  I shrug. “Enjoying my imprisonment, I guess.”

  “Don’t act like this is some grave injustice, Charlotte. You have no idea of the consequences of that video. It put your father at risk. I can’t believe you would be so glupyy.” Foolish.

  “The last thing I want to do is hurt him. I was trying to help. I told you I didn’t post it!”

  “No, but you made it in the first place. Without talking to me. Without talking to Miguel. The FBI is another matter, but you didn’t come to us.”

  “I didn’t plan for things to turn out this way. We came up with the idea and went for it. It seemed like it could help. You know we have to keep him in the news. We talked about that on Friday night.”

  “Yes, we talked about talking about it. You were never supposed to do anything.” She yanks her hair free from her ponytail and shakes it out so it falls to her shoulders. She, too, is covered in flour.

  “Someone had to do something, Mom.” I try to hang on to my intention: to help Dad, even though now I worry that I’ve done more harm than good.

  “If you had just waited. Uncle Miguel was going to keep working on his publisher—he felt confident he could persuade the paper. I don’t know why you couldn’t just wait.”

  “Because I’m sick of waiting! Will Baxter’s parents have been waiting for years. We all agree that can’t happen to Dad. And, sorry, Mom, but it’s not like you were going to do anything. I’m lucky that you’re out of bed. I know you don’t want to be stuck here with me, but you better get used to it. Dad may never come home. I know you wish it was Lena who had lived and not me.”

  If I had slapped her or set her on fire, I’m sure it would have hurt less.

  I can’t believe I spoke those words out loud, and as I watch her face fill with pain and tears spill onto her cheeks, regret blooms inside me. I’d do anything to take the words back. “Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean that. Really.” I take a step closer, but she moves out of reach.

  I want her to yell or scream. Say anything. Punish me in some way. But Mom is silent, so completely still that she may have been made out of marble or plaster.

  “I’m so sorry,” I repeat.

  She’s standing before me, but she’s gone. She’s left me again.

  Twenty-Nine

  After the earthquake in Ukraine hit, buildings and roads and houses were reduced to rubble. Smoke and ash and destruction.

  Somehow, in less than a day, I’ve managed to create similar conditions here.

  I’ve never, not once, spoken to Mom—or anyone—like that. I regret it in every molecule of my body. I’ve never felt so ashamed, even when my face appeared on national television. It will take a lot to make up for what I’ve done. It’s like I’m burning down the house and everything in it.

  Mom opens my bedroom door. She’s out of her baking clothes, wearing jeans and a T-shirt and sneakers. “Get dressed, Charlotte.”

  I don’t ask where we’re going. I obey and pull on the exact same clothes as her.

  I follow her out of the apartment and into the garage. As we drive through the city and across the Golden Gate Bridge, she doesn’t say a word. Nothing but silence, a different kind than I’m used to. Mom’s rarely angry at me. Not like this. It’s as though she’s expressing something I always feared was inside her—a fury for what I did to her body when I was born.

  We park at Muir Beach. It’s low tide, and the fog’s so thick that I can’t see the bridge and the Farallon Islands. I gaze into the ocean, at the wavering expanse of water, so large that it defies shape and containment. The other side of the ocean is irrelevant, the opposite shore meaningless.

  “Dad used to bring me here,” I say. “Remember? We’d come really early and hunt for sand dollars. I was what, three or four? In preschool.”

  “No,” she says.

  “I was older?”

  “You’re right about the age, but your father never took you here. That was me. You were so upset when your dad would leave that I’d take you outside. It was the only way to calm you down. We came here, even in the rain.”

  “But the sand dollars,” I say. They still line my windowsill. “Why don’t I remember that it was you?”

  The wind whips her hair, and she struggles to put it in a ponytail. “I think we have a hard time seeing each other sometimes. Let’s walk.”

  It’s like we both took a vow of silence and the gulls overhead are the only ones who speak, with their relentless caws. Mom leans over and presses a sand dollar into my hand. I trace the rough edge with my finger and the embossed flower in the center. Sand dollars have a season, just like tulips, just like peaches. This is a rare time of the year to stumble upon one. Mom taught me this. How could I have forgotten? What else have I forgotten?

  We’ve walked a good distance down the beach when Mom bends over again. “Give me your hand.”

  I oblige. She places something sharp and cold in my palm. A shell, sandy, with a broken edge. The wide mouth tapers into a small curved top. “Scallop.”

  “Right,” she says. “And here’s another.” A long half shell, narrow as a dragonfly’s wing, smooth on the inside and rough lines on the outside. A mussel.

  “We need to turn around if we’re going to beat traffic,” she says.

  She bends down once more. “Your favorite.”

