Inside the car, I twist my ring. Even though Mom and the school counselor told me that Dad didn’t leave because of that contest or me, I’m not sure I believe them. How do they know? I know Dad. And I can’t help but think that if I had won that contest, he might have stayed. He would have been proud to have an artist daughter like him.
Opal pulls out of the airport parking lot, and I stick my head out the window. Even though it’s almost nine o’clock, the sky still glows with a misty pink and red sunset. Uncle Jasper talked about these summer sunsets. The misty pink. The snowcapped mountains in the distance. It is a perfect painting. I stick my hand out the window and twirl my fingers in the breeze. The nerves rattle around in my stomach, and I try to pretend that I’m on vacation with a carefree and light heart, and not about to spend the summer on some island I’ve never visited.
Opal turns left and we merge onto Interstate 5. “Do you know much about the Island?” she says.
“Yes!” I grab my art bag and pull out a thick blue binder. I’m glad to have something to talk about. The car is beginning to feel a little tense, and I’m not sure I can stand much more. “I did some research.” I tap the binder that I have labeled “Island Life.” I used a manila divider sheet with colored labels for each section.
I flip through the pages of festivals, music in the park series, farmer’s markets and restaurants. A different colored paper clip holds each category together. I spent hours studying websites and printing pages as I wrote my Island “To Do” list. I tried to imagine what I should accomplish in order to fit into Island life, and what activities would give me the perfect Island summer.
Opal shakes her head. “The things they say about us.”
“Who says?” My stomach tightens. I suddenly want to get out of the car. Frantically, I look for the car radio. Music is good for lightening the mood. At least that’s what Dad always said in the studio, when I started to annoy him and he would turn up the music. But I only find red, blue, and yellow strands mixed in a coiled heap in the dashboard where a radio should be.
“People who want tourists to visit make the websites.” Opal clutches the steering wheel as the wind whips through my hair and sends it twirling into my eyes and mouth. I roll up the Buick’s silver window handle and lift a strand of hair out of my mouth. I’ve forgotten to stick a cotton hair scrunchie into my bag, and now I regret it.
“These things aren’t true?” I drum my fingers on the binder. I need to redo a few things on my list if the websites aren’t true.
“Island life cannot be defined by a website.” Opal looks at me briefly. I know that we could be killed in that moment, but something tells me Opal isn’t afraid. I try not to be either. Opal’s dark blue pupils sparkle. In the center of the blue iris is a sparkling crystal white light. Dad liked to say that the way to tell an artist is by the light in their eyes.
“How do they get that light?” I asked Dad as I looked into a mirror at my own blue eyes. “I don’t have a light.”
“Not yet,” Dad said. “You will, one day.”
I am still waiting to see the light in my eyes.
“Websites,” I say very slowly, “help visitors.” My stomach tosses and I close the binder with a loud thump.
Opal’s lips tuck so far inside her mouth, I wonder if maybe she has swallowed them.
“Visitors,” Opal spits out. “They come and they go. Ask the real Island people—the ones who live there full-time, not just on holidays—ask them about Island life. We’ll tell you.”
“Like you?” I move closer to the car door. I’m used to intense people with strong opinions. Dad’s friends all seem to carry their own strong energy that is alive and full of passion, ideas and dreams. But I’ve never been locked in a car with any of them.
“Island life comes from inside, dear.” Opal suddenly softens her tone. “You’ll see.” She waves her hand over my folder.
I twist my ring and try to take deep breaths. I don’t understand Opal. Island life comes from inside? The only thing inside me is a long, empty hole. I rub my hand over the ring stone. The hole stretches from my toes to my head.
The hole inside that doesn’t fill.
Chapter Five
After an hour waiting at the terminal for the next ferry to the Island, Opal drives onto the ferry’s slanted ramp. The car wheels clatter against steel as she follows the direction of a man in an orange vest who stands on the ferry’s car deck. He points her toward the left side. I stretch my legs under the dashboard. I know exactly which ferry we are taking—the 10 p.m. ferry. I memorized the ferry schedule on the plane.
