Songs of Willow Frost: A Novel

by Jamie Ford

  Sister Briganti hailed a taxi and frowned. She hesitated and then said, “I know that, William.” Her words crashed to the ground like a tree falling, snapping twigs and branches of half-truths and outright lies.

  William stammered in disbelief. “What do you mean you know?” He watched as the stout woman struggled to express herself. He was used to her expressions of grace and joy, of wrath or condemnation, even pride, but he’d never seen her like this. What was it? he thought. Not sad, but doubtful.

  “I knew you’d be here, William,” Sister Briganti said. “From the moment I saw her in the movie theater and then on that blessed poster, I knew you’d do something impetuous like this.” She shook her head. “I’m taking you back to the orphanage.”

  “Why should we go?” Charlotte asked. “He has a mother—that was her!”

  Sister Briganti paused, shaking her head. “Because, William, your mother is not supposed to see you, nor you her. It’s for the best. Come home and I’ll tell you why she gave you away.”

  WHEN WILLIAM ARRIVED back at Sacred Heart, it felt like anything but home. To make matters worse, he was sickened by the thought of his ah-ma returning to her dressing room and finding the place empty. Would she think I left to pay her back for leaving me? Would she think I didn’t care, that I didn’t want her back? He imagined her searching backstage and then giving up, thinking the truth of his father was enough shame for one lifetime. He knew he would have to leave again and find his way back to the theater. The only thing holding him was that Charlotte might be whisked off right then and there—taken to a school for the blind, or some other place far away. Much to his surprise, she was allowed to return to her cottage unaided. She hugged William for what seemed like a whole minute and kissed him on the cheek.

  “Thank you,” she whispered in his ear.

  “For what?”

  “For taking me and not taking advantage of me. Thanks for keeping me safe.” She smiled, sadly. “I know you’re going to find her again—your mother.”

  How little you know.

  “It’s only a matter of time now. And now that you know it’s really her, do whatever you have to do, with or without me.”

  William thanked her in return. Charlotte had always been a friend—a good pal, nothing more. But that dynamic had somehow changed, and his hollow heart felt emptier without her. He was surprised that he could feel anything beyond the shock and longing of meeting his ah-ma again. His desperate imagination swirled with joy, anger, and exasperation. Love? That too. William felt as though he were treading water to keep from drowning; his emotions and memories swirled like so much flotsam and jetsam.

  He was taken directly to Sister Briganti’s office in the administrative wing; he walked down the long hallway like a condemned man, passing grim-faced portraits of Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt, but none as dour as his headmistress. As William passed Sunny and a handful of others who were mopping the floor, some looked happy at his return, some disappointed, all of them surprised. Good to see you boys again. I’m afraid I won’t be staying long.

  He was ordered to remain in the office with the door closed until she arrived. He sat on his hands and stared at the books on her shelves, unsure if he were in trouble or not—not caring either way. Willow was Liu Song—his ah-ma. He had someplace to go, someone to go to, a reason to leave, even if that reason was only temporary. He hoped they would kick him out—expected it, even. But until then, he wanted answers.

  He waited and waited, until he finally heard Sister Briganti arguing with someone in the hallway, in Italian. Then she walked in with an armload of papers and file folders.

  William didn’t wait for her to sit down. “How did you know that was my mother?” he asked. “How did you know she was alive?”

  “Same as you, William,” Sister Briganti said with a long, exhausted breath. “I recognized her at the theater, I heard her on the radio—”

  “No,” William interrupted. “How did you know it was her?”

  Sister Briganti sat down across from him, collecting her papers and her thoughts. She opened her desk drawer, pulled out a roll of anise Life Savers, and offered one to William. He shook his head and watched as she popped two into her mouth and bit down on them immediately, chewing them to bits. She sat back in her leather chair and absently touched the rosary that draped from her wide collar.

