Songs of Willow Frost: A Novel

by Jamie Ford

  His ah-ma would scold him, snatching the utensils from his hands. He’d sit down and start to cry until she made funny faces that made him laugh, then handed him a shoe box of empty spools that he used as building blocks.

  Then there was the strange man. William vaguely remembered Colin. He recalled, years ago, thinking he must have been his father, or at least a kind fatherly figure. Colin was always smiling and gracious—he never raised his voice, was always joking and laughing. Through the prism of memory, he seemed the perfect gentleman, with a spectrum of manners, decorum, and wealth. William remembered going for rides in Colin’s fancy car. William used to sit in the back and watch his mother’s scarf whip in the wind. Colin seemed to have been there from the beginning, but William had eventually guessed—by the way this man came and went—that he was not his father, not his true parent. But he was there, just out of frame, in William’s earliest childhood memories. And he remained for years. His ah-ma and he seemed to have it all—health, happiness, a sense of belonging.

  But then their fortunes changed again. The first thing William noticed was the emptiness in his stomach when their food began to spoil and eventually treats in neatly wrapped boxes stopped showing up and more often than not he went to bed hungry. The flowers had stopped coming as well, and the ones in their vases began to wilt and die; dried petals scattered on the table and blew on the floor when he opened the window. That was when he noticed that his clothes always seemed to be too small—his shoes too. But in retrospect, his ah-ma rarely let on that anything was wrong. Their austerity became a matriarch’s virtue, one he had gradually understood. That loving mothers quietly sacrificed their flesh for their children, like ritual suicide, but slowly, one day, one hour, one meal at a time. Which is why he dutifully nodded whenever his ah-ma insisted how full she was—that she wasn’t hungry—as he swallowed his guilt each night and ate her portion of the modest dinners she’d prepared.

  And he remembered the caustic smell of mothballs as his ah-ma tried to preserve their clothing, which eventually wore thin. She’d patch the knees of his trousers and darn the holes in his socks. He didn’t know what bad luck was until their apartment grew colder, even with the windows shut. He remembered sleeping in his mother’s bed, huddled against her for warmth. And on nights when she worked, which as he grew older seemed like all nights, he’d take his blanket and pillow and set them on the radiator, which was merely warm instead of hot to the touch. He’d shiver, bouncing back and forth between his feet, waiting for the blanket to heat up. Then he’d wrap the musty fabric around his shoulders and lie on the wooden floor like a caterpillar in a silken cocoon, his back to the bare metal of the radiator, feeling snug and safe once again.

  William remembered that when he pressed his ear to the floor, he could hear music playing in the next building—a piano, drums, even a horn section, and people making all kinds of noise, some laughing, some fighting.

  Then his ah-ma would return, sometimes sniffling from the cold.

  “How was work at the club?” he’d ask. “Or were you onstage this time?”

  William remembered her shaking her head and frowning, “It was just a party,” she said as she curled up on the floor next to him. “With someone I used to know.”

  William felt her wrap the blanket around the two of them as he moved so she could share his pillow. She smelled strange, like smoke and sweat and old perfume.

  “I’d like to go to a party,” he said, thinking of birthday parties, dinner parties in the neighborhood. He’d never been to one of the big fancy ones, but he’d seen people celebrating in the restaurants and clubs. “I’ll be good …”

  “It’s not a party for little boys,” she said, tearing up.

  What’s the matter, Ah-ma? He remembered thinking those words, but he had been too afraid to ask. Sometimes he made her cry when he spoke, especially when he asked too many questions. He didn’t know why.

  “It’s just the weather, it’s just a cold,” she said, as though reading his troubled mind. “It’s nothing. Everything will be okay.” But as she wrapped her arms around him, he could feel her sobs. It was the first time he remembered ever feeling scared.

  “WAITING FOR LAZARUS?”

  William opened his eyes, looked up, and saw Sunny blocking his view of the sky, which was now streaked with orange and pink. I must have dozed off, he realized as his friend lowered himself to the ground and lay perpendicular to William.

  “I didn’t know her as well as you, but I miss her too,” Sunny said, nodding toward the plank of wood that rested in the dirt. The fresh paint bore Charlotte’s name.

