by Sonya Cobb
Copyright © 2014 by Sonya Cobb
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Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Prologue
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Twenty-Two
Reading Group Guide
A Conversation with the Author
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Back Cover
For my grandparents, Jo and Ed, and their Ono Island dreams.
Prologue
Hastings-on-Hudson, NY
May 28, 1936
Frederick Howard
Library
Pennsylvania Museum of Art
4231 Avenue of the Republic
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Freddie,
I’d first like to convey my heartiest congratulations, not only for landing your marvelous job in these desperate times, but for keeping it! I could not be more pleased that it affords me the opportunity to correspond with you after all these years.
I apologize for the crate; I know it’s absurdly large. Your great aunt Hester, who, you probably know, died in April of encephalitis, specified in her will that all of her silver should go to a museum. She did not specify which museum, nor did she mention why she considered her family less deserving than some arbitrarily selected institution, but perhaps that is a question best left unanswered. As the executrix of her estate it is my duty to execute and not to exhume.
I wish I could tell you more about this charmingly eclectic collection, but Hester was not what I would call a meticulous archivist. I believe she acquired some of these pieces during her travels in Europe, where her passion for collecting decorative arts was surpassed only by her zeal for collecting decorative companions. The silver-framed mirror, if you must know, was a gift from that German duke whose family was so inconvenienced by Hester’s existence. I’m frankly surprised Daddy let her hold on to a souvenir from such an embarrassing episode. Memories fade; silver hangs around and tarnishes.
If you still have any curators on the payroll, they must be horribly overworked, so I implore you not to waste their time with our family knickknacks. Sell them, put them on a shelf, leave them in the crate; I place the decision in your very capable hands.
Thank you, dear Freddie, for your help as we scatter Hester’s remains. I wish I could say you inherited more than this task, but alas, Hester died as she lived: with tightly clenched fists and a swollen head.
With best wishes for your continued success, I remain, as ever, your affectionate
Martha
New York Central Railroad
Bill of Lading
RECEIVED
at New Rochelle, NY From John Lucas & Co. March 2, 1936
Destination: Philadelphia: Pennsylvania Museum of Art
State of: Pennsylvania
Quantity
Description of articles
2
candelabras
2
saltcellars
3
trays
2
coffeepots
1
inkstand
23
souvenir spoons
4
champagne buckets
1
silver-framed mirror
This is to certify that the above articles are properly described by name and are packed and marked and are in proper condition for transportation, according to the regulations prescribed by the Interstate Commerce Commission.
John Lucas & Co. Shippers.
Per PLT
One
2005
Like most Philadelphians, Sophie had always bought her produce at Superfresh, or, if she found herself on the other end of town, the ACME. It had never occurred to her to drive to an actual farm and pick it herself. But now she had children, and apparently, produce picking was an indispensable part of any happy childhood—like trick-or-treating or hunting for Easter eggs. You went peach picking in August, pumpkin picking in October. You introduced your children to the concept of agriculture, and took hundreds of pictures for the grandparents; or in the absence of grandparents, for the other moms in Music for Me class.
Now it was strawberry season, and the moms were all taking their kids to Shadyside Orchards, just outside the city, among the rippling, subdivided hills of Chester County. “It sounds nice,” Sophie said to Brian. “A day on the farm—it’s the sort of thing we’re supposed to do. As parents.” But Brian had been skeptical, pointing out that if this was really what all the moms and kids of Philadelphia were doing, they could hardly expect a quiet day immersed in the hush of nature.
“More like the crush of Sesame Place,” he’d predicted. But when he’d seen Sophie’s face, carefully arranged into a combination of disappointment and dogged hope, he’d relented, as usual, even though it meant missing his Saturday ride. But Sophie had figured that out, too. The farm was only two miles from the cycling team’s training route. If he timed it right, he could pick some strawberries with her and the kids, then jump on his bike and catch up with his team for the second half of the ride.
Brian had a lot of opportunities to say “I told you so” that morning—starting in Shadyside’s vast, SUV-choked parking lot, where they were greeted not by a flock of ducks or even a stray barn cat, but by a sluggishly waving giant strawberry and a man with a walkie-talkie. He could have said it as they joined the crowd pushing their way to the ticket booth thr
ough a forest of loudspeakers. And he probably came close to saying it when he bought full-price tickets for themselves and for Lucy, age two and a half, and Elliot, a mere seven months. But he didn’t.
