The Amber Photograph

by Penelope J. Stokes

  "Did mutilating the statue help?"

  Amber shook her head. "I guess not. It was a stupid thing to do."

  "Was it?"

  Amber quit picking at a bit of clay lodged in her thumbnail and looked up at Susan. "What do you mean?"

  "When I finally got away from my husband, it took a long time for me to understand my anger. I had healed—physically, anyway—and I had resigned myself to living with the scars." Susan gazed off into middle space. "But years later, when I thought I had finished with my recovery, suddenly I began to feel this irrational anger. Blind fury, like what you're describing. A depression so deep I felt as if I were drowning in it."

  Amber nodded for her to continue. This was beginning to make sense.

  "My own counselor helped me see that emotions can lie buried for a long time, especially powerful emotions like anger. And if we're accustomed to being powerless, we don't know how to deal with them in a constructive way, so we continue to suppress them until they explode inside us, like a psychological Mount Saint Helens."

  "That's pretty much what happened to me."

  "Emotional healing doesn't come all at once, Amber," Susan said quietly. "Sometimes it's like grief—we think we've gone through that long dark tunnel and come out on the other side, and then when we least expect it, the pain erupts again. It takes many forms—fear, depression, anger, denial. The important thing is not to shove it back down again. Let it come out. Face it. Work through it."

  "How do I do that?"

  "How have you done it in the past?"

  "Through art, mostly. A lot of people use journaling, I know, but I'm just no good at writing. Instead I create images out of clay." She exhaled heavily. "Though I usually don't destroy them after I've made them."

  A brief smile flitted over Susan's face. "It's okay to destroy them, if it will help. Let the images surface, and then deal with them as you need to. That's much more constructive than allowing the anger to fester, or taking it out on a human target."

  "Makes sense." Amber glanced at her watch. "Looks like our time is up." She got to her feet. This hadn't been nearly as bad as she had expected. She actually liked the Reverend Doctor, even if she did talk about God now and then.

  But this could get messy, an inner voice warned. If you go down this road again, it's likely to get worse—a whole lot worse—before it gets better

  13

  Road Trip

  HEARTSPRING, NORTH CAROLINA

  LATE APRIL

  "She ain't here, Mister Duncan. I done told you, she's gone."

  "What do you mean, she's gone?" Duncan McAlister demanded. "Think, Vesta! What did she say?"

  "She said she was leaving, Mister Duncan." Vesta fixed her gaze on the floral carpet at her feet. She watched out of the corner of her eye as he strode to Diedre's closet, opened the door, and stood there looking in.

  "Some of her clothes are missing." He turned, surveying the room. "Her camera equipment. Her laptop."

  "Yes, sir."

  "So where did she go?" His voice went up higher, frantic. Vesta felt bad for him, but she had promised Diedre she wouldn't tell him, and she'd keep to her vow, even if Mister Duncan fired her over it. "Please tell me. When did she leave?" he asked. "And don't try to tell me you don't know—you've followed that girl's every movement since she was two months old." He lowered his voice. "Vesta, please. She's my daughter. I'm worried about her."

  "She'd been mopin' around ever since her mama's funeral. Then yesterday she just come up here, packed her things, and skedaddled. Drove out of here like she was never coming back."

  "And didn't say where she was going."

  "Not directly." Vesta shook her head.

  The man paced across the bedroom, raking his fingers through his thick white hair. "She's gone looking for her sister. Has to be. But where?" He ran a hand over his eyes and continued, talking to himself more than to Vesta. "I'll get Jack on it right away. He's got people who can track her down—"

  He turned back to her. "She's only going to get herself hurt, you know. She's going to get everybody hurt." Suddenly a light came on in his eyes. "She drove, you say? Well, she won't be gone long. Her Camry needed new tires, and—"

  Vesta hesitated. "Naw, sir. Not that car."

