Where'd You Go, Bernadette

by Maria Semple

  “Bernadette Fox,” I blurted.

  I am fifty, slowly going mad.

  This can’t make sense to you, Manjula. It doesn’t have to. But you see what happens when I come into contact with people. It doesn’t bode well for the whole Antarctica thing.

  *

  Later that day, Mom picked me up. Maybe she was a little quiet, but sometimes that happens, because on the way to school she listens to “The World” on PRI, which is usually a downer, and that day was no exception. I got into the car. A terrible report was on about the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and how rape was being used as a weapon. All the females were getting raped, from baby girls, six months old, all the way to eighty-year-old grandmothers, and every age in between. More than one thousand women and girls were getting raped each month. It had been going on for twelve years and nobody was doing anything about it. Hillary Clinton had gone there and promised to help, which gave everyone hope, but then all she did was give money to the corrupt government.

  “I can’t listen to this!” I smacked the radio off.

  “I know it’s horrific,” Mom said. “But you’re old enough. We live a life of privilege in Seattle. That doesn’t mean we can literally switch off these women, whose only fault was being born in the Congo during a civil war. We need to bear witness.” She turned the radio back on.

  I crumpled in my seat and fumed.

  “The war in Congo rages on with no end in sight,” the announcer said. “And now comes word of a new campaign by the soldiers, to find the women they have already raped and re-rape them.”

  “Holy Christ on a cross!” Mom said. “I draw the line at re-raping.” And she turned off NPR.

  We sat in silence. Then, at ten of four, we had to turn the radio back on because Fridays at ten of four is when we listen to our favorite person ever, Cliff Mass. If you don’t know who Cliff Mass is, well, he’s this thing me and Mom have, this awesome weather geek who loves weather so much you have no choice but to love him in return.

  Once, I think I was ten, and I was home with a babysitter while Mom and Dad went to Town Hall for some lecture. The next morning, Mom showed me a picture on her digital camera. “Me and guess who?” I had no idea. “You’re going to be so jealous when you find out.” I made a mean face at her. Mom and Dad call it my Kubrick face, and it was a glowering face I made when I was a little baby. Mom finally screamed, “Cliff Mass!”

  Oh my God, can someone please stop me before I write more about Cliff Mass?

  Here’s my point: first, because of the re-raping, and second, because Mom and I were so in love with Cliff Mass, of course we didn’t talk much on the way home that day, so I couldn’t have known she was traumatized. We pulled in the driveway. There were a bunch of giant trucks on the side street, and one was parked on our loop to keep the gate open. Workmen were coming and going. It was hard to make out what exactly was going on through the rain-smeared windshield.

  “Don’t ask,” Mom said. “Audrey Griffin demanded we get rid of the blackberries.”

  When I was little, Mom brought me to see The Sleeping Beauty at the Pacific Northwest Ballet. In it, an evil witch puts a curse on the princess, which makes her fall asleep for one hundred years. A gentle fairy protects the sleeping princess by enveloping her in a forest of briars. During the ballet, the princess is sleeping as thorny branches grow thicker around her. That’s what I felt like in my bedroom. I knew our blackberry vines were buckling the library floor and causing weird lumps in the carpet and shattering basement windows. But I had a smile on my face, because while I slept, there was a force protecting me.

  “Not all of them!” I cried. “How could you?”

  “Don’t get all peevish on me,” she said. “I’m the one taking you to the South Pole.”

  “Mom,” I said, “we’re not going to the South Pole.”

  “Wait, we’re not?”

  “The only place tourists go is the Antarctic Peninsula, which is like the Florida Keys of Antarctica.” It’s shocking, but Mom genuinely didn’t seem to know this. “It’s still zero degrees,” I continued. “But it’s a teeny-tiny part of Antarctica. It’s like someone saying they’re going to Colorado for Christmas, and then you ask them, How was New York? Sure, it’s the United States. But it’s just totally ignorant. Please tell me you knew that, Mom, but you forgot because you’re tired.”

  “Tired and ignorant,” she said.

  *

  From: Soo-Lin Lee-Segal

  To: Audrey Griffin

  Before you write me off as the Girl Who Cried Real-Time Flash!, listen to this.

  As I told you, Elgin, Pablo, and I had a lunch meeting downtown. Elgin insisted we take the 888 Shuttle. (Which, it turns out, is no different from the Connector. All these years I’d imagined the doors opening and it looking like the inside of a genie’s bottle or something.) There was construction downtown, so when we got to the corner of Fifth and Seneca, traffic had completely stopped. Elgin said it would be faster to walk. It was pouring buckets, but it wasn’t my place to argue so I followed them