The Amber Photograph

by Penelope J. Stokes

  Didn't most children call out to their parents when they were frightened? Didn't the parents come to them in the night, rather than the other way around? But Diedre had gone to her mother, quietly, secretively, as if she had something to hide.

  And didn't most parents sleep together, in the same bedroom? Yet she recalled how shocked she had been to hear her father's voice coming from her mother's room. His bedroom was down the hall on the other side of Diedre's, at the opposite end of the house. He had always slept down there. Diedre had been eleven years old before she consciously realized that other children's parents shared not just a room, but also a bed. And even then she assumed it was because the McAlisters were wealthier than most other people and had a bigger house.

  The video in her mind played on, until the child Diedre stood at the door of her mother's bedroom. She could hear the voices clearly now, her father's raised in anger or exasperation.

  "It's for the best. And after what she's done, she should be grateful she's not facing prison. But she's not coming back into this house. Not ever."

  Mama was crying, and when she spoke, her voice sounded choked and rough. "But Duncan, she's our daughter!" At the word daughter, a thrill of fear went up little Diedre's spine. Was he talking about her? About sending her away? He had to be; he only had one daughter. But maybe if she kept very quiet and was very, very good, he would change his mind.

  She huddled in the shadows while her father stalked out of the room, slammed the door, and stomped down the hall. She couldn't go in to Mama now; she had to be good and not cause any trouble. And she was getting to be a big girl, after all; she could take care of herself.

  Strangling on unshed tears, the child Diedre hugged her teddy bear to her chest and waited until the door to Daddy's bedroom shut with a bang. Then she dashed down the hall as fast as her stubby little legs could carry her, jumped into bed, and pulled the covers up over her head.

  They had been talking about Sissy . . .

  In the backseat, Sugarbear grunted, pawed at the corner of her bed, and settled down again with a sigh. Carlene was humming quietly to herself, tapping her fingers against the steering wheel in time to the music in her head. Diedre shut her eyes and tried to will herself to sleep as the tires made dull thudding noises across the expansion spaces in the highway But the images kept coming, as if she had unwittingly opened a floodgate to the past and couldn't get it shut again.

  All those hushed conversations that ended abruptly the moment she walked into a room. Her mother murmuring, "I have to go" into the telephone, then slamming down the receiver and acting nervous and agitated for an hour afterward. Unintelligible voices raised behind closed doors. Uncle Jack coming to the house at all hours of the day or night, explaining nothing, simply muttering that he "had business" with Daddy. Mama crying for no reason and stifling her tears if Diedre happened upon her without warning.

  And "the look" Daddy sometimes gave her—that fleeting, panicked stare, as if he didn't know her at all.

  Things aren't what they seem, Mama had warned her. And, Don't expect the truth to be what you thought it would be.

  Well, Mama had spoken truthfully, at least that one time in her life, at the very end. But why had she done it—why had she been unfaithful to Daddy? People didn't just have an affair, bear a child, and then go back to their normal lives for the next twenty-five years as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Didn't she know an affair would eventually wreck everything, ruin not just her own life, but everyone else's as well? And then later, when the deed couldn't be undone, couldn't she have told the whole story, or none at all?

  Keeping the secret all these years had been bad enough. But what kind of mother would dump the truth in her daughter's lap and leave her behind to clean up the mess?

  Anger welled up in Diedre. Despair and abandonment, an adult's rage and a little child's fear, all combined into one enormous, suffocating sense of loss. The loss of her mother, her innocence, her identity.

  For a moment Diedre saw herself again as that tiny child, cowering in the dark shadows of the hallway. Perhaps if she stood very still, her mama would come to her, explain everything, and kiss her fears away. Maybe if she were very quiet, and very, very good, this would all fade into nothingness, and she would awaken to find it had all been a bad dream.

  But that wasn't going to happen, and the adult Diedre knew it. Mama was dead. Daddy wasn't Daddy anymore. The flat, empty spaces in her soul stretched out before her like a barren wilderness.

  She laid her head against the cold glass of the window and began to cry.

