by Iman Verjee
‘She has learned her lesson, Annie. I think it’s time we were a family again.’
‘I just want what’s best for her,’ she replied. ‘I hope you’re right, James.’ I could tell she was hugging him because her words were muffled.
‘Let’s not make a big deal out of this,’ he said. ‘She knows what she did was wrong. Let’s just move on.’
‘I’m just glad she’s okay. I love her.’ And the words carried up, settled over me and gave me some small bit of comfort before I fell asleep.
‘Has it always been this quiet here?’ I ask now.
‘I’m surprised you’re just realizing that,’ cocking her eyebrow at me.
I had never had any need for other people. I preferred it when they stayed away but now my life seems as empty as that blank street outside; no pedestrians, no noise, no traffic. No one except him, shoveling at my heart and pushing everything else out.
‘What are you doing?’ I ask.
‘Knitting.’ She grins ruefully. ‘Some of the ladies do it at the hospital when it’s a quiet night and I just sort of picked it up.’
‘Looks like fun.’
‘I could show you,’ she says, treading carefully. ‘If you want.’
‘Yes.’ I smile slowly. ‘I would like that.’
‘Great.’ It’s almost a shy look she gives me, a flush of pleasure in her cheeks. It makes me blink in surprise. She really does love me. I don’t know how or when I forgot that, lost in all my violent feelings for him.
‘Do you want to go for a walk?’ I ask in a rush, worried she will say no. Instead, she puts her knitting down.
‘Sure. Shall we tell your dad?’
I put my glass in the sink. ‘I think it’ll be nice for us to spend some time together, alone.’
She rises, unable to contain the grin that splashes childishly over her face. ‘Let me get my coat.’
I suggest that we go to the park, the one he always used to take me to. The small pond has frozen over and I wonder where all the ducks have gone and if they will come back. I can almost see him there; blurred against the cold sunlight, calling out to me, and I turn away. We find a bench and she brushes away the snow with her glove and sits down, holding my hand and bringing me down with her.
‘I talked to the principal at Crawley,’ she says, referring to my old high school. ‘They said they would be willing to take you back next week, granted you pass a standard test.’
‘I hope I haven’t missed too much.’
She pats my hand. ‘We’ll get through it,’ and I bring my head down to her shoulder and thank her. There is a pause; I copy the rise and fall of her shoulders, the soft pattern of her breathing. It loosens the truth in my gut, pushes it upward until it is at my throat, hovering on the tip of my tongue and I sit straight, convinced I will tell her. I am tired of holding onto it and I want her to help me. But she speaks first.
‘I want to tell you something,’ she says. Her eyes are downcast; she plays with a loose thread in her glove, tugs at it until the material knots up and shortens. She takes it off and pushes it into the pocket of her parka.
‘What is it?’ I am hesitant to ask, hoping she doesn’t know what has happened with my father. She is the only person I have left and it would be too hard to know that she had a part in it too. She takes a strand of my hair and turns it in her hand.
‘Everyone must tell you what a beautiful color this is.’ She smiles a little sadly and when I raise my head to look at her, her beauty crashes into my eyes. Her pale cheeks are stained pink from the cold and her eyes, when they look at me are simple and easy; a peaceful black, eyelashes that graze the bottom arch of her eyebrows. ‘Tell me, do you ever wonder why you have red hair?’
‘Bubbie said I got it from her side of the family.’
‘What about the freckles? The height?’ She stops playing with my hair, turns her fingers down to my cheek. ‘Do you ever notice how different the two of us are?’
‘I never really cared.’ That’s not true. I spent a long time wishing I looked more like her; cursing the color of my skin, the lankiness of my frame compared to her toned, small one. My hardness compared to everything that is soft about her.
