“Remember when Martha quoted that Chinese saying that ‘even the palest ink is better than the best memory’? It’s true. Sometimes, I wish Dad had kept all our small love notes and letters, but we moved around so much that, well, I guess it was just too many boxes to move around with us.” Her eyes grew moist as she shook her head. “And here I go again, getting all sentimental again, thinking about Dad.” She looked at me and smiled. “Just remember, the written word is very powerful. It can not only convey so many feelings, it can also evoke feelings you didn’t know you had. Sometimes you just have to read between the lines.”
“What are you saying?”
She looked up at the ceiling and I noticed a silent tear escape her eyes. “I’m just saying, um, I’m just trying to explain what Franz was trying to tell us when he mentioned the letters from Napoleon. I guess he questioned why we were on a mission, impossible or not, to find Hans when, perhaps, he might not be the one you’re looking for, or should be looking for. I know he’s Alfred’s dad and all, and I know that’s mostly why you’ve decided to find him, but don’t let that muddy the waters when it comes to you. Being a mother and a woman are two different things. You need to separate those two things—passion and paternity. Now, try to close your eyes a little and get in a small power nap. We’ll be there in less than forty minutes.” She leaned all the way back in her seat and closed her eyes, leaving me with a million questions… For starters, what did she mean by read between the lines? How, and where?
Not able to close an eye, let alone sleep, I opened my laptop instead and found a few likes and a long comment from Martha that almost brought me back to the letters Mom had just romanticized about, tears and all.
Martha Jensen
Dear all. Sorry, I didn’t write for a few days. My arthritis is acting up again now that we’ve had a few days with humidity and drizzles (sweet Seattle rain, as your dad would say) I do love following you around though. This Facebook page is quite entertaining and informative, and it sure brings back memories, travelling to and from Europe many moons ago … Gosh, I can’t wait until you get to Denmark. I wish Thomas and Eleanor had made a similar page, too. Don’t hear a lot from them, except when they write here… Hope all is good (that was a friendly reminder to call your old mother @Thomas Jensen). And that Mrs. Rock of yours. I feel like I’m getting to know her quite well day by day, post by post. Just like your trip, she’s full of surprises. I have a feeling we’ll all be great friends when you are all home and safe. I miss you and your mom and our little coffee dates. The outdoor garden looks even more empty on Wednesdays, our weekly day together. I truly hope Abby gets to walk in the footsteps of Paul. I’m so very jealous and happy for her. Remember how many times we’ve talked about this, even more after we watched his carpool karaoke with James Corden. Oh, just thinking about it now brings tears to this old sentimental fool’s eyes … The part about how he was inspired to write “Let it Be,” by his late mother. Oh dear. Anyway, I hope Abby gets to see it all, and as for you, dear, I hope you find what you’re looking for. Remember, to quote a once young lad from Liverpool, “All you need is love.” All my love. Frederick says hi.
I couldn’t help smiling when I envisioned her sitting by the bay window—her favorite spot—The Cat in The Hat purring in her lap, as she imagined Mom walking through the little townhome where Paul grew up, with his brother, dad, and mom. I looked down at her words again and noticed then that someone had loved and commented on her. When I saw who it was, I was almost in shock.
Aaron T. Rock.
All you need is love.
All you need is love.
All you need is love.
Not only had he loved and commented on the post, he had also shared a few lines from the song itself.
I looked over at Mrs. Rockefeller. She was fast asleep, her head rolling in a half circle, the way people do when they sit upright and sleep. I would tell her about Aaron later, at the right time, and she could deal with it and their future together then. Now, I had to deal with myself and my own future.
***
“Hello, ladies.” The chauffeur tipped his black hat and opened the trunk, and we all, including Alfred and Ava, just stared at him. Of course, we knew he wasn’t Boris, considering we had just waved goodbye to him at Brandenburg Airport, but he looked so much like him that he could be his stuntman double, if he ever needed one, that is.
“Is all ye’ have, love?” he asked with his cute cockney English (which sounded nothing like Boris’s heavy German accented English). He nodded down at the backpack by my feet.
