The Dime Box

by Karen Grose

  “A little more now.”

  “Do they know you’re here?”

  Eyes to the floor, Greta shrugged. “No.”

  Near the end of the afternoon that first day, she’d met her grandparents, her grandfather hitched up the sleeves of his plaid buttondown shirt to the elbows, and reached out his hand. “Let me see it.”

  Greta sighed. The sight of her dime box would remind him of the daughter he no longer had, but she pulled it out of her backpack and put it gently in his palm anyway. A dark shadow crossed his face as he held it, struggling, staring, a piece of his life from a long time ago—a piece of their family history. It was Hannah. It was Emily. It was her grandparents, too. He coughed and leaned back in his chair, tapping his fingers on the sides.

  “My father carved this from a piece of wood he found in the ravine behind our house,” he told her.

  “This house?”

  “No, the one I grew up in. A few streets from here. I watched him do it. He spent hours sanding it down. Making it smooth so I wouldn’t get splinters.”

  After all the times she’d traced the lines in the dime box, Greta knew her great-grandfather had done a great job.

  “He asked what colour I wanted it painted.”

  “You said red.”

  He winked. “That was my favourite as a boy.” He passed her back the dime box and Greta turned it over. “My initials,” he told her. “My father carved them in there because he wanted to be sure I remembered where I came from.”

  Greta traced them gently with her finger, and then passed her grandfather the dime box. He stopped for a moment and wiped his eyes on his sleeve.

  “Our family collected dimes in it for the pay phone. When the price of a call went up way back, we collected quarters. But the name stuck. We never could call it a quarter box; it was always a dime box to us.”

  With his eyes still moist, Daniel put it on the coffee table in front of him. “I never knew where the damn thing went.”

  “Language,” Polly said sharply, reaching down and smoothing out the creases in her skirt.

  Greta smiled. She was looking forward to spending more time with her grandparents and observing their relationship. Daniel and Pauline Strachan. Or Daniel and Polly. It had a nice ring to it. And they were adorable together; kind, gentle and funny. They finished each other’s sentences, like two halves of a whole. Like she and her mother had been.

  “I couldn’t be happier you’ve brought it home to us, Greta. Not because I’ve missed it. Not because I’ve wondered where it’s been all these years. But because it brought you with it.” Greta looked up and smiled. “It’s brought our family back together,” he said. “We were four. Then we were two. And now we’re three.”

  THIRTY-FIVE

  G reta put her head in her hands and groaned as the car pulled out of her grandparents’ driveway.

  “Is now a good time to ask what you’re thinking?” Colleen probed.

  She peered through the cracks of her fingers. “I’m so messed up.”

  Colleen grinned. “It was pretty surreal. You going to be okay?”

  Greta laughed; the sound mixed with the sound of her sniffled sobs and helped to release the pent-up energy bouncing around inside her. She thumbed through the pictures on her phone. “Look at this. My mom’s eyes are the same as my grandmothers. And she has my grandad’s smile. It was like I was looking right at her again.”

  “There’s definitely a resemblance.”

  “Nothing makes sense. I was so scared to meet them… But they’re so nice and I didn’t want to leave.”

  Colleen looked sideways and changed lanes.

  “And while we were there, I missed my mom less. Which is freaking me out because if, I see them again, I don’t want my memories fading.”

  The traffic slowed. Colleen slowed with it. “Not if. When. Did the good ones fade today?”

  She shook her head.

  Colleen pointed to her head and her heart. “That’s where you’ll keep them.”

  She caught her breath. “I still have so many questions.”

  “Shoot.”

  “I wish I’d met them before. Why didn’t my mom reach out to them?”

  The traffic came to a standstill. “Seeing you today, I’m sure they’re heartbroken they didn’t have you in their life as a child.”

  She smiled, pleased to hear Colleen acknowledge her as an adult. She’d grown up ten years in one day alone.