‘That’s probably because you’re so pretty.’ Her hand falls back into her lap and she takes a deep breath. ‘Frances, what I’m about to tell you, you should know first that your father and I kept it from you because we thought that it was the right thing. We didn’t see the point of telling you because we loved you so much and we didn’t want you to suffer.’ Her face crumples. ‘I know it’s not an excuse, but I don’t know if you remember—you were so young—we used to be so happy. And I didn’t want to spoil that.’
‘I remember,’ I say, because somehow I do. I remember this look in her eyes, the pulse of love in her voice. I remember how much she used to mean to me and I can feel it now, rising up in me again.
‘I’m not your real mother.’ She says it quickly and when she finishes, she is panting, bright-eyed with shame. She chews down on her bottom lip, pulls at it between her teeth. ‘Oh God, I’m sorry. I—’
‘What do you mean?’ It is so far from anything I ever expected to hear from her that I almost don’t believe her and respond with a strange calmness. Almost nonchalance.
‘Your father and I were married for four years when we had a rough patch—that’s all it was. Just a point where we were confused about the things we wanted. It was the first time we had really disagreed on anything and he…’ she shrugs helplessly. ‘Maybe I should have been more aware of what it was doing to him.’ She heaves the blame onto her shoulders, doesn’t want me to think any less of him. ‘Anyway, none of that matters. What matters is that your real mother’s name is Gina Baker.’
Gina. I let the name sit in my brain, settle on my tongue. I accustom myself with it but when I try to imagine what she looks like, I only see the woman sitting next to me.
‘What happened to her?’
‘Your father said she left when you were a baby.’
‘Why?’
She takes my hand, turns to face me fully. ‘I don’t know, Frances. Maybe she wasn’t ready to have you or maybe she wasn’t cut out to be a mother but it wasn’t your fault. And none of it matters because I’m here and I’m so glad that I’m a part of your life.’ Her face clenches. She even looks pretty when she cries. ‘I loved you from the first moment I saw you.’ She looks terrified at the thought of losing me and I want to comfort her.
There was a girl at the Academy who discovered she was adopted close to the time I arrived. I remember the way she fell to the floor in my room, having come to talk to Judy. I remember the way all the other six girls there dropped down around her in a tight, comforting circle. She was crying and saying she didn’t belong anywhere, that her ‘fake parents’ were liars and her real ones deserters. She didn’t know who she was anymore, she said, her eyes going around the circle, pleading for help and they reached out and stroked her shoulders and told her that no matter what, they were her family. I had watched as she stood up suddenly, stepped out of the circle, looked at me with blood-shot eyes.
‘I’m going to find her,’ she had announced. ‘I have to know who she is. I have to find my family.’
That is not the way I feel. Gina is a strange name of some strange woman I can’t even picture. Although recently I have been angry toward my mother, she has never been a stranger to me. She has always been there, hiding in the shadows, waiting patiently for a time when I need her. Like the time I was eight and fell off my bike and she was there to drag me into her lap, sing a song and make me chocolate-chip cookies. Or the time Freddie Keating called me ‘spotty face’ and I tried to scratch my freckles off, came home with bloody cheeks and she turned me to the mirror. ‘Do you know why they’re all different shapes? Because they’re telling a story about you,’ she had said. ‘This one here,’ she pointed to a misshapen one on my cheekbone, ‘it says how funny you are,’ tickling me until I giggled. ‘This one,’ touchin
g the largest one near the bottom of my ear, ‘tells me how big your heart is.’ She wrapped her arms around me and brought me close to her and her voice swallowed me. ‘You should never be ashamed of any part of yourself.’
‘So you came back after she left?’ I ask her now.
‘Yes. Your grandmother convinced me, reminded me of how much I always wanted a family.’ She takes a long breath. ‘I’m sorry it’s taken so long for me to tell you. But I want to be honest and I think you deserve that. You’re old enough now to know the truth.’
‘Thank you.’ I hold out my arms around her and bring her close to me. It’s a shock to hear her say it but all I feel is mild, indifferent surprise. ‘I’m not upset,’ I assure her.
‘You don’t hate me?’
