“I lied to you,” she said.
“About what?”
“My father. He is mean.”
“Oh, that. Well, all parents suck sometimes,” I said.
“Is suck a bad thing?” Molly asked.
I nodded.
“Then yes. They do suck. I didn’t want to say it before. Perhaps I thought that would make it more real, saying it out loud. He’s always been cold to me, but this summer … I’ve just been up here alone, waiting for things to be better. Instead they got worse. Papa sucks terribly, and if he’s going to hate me, then maybe I can just hate him back. That might be easier.”
“Hold the phone,” I said. “What are you talking about? Hate? He doesn’t hate you.”
“How can you say that?” asked Molly. “He locks me away in here.”
“You’re wrong,” I said, shaking my head. “He’s a jerk, sure, but he doesn’t hate you. He’s your dad. He put you up here because some doctor told him it was what you needed. And he’s ignoring you because he’s a dumb grown-up. That’s what they do half the time, ignore us.”
“But your mother doesn’t. You said she was plenty. Remember? You said she was there.”
“Well, she is, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t a screwup! I also told you she forgets to pick me up from dance class, remember? One year she forgot my birthday, and she’s the worst tooth fairy on the planet. Also, she’s kept secrets from me all my life, about some pretty important stuff.”
“What sort of secrets?”
“Oh—umm, stuff about my grandma. But never mind about her. You wouldn’t be interested. The point is—parents can be stupid and mean, but that doesn’t mean they don’t love us.”
“He’s always busy.” Molly shook her head. “Always.”
“I don’t know, Molly. Maybe your parents are fighting. Maybe that’s why your mom is gone right now. Hey, if this were a movie, he’d have a mortal illness or a drinking problem. But he does love you. Even when they’re being mad or dumb, your parents have to love you. It’s in their DNA or something.”
Molly stared at me. “What’s DNA?”
“Never mind. Just be glad you’ve got parents.”
Molly rubbed her wet eyes on her sleeve. When her face came away from the fabric, she looked slightly less miserable. “You know—I don’t exactly believe what you said, but I’d like to. I want to. Perhaps—I need to.”
Nora didn’t show up that morning with breakfast. Nobody did. Molly and I sat and waited. We got hungry. We played a game of checkers and tried not to think about muffins. Friend roamed around mewing. He’d gotten used to his sardines.
At last Molly’s belly growled so loud I could hear it. “Oh my!” she said. Her cheeks turned pink. “Excuse me.”
“No problem,” I said. “I’m starving too. My stomach feels like it’s been scraped out like a jack-o’-lantern.”
“Mine feels like a cave,” said Molly miserably. She pushed away the checkerboard. “Come on!” She headed for the bathroom.
We made our way down the fire escape, carefully because we were feeling so faint. But at the bottom, instead of heading to the alley or the basement, Molly turned sharply and walked up the path to the front of the hotel, right around the side of the building to the main drive. I followed her as she marched in through the double doors.
I hung back by the piano as Molly went up to the reception desk and rang the brass bell. I had no idea what to expect. “Papa!” she called. “Is my father here? McGhee!”
After a minute Mr. McGhee appeared.
“Yes,” he said nervously from behind the desk. “Oh! Miss Molly. You’re … back. I didn’t expect you. Your father is, erm, occupied. Are you supposed to be downstairs? I’ve grown unaccustomed to seeing you about.” Mr. McGhee looked like he might throw up. He kept fidgeting with his glasses.
Molly cleared her throat. “Where is he?”
“He’s in his office … taking care of a business matter.” McGhee ran his hand through the wisps of hair on his head. “Nothing you need concern yourself with. But if I might ask … how did you get out?”
“Fire escape,” Molly said simply as she turned away.
Mr. McGhee stared after her and said nothing as Molly walked to a large door, which she pulled open without knocking. The door was so big she had to tug at it with both hands. I followed, lingering at the open door.
Inside the office Mr. Moran was standing behind a large desk. Facing him sat Nora in a straight-backed chair. Mr. Moran was glaring at her. As Molly entered, he looked up in surprise. “Mary,” he said in his grim voice. “I have had quite enough of your shenanigans.”