“It is.” I looked over at Mom’s backpack.
“We travel light.” Mom smiled.
The chauffer’s eyes darted over to the sidewalk, to Mrs. Rockefeller and her two big heavy suitcases. “Some of ye, ay see.” He looked back and forth between the heavy suitcases and the trunk of the car as if to measure, I guess, if he even had room for Mrs. Rockefeller’s tower of suitcases, now missing a few floors. “It’ll work, I reckon.” He started hauling one of the suitcases over to the car, straining a bit. “Wha’ ye go’ in here?” he began, looking in Mrs. Rockefeller’s direction. “Did ye bring all ye the complete silverware from home.” He winked at me and leaned the suitcase against the car. “Me mum used to bring all kind o’ useless stuff, too, like her own ironing board. Can you believe?” He stood up tall and looked at Mrs. Rockefeller.
“Well, I can, in fact. If you have something that works for you, then….” She cupped her hair and smiled. “Do you need a hand with that?” She gestured toward the suitcases.
“Na, I’m good.” He offered a loud crackling laugh. “Besides, who’s gonna help me—this fine lad?” He squatted down beside Alfred and tipped his hat. “Just ye tell ‘em ladies to get in the car. Alfred got this?”
“Alfred?” Alfred and I said at the same time.
The chauffeur saluted Alfred. “Alfred Junior. Me’ dad, rest his beloved kind soul, was the first but them called him ‘Red’ because of the hair. Sometimes people call me Red too.” He took off his hat and revealed a head of red stubbles.
“My-my name is Alfred, too,” Alfred informed him, all proud.
“Really? What a fine name for a fine lil’ lad. And I see red hair runs in this family, too.” The chauffeur a.k.a Alfred Junior slash Red looked up at me and Mom. “These two could for sure be me daughters. They are almost as beautiful as me, don’t ye’ think?” A smile stretched across his face.
“Mom is.” Alfred looked up at me and nodded.
“Mums are the best in the entire world.” Alfred Junior
stood up and gestured toward the car. “Well, what are we waiting for now? Hop in. We got this.” He winked down at Alfred.
“Well, that’s quite the character.” Mrs. Rockefeller adjusted the mirror and got out her lipstick.
“I think he’s lovely—lovely,” Mom tried, copying Alfred Junior’s accent.
“Well, I think it’s lovely we’re actually here already. I owe Colleen quite a compensation for a job well done.”
I fastened the seatbelt around Ava and looked at Mrs. Rockefeller in the mirror. “But how did she even do it, I mean, how do you get on a semi-private plane in less than an hour? And make sure that they have gluten-free crackers. I’m pretty impressed.”
“Me too.” Mom held up the bag of crackers as proof. Of course, she had decided to bring the remainder of the bag, reasoning that the odds that someone with celiac would board the plane within the next three days (apparently, the amount of time it takes for gluten-free crackers to go stale), was as plausible as us being on a private plane in the first place. “And they are good, too,” Mom added around the crackers.
“Well, it’s not like she just found them. They were expensive AF.”
“Ohh, Mrs. Rockefeller, as in…” I lowered my voice and scooted a little closer, “As in ‘as fuck’?”
She looked in the mirror and nodded.
“I didn’t know you even knew what that meant,” I tea
sed.
“I learned it from Jonathan—Jonathan Van Ness—from “Queer Eye,” my favorite TV show. He says it all the time, so I had to look it up.” She ran the lipstick over her lower lip and smiled.
“Queer Eye, huh? You really are full of surprises.”
“Or maybe you have, no offense, been colored by your dad. I mean, just because you are rich AF doesn’t necessarily make you an asshole who only watches boring BBC documentaries or cooking shows, which, FYI, are my least favorite thing to watch.” She pursed her lips together and took one last look in the mirror before she slipped it up again.
“You might be right. And no offense taken.” I looked over at Mom, who was nodding her head, her mouth still full of crackers.
“You’re right,” I think she said. “You also owe at least two pennies to the travelling swear jar.” She looked over her shoulder and continued with a low whisper, “Alfred thinks we have it with us.” Mom smiled.
