Through Her Eyes

by Jennifer Archer

  Do it, I think. Or you’ll never know.

  My hand shakes as I pull the photograph from the envelope and lay it in my lap. I reach for Henry’s pocket watch and close my fingers tightly around it. Just as before, I tilt the crystal until it catches the lamplight. Just as before, a shimmering beam extends toward the fading image on the picture…expands…surrounds me.

  Suddenly I’m back in the frozen, black-and-white world of the photograph, standing beside my young grandfather, who is as still as a mannequin. The guy who resembles Tate stares down at us from where he sits above in the mulberry tree’s barren branches.

  Thump, thump. Thump, thump. Thump, thump.

  A bell clangs, shattering my nerves and the silence. I tell myself to turn toward the Quattlebaum farmhouse, but I’m afraid. I know the man is out there, bundled up in warm clothes, a shovel in his hands. Snow. That’s what he shovels; I know that now, too. There’s a black dog…a ball…white smoke drifting from the man’s mouth when he removes his gloves and blows on his fingers. No, not smoke…the cloud his breath makes when it hits the air. Because it’s winter and freezing outside. Everything is clear to me now—

  “Tansy?”

  Air moves around me in ripples…lake water touched by a breeze.

  “Do you want to watch a movie with us?”

  The air settles as I’m pulled back to the velvet chair by my mother’s voice. The room is warm. I shiver. I’m afraid to answer Mom, afraid to open my eyes. Terrified of what I might see.

  She knocks at the door. “Hey! Are you okay in there?”

  “Just a second,” I call, my throat as scratchy as if I’d swallowed sand.

  I blink and look down at the photograph in my lap. Papa Dan—old, feeble, and in vivid Kodak color—squints up at tree branches heavy with leaves, like he did as a frozen boy in the surreal world I just left. The branches, though, were bare in that world, and the tree was smaller. In the dead grass at his feet, something glimmers, an object I am sure was not in the picture before. I look closer, and feel a shifting take place inside me.

  The item is round and gold, the size of a gingersnap cookie.

  I lower my gaze to my lap and open my hand.

  Henry’s pocket watch is gone.

  10

  “You’re up early.” Mom slides her sunglasses to the tip of her nose as I walk down the porch stairs the next morning. Clutching a thorny weed in her gloved hand, she crouches next to the barren flower bed that borders the front of the house. A few feet away, Papa Dan sits in a lawn chair, looking lost.

  “I’m meeting Beth at the library at ten.”

  “Beth?”

  “Bethyl Ann Pugh. The librarian’s daughter. For our project, remember?”

  “Oh, that’s right.” Sitting back on her heels, Mom wrinkles her nose. “Her name is Bethyl Ann? That poor girl.”

  “Yeah, her parents pretty much doomed her to geekhood.” I tug my camera strap up to my shoulder and dart a glance toward the side of the house. After what happened last night, it wouldn’t surprise me if those mannequin boys came alive and walked around the corner. I almost wish they would, so Mom would see them, too.

  Mom glances at her watch. “It’s a long time until ten.”

  “I thought I’d go into town a little early and take some photos.”

  “Good idea.” She puts on the sunglasses again and tugs down on her straw hat when the breeze picks up. I don’t have to see her eyes to know they scrutinize me from behind those dopey pointed frames. “The library on a Saturday…that’s something new. I could get used to it.”

  “Don’t,” I say. Raising the camera, I adjust the focus. Mom strikes a pose and I snap her picture. “Can I take the van?”

  “Do you think you’ll be gone long?”

  “I should be home by lunch.”

  “Okay.” A strand of hair escapes her hat and blows across her eyes. “Haven’t seen you wear that cap in a while. It’s one of my favorites.”

  Papa Dan’s leather newsboy cap is a favorite of mine, too. I considered giving up his hats after what happened with Mrs. Tilby but decided against it. I’m wearing them outside of school, whether people make fun of me or not. My grandfather’s hats are a part of me, and now that I might be losing my mind, holding on to every other piece of myself that I can is a priority. I wonder: Did Papa Dan feel the same way? Does he still?

  “Why don’t you and Beth have lunch on me?” Mom asks. “My purse is in the kitchen. There’s a twenty in my wallet.”