  “I knew … because it’s my sacred responsibility to carry the burden of truth for your families; that duty is not something to be taken lightly.” She looked back at William, shifting her weight as though unable to find a comfortable position. “Because of that, I’ve always known who your mother was.”

  “How?” William asked. Don’t make me beg.

  He watched her open one of the files that was stuffed with letters. He leaned forward and pawed through the envelopes; all of them had been opened, and all of them were addressed to him. They were from San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, but mostly—the ones that made his head pound, his temples throb, and his stomach churn—they were from an address right here in Seattle. He brought them to his nose, smelling the paper, hoping to detect a fragrant memory. “She was here.” He looked at the postmarks. “That first year … here all the time …” She was only miles away. Why didn’t she come back for me? William remembered sweet times with his mother. None of this made sense. Did she leave to be an actress?

  “I’m sorry, William.”

  “For what? For lying to me …”

  “Watch your tone, young man. I never lied to you, William. Not once,” she snapped, touching the letters. “But I did withhold the truth. And I did it for your own good, because your mother was ultimately declared unfit to care for you. And she didn’t fight those accusations. She willingly gave you up when she signed these papers. She was never coming back, not here anyway.” Sister Briganti opened a file of stamped documents. “My deepest regret is that she didn’t give you up at birth. She was selfish in thinking she could provide a proper home. All she did was make it worse for you.”

  “But … how … why?”

  Sister Briganti coughed, cleared her throat, then snapped her fingers, and a novice outside her office brought in a cup of coffee and dishes of sugar and cream. Sister Briganti looked pained as she stirred her coffee with a tarnished silver spoon, the pinging sound punctuating the silence between them. She sat there, not drinking the coffee.

  “Why?” he asked, again.

  “She didn’t want you, that’s why she gave you up. She’s moved on.”

  He pointed to the cards and letters. “I don’t believe you.”

  William watched as she shook her head, rose, and reached for an old hymnal on the shelf behind her. From behind the volume she fished out an open pack of Fatima cigarettes and a book of matches. She lit one and sat back down, taking a slow drag and blowing the smoke toward the nearest window, which was slightly ajar.

  “You can’t keep me here,” William said. “It’s not fair.”

  Sister Briganti paused to attend to her cigarette. “You can run away again, if that’s what you really want. But it’s not any easier out there. If the police pick you up without an address to your name, you’ll be arrested. You’ll go before a judge, perhaps one less caring than me, and you’ll be remanded to a reformatory—sent to a place where they take your shoes at night so you don’t slip away, where they lock you in a basement and feed you bread and water. Where they label boys like you as wayward or incorrigible and send you to the punishment cottage. A reform school won’t treat you with the same courtesies as Sacred Heart. Do you want that? Mother Cabrini always had a soft spot for the Orient; that’s why you’re treated as well as you are—for that you should be thankful.”

  For the whippings, being tied down at night, for keeping my mother’s words neatly tucked into a folder beside your desk. William stared back, angry, hurt, but most of all, confused. He rested his elbows on the desk and put his head in his hands. He spoke softly, choosing his words carefully. “I just want w
hat anyone would want …”

  “And what’s that, a perfect family? A mother? A father?”

  William shook his head. “Willow—my mother—she told me who my father is, what he was. I don’t care. I just want the truth.”

  Sister Briganti leaned back in the chair, which creaked beneath her weight. She blew smoke. “But your mother cared who your father was. That’s why she allowed you to come to Sacred Heart in the first place. Because she knew he’d never find you here.”

  Fathers

  (1934)

  William sat with Charlotte on the old porch swing in front of her cottage. The grass had long since turned a dull shade of brown, like the color of unwashed hair. They shared an old wool blanket, warding off the chill air as a flock of geese flew overhead, disappearing in and out of fog, heading south for the winter to places warmer and more inviting. William dangled one foot to the ground, pushing off lazily as the swing rocked back and forth. The rusty hinges squeaked and pinged like the slow tick-tock of a metronome setting the pace, matching the unchanging rhythm of life at Sacred Heart.