As they followed the signs to the wagon-boarding zone, Sophie consoled herself that Lucy was still too young to form permanent memories; she wouldn’t necessarily grow up thinking farms were the folksy cousins of amusement parks. There would be plenty of other farms to visit…plenty of time to get it right. She looped her arm around Brian’s, grateful for his stoic good humor, hoping he wouldn’t take off before they got the call from Steve, their real estate agent.
She was pretty sure Steve was going to say their offer on 2224 Hickory had been refused, and she didn’t feel like absorbing this depressing news alone. She knew Brian would be relieved—delighted, even—to hear they weren’t going to empty their savings into a 150-year-old fixer-upper. But at least he could still be counted on to provide the silent, consoling hug she was desperately going to need.
On the wagon, the strawberry pickers sat on scratchy hay bales, facing each other like subway passengers. Unlike people on the subway, however, they all looked directly into each other’s faces, excited about the adventure, impatient to start moving, making little jokes about traffic jams. A grandmother sitting on the opposite side of the wagon looked at Lucy and then up at Sophie.
“She looks just like you!” she said.
“Thanks!” said Sophie, as she always did, even though she knew it wasn’t really the right answer. “I know” sounded unfriendly; “Really?” sounded disingenuous. She figured it must be true, because she’d heard it countless times since Lucy’s birth three years ago. Nevertheless she often found herself looking into Lucy’s wide-set brown eyes and thinking, “Is that me?” She also wondered when Lucy would first ask herself, with amazement and possibly a stab of horror, “Am I turning into her?”
The tractor started with a jerk; everyone swayed and grabbed on to each other, laughing. They pulled out behind another wagonload of people and staggered up the rutted road toward the strawberry field. “Faster!” cried Lucy, kicking her legs against the hay bale. Sophie looked down the row to where Brian was sitting, Elliot strapped to his front like an underdeveloped Siamese twin. Elliot was all baby fat and Brian was taut with lean muscle, but their heads were perfectly matched, with hair like the grain of a pine floorboard and a look of impassive forbearance in their pale eyes. Brian caught Sophie’s gaze, raised his eyebrows in mock glee. She smirked in answer, then turned to watch the slow approach of the strawberry field.
In the distance she could see a row of houses on a low rise just beyond the edge of the farm. They were large and identical, with layers of peaked roofs arrayed over a jumble of mismatched windows, the largest of which was two stories high and arched at the top. The houses huddled above the field as if whispering to each other about its quaintly inefficient use of space. Just that morning, on the drive from Philadelphia, Brian had said he’d like to widen their search to include some of the suburbs close to the city. “Not like this, of course, but maybe one of the older towns. We could get a lot more space in Mt. Airy or Germantown. And a backyard.” Sophie hadn’t responded to this. As far as she was concerned, the Philadelphia Zoo was their backyard. And the Azalea Garden, where Elliot could practice crawling through the thick, cropped grass. And the Horticulture Center, with its delicately landscaped Japanese Tea House, where they would exchange their shoes for white slippers and clap their hands to attract the koi, who would lumber up to the side of the pond looking for treats. A backyard sounded, to Sophie, like an excuse to stay home.
The wagon stopped; a step stool was proffered; the pickers climbed down and accepted empty pint baskets from the sunburned teenager just starting his summer job. The strawberry plants grew in long, bushy lines, with hay scattered on the ground between the rows. On the other side of the dirt road, at the bottom of a slope, ranks of young spruce and pine trees waited for December, when crowds of jolly executioners would come for them, wielding their red-handled saws.
Lucy broke away from Sophie and hurtled into the field, plunging her hands into one of the plants. She pulled out a large red fruit and looked up at her mother for permission.
“Go crazy,” Sophie said, and the look of ecstasy on Lucy’s face as she bit into the berry more than repaid the drive, the loudspeakers, the overcrowded wagon. Brian unstrapped Elliot and set him on the ground, where he began picking up handfuls of straw and moving them toward his mouth. Brian pried the hay out of Elliot’s clenched fists and tried directing him toward a fruit-heavy bush, but Elliot was transfixed by the loose yellow stuff, so lightweight and abundant, so easily scooped and crushed in his hands. “You might as well just let him taste it,” Sophie said, knowing that the easiest way to keep Elliot from doing something was to let him come up with the idea himself. But Brian made a face and picked Elliot up, batting his hands away from his mouth and making him drop the hay. Elliot’s arms shuddered and his face reddened as he gathered himself for an explosion of cries. Sophie dropped her strawberry basket next to Lucy and reached for Elliot.
“I’ve got this,” said Brian.
