Truth of the Matter

by Beck, Jamie

  When I get to the photograph, I hold it up. “Do you recognize this man? Grandpa didn’t have that dimpled chin, but maybe this was someone you knew before you met Grandpa.”

  Her nostrils flare briefly, but her otherwise inscrutable expression tells me nothing.

  I set the items aside and rest my hand on her knee. “The contractor found this box when he broke through the master closet. I thought it’d be fun for you to go back in time and share your memories.”

  “Fun?” The word flies from her lips, landing with an angry thud. “Are you trying to be hurtful?”

  More questions crowd my thoughts, but Katy shakes her head at me in a silent appeal to drop the whole thing. She needn’t be worried. It isn’t my nature to torment people.

  “Sorry,” I say, although I have many more questions than I did when we arrived. Gram might not remember everything, but something in that box triggered her.

  I stuff the items back in the box and squeeze it in my hands. If these items are painful reminders, why keep them at all?

  Her eyes are as misty as when we first arrived. “I’m tired.”

  Katy hops off the mattress, eager to flee.

  “Okay.” Guilt trickles through me for foisting memories on her without warning. I set the box on the table and stand to help her out of her chair. “How about if I come back next time with that pudding?”

  “My head hurts.” She presses her fingertips to her forehead as I seat her on her bed. “No more about Billy.”

  Billy again. Not Bobby. Is he the man in the photograph? Does the W on the handkerchief stand for William?

  “We’ll let you rest. I’ll see you next week.” I bend to kiss her forehead and then pull the pink-and-red-and-white afghan folded on the side of her bed up to her waist.

  “See you later, Grammy.” Katy pats her shin.

  I nod toward the door, giving my daughter permission to bolt.

  Gram rolls onto her side, facing the wall. On my way out, I gather the tin box and then turn off the light and close her door.

  Katy is waiting in the hallway.

  “You were sweet to relate to Gram with photography. Thank you.”

  She shrugs. “Mom, please tell me you don’t ever want to live like this. I mean, it’s really sad. Cooped up in a little room. Unable to remember stuff. Not even hungry.”

  I throw my arm around her shoulder. “It’s very sad. Scary, even. But I want to live long enough to see the amazing woman you become, and to meet my someday grandkids, even if I’m stuck in a bed and can only visit you on FaceTime.”

  Katy snickers. “Who says I’ll get married and have kids? You heard Gram. Love kills your soul.” She makes her hands into claws and fake swipes at my face.

  I bat them away, chuckling yet preoccupied with Gram’s paradoxes. “Not always.”

  We exit the building to walk beneath a sunny summer sky dotted with cotton ball clouds. The hint of saltwater tang floating on the breeze loosens the tightness in my shoulders, as always.

  “I guess not if you’re a guy.” Katy ties her hair into a ponytail high on her head.

  I slow to a halt. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because most men are cheaters, and even when they’re not, women get stuck doing everything. Why should I slave all day at work and then cook, do laundry, help with homework, and pick up after my husband, too?”

  “Not all men cheat.” Her cynicism is worrisome. “And some couples split household work evenly. I did everything because I didn’t have a day job.”

  “All my friends’ dads breeze in and out and play golf. And look at Pop-Pop. You always tell me about how, when you were my age, you were doing your own laundry and cooking for you and him.”

  Mistrusting men had not been the goal of those “responsibility” talks. Do all teens misinterpret their parents’ life lessons, or just mine?

  “Your dad and I married too young. But marriage can work if you know yourself well before you choose a partner. Either way, falling in love—being in love—is magical. I want that magic in your life.”

  “So I can end up hurt like you?” she asks.

  Oof. Sometimes Katy’s observations land like a sledgehammer.

  “Without your dad, I wouldn’t have you. You’re worth ten times the pain of this divorce.” I wink before sliding into the front seat and setting the tin box in the console between us. Of all the decisions to second-guess, I don’t regret my marriage. Richard’s rising star changed us, but it also allowed me to dote on Katy—moments to treasure that melt away too quickly.