  16

  Badlands and Black Hills

  With her left hand on the wheel and her right hand gripping Diedre's, Carlene steered the Lexus down the straight line of highway. Outside the car, a bright afternoon sun shone in a chilly April-blue sky. Inside, the storm had finally broken, and torrential forces lashed at her best friend's soul. For a long time Diedre sobbed and muttered incoherently, and Carlene just sat there, holding her hand and murmuring over and over, "It's all right, let it out."

  Sugarbear, instinctively aware that her human was distressed, became restless and began to whine and paw at the back of Diedre's seat. At last Carlene reached over and scooped her into the front of the car. There wasn't much room, given the console between the leather bucket seats, but the dog managed to wedge herself in, half on the seat and half in Diedre's lap, and began nuzzling at Diedre's arm.

  After a moment Diedre stirred and lifted the dog to her shoulder."It's okay, sweetie. I'm fine." A long wet tongue darted out and slobbered across her cheek, and Diedre relented and gave a halfhearted smile. "She can always make me feel better," she murmured, cutting a sidelong glance at Carlene. "I don't know why, but it never fails."

  "It's unconditional love," Carlene responded. "Total selflessness. She's only interested in what makes you happy."

  When Sugarbear had calmed down, Diedre returned her to her bed in the backseat. The dog sighed and propped her chin on the edge of the bed, her soulful brown eyes following Diedre's every move. Carlene watched her, too, wishing she would talk, but unwilling to intrude into her private grief. The time would come, sooner or later, and when it did, Carlene would be here.

  For a long while Diedre said nothing, just sat staring out the window. Finally she turned back to Carlene. "Where are we?"

  Carlene pointed to a sign on the right, a huge billboard bearing the likeness of a cowboy on a bucking horse. Wall Drug, Next Exit "Tell you what," she said. "Let's stop for a few minutes, get some of that free water and something to eat, and see this wonder of the modern world. Then before the sun sets we'll drive on down and take the loop through the Badlands National Park."

  "Badlands," Diedre repeated, shuddering a little. "I feel like that's where I've been living lately."

  "From what I understand, it's barren, but beautiful."

  Diedre grimaced. "Like I said—my life. The barren part, anyway."

  Wall Drug turned out to be nearly as tacky as the Web site promised. Its claim to fame was its sheer size—acres, Diedre thought, maybe even square miles of rubber snakes and plastic squirt guns and acrylic deer with clocks in their bellies and cheap T-shirts, all plastered with the logo,ITM Wall Drug.

  The place made Diedre feel claustrophobic and grimy, but she tried to be patient while Carlene bought a small red birdhouse with WALL DRUG in block letters on the roof. They purchased sandwiches, chips, and soft drinks, a bottle of water and a small bag of doggy treats for Sugarbear. At Carlene's insistence, Diedre took a few pictures, but her heart wasn't in it. Within forty-five minutes they were back on the road again, heading into the loop that would take them through the Badlands.

  It was still early in the season, and the park was almost deserted. On a hillside overlooking waving prairie grass flanked by the high buttes and sharply eroded spires that gave the Badlands its name, they stopped the car and ate their sandwiches.

  After a few minutes of silence, broken only by the sounds
of chewing, Diedre opened the door and got out.

  Carlene grabbed her arm. "Where are you going?"

  "Relax, I'm not going to jump off a cliff," Diedre said. "Pop the trunk, will you? I need my camera."

  Carlene let go of her arm and rolled her eyes heavenward. "Atta girl."

  "Don't make a big deal of it, will you?"

  "OK. But the wind's cold out there. Put on your coat."

  "Yes, Mother." The words were out of Diedre's mouth before they registered in her brain, and just as quickly, tears stung at her eyes.

  Carlene's gaze never left her face. "Are you all right?"

  "I'm fine. Or I will be. I just need to get some of this on film before the light changes."

