“No,” Agnes interrupts. “I’m not curious in the least. My father told me that she was full of sinful behavior. That’s why he gets upset whenever Nana Pete even mentions her name.”
“What sort of sinful behavior?”
“I don’t know,” Agnes says. “He didn’t tell me. But it was bad.”
“Why was it bad? Because your dad thinks it was bad?” Agnes nods. I roll my eyes. “For all you know, Agnes, Lillian’s ‘sinful behavior’ could have been using a curse word. Or eating a strawberry.”
“No, I’m sure it was a lot more serious than that,” she says. “Besides, what she did is not the point. The point is that Nana Pete is breaking a major rule by letting us see her—and she’s making us break the rule, too. Against our will, I might add. Dad’s going to be furious when he finds out.”
“How’s your dad gonna find out anything, Agnes?” I say. “He’s history, remember? We’re leaving him and—” I stop as Agnes’s eyes get wide in the rearview mirror. “I mean … he doesn’t have to find out … ,” I stammer, trying to repair the damage I have just created. But Agnes isn’t listening. She’s withdrawn completely inside herself, staring out the window again, chanting her prayers.
I drive for a long time after that without saying anything. I guess I’ve said more than enough. I glance back once or twice, just to see if Agnes is okay, but her forehead is pressed against the window, and she seems lost in thought. I feel so sad all of a sudden, so lonely, as if the darkness settling down around us is going to swallow me up. A little while later, as the sun sinks completely behind the low green hills and the light disappears, I start to get nervous. The road is harder to see in the dark and I don’t like it. I elbow Nana Pete.
“Huh!” She sits straight up, as if someone has just pinched her.
“It’s getting dark, Nana Pete. And we just passed a sign that says Raleigh is twenty miles away.”
Nana Pete looks out the side window and rubs her eyes. “Lord Almighty, Honey, you did it. I think you can do just about anything you put your mind to.” She points to a motel billboard up ahead. “That’s where we’ll stay tonight. It won’t be fancy, but all we need are a few comfortable beds. We’ll get a good night’s sleep and then hit the road tomorrow, nice and refreshed.”
She pulls out her phone and dials a number.
“Hi, darlin’,” she says into the mouthpiece. “Yes, we’re here.”
AGNES
Lillian is prettier than I imagined she would be. She has curly strawberry blond hair, cut close to her head. Seven silver hoops run along the edge of her left ear, but there is nothing at all in her right one. Her nose is long, but not too long, and she has very small, square teeth, exactly like Dad’s. Her slight, graceful build is accentuated by a pair of lemon-colored corduroy pants and a white T-shirt. I try hard not to look at her for too long—(I will tell Dad later how I avoided her at all costs)—keeping my eyes on her shoes when she walks over and stands in front of us. Brown leather ankle boots with lug soles. The one on the left has a torn shoelace.
“You must be Agnes and Benny,” she says. “I’ve heard so much about you.” Her voice is soft, barely above a whisper. “And Honey.” Her voice cracks on the word “Honey,” which is what finally makes me look up. When I do, she looks away from Honey and gives me this great big fake smile. “I’m your aunt Lillian.” She extends her hand. I drop my eyes again until she lowers her arm. But then Benny steps forward, his good hand stretched out just a few inches. Lillian drops to one knee. “Benny.” She studies his face for a few seconds. “You look just like your dad.” I sidle a glance over at my little brother, whose hand Lillian is now gripping, and resist the urge to push his hand away from hers. He doesn’t know any better.
Benny reaches out and runs his finger along the display of silver lining Lillian’s ear. She doesn’t move. “You like those?” she asks after a minute. Benny nods. “I got one put in every year after I turned twenty-five.” She grins. “Helps keep me young. I hope.” I do a mental math check in my head. Seven hoops. She’s thirty-two.
“Well, let’s go inside,” Nana Pete says, running her hands up and down the sides of her arms. “I’m freezing.” Lillian stands back up and looks at her mother.
