The Appearance of Annie Van Sinderen

by Katherine Howe

  Tyler and I exchange a glance. Who is she talking about?

  “Okay?” Maddie presses us.

  “Sure,” I say uncertainly. “Okay.”

  Annie and Tyler both nod.

  We walk up to the door, and on our approach it is silently opened by a short, barrel-y guy dressed in a navy uniform coat and peaked hat.

  “Good evening, Miss Van Sinderen,” the doorman says in Russian-accented English.

  “Good evening,” Maddie and Annie say in unison, then look at each other and burst out giggling.

  The doorman, who I can only assume doesn’t see or hear Annie, and so is watching a punked-out teenage girl laughing by herself with two sketchy-looking guys walking two steps behind her, stays stone-faced. Like he sees everything and nothing all at once.

  Tyler and I walk past him stiffly, both of us pretending like we’re totally comfortable in this situation. I see the flicker of a smirk on the doorman’s mouth as we pass.

  “Dude,” Tyler whispers to me out of the side of his mouth. “What is it with you and the fancy girls?”

  “Shut up,” I hiss back. The truth is, I’m worried I’m having a panic attack. My heart is racing, and I can feel sweat dribbling down my rib cage. My parents’ house has wall-to-wall carpeting and a huge TV over the fireplace. Every year my mom puts an original of our holiday card photo in a silver frame that she buys at TJ Maxx, and she yells at me and my sister if we get fingerprints on them. I grew up thinking that our house was pretty nice. I had no idea what I was talking about.

  This must be where Maddie had to go, when she left my room the other night. For her curfew. God, this place is plush. Why would she want to stay in abandoned buildings, if this is what she’s accustomed to? How does it even feel to be accustomed to a marble-hallway kind of life?

  We stop in front of an old-fashioned cage-style elevator, and Maddie presses the button. With a creak and groan the mechanism starts up, and an old analog floor indicator, the kind that’s shaped like a fan with the floor numbers on the edge, with an arrow pointer, grinds to life. Lights indicate that the elevator was on the top floor, the ninth. After a long pause while the elevator tries to remember what it’s supposed to do, it slowly oofs down to the first floor and the door opens to reveal an impossibly old guy dressed in livery that matches the doorman’s.

  “Good evening, Clarence,” Maddie says.

  When she speaks in here, her voice sounds different. Smoother. More polished.

  Rich.

  “Good evening, miss,” the old guy says.

  We all pile into the elevator, which is so small and made of such delicate metal scrollwork that I’m frankly shocked it can handle all our weight. Maddie doesn’t even tell him what floor she’s on. Tyler and I both notice this absent detail at the same time, and Tyler’s lined eyes are popping so hard they might fall out. Annie, meanwhile, is so busy marveling at the elevator that she’s not paying any attention to us.

  “Amazing,” I hear her whisper to herself. “It’s like a climbing machine.”

  The elevator rings to a stop on the eighth floor, and the operator cranks the doors open.

  “Eighth floor,” he announces, as if we didn’t know it, and we all load off.

  “Maloulou? Is that you?” a woman’s voice trills from very far away.

  The elevator has opened directly into a softly lit foyer, painted dove gray with white egg-and-dart trim (Gran would be so proud of me, remembering that’s what it’s called). There’s a worn Oriental carpet in the middle of the room, over a polished black-wood floor, with no furniture at all except a huge circular white marble table with a crystal bowl spilling white peonies over its lip. The flowers are fresh, and they fill the air with a fragrance that’s just a shade too sweet to be pleasant.

  “Yes,” Maddie shouts too loudly. To us, she barks, “Come on.”

  She strides straight across the room, leaving a trail of city grime behind from her combat boots. Tyler and I edge closer together, in the instinctive resistance of middle-class guys to environments in which they might break something expensive. I’m worried about even breathing in here.

  “Maloulou? Darling?” the woman’s voice calls, having drawn a room or two nearer.

  “Dammit,” Maddie mutters.

  We’ve only made it halfway down a hall that seems infinitely long, lined at sedate intervals by small gilt-framed landscape paintings, each lit with its own special spotlight. They’re mostly images of the Hudson River or pastoral scenes of sad-looking Indians posed against the sky atop a dizzying waterfall.