When Molly cut her father off, what came out of her was a voice so remarkably like Mr. Moran’s that I caught my breath. “No,” she said coldly. “No, you really haven’t at all! Now listen to me!”
Nora stared wide-eyed at Molly. Then she turned back to Mr. Moran.
I waited at the door, afraid to enter. I didn’t have a place in that room.
Mr. Moran’s voice was a growl now. It reminded me of teeth grinding. “And just what is it you expect me to listen to, Mary? This is not the time.”
Molly spoke sharply. “It’s never the time for me, Papa. Ever.” Molly was mad. But there were tears in her eyes too. “I can’t stay there anymore, in the Lonely Room. It’s too horrible, and look at me! I’m fine, I am.”
“You are not fine,” said Mr. Moran, glaring at his daughter. “I apologize if I haven’t come to see you as I ought, if I haven’t done my duty. I’ve been busy. But you are not well, and you can’t be running around this way. I thought Nora could keep an eye on you, but I suppose we need someone stricter to—”
“No!” cried Molly. “It’s not Nora’s fault. She’s been wonderful.”
Mr. Moran tossed a hand into the air, exasperated. “Just like your mother, full of unnecessary emotions. I have no time for this. McGhee!”
“Papa. Please. Listen? You don’t have to visit me, or talk to me, or love me, but don’t make Nora go. I need her. I need … someone.” The tears spilled over now.
Mr. Moran looked like he’d been socked in the gut. “What? What did you just say?”
Molly stuttered through her tears. “P-p-please don’t make Nora go.”
“No. Did you just say … I don’t love you?”
Molly didn’t speak, only nodded. Her crying was silent. “It’s all right. I understand. Just leave me Nora. Please?”
For a minute Molly and her father just looked at each other. His hands were on his desk, as though holding him up. Molly was shaking, alone, in the middle of the room.
“I don’t,” he said.
“Don’t?” Molly tilted her head and said it again. “Don’t?”
“I don’t … not love you.”
“Really?” Molly’s voice rose hopefully.
Mr. Moran sat down in the big chair. “I care for you, don’t I? Keep you fed and clothed? Call the doctor? Provide dolls and games and so forth?”
“Dolls, yes,” Molly said quietly. “I have dolls … and plenty of pudding.”
Nora stifled a sob.
“But I’m alone, Papa,” said Molly at last. “Always alone.”
Mr. Moran put a hand to his face. “It’s what the doctor said you needed.”
“He was wrong,” Molly replied fiercely. “I know he was.”
Her father took a deep breath. “Mary, when I was a boy, we lived in two rooms, ten of us. I shared a bed with my three brothers. My parents sent me to work in a factory. When I made my money, then married your mother and came to own all this”—he gestured at the rich room—“I swore my children would never live like that, never.”
“But—”
“I never thought, in all my days, that a child with everything might feel … unloved.”
That was when I really thought they might hug and kiss. In a movie that would have happened. But all Molly did was take a deep breath. Her tears had dried. She wasn’t shaking anymore. “I under
stand. I do. And if you would let Nora stay, I’ll go back to my room. For now.”
Mr. Moran looked very tired. “I’m sorry, but I think that would be best. I have work to do. Work cannot be set aside, not even for one’s children. You understand?”
“I think I do,” Molly said. “Yes.”
“But,” said Mr. Moran, “you must promise you’ll not go running around in the night anymore, or climbing through windows. Can you do that? And in exchange, perhaps Nora can bring you down into the yard each day. And for meals. You do seem … improved.”
“Oh, I am, Papa, I promise I am!”
“I suppose we should also find you a key to your room,” said Mr. Moran. “How would that be?”
Molly nodded. She turned to go. Nora rose too.
Mr. Moran cleared his throat. “I wonder, Molly, have you had breakfast?” he asked.
“No—no, sir,” she said.
“Perhaps you should go do that,” said Mr. Moran. “It’s important to eat.” He smiled at her. It was a small smile, but a real one. “I suggest you have waffles. They’re my personal favorite.”