“Freezing? It’s at least sixty degrees out here, Ma.” She takes a step toward her. “You look a little shaky. Are you feeling okay?”
“Oh yeah,” Nana Pete says. “But lying down for a while wouldn’t kill me, either.”
“You sure you don’t wanna play, Agnes?” Lillian asks me. “Final round? Double or nothing.” I look up from my book that I am pretending to read and shake my head for the third time. Lillian, Honey, and Benny are sitting on the floor between the two beds, playing gin rummy. Lillian’s back is pressed up against the side of my mattress. Nana Pete is in the other bed, sleeping like a log.
“Don’t ask her again,” Honey says. “She’s doesn’t do anything fun anymore.”
Lillian turns around to look at me. “Is that true, Agnes? You don’t like to have fun?”
I roll my eyes and turn over on my other side.
“See?” Honey says. “I told you. All she ever wants to do is read that ridiculous book.”
“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here.” I’m talking to the wall, but I know Honey can hear me.
“Don’t tell me what to do. You’re not my mother.” Honey’s voice is edged with a meanness that I don’t recognize. It makes my heart jump a little. I lower my head and stare down again at the picture of Saint Germaine, who was treated like a slave by her own family for most of her life, forced to sleep in a barn, nearly starved to death, and beaten regularly. She had offered everything up for the glory of God, refusing to succumb to her earthly torment. If only I could do the same.
“So, Lillian,” I hear Honey ask. “What was it like growing up with Agnes’s dad?” She’s using her fishing voice, trying to extract information that isn’t any of her business. “You guys just don’t seem to be anything alike. I wouldn’t even guess you two were related.” I grit my teeth and roll back over soundlessly, holding the book in front of my face.
Lillian doesn’t say anything for a minute. Then she clears her throat. “Actually, I used to be a lot like my brother. Or at least I wanted to be. He was smart and funny and a great athlete. You know, just an all-around wonderful guy. When we were growing up, I followed him around like a puppy dog. He never made me feel bad about it, either. He let me come along when he played basketball with his friends or whenever he went out for a hamburger at the Friendly’s on the corner.”
I feel a twinge, thinking of how often I have told Benny to scram when he comes around Honey and me. But it fades again as Lillian keeps talking.
“When he went away to college in Iowa, I thought I was going to die from loneliness. I was still in the same high school we had gone to together, but it felt like being in jail or something without him there. Not being able to see him when I walked down the halls or listen to my friends scream his name when he lined up for a foul shot on the basketball court just really tore me up inside. I literally counted down the days until he came home for his first break. All I wanted to do was go down to the hamburger place and sit in one of the booths and talk with him.” She pauses. The cards snap and flutter under her fingers.
“And?” Honey asks. I lower my book slightly so I can see the top of Lillian’s head.
“Well, the first few times he came home things were all right. I remember during fall break of his sophomore year, he brought home a girl he was seeing. I think her name was Fern. Or maybe it was Bernie. Something like that. Anyway, he took me along for just about everything he and Fern did together that weekend. The three of us went out to the movies, we hung around the house, we even went horseback riding.”
“I bet ol’ Fern loved you,” Honey says.
Lillian grins a little. “Yeah, she wasn’t too happy about it. She made it a point to tell Lenny in front of me that the next time they were going to go t
o her house—so they could be alone.”
“Ha!” Honey laughs. “Good for her.”
Lillian starts dealing the cards again slowly, placing each one on the carpet until two neat piles form. “But then in his third year,” she says, “when he came home for Thanksgiving he was … different.” I lower the book some more.
“What do you mean, different?” Honey asks.
“He just wasn’t the same Leonard I knew. It was like he had turned inward, away from all of us. Away from me, anyway. And definitely from Ma. He spent the whole time just locked in his room. He didn’t even come down for Thanksgiving dinner, even when Ma cried.”
I listen intently, my eyes fixed on a weird curlicue shape in the yellow wallpaper.