  "She didn't take the Camry?" McAlister peered into her face. "What? She took her mother's new Lexus?" Vesta didn't answer, but he didn't need verbal confirmation. "All right, then, I'll have to think of something else."

  He paced for a minute or two more, then smacked a fist against the opposite palm. "Her credit cards are billed to me," he declared. "One phone call—that's all it will take to get her back home where she belongs."

  Vesta frowned and shook her head, but said nothing.

  "Vesta, you can't possibly think it's a good idea for a girl her age to be on the road alone. I'm doing this for her own good. I'm only trying to protect her."

  "She don't need protection," Vesta whispered to his back as he exited the room. "She needs the truth. And if I know my Diedre, she won't stop until she gets it."

  Diedre awoke to the sound of water banging through pipes inside the wall. Someone, somewhere, had flushed a toilet. How anyone got any sleep in a place like this, she couldn't imagine. But only the low-end chain motels would accept dogs, so at midnight last night she had dragged herself and Sugarbear wearily through a maze of garishly painted two-story rectangles, located room 1115, and dropped into the sagging double bed.

  She peered at the clock, then sat up, turned on the light, and rubbed her eyes. It was barely six, and Diedre felt as if she hadn't slept at all. Twelve hours of driving had brought her to some nameless suburb on the outskirts of Chicago—a strip of neon littered with fast food restaurants, cheap motels, and used-car dealerships. Through the crack between the curtains, she could see a bit of dark gray sky, a slice of parking lot, and a shabby sign across the street advertising EATS.

  Diedre glanced at the foot of the bed, where Sugarbear still lay curled up amid the covers. The dog stirred, stretched, and reluctantly left her warm nest to come closer. Diedre stroked her upturned belly and gazed around the room.

  Last night, too exhausted from the long drive to be particular about aesthetics, Diedre hadn't given the condition of the motel much thought. Now she saw how awful it really was—the matted shag carpet, the slippery turquoise polyester bedspreads and curtains, the dark veneered furniture, chipped on the corners and showing layers of fiberboard underneath the fake wood. On the wall next to the dresser hung a gaudy, amateurish print of rocks and seashore, its frame screwed to the wall as if the proprietor treasured it like one of the Old Masters and feared someone would steal it under cover of darkness.

  "Not quite what we're accustomed to, is it, girl?"

  Sugarbear grunted and snuggled closer.

  Diedre welcomed the nearness and warmth, even if it was canine rather than human affection. She missed Vesta, missed her nice room at home, missed the prospect of a leisurely breakfast in the tastefully decorated dining room, or in the cozy bay window nook off the kitchen. She missed her mother—not the woman with the dark secret past, but the one who had loved and nurtured her since birth. And she missed her father, even though it seemed he wasn't really her father. But Daddy was probably still acting like a father—worrying about her, being his overprotective self. It was confusing, finding out the people you thought you knew weren't what you believed them to be.

  But instead of being home where she belonged, she was stuck in a seedy motel on the outskirts of Chicago, on her way to . . . to what? To Seattle, certainly. But what would she find there? Answers, or simply more questions, more confusion, more heartache?

  A surge of resentment rose up in her soul. Ever since the insidious disease had invaded her mother's body, it seemed that Diedre's life had been determined by forces beyond her control. First Mama's cancer, then the letters—the revelation that she had been deceived about her own birth and deceived about her sister.

  She shouldn't have to
do this. Shouldn't have to go on a wild-goose chase, searching for her missing sister, trying to discover the identity of her real father. If she were going to travel anywhere, she should be going to Asheville this morning, to meet Carlene and decide on furnishings and decorations, to make plans for the grand opening of Mountain Arts. She should be looking for a house of her own, or sorting through her photographs to decide which ones to feature. She should be having lunch on the terrace at La Paz.

  A normal life. That's all Diedre wanted. She had endured the heartbreak of watching her mother die. She had done everything that was expected of her. Wasn't it about time she got a chance to rebuild her life, get past all the pain, find the kind of life she wanted for herself?

