“Should we stop the tape?” Joss asks.
“No,” I murmur weakly. This isn’t too strange—we’re sisters, I tell myself. Sisters look alike. Like Mom and Myrlie. Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsenfrom that old TV show Full House. Okay, they’re twins. How about my friend …? But I can’t think of any friends—or even acquaintances—who look so much like their sisters. Elizabeth and I are identical except for the glasses.
“Look how much Elizabeth is blinking,” Myrlie says. “Remember how determined she was that those contacts were going to work out?”
Oh, I think, and it’s like I’ve had yet another bombshell dropped on me.
But I force myself to keep watching the TV screen, and I notice a few, small differences. Elizabeth has a tiny scar just above her lips, that gives her whole face a mischievous look. Her eyes light up and she bounces in her seat while she talks, as if it’s impossible for her to keep all her energy and enthusiasm bottled up. I don’t think I’ve ever looked that self-confident and unguarded, even in the days before Mom started crying full-time.
“And what do you like to do in your spare time? Besides gymnastics?” Tom asks from behind the camera.
“Oh, we don’t have spare time,” Joss says, and Tom swings the camera toward her. “We don’t even have time to do our homework, except in the car on the way to gymnastics. It’s always practice, practice, practice. We have to work really hard.”
Up close, eleven-year-old Joss’s face shocks me nearly as much as Elizabeth’s. Joss looks not just smaller and younger, but unformed somehow, as if the pieces that are going to come together to make the grown-up Joss aren’t all there yet. Her dark eyes seem a little vacant, and she seems to be trying too hard to be as enthusiastic and peppy as Elizabeth.
“Yes, we do practice a lot, but I have other interests besides gymnastics,” Elizabeth says, and Tom focuses the camera back on her. “I like to run and paint and read and watch TV and go to movies. In fact, when I grow up and I’m too old to be a gymnast, I’m going to go to Hollywood and be a set designer. Either that, or be a raconteur. That’s someone who tells stories.”
Beside me, Joss laughs.
“I’d almost forgotten how much Elizabeth liked using big words that nobody else knew,” she says. “I mean, raconteur? From a twelve year old?”
Myrlie chuckles too, and neither of them seem to notice that I’ve gone stiff with horror. I’m the one who wants to be a movie set designer, I think. I’m the one who likes to collect unusual words. In fact, “raconteur,” is exactly the kind of word I would have added to my list, though it’s ruined for me now.
Is it because Elizabeth and I were raised by the same parents? I wonder. Did they do something to make both of us love words and movies?
As if on cue, I hear my mother’s voice from the TV.
“Girls! Where are you?” she calls in the distance. “Time to go home!”
“And here are the parents of the two gymnastics prodigies,” Tom says turning the camera toward Mom’s voice. “Walter and Hillary Krull, and Myrlie Wilker and her husband—hmm, can’t think where her husband could have gotten to. Tell the viewers of America: What’s it like to have such talented daughters?”
“Exhausting!”
I think that’s Myrlie’s voice, but once again, the camera is taking a long time to focus, so it’s hard to tell. Three blurry people are stepping out of the front door onto the porch—one tall, two short.
And then the focus finally kicks in and I see my parents and Myrlie as they used to be. They all look so young it’s tempting to think of them as kids as well. None of them have any wrinkles; Mom and Myrlie both have blond hair as radiant as Elizabeth’s; my dad isn’t stooped over at all but stands tall and straight and proud, with a full head of longish, sandy-colored hair. An older, white-haired woman joins them at the door. The real Myrlie, I think—but no, it’s the grandmother, passing out good-bye hugs and calling out, “Come for Sunday dinner next week too! Same time!” I hear Elizabeth, off-camera, asking, “Mom, can Joss come home with us?” and then Joss complaining, “Dad! You don’t need to tape this. The profile’s over.”
“Oh, all right,” he says agreeably, and the screen goes black, then turns to fuzz.
The real-life, present-day, adult Joss sighs beside me.
“I wish he’d taped it all,” she says. “Every single second.” She hits a button on the remote, shutting off the TV, and the three of us blink, resurfacing from the past.