  Mom places an abalone shell in my hand, its shallow shape as distinct as the mottled rainbow colors inside. I have such an affinity for this shell with its muted eddy of color, abstracted circles—a perfect mirror of how I feel, so many emotions swirled together that I can’t identify the primary one. I slip it into my pocket.

  “This is what we used to do. All the time.”

  “Why did you bring me here today?” I ask.

  She stops walking and looks at me. Tears gather at the edges of her eyes, but don’t fall. “You never would have said that to me if you remembered our trips to the beach. I don’t know how to make you understand how much I love you. You’re my child. My serdtse.” Heart.

  I wipe my cheeks dry. I wish I had the words to explain how I feel. I’ll have to show her instead.

  Thirty

  I was raised not to waste, and even though my photo project has lost its magic, I return to the kitchen and sprinkle freshly broken ice crystals onto the sugar and flour.

  It doesn’t take long for me to re
cognize my power. I’m the storyteller. I don’t have to create a literal interpretation of the folktale. I can make it my own.

  There doesn’t have to be one sister who stays and another who leaves. I don’t have to damn the father to cowardice and the mother to menace. Sometimes things happen and no one is to blame.

  I rework the scene, leaving the snow but changing the story. I’d removed the figurines from my old dollhouse in the attic, along with nesting dolls from my room, to use as characters. Now I place them in the snow and shoot. I rearrange the scene and shoot again. I don’t have the confidence I did earlier, or the other day, but I’m too defeated to overthink anything.

  By the time I finish and clean the kitchen, Mom still hasn’t emerged from her room. I take out my laptop, not caring if she sees it and confiscates it. I want to work on the project. It’s not homework anymore. It’s for her.

  The notes from the spring break camp help, and I follow the steps I learned in the digital photography class. I oversaturate the color and intensify the contrast. I don’t want the dolls to resemble dolls, so I crop and use shadows. It works, but each step takes time. I don’t want to be sloppy. I don’t want to rush.

  Sometimes words aren’t enough. I know that’s the case for Mom and me.

  I need to do something to get her back.

  Each picture takes about an hour, but I become faster as I go, shaving off time. Not that I expect to sleep, with everything that’s going on.

  As I tinkered with the makeshift snow, I rewrote the folktale by hand, and now, as I type it up, I make a few changes here and there. Now the parents are married and always have been. They are kind and loving, but the mother can’t keep the father home. He works too much. He’s curious. He likes to explore.

  They have two daughters, one just like the mother and one just like the father. The oldest girl, the one who takes after her dad, enjoys exploring too. As soon as she learns to walk, she ventures outside, going farther and farther, instilling panic in her parents. They give the girl a sister, hoping that will keep her home. But their older daughter is restless, even more than her father, and one day she skips outside to play and never comes back.

  The younger daughter is a taller, darker version of her quiet and domestic mother. She likes adventure and exploration in small doses only. After her sister disappears, the house fills with cold. Whenever the wind blows, the fire and candles go out. No matter how hard her mother tries, the house remains dark.

  One day when they expect the father to return from a trip, they receive a letter. He’s delayed. The mother has been cooking for hours, and they’re nearly out of firewood. “Go to the forest,” she tells her daughter. “Fetch some wood.”

  The girl wraps herself up in a thick blanket and pulls the sleigh through the ankle-deep snow to the edge of the woods. She’s met by an old man dressed in white.

  “Do you know who I am, child?”

  “You’re Father Frost,” she says. “May I take some wood? Our house is so cold.”

  Father Frost, the King of Winter, knows the girl won’t survive long in the cold. He offers her a trunk filled with everything that will keep her warm: beautiful silk quilts, furs, and more clothes than she ever could have imagined. Of all the dresses, one stands out: a deep blue sarafan embroidered with silver thread and embellished with pearls.

  She slips on the dress and the woods quiet at her beauty.

  He waves his hand, and the girl sees that the sleigh is stocked high with not only wood.

  The girl hears a familiar voice and watches as her long-vanished sister approaches her. She hasn’t aged a day since she left three years earlier.

  “Hello, sister. Please don’t tell Mama and Papa that I’m here. They’ll see my things in the trunk. I put in some toys and the dress I wore the day I left. I can stay a child with Father Frost. I never have to grow up. Please don’t make me go back. Tell them I’m safe and happy. Tell Mama not to be sad. Tell Papa to stay at home. Tell them to take good care of you.”

  Father Frost looks at the girl. “Can you do that?”

  The girl stares at her sister, seeing her happiness and contentment. It would be cruel to bring her home when she so clearly belongs with Father Frost.

  The girl nods, sad that she has to leave her sister, but happy knowing she’s safe. She belongs in the woods. There, she is free.

  Thirty-One

  I work through the night, and when I finish the project very early in the morning, I print two copies—one for Megan and one for Mom. I leave Mom’s on the counter by the coffeepot, where I know she’ll see it first thing.

