Pale Phoenix

by Kathryn Reiss

  "Nothing at all? Mither, I'm telling you, her bed was empty!"

  "I think we're all tired," said her father. "Let's go to bed now. We can talk more about all of this in the morning." He headed for the master bedroom. "If we must."

  Miranda stomped down the hall to her own room. She slammed her door and leaned against it, trembling. From behind her closed door she could hear her parents out in the hall.

  "Mandy's just fanciful," Helen said to Philip.

  "Well, it's not like her at all. Do you think she's jealous because we're going to try to help the poor girl out for a while?"

  Then their door clicked shut, leaving Miranda standing in silence, her fists balled tightly at her sides. Abby wasn't there—she wasn't, she wasn't. The words slid through Miranda's mind, wormlike, insidious, and the anger and hurt were replaced by fear. Abby had been crying. She had not been in the room. Then she had reappeared—as if out of thin air.

  But that's impossible.

  First the vanishing footprints, and now this. The bubble of fear deep inside expanded with each breath Miranda took, and one question pumped in her ears with her heartbeat: What in the world is going on?

  Chapter Six

  IN THE MORNING Miranda blocked the bathroom door while Abby was brushing her teeth. Abby's long hair was tied back from her face with a faded pink ribbon. In the too long, white flannel nightgown, borrowed from Miranda, she looked very small and innocent—almost angelic. But Miranda was not fooled.

  "I want to know what's going on." Miranda's voice held all the pent-up hostility and fear of the past night.

  "I'm brushing my teeth. That's what's going on. What do you think?" Abby rinsed her mouth and patted her lips with a towel.

  Miranda stepped into the room. "I heard you crying. And then you weren't there. So where were you? You'd better tell me, or—"

  "Or what?" Abby smirked. "See how I'm shaking? Trembling with terror of what you might do." She reached back to untie the pink ribbon and shook her hair over her shoulders. Her eyes met Miranda's in the mirror over the sink. "There is no way in the world you could have heard me crying, Miranda Browne. So just put it out of your head. You imagined the whole thing." There was a challenge in Abby's expression, frighteningly at odds with the angelic hair and heart-shaped, pale face.

  Miranda stamped out of the room, unsure how to meet that challenge. Abby's laughter followed her down the hall.

  Abby settled in quickly, much too quickly as far as Miranda was concerned. Helen moved her files and medical journals to her office in town, and soon the room at the top of the stairs was referred to by all the Brownes as "Abby's room." The sofa bed remained unfolded during the day, and Helen gave Abby a quilt, brightly patterned with blue cornflowers, to cover it. Abby's schoolbooks lay on the desk by the window, and her two dresses and one blouse hung in the closet. She didn't have many personal belongings. Most of what she owned she carried around with her in the bulging beaded bag. Helen promised her a shopping expedition to Boston for some new clothes.

  But the hostility between Miranda and Abby grew thicker each day. Abby bristled at everything Miranda said to her, and Miranda counted up all the snide remarks, the insults, and sarcastic comments Abby flung her way, and brooded over them. Miranda spent a lot of time holed up in her bedroom, curled on her window seat, reading or staring out the window at the snow. She could not forget the vanishing footprints and the mysterious crying. She longed for spring. Spring sunshine would melt the snow, and maybe also the icy grip of unease she felt with Abby around.

  If only Abby were quieter. That might help Miranda pretend she wasn't really there. But Abby was loud. She had appropriated the old upright piano in the family room at the back of the house and played all the time. Or at least it seemed that way to Miranda, who used to practice her flute in the family room but shunned it now. Abby's music flooded the house.

  Helen and Philip were impressed. They urged her to see Mrs. Wainwright about playing in the spring concert. Miranda would be performing on her flute. Yeah, thought Miranda. If I ever get a chance to practice around here. Abby ducked her head and said she was too shy, but the big house rang with music that seemed anything but shy. Abby played Bach and Mozart and Beethoven with the touch of a master. She played folk songs and ballads, sometimes singing along in a thin, soft soprano. She hammered out boogie-woogie and wrenched out the blues, playing sometimes from memory and sometimes from one of the old, yellowed scores of music she pulled from her beaded satchel. Helen and Philip sang along and sometimes even danced when Abby played. One night Abby taught them the Charleston, and Miranda watched dourly from the doorway as they shimmied, laughing uproariously, across the family room. Another night Abby taught them the steps to a minuet. As the bell-like notes of the simple Bach tune rang out and Helen and Philip faced each other formally to begin, Abby glanced from the music over at Miranda in the doorway. Abby's smile was the quirky, crooked one that made Miranda shiver. She hurried away, back upstairs.

