Pearl

by Jo Knowles

  “In your dreams!” Claire calls back from my mom’s room. I guess they aren’t fighting anymore.

  I touch the book in my hands. I can almost hear it calling to me in my mom’s voice. I trace the words on the cover with my finger. The handwriting looks just like mine.

  I move my fingers to the edge of the cover, then stop. I know I can’t do this alone. I pick up the phone and dial Henry’s number. I let the phone ring until the machine answers and hang up, hoping he knows it’s me. Then, I wait.

  About ten minutes later, the phone rings.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi,” Henry says. His voice is fuzzy.

  “Where are you?”

  “The pay phone at the MiniMart. I figured that was you who called.”

  This makes me smile. “Yup. I have something. Can you come over?”

  “Uh—”

  “What?”

  “I’d kind of prefer to avoid your mom.”

  “Oh. You know I think she’s calmed down a bit.”

  “Still.”

  “Are you up for another boat ride?”

  * * *

  Henry is already standing at the end of the dock when I get there.

  “What’d you find?” he asks. We’re both sweating and out of breath.

  “A notebook.” I hold it up for him to see.

  “Um, whose?”

  “My mom’s. She gave it to me to read.”

  We get in.

  “Okay,” I say when I’ve rowed us out to the middle of the river. “Ready?”

  Henry nods and I hand him the notebook.

  “Wait a minute. This is a diary, not a notebook.”

  “I know.”

  “But we can’t read this!” He gives it back to me.

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s your mom’s diary!”

  “But she gave it to me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she wanted me to read it?”

  “Obviously. I just mean … why?”

  I look out at Gus’s river. “Because she wants me to know the truth,” I say. “And I think this is the only way she can tell it to me. Maybe she knows this is the only way I’ll listen.”

  He sighs. “I don’t know, Bean. It seems wrong.”

  I hand it to him again. “She wants me to read it.”

  “Then what are you giving it to me for?”

  “Because I can’t do it.”

  “Do what?”

  “Open it.”

  “Wait. You want me to read it? No way!”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s your mom’s diary!”

  “Please?”

  He looks down at the book sitting on his knees like he’s afraid to touch it. He shakes his head. “If she gave it to you, she wants you to be the one to read it.” He puts the book back on my lap.

  I touch the cover again. The edges are worn.

  “Go on,” he says.

  I hear my mom’s words in my head. It holds all the truths I have, Bean.

  But do I really want to know what they are?

  Henry nods at me. “You can do it.”

  “Okay,” I say. “Okay.”

  Carefully, I open the cover.

  The first page is filled with doodles. Like the kind you make when you’re sitting in history class and bored out of your skull.

  There are faces in the squiggles. Smiley faces.

  I turn the page.

  More doodles.

  I look up at Henry, who shrugs.

  I keep flipping. Finally, I come to a page with some writing.

  I’m fifteen today.

  Dad gave me pearl earrings that used to be my mom’s.

  We went out for dinner and stopped at the Italian bakery on the way home. He let me order coffee with my cannoli.

  When we got home, there was only one small present and I was disappointed. I opened the box and saw the earrings. When I put them on, Dad started to cry.

  I wish I could remember Mom wearing the earrings, but I can’t.

  Underneath, there’s a drawing of the earrings. My earrings. I touch them in my ears. I haven’t taken them out since the day I got them from my drawer. But if Gus gave them to my mom, how did I get them? And she refers to Gus as Dad. Dad. Not Gus.

  The next two pages are filled with ears and the pearl earrings in them. No writing, just sketches.

  I look up at Henry, who is glancing over the edge of the book.

  “Ears?” he asks.

  I shrug, touching the earrings again. I don’t know why I don’t want to tell him how they’re important. But I keep it to myself. My stomach hurts.

  The next several pages have sketches of a girl about my age. All faces. There must be about fifty. I look more closely. They aren’t the same girl. It’s two different girls.

  Henry leans in closer.

  “That looks like you.”

  “What? No. You’re looking at it upside down.”

  I flip the book around so he can see.

  “Yeah. You,” he says. “Bet it’s your mom. And the other one looks like Claire.”

  I turn the book back toward me again. He’s right. I recognize Claire’s pointy features. I flip the page.

  Claire came over again today.

  She gave me a bracelet for my birthday.

  She bought one for herself, too.

  On the inside, mine says “Best” and on hers it says “Friends.”

  Underneath the entry are two bracelets looped together so you can see the inscriptions. They look like rings. The next pages show more sketches of my mom and Claire’s faces. Sad and happy. Tired. Angry. All different expressions. Some with captions underneath.

  Best friends.

  Together forever.

  My mom’s always been good at drawing. She’s the one who writes the specials on the board at Lou’s. And she’s always decorated my birthday cakes and made homemade birthday cards. But these drawings are different. The details and the facial expressions are stunning. Page after page. My mom and Claire, Claire and my mom.

  Soul mates.

  And then a new entry with smudgy letters.

  He caught us!

  Oh, God.