  A woman appears from some secret room and gives us all a look that she probably intends to be welcoming. She’s dressed in cream slacks, a cashmere cardigan, and ballet flats that probably cost six hundred dollars, and her hair is the same shade of blond I saw on those women in Eastlin’s shop. Like, the exact same shade.

  “Well! Are these your friends?” the woman says. A tiny hand hovers under her chin like a hummingbird.

  “Uh-huh,” Maddie says without breaking stride.

  “Hi,” Tyler says, not making eye contact, and ducking under the woman’s gaze like he’s cheating at limbo.

  “Hello, ma’am,” I say, sticking my hand out. “I’m Wes Auckerman.”

  She stares at my hand with faint shock and distaste. She doesn’t say anything.

  “Um . . . ,” I say, not sure what I’m supposed to be doing differently. Something, obviously.

  “We’re going in the living room,” Maddie shouts. “Don’t bother us.”

  “Oh!” the woman exclaims. “All right.”

  Annie moseys by her with an arched eyebrow, but the woman doesn’t acknowledge her. She probably can’t see her. Then again, she didn’t acknowledge me, and I’m not a Rip van Winkle.

  “I’ll have Etta bring in some sandwiches.” The woman’s voice follows us down the hall, uncertainly.

  “God,” Maddie grumbles as we arrive at the end of the impossible hallway. She stomps around, slapping on lights.

  “Is that your mom?” I ask, hesitating by the entryway. It’s flanked on both sides by Doric columns, and the entire opposite wall is casement windows with a staggering view of the tops of the trees along Park Avenue.

  “Please,” Maddie says, rolling her eyes. “Step. Number two.”

  Tyler and Annie and I file into the room as Maddie pulls light chains here and there. I’m taking in everything—the chintz, the Lalique, the claw feet, and polished wood. Her living room looks like a hotel lobby. Except way nicer. It feels as big as a hotel lobby, too. Tyler can’t contain himself, poking around, touching things. I’m afraid to even sit down. The couches look so deep and professionally fluffed that I might fall into them and never escape.

  Finally, Maddie hits a light that floods a large portrait hanging over the fireplace.

  “Annie,” she says, beckoning. “Come see.”

  Annie’s rooted in place. I can’t tell if she’s as struck by the sumptuousness of it all as Tyler and I are, or what. But she’s frozen stock-still in front of the fireplace, staring up at the portrait with her rosebud mouth trembling.

  It’s a family group, a man, a woman, two girls, and a boy, gathered around a table covered by maps of New York State. The man wears a dour expression, with a fat belly and gold watch chain, and he’s pointing at the maps on the table. His wife looks just as awful. She has a pinched face, and sits across from him in a red satin high-waisted dress, resting a proprietary hand on his coat sleeve. One of the girls is seated between them, younger than we are now, with her hair done up in a weird pointy arrangement. The other girl stands behind them, with her hand on the first girl’s shoulder. The little boy stands next to the seated man, dressed in forest-green velvet knee pants and a waistcoat, one foot crossed in front of the other, staring out at the artist with a challenging expression in his face. His elbow rests on his
father’s back, with his fingers hanging down.

  Annie just stares, her hands balled in fists at her sides.

  Maddie stands below the painting, arms crossed over her chest, staring up at it, too. “I didn’t recognize you,” Maddie says.

  I’m staring at Annie as she gazes at the painting, watching the minute expressions on her face change from surprise to confusion to mild wonder. I hear rather than see Tyler pull my video camera out of its bag and fire it up, making a record of the scene.

  “That’s . . . ,” Annie starts to say, but she trails off. She turns to Maddie in wonder. “We had this done last year. The corporation paid. It was to hang in Papa’s office at the bank.” She steps nearer, reaching out as though to touch the canvas.

  “Dude,” Tyler breathes from behind the camera.

  “Wait a minute,” I say. “Is that supposed to be you?”

  Annie turns to me, and my eyes jump between the real-life apparition in front of me and the waxy effigy in the painting. Annie, with her flushed cheeks and bottomless black eyes and delectable mole, looks nothing like the girl in the picture resting her hand on her sister’s shoulder. There’s no mole. There’s no vibrancy at all.