“Ah, you and your jar. The good thing about being rich AF is that you can swear as much as you like ‘cause you can afford it.” Mrs. Rockefeller threw her head back and laughed.
“And that’s exactly what makes you, in Dad’s words, a rich asshole,” I teased, which cut a smile on her face.
“I guess you’re right. Now what’s taking him so long?”
We all looked toward the back of the car. Alfred Junior was standing right behind the open trunk, his legs widespread and arms crossed over his black blazer, staring. I’m afraid Mrs. Rockefeller was about to lose yet another of her big suitcases.
***
Mom was as giddy as a little kid on steroids in Disneyland. Not only was she in Liverpool—the hometown of the Fab Four and birthplace of “Penny Lane,” “Hey Jude,” “Lucy in the sky with diamonds,” and of course, “Eleanor Rigby”; Colleen had booked us two rooms at the Hard Day’s Night Hotel, the only Beatles-inspired hotel in the whole world, located in the heart of Liverpool’s so-called Beatles Quarter.
Whether it was pure coincidence and the only uppity place to get with such short notice, we didn’t know, but Mom was forever grateful to Colleen.
“If I ever met that woman, I swear I’ll get down on my hands and knees and say, ‘And all I gotta do is thank you girl, thank you girl. Oh, oh, you’ve been good to me, you made me glad when I was sad.’”
I looked over my shoulder and rolled my eyes at Mrs. Rockefeller, who had volunteered to push the Yellow Submarine double stroller the hotel had kindly provided for us.
“Another one?” She looked quite amused.
I nodded. Ever since Alfred Junior had dropped us and our luggage off at the hotel (well, Mrs. Rockefeller’s two suitcases had been transported separately in a van), Mom had been bursting with excitement and Beatles songs. She burst into her first song almost the second the young concierge with very purple hair and slightly crossed eyes had handed her over the keys to our room and instructed us where we were staying.
“Mrs. Rock is in the Penny Lane suite on the fifth floor, and Mrs. Jensen and Miss Jensen and two Pack n’ Plays are in the Strawberry Fields suite, on the fifth floor as well.
“Strawberry Fields, you said?” Mom had chirped, clapping her hands together. When the concierge had confirmed that we were, indeed, staying in the Strawberry Fields suite, Mom had started singing, “Let me take you down. ‘Cause I’m going to Strawberry Fields,” And all the way down the hallway and up the elevator, every wall plastered with photos or paintings of everything Beatles, Mom kept finding a song that went with whatever Beatles song, band member, or memory that the pictures were conveying.
Mrs. Rock caught up with me and whispered sideways, “Which one was it this time?”
“Beats me.”
“‘Thank you, Girl’—the B-side of ‘From me to you.’ Not a lot of people know this one, but I do,” Mom announced, still with her back to me.
Mrs. Rockefeller and I exchanged a few eyerolls and giggles. Of course, we were only pretending to find it ridiculous. Even though it was beginning to become slightly annoying, it was also adorable. This came straight from her heart, and it just made Mom even more loveable.
“So,” Mrs. Rock began, still chuckling, “tonight, I mean soon, we’ll have a good night’s sleep and then I have arranged that Alfred Junior pick us up in the a.m. I figured since we’re travelling West, we’ll be up quite early, even for an old lady like me.” She smiled.
“And where do we go then?” I stopped, right under a big portrait of Lennon from his Yoko Ono days—Mom’s least favorite Lennon look.
“Colleen is still working on a few things, but the plan for now is that he’ll take us straight to Stockton Wood Road Primary school. The bench is not far from that.”
“And then what?” I probed.
“Well, hopefully, we’ll find his grandmother. Colleen is in contact with someone at the school that might be able to help us. So, by this time tomorrow, we might know…” her eyes darted to the top of the stroller and, in a lowered voice she continued, “…who Alfred’s father is.”
With the mentioning of the word father, my stomach flipped over. I looked up at the Lennon painting, at his sad eyes studying me through the glasses, which would later become the Lennon Signature Golden glasses.
“Did you know that Julian Lennon, John Lennon’s son, never had any kids?” I informed them, suddenly remembering a People Magazine article about Julian Lennon as if I had only read it yesterday.