“It’s okay.” Sophie took Elliot and bounced him in her arms, cooing in his ear, searching for the rhythm and tone that would calm his fury. Brian looked at his watch again. Standing there among the strawberry plants in his red-and-black cycling spandex, he looked like a futuristic scarecrow. Sophie felt a twinge of regret for having swooped in so quickly. She’d done it that morning, too—snatching a diaper out of his hand because he was taking too long with it. She knew it was a bad habit; it wasn’t fair to Brian. On the other hand she did wonder, sometimes, if he was exaggerating his clumsiness just a bit, offering himself up for the swoop-in.
“You’ve got great weather for your ride,” she said now, feeling around for a thread to draw them back together. She genuinely wanted Brian to enjoy his afternoon away; he was here, after all, even though the farm visit was her fantasy, not his. But that was Brian—letting her get the pale yellow upholstery she loved even though they had two kids in diapers; letting her get the eight-foot-tall Christmas tree even though their apartment ceilings were only seven feet high. He was too good to her; she knew that. He wanted nothing but her happiness, and she kept trying, in spite of her mistakes, to provide it.
“I’ll be home in time to make dinner,” Brian said. He pulled a strawberry from a bush, wiping it on his jersey and holding it up to her lips. “Grilled shrimp rémoulade?” Sophie bit slowly into the berry’s red flesh; Brian ate the other half with a suggestive eyebrow raise. She laughed gratefully. Dinnertime was the moment she looked forward to every single day, Brian stirring at the stove, Sophie keeping him company, Elliot in the Pack ’n’ Play, a bottle of wine on the counter. She couldn’t cook—she hated the messy panic of it all—so in the kitchen Brian was fully in charge. Without Sophie swooping in, he was free to create elaborate meals so full of depth and complexity, they were like a window into his soul—or maybe, Sophie liked to think, his feelings for his wife.
“Why do you think Steve isn’t calling?” she asked, wanting Brian to share the savory mixture of hope and dread she’d been nursing all morning.
“I don’t know. The twenty-four hours are just about up. He’ll have to call one way or the other.”
Sophie tried to detect a hint of anxiety in his voice, but was unrewarded, as usual. “Should we call him? I think we should call him.”
“He must not have anything to say, or we would’ve heard from him.”
“Maybe we should’ve come in a little higher,” Sophie said. “What if there’s another offer?”
“I don’t even think we can afford what we did offer,” Brian said, adjusting his bike shorts. “With the renovations—it’s serious money. It’s crazy.”
“I can make it work. I’m not worried. I’ve already got two jobs lined up for this summer.” Sophie set Elliot
down between two strawberry plants, then stepped into the next row to check on Lucy, who was pushing strawberries into her mouth as fast as she could pick them. Red juice stained her shirt, her chin, her teeth; even her hair looked sticky. “Lucy, we’re supposed to take some of these home, you know. Here, start putting them in this basket. I don’t think you should eat that many. How many have you had?”
Lucy held up both hands. “Lots?”
Sophie helped her fill the basket, teasing the ripe berries away from the greenish-white ones that dangled from flimsy stems like bowed heads. The sun was hot on her neck, but it was still early enough in the season for the heat to be dry and welcome.
Her mind turned back to the house, as it had for the last few days, trying to reassemble the rooms within the three stacked stories of brick, patching together her memories of the fireplace mantels, the high ceilings, the heavy, ornately faceted doors. It was a sharp architectural retort to the apartments and rental houses she’d grown up in, with their hollow-core doors and drop ceilings, the acrylic bathtubs that flexed and thumped when you stepped into them. This was a house made to last; a place to stay put.
As she toured it in her mind, she peeled away flocked wallpaper and shag carpet to reveal plaster walls and wood floors. She flaked paint off of chestnut, porcelain, and iron. She hung a fanciful light fixture in Lucy’s bedroom, and installed shelves for Elliot’s bins of toys. She renovated her childhood and offered it, freshly painted and outlined in crisp white trim, to her children.
“Here, Soph.” Brian handed her the baby carrier. “I’m going to catch that wagon back so I can change shoes and all. Call me when you hear from Steve, all right?” He reached around and patted the phone-shaped lump in the pocket on the back of his jersey. Sophie nodded, spreading the fingers of one hand across her belly. Seeing this, Brian stepped forward and pulled her into a hug. “It’s going to be fine.” His smile hovered between apology and reassurance as he stroked his thumb across her cheekbone. “Try to have fun. Call me if you need me to come back, okay? I’ll come right away.”