  William didn’t say anything. He knew the grave marker was intended to be only temporary, until a family member or a kindly benefactor would pay for a granite slab. But as he looked around the burial ground and counted dozens of similar wooden signs, most of them faded and rotting, he knew those hopes had also been laid to rest.

  “You skipped out on Saturday chores,” Sunny said. “But I doubt Sister Briganti noticed. She’s been in reconciliation all afternoon with Father Bartholomew.”

  We all have atoning to do, William thought. He felt guilty for leaving Charlotte alone. He regretted his lack of conviction and was prone to fits of guilt and paralyzing bouts of regret. He wasn’t certain Sister Briganti felt such emotions.

  “You missed supper.”

  “Not hungry,” William said as his stomach grumbled ever so slightly, a faint reminder that he was capable of feeling something other than sadness. He hadn’t eaten since before the funeral. And he’d lost what remained of his appetite when he learned that Charlotte’s father hadn’t bothered to take any of her belongings when he left Sacred Heart. The sisters, in their strange, generous wisdom, had scattered her possessions among the orphans like birdseed. William bit his tongue as he imagined spiteful girls pecking at the remaining bits of Charlotte’s existence until there was nothing left.

  “I’m sorry, Willie,” Sunny said, tearing blades of grass and scattering them in the warm autumn breeze. “But your mother is out there—you don’t belong here. I don’t want you to leave again and I’ll miss having you around. But you need to go. You need to find your mom while you still can. That’s what I would do.”

  William didn’t need the reminder, though he wasn’t sure how he’d go about leaving again. He’d already spent what little money he had, and without Charlotte’s help he wouldn’t get far. He’d heard about street kids earning pennies by helping ferry passengers with their luggage at Colman Dock, or standing in line for rich people at movie theaters or the opera. The notion seemed bleak, but possible.

  Then he noticed Sister Briganti walking slowly, solemnly across the mossy courtyard toward the grotto. She palmed her rosary.

  “Did you hear what I said, Willie? You don’t belong here.”

  William stood, dusted off his trousers, and then helped Sunny to his feet. William stared at the place where he and Charlotte used to meet. The trees were swaying gently in the wind, brown leaves tumbling from the outstretched branches like thistledown.

  William walked toward the main gate. “None of us belong here.”

  WILLIAM SAT ON a bench at the nearest streetcar landing. He had enough money to make it halfway to downtown, but not enough for a transfer. He didn’t care. He was done with this place. His mother, his beloved ah-ma, was out there—somewhere. If she wanted him, if she missed him, if she only vaguely remembered the sweet times with him, amid the cameras and glitter and stage lights of her world, none of it seemed to matter. All he knew was that he needed something to fill the pit of emptiness, the cavity that served as a gateway to nothing but raw, exposed nerve—where warmth and cold hurt him in equal proportions.

  As he looked back at the school, his residence for these past five years, he saw the stout figure of Sister Briganti walking toward him. He didn’t feel like running, or arguing, or supplicating—all he felt was gravity pulling him homeward, to his ah-ma, the person he’d orbited his entire childhood,
until she’d given him up. He shrugged and turned his back to Sister Briganti, hoping she’d leave him alone but expecting to feel her wrenching his ear and dragging him back to the orphanage. He listened for the clanging bell of a coachman, the crackle of sparks from the wires overhead, the shimmy of wheels on tarnished rails. But all he heard were footsteps and words in Italian that he recognized as a prayer.

  Amen, he thought as he waited. He tensed, his stomach in knots, his heart beating frantically. He remembered the words Run away, Liu Song. Run away! And she had. His mother had run away from everything. She had run away from me.

  Then William heard the flutter of wings as a flock of birds vacated their perch atop the trolley line. The wire shook with the approach of a streetcar. He turned around, and Sister Briganti was staring down at him, her lips pursed. She handed him an envelope containing streetcar tokens and a note.

  “The note is from your mother. I debated whether or not to give it to you, but after what happened … with Charlotte …” She glanced toward the cemetery. “Save a token for the return trip.” She turned and walked away. “You can thank me when you come back.”