  “That’s my great-whatever-grandfather,” Maddie says, pointing. “Who dug the Erie Canal. That’s where the money came from. At first, anyway. Later it came from shipping. And subways; they owned part of the IRT. I always thought he looked like kind of an asshole. And that’s his son, my great-whatever-grandfather minus one. I don’t remember their names. But I know they all died together, except for the boy.”

  Annie’s eyes go wide, and she steps nearer. “Eddie,” she whispers.

  We all peer closer at the little boy, with his jaunty foot and impish smile.

  On the index finger of his right hand, where it dangles down along his father’s back, is an oval smear of red paint, with tiny flecks of gold.

  “Oh my God, that’s it!” Annie cries, pointing. “Look!” She rocks up on her toes, excitement vibrating off her, as though invisible fireworks are going off over her head.

  “Wait. Are you sure?” I say, hurrying forward to see. I squint at the painting, trying to make the blur of paint resolve into a recognizable shape.

  “Sure I’m sure,” she says excitedly. “It’s my cameo!”

  “But you said it was painted last year,” I point out. “You didn’t have the cameo then.”

  “Daddy had it restored at the Met conservation lab a couple years ago,” Maddie says, sounding sheepish. “They told us the boy had been repainted. Changed the color of his suit. Maybe he added the ring later?”

  “Eddie.” Annie smiles, her eyes going soft. “It wouldn’t surprise me, him being vain. And the cameo would’ve been too big for him to wear on the proper finger. He’d wear it that way instead. I must have given it to him.” She looks at me. “But why? Why wouldn’t I give it to Beatrice? It doesn’t make any sense. And what happened to them?” Annie paces back and forth in front of Maddie’s fireplace, her fists pressed to either side of her head.

  We all climb into the chintz sofas to think. Tyler starts to put a Chuck Taylor on one of the antique coffee tables, but stops himself.

  “So, if Maddie’s great-whatever-grandfather got the cameo,” Tyler mulls, my camera in his lap, “does that mean Maddie’s mom would have it now?”

  “Actually,” Maddie says, avoiding eye contact with all of us. “No. Not exactly.”

  At that moment a bent-backed uniformed woman shuffles in carrying a heavy tray heaped with sandwiches.

  “Good evening, Miss Malou,” the woman says with a raspy smoker’s voice. She’s as old as the elevator guy. I’m concerned the tray is too heavy for her to carry. My instinct is to get up and help, but that doesn’t seem like what I’m supposed to do, so instead I sit and do nothing and feel like a jerk.

  “Thanks, Etta,” Maddie says, not getting up from where she’s slouched down in the sofa, boots splayed and in the way.

  The woman sets the sandwich tray down on the coffee table with a grunt, and then shuffles back out without acknowledging any of us.

  Tyler picks up one of the sandwiches and sniffs it. He makes a face.

  I pick one up and stuff it into my mouth without hesitating, which is a mistake. I suppress a gag. It’s cucumber. And mayonnaise. And nothing else.

  Maddie eyes me, laughing silently.

  “So,” I say through a mouthful of sandwich. “What does ‘not exactly’ mean?”

  Maddie sighs and stares up at the ceiling.

  “Don’t laugh,” she warns.

  Tyler and Annie and I all look at one another and nod.

  Maddie sinks lower into the cushions.

  “I bet it’s at the New-York Historical Society,” she says. She waggles one booted foot thoughtfully.

  “What?” I say, rather intelligently, I think.

  “My dad loaned them a ton of stuff last year. All these papers and crap, I don’t know. Junk. Stuff his WIFE”—she yells that last word—“didn’t want.”

  “Crap,” Tyler says.

  “And my mom doesn’t have it, ’cause she lives on Antigua with her tennis instructor,” Maddie says to one of her boots. “Dad took back the family jewels in the divorce.”

  Tyler snorts on family jewels, but doesn’t say anything.

  Annie keeps staring up at the painting. I can’t imagine what it must feel like, to see such a wrong painting of yourself. Especially after you’re . . . after you’re . . . Anyway.