Molly smiled back. “Yes, sir,” she said. “I’ll do just that!”
Everything in the coffee shop was small. The white leather swivel stools were low, and the glasses of water were like children’s cups. It all made me feel very big, like I might knock something over.
Molly smiled shyly as she sat down. “I’m not exactly certain what just happened,” she said. “I can’t believe it did. Pinch me?”
“You were brave,” I said.
“I didn’t have any other choices. I had to do that. It was as though it all happened to me.”
From behind the counter, a waitress arrived and set down two small cups of coffee, a cream pitcher, and two tiny spoons. “Why, Miss Molly! I haven’t seen you in months and months. We heard you were poorly. Doing better?”
“I am, Irma, thank you.” Molly nodded cheerfully, then looked back at me. “Would you like waffles?” she said. “Papa’s right. They’re very good.”
“Sure, I guess,” I said. The waitress made a note and hurried off.
I stirred cream into my coffee and took a sip. It was bitter. Mom didn’t let me have coffee. I looked at the tiny spoon, fingering raised letters that said HC on the silver handle. “Pretty,” I said. It was heavier than it looked.
“My sisters and I used to steal those,” said Molly. “For tea parties.” She spun her stool. “Oh, it does feel nice to be out and about, not having to sneak anymore. It’s been over a year since I got to come down here for breakfast. Isn’t this fun?”
I didn’t know what to say. I was glad for Molly, but I was still stuck. What would happen to me now? What could happen when Mr. Moran found out about me? I thought again of the girls’ home, of Bayla. I couldn’t sort it out. My brain felt like a TV on the fritz, full of buzz.
Then the waffles arrived, each with its own tiny pitcher of syrup. Molly smeared soft butter on hers and began to cut fiercely and cram bites into her mouth. “So what shall we do today?” she asked through a sticky mouthful.
“I don’t know,” I said. I watched her lick her fork happily. “I guess we should stay in. You just promised your dad—”
“Well,” she said, “I only said I wouldn’t run around at night, or climb through windows.”
“Oh, okay,” I said. “I guess.”
“You know what?” she asked.
“Uh-uh, what?”
“Someday I’m going to be a grown-up, and I won’t be like Papa. I mean to have lots of children, so that I can tell them all the time how much I love them.”
It made me happy to hear Molly talking so cheerfully about the future, but it also gave me a shiver. I thought of Mom. “Maybe you’ll just have one kid,” I said. “That would be okay, right?”
“I suppose,” said Molly, taking a sip of water. “But who only has one child?”
“Well, my mother,” I said. “I’m all she has. And she was an only child too.”
“I’ve been an only child for one month. It hasn’t been nice at all.”
I shrugged. “Mom and I do lots of fun things together. Road trips and dinners out and stuff. It’s … nice.” I stared at the remains of my waffle.
Molly set down her fork. “Are you all right, Annie?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I miss her. And I’m getting … scared.”
Molly thought about that, licking a drip of syrup from her finger. “Perhaps we should go back to the fair. You could ask Mr. Fortunata what to do.”
“Don’t be silly,” I said. “How can he help me?”
“I don’t know,” said Molly. “But wouldn’t doing something be better than doing nothing?”
I thought about that. “Yes, something. I guess.”
“Then it’s settled,” said Molly. “We’ll go back to the fair. And we’ll take all my money, so that on our way back, we can pay for the lamps. Everything will work out just right. Right?”
When we were finished with our waffles, I followed Molly over to Mr. McGhee’s desk, where she grinned as she took the key from him. Then we scurried upstairs for Molly’s money, and to say a quick hello to Friend before we rode back downstairs and cut through the grand lobby, heading for the big double doors. They were held open for us by two men in green and gold uniforms.
“Bye, Joe! Bye, Quincy!” Molly called lightly over her shoulder. She was grinning as she stepped into the circular drive, where a taxi just happened to be waiting. I ran down the steps after her.
I climbed into the car, half expecting to see Frank Callahan again. Instead our driver was an older man. He looked back over his shoulder. “And where will we be heading today, miss?” he asked in a formal tone.