  “So she was pregnant?” Charlotte asked. “With you?”

  William nodded absently, staring toward downtown Seattle and the terra-cotta pyramid atop the Smith Tower that peeked above the horizon. “I guess so. She didn’t know right away. Sister Briganti says there’s a test they can do now, but back then she had to wait weeks to be sure. Her boss at some music store arranged for her to go to a place for unwed mothers. I was born there.

  “Sister Briganti said I was lucky—since Chinese mothers aren’t allowed in hospitals, they usually give birth down on the docks. She also said that at the place where I was born, most of the babies are given up or are taken away. But for some reason my ah-ma decided to keep me.” I guess I was the only family she had left.

  “But that explains why she never spoke about my father. I remember being little and listening to President Wilson on the Zenith giving a Father’s Day speech. I took out my crayons, sat down, and began to draw a picture for him—I must have thought my father was going to show up or something. When I presented the drawing to my ah-ma, she gushed and told me how beautiful it was. But later that night I saw her take a candle and light it on fire.”

  Charlotte nodded. “I don’t blame her.”

  “For burning it?”

  Charlotte paused. “For not telling you. You’re so fortunate that she even kept you. Most unwed mothers would have given you up for adoption right away—they would have had nothing to do with you. There are older girls here who were pregnant once. They’ve told me frightening stories. She must have really cared about you, William. You must be very special.”

  At least I used to be, William thought sadly, trying to reconcile his strange circumstances—his unusual parents and the possible outcomes of knowing or not knowing who his father was. It mattered then. Does it matter now?

  “And Willow told you all this?”

  William nodded. “But I’m sure she didn’t tell me everything.” He didn’t know what was real and what was illusory. He’d created fictions in his mind all these years, based on memories and half-truths, mixed with wishes, hopes, and dreams. He’d believed his ah-ma to be dead all along; instead he was dead to her—abandoned, and according to Sister Briganti, he was eventually forgotten. And yet much to Sister Briganti’s chagrin and his surprise, William’s mother had miraculously reappeared. But the person on-screen, onstage, on the radio, she wasn’t his mother either, or at least not the ah-ma he once knew. His ah-ma was Liu Song, while Willow was just a facsimile—an actress with makeup and fancy gowns putting on a show.

  What kind of bastard am I?

  William chewed his lip and then spoke. “Sister Briganti filled in the rest. She told me about how my ah-ma gave birth to me, how she raised me for a few years. She started to explain why my mother seemed to come and go—about other men she dated, about how if my ah-ma couldn’t have me, she didn’t want her uncle Leo to have me either.” He looked down at his empty hands. “She said that’s all I needed to know.”

  “What else is there?”

  “Why she never came back for me.” Or was I that much of a burden? Did she give me up so she’d be free to marry someone? Or did she give me up to be an actress? “She’s famous now. I don’t think there’s room in that spotlight for a bastard.”

  William felt Charlotte sit up. He turned and saw Sunny running toward them with a note in his hand. His friend stopped and walked the last fifty feet, nearly out of breath.

  “Someone’s coming for you,” Sunny said, wide-eyed.

  William, Charlotte—in fact all of the orphans—recognized that tone, like the prickle of electricity that seemed to hum in the air before a lightning storm, the rush of excitement that came only when a parent returned. Most had learned not to get their hopes too high. After all, often parents came back only for a final, wrenching goodbye. But occasionally and often without advance notice (because parents seemed to love being on the giving end of surprises), one of the orphans would hit the jackpot and be told to pack his or her belongings, which meant one thing—going home.

  William’s heart leapt in his chest, hoping it was Willow—his ah-ma.

  “Coming for who?” Charlotte asked.

  “It’s your father,” Sunny said. “Can you believe it?”