  Katy sinks onto her seat and opens the box’s lid, peering at the items again. “Grammy doesn’t want to talk about this stuff—if she even remembers it.”

  “She knows something. She mentioned someone named Billy twice . . .”

  Katy grimaces. “She also called you Lonna, so don’t get your hopes up.”

  “You don’t think I should pry?”

  My daughter stares ahead, sighing. “What’s the point? We have bigger things to worry about, like having a kitchen.”

  True. There is plenty on my plate right now. Yet this little mystery piques my curiosity in a big way.

  “Gram raised me. She was my rock.” I followed her advice blindly—about college, about what to do when I got pregnant, and about how to manage Katy—even though she mistrusted therapists like Richard did. “I admit I’m a little shaken by the idea that she might not be who I thought. To think that she might not have loved her hometown, that she resented her sister, that she keeps painful secrets . . . It’s not like there’s much time to learn the truth, either. I don’t know. It feels like fate dropped this box into my lap because I’m at a crossroads.”

  She wrinkles her nose. “Mom, if there’s a reason Grammy hid that box, you might not like what you learn.”

  “True.” I nod, staring at the road as we drive along the bay.

  Katy’s skepticism aside, I want to know about the elusive Billy T. and New York and what Gram wants to explain to his parents. At the very least, it’s a distraction from the aftershocks of my divorce.

  Then again, it’s not often that buried secrets yield happy endings.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  MARIE

  October 14, 1949

  The pink wool swing coat I got for my eighteenth birthday is marvelous. The way it swirls when I spin and how its outsize pointed collar frames my face make me feel like a movie star, which is a welcome change from being plain Marie Robson. That sounds trivial compared with all the important things happening in the world. This coat won’t bring about the end of the Cold War, but I delight in its power to transform me.

  “Stop spinning. You look silly,” Lonna says from my bedroom floor, where she’s playing with her doll.

  I meet her gaze in the cheval mirror and shrug.

  She’s only ten. What does she understand about fashion? “You still play with dolls,” I want to say but don’t.

  Lonna wearily shakes her head and then gives her doll a fake bottle. “Drink all this milk, Annabelle. And when you’re finished, I’ll burp you and change your diaper so you’re comfortable.”

  Her gentle voice racks me with envy because she’s exactly like our mother. Sweet and nurturing. Obedient. All the things I fake in order to please my parents and have invitations to school dances. If I pretend long enough, maybe I’ll learn to feel the things “Dr. Robson’s girls” are supposed to feel. I’ve no particular talent or gift—nor am I a great beauty—but I yearn to do something more exciting than spending the rest of my life in this town. Sometimes I regret reading about more interesting lives when I might be required to settle for one that fits me less well than this coat.

  I lean over to pat Lonna’s head on my way downstairs. “Have fun with Annabelle.”

  When I reach the living room, my father is encircled by lamplight and a hazy blue curl, reading and smoking his pipe. Like my mother and sister, I admire and want to please him. A conundrum, because to do so I must pretend to be some
one else.

  I hear my mother busying herself in the kitchen. Cook, clean, iron, repeat. The thought makes me shudder. My father came from Scottish immigrant parents who worked menial jobs to give their children a shot at the American dream. He met my mother while at medical school, where she worked as a secretary. Both of them strive to be their very best at all times. It’s exhausting.

  “Good night, Daddy!” I wave.

  “Where are you off to?”

  “The movies.”

  My father frowns, like he does whenever he deems something frivolous—which is not uncommon. “Come home directly afterward, please.”

  Swallowing a sigh, I agree. Outside, a horn blasts. “I have to go.”

  “Would you like money for your ticket?”

  “Yes, thank you!” I rise onto my toes. His stern shell hides a soft underbelly. It gives me hope that one day I can talk him into letting me explore options other than college.

  He removes his wallet from his pocket and hands me twenty-five cents, which will pay for the movie and two ice cream sundaes.

  “Thank you.” I wrap my arms around his neck. “I promise I won’t stay out late.”