When Molly said, “To the market in Fell’s Point, please,” the driver didn’t comment. He drove in silence. It felt distant, cold. Very different from our speedy cruise with Frank.
As we pulled up near the harbor, I tried to be hopeful. But the day was chillier. I noticed how old the boats were. I saw how all the masts stabbed at the gray sky. The water was choppy and oily. The docks were dirty.
We climbed out of the taxi, paid the silent driver, and walked toward the fair. Molly looked loose and easy in her skin. I wished I could be easy in mine. But what if I never made it home? I pictured Mom, driving the streets of Baltimore alone, fifty years away. Mom, heading home to Atlanta by herself. Would she do that? I guessed she’d have to eventually. The same way everyone survived things. Molly in her Lonely Room. Bayla at the home.
Could I survive it? Never going home, being without Mom? I had a feathery feeling in my belly when I thought about it, a flurry of panic. I walked faster.
Then for some reason Fortunata’s words swam back to me: “Magic is what people call it when the universe corrects itself.” I thought about those words, and for the first time I considered that maybe I was just part of Molly’s story, Molly’s wish. She seemed so much better. Maybe I was only here to help correct things for her.
I stopped walking, frozen by the thought. So many things had changed because I was here. The angel had broken and wouldn’t be there for me to find back in the future. Molly was not going to spend years in her Lonely Room. She might become a different person altogether.
Would I stay, stranded forever? Was it possible that the past—this past—might be my life now? Maybe the fog would get a little heavier each morning until I didn’t notice anymore. What then?
What if Molly moved to China and never met my grandfather, whoever he was? What if she became a nun, or had all those kids she wanted? What if none of those kids was my mom? The feathers of fear rose up from my belly into my throat. For a block I couldn’t breathe.
And what about Mom? In that other future, where Molly escaped the Lonely Room, would Mom exist at all?
Oh, god. It made a terrible kind of sense.
I walked beside Molly in silence, thinking, There has to be a way.… There has to be a way. We
turned away from the harbor and market into the fair, and I began to run. Molly chased after me and we ran on those rough bricks, with the breeze from the water on our faces. At last we slowed. My cheeks were hot. Molly was panting from her run, wheezing again, and so was I.
We stopped in front of the cotton candy booth. “I can’t remember,” I panted, “exactly where he was. Do you?”
Molly looked around. “I’m certain he was over here, this way!”
We walked where Molly had pointed, and I saw things I hadn’t noticed the day before. There was a man on a bench, asleep, drooling on his own arm. I noticed ragged hems on the colorful costumes the dancing girls wore. There was peeling paint and trash on the ground. Suddenly something seemed wrong about a flock of too-skinny people waiting to see a fat lady.
At last we arrived in front of Fortunata’s booth. He was cutting up an apple. “You’ve returned,” he said pleasantly. “I hope you were satisfied with your purchase.”
“Yes!” said Molly. “Or … no. Well, I haven’t tried it yet. But I feel better.”
“That’s all that matters,” said the man. “Apple?” He held out a slice.
“Oh, no, thank you,” said Molly.
“You?” He held out the slice to me, and I took it silently as I tried to sort out what to say. I watched the man take a bite. After he swallowed, he said to me, “So, then, it’s your turn, is it?”
“I … yes!” I said, startled. “How did you know?”
“Process of elimination,” said the man.
“Oh, well, I mean, I doubt you can help. But I—”
He spoke softly. “If you doubt I can help, I can’t. What is it you need?”
“I’m not sure how to explain it,” I said. “It’s complicated.”
“Try,” he said.
“Well, I need …” I faltered. “I need to find … my future.”
He looked at me, staring deep. His eyes were a warm greenish brown, a comforting, earthy color. “Your future? You’re certain about that?”
I nodded. “I’m sure.”
“In that case,” he said, setting down his apple, “show me your palm.”
I glanced at Molly nervously, then slid my trembling hand into his still one. The man lowered his eyes, stared down a minute, then looked up. His face had gone pale.
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