  Apparently God or fate or the forces of the universe didn't think so. For here she was, less than a month after her mother's funeral, seven hundred miles from home, on the first leg of a journey into the unknown. And even though it was a journey she had ostensibly chosen, Diedre had the odd feeling that she hadn't really had a voice in the matter. That she had been led, somehow—once again directed by a will other than her own.

  By the time she had taken Sugarbear to the designated spot to do her doggy business and swung by the motel office for a Styrofoam cup of the world's worst coffee, Diedre had made a decision. She needed someone to talk to—someone objective, someone who could help her make sense of all this. She returned to the room, rooted out her calling card, and dialed Carlene's number in Asheville.

  "Mmm-hmm?" a voice answered on the fourth ring.

  "Carlene? It's Diedre. Did I wake you?"

  "Late night," Carlene mumbled. "What time is it?"

  Diedre glanced at the clock. "Quarter to seven. Central time. Almost eight your time."

  "Central time?" Carlene's voice cleared. "Where are you?"

  "Near Chicago somewhere, in a Super Dump Roach Motel. Can you wake up? We need to talk."

  "Okay. Give me a second. I think I heard the coffee maker go on a few minutes ago. I'll get a cup and be right back."

  After a couple minutes, Carlene came back on the line. "All right. I got my coffee. What's up?"

  Diedre tried to formulate all the things she wanted to say to her friend. Everything had happened so fast; Carlene knew nothing of the developments that had taken place since the funeral. Where should she begin?

  "Diedre? You there?"

  "Yes, I'm here."

  "Is something wrong? You sound . . . strange." Carlene paused, then let out a little laugh. "Stranger than usual, I mean."

  Diedre chuckled. "You wouldn't believe it."

  "Try me. For starters, what are you doing in Chicago?"

  "It's a long story." Diedre took a deep breath and plunged in, telling Carlene everything—about Mama's birthday gift, the old photograph and birth certificate, the revelation that her sister might still be alive, the startling news that Duncan McAlister couldn't be Diedre's real father. "And so," she finished, "I left. Just packed up and drove away. I figured I'd head for Seattle, hoping to find Sissy. And if I do find her,that she might tell me about my birth father." She paused. "But now I'm having second thoughts about it. This is crazy. I mean, I left my father—or the man I thought was my father—I don't even know what to call him now. I tried to talk to him, but I didn't get anywhere, so I just left. He's got to be hurt by my leaving, but—oh, Carlene, am I nuts?"

  "Of course you are, but that's not the point," Carlene said. "The point is, you're not looking for your sister. Or your father. You're looking for yourself."

  Diedre's heart caught in her throat. She could always depend upon Carlene to hack through the jungle of tangled emotions and get to the heart of the matter, but that awareness didn't make the process any more comfortable. "Maybe you're right," she admitted reluctantly. "But I don't know where to find me. And I'm beginning to think I'm absolutely insane even to conceive of a plan like this."

  "You could always come to Asheville and stay with me for a while," Carlene said. "But I've got a better idea. I'm going with you."

  "Come again?"

  "Listen, Diedre, we've run into a little setback at the shop. The seller has to bring the electrical system up to code before we can go to closing. The whole process will take about three weeks, and then another two weeks to finish up the paperwork. Meanwhile, I'm just down here twiddling my thumbs. How about if I fly to Chicago and meet you, and we'll drive out to Seattle together?"

  Diedre had a sudden mental flash—of Carlene swooping through O'Hare like some great exotic bird, scattering bright purple feathers in her wake. She smiled to herself. "Can you do that?"

  "I don't know why not. Mona next door can look after the kitties."

  "So you really think I should pursue this?"

  "I think you have to. For your own soul's sake." Carlene paused. "Give me your number there at the motel. I'll see if I can get a flight and call you back when I know something."

  A wellspring of relief opened up somewhere in the depth of Diedre's heart. "Thank you," she whispered.

  "For what?"

  "For being such a good friend."