  One night after Abby had been with them about ten days, Miranda couldn't keep her anger inside anymore. She had promised her parents she would try to make Abby welcome, but enough was enough. Abby was banging out a fifties' tune, "At the Hop," down on the piano and the house reverberated with the beat. Miranda's head ached. She left her essay for English unfinished and crawled into bed, pulling the quilt over her head. Finally the music stopped. She waited until she heard her parents coming upstairs to go to bed, then left her warm quilt and stalked into their bedroom, plopping herself down into the middle of their big bed.

  Philip pulled his sweater over his head and dropped it onto a chair. "Insomnia, Mandy? You have school tomorrow."

  "Dad, I can't sleep because I'm going crazy." Tears pressed hotly behind her eyes.

  Helen sat down next to Miranda on the bed. "Mandy? You're crying! What is it, honey?"

  Miranda shook her head. "No, I'm not crying. I just have a headache. But, Mither—oh, how much longer does she have to stay? It feels like forever already. I can't stand it."

  Philip sank onto the bed, too. "I take it 'she' refers to our houseguest across the hall?"

  "I mean it. Having her here is making me sick. All her nasty little digs at me. And that piano! I'm trying to live with her, but all I can think of is that soon she'll have to go. I'm practically crossing the days off on my calendar."

  Philip's face creased with a frown. "Hey, I didn't know you felt like this. I thought things were working out."

  "I guess I did, too," added Helen.

  "You both must be blind, then. And deaf." Miranda scrubbed her hands through her hair. "We can't be in a room for two seconds without fighting. She's always giving me nasty looks and saying obnoxious things—like how immature I am. Me? She's the one who had better grow up, if you ask me. Her piano playing is driving me nuts. I know you want me to be a good hostess, and I've been trying not to let her bug me, but I just can't anymore. She doesn't seem like a guest at all—it's like she's digging her heels in." And she can make herself vanish. That was the worst thing of all.

  Helen reached over and smoothed back Miranda's dark curls. "What do you mean, Mandy?"

  "I just don't trust her. Don't you feel it, too? She's holding something back—I don't know what. I just feel ... oh, I don't know. Kind of weird whenever she's around." She wanted to say something about the footprints and crying, but didn't. She couldn't bear hearing them say again that she was just jealous.

  Philip said it anyway. "Seems to me you feel threatened by her. But why? Her being here doesn't take anything from you, honey." He lay back and tossed a pillow into the air, catching it lightly, "I mean, think about that. She's in a terrible position."

  "I know you just think I'm jealous, but it isn't that." Miranda bit her bottom lip. "She makes me uneasy. She makes me cold." She thought for a second. "Threatened—but not in the way you mean, Dad. I'm not jealous of Abby. She makes me ... she makes me feel queasy."

  Philip smiled. "Queasy?"

 
"OK, so it sounds dumb. But she gives me the creeps." Miranda bit back the real reason: She can disappear!

  "Wow." Helen sighed. "I like Abby a lot." Miranda steeled herself as Helen continued. "Dad and I hoped we might let her stay a bit longer. Until her relatives are found. You know, we feel you've been an only child for too long."

  "Then have a baby, Mither!"

  "I don't think you know how hard we've tried to," said Philip quietly.

  "Funny, isn't it," murmured Helen. "I help infertile couples all the time but haven't managed to do anything for us. Now we don't want a baby anymore, Mandy. But if we can help out by having Abby stay a while...."

  "I can't believe this! Now you're talking as if you're planning to adopt Abby tomorrow." Miranda felt panic rising in her. They just didn't understand.