‘How could I?’ I pull away. ‘You came back to look after me even though I wasn’t yours. I love you.’ I say it with all the truth I can muster; with all the affection I have held back from her for so long. I say it, pushing the guilt deep down inside me; she has been honest with me but I cannot afford to do the same with her, even though I was ready to only moments before. Our family has been built on a volatile foundation of secrets and it is slowly crumbling. The only thing that is keeping us together is the biggest one of them all, and if that should come out, none of us will survive it. So instead, I tell her that there are worse things people can do to each other, that eventually I may want to look for my biological mother but that will never make me feel any less for her and that the time is not now. I’m happy here, with my face against her neck and her scent heavy in my nose. I like the sound of her bracelets running down her wrist as she strokes my hair, the pacing of her heart; it’s strong and steady and reminds me that no matter what, as long as she is there, I will never be alone.
There is a resistance between us; I feel it more acutely every day, whenever he comes near me. The other night, I asked for the key to my bedroom.
‘Why do you need one?’ he asked and I felt a surge of annoyance.
‘I want my privacy.’ Truth was, it made me uncomfortable knowing he could come and go as he pleased.
He didn’t want to give it to me but my mother persuaded him. ‘She’s old enough now, James,’ she said.
‘I’ll have to look for it,’ he grumbled and the look he gave me was so reminiscent of our past that it almost made me relent.
I start back at my old school and everything feels different. No one is as hostile as I remember and it’s a little easier to get along with them. Having opened myself up to Joseph, it’s simple now to do the same with other people.
I find a job at the local video store to keep me out of the house for as long as possible and the distraction proves useful; I am slowly starting to forget what he means to me. I am leaving the store late one afternoon, a slight flutter in my nerves when I think of what I am returning to. Distracted, I accidentally run into someone.
‘Whoa.’ Arms reach out to steady me and I look up into a wide, friendly face. ‘Sorry about that.’
‘No, it was my fault.’ I step away, recognizing him from my school.
‘Frances, right?’
‘Yes.’ I play nervously with the strap of my bag. It shocks me that he knows who I am. ‘Sorry, I don’t know your name.’
‘Darren.’ He holds out his hand and I take it tentatively, pulling away almost immediately in case he can tell they’re clammy.
‘I’ve seen you around school,’ he says, his hands deep in his pockets, a little self-consciously.
‘Math class,’ I help him. ‘I think we’re in the same one.’
‘That’s right.’ He nods, tilting his head at me and I look at the ground. ‘You work here?’ Pointing up with his thumb to the sign on the door.
‘Just on weekends.’
‘Do they let you watch videos all day?’ he asks in a teasing tone.
I laugh. ‘They keep me pretty busy.’
‘That’s too bad.’ He holds my gaze for a long time and when I blush, he breaks it. ‘Well, maybe I can come by sometime. Rent a couple of videos. You can tell me which ones are your favorites.’ There is a look on his face that creates a sudden coldness in my gut. The keen interest hiding within his pupils reminds me of the way my father used to watch me; daring and hopeful. It flatters and scares me and I try to tell myself that he isn’t my father, that it’s okay to be doing this—that there is nothing to be afraid of. But I cannot stop the hammering in my chest or the cold sweat that breaks out along my neck. The unprovoked resentment I feel for this boy.
‘I have to go,’ I say, starting to walk backward, turning to run down the street. ‘I’m sorry, I have to go.’
When I turn the corner onto my street, I slow my pace, bending down over my knees and sucking in deep breaths of cold air. My chest hurts but not from the exertion. It’s from that boy’s curious, bronze eyes. His lips red and cracked from the cold, stretching to smile sweetly at me. The chance I may have just passed over and all the opportunities I might miss in the future. I automatically reach into my pocket and there it is, where I always keep it, unbroken and waiting. I run my fingers over the well-known lines of it, the four heads, four pairs of hands joined together. I can picture them now; they make me smile and laugh with their dark, glowing faces and their voices are soft and loving and good, easing the tension that runs in my veins. Give it a little more time. All you need to forget and move on is just a little more time, reminding me that despite everything, there is still the possibility of something better.
