by Gigi Pandian
“I still think flowers are safer. How do you know what she’ll like?”
“She’s Max’s mom. I’ll make a guess.”
thirty-three
“I should warn you,” Max said.
“Really, there’s no such thing as a ‘normal’ family, Max. They don’t exist.”
We were nearly to Astoria. As the sun approached the horizon, the rocks off the Oregon coast reminded me of the natural formations common in the Southwest, but these rocks were in the ocean. The US Southwest had been an easy place for me to fit in wherever I parked my Airstream. I didn’t attract much attention there, and it also offered me as much solitude as I wanted. Even sharing the national parks with hikers, it was impossible not to feel at one with nature.
“My sister in particular. She’s … She’s going to try and fix you.”
“Fix me?”
Max lifted a hand from the steering wheel and reached over to tuck a lock of my white hair behind my ear. “She’s going to notice your hair isn’t dyed.”
“So? It’s fine, Max. Really.” People with keen observation skills noticed my hair wasn’t the white-blonde of some northern Europeans and that I didn’t have albinism, so they assumed I’d fried my hair by dying it.
The faint sound of thunder rumbled in the distance. Only half the sky was filled with storm clouds, but the wind was moving quickly. We pulled up at a sprawling two-story white house with a monumental Atlas cedar tree in the front yard. One of its hulking branches bore the marks of hammocks and tire swings.
“This is the house where you grew up?”
“Yup.” He grabbed our bags from the back and helped me out of the jeep. My ankle and his cold were nearly better, but not quite perfect.
“I love it.”
“Zoe?” Max hesitated before starting up the path to the house.
“What is it?”
“You know this is my mom’s birthday … ”
“Of course.”
“It feels absurd that I don’t know this, since I’ve known you for nearly a year, but … when is your birthday?”
I laughed. “You didn’t miss it. It’s January first.”
January 1 wasn’t the day I was born, but it was the birthday I liked to celebrate. I was born under the Julian calendar, where the new year began on March 25. That was decades before the current Gregorian calendar was adopted, and in a community that didn’t celebrate birthdays. My old life in Salem felt so far removed from the life I’d been living when I met Ambrose that we chose that day of new beginnings as my symbolic birthday.
“Come on inside before the rain hits,” a woman’s voice with a thick Texas accent boomed from an open front window. “I know these skies. It’s breaking any second.”
Sure enough, as we walked past the cedar tree, two fat raindrops fell onto my face.
Max’s mom came through the front door and enveloped me in a hug. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to finally meet you. I was beginning to think you were a figment of my son’s imagination. I’m so glad you could make it tonight.”
“Zoe, this is my mom, Mary Jasper. Is Mina here yet, Mom?”
“She’s inside cooking.” Mary squeezed my hands before letting go of me. She wore steel-tipped cowboy boots over leggings and a blue tunic. Her black hair was cut nearly as short as Max’s, giving plenty of room to her radiant smile and freckle-covered nose and cheeks.
“I’m so happy to meet you, Mary,” I said as she ushered us inside with the rain pelting behind us. “Happy birthday.”
The house was stuffed with the cozy furniture of family life, much of which I guessed had been there since Max’s childhood. The side table next to the door, as well as most of the free surfaces, were covered in framed photographs of an extended family.
“You two arrived just in time.” A woman who looked very much like Max, from her features to her smart style of dress, stepped out from the kitchen, wiping her hands on an apron with an illustration of a cactus. “There’s no way the storm is letting up tonight. Hi, Maxi. This must be Zoe.”
Mina shook my hand warmly, then her expression changed. “Your hair … ” she murmured.
“Don’t,” Max said.
“What?”
“Why don’t I get everyone drinks?” Max said, shooting his sister a look.
“Let me show you around the house while the kids get our food and drinks ready,” Mary said to me. She grinned as she began the tour with the staircase lined with framed photos. “I swear those two act like kids when they’re in the same room together. I almost expect them to stick out their tongues at each other. But they know not to mess with me.” She laughed and paused at a photo of a young girl at the gates of a ranch.
“Texas, 1960s?” I asked.
“Max told you about my childhood?”
I shook my head. I’d seen similar ranches during that decade when I was traveling across the country.
“That’s me at twelve or thirteen,” Mary said. “I grew up in a rural area. My dad’s family were Texan farmers and ranchers for generations, and my mom was first-generation Chinese American. I grew up learning to live off the land. I’m a crack shot. Maybe that’s what keeps the kids in line.” She laughed again. It made her look so much like the girl in the photo.
“I taught Max to shoot as well,” she added. “From the start, he hit a bull’s-eye every time. Though when he was young he refused to shoot anything besides zombies at the shooting range.”
As we proceeded up the stairway, I learned that Mary hadn’t had many Chinese friends and had no interest in learning to speak Chinese because she just wanted to fit in. When she met Max’s dad in college, she’d found another second-generation immigrant unsure where he fit in. That connection was so wonderful that it had eclipsed the fact that they didn’t share the same life goals. They’d been divorced for decades, so Mary used her maiden name, Jasper.