  “Maybe one day you’ll all discuss it. Your mom’s situation was complicated. You know that. Nothing you caused, of course. I bet your grandparents had a tough time when your mom took off with your dad.”

  Greta thought of their kind faces; their warmth and their smiles; and how much they accepted her unconditionally. “Yeah. They’d already lost one child.”

  “I’m sure they wanted to keep in contact and never stopped trying. But as her life spun out of control and her life became your father’s, well, things will have changed.”

  She balked. “That’s an understatement.”

  “Your mom might’ve shut them out at first. Maybe she didn’t want them to see her like that, especially if she believed she already caused them a ton of grief.”

  She nodded. “The guilt would be huge.” Her mother must’ve been going through hell.

  “By the time I met Emily at the shelter, she couldn’t have reached out even if she’d wanted to.”

  “Ian forced her to cut them off?”

  Colleen nodded. “You know what he would’ve said. Rules are rules to be followed.”

  “Or consequences dealt.”

  The traffic moved forward and Greta yanked her seatbelt from around her waist. “Why were my parents allowed to adopt me?”

  Colleen looked over her left shoulder and changed lanes. Smooth and silent.

  “I mean, didn’t anyone in Parry Sound know about Ian’s history?”

  With one hand on the wheel, the other draped on the back of her seat. Colleen blew her breath out slowly.

  “Come on.” She turned to face her. “Someone must’ve known.”

  “I did. But with your dad so involved in the church, no one else questioned it.”

  Greta’s nose twitched. It filled with the smell of the nave. She crossed her arms and stretched her legs in front of her.

  “It all happened so fast. I didn’t share my concerns with anyone, but, yes, I should’ve. I’d never heard of an adoption going through that quick.”

  Greta glanced sideways. Her mother had told her it shocked her father, too, when they’d got the news in less than a month.

  “I’m sorry, Greta,” Colleen said. “It haunts me, and if I could go back in time, I’d deal with it differently. I’m going to regret this for the rest of my life.”

  Greta reached across the front seat of the car and squeezed her hand. Colleen squeezed hers back. They sat in the car in the silence, lost in their own thoughts.

  “I still don’t understand why my mom would bring me into the picture in the first place? I mean, what if she died when I was really little and I was left with him alone when I was even younger?” The thought made her anxious. It actually sickened her.

  “That’s a tough one,” Colleen said. “When your dad moved them out to the cabin, I think she felt he owed her.”

  “A baby?”

  “You were what she wanted. You think he had it in him to think of kids?”

  Maybe that was a good thing. Except, if he hadn’t, she wouldn’t have had her mother. She pushed those thoughts aside; they were too painful to think about.

  “She wanted to be happy. You made her happy,” Colleen said. “As your father was all appearances, she went at him from that angle. She knew how to work him.”

  “He’s pathetic.”

  “And she was smart. She loved you more than anything.”

  Blood rushed to her temples as she thought of their days together. They had a lot of fun those first ten years when it was just the two of them. They had plan
s, she and her mother. They’d move to the city one day. Which city, she didn’t know. But they talked about how there’d be bathrooms and bathtubs and neighbours and noise. Parks. And pets everywhere. She longed for times they’d spent with each other, back when she didn’t understand. Home together meant not lonely. Home together meant safe. With everything she’d found out the last few months, the phrase that tormented her childhood took on a whole new meaning.

  “Your mother lived day by day. In the present. She never thought about what might happen when—.”

  ***

  Detective Perez frowned and folded her hands on the table. “Officer Pappas didn’t mention anything about this last night. How much Colleen appears to be aware of…”

  “He wouldn’t,” she said confidently. “It was all after I left for Toronto.”

  “And if Colleen knew about your father’s history, why didn’t she share her concerns with someone at the time? She could have and should have contacted the adoption agency.”

  Greta shrugged. She wanted to tell Detective Perez to ask her herself, but if she did, the detective would know she’d read her screen.

  Detective Perez raised her eyebrows at Phil and looked over the top of her glasses. Her expression was cautious. “Let me explain something to you, Greta.”