  My mother—a short, blonde beauty with a curvy figure hidden by an apron—peeks out from the kitchen. “Have fun, dear.”

  I blow her a kiss and then trot out the door to catch up with my friends. Susie’s father bought a new Ford this Christmas—pea green with whitewall tires.

  I slide into the back seat. “Nice car.”

  “Isn’t it?” Susie smiles, proud of her father, our school principal.

  Janice is studying me from the passenger seat. “I love that coat.”

  “Thank you.” Unlike my sister, my friends appreciate glamour. “Let’s hurry. I don’t want to miss the beginning.”

  The car lurches away from the curb—Susie’s not the best driver. It’s chilly out tonight, so we’ll have to keep the windows rolled up for the whole ride to the next town over, where the movie is playing.

  “Joe Johnson is planning to propose to SaraJane when he gets back from Georgetown for the holidays,” Janice says as we drive through Potomac Point.

  I cringe at the thought of being married to Joe Johnson. He’s arrogant and will probably be a bossy husband. “Will she say yes?”

  Susie laughs. “Who wouldn’t? He’s got a bright future. In a couple of years she’ll be a mom and set for life!”

  I must’ve made a face, because Janice says, “You look like you’ve swallowed whiskey.”

  My friends are conventional, so I temper my opinion. “Is that all we get—a husband and some babies? Nothing of our own . . . no adventure?” My gaze darts from one to the other, while they stare at me like my skin has turned purple.

  “Who says a handsome, nice man can’t be an adventure?” Janice titters, unaware that she ranked handsome above nice, which highlights another difference in our priorities. “We can travel and do other things later, but we need to find husbands before we’re too old.”

  I keep mum, but none of the mothers I know ever see the world. Maybe they’re living their own dream, which is fine for them but leaves women like me out of luck.

  Susie swats my shoulder. “You’ll feel differently when you meet the right man.”

  She and Janice laugh, so I join in. So far every boy I’ve met is either too immature—like Ronnie Eggers, our high school’s star pitcher—or too serious, like Fred Harrison, the school paper’s editor, who only ever wants to talk about student government. The only men with the right combination of charm and daring live in Hollywood, which might as well be the moon.

  “If Montgomery Clift asked for your number, would you give it to him?” Janice asks as we pull onto the north route out of town.

  I giggle. “Of course, but he would be an adventure!”

  We all burst into a fit of laughter, but then the car starts to shake and rumble. “Oh gosh!” Susie’s eyes are wide. “What’s happening?”

  “Pull off the road,” I say.

  After she shifts into park, we all file out of the car and walk around, inspecting it.

  “You’ve got a flat tire.” Janice points to the rear driver’s side tire.

  “My dad’s going to kill me,” Susie whines.

  “It’s not your fault.” I pat her shoulder. “Do either of you know how to use the spare?”

  They shake their heads. I don’t, either, and I don’t want to dirty my coat.

  “What do we do?” Janice asks.

  “Wait for help,” Susie says.

  Waiting could take forever and we’ll never make the movie. “I’ll walk back toward town to get help.”

  “It’s at least a mile or farther . . . That’s not safe, especially in the dark.” Janice shakes her head.

  I’m not worried. It’ll be practice for city life. Besides, there’s rarely any crime in Potomac Point, and most of it is petty theft. This is the closest I’ll come to an adventure this year. “I’m fine. I’ll stop at the first house I see.”

  Before they can argue, I take off down the shadowy road. Humming helps distract me from how creepy it is. A few minutes into the walk, a motorcycle shifts gears in the distance. I tense, then shake my arms loose. Within seconds a headlight appears on the horizon, coming toward me pretty fast. My heart beats hard, but I wave my hands overhead to catch the driver’s attention.

  He slows, passing me before pulling over. Once he gets off his bike, he starts toward me. “What are you doing on the road? You could get hurt!”

  I freeze in the face of the boy—no, the man—I’ve never seen before. There’s a bit of rascal about his unruly dark hair, bushy brows arched high around rich brown eyes, and deep dimple in his chin. He’s not classically handsome, but he’s rugged and interesting looking. Perhaps an Italian or Greek. I’m not sure, but he’s definitely not Scottish.