A few days later, she is leaving for work, waving goodbye to me in the darkness. See you soon. A prick of anxiety stings my gut; a new sensation that overcomes me now whenever she leaves. Please come home quickly. I stay outside for a long while, sitting on the stoop, finding a twig and drawing in the snow. From my position, I see him moving within the kitchen, fixing dinner, and I feel an acute stab of sorrow; a sympathy for him although I’m not sure why it’s there. At times like this, I wish I had never discovered the truth because now I see something soiled in what I had always believed to be perfectly beautiful. It makes me worry that all the other things and people I love, or might come to know, might be that way too.
He opens the door and comes to sit beside me, exhaling loudly, his breath coming out in a fog. He puts his hands into the pockets of his jacket.
‘Has she gone?’ he asks.
‘Yes.’
‘This came for you today.’ He pulls something out of his pocket. It’s a slim, white envelope, crisp and uncreased. My name is written in shaky letters on the front. I take it slowly, running my hand over the smooth manila, turning it in my hands. ‘Do you know who it’s from?’ he asks.
‘Friends.’ I recognize the immature handwriting immediately and although I want to open it, I refrain from doing so.
‘From the Academy?’
‘You could say that.’
He knows from my tone that I don’t want to tell him anymore and he leaves it alone, changing the subject.
‘Your mother told me you’ve been asking about other boarding schools.’
‘A few.’
It’s a much-needed comfort to stare at the thick, inviting pages of a brochure and imagine myself within the vibrant possibility of them. To remind myself that I don’t have to stay here—that there are other places I can escape to.
‘You told me you were never going to leave. Do you remember how adamant you were that you couldn’t bear to be away from me?’ His eyes meet mine but I don’t hold them for long. With the silver reflection of the street lights in them, they don’t look like his. ‘Don’t you feel that way anymore?’
‘A lot has happened since then,’ I state simply.
He closes his eyes. ‘It feels like a lifetime ago.’
And we sit together, lost for words and uncomfortable in each other’s presence for the first time.
‘Is she safe with you?’ I ask finally, needing to know and feeling guilty that I’m already thinking of abandoning her. That she will never l
earn the truth about her life.
‘Your mother? I would never hurt her.’ He is offended that I could ask. ‘I love her.’
That doesn’t mean you aren’t going to—I can’t say it; thinking it is one thing, but to have the words pressing and real on my tongue, is entirely something else. ‘You’ve done it before.’
‘And look at how much it’s cost me,’ he answers. ‘Look at what’s happened to us.’ He is spitting out the words now.
‘How come you can control it now, after everything that has happened between us?’ I ask stonily.
‘You were always there,’ he tells me. ‘I couldn’t get away from you and every time I saw you, it just became harder and harder. But now that you’re going, now that I can avoid them,’ he is referring to our neighbors’ children and to hear him speak it so simply, so truthfully, makes me cringe in disgust, ‘I can almost pretend it’s not there.’ He sighs, puts his head into his cradling palms. ‘It’s easier to remember what’s important.’ And then he adds quietly, ‘Look at how much it’s taken from me.’
And as I look at his too-long hair falling into his eyes, the way his shoulders sag—with relief or failure, I can’t tell—I believe him. It’s time to move on, for both of us.
‘I’m sorry I had to ask.’
He stands up. ‘Dinner is ready,’ he says in a way that is distant and makes me momentarily regret asking him. He goes in and I follow him.
‘I’m just going to put this away,’ I say and run upstairs. I open my bottom drawer, push aside the piles of clothes until my fingers graze at the brochures I have there and I take the statue out of my pocket and place it on top. I hold the letter up to the light, let it sink into the spidery letters of Alex’s writing and then put it down with the statue, wanting to keep it closed until a time when I really need it.