TWENTY-ONE
We don’t really talk about the video. Myrlie and Joss seem a little lost in their memories, and I’m struggling to act normal while carrying on an internal debate. She didn’t look that much like me…. Yes, she did…. No, she didn’t….
“Want to play cards or something?” Joss finally says.
Myrlie and I both shrug, but that’s all the encouragement Joss needs. She pulls out an Uno Robo-Attack, the old-fashioned card game jazzed up with a little robot that shoots out cards when you least expect it. I’ve played it a few times at friends’ houses, though all we have at home is the original game.
“I thought you were crazy when you gave me this last Christmas,” Myrlie says, pepping up a little. “But it’s actually a pretty fun game.”
After a few rounds, all three of us are much more energized, throwing down the “Hit Four, Robo-Scum!” cards with great relish. Myrlie is even laughing again.
“When I was a little girl, my great-aunt Agatha would have been scandalized by the notion of playing cards on Sunday,” she says. “And with a minister, no less!”
“Your great-aunt Agatha obviously had no sense of humor,” Joss says. “And no appreciation for the importance of playfulness in God’s world.”
She hits the button on the top of the Attack Robot and groans when it spits six cards at her.
“Appreciate playfulness, remember?” Myrlie taunts her. She frowns at her own handful of cards. “Sorry, Bethany, this is the only green card I have.”
She puts down a “Zap! Hit-fire!” card, which usually would mean that I’m at the mercy of the Attack Robot, too.
“Oh, don’t be sorry,” I say. “Save your pity for … yourself!” I lay down my “Throwback Attack” card, which makes her, not me, the robot’s victim.
“Great play!” Joss crows. She throws her arm around my shoulder, as if the two of us are ganging up on Myrlie. “Oh, Elizabeth,” she says, “it’s so nice having you back! I’ve missed…”—she gets a stricken look on her face—“you,” she finishes lamely.
All three of us freeze. The Attack Robot’s eyes flash red and green and yellow, like some malfunctioning traffic signal. Stop, go, caution …
“I wish we could pretend I didn’t say that,” Joss says quietly. “I know you’re not Elizabeth. I’m sorry.”
The Attack Robot hums at us. Joss and Myrlie stare at me, their expressions mirroring one another: mixtures of regret and compassion and confusion and fear.
“Am I really that much like her?” I ask forlornly.
“Yes … no …,” Myrlie says, at the same time that Joss says, “No … yes.” They look at each other and shrug.
“You saw the video,” Myrlie says apologetically. “There is a strong resemblance.”
“It’s like, you know how things look different when you look at them out of the corner of your eye, instead of straight on?” Joss says. “Out of the corner of my eye, you are Elizabeth. Same features, same expressions, same person. But straight on, you’re different.”
“You’re a lot quieter than Elizabeth,” Myrlie says. “More … self-contained.”
“Elizabeth could be such a spaz,” Joss says. “Hyperkinetic. And so sure of herself—I’m going to be in the Olympics, I’m going to win more gold medals than anyone else, I’m going to be the most famous gymnast ever.’”
“She was ambitious,” Myrlie agrees. “Hillary was like that too, as a child. And then when Elizabeth was born, she transferred all her ambition to her daughter….”
&n
bsp; She glances toward me as if she wonders if she should have said that. I am also Hillary’s daughter.
I think back to the years before my mother cried full-time. Was my mother ambitious for me?
Oh, honey, don’t worry about it. You’re doing the best you can, she’d tell me when I was little and I couldn’t quite manage to color inside the lines.
You don’t need those friends. You’ve got Mommy and Daddy, she’d tell me in third, fourth, fifth grade when I fretted about my ranking in the various popularity contests of school.
Let’s just stay home together, she’d say when I suggested going just about anywhere: the skating rink, the zoo, a play. If I pushed at all, she’d give in. But I had to push.
My mother isn’t ambitious for me, I think. She’s done everything she can to hold me back.
I shove myself away from the table and the Uno Attack Robot and Myrlie and Joss.