Once Opal is parked, she turns off the car and tilts back in her seat. When she stretches her arms, I wait for her fingers to crash against the rip in the dirty seam. But Opal’s hands stop and move over the rip like she’s touching a small child with a hurt arm.
“It’s been here as long as I’ve had the car,” she says. “I often wonder what made the tear, but I think it adds character.”
I study Opal’s profile. There is something familiar about her. It’s like a game of Memory I play with the four- and five-year-old students on Saturday mornings at the Art Palace. I love the bright eyes of the young students. It’s as if they think I have all the answers in the world. I have no answers to anything, but the young artists help me think that maybe I can find some. Opal seems like a card that I’ve turned up once but can’t find the match again.
“We’ll go up to the deck,” Opal says, and unlatches her seatbelt. She turns around to reach into the backseat as a woman in an orange vest slides an orange triangle-shaped cone under the front wheel. Empty-handed, Opal flips back around and across my legs to open the glove compartment. She pulls out a pencil and tucks it behind her ear.
I’ve seen pictures on the internet of the green and white ferry boat sliding through blue water, but not pictures of the inside. But now, when I see Opal and her pencil, I wonder if there is a kind of class on the ferry. Do I need a notebook and pencil too? I don’t remember anything about classes, but Opal said the websites aren’t right. Maybe this is where the website didn’t give all the information. I grab my black canvas art bag and hope I have stuck a tablet of paper into the bag. I want to be able to take good notes.
Outside the car, the cold wind whips around my hair. It’s much colder than I think it should be for August. It feels more like spring in Chicago. The boat glides through the water, and I grab onto the cold steel bars surrounding the boat. But there isn’t any sideways movement and, feeling a bit foolish, I release the bars.
“Do they have food stands up there?” I ask as I follow Opal to the narrow metal staircase. I haven’t eaten since I left Chicago and my stomach rumbles.
“Another Italian soda?” Opal turns and raises an eyebrow.
“Or food.” I wink at her. She looks like she is trying to give motherly advice and failing. Her eyes dance with the sparkle I saw earlier.
“After you get your food—” Opal waves toward an empty bench. “Join me.”
I’m relieved that Opal seems to have relaxed now that she’s not driving. I head toward a small green sign hanging from the top of the ceiling. Food and Drinks. I walk easily and can barely tell we’re gliding through the water.
“Closed,” a woman says as I reach the entryway to Food and Drinks. A fishnet catches her brown hair into a bun on top of her head. She wears a stained green apron with Washington State Ferry in white lettering.
“No problem,” I say. We aren’t far from the Island. It’s just an hour on the ferry, and Uncle Jasper will have food. I can wait. As I wander back to Opal, I try to look outside the dark rows of windows. The inside of the ferry reflects back to me. A woman curls on an orange bench two rows down from Opal. Her knees tuck up to her chest, and her face rests against her hands. Her eyes are closed. At the next bench, a mother and daughter play cards.
I like when things move at a slow pace and I can notice them. Sometimes it’s the shape of a scrap of paper on the floor at schoo
l, or the way the paper rustles, crackles and changes form every time someone steps on it. Sometimes it’s the way the sunlight shines through the loft’s windows, and shifts in just fractions of a minute.
When I reach Opal, I step over her outstretched legs. I sink down on the orange plastic bench across from her. I lift my legs and try to prop them against her bench, but they don’t reach the seat and slide down. I flip off a sandal. It seems so comfortable on the ferry. Not like the airplane, where everything is all scrunched together.
Opal scribbles on her yellow tablet, and Art Glass for the Kitchen and Bathroom lays open beside her.
“Are you decorating?” I ask. Mom never read books about decorating when she was removing all traces of Dad. She just went to the furniture store and picked out new items.
“No.” Opal shakes her head and keeps scribbling.