  “Great,” I say, leaning my head back on the sofa and staring at the ceiling.

  Perfectly smooth plaster patterned in delicate florets.

  No divots.

  “How the hell are we going to get it out?” Tyler asks the room at large.

  “Depends on their security,” I say. “Like, is it more Thomas Crown Affair, or more Ocean’s Eleven?”

  “Please. Thomas Crown is bullshit. They’re not going to have sliding metal doors on the walls. Now, Pink Panther, on the other hand,” Tyler says. “They might have lasers. Lasers are way cheap now. With motion sensors.”

  “The Italian Job!” I add, getting excited. “The remake, though. The original sucks.”

  “Mmmmm.” Tyler sighs in a Homer Simpson voice. “Charlize Theron.”

  “But where are we going to get equipment?” I say. To Maddie, I ask, “Is there, like, a spy gear store around here? Or police supplies?”

  “You need ID to buy at the police supply place. What about an REI? They’d have grappling equipment,” Tyler points out.

  Maddie is watching us, disbelieving.

  “Are you guys insane?” she asks. To Annie, she says, “They’re insane, right?”

  Annie suppresses a giggle. “At least I know what an ID is now,” she remarks. “Everything else, I’m just guessing. What does ‘spy gear’ mean?”

  “Huh?” I say.

  “I can just go pick it up tomorrow,” Maddie explains.

  “You . . . what?” Tyler looks disappointed.

  “Duh. I turned eighteen last week. And thanks for the flowers, by the way,” she says pointedly at me. “And the card and the pony.”

  “I had a pony.” Annie sighs, but nobody pays any attention.

  “So you can just go get it?” I ask, incredulous.

  “Yeah. Pretty sure. Anything that’s on deposit that’s ours, I can just go pick up.”

  Tyler and I stare at each other, and then we both look at Annie.

  “We can go get my cameo?” Annie says. “Tomorrow?”

  “Sure,” Maddie says. “There’s just one thing.”

  “What?” I ask her.

  Maddie casts a baleful eye down on her clothes: ragged cutoffs, ripped fishnets, white ribbed undershirt.

  “I think I need a costume change,” she says, arching a pencile
d eyebrow. “When I moved to the squat, I sold my other clothes.”

  “I know just who to call,” I announce, feeling pleased with myself and pulling out my phone. “And he doesn’t have to be at Abraham Mas until ten.”

  CHAPTER 12

  Outside on the street, so far uptown that I have trouble reconciling myself to the fact that we’re not standing on a wooded stretch of the post road under the watchful eyes of cows, I stare up at the face of Malou’s tenement building, trying not to be afraid.

  Wes and Tyler are conferring between themselves, as boys are wont to do. I don’t know if they’re not including me in their conversation out of habit, or for fear that I’m such a being out of time that I can’t conceive of whatever it is that they’re saying. The funny part of that is, though it’s bigger than I would have expected, and taller, and better lit, and with fewer horses, it’s not after all so very different. The pace is the same. The crowded streets, the smell of food and spirits, the thrum and noise and crush.

  New-York is always New-York.

  Though the air in Malou’s house was exquisitely cold. Like a perfect fall day, all the time. Amazing.

  Malou is going to take me with her tomorrow to the historical society, which she thinks holds the cameo Herschel gave me, which at some point I must give to Ed, and Ed to his wife, and his wife to his son, and so on for longer than I can think about. I haven’t tried to discern what we are to each other, Malou—Maddie—and I. Those tattoos. She looks like a whaler. She’s beautiful, though, for all her ink. I see in her cheeks and in the corners of her eyes contours rather like Ed’s and Beattie’s. She’s like my sister, if we weren’t separated by so much distance and time.

  Ed. Ed grows up, and marries. I wonder who.

  I wonder where he is, right now.

  And Beattie. Where is she? She looked so sad, in the painting. And not at all like I remember her. She dies with me and our parents, Maddie said. But why?

  Wes and Tyler’s conversation is intensifying. It’s almost an argument. Malou told us to come back tomorrow morning at nine, and I think they’re trying to decide what to do with me until then. I’ve considered absenting myself, but I don’t know how much memory I have left to explore, if I try to go back.