“Speak English, child.”
“Why, Meta?”
“So you don’t forget. There is time to work in the garden. I know you’re worried about the weeding. First, you come into the front room. Armen and I must talk to you.”
“But, Meta, the garden . . . and Chelsea.”
“Ya, ya, child. First you come with us and sit awhile.”
I heard the sliding door of the front room open and close. Vinni’s voice sounded older. Deeper. Impatient. The voice of a child who believes others will derail her from what she needs to do.
“Meta.” I heard Vinni’s voice in the distance. I held still. Unable to move. White clouds skated in front of the blue until all the blue disappeared. Voices speaking in German slipped through the walls. I heard a pocket door slide open. More quiet.
Then Meta’s voice in English.
“Go, child. She waits for you.”
As I heard her footsteps come closer to the bedroom, I froze out of fear. Fear that she would have to learn to love me all over again. I had been cheated of my daughter’s life for five years. In the meantime, something had happened to my heart. It had stopped and started up again. What had happened to Vinni’s? Would her heart explode from joy or slink into a distant murmur? I had no way of knowing as I sat in her room. Maybe I would be her blessing and she would be mine. And we would ride the back of the bull together. Clutching its horns. Riding the waves.
“Mama?” Vinni stood at the door. Her long hair fell over one eye. Beauty is too tame a word to describe her, love too simple a sound to say. Neither of us moved.
I was the mother. I knew it was up to me.
“Meta told me you have a blue garden,” I said.
My voice trembled. Tears bound by five years of believing broke free and slid down my cheeks. Vinni leaned against the door frame, her face still dry.
Where are her tears?
I walked closer and cupped my hands around her face. I kissed her forehead. My lips rested against her skin. I smelled her, and then I broke and shook until I felt Vinni’s arms wrap around me. They were strong but unfamiliar. She had grown up while we were apart. She was almost as tall as I.
She whispered, “Mama” from inside her throat, and I knew that she still loved me. She had not forgotten. I could feel her heart against mine, racing inside her chest. I smoothed her hair on the back of her head. A sound like I had never heard before came from my girl. Not a howl or a wail, but something else that kept her from letting go all at once.
“It’s okay, baby,” I said. “It’s okay.”
The note continued until finally her mouth split open and together we slid down to the floor as she let out a piercing cry.
“Ma . . . maaaaaaaa.”
Over and over, she screamed for me.
“Ma . . . maaaaaaaa.”
We rocked back and forth. She shook uncontrollably, trying to make her body smaller, curling up inside my arms.
My little girl was gone. In that moment, I knew we would never get back what we had lost. We had no choice but to lead each other to someplace new—someplace where love would never be blue.
“I love you, baby. Oh, God, how I love you.” I whispered her name into her hair.
“Vinni. Vinni. Vinni.” Over and over. At first, saying it stung my heart, but then it sweetened.
I leaned my head into hers to inhale her. To smell her. How would I make her mine again? I had no idea. It would take time.
“How did you find me?” Vinni said in a voice I could barely hear.
Tears slid over my lips into my mouth. “I never stopped believing,” I said.
Vinni kissed the palm of my hand, turned it over, and kissed the outside. She gave me a slight smile, and I smoothed her hair back from her face as we stared at each other.
I kissed her cheeks. I kissed her neck. I kissed her hair. I couldn’t get enough of my skin against hers.
“Would you like to show me the blue garden?” I asked.
Vinni uncurled from my lap. She took my hand and helped me up from the floor.
“The garden. I wanted the garden because . . .”
She stopped. Who knew the answer?
“The garden needs weeding.”
“I can help,” I said.
It would take time.
There are moments on most days when I feel a deep and sincere gratitude, when I sit at the open window and there is a blue sky or moving clouds.
—Käthe Kollwitz
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To begin, I must thank the countless listeners who took this journey with me. Many have heard my discoveries on the page during writing workshops I have led in my home or on writing retreats in Sea Girt, New Jersey, and on the island of Alonnisos in Greece and in St. Gauderic, France. Their kind attention confirmed my belief that something was working. I am grateful to those who refrained from asking why it was taking so long.