  She got out of the car, pulled a camera and two telephoto lenses from the trunk, and began walking, searching for just the right vantage point to make the best use of the remaining sunlight on the hills. The buttes were magnificent, splashed with late-afternoon sun that turned gray rock to gold. Behind her, Diedre could hear Carlene walking with Sugarbear in the grass, and before her, the vistas swam in her tear-filled eyes as if reflected in a shimmering pool.

  She finished one roll of film and was beginning to load another when she realized that her fingers, now numb and clumsy, had taken on the color of pale putty. The sun had shifted, and the wind whipped through her hair and made her cheeks tingle with cold.

  Carlene put down the driver's side window and called to her. "Got what you need?"

  "Yeah. I'm coming." Diedre sprinted to the car and got in.

  When she shut the door, the sudden silence descended around them, so profound that Diedre could hear the rush of her own blood pumping in her ears.

  Finally Carlene spoke. "Do you want to talk about it?"

  "Talk about what?"

  "Your grief. Your confusion. The things you've been crying over for the last two hundred miles."

  "No, I don't want to talk about it."

  "Yes, you do."

  Diedre looked up to find Carlene smiling faintly, gazing out over the vast pinnacles that loomed up from the prairie—gray and purple steeples of rock, tall and forbidding.

  "It's amazing, isn't it?" Carlene pointed toward the vista beyond the car window. "All those miles of open land, so comfortable, so predictable. Then you round a bend, crest a hill, and face this." She waved a hand at the imposing stone monuments. "I can only imagine what those wagon train settlers felt when they caught their first glimpse of this. Nature can be unnerving, intimidating."

  Diedre twisted up her face in a scowl. "All right, you don't have to hit me over the head with a metaphor. I get your point."

  "I was just making conversation."

  "Sure you were." Diedre paused for a moment and let out a soul-deep sigh. "You're right. I've had my comfortable world uprooted, and I wasn't prepared for it. But how do you get prepared to face truths that have been hidden for years?" She frowned and narrowed her eyes. "If you were in my position, how would you deal with it?"

  "I'd be outraged," Carlene answered immediately. "I'd be furious at my mother, both for not telling me sooner—and for having an affair in the first place. I'd be angry at my father for all this pretense and manipulation; I'd probably even be mad at my sister for not coming back to find me."

  "Yes," Diedre said. "Yes to all of it."

  "And I'd be hurt," Carlene went on. "Hurt and confused and grieving, and not knowing how to express any of those feelings."

  Diedre felt tears stinging her eyes, and she blinked hard and turned toward the horizon. It looked like the jagged jawbone of a dinosaur, gaping with enormous dark teeth, ready to chew her up and spit her out again. A terrifying beauty. She shuddered.

  "I want to grieve for Mama," she said after a while. "I loved her so much, and I miss her. But every time I think of her now, I just get so angry. And I keep having to remind myself that Daddy's not my real father, that someone else—" She stopped, unable to continue.

  Carlene stared at her. "Go on," she prompted.

  "The issue that keeps eating at me," Diedre said at last, "is, who? If Daddy's not my real father, who is? Was Mama in love with him—and if not, what led her to be unfaithful to Daddy? It's this enormous question mark, this big black hill that blocks the sun and turns my heart cold." She shook her head. "I have to get the answer to that question, Carlene. I have to know."

  Carlene stashed her sandwich wrapper in the trash bin and cranked the engine. "Well, that's what we came for," she said as she eased the car back onto the road. "We've got two more days until we get to Seattle. Let's see if we can locate your sister, and maybe we'll find the truth."

  17

  An Image Trapped in Stone

  Diedre put a new roll of film in her camera, replaced the wide-angle lens with a zoom, and took a few closeups of Crazy Horse. Instinctively, almost mechanically, her mind went on autopilot, taking into account issues such as light and composition and perspective.

  Two more days to Seattle, Carlene had said. But two days was quickly turning into three, maybe even four. From the Badlands, they had driven into Rapid City for the night, then detoured down Highway 16 to spend three hours this morning at Mount Rushmore—including, at Carlene's insistence, the hideous strip of tourist traps at the foot of the monument—and finally to the unfinished granite sculpture honoring the Native American chief Crazy Horse. After they left here, they would continue to Custer State Park and have an afternoon of relaxation, culminating in a night at the Blue Bell Lodge, which offered individual log cabins right on the park grounds, amid deer and antelope and buffalo. Diedre could almost hear the strains of "Home on the Range" being sung around the campfire.

