Deep and Dark and Dangerous

by Mary Downing Hahn

  "I'll jump again if I want," Emma said, but she made no effort to break away from me. I had a feeling she'd scared herself. The water was deep, and she couldn't do much more than dog-paddle a few feet.

  On the sand, the three of us built castles. Neither Emma nor Sissy said a word to me. They sat close together, their heads almost touching, whispering and giggling.

  "It's rude to whisper," I told Emma.

  Sissy smirked. "So? Nobody invited you to play with us."

  Emma carefully duplicated Sissy's smirk. "Why don't you go home? Sissy can be my babysitter."

  "Two's company, three's a crowd," Sissy added. "Don't you know that yet?"

  "If anyone should go home, you should!" I wanted to slap Sissy's nasty little face, but I knew that would only make things worse.

  "Just ignore Ali," Sissy told Emma. "We don't like her, and we don't care what she says or what she does. She's mean."

  "Meanie," Emma said. "Ali's a big fat meanie."

  "Ali's so mean, Hell wouldn't want her." Sissy's eyes gleamed with malice.

  Emma stared at her new friend, shocked, I think, by the word "Hell." Sissy smiled and bent over her castle, already bigger than the one she'd built yesterday. "It's not bad to say 'Hell,'" she told Emma. "It's in the Bible."

  Emma glanced at me to see what I thought about this. I shook my head, but Sissy pulled Emma close and began whispering in her ear. Emma looked surprised. Then she giggled and whispered something in Sissy's ear that made her laugh.

  I pulled Emma away. "What are you telling her?" I asked Sissy.

  "Nothing." Sissy pressed her hands over her mouth and laughed.

  "Nothing." Emma covered her mouth and laughed, too. She sounded just like Sissy.

  I wanted to get up and leave, but I couldn't abandon Emma. Instead, I moved a few feet away and watched the two of them. Their castles grew bigger and more elaborate. Everything Sissy did to hers, Emma copied. It was pathetic.

  "It's nearly lunchtime," I told Emma. "Why don't we go back to the studio and get your mom?"

  "Do you want to eat lunch with me?" Emma asked Sissy.

  She shook her head. "It's almost time for me to go home."

  "I thought you didn't have any rules," I said. "I thought you could do whatever you want."

  Sissy gave me a long cold look. "Maybe I want to go home."

  "But you don't have to go," Emma persisted. "My mommy's very nice. She fixes good peanut butter and jelly sandwiches."

  Sissy made a face. "I hate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches."

  "I hate them, too," Emma put in quickly. "Mommy can fix something else for us. Tuna salad, maybe."

  I happened to know Emma despised tuna salad, but I didn't say anything. What was the use? She probably thought it sounded more grown up than peanut butter and jelly.

  "I don't want to eat at your house." Sissy looked at me. "Not with Ali there."

  "Maybe we could have a picnic, just you and me," Emma said. "Outside on the deck."

  "Some other time." Sissy stood up and looked down at the castles. "They're pretty enough for a mermaid to live in," she said. "Do you like mermaids, Em?"

  "I saw The Little Mermaid ten, twelve, a dozen times. It's my favorite movie."

  Sissy tossed her head to get her hair out of her eyes. "Twelve is the same as a dozen, dummy."

  "I'm not a dummy," Emma said. "I just—"

  With a sudden jerk of her foot, Sissy kicked Emma's castle down.

  "You ruined my castle," Emma wailed. "Now a mermaid can't live in it."

  "Hey!" With a couple of kicks, I leveled Sissy's castle. "There! How do you like that?"

  "I don't care." Sissy laughed. "I can build another one, better than that, and so can Emma. We have all summer to build castles for mermaids."

  She laughed louder. After a moment's hesitation, Emma joined in. Shouting with laughter, they held hands and spun round and round in circles until they staggered and sprawled on the sand, still laughing.

  I stared at them, slightly worried, maybe even scared of their behavior. "What's so funny?"

  "Everything," Sissy giggled. "The whole stupid world is funny."

  "Ali's funny." Emma laughed shrilly. "Mommy's funny. You're funny. I'm funny. The lake's funny, the seagulls are funny, the—"

  Suddenly, Sissy stopped laughing. Her face turned mean. "Shut up!" she shouted at Emma. "You aren't funny. You're stupid. And you're a copycat."

  "I'm not a copycat." Obviously bewildered by Sissy's mood change, Emma began to cry.