  "No one is talking about adoption." Helen stood up, wandered over to the window, and looked out into the snowy night. Then she turned back. "I know it's a big change having her here, Mandy. But—"

  "But what you're saying certainly alters things," Philip interjected. "If you're miserable, of course she'll have to go. Still, I'd like you to try especially hard to settle things with her. Maybe there's some problem you girls can work out together. Maybe talking will help. Do you think?"

  Miranda shrugged. "I really don't think you understand anything I've been trying to tell you. It's not just a personality conflict. There's something about her. Something..."

  "Weird," finished Helen. "So you keep saying."

  "Look, will you at least tell her to cut out all the piano playing? I can't practice my flute anymore, or even do my homework, with all her noise."

  "All right, Mandy," said Philip. "I'll talk to her about cutting down. But it is a shame to restrict the one thing that seems to make her really happy." Philip gave her a hug. "Now get back to bed. It's nothing to lose sleep over. Agreed?"

  "Not really."

  He sighed. "Good night, sweetheart."

  One Monday after school, Helen picked up Miranda, Abby, and Susannah and drove to the Revere Mall, a huge complex of department stores, specialty shops, and restaurants on the outskirts of Boston. Abby sat up front next to Helen and chattered excitedly, her pale face flushed. She seemed childishly eager, thought Miranda, to shop for the new clothes Helen had promised. Miranda sat in back with Susannah. She had invited her friend along after Helen made it clear there was no getting out of this shopping expedition. Miranda hoped she and Susannah could slip away and browse in a bookstore or something while her mother and Abby bought out the junior department at Macy's.

  "You need a new pair of jeans and of course underwear and socks," Helen told Abby: "Also a skirt or two. And what about a new nightgown? Miranda's is really too big for you. A heavy flannel nightgown would keep you cozy in this weather."

  "You make it sound like I sleep out in the snow, Helen," objected Abby. "I always feel warm at your house. It's so cozy and ... and safe."

  "I'm glad." Helen took one gloved hand off the steering wheel and reached over to pat Abby's knee.

  Miranda crossed her arms across her chest and stared hard out the side window. Her head was aching again. She watched the bare trees blur as their car zipped past.

  "What about you, Susannah?" asked Helen. "Are you up for some fashion shopping?"

  Susannah leaned forward, laughing, and brandished her mother's credit card. "I'm armed and dangerous!"

  Abby giggled softly from the front seat. She seemed unusually animated today, more like a normal teenage girl than before. But Miranda suspected Abby was anything but normal. She dug her elbow into her friend's ribs. She couldn't bear to have Susannah falling in with Abby's high spirits. She needed Susannah to sustain her. But her friend was acting like a traitor now, leaning forward to discuss with Abby the best color choices for people who had blond hair, as both of them did. Miranda fingered her own dark curls and frowned out the window until they arrived at the mall and parked.

  Inside the department store, she sat outside the dressing room and rubbed her throbbing temples while her mother and Susannah dashed all over the place to find items for Abby to try on. They chose cotton turtlenecks, colorful sweaters, and skirts, handing them to Abby when she peeked around the concealing curtain. Helen wanted to come in to help, but Abby wouldn't let her.

  "Oh," she said in wonder, coming out to model the first outfit, "Is it really me? I look like a whole new person. Don't you think? Now I feel like a real modern-day girl!"

  "You look like a fashionable girl, that's for sure," said Helen. "And very pretty, too. The bright colors make you look less pale. Now, try on the other things. And before we go, I'd like to find you a winter jacket. The beige one you have is really worn quite thin."

  Miranda waited quietly while they trooped out to search for a coat. After about ten minutes they came back to the dressing room in triumph, and Abby modeled a thickly quilted denim jacket. "What do you think?" Helen asked Miranda.

  "It's fine." Miranda gave Abby a small smile. The pale girl beamed at herself in the mirror. She seemed astonished at her transformation.

  Miranda stood up from the little stool and picked up her own coat. "Can we go now?"

  "I still want to get Abby some underwear and a nightgown," said Helen. "And a pair or two of shoes. The ones she has now are worn out and unsuitable for the weather."

  "You can wear your new things to the Valentine's Dance, Abby," said Susannah as they left the dressing room. "You are going to that, aren't you?" Carrying the other clothes, Helen walked over to the saleswoman to pay.