A heartfelt thanks to my dear friend and colleague, novelist Jacqueline Sheehan, whom I met on the island of Cumbrae in 1998 at a writer’s retreat, for her steadfast support and encouragement. I am grateful to Chief David Stokoe from the Randolph Police Department in Randolph, New Jersey, for his guidance on police procedure, to John Crisci, retired New York DEA agent for his expertise, and to Thomas E. Maloney, Esq. for his legal mind. Thanks to Julie Gridinsky Friedman, friend and artist, for her generous insight into what it means to paint. Thanks to Michael and Kathleen Robbiani, gracious owners of a real live doll and clock shop, for giving me a private tour of their shop in Marlboro, New Jersey, and for answering my many questions. I am grateful to Dr. Michael O’Neil for his prompt responses to my medical questions. Thanks, also, to novelist, Jenny Milchman, for her generosity of spirit.
To the readers who read early and later drafts, know this: I needed you. My thanks to all: Jacqueline Mitchard, Mary Logue, Caroline Leavitt, Joyce Norman, Juanita Kirton, Marilyn Nusbaum, Ellen Kahaner, Elizabeth Caputo, Joanne Edelmann, Elizabeth Cipriano, Rosemary McGee, Susanna Rich, Mort Rich, Vasiliki Katsarou, Kayla Jerz, Virginia Dillon, JoAnn Claps, Priscilla Orr, Janice Molinari, Lynne Rosenfeld, Susan Ganjamie and Nancy Pickard.
I am indebted to my dear friend and reader, novelist MaryAnn McFadden, for telling the truth during our regular breakfast critique sessions. How fortunate am I.
My gratitude goes deep to all the writers of WOMEN READING ALOUD throughout the USA and across the ocean who hold me up by being present.
Thank you to She Writes Press, led by the indomitable Brooke Warner, with Lauren Wise, Cait Levin, Annie Tucker, Julie Metz, and the entire team for their enthusiasm, kindness, and unflagging support.
Most of all, I owe big thanks to my glorious children— Jenna and David and Kayla—for loving me. And to Tom, their father and my husband, whom I met by chance and whose love fills me each day.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo Credit: Sue Kenney
JULIE MALONEY is a former dancer/choreographer and artistic director of her own modern dance company. She is a poet whose work has been published in many literary journals. Her book of poems, Private Landscape, was published in 2007. As founder/director of Women Reading Aloud, a non-profit organization dedicated to the support of women writers, she has been leading workshops and writing retreats in the US, Greece, and France since 2003. A Matter of Chance is her debut novel. She lives outside of New York City in Morris County, NJ.
SELECTED TITLES FROM SHE WRITES PRESS
She Writes Press is an independent publishing company founded to serve women writers everywhere. Visit us at www.shewritespress.com.
Shelter Us by Laura Diamond. $16.95, 978-1-63152-970-2. Lawyer-turned-stay-at-home-mom Sarah Shaw is still struggling to find a steady happiness after the death of her infant daughter when she meets a young homeless mother and toddler she can’t get out of her mind—and becomes determined to rescue them.
The Tolling of Mercedes Bell by Jennifer Dwight. $18.95, 978-1-63152-070-9. When she meets a magnetic lawyer at her work, recently
widowed Mercedes Bell unwittingly drinks a noxious cocktail of grief, legal intrigue, desire, and deception—but when she realizes that her life and her daughter’s safety hang in the balance, she is jolted into action.
The Rooms Are Filled by Jessica Null Vealitzek. $16.95, 978-1-938314-58-2. The coming-of-age story of two outcasts—a nine-year-old boy who just lost his father, and a closeted young woman—brought together by circumstance.
Last Seen by J. L. Doucette. $16.95, 978-1-63152-202-4. When a traumatized reporter goes missing in the Wyoming wilderness, the therapist who knows her secrets is drawn into the investigation—and she comes face-to-face with terrifying answers regarding her own difficult past.
True Stories at the Smoky View by Jill McCroskey Coupe. $16.95, 978-1-63152-051-8. The lives of a librarian and a ten-year-old boy are changed forever when they become stranded by a blizzard in a Tennessee motel and join forces in a very personal search for justice.
Eden by Jeanne Blasberg. $16.95, 978-1-63152-188-1. As her children and grandchildren assemble for Fourth of July weekend at Eden, the Meister family’s grand summer cottage on the Rhode Island shore, Becca decides it’s time to introduce the daughter she gave up for adoption fifty years ago.
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