  "Baby, baby copycat," Sissy chanted, "sat on a tack and ate a rat." Without looking back, she ran toward the Cove, still chanting.

  Emma threw herself against me and pounded me with her fists. "Look what you did! You made Sissy mad! Why can't you leave us alone?"

  I grabbed Emma's shoulders and held her away from me. Little as she was, her punches hurt. "I didn't do anything to that brat. She's a troublemaker, she's mean to you, she's—"

  "Don't you talk like that. Sissy's my friend!"

  "Some friend," I muttered. "Calling you a baby, daring you to jump off the dock, knocking your castle down. Why do you want to be friends with a girl like her?"

  "You're just mad 'cause she likes me, not you."

  "Don't be silly. I don't like her. Why should I care that she doesn't like me?"

  "Sissy says you're jealous—that's why you don't like her, that's why you're not nice to her. You want me all to yourself!" Emma muttered.

  I stared at her, amazed. "How can you believe that?"

  "'Cause it's true!" Emma shouted. "Sissy doesn't lie!"

  With that, she ran away from me. Surprised by the speed of her skinny little legs, I chased her. What would Dulcie think if Emma came home crying?

  By the time I caught up with her, it was too late. She'd flung herself into her mother's arms.

  "I hate Ali!" she sobbed. "Make her go home. I don't want a babysitter!"

  Dulcie looked at me, perplexed by Emma's words. "What's going on?"

  "I'll tell you later." Without waiting for my aunt or my cousin, I trudged up the steps toward the cottage.

  If Dulcie wanted to send me home, fine. Sissy had turned Emma into a nasty little brat, just like herself, and I was sick of both of them.

  10

  Dulcie fixed the usual peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and chocolate milk for lunch.

  Emma pushed her plate away. "I don't like peanut butter and jelly," she whined.

  Dulcie looked at her in surprise. "Since when?"

  "Since now." Out went Emma's lower lip in a classic pout. "They're for babies."

  "What do you mean? Ali and I eat them. We're not babies."

  "I want cheese," Emma said.

  "I thought you liked tuna salad," I said.

  Emma glared at me. "I can like whatever I like!"

  Dulcie put her hands over mine and Emma's. "Would you girls please tell me what's going on?"

  "It's Sissy's fault," I told her. "She's a bad influence on Emma."

  "She is not!" Emma scowled at me.

  "Then why was she so nasty to you?" I asked, trying to stay calm.

  "She wasn't," Emma said. "You were!"

  I stared at my cousin, truly shocked. "What did I do?"

  Emma turned to her mother tearfully. "Ali called me stupid and said I was a baby."

  "I did not!" I told Dulcie. "I'd never say anything like that. Sissy called her names, not me."

  Emma climbed into her mother's lap and began to cry. "Ali's not nice to me and Sissy," she insisted. "Just 'cause she's bigger, she thinks she's the boss."

  Dulcie rocked Emma, but her eyes were on me. I had a sick feeling that my aunt wasn't sure which one of us to believe. From her mother's lap, Emma watched me closely, her face almost as mean as Sissy's.

  "It's not true," I said weakly. "Sissy—"

  "Ali pushed me off the dock, too," Emma interrupted. "If Sissy hadn't been there, I would have drowned—"

  "That's a lie and
you know it, Emma!" Close to tears I turned to Dulcie. "Sissy dared Emma to jump. I tried to stop her, but she got away from me. She wants to do everything Sissy does."

  Dulcie looked from Emma to me and back to Emma, her eyes worried. "I can't believe Ali would push you off the dock, Emma."

  "Yes, she would," Emma insisted. "Ali's so bad, even Hell doesn't want her."

  "Emma!" Dulcie stared at her daughter. "Where did you pick up that kind of talk?"

  I spoke before Emma had a chance to answer. "Sissy told her cussing was fine. She could say whatever she wanted."

  Dulcie stood Emma on the floor and got to her feet. "I've heard enough. Sit down and eat your sandwich."

  "I don't want any stinky lunch!" Emma started to run out of the kitchen, but Dulcie grabbed her arm and stopped her. "What's gotten into you?" she asked. "You've never acted like this before. Never."

  "I told you," I said. "It's Sissy's fault."

  Dulcie ignored me. This was between her and Emma. "Sit down," she said. "And eat your lunch."