“Stained glass?” I study her scribbles that are pictures in small squares. When I was eight, Dad took me to a cathedral for a photo shoot. He pulled open the church doors and held his fingers to his mouth. The water in the small bowl by the door fascinated me. I thought it was for cleaning your hands, and immediately dunked and splashed my hands in the warm water. Dad yanked them out and showed me the glass windows at the front of the church.
“Look at the pictures.” I gazed at the lighted pictures of children gathered around lambs, and wondered who was behind the pictures making the light. Was it like TV? Or my computer screen? Dad explained how the light came through the glass and made the reflections.
“Stained glass.” Opal nods. She continues with her sketch.
“Are you an artist?”
I know the answer before she responds. Of course she is an artist.
“Glass art,” she says. “I do blown glass and stained glass.”
Glass art. The vase that cracked in our living room. I tap my fingers on the bench. An artist just like Dad.
The ache inside me comes back. I’ve tried not to check my phone for messages too often in the three weeks since Dad has been gone. It’s always the same; no message. But I can’t help it now. I reach for my bag and fumble inside for my cell phone.
“What’s wrong?” Opal’s eyes meet mine.
“Nothing.” My heart beats faster before I find the phone. It’d be perfect timing for Dad to have called. I’d have missed the ring because of all the noise getting on the ferry. There will be a message with a phone number. I’ll call him back and tell him that I’m on my way to the Island for the summer, and I won’t say anything about how disappointed I am that I haven’t heard from him. I will be exactly who he wants me to be.
“Those don’t always work on the ferry.” Opal shakes her head. “The Island is shadowed by Mount Constitution. It blocks cell service in some places.”
I stare at the screen. No service. Opal is right. I toss my cell phone into my bag. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway. There is a part of me that knows there is no message from Dad, and the familiar wave of disappointment washes over me. I close my eyes and work hard to push down the sadness. I am on my way to a summer on the Island. I don’t have to think about Dad.
But, somehow, my little self-talk isn’t working, and a tear slips out anyway.
The ferry slows and I open my eyes. I stretch and glance out the dark windows. All I see is my reflection peering back at me. A girl with wide frightened eyes and disheveled hair. I smooth my hand over my hair and try to tuck a few strands back into place.
I look around and see that the lady with the cards has now shifted and lies face down on one of the long bench seats. I wish I had thought of that before I fell asleep sitting up. Now I feel stiff and uncomfortable. “Are we there?”
Opal glances out at the dark water. “Next island.” The ferry reminds me of a bus ride, only on water.
The boat sways as coming in to dock, it bumps into the pilings. Startled, I grab onto the sides. “Do these ever tip?” I once heard that if a car went into the water, windows should be rolled down before the car hits the water. But I’m not sure what to do in a ferry. The windows don’t have latches on them. In fact, I’m not real sure how to open them at all. And no one has handed out life jackets, although I think I heard something about life jackets located in bins on the car deck.
“People fall in.” Opal says. “Tourists.” She smiles at me and winks.
“Maybe we should go back to the car?” I don’t want Opal to know that I’m not enjoying the ferry ride, but my stomach is slouching around like the water under the boat. “If we’re the next island?”
Opal stands. “My son got lost on the ferry when he was little. He thought it was a big playground and wanted to play hide-and-seek. They had to search the boat before they found him tucked up inside one of the bathroom stalls.”
“Your son?” I perk up.
“Cole.” Opal stands and looks out the dark window. “He’s thirteen.” She turns and glances at me. “About a year or so older than you.”
Opal’s thirteen-year-old son. Is he cute? I try to picture what Opal’s son might look like. Blue eyes? Blond hair? I smile to myself, and then catch Opal watching me. She has a frown on her face. I shrug and try to pretend that I’m not that interested in her son.
As the ferry pushes back from the dock and bounces against the wood pilings, I grab onto the plastic bench seat. “Don’t forget your notes.” I pick up the yellow tablet where Opal has written, ‘Stained Glass Contest’.