“I don’t want to play anymore,” I say, sounding just like a spoiled little kid. “I’m tired. I’m going to bed.”
“That’s fine, dear,” Myrlie says.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Joss says. “Good night.”
They watch me climb the stairs. I know they will talk about me after they think I’m in bed, out of earshot. I am tempted to creep back down to the landing, press my ear against a wall and listen, out of sight.
Instead I pull my pillow over my head and clutch it tightly to my ears, so there’s no danger of any sound leaking in.
TWENTY-TWO
When I wake up the next morning, I find Joss puttering around in the kitchen. But Myrlie is missing.
“She went on in to work, since I’d be here with you today,” Joss says casually. “She’s got one kid in her class she’s really worried about—she didn’t think he’d do well, having another day with a sub. You don’t mind, do you?”
I know I’m supposed to say, “No, that’s all right. It doesn’t matter.” I’m supposed to remember that Myrlie had a life before I showed up on her doorstep, that she’s responsible for an entire classroom of kindergarteners. She’s not actually supposed to be responsible for me. My parents are. And it’s not like she’s left me alone. Joss is a perfectly acceptable substitute. She’s an adult too, however much she may clown around. She’s a minister, for God’s sake.
Still, I want to say, childishly, “I do mind. Make her come home. Now.”
If that kind of strategy worked, I would have gotten Mom and Dad back, I’d be home in Pennsylvania, I’d know the answers to all the questions I’ve wanted to ask ever since I arrived in Illinois.
I grunt noncommittally and reach into the cereal cupboard.
“I had some of the leftover chocolate cake for breakfast, myself,” Joss says. “I know Mom and Aunt Hillary would be horrified, but, hey, they’re not here. Want some?”
“No, thanks,” I say. I notice a box of instant oatmeal beyond the cereal. I grab it instead. Moments later, I’ve just taken my first bite when I realize Joss is staring at me. I lower my spoon.
“Elizabeth loved oatmeal, too, didn’t she?” I say miserably. Myrlie’s exact words ring belatedly in my head: She’d choose it over chocolate. And now that’s just what I’ve done.
Joss nods slowly.
“What do you say we put a moratorium on Elizabeth talk today?” she says. “Pretend she never existed?”
“Sounds good to me,” I say.
“That is, unless you want to bring her up, as a topic of conversation,” Joss says. She hesitates. “What do you think about your parents? Do you want to make them off-limits too?”
I think about this. Joss knew my parents twenty years ago, when they were Walter and Hillary Krull, so she might be able to provide some insight I don’t have. But Walter and Hillary Krull were Elizabeth’s parents, not mine.
“They’re verboten too,” I say. For a second I think Joss might want to comment on my choice of words, maybe mention that verboten was one of Elizabeth’s favorites too. But Joss only shrugs.
“Fine by me,” she says. “Any other ground rules you think we ought to have?”
We discuss all sorts of restrictions, even ridiculous ones, like banning any mention of SpongeBob SquarePants. I can see what Joss is doing, trying to make me feel like I have some sort of power, some small sense of control. But seeing through her ploy doesn’t make it any less effective. I can’t summon my parents back, I can’t make the phone ring, I can’t understand why my last name is Cole when my sister’s last name was Krull. But I find a tiny glimmer of happiness voting thumbs down on SpongeBob.
“Okay, so we know what we can and can’t talk about,” Joss says. “What are we going to do today? Mom says you’re big on swimming—”
“I don’t want to do that today,” I say quickly.
“Fine, fine,” Joss says. “It’d be crazy to stay indoors today anyhow. According to the radio, today is supposed to be absolutely stunning, autumn’s last gasp of glory before we all fall into winter—no pun intended, of course. And it just so happens there’s an incredible park just twenty minutes from Sanderfield….”
So we go hiking. McCutcheon State Park, I discover, is a beautiful near-wilderness with windy trails that stretch my leg muscles every bit as much as a swim session would have. I’m tempted to ask Joss what kind of memories she has of this place—were there family picnics here back in the seventies and eighties and nineties? Did Elizabeth hang upside down from that tree over there? Did either of the girls fall down and scrape their knees on that rock over here? But I stifle those questions and pretend that Joss and I are both discovering the park for the very first time.