  Was the room getting stuffy? It was getting hot. Sahara Desert hot. The burn in her cheeks confirmed it.

  “I’m not saying it didn’t happen, but there’s a big difference between accusing someone of committing a serious crime and actually proving it.”

  Greta rolled her eyes. Did Detective Perez think she was stupid? She’d figured that out a long time ago. She thought back to the kitchen in Ravensworth, to the three auburn hairs stuck on the edge of the table.

  “You might think your father murdered your mother—”

  “He did.” Greta glared at her. Sometimes it was necessary to state the obvious. At ten years old, she knew her mother had been murdered, but when Officer Pappas visited the cabin the day after the funeral, she couldn’t give him what he needed even if she’d wanted. Her father was sitting in the next room listening to every word she said.

  The heat in the room was unbearable, the air between them tense. Greta wiped the sweat from her upper lip as Detective Perez took off her glasses and put them on the table.

  “Proof”—her voice tightened—“requires evidence.”

  Greta’s whole body trembled. She’d just provided more evidence of her mother’s murder—a witness who could corroborate her father’s abuse. The irony of the whole situation made her sick. “Why are you more concerned with my father than with me? My mother was the one murdered and you’re saying the responsibility to prove it was on me? Quite the justice system you’ve got here.”

  Detective Perez shrugged. “I’m aware of your allegations against him and I want you to know I take them seriously. Listen, Officer Pappas couriered down an evidence box to my office last night. I’ll have my ETs send it over and take a look through it.”

  “ETs?”

  “Evidence Techs.”

  Greta relaxed in her seat. Good. She felt part of the conversation.

  “Until then,” the detective directed her attention back to the file, “we’ve got evidence here we need to deal with.”

  “Are you for real?” Greta jabbed a finger at the papers. “That shit?”

  Detective Perez’s lips pressed into a thin, bloodless line. “You’ve got motive means—”

  “I didn’t do it.”

  “…and opportunity.”

  Greta crossed her arms, sucked in a slow breath and clenched her jaw shut. Detective Perez looked to her lawyer. All she got back was a shrug.

  “Okay,” the detective said, wearily. “Lunchtime. Let’s shut it down here.”

  Detective Perez sat down heavily in her leather chair and pressed the record button. She half smiled, leaving an uncomfortable impression. “So, you met up with Colleen again. You met your grandparents—which, by the way, I think is wonderful. And you got answers to some of your questions.”

  Greta nodded. The comment about her grandparents made her feel more at ease. But before lunch, the detective had suddenly switched tactics, and she wasn’t going to let her guard down. She knew what was coming. What she didn’t know was when.

  “So, take me through what happened after that.” The detective straightened her face and added, “Briefly please. We need to get on to the evening your father died.”

  There. Detective Perez confirmed it. Greta’s stomach tightened. She shut her eyes and tried to pull herself together. Before the inevitable. She paused. “I started counseling.”

  She’d travelled the recesses of her mind, the pitch-black corners, all the dead-end alleys, with Kanza beside her, as they dragged out demons one at a time, putting each one on full, ugly display. They’d named them. They’d explained them. They’d taunted them. They’d teased them. They’d trapped every one of them when they tried to retreat.

  “Did it work?” the detective prodded.

  “Kanza helped me pull myself together.”

  “You’re sure?”

  She looked the detective straight in the eye. “Excuse me?”

  The detective held her gaze. “How would I know?”

  Her comment was like a slap across the face. Years of emotion had formed a hard wall inside of her, and getting past it had been so difficult. Very few had done it; her mother, Latoya, Mrs. Xiangzi and Colleen. That was it. She preferred to go it alone. Until Kanza had come along and done it, too.

  Heat crawled up her cheeks. Words stagnated in her mouth. How could she prove it? Her mind relaxed; she’d earned her credits and had graduated from high school. She’d started doing yoga and meditating, which, although was painful at first, she liked it now. Wait. She’d started running again. What difference was it if it was only a few blocks? She’d built up to an easy 5K. That she’d overlooked how running purged her insides, like a diuretic for her pain, she vowed she’d never forget again. How could she explain all that—and do so briefly?