A contest! I’m not even on the Island and already I’ve found out about an art contest. I know what to do! I will enter the Island Stained Glass Contest. And I will win. And once I win, Dad will find out and come home. He will be so proud of me.
Never mind that I know nothing about stained glass. It can’t be that hard. Can it?
Opal drives off the ferry and raises her pinkie and ring finger at the man in the yellow vest. He waves an orange stick to the left. She turns right and cranks the Buick into high speed.
“Where are the goggles and race car gloves?” I stare straight ahead and try to ignore the tall evergreen dark trees passing in a blur. Instead, I focus on the dark, curvy road and clench my hands in a fist. I don’t have to look at the speedometer to know Opal is way over the speed limit and I’m about to be killed.
“I like the speed,” Opal says without taking her eyes from the road. “Everyone knows. They leave me alone.”
I gasp as the car swerves. I can no longer keep pretending everything is fine, and I grab for the car door handle that I hold in a death grip. The road twists past rolling farmland and thin wire fences. Just as I think enough is enough and I’ll have to start screaming about the speed, Opal slows to turn into a gravel driveway. I look out the window. Even in the dark I can see white dust covering the tall fir trees’ green limbs.
“What’s with the dust?” I’ve never seen dust on trees before. I’m itching to pull out my sketchpad and try to sketch the tall trees with their white coating. It looks like powdered sugar on donuts.
“We haven’t had rain.” Opal picks up speed and the car slams against large potholes.
I grab the door handle again. Is it rude to tell Opal to stop the car? The driveway looks like it goes on for miles, but I know I can walk the rest of the way. Before I can say anything, Opal rounds a bend in the driveway and pulls up next to a small house illuminated with one yellow porch light.
“Here we are,” she says.
I unclench my hands from the door handle and vow to tell Uncle Jasper that, although I really appreciate meeting Opal, I can’t take any more rides from her.
“Uncle Jasper!” I cry as I fly out of the car, and shout like I’m returning home after being gone for months. I can yell as loud as I want and no one is going to hear me out here. I spin my arms like a windmill and take deep breaths of the cool Island night air. Suddenly I feel like I could be a bird and lift off with my new freedom.
Uncle Jasper steps onto the porch and says, “Who’s out there?”
“Your favorite niece.”
> Uncle Jasper wears a flannel shirt, which hangs untucked above his dark blue jeans. The shirt matches Opal’s shirt, and I try to picture them buying the shirts together.
“Cold feet?” Uncle Jasper frowns at my sandals and walks toward me.
“Yes.” By now I know the sandals are the wrong shoe to wear on the Island. As soon as I can find a shoe shop, I’m buying cream-colored work boots.
“Good to see you, Jasmine.” Uncle Jasper pulls me to him in a warm hug. “I’m glad you made the trip safe and sound.” As I step into Uncle Jasper’s embrace, I remember how Dad’s hugs always smelled like spicy aftershave. The hole inside me begins to ache before I shove my imaginary dirt over it and try to pretend everything is fine.
“Where’s your suitcase?” Uncle Jasper asks.
“I’ll get it.” I scramble toward the car and throw open the door. I figure Uncle Jasper won’t toss my suitcase around the way Opal did at the airport, but I want to prove that I am going to be independent on the Island. I lift the heavy suitcase from the back of the car and wish the car had four doors instead of two. I shove the front seat forward and pull the suitcase until the weight sends me backwards on the gravel driveway. My luggage sprawls out beside me.
“Whoops,” I say as I stand, dust the gravel off my hands, and pull out my suitcase handle. My palms sting from the gravel, which has made dents in my soft skin. The sound of gravel bumping against my new suitcase wheels sets my nerves on edge, and more gravel pieces find their way into my sandals, settling in the cracks of my toes and under the soles of my feet. I wonder if Uncle Jasper has ever heard of black top driveways.
Stained Glass Summer Page 4