Joss proves to be a good guide, full of information about why different trees turn different colors, which kind of tree will lose its leaves first. As we near a clearing on our trail, she dives down and grabs a small, fanlike yellow leaf.
“Ginkgo,” she says, and looks around. “Aha.”
She points at a brilliant yellow tree off to the side, beautifully shaped, its branches gracefully swaying in the breeze.
“Imported from China,” she says. “I don’t know what it’s doing here. Ginkgo is a prehistoric species. They’ve survived for centuries, even though most of the other plant life from their time period went extinct a long time ago. And scientists consider them absolutely unique, in a class by themselves, because they can’t really be classified as either conifers or deciduous.”
“How do you know so much about trees?” I ask.
“I was a double major in college,” Joss says. “Religious studies and biology.”
I give her a dubious look, and Joss laughs.
“I know,” Joss says. “Both of my advisers thought I was absolutely crazy.”
I pick up a handful of ginkgo leaves and arrange them all stemside down, like a bouquet. Then I release them into the wind.
“Didn’t that get confusing, taking tests?” I ask. “Did you have to keep reminding yourself which class you were in? You know, that whole thing about creationism and evolution …?”
“I didn’t get confused at all,” Joss says. “Science and religion deal with different questions. Science is how things happen and religion is why. The problem comes when people forget what they’re asking of whom. Now, when do you think we should stop for lunch?”
“What category does that question fit in?” I ask. “Science or religion?”
“Now you’re really taxing my mind, you little smart aleck,” Joss says, and playfully swings her backpack at me.
When we arrive back at Myrlie’s house, hours later, I feel like I’m returning from a vacation. I’ve got windburned cheeks and a slightly sunburned nose. My calf muscles have that same pleasant little ache that I get after swimming. And I’ve mostly managed to avoid thinking about Elizabeth or my parents the entire day.
But then as we’re walking across the porch I notice the empty hooks on the ceiling where the swing once hung—the swing where Elizabeth and Joss sat, all those years ago. And when we walk in the front door,
Myrlie is there on the couch, huddled over papers strewn across the coffee table. She starts to gather the papers together when she sees us, then gives up and just leans back against the couch.
“What’s all this?” Joss asks.
“I got a package from Walter, today,” Myrlie says. “We don’t have to worry about emergency medical care for Bethany anymore.”
I pick up a paper from the edge of the table. It’s a form written in hard-to-follow legal terms, but it seems to be giving Myrlie the right to take care of me in any circumstance, in whatever way she thinks is best. It’s signed in my father’s familiar handwriting, “Walter Cole.”
“See?” I say, holding it up. “Didn’t I tell you—?”
But I look over, and Joss is holding a similar form. It’s signed “Walter Krull.”
I reach down and there are more papers, signed “Walter Ebern,” “Walter Stanton,” even “Walter Ronkowski.”
“He sent your birth certificate, too,” Myrlie says. “Certificates, I mean.”
According to the papers in front of me, I am Bethany Cole, born in Riverview, Pennsylvania; or Bethany Ebern, born in Albuquerque, New Mexico; or Bethany Stanton, born in Viewmont, Minnesota; or Bethany Ronkowski, born in Atlanta, Georgia.
“He wrote that I should keep all of these safe,” Myrlie says, holding up a scrawled note. “Only use them if I have to. What did he think I was planning to do?”
Joss and Myrlie stare at me, like they think I might have an answer, like they think I might know more than I’ve told them.
“Who am I supposed to be?” I whimper. “Who am I really?”
No one answers.
“Let me see the envelope,” Joss says. “Where was he when he mailed this?” She hunts through the papers and surfaces with a padded cardboard mailer. But there’s no return address. The only postmark says “Sanderfield, Illinois.”
“He could have tossed this in a mailbox Thursday night as he left town,” Myrlie says in disgust.
“Or he could be hanging out just a few miles down the road,” Joss says. “Ever think of that?”
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