“And then in the spring, a year before he was supposed to graduate, he started talking about this man that he had met named Emmanuel. You would have thought it was Jesus himself the way he talked about his prayer and healing services, the meetings he held at this little house of his off campus. Ma and I asked him questions about it and tried to seem interested, but it was kind of strange.”
“How so?” Honey asks.
“Well, we’d just never seen him like that before. Ma actually used the word ‘mesmerized.’ And that’s what he was. He was just completely obsessed with everything about Emmanuel.”
“Yeah,” Honey says. “That sounds about right.” I press my lips together hard. Why can’t she just be quiet?
“He disappeared pretty soon after that,” Lillian says. “It took us a year to find out that he had moved to the East Coast and was living with the Believers at Mount Blessing.”
Honey makes a hmm sound between her lips. I can tell she wants to ask more, probably something about how much my Dad has changed over the years, but she is guarding her words in front of Benny and me. “Do you miss him?” she asks eventually.
Lillian looks up in surprise at the question. “I do,” she says, placing a card down flat on the floor. There is a pause. “Gin,” she says. “I win.”
A few hours later, after Honey has disappeared into the shower and Benny has fallen asleep, I get under the covers and start my evening prayers, counting my consecration beads as I go. Lillian is in the corner with her back to me, undressing hurriedly. I close my eyes, trying to concentrate on the prayers and the beads. When I open them again Lillian is kneeling next to me on the floor, dressed in old sweats and a long blue T-shirt.
“What are you doing?” she whispers. “Saying night prayers?”
I am so startled by her presence that I just nod.
“Okay. I don’t mean to interrupt, but I just wanted to ask you a question.” My fingers are frozen around one of the beads, my eyes fixed on the arch of her red eyebrow. I’m not telling her anything about Dad, no matter how much she begs me. “Who has Honey been living with all these years?”
I narrow my eyebrows. “What?”
“I mean … ” She stammers, trying to find the words. “She lived in the nursery with you for a long time, right?”
I nod slowly. “Until we were seven.”
“Right, until you were seven. And then you went to live with your parents, right? In the house they lived in?” I nod again. Her forehead creases. “Ma told me that Honey went to live with a guy named Winky. Do you know anything about him?”
“Not really,” I answer. “He’s kind of … slow. They live in the Milk House.”
“Do you know anything else about him?” Lillian presses. “Is he a good guy?”
I stare blankly at her for a moment. Why is she asking me this? And why would Nana Pete be talking to Lillian about Honey?
The running water from the shower shuts off suddenly. I sit up. “Why are you asking about—” But Lillian stands up, cutting me off with a shake of her head.
“Never mind,” she says, walking back over to her side of the room. Her voice sounds garbled, like a small bird trapped inside her throat. “Good night, Agnes.” I watch as she slides under the covers next to Nana Pete and pulls the blankets over her head.
“Good night,” I whisper, not loud enough for her to hear.
HONEY
Sleep feels as far away right now as Mount Blessing. I turn on the TV, putting the volume on mute so as not to disturb anyone, but pretty soon my mind starts to drift. For some reason, I can’t get Lillian out of my head. I like her. She’s sort of sloppy, or at least it seems like she doesn’t really care all that much about her appearance, and she says things the way they are, even if what she’s saying doesn’t make her look all that good. I like that in a person. I’m so sick of all this striving toward perfection I could puke. After we were done playing cards, I was so disappointed when she stretched and then told us that she was going to bed.
“But it’s only eleven o’clock,” I said, trying to hide the disappointment in my voice. She looked at me—and let me tell you something, she has this funny way of looking at you—and smiled.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “We’ll have lots of time to talk tomorrow.”
“But I want to talk now,” I say aloud to no one. Throwing back the covers, I climb out of bed, unzip my knapsack, and pull out my sneakers.
The main lobby is bright with lights. A man is sitting behind the front desk, reading the funny pages on the back of a newspaper.
He looks up as I pad along the floor. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah,” I say, pointing to the door. “I’m just going outside for some fresh air.”