  “Miss?” His Yankee accent—possibly New York or farther north—intrigues me more. He snaps his fingers. “Are you okay?”

  My cheeks are probably turning the color of my new coat, but all I can do is blink and catch my breath.

  “Sorry.” I’m dizzy. “My friends are up the road. We got a flat tire, so I came looking for help.”

  “You should’ve waited together until someone passed by. What if I were a dangerous guy?” He’s shaking his head. “Let’s go fix the tire.”

  The whole time he’s been talking, I’ve not blinked once. He’s at least three years older than me, but he’s no college boy. “What’s your name?”

  The words erupt without thought, but at the same time, I don’t honestly care if I’m forward. He doesn’t seem to, either.

  “Billy.” He wipes his hand on his pants before extending it, which is when I notice his gas attendant uniform. “Billy Tyler.”

  “That’s not Italian.” I slap my hand over my mouth, but he laughs.

  Still smiling, he says, “My mother is Italian.”

  My mouth is dry, but I answer, “Nice to meet you, Billy. I’m Marie Robson.”

  When he squeezes my hand, something shifts into place, unlocking an unfamiliar, exciting array of emotions.

  “Come on, Marie. Your friends are probably nervous.”

  I’ve wanted to ride a motorcycle ever since I saw Loomis Dean’s photographs in Life magazine of those women joyriding around Griffith Park in Los Angeles. One—Cecilia Adams—won an amateur all-girls trail race, too. But no one we know owns a motorcycle, and my parents consider it unladylike. My heart clutches so hard I’m breathless again. “You’re right.”

  When I get to his bike, it isn’t as big as it first appeared. A turquoise Indian Chief, with metal caps covering the tops of both wheels. Billy lifts one leg over the front tip of the seat to make space for me. He pats the seat behind him. “Sit here and wrap your arms around my waist, then hold tight. You can rest your cheek against my back if you don’t like the wind.”

  With clammy hands and a tremulous smile, I climb onto the seat. My coat is too long. I can’t h
old it up and wrap my arms around his waist, so I do my best to tuck it under my butt. My body responds in confusing ways to Billy’s firm, warm stomach—like I need to squeeze my thighs together.

  “Hang on!” he says as he uses his body weight and foot to start the engine. It roars to life so loud it scares me.

  My very being vibrates with the bike. My heart stutters—a moment of doubt—and yet I can’t stop laughing as we start down the road. The wind blows my hair everywhere and freezes my hands, but I don’t care. I feel free and brave and completely alive.

  Too soon we come upon my friends. When I get off the bike, their wild-eyed gazes dart back and forth between Billy and me.

  “This is Billy. He’s going to help us.”

  He waves. “Hi, ladies. I’ll get your spare switched out so you can be on your way.”

  “Thank you.” Susie takes him to the trunk, while Janice sidles up to me.

  “I can’t believe you got on that motorcycle with a stranger.” Her face is pinched and splotchy.

  Ignoring her, I turn away and watch Billy heft the spare tire and roll it around before he stoops to loosen the bolts on the flat tire.

  “What’s got into you, Marie?” Janice elbows me as Susie joins us.

  Is she blind? I whisper, “Billy Tyler is swoony!”

  Susie tsk-tsks. “Your dad will never approve.”

  Maybe not, but that won’t stop me from trying. “I’m eighteen now. I don’t need permission.”

  “You don’t even know this guy,” Janice whispers. “He might be a creep.”

  “He’s not.” Don’t ask how I know that, but I’m certain.

  Susie is tapping her foot. “We’ll never make the movie.”

  I hardly care, because my interest in make-believe has evaporated in the face of the real-life Billy Tyler.

  It seems like thirty days instead of thirty minutes before he is finished changing the tire. He holds up the culprit—a big nail—and then puts it in his jacket pocket. “All set, but don’t drive too far on the spare.”

  “It’s fine. We’ll go right back home,” Susie promises. “Thank you. Can I pay you for helping?”