Her twenty-minute tour of the house was mostly focused on telling me about the people in photographs. We returned to the living room and I picked up a photo that had caught my eye when I’d first entered the house.
“This is Max and Mina as kids?” The picture was of two cute kids silhouetted against a boulder with the ocean behind them.
“Did Max tell you why I named her Mina?”
I shook my head.
“She has a birthmark on her neck.” Mary’s expression grew more serious than I’d thought her happy face capable of. “Two small marks that look like puncture wounds.”
I leaned in closer as she pointed at a shadow in the portrait.
“You know what I’m talking about,” Mary whispered, “don’t you?”
“Dracula?” Was this why Max had warned me?
“Ma!” Mina’s voice came from behind us. “Zoe, is she telling you the Dracula story? That’s not why I’m named Mina.”
Mary laughed. “She speaks the truth. That’s not why I named her Mina. She’s named Willamina after my father, William. Mina has a beautiful ring to it, doesn’t it?”
“Except for the fact that my brother is named for a warrior,” Mina said, “and I get the diminutive of a patriarch.”
“Bite your tongue,” Mary said. “You loved your grandpa.”
“He was a great man, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t a patriarch.”
Mary sighed. “She really does have a birthmark on her neck, so she loved to tell kids that story to scare them. Mina has always been the dramatic one of the pair. I grew up reading southern Gothics, and have a beautiful old copy of Dracula that Mina found on the bookshelf when she was a bit too young. She loved that it had a character with her name, so she made up that story about herself when she was little. I just borrowed the story once she was old enough for it to embarrass her.”
Mina kissed her mom’s cheek. “Ma, will you talk some sense into Max? He won’t take the zinc I of
fered. He’s got a cold. He’s not taking care of himself.”
“I heard that,” Max called from the kitchen. “Your collards are burning.”
Mina swore and rushed back to the kitchen. Mary and I followed.
“I guess I should expect you not to care about your own health,” Mina was saying to Max as she stirred the pot, “since you’re someone who doesn’t care about taking care of people.”
“Mina, don’t start,” Mary said. “And Max, since it’s just us, we should have rescheduled. Do I need to make you some chicken soup? And I think we have cokes in the pantry.”
“I’m fine,” Max said, handing me a glass of sparkling wine. “Truly. It’s just the tail end of a cold. Zoe has been taking good care of me.”
“Then why are you still sick?” Mina asked.
“He’s doing a lot better,” I said. “I made him homemade nettle soup the day he got sick. Along with a cayenne tea that seemed to do the trick.”
“Nettles?” Mina slipped her phone into her hand and looked up something on the screen. “I specialize in integrative medicine and I’ve never seen nettles suggested for—”
Max threw his hands in the air. “I only got sick three days ago. I’d say I’m doing pretty well.”
Mina’s brow drew together. “That’s awfully quick a recovery. What else are you taking?”
“I told you, Zoe’s been taking good care of me. She found the nettles in my backyard and used what I had on hand.”
“Food smells delicious,” I said. I breathed in the scents of various chili peppers. I’m usually good at identifying scents, but I didn’t recognize all of these.
“Mom’s favorites,” Mina said. “I hope you like spicy food.”
“I love it.”
Mina grinned and showed me the range of southern-inspired dishes sitting on the counter, from corn bread to collards, all seasoned with Chinese chili pepper sauces. We sat down to dinner at a round dining table. In the warm house, I’d taken off my sweater and was wearing a short-sleeved silk blouse. I caught Mina studying my arms as I reached for the salad.
“I’ve never seen a condition like yours,” she said.
“Mina, please—” Max said.
“What? I’m a doctor. I could help her. Zoe, have you ever seen a specialist? I’ve never heard of someone without albinism who has white hair all over.”
“A toast to Mom,” Max said. “Happy birthday.” He stood and toasted, then retrieved a small gift wrapped in newspaper.
“My favorite of your homemade teas!” Mary kissed his cheek.
Mina handed their mom a much more formally wrapped present. Inside was a cookbook holder made of copper.
I handed her a small package as well.
“You needn’t have brought me anything,” Mary said, but she looked touched. Her face lit up as she opened the kraft wrapping paper to reveal a Victorian vampire hunting kit: a small wooden box containing a stake, mallet, and crucifix.
A wide grin spread across Mary’s face. “This looks antique. Is it what I think it is?”
I nodded. “It’s over a century old, and it is.”
“Had Max told you that story about Mina already?”
“I didn’t.” Max shook his head, a baffled look on his face. “How did you know?” he whispered to me.
“I have my secrets.”
thirty-four
After dinner, Max’s mom insisted she and Mina would clean up and they’d join us on the covered back porch. Max and I took cups of chamomile lavender tea to the warm room filled with plants that overlooked the backyard.
“Sorry about Mina,” he said. “I warned you she’d try to fix you. She’s like that. She’s a great doctor, but most things don’t interest her. It’s only rare cases that make her pay attention. She likes to know the exact mechanisms that make things work.”