  I’ll never thank you. And I’m not ever coming back. William swallowed his words and unfolded the note, which read: Waiting at the Bush Hotel.

  Home

  (1934)

  William felt reborn to walk the streets of Chinatown again. In his imagination every face was a long-lost relative, every city block was a welcome mat. He relished each sensation, each rediscovered memory, from the sweet, tangy smell of fresh oyster sauce to the magical way fish scales shimmered like flecks of glitter in the gutter as old men in bloodstained aprons hosed down the sidewalks. And King Street had hardly changed in his absence. There was still the familiar yelling and laughing from the alleys, the distant wail of a saxophone, the songs the Japanese Baptist Sunday school children sang as they collected money for the poor, and the splashing of ivory mah-jongg tiles that sounded so much like rain. The only aspect missing was the grip of his mother’s gloved hand as they used to walk to the Atlas Theatre. The click-clack of her heels as they stepped around mud puddles dotted with cigarette butts and pigeon feathers.

  But this time William was alone. He listened to the lumbering, bellowing trains coming and going from the station two blocks away as he stood outside the Bush Fireproof Hotel, which looked vacant.

  The brick façade looked a bit smaller, but the tall building still stood out like a tombstone, marking the death of everything he’d known. He inhaled and smelled diesel and shoe polish and tobacco and the metallic scent of blood from the butcher’s stall up the street. And with each scent came a glimmer, a memory of his childhood that had been all but washed away by the wood soap and the lye of Sacred Heart.

  As he stepped inside he asked the front desk manager if he could look around.

  “Look all you want,” the man said, through a haze of cigarette smoke. “Hard to keep tenants these days, after that whole fracas way back when.”

  William paused for a moment, then remembered reading about Marcelino Julian, a migrant worker who a year and a half earlier went on a rampage in and around the old hotel, killing six men and injuring a dozen more. The hard times had brought out the worst in people. William climbed the stairs, trying not to let his imagination run away with him as he noticed dark stains on the carpet.

  He couldn’t remember the number of his old apartment, but his feet led the way to the stairs that he used to slide down on, belly-first, leaving a rug burn on his stomach, to the sparkling vinyl flooring in the hallway, which changed from silver to gold with each step. As he walked down the silent hallway, he came upon the door to his former apartment. He felt as though he were merely arriving home from school, five years too late. His life had taken a strange detour, but somehow he’d managed to find his way back. He looked at the note Sister Briganti had given him, out of concern or guilt, he didn’t know, nor did he care. It simply listed the Bush Hotel. No apartment number. No other message. But he understood. His ah-ma had known where he was all along. She’d written him before, but those messages had been kept from him, until now, under the right circumstances. Is that what your death bought me? William would have asked Charlotte if he could. Had her final answer to the question of her father softened Sister B’s pious heart?

  William didn’t knock. Instead he felt for the cold brass of the doorknob and opened the unlocked door. Inside, the place was barren, save for an old carpet and a few empty beer bottles strewn in a corner. The apartment smelled like dust and cat urine, and judging by the cobwebs on the ceiling, no one had lived here for some time, maybe since they’d left. Without the benefit of furnishings, pictures on the wall, curtains, blue flowers in a vase, it looked larger than he’d expected—an empty box that a home, a life, a family had once fit into comfortably. Now devoid of the tokens and touchstones of life, the place felt like a mausoleum, a rotting cavity, mirroring the pit in his stomach. The only home he’d ever known was now a forgotten void where even the ghosts had grown bored and weary and fled to more comforting surroundings.

  “Hello,” William said softly, hearing nothing in reply.

  The only sound came from his leather soles on the creaking wooden floor as he peeked into the bedroom. The space was nothing but blank walls and an open wardrobe with a single coat hanger. The wire frame looked so still, William could have sworn the hanger had been painted there. Daylight poured in through a cracked window, illuminating a swirl of soot and grime that made him want to sneeze.

  Maybe she isn’t here. Maybe this is Sister Briganti’s idea of a joke.