Mrs. Rockefeller and Mom stood beside me and we all examined the painting closer.
“I did not know that.” Mrs. Rockefeller put the brake on the Yellow Submarine stroller and reached for her Gucci purse. “Why?”
“Well, apparently it was because he had such a difficult relationship with his dad, Lennon. He said that his dad discouraged him from starting his own family. That he was way too young to cope with fatherhood, that he didn’t know what the hell he was doing.” I looked over at Mom, who was clearly proud of me for quoting Beatles slash Lennon stuff—even though it was not particularly flattering.
“His eyes do, or did, always look so sad. John Lennon’s, that is.” Mrs. Rockefeller inched closer and squinted at the painting.
“Also, Julian was born in 1963, right when the Beatlemania started, when the tours started,” Mom added, still looking at me all proud. “I guess John was never really there. I can’t even imagine… To grow up with a dad who’s never there. My dad was not the best, but at least he was around.”
“He also said, in the article, that is, ‘I want to know who I am first.’ Those were his exact words. I remember them so clearly because it made me think about myself—about having a baby at eighteen before I had time to find myself or do anything with my life, really. And maybe that’s exactly what Hans will say if I ever find him… At least Lennon could write the best songs in the world.”
“Come here, honey.” Mom gave me a sideways hug and kissed the top of my head. “John Lennon might have been one of the best songwriters in the world, but he was a lousy dad. You’re the best mother in the world, and you’re not on a world tour.”
“We kinda are right now though. In a Yellow Submarine stroller and everything,” I added, which made her smile.
“Yes, but you don’t have to be a young parent to screw things up. Being young doesn’t equal being a lousy parent. There are plenty of older parents out there who are far from perfect.”
“You can say that again.” Mrs. Rockefeller retrieved her lipstick and started applying her first coat, using the reflection from the glass frame as a mirror.
“Anyway.” Mom unlocked the stroller and started to back it up when Mrs. Rockefeller suddenly grabbed her arm to stop her. “You listen here, the both of you, but mostly you, Eleanor.” She took a step back and gave me an intense stare. “You—this little crazy constellation of a family...” She made a circular motion with her lipstick. “I’ve have never seen so much love in one place. Who cares how old anyone is, if there’s a father in the picture or not, in Berlin, Li
verpool or not? These kids, and that includes you, Eleanor, have all the love in the world. All the love they can have.” A handful of emotions passed over her face before she continued. “All you need is love,” she started singing, which took not just me and Mom by surprise, but also Ava and Alfred, who were staring up through the little peephole in the Yellow Submarine stroller.
“See, you’re even making me sing now, and I never ever sing. I’ve never sang a Beatles song before, let alone the cheesiest one of all.”
“Are you so sure about that?” I looked over at Mom and winked, but when she stared back at me with a baffled look on her face, I suddenly realized that I had totally forgotten to tell her about the comment from Aaron. With all the commmotion going on—getting on and off of airplanes, going to and from different airports, in and out of town cars, Boris, Alfred Junior, not to mention Franz Fassbender and the gluten orgy—I had totally forgotten about it.
“Aaron must’ve learned it from someone,” I announced.
“What?” Mrs. Rockefeller looked at me with the same face she had offered me when I had explained to her about the Facebook page.
“He was quoting it. On the Facebook page,” I added, eager to see her reaction.
“He-he wrote something?” she asked in a somewhat frantic voice.
“He did?” Mom gave me a look that clearly asked why I hadn’t said something.
“He did. Hold on, let me...” I squatted down and pulled my phone from the Yellow Submarine cup holder and Alfred peeked out from under the hood.
“Are we leaving soon? I’m hungry,” he asked in a sweet voice, not yet overly whiny.
“We are but I first need to do something,” I assured him.
“What?” he asked impatiently.
I kissed him on his mouth and, suddenly feeling very emotional, I whispered, “I just need to do something for Mrs. Rockefeller. Something that’ll make her very happy, I hope.”
Lost in Love (The Miss Apple Pants series Book 2) Page 19