The night air is sharp and cool. I inhale deeply, filling my lungs as I look around in the dark. It’s really dark. Just as I am about to turn back around and go inside again, I notice the Queen Mary parked a few cars away. I streak toward it, open the front door with a trembling hand, and scoot inside. Reaching under the front seat, I feel around until my fingers come in contact with Nana Pete’s keys. I turn on the engine, and then switch on the front beams until I can see the shrubs on the side of the motel. Okay. Much better.
I open my hand carefully and stare down at George lying in the middle of my palm. I have been clutching him so tightly that I am afraid he is broken. The chips in his tail and ear are still there, and everything else seems to be in place.
“Hey, George,” I whisper softly. “How are you, buddy? What’s new?”
There is a rapping sound on the side window. My head jerks around so suddenly that I pull a muscle inside my neck. “Agnes!” With only a sliver of light illuminating her wide face and her bare legs sticking out from under Nana Pete’s long brown cardigan, she looks like she is about three years old. I wrap George up tight again in my hand, roll down the window, and lean out toward her.
“God, you scared me!”
She cocks her head and pulls the edges of Nana Pete’s sweater under her chin. “What are you doing out here? It’s freezing. Do you know what time it is?”
I shake my head. “I just needed some air. It’s not that cold.”
She studies me, waiting for me to say something more, but I don’t. “Were you going to run away?” Her voice is wobbly.
“What? No!” I open the door and get out of the car. “I wouldn’t do that, Agnes. I promise. I wouldn’t leave you. Ever.”
She stares at the thick yarn weaving in and out of the cardigan sleeves. “You were ready to back at the hospital.”
“Oh, that’s just what I said. But I didn’t mean it. Not really.”
“Can I ask you something?” she asks.
I nod. “Yeah, anything.”
“Did Winky ever do anything to you? Like hurt you at all? I mean, since you’ve been in the Milk House?”
I take a step back. “What? No! Never! Why would you even ask me that?”
Her body shudders, trying to hold back the tears. “I don’t know. I just … ” She shakes her head. “I’ve been thinking … ,” her voice trails off softly. “Things have just … gotten so crazy all of a sudden.” She brushes her fingers across her eyes. “I don’t know what to think anymore. It’s so confusing.” She pr
esses the edges of the sweater against her face. “I just want to do the right thing, Honey! I just want to be good!”
I wrap both of my arms around her and bury my nose in her hair. “You’re already good, Agnes,” I say after a moment. “Why can’t you believe that?”
She shakes her head. “I’m not good! I’m weak! I was terrible to Benny and I am always tempted to sin, especially out here, where everything is weird and freaky.”
“Have you ever tried to trust yourself to do the right thing?” I ask. “Instead of always waiting for some sign or trying to figure out what Emmanuel thinks is right for you?”
She raises her tear-stained face. “I couldn’t do that. I’m not strong enough. I need Emmanuel to tell me what’s right. We all do.”
I shrug. “I don’t.”
“But that’s because you don’t care about being good!” Agnes wails. She looks at me intently. “Why don’t you want to be good? Why, Honey? Why?”
“I care about being good. I just—”
“Then what’s this?” Agnes pulls the pink flower barrette out from under the cardigan and shoves it at me.
I stare at her, speechless. “Where’d you find—”
“In your backpack,” she says sadly. “I noticed it sitting open by the door, just before I came out here. The barrette was right on top.” She shakes her head. “Why would you steal, Honey? Why? You broke a commandment!”
I shrug. “I just … I saw you looking at it in the store and … and then you went and put it back and … I know it’s wrong to steal, but … I just wanted you to have it, Ags.” I look into her blue eyes. “I just wanted you to have something for yourself for once. To feel pretty, instead of always trying to make yourself ugly with all those freaky penances you do. It’s not a sin to feel pretty, Agnes! It’s not!”
Agnes’s eyes blur with tears as I talk and when she blinks, they roll down her cheeks. “We’re not supposed to clothe the body,” she whispers. “Just the soul.”
The Patron Saint of Butterflies Page 16