  It’s easy to leave the apartment unnoticed and walk to the bus stop in the chilly fog. The noises of the bakery drown out my footsteps. It’s early enough that I should be able to catch Megan before anyone else is there. I need to turn this in. I need to see how she reacts to the photos. I can’t make a decision without that.

  I elbow my way onto the crowded bus. Hands overlap as we all cling to the rail, trying to ride the lurches like they’re waves. I don’t plan to stay at school once I turn in my work—can’t deal with everyone’s stares and whispers. I can’t see Josh right now. I’m too hurt. Too angry. And I honestly can’t deal with one more thing.

  I arrive to the smell of coffee, which means it’s already later than I’d hoped. Megan looks surprised to see me. Before she can say anything, I blurt out, “I just wanted to drop this off. I’m not staying.” I hand her the folder.

  She pours me a mug of coffee. “How are you holding up? Have you heard anything about your dad since your video came out?”

  I shake my head. “I’m worried that it backfired. The FBI said it could make things worse for him. The rebels might hurt him as a way to retaliate.”

  “Oh, Charlotte. I’m so sorry. I’m here if you need someone to talk to.”

  “Thanks.”

  Megan takes out the photos one at a time. “God, the color.”

  I watch as she spreads them out in order and reads the accompanying story. She goes back to the trunk shots, holding one up to the light. Lena’s rattle rests in a nest of lace dresses.

  “Sit,” she says.

  I’d been hovering.

  “Charlotte, who knows what kind of photographer you’ll end up being. Journalistic. Portrait. Fine art. There’s no telling. But you could do any and all of them. Emma said you got into Berkeley and State and Emerson?”

  “And NYU,” I say. “But I’ve always wanted to stay close to home. I still do. The thing is, though, I don’t really feel ready for school. Maybe that’ll change if my dad comes home, but right now, I don’t want anything to do with journalism. I can say this for sure: I don’t want to be a photojournalist. Not anymore.”

  “This isn’t about out earlier conversation, is it? Because I never meant to give you the impression that you aren’t talented. You are. If anything, you have so much talent that I think it would be good for you to explore all forms of photography. Explore everything. That’s what college is about.”

  I shake my head. “No, I’ve been thinking about this for a while. My dad loves that I work on the paper. And my best friends are just like him. But I’m not. To be honest, I never have been, and I’m just seeing that now, you know, really seeing it. I can’t keep doing something because I’m trying to be something or someone else. I’m happier spending an entire day taking pictures of a slice of bread than shooting an assembly or science fair.” I take a deep breath before making my announcement. “I want off the paper. I’m even thinking of taking a year off from school. I might decline admittance to all of them.”

  Megan practically spits out her coffee. “Charlotte, I’ve tried my best to be supportive and not bossy, but under no circumstances can you turn down college. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get into those schools?”

  “But I told them this story of me following in my dad’s footsteps. It was a love letter to the media. That’s not what I want to do now. That’s not who I am.”

  She
laughs gently. “Guess how many majors I had.”

  “I don’t know. Two?”

  “Four. I started out as premed. If my parents can adjust their expectations, so can yours. My undergraduate degree is from Johns Hopkins. I didn’t go there to study international relations. Promise me you’ll accept Berkeley. It’s your top choice, and they have a great art department. You’ll do well there. And you came back from camp saying you didn’t want to go to college anywhere else.”

  “I know it’s late in the year, but can I drop the paper and move to Mr. Donoghue’s class? Is that even possible?”

  “We’ll make it work. I support your decision to take a break from the paper, especially given what your family is going through.”

  I barely manage a smile. “Thank you. I need to leave before the bell.”

  “You’d better get going, then.” Megan picks up a photo. “This is great work. I can’t believe you did it in a day.”

  “I’m grounded, so I don’t have much else to do. It helped, though. Being in the darkroom always calms me, but working like this did, too.”

  “Keep taking pictures, Charlotte. You have a point of view. That’s important and rare.”

  I nod and thank her again. “I will,” I say. “I promise.”

  Thirty-Two

  I listen to Dad’s beloved Cuban hip-hop as I wait for the bus home. I don’t understand Spanish, but I looked up the lyrics online. All love songs, unrequited and pining and passionate. One in particular is so explicit that I blush whenever I hear it.

  I take a few steps toward the curb and nearly walk right into him. Josh, wearing a hooded sweatshirt and jeans and black combat boots. If I hadn’t studied him so closely for years, the precise way he puts one foot in front of the other, I wouldn’t have known him through the thick fog.

  “Jesus, Josh,” I say. “You scared the crap out of me.”

  He pushes back his hood and looks as wrecked as I feel. For a second, I forget that I’m not speaking to him.