“That’s why she was grilling me about nettles.”
“That’s just her way.”
“I know. I like her. And your mom is the sweetest person on the planet.”
“Mom? My mom? Mary Jasper Liu? I love her more than anything, but ‘sweet’ isn’t a word I’d use to describe her.”
“This house is great,” I said as I sipped the tea. Max’s special blend. “I bet you have some great memories from this place.”
“Before my parents got divorced, my dad’s parents spent a lot of time here with us.”
I knew Max had been close with his grandparents. He’d spoken of them often. His grandfather had gone back to China after his grandmother passed away, and Max had gone to his grandfather’s hundredth birthday celebration earlier that year.
“My grandfather used to take me treasure-hunting along the coast nearby,” Max continued. “When I was little I was obsessed with this kids’ movie, an adventure about a pirate’s treasure that was set here in Astoria. You ever see The Goonies?”
I shook my head.
“Really?” Max asked. “I guess you’re too young. For my birthday one year, Granddad really buried a treasure for me to find.”
“What was the treasure?”
“A treasure chest filled with blocks to build a castle. Which I built here in this room. This is also where … ”
“Where what?”
“It’s silly. Never mind.”
“Come on.” I set down my steaming mug of tea and took Max’s hand in mine.
“This is also where my grandmother showed me how to take care of plants.”
“Why is that silly?”
“Grandmother had the greenest thumb of anyone I’ve ever known. When I was a kid, I believed she could truly bring dead plants back to life. It was like magic.” He shook his head and squeezed my hand. “Now I know they were only false memories of a child, blending my imagination with what I’d really seen.”
“It’s not magic,” I said. “It’s alchemy. The science of transformation. We both coax plants in our backyard gardens back to life from unhealthy states.”
“I know. But it was the way she talked about it too. She believed it was magic, and I believed her. Mina was closer with our mom’s parents than our dad’s, even though she’s the one who went on to become a healer. Mina hates that I became a cop. She thinks she’s the only one who helps people.”
“There’s more than one way to help people,” I said, as much for my own benefit as Max’s. Since giving up my Paris apothecary shop, I hadn’t been helping people as directly as I used to, and I’d even begun to wonder if I was moving away from my humanity, the danger for alchemists. That was one of the reasons I was eager to sell my tinctures at the Autumn Equinox Fair the following weekend. My prices were on a sliding scale, as they always had been, charging however much people could afford.
“You never talk about your family,” Max said.
“I lost them a long time ago. Even the couple who took me in … I lost them too.”
“They all died?”
“My biological family are long dead, but … ” I thought of Nicolas, who’d shown me more fatherly affection and guidance than I’d experienced in my life. “I ran away and lost touch with the surrogate parents who saved my life and mentored me.”
“Sorry. I can tell it’s painful for you to talk about. It’s okay. You don’t have to tell me.”
“You’re lucky to have your mom and Mina.”
“I know. And as much as we disagree, Mina’s partly right about me. About why I became a cop. One of the reasons I wanted to be a detective had nothing to do with helping people. I love the feeling—the personal satisfaction—of catching the bad guys. In that pirate treasure movie I loved as a kid, the scrappy bunch of teenage friends come together to defeat the bad guys at the end. I always wanted to be like them.”
I laughed and Max looped his fingers through mine.
“What do you say we watch the movie before bed?” h
e suggested. “It’s a silly kid’s movie, but … ”
“I’d love to.”
Sitting there on the Oregon coast in a cozy covered porch with a wild storm swirling around us, I knew it was the calm before the storm I’d return to in my quest to rescue Nicolas. But I let myself enjoy it. Just for the night.
In the morning, mist surrounded the seaside house but no rain was falling. Mina had left before dawn so she could make it back home in time to start the day at her medical practice. Max’s mom packed half a dozen mason jars of leftovers to send home with us. She also handed a second bag to Max. He peeked inside and smiled.
“What is it?” I asked, looking over his shoulder.
“Homemade chicken soup and Sprite. What she gave me as a kid when I was sick.” He gave his mom a hug. “This is why you got up so early.”
“Of course,” Mary said. “But I forgot one thing. Zoe, can you help me get it?”
I followed Mary into the house.
“You know, all three of us are both right and wrong,” she said. “Me, you, and Mina. We each have different ways of taking care of Max. I’ll tell you a secret I learned from my in-laws. It’s not the method and medicine that matters—it’s the love behind it. We all love him. It’s the love that cures.”
She gave me a hug and walked me out.
“What did she give you?” Max asked after his mom helped me into the jeep and waved goodbye.
“Advice,” I said with a smile. It had been a magical evening of family and pirate treasure, convincing me anything was possible. I had survived wars and witchcraft trials. I almost believed I could get Nicolas out of the painting, and also have the nearly normal life I wanted to have with Max.
“Are you going to tell me how you picked out the perfect gift for my mom?”
I leaned over and kissed him. When I pulled back, I held up two small bundles in my hand. “I didn’t,” I said. “I picked out three. Once I met her, I selected the one that seemed most appropriate.”