  Lunch in town with Bethyl Ann—just what my reputation doesn’t need. But it’ll be worth it if I find out more about Henry. And maybe something about Papa Dan’s past, too.

  Clasping my hands behind my back, I walk over to Papa Dan. “Morning,” I say.

  He fidgets, his fingers gripping his knees, off in his own world today. Papa Dan’s expression has never been so blank, and his sudden frailness strikes me again like a slap in the face. How did my stout grandfather become so thin in such a short time?

  Feeling helpless, I return my attention to Mom. “Why are you pulling weeds?”

  Clods of dirt fall off her gardening gloves as she brushes her hands together. “Don’t you think they need to be pulled?”

  “Yes, but weeds have never fazed you before.”

  A horn honks, and I shift to see the Cedar Canyon Handyman Service truck turn onto our road. It’s become a familiar sight, but something’s different this time; I think I recognize Sheriff Ray Don in the passenger seat.

  Mom waves and grins. “They’re going to start painting the outside of the house.”

  “The sheriff paints, too?”

  “He helps out sometimes. Ray is Bill’s brother.”

  “The handyman’s name is Bill Dilworth?” She nods, and I mutter, “That’s almost as bad as Bethyl Ann.”

  The truck swings into the driveway and pulls to a stop beside our van. As Mom hurries over to greet the Dilworth brothers, I wander to the side of the house and inspect the grass beneath the mulberry tree. Last night after Mom and Papa Dan went to bed, I returned to the turret and searched everywhere for Henry’s pocket watch. I couldn’t find it. It’s not out here, either; how could it be? I was holding it when I stepped through that prism of light and into the picture. That sounds absurd, I know; how could I possibly do such a thing? I couldn’t, which brings me back to the insanity theory, an explanation that twists my stomach into knots. But if I’m crazy, how did the watch wind up in the picture? Was it there all along? Did I only imagine finding it in the cellar? Holding it in my hand?

  A rustling in the hedge beside the house draws me over. Bracing my hands on my knees, I lean forward to peer into the bush and spot a little bird ruffling pale brown feathers. I expect it to startle at the sight of me and fly away, but instead it climbs out and hops to the top of the hedge. The bird’s straight legs move restlessly. Its chestnut tail twitches. I wonder if it is the same bird I saw on my windowsill my first day here.

  “Did you lose something?” Mom asks from behind me.

  “Come here,” I whisper, turning to motion her over. “I think I found the loudmouth that’s been keeping me up at night.” She pauses at my side, but when I face the hedge again, the bird is gone.

  “What is it?” Mom moves closer, leans down.

  “There was a bird here. We must have scared it off.”

  “You’d think we would’ve seen it fly away.”

  I frown. “Yeah, I know.”

  Mom steps back. “Aren’t you going to say hello to the Dilworths?”

  “I guess.” Hoping to startle the bird from its hiding place, I shake the bush gently. No luck. I have the weirdest sense that a puzzle piece is within my reach. Pieces, actually, not just one. The bird. The man and dog I’ve seen at the Quattlebaums’ farm. The scene I stepped into last night. The artifacts from the cellar. The lost watch and how it’s always set to 12:22. Henry’s resemblance to Tate. All clues…but to what?

  I follow Mom up front again, where th
e men are unloading supplies from the bed of the truck. Lifting a hand, I yell, “Hello!” and the Dilworth brothers call back a greeting.

  While Mom talks to the two of them, I go inside the house, find her purse in the kitchen, and take the money from her wallet. When I return to the yard, she’s on her knees in front of the flower bed, tugging at the weeds again. “You leaving?” she asks.

  “Yes.” I start toward the driveway, then hesitate. “Mom?”

  She drops a dandelion into the small pile of weeds at her side and glances up at me.

  Words pummel my throat, the truth wanting out. Taking a breath, I push the words back. For some reason, I feel ashamed. What will Mom think if I tell her about what I’ve seen through the lens of my camera? About stepping into the photograph and hearing the voice in Papa Dan’s room? What would she do? Would she be worried enough that she’d take me to a doctor? Maybe. I’m no expert on mental illness, but I’m pretty sure what I’m experiencing is symptomatic of schizophrenia or something worse. Delusional. Isn’t that the label shrinks slap on whacked-out people who see and hear things that can’t exist?