  Emma took her place between Dulcie and me. She didn't look at either of us but ate quietly, her head down, her jaws working as she chewed. She left half the sandwich on her plate, despite Dulcie's pleas to eat it all.

  "Do you want me to read a Moffat story?" I asked, hoping to resume our normal relationship.

  Emma scowled. "I hate the Moffats. They're dumb. Just like you!"

  "Don't talk to Ali like that," Dulcie said. "We never call anyone dumb."

  "Leave me alone," Emma said. "You're dumb, too."

  Dulcie frowned. "If this is how you act when Sissy comes here, I don't want you to play with her anymore."

  Emma responded with a major temper tantrum. She screamed and cried. She told Dulcie she hated her. She threw herself on the floor and kicked.

  Finally, Dulcie hauled Emma to her room and put her to bed. Closing the door firmly, she left her to cry herself to sleep.

  She dropped back into her chair, her face puzzled. "How can this child have so much influence on Emma so quickly?"

  I'd been wondering about this myself. "Maybe it's because Emma's never had a friend before. She wants Sissy to like her, so she does everything Sissy tells her to do."

  Dulcie went to the stove and poured herself another cup of coffee. With her back to me, she said, "I guess I really don't know much about kids. Sometimes I wonder if I was ever actually one myself."

  She laughed, not as if it was funny, more as if it was sad or odd. "I have friends who remember every detail of their childhoods, their teachers' names, what they wore to someone's birthday party when they were eight years old, what they got for Christmas when they were ten. Me—I can't remember a thing before my teen years."

  Dulcie carried her coffee outside. The way she let the screen door slam shut behind her hinted she wasn't expecting me to follow. She sat at the picnic table, her back to the window, her shoulders hunched. Even without seeing her face, I knew she was unhappy. Maybe her summer wasn't going any better than mine. Who could have imagined a kid like Sissy would turn up and spoil everything?

  I stretched out on the sofa with To Kill a Mockingbird. I was on the seventh chapter with many more to go.

  While I read, I heard a car approaching the cottage. I sat up and looked out the window. For some reason I expected to see Mom and Dad, but a big red Jeep emerged from the woods. Dulcie walked toward it hesitantly, apparently unsure who it was.

  "Dulcie, it is you!" A plump woman with short silvery blond hair jumped out of the Jeep and stood there grinning as Dulcie approached. Her tailored shorts and pink polo shirt contrasted sharply with my aunt's black T-shirt and paint-spattered jeans.

  She stopped just short of giving Dulcie a hug. "Look at you," she exclaimed, "you're just as skinny as ever!"

  "I'm sorry," Dulcie said, smoothing her mop of uncombed curls back from her face, "but I don't remember—"

  "Well, no wonder. I wasn't this fat when we were kids!" She laughed. "I'm Jeanine Reynolds—Donaldson now. We used to play together when you and Claire came to the lake."

  "Jeanine," Dulcie repeated. "Jeanine.... I'm afraid I—"

  "Oh, don't worry about it. Good grief, it's been what? Thirty years, I guess."

  "My sister would probably remember you."

  "Is Claire here, too?"

  "No, but her daughter, Ali, is staying with us this summer."

  Jeanine nodded and looked at the cottage. "It's just the same as I remember. I hear you had Joe Russell working on it. He's good. Not cheap, though."

  "Compared to New York, he's a bargain," Dulcie said.

  Jeanine sat down at the picnic table. "Is that where you live?"

  Dulcie nodded. "Would you like something to drink? I've got mint tea in the fridge, if you'd like that."

  "Anything, as long as it's cold," Jeanine said. "Today's a real scorcher."

  Leaving the woman on the deck, Dulcie came inside. By then I was in the kitchen, ready to help with cheese and crackers if she wanted them.

  Dulcie rolled her eyes. "There goes the afternoon," she whispered.

  A few minutes later, I was setting down a tray with an assortment of crackers, cheese, and sliced fruit. Dulcie poured glasses of iced tea for herself and Jeanine and offered me a can of soda. The three of us settled ourselves comfortably under the patio umbrella.

  "My daughter, Erin, tells me you're an artist," Jeanine said. "I'm not surprised. When we were kids, you were always drawing. You carried a sketchbook and pencils everywhere we went."

  Dulcie smiled as if she were beginning to warm up to Jeanine. "Yes, I guess I did."

  "You were so talented. We were always asking you to draw pictures for us. Teresa, especially. She was crazy about your mermaids—remember?"