  “My father? Uncle Leo?” William blurted, bewildered. A surprising tide of anger seeped into his voice. Though truth be told, a queer part of him was curious, the same way a newspaper article about a ship sinking makes one curious, or a train wreck, or a gang shooting. “Sister Briganti said he’d never find me here. Why would he …”

  “Not your father,” Sunny said as he rested his hands on his knees, out of breath. Then he pointed to Charlotte. “Hers.”

  William sat back, relieved, disappointed, but hopeful for his friend. He touched her arm as she stared at something unseen. She grimaced and stood up. He noticed that her pale skin seemed to redden and her hand trembled as she reached for her cane.

  Charlotte uttered only a single word. “When?”

  “In a few days. He’s coming to visit, to make arrangements to eventually take you away from here. Can you believe it?”

  “I thought your dad was …” How do I say he was a creep, a criminal? William wasn’t sure how much Sunny knew, so he stopped short of saying the word prison.

  “He must have got out, William,” Charlotte said. “All good things come to an end. All bad things go on forever.”

  “You’re not happy about this?” Sunny asked. “This is what everyone hopes for. This is great news—you deserve it.”

  Charlotte tapped her cane until she brushed Sunny’s leg. “That’s sweet of you. But you’d understand if you were a girl and you had my father.”

  “But …” Sunny said. “It means you’ll get to go home.”

  “It’s okay,” William said. Home is a fairy tale, the kind where children are lost in the woods, found, cooked, and eaten.

  “You can tell Sister B that I don’t have a father,” Charlotte said. “And that I’m not going anywhere.”

  AFTER DINNER WILLIAM sat with Charlotte outside the main chapel as the boys’ choir practiced some Latin hymn he didn’t recognize. Their melodic voices filled the alcove, inspiring a sad reverence. The song had a depressive quality, like a funeral march—intended to be celebratory, but laden with melancholy. William helped Charlotte light a candle for her mother. He lit one for his own ah-ma while he was at the altar. And he lit one for Charlotte, though he didn’t tell her that. He had such mixed feelings. He struggled to see her situation through any lens but the one that magnified his own loss, his own longing. She had been given a damaged gift, but one most at Sacred Heart would have been grateful to receive. If his mother had wanted him back—if only for an afternoon visit, he would have jumped into that quagmire with both feet. But he knew their circumstances were different. Their situations weren’t merely apples and oranges. They were oranges and some strange po
isoned fruit.

  “Did you tell Sister Briganti that you didn’t want to see him?” William asked. Because we all know how compassionate that woman is. She makes cactus cozy.

  Charlotte nodded, then shrugged. “There’s nothing she can do. He’s my father. My mother is dead. He has every right. I asked about my grandmother—I practically begged to go live with her, but she doesn’t have a say in the matter. My father served time for bootlegging. But now he gets a fresh start. We should all be so lucky.”

  “But did you tell her?” William asked delicately. He knew that Charlotte was terrified of her father—something terrible must have happened between them. She never spoke of it, and William had always been too afraid to ask.

  “Sister B said that perfect parents don’t exist and that I was just being willful and belligerent—that sometimes children get used to the routine here and don’t want to return to the real world. She said I should be grateful to have him back in my life.”

  People change, William thought, Willow certainly did. Maybe Charlotte’s father missed her and would make restitution somehow. William wanted to be positive and optimistic, but if Charlotte didn’t want to have anything to do with her father, her reasons were valid enough, and he believed her.

  “Sister B just told me to pray,” Charlotte said. “As if that ever helped any of us.”

  William had tried. But Catholicism, with all of its pageantry, was still a mystery clad in Latin, with ceremonies he didn’t understand. Like a mynah bird, William could mimic what was expected of him, but he knew it was merely the price of admission to a strange musical.

  Charlotte pulled out a long string of glass beads with a large crucifix at the end. “She gave me a new rosary. Sister B said she gives a special one to every orphan who finds a new family, or every child who is welcomed back into the home they once knew.”