  Maybe Carlene was right. She had protested that they simply couldn't drive six hundred miles a day for an entire week, that they needed to relax a little and take in the sights. But she had coerced Diedre into snapping pictures everywhere they went, and Diedre suspected an ulterior motive, some half-baked plan for turning those photos into a major exhibit. She could see it now: a touring road show called Tackyville USA. They'd make a bundle.

  She had to admit, however, that the Crazy Horse monument was impressive. So far, only the front half of the carving had been blasted from the rock, but when the entire memorial was completed, it would be a sculpting feat to rival the Great Sphinx or the ancient pyramids of Egypt. The Chief's head alone was nine stories tall.

  "Look at the details!" Carlene said in awe-struck tones. "The way the chief's hair blows back from his head, the arch of the horse's neck, the hand stretching out pointing east—"

  "Is that east?"

  "Well, east on the compass, anyway." Carlene moved away, murmuring, "It's fabulous."

  And it was. But what affected Diedre the most was not the beauty of the sculpture or the sheer impossibility of its size, but the agony of it. The massive Chief Crazy Horse emerged from the mountain—his chest and shoulders thrust forward, his eyes on the horizon, his hand reaching out—as if striving to liberate himself from the grip of the granite behind him. Even his horse struggled and flailed against the rock, pawing the air with its hooves, lunging vainly toward freedom.

  Diedre understood, at least partially. Something inside her, too, was being chiseled from its moorings, released from a lifetime of captivity. But she couldn't be sure whether the transformation was positive or negative, a blessing or a curse. Whether she should, like Crazy Horse, strain forward toward her liberty or shrink back into the comfortable imprisonment of the rock from which she was being hewn.

  The drive through Custer State Park had unique gifts of nature to offer—up close views of a buffalo herd, a doe with a fawn barely two days old, and a mother fox with an adorable litter of playful, adventurous red kits. Shortly before sunset, they checked in at the Blue Bell Lodge and settled their gear in a tiny log cabin overlooking a clearing with several deer browsing in the dewy grass.

  The quietness of the evening was broken only by the music of birds, the gentle whoosh of wind through the tree
branches, and the faint rush of a waterfall somewhere in the distance. Sugarbear, overly energetic from being cooped up in the car, had been chasing the tennis ball Carlene threw for her, but apparently she had tired of the game, or perhaps been lulled by the peacefulness of the place, and now lay on the top step gazing out into the gathering dusk. With a sigh of contentment Diedre parked herself on the porch.

  "I'll be right out," Carlene called from inside the cabin. "I'm just changing into something a little warmer." A couple minutes later she appeared, dressed in black leggings and a bright fuchsia sweatshirt that came nearly to her knees. She handed Diedre a Diet Pepsi and deposited a bag of Oreos on the table between their chairs.

  For a while Diedre busied herself with the task of unscrewing Oreos and licking the cream filling off. Only after half a dozen cookies did she work up the nerve to broach the dilemma that had been weighing on her all day.

  "Carlene, what do you believe about God?"

  Carlene was leaning back in the deck chair with her tennis shoes propped on the porch rail, sipping her diet soda and watching as the sunset spangled the clouded sky with red and yellow and orange. At first she didn't move, didn't answer—didn't give any indication that she'd even heard the question. Then, slowly, she removed her feet from the rail and dropped them heavily onto the wide planks of the porch floor.

  "What kind of question is that?" She turned to face Diedre.

  "A legitimate one," Diedre countered. "I know you believe in God—that's not what I'm asking. I want to know what you believe about God."

  "Do I believe in the omnis, you mean? That God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and all the rest?" She scratched an eyebrow with one finger. "I suppose I do. I'm not always sure what that means, or how those qualities translate into God's relationships with people, but I do believe."