  All traces of friendliness suddenly disappeared from my aunt's face. She gripped her glass of iced tea and shook her head. "No, I don't remember Teresa. Or any mermaids I might have drawn."

  I held my breath and waited to hear what Jeanine would say next.

  Staring at Dulcie in disbelief, she said, "You can't have forgotten Teresa. What happened to her has haunted me all my life—"

  "I don't know what you're talking about." Dulcie stood up so fast her chair fell over with a bang that made both Jeanine and me jump. Her hair seemed wilder than before, and her body was so tense, you could have snapped her in two.

  She stood there a moment, glass in hand, avoiding our eyes. "Excuse me," she said in a lower voice. "I have work to do, paintings to finish for a show this fall."

  Without looking at us, Dulcie left Jeanine and me sitting at the picnic table and ran down to her studio, her sandals flapping on the steps. The door slammed. For a few seconds after that, the only sound was the lake quietly rippling against the shore.

  "Oh, dear." Jeanine's face flushed. "I guess I shouldn't have come, but I—well, I've always wondered what became of Claire and Dulcie. I thought—"

  She broke off and reached for her car keys. "I'm so sorry, Ali. I never meant to upset your aunt. I hope she, you—Oh, I just don't know why I'm so thoughtless, coming here, bringing up the past." She started to rise from her chair.

  I touched her hand to keep her from leaving. "Please tell me what you're talking about. Who was Teresa? What happened to her?"

  Jeanine sipped her iced tea silently, her eyes on the horizon and the blue sky beyond. She wanted to finish what she'd started, I could tell.

  Sure enough, the next thing she said was, "I don't see how Dulcie could have forgotten that child—or even me, for that matter. The two of us spent a lot of time at this cottage, especially Teresa. Why, your grandmother used to call us her borrowed daughters."

  She paused to watch a squirrel dart across the deck and leap onto a pine tree. A branch swayed, and he was gone. Her eyes turned back to me. "Your mother didn't tell you about Teresa?"

  I toyed with my empty soda can, turning it this way and that. "Mom never talks about the lake. She hates it so much, she almost didn't let me com
e with Dulcie." I hesitated and rubbed the wet ring my soda can had made on the table. "You saw how Dulcie is—she claims she doesn't remember anything. But—" I stopped, not sure what to tell Jeanine. Her face was kind, her eyes understanding, and I desperately wanted to talk to someone about Teresa.

  "But what?" Jeanine helped herself to another slice of cheese.

  I watched her sandwich the cheese between two crackers. "Well, before Dulcie invited me here, I found an old photo of her and Mom when they were kids. Another girl had been sitting beside Dulcie, but someone had torn her out of the picture. On the back, all that was left of her name was a T Mom got really upset and swore she didn't know anyone whose name started with T."

  "And you think it was Teresa," Jeanine said.

  "The lake was in the background, so it must have been her."

  Jeanine nodded and helped herself to another piece of cheese. She seemed to be waiting for me to tell her more.

  "Last night, I got out an old Candy Land game," I went on. "Mom and Dulcie had written their names on the board. Teresa's name was there, too. But someone had scribbled over it with a black crayon. Dulcie said she didn't know why 'Teresa' was written on the board. She got mad and shouted at me."

  I lowered my head, almost ashamed to finish. "Dulcie remembers Teresa—I'm sure she does. Why would she lie about it?"

  "Maybe it has something to do with Teresa's death." As she spoke, Jeanine looked at the lake, her face expressionless.

  "Teresa died?" Shocked, I gripped the soda can and stared at Jeanine. I'd never imagined Teresa dead. All this time, I'd pictured her living around here somewhere, stopping by for a visit, forcing Dulcie to remember her. "How did she die?"

  "It was the last summer your mother and aunt came to the lake." Jeanine sipped her tea. "For some reason, no one knows why, Teresa went out in your grandfather's canoe all by herself. It was rainy, foggy. The canoe washed up nearby, but..."

  Shivers raced up and down my bare arms.

  Jeanine looked at me, and a shadow crossed her face—worry, maybe. "I hope I haven't upset you." She patted my hand, white knuckled from its grip on the soda can. "Teresa's been gone a long time now."

  She broke a cracker into pieces and tossed the crumbs to a pair of sparrows hopping around our feet. For a moment, she sat silently, watching the birds fight over the crumbs. Without looking at me, she said, "It must have been very painful for Claire and Dulcie. It certainly was for me."