  “Tansy, what is it?” Mom asks.

  “Nothing,” I say. “Never mind.”

  Mom tugs off a glove. “I know how upset you are about moving. I wish you’d talk to me about it.”

  “I’m okay.”

  “I was hoping for better than okay.”

  I walk over to her, kiss the top of her head, and step back. “I am. Better than okay, that is.” I manage a smile. “Don’t worry about me so much.”

  “Are you using that new notebook I bought for you?”

  “Mom.” I make a face at her. As if a diary would solve anything.

  Mom hesitates, then says, “Do you like it here?”

  “You mean Cedar Canyon?” She nods, and I shrug. “Do you like it?”

  Mom darts a look toward the driveway, where Sheriff Ray Don is bent over the bed of the truck. “The people are nice enough.”

  “What about the house? Are you happy with it?”

  “Yes. Aren’t you?”

  “Yeah, but I just meant, you know…is it right for your story?”

  “It’s perfect, as a matter of fact. Being so isolated out here really helps me set the atmosphere.” She shakes loose dirt out of her glove, then puts it on again. “Oh! I forgot to tell you that Papa Dan and I drove to the canyon and saw the bridge yesterday. It’s fantastic! If only it could tell me all its secrets. Now, that would be a best seller for sure.”

  Leave it to my mother to talk about an inanimate object as if it’s a living, breathing thing. “Did Papa Dan act like he recognized it?”

  “Funny that you ask that—he wouldn’t get out of the van.”

  I search her face for clues that she might’ve noticed something strange out there or something even more odd about my grandfather’s behavior. Maybe, like me, she’s just afraid to admit it. But the sunglasses hide her eyes, and I only hear wistfulness in her tone, so I say, “Maybe I’ll go out there later today.”

  “Tansy…If something’s wrong at school, you’ll tell me, won’t you?”

  I start to assure her again that everything’s fine, but then the toll of a bell vibrates the morning air, making me jump. “Did you hear that?”

  “What?” Mom pushes to her feet.

  “A bell. Over at the Quattlebaums’.”

  “A bell?”

  She follows me to the side of the house, where I squint across the field at our neighbors’ property.

  “Looks pretty quiet over there,” Mom murmurs in a baffled voice.

  She’s right; there isn’t a person in sight at the Quattlebaums’ farm.

  “What a pretty place,” she says. “So peaceful. You should take a picture.”

  Murmuring, “I will,” I look through the viewfinder and see the man with the shovel and the black dog running toward the barn. I know without looking at my watch that the time is 8:15. A ringing starts in my ears, and scattered pinpoints of light fill my narrowing vision. The camera feels too heavy to hold. I quickly turn away from the scene.

  “Tansy?” Mom lays her hand on my arm. “You’re shaking.”

  The truth knocks at my throat again, and for a moment I’m ready to tell Mom everything and risk having her think I’m hallucinating—maybe because I’m thinking it, too. But then Papa Dan wanders around the corner to join us, and I can’t do that to my mother. How could she handle knowing that Papa Dan and I are losing our marbles at the very same time? I have to work this out on my own.

  “I just had a chill,” I say, pulling away to head for the van and my escape.

  Papa Dan leans against the repair truck, watching the Dilworth brothers stir paint. I’m startled by how young he looks with his elbow propped on the hood of the truck, his ankles crossed, and his hat at a crooked angle atop his head. I pause, tightening my grip on the camera, dread coiling in the pit of my stomach. I can’t resist; I have to look.

  The scene the lens reveals is black-and-white. Our van, on the far side of the drive, has disappeared, and an old-fashioned car replaces Bill Dilworth’s truck. The black car—a convertible—has fenders around the tires that look like doughnuts cut in half, and the headlights remind me of tiny, round spectacles. Papa Dan is young, a teenager with suspicious eyes that peer from beneath the brim of his cap—the same newsboy cap I’m wearing now. He stares at something or someone offscreen.

  In books about photography, I’ve read the term parallax, but I didn’t understand the meaning until now. Parallax refers to a difference in what the photographer sees through the viewfinder and what shows up on the film once the picture is shot. I capture the scene in front of me, certain nothing I’m seeing now will appear in the actual picture.