  He caught us and sent Claire home.

  He hit me for the first time in my life.

  He hates me.

  He took all of my sheets and stuffed them in the metal trash bin behind the garage.

  He burned them.

  He burned my sheets and my quilt.

  The quilt my mom made for me before she died. He took back the earrings, too.

  He said he was glad she died before she found out what I was.

  I HATE HIM!!!!!

  I stare at the tear-smudged words and put my hand over them as my throat closes up.

  Oh, God.

  She wasn’t lying.

  It holds all the truths I have, Bean.

  She wasn’t exaggerating. I was hoping. I was really hoping if she could almost convince herself that Bill raped her, she could have misremembered how Gus treated her, too.

  “What?” Henry asks.

  I shake my head.

  No.

  Not Gus.

  Not my grandfather.

  He wouldn’t do that. He couldn’t.

  But you don’t lie in your own diary. Your diary is where you write the truth.

  I cover my mouth to keep from being sick. I close my eyes and lean over the book. I feel like I am twisting in a water tornado, sinking deeper and deeper into nothing but black.

  “Bean! What is it?”

  I shake my head. No. No. I don’t believe it.

  Henry leans over to look, but I cover the ugly words with my hand and turn away from him.

  I want to throw the book in the river, but the pages under my hand feel alive.

  Breathe. Just breathe. I force myself to turn the page. There’s a large sketch of Gus’s angry, hate-filled face. It’s like an evil caricature of the Gus I loved. I turn the page so
I don’t have to look. But he’s there again. And again. Page after page of Gus’s rage. Uglier and uglier. I don’t want to recognize him. This isn’t my Gus.

  But it is.

  Claire asked me to run away with her.

  But where could we go? We don’t have any money. We don’t even have a car.

  HE would come after me anyway.

  I will never call him Dad again.

  I STILL HATE HIM!!!

  I picture my Gus acting this way. I never questioned why we called him Gus. I never knew.…

  Claire tried to call today.

  He ripped the phone out of the wall.

  At school today, Claire wouldn’t talk to me.

  She doesn’t understand why I won’t run away with her.

  But where would we run to?

  He bought new sheets and a comforter for my bed.

  Everything is purple. He thinks it’s girlish, I’m sure.

  Like the color will make me be the girl he wants.

  I don’t tell him what purple means to me.

  I wish I could tell Claire.

  She would die laughing.

  If she would talk to me.

  “Bean, you okay?”

  I nod, wiping my cheeks with the back of my hand. I picture my mom’s still-purple room and how she picks out purple bedding when she gets new sheets and things. I always thought she just had bad taste. But it was all about him. Still.

  I got a job today at Lou’s Diner.

  The less time I have to be at home the better.

  The next few pages are filled with sketches again. There are ugly shoes, a hairnet, a rough sketch of Lou’s storefront. After that, there are pages with more doodles. Tiny sketches of flowers and some houses. The flowers remind me of the ones she decorated her dream menu with, only these are even more intricate. It seems that with each page, her drawings become more and more detailed. Beautiful. But there’s something sad about them, too. This was my mom. I feel like I’m getting to know her for the first time. I touch the flowers with my fingers, imagining her drawing these when she was the same age I am now. Drawing these beautiful images while living with a man who thought she was sick. Her own father. I realize I’m getting to know him for the first time, too. And I hate it.

  I look up at Henry through bleary eyes. We’ve drifted pretty far down the river, but I don’t want to turn back. I paddle toward the center and pull the oars in again. Then turn the next page.

  I met someone.

  The words are surrounded by sketches of a man’s face. My heart jumps.

  I close the book.

  “What?” Henry asks.

  But my throat has closed again and I’m shaking.

  He reaches for the book, but I put my hand on top of his to stop him. His hand is soft and warm and familiar. I want to keep it there and push it away at the same time.

  “He’s in there,” I say. I knew he would be. I knew that was the main reason my mom wanted me to read the book. But suddenly it feels like too much. It’s all just too much.

  Our hands stay pressed together on top of the book as we float slowly down the river. With my hand on his, we’re connected. We’re joined somehow, and it feels like more than friendship. Like we’re bonded. The question is, how? And do we really want to know?

  “You have to look,” he finally says, taking his hand back. “She wanted you to see.”

  I nod. The bottom of my hand is damp from pressing against the top of his. I open the book again and flip through the pages that came before. The squiggles and houses and faces. The horrible faces of a Gus I never knew. And then …

  Him.

  chapter twenty-four

  I’m afraid he’ll have my eyes. Or that he’ll look exactly like me. Or Henry. But he’s just a stranger looking back at me. A stranger looking over a steering wheel on one page, drinking a cup of coffee on the next. Page after page of this man. My father. Looking not at me, but away. Into the distance. You can tell my mom drew him as he was, never looking at her, but always beyond her. Maybe where he wished he could be.

  He was my mom’s revenge, this man. I wonder if she pictured Gus burning her things while she was with him. I wonder if she cried.