  "Oh, no," said Abby. She stopped before a full-length mirror and turned this way and that, admiring her new jacket.

  "Why not?" pressed Susannah. "It could be fun. Mandy and I are on the committee to decorate the gym. It's going to be so pretty. You haven't really gotten to know any of the kids, Abby. This would be a good time."

  Helen beckoned to Abby. "Come over here, Abby. The salesclerk needs to see the tag on your coat."

  As she obediently walked away, Abby spoke over her shoulder to Susannah. "Kids these days don't really know how to dance at all." Her voice was emphatic. "It's so dumb the way they just leap around. School dances are always so embarrassing."

  Susannah looked at her in surprise, but Miranda narrowed her eyes. Kids these days? As if Abby were so much older. "Ignore her," she hissed to her friend, and then trailed behind as her mother led them to the shoe department, where Abby selected a pair of pink high-tops and some bright yellow, fleece-lined waterproof boots.

  "I'm beginning to see what you mean," said Susannah a few days later when she and Miranda were making brownies after school. They had come to the Johnstons' house especially to avoid Abby, who always went straight home after school. "Half the time I think Abby might want to be friends, but as soon as I try to get close to her, she says something totally nasty or weird. I mean, she says hello in the hall, and she loaned me a pen when I left mine in my locker, but whenever I ask if she wants to eat lunch with us or something, it's like she's deliberately nasty." Susannah looked insulted. Miranda was sorry to see her friend's feelings hurt but was also secretly relieved. She couldn't bear it if Susannah fell for Abby as thoroughly as her parents had.

  Miranda measured out a cup of chopped walnuts and stirred them into the brownie mix. Susannah poured the batter into the buttered pan and slipped the pan into the oven. They sat at the table to wait. Susannah flicked back her blond ponytail and glanced at the clock. "Eighteen minutes. How can we wait that long?"

  Miranda opened her backpack and drew out the school newspaper. "Have you seen Dan's photos of the Prindle House? They turned out really well. I wish we could have stayed longer that day, but you know Abby." She slid the paper across the table. She and Abby had stayed only for the ceremony when the Student Council presented the money raised from the flea market to the Historical Preservation Society. A lot of the other students started work on the house right after the ceremony, following the directions of the carpenters, but Abby
, who seemed bored by the whole preservation project, demanded they go home. Abby never let on she had been in the Prindle House before, and Miranda kept her secret.

  Susannah studied the photos Dan had taken. There was a shot of Mrs. Wainwright, as Historical Society President, surrounded by high school students and beaming as she held up their check. There was a picture of students setting to work to repair the staircase. Susannah was in the foreground, brandishing a hammer.

  "Hey, I'm famous!" She laughed, then jumped up to check on the brownies.

  Miranda was always hungry after school, especially on snowy days, and her hunger grew as the smell of warm chocolate filled the kitchen. She was enjoying the peace and warmth of the Johnstons' house—and the silence of no piano music—when the back door opened and Susannah's mother entered, wiping her snowy boots on the mat.

  "Hi, girls! Nice to see you, Mandy." She held the door for the frail, elderly woman with a cloud of white hair who came in slowly behind her, leaning with one gnarled hand on an aluminum-frame walker. The other arm was encased in a white cast.

  "Nonny!" cried Susannah, leaping up to hug her. "You're back!"

  Miranda grinned. She was very fond of Susannah's great-grandmother. The old woman had been born in Garnet, right in the house where Miranda's family now lived. Miranda enjoyed hearing stories about her house in the old days when Nonny was a little girl. Nonny was in her nineties now and growing increasingly frail. After her husband died last winter, Susannah's parents urged her to move in with them, and she did. She had recently been hospitalized with a badly broken arm after a fall on the icy front steps.

  Susannah patted Nonny's uninjured arm. "Is your suitcase in the car, Nonny? Shall I bring it in?"

  "Thank you, my dear, but your dad's fetching it." Nonny sniffed the air appreciatively. "Smells good in here."

  "We were making a batch of brownies for our after-school snack," Susannah told her. "We didn't know you were coming home from the hospital today, or we'd have made them in your honor."