  “Willow?” William asked, sniffling. He saw a shadow move, but the shape was only a flight of pigeons that had nested on the fire escape. They fluttered and squawked, dancing about one another, oblivious to his presence.

  He swallowed and slowly opened the bathroom door. The overhead light socket was empty, and it took the better part of a minute for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. His heart froze when he saw the outline of a figure draped within the confines of the claw-foot tub. The shadow was that of a woman—her head tilted back, the peaks of her bare knees rising above the dirty, mildewed lip of the basin.

  “Ah-ma?”

  The shadow woman inhaled, which caused no small relief to William as he stepped closer. She was clothed in a pale blouse and skirt. The tub was dry. It was as though she were bathing in memory alone. Her fur stole covered her chest like a blanket. Her hat sat in the bottom of the tub, near the drain. William could hear a baby crying in another apartment, somewhere down the hall, though the haunting, desperate sound was gone so fast he might have imagined it.

  “Ah-ma?” he asked again.

  She didn’t say a word. William watched as she blinked, the whites of her eyes seeming to glow in the dimness of the room. That faint glow was wet with tears.

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t there when you got back,” William said, suddenly realizing that those were the words he’d hoped to hear from her. Instead she said nothing as she sat in the tub, staring at the blank wall in front of her as though watching an old movie.

  Finally she spoke. “This is where it happened.”

  I know what happened here. William swallowed the words.

  “This is where our lives changed,” she said. “This is where I lost you.”

  Will

  (1924)

  In a dreamlike fog, Liu Song stumbled out of bed and to the crib where her two-year-old son was standing up on wobbly legs, crying. In the darkness she felt his small hands reaching out to her. She picked him up, put one arm beneath the baby fat of his chunky thighs, and curled him toward her, her nose pressed into the fluff of his hair, which smelled like lilac soap and fresh shea butter from his nighttime bath.

  “Ah-ma,” he said in a toddler’s voice.

  “Shhhhh …” she whispered as she felt his tiny sausage fingers touch her cheek, her nose, and her lips. She knew he could recognize her voice, her smell, but he always had to touch her face,
especially in the dark, just to make sure. Liu Song felt him draw a long breath and then peacefully exhale. His entire body went limp, as though he’d been running in a dream and the sandman had finally caught up to him.

  Liu Song swayed back and forth for a moment, debating whether to return him to his crib. She loved rocking him when he was so peaceful, such a contrast to the first time she’d held him, warm and wet and screaming, at the Lebanon Home for Girls.

  She delighted that he’d been born eight pounds, eight ounces, two lucky numbers in a row to a mother wedded only to sadness and misfortune. During her pregnancy she’d worried about her ability to care for him, but once she had him in her arms—once she felt his breath, heard his whispered cry—motherhood felt right, felt complete, and she knew she never wanted to let go.

  She’d told the midwife, “His name is William.” Then Liu Song had reclined in the birthing chair, her newborn in her arms, wondering what the spirits of her mother and father would think of such a Western-sounding name. She wished she’d been able to hire a fortune-teller to evaluate William’s date of birth, to confirm which of the five elements complemented his name. And she gazed heavenward, looking for a portent, an omen, or a sign, but all she noticed were brown water spots and the rust on the cracked tin ceiling, and vacant cobwebs in every dusty corner.

  Looking back, Liu Song could still hear Mr. Butterfield’s voice ringing in her ears. He’d warned her that most people viewed that run-down home in North Seattle as a repository for weak-willed women. So to Liu Song the name Will seemed a natural, suitable argument to the contrary. Plus, that simple word was close to Willow, the Anglicized version of Liu Song. Will would be a family name. And when the nurses had moved Liu Song to a tiny recovery room, she’d lain nearly elbow to elbow in a row of matching beds with six other girls and their newborns. Liu Song remembered everyone looking exhausted, delirious with drug-spawned resignation, many still bleeding or in horrendous pain. But weak-willed wasn’t a description that applied to any of them. Not anymore. Like the others, Liu Song had come this far. She’d staggered, fallen, and then crawled across some unspoken maternal finish line where a new challenge was set to begin—one measured in days, weeks, months, and years. But there was satisfaction in the prize swaddled at her breast, then and now.