  When I’ve seen enough, I hand the book to Henry. He studies the pages carefully, not saying a word.

  I watch the houses as we float by, wondering again about the people who live inside, and what sorts of secrets they hide. I think about Gus coming out here not to get away from a noisy baby, but from a daughter he couldn’t stand the sight of. And to be close to a wife who no longer existed.

  The loneliness I’ve felt since he died turns into something darker. Something I can’t name but feel desperate to get out of me. I touch the earrings in my ears and have the urge to throw them in the river. My mom never said a word about them. Never hinted that they were hers before they were mine. How could he have done that? How can my quiet, loving Gus be her angry, hateful one? How?

  Finally, Henry closes the book.

  “Well?” I ask.

  “I don’t know. It’s too hard to tell.”

  “He doesn’t look like either of us, I don’t think,” I say.

  “No.”

  “He looks like he wants to escape somewhere.” I look down at the water again. “I wonder where he is now.”

  “I don’t know, Bean.”

  “You need to get that box.”

  He sighs. “I know.”

  “When will you get a chance, do you think?”

  “Maybe tonight. She usually showers before she goes to bed. But sometimes she doesn’t shower at all. Not when she’s really depressed. So I don’t know.”

  I don’t answer. Imagining Sally being too depressed to wash makes my heart hurt.

  “I wish I could do something,” I say.

  “Me too.”

  “I mean it.”

  “I know.” He hands the diary to me.

  “I guess we should get back,” I say.

  We row home without talking.

  As we make our way back to the sidewalk, Mr. Clancy steps onto the path.

  “Out for another joy ride?” he asks.

  I nod.

  “Glad the boat’s not going to waste, then. Gus’d like that.”

  He gestures toward Henry.

  “You two should have life jackets on, though. That current can be stronger than it looks. It’s dangerous.”

  Henry looks at me for help.

  “They’re in the boat,” I say.

  “You wear ’em next time, Gus’s granddaughter.” He winks at me. Inside I cringe at his name for me.

  “We will from now on,” I say. “I promise.”

  He starts to turn away.

  “Excuse me?” I say.

  He stops and faces me again.

  “Were you and Gus good friends?”

  “Good friends?” He thinks a second. “No, not good friends. Acquaintances, more like. Kept to himself, mostly. Back when your grandma was alive, the two of them used to take that boat out now and then and row up and down until sunset. So sad when she died. She was a beautiful woman.

  “You knew my grandmother?” I ask.

  “Not to speak to. Just remember seeing them go out every so often. When you live alone like me, you notice lots of things.” He smiles at me and nods. “You take care of her,” he says to Henry.

  Henry blushes and wipes the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. “I will.”

  “All right,” Mr. Clancy says, and keeps walking.

  Henry and I don’t talk on the way back to my house. We stop at the edge of my driveway.

  “You going to go read the rest of that?” he asks.

  I nod. “Call me later? After you get the box?”

  His eyebrows crinkle like they do when he gets scared or nervous. “I will.”

  “You can do it, Hen. It’s the only way for us to get to the truth. I mean, unless we go total Days and get DNA tests.”

  “No more Days,” he says
. “We’ve got enough drama as it is.” He smiles a little and turns and walks away.

  I stand on the corner holding the diary and watch Henry trudge on down the street. He pulls his shirt away from his body three times before he’s too far away for me to see.

  chapter twenty-five

  Inside, Claire and my mom are watching something on the Home and Garden channel. I go to the kitchen unnoticed and make a sandwich, but I can’t eat it. The diary and the truth inside it sit on the table, waiting for me. The earrings burn my ears. I finally give up and go to my room. I take the earrings out and put them in their soft, velvet case. I could give them back to my mom, but I bet she doesn’t want them any more than I do. Instead, I go into Gus’s room and put them on top of the dresser, next to the photo I can’t bear to look at. On my way out, I shut the door.

  Then I head to the roof.

  It’s evening now and the sun casts long, branch shadows over my place near the window. I lean back against the steep roof and open the diary. I carefully flip through the pages until I reach the section I left off at.

  I study the sketches of my father again. Page after page until they finally stop, and there’s my mom, all by herself. There’s a long section of self-portraits of my mom at my age, looking sad and alone. I look closely at her face to find traces of myself, to see what Henry saw, but I can’t find a resemblance. Holding the book, I can almost feel her despair seep out of the pages and into my hands, spreading through my body. I turn another page and come to a full-body sketch of my mom. She’s skinny, except for the tiny bump of her belly.

  I’m changing.

  Please don’t let this be happening.

  Please let it be a mistake.

  I turn another page to find more sketches of my mom and her growing stomach. My mom and me. Most pages don’t have any words, but some do.

  He’s gone.

  I don’t know what to do.

  I’m scared.

  And then nothing. Just blank pages. I flip through every one, just to make sure. But that’s it. After she had me, she must have stopped.

  “Beany?” My mom ducks her head out of the bathroom window. She looks different, but the same.

  “We should talk now, I guess,” she says.

  “All right.”