  How could she fit eighteen months into a sentence? She couldn’t meet Detective Perez’s eye. “I focused on my goals. Passed school. Spent weekends with my grandparents.”

  “Right. You expect me to believe everything fell naturally back into place?”

  She didn’t know whether what Detective Perez had said was a matter of fact or an accusation. Maybe both? Everything was a stretch. Most things was more accurate. No, that wasn’t true. Some things. For the first time, she questioned whether she and Kanza should have pushed harder. She drew a deep breath, and picked her words carefully. “I’ve come a long way.” And then, as if to reassure herself, she said it again. “Considering what I’ve had to deal with.”

  “Meaning?”

  “I still might have had a couple blind spots.”

  “No doubt.”

  Greta searched her face, her blue eyes still and cold. Words bounced around her head, but she needed to continue. She sat up straighter. “Kanza suggested facing the past might be a good way to bring closure,” she said.

  “To put it all to bed?”

  “Yeah. If you want to word it like that.”

  “Did you question that?”

  “Up till then, it’d all gone well.”

  Detective Perez leaned forward. “So you did or you didn’t?”

  Greta shook her head. “No,” she said softly.

  THIRTY-SIX

  “I don’t understand,” her grandmother puffed, rosy-faced, as she struggled to carry an oversized suitcase from the elevator. “Why pay so much to live in a shoebox when you can live free in a house?”

  Greta took the bag from her hands. She loved her new studio in Riverside. It was hers and hers alone. Floor to ceiling windows graced the living room and led to a balcony overlooking the east side of the city. A modern kitchen and hardwood floors gave it a comfortable, lived-in feel. The only reason she could afford it was because Penn had access to a grant t
o help with the rent as she transitioned to independent living.

  “Looking after myself will be good for me, and besides, I’m still coming to stay with you and Gramps every weekend,” she said.

  “You trying to kill me?” Daniel said with a wink.

  Polly shot him the death look.

  Her grandfather leaned in and gave her a hug. “Don’t let me down, G. I can’t wait.”

  There was no chance of it. She’d never fail her grandparents. They adored her, yet sometimes she wondered if they realized she needed them more than they needed her. They were her bridge from her past, her bridge to her present, and, she hoped, to her future—whatever that future would be.

  As she unpacked her suitcase and hung her clothes in the closet, Polly, a tech whiz, busied herself in the living room, setting up the TV. Daniel unpacked the plates, utensils and pots and pans, arranging them in neat rows in the drawers in the kitchen. When everything was done, Greta walked them along the carpeted hallway to the elevator, grateful they’d helped move her in yet counting the days until she’d see them again.

  Detective Perez stopped writing. “Did you want to move out of Penn?”

  She shrugged. The detective wasn’t buying her story, and she understood why. She hadn’t quite come clean. “No choice,” she told her. “I’d aged-out of the system.”

  “How did you pay for this apartment?”

  “It’s part of the outpatient program. Penn finds the place and their grant pays the rent.”

  “So you would have stayed?”

  “At Penn?”

  Detective Perez ran her fingers through her hair, looking flustered. “Here’s why I’m asking,” she said, without raising her voice. “Is there any chance you wouldn’t be in the situation you’re in right now if you’d stayed there a year or two longer?”

  Greta thought it for less than a nanosecond. “I’d be sitting here no matter what.”

  She fell silent, giving Detective Perez a moment to digest what she’d said. In case she hadn’t heard her, she repeated it. The detective’s eyebrows furrowed as she scribbled on the page in front of her. Her decisiveness made her uneasy. She waited for her to look up, but she kept writing at a furious pace. Had she said the wrong thing? Did she need to correct herself? Would it be wise to circle back? Nope. There was no point. She knew in her heart if she had the power to turn back the time, she’d do the same thing all over again.