  "Hey, it'll be fun. Like Thelma and Louise."

  Diedre rolled her eyes. "I just hope it doesn't end like Thelma and Louise."

  "You wouldn't drive into the Grand Canyon for me? I'm dis-appointed."

  "Your geography is terrible. We're not going to the Grand Canyon."

  Carlene gave a deep, throaty laugh. "With the two of us, you never know quite where we'll end up."

  14

  The Tackiest Place in America

  INTERSTATE 90

  SOUTHERN MINNESOTA

  "Where did you say we were going?" Diedre repeated for the third time as she headed the Lexus west along 1-90. "Let me see that map."

  "Accustomed to being in control, aren't you?" Carlene grinned, reached around to the backseat, and stroked Sugarbear under the chin. "I've got it all right here," she declared. She held up several pages of paper and waved them in Diedre's direction. "I ran across this when I was doing a Net search for maps. It's a great Web site—The Tackiest Places in America. And our route takes us right past several of them."

  "This isn't a pleasure trip, you know."

  Carlene turned her round, dimpled face in Diedre's direction and gave her a mocking scowl. "Maybe not, but there's no law that prohibits us from having a little fun along the way. Think of it this way: we've been given a great opportunity to see our nation's tackiness up close, in all its glory. We might not pass this way again."

  Diedre shook her head. "You are a piece of work, you know that?"

  "I am," Carlene assented proudly. "It's one of the things you love most about me." She shifted her ample form in the leather seat and grimaced. "And speaking of tacky, why are we driving this $50,000 car? I feel like a rich widow from St. Petersburg."

  "The Camry needed new tires, and I didn't have time to get them. What's wrong with Mama's car?"

  "Nothing's wrong with it—I'm just not very experienced at living like the overprivileged elite in the lap of luxury."

  "Can we get back to the tacky list?" Diedre prompted.

  "Oh, yeah. Well, here's the rundown—the most outstanding monuments to American ingenuity and bad taste." She flipped pages. "Carhenge, a reproduction of Stonehenge made from junked automobiles. The Roadkill Cafe. A black widow spider made from a Volkswagen Beetle."

  "You don't actually expect me to stop at these places, do you?"

  "Not those. They're not on our route. I was just giving you an appetizer."

  Diedre laughed and realized with a little shock how good it felt. She hadn't laughed in a long time. And although the pall of her mother's death and the subsequent revelations still hung like a shroud at the perimeters of her mind, for now the curtain had been drawn back. This was a good idea, Carlene joining her on the trip. She knew what Carlene was doing, and she was grateful. Everybody should have such a friend.

  "OK, I'll bite," she said at last. "What is on our route?"

&n
bsp; "First stop, Blue Earth, Minnesota," Carlene proclaimed with a flourish. "A sixty-foot statue of the Jolly Green Giant."

  "You're kidding."

  "Nope. There's a picture, see? In fact, the Green Giant won the Web site award, if you can call it that, for the tackiest place in America. I'm afraid everything else will seem anticlimactic after this, but unless you're inclined to backtrack, it can't be helped. Blue Earth comes first." She pointed toward a road sign. "About ninety miles."

  Diedre leaned over the steering wheel, trying to stretch the kinks out of her back. "Well, don't keep me in suspense. What else is on the agenda?"

  Carlene scanned the papers. "Mitchell, South Dakota—the Corn Palace."

  "What on earth is a Corn Palace?"

  "Apparently it's a building elaborately decorated—like with mosaics, only made entirely with corn and corn husks."

  Diedre swiveled her head and stared at Carlene. "Corn husks? Don't they rot?"

  "Says here they change the displays regularly." She raised one eyebrow. "Welcome to the Midwest."

  "Anything else?"

  Carlene nodded. "A place called Wall Drug, slap in the middle of nowhere. Evidently it's the largest, tackiest tourist trap in the world. Sort of a way station en route to the Badlands, just in case you haven't had your daily fix of kitsch. They advertise free water."