  “Ohmygosh! Listen to this!” Bethyl Ann touches the microfiche screen.

  Expecting her to recount the boring details of yet another of Mr. and Mrs. Peterson’s trips “abroad,” I continue looking through a book about birds I found on the library’s nonfiction aisle. I scan the pages for a picture of the bird I saw in the hedge. My two hours with Bethyl Ann at the tiny old house that serves as Cedar Canyon’s library have been a total waste. I can’t help wondering if her claims of finding articles about Henry were a scheme to get me to hang out with her. We haven’t run across a single one.

  “Maybe we should go to the newspaper office,” I say absently, flipping through the pages of colorful bird photos. “I bet they have archives of old papers, too.”

  “Look.” Beth nudges me with an elbow.

  “Just tell me what it says.”

  “It’s about a Christmas party at the Peterson place. I didn’t find this one before.”

  I turn another page in the bird book, pause, and announce, “This is it!” Smiling, I press my finger against a photo of a small bird with pale brown wings and a brownish red tail. “My insomniac bird is a nightingale.” I clear my throat and read, “The sun-shy nightingale is one of only a few bird species that sing primarily at night. Known for its melancholy serenades sung in low, haunting whistles and refrains, the nightingale has been a frequent subject of mythologists, poets, and songwriters throughout time.”

  “Sorry, Charlie. Impossible.” Bethyl Ann gives the page a dismissive glance. “Nightingales don’t exist in North America, only England. Unless your bird swam the Atlantic, it’s something else.”

  I read further into the text and sigh. “You’re right. But I swear this is the bird I saw.” Or did I? Maybe that was a figment of my imagination, too.

  Bethyl Ann blinks at me and sniffs. “As I was saying…” She returns her attention to the microfiche. “The Petersons were having a Christmas party and the ten-foot blue spruce tree in their parlor went up in flames.”

  “When?” I close the book and lay it in my lap.

  “Henry was seventeen. A reporter interviewed one of the guests, and he said everyone was in the parlor for the tree lighting while Henry played his violin for them.” Squinting at the screen,
she twirls a strand of hair around her index finger and continues, “When Mr. Peterson plugged the tree in, it exploded. Everyone except Henry screamed and got the hell out of Dodge. He kept playing ‘Silent Night’ as if nothing had happened.”

  I laugh. “The paper says they got the hell out of Dodge?”

  “No, I said that, smarty-pants. The paper said they ran.” She smirks at me. “Henry did it, of course.”

  “Did what? Blew up the tree?”

  “Big duh.”

  “But why would Henry blow up his parents’ tree?”

  “Though this be madness, yet there is method in it.” Bethyl Ann shrugs. “Maybe he wanted to get their attention. Maybe he didn’t like them.”

  “He was a spoiled rich kid. They probably gave him whatever he wanted.”

  “Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind,” she says.

  I decide it’s a waste of time to try to silence her Shakespearean tongue. The quotes are so much a part of Bethyl Ann, I doubt she could speak without them.

  “Here’s another one.” She leans closer to the screen and reads, “William and Lenore Peterson were summoned home early from a business trip to Chicago when their teenaged son, Henry, suffered a gunshot wound to the foot while cleaning a hunting rifle in the turret of their mansion east of town. Though recorded as an accident, Miss Adeline Ivy, the Petersons’ housekeeper, suggested the wound was self-inflicted. Miss Ivy resigned from her job and left Cedar Canyon soon after our interview.” Bethyl Ann lifts her wide-eyed gaze to mine. “Wow. See? I told you he hurt himself on purpose.”

  Uneasiness flutters in my chest. If the rumors are true, why was Henry so disturbed? I’ve been pretty unhappy at times. Depressed, even. But I can’t imagine shooting myself in the foot or anywhere else.

  I recall the pale face of the guy in the tree, his black marble gaze staring down at me. He’s Henry. I don’t know why I’m so sure of it, but I am. I wish I was as certain of everything else—that I had answers to all the questions crowding my mind. Does he want something from me? Why is he upsetting Papa Dan? And what’s up with his resemblance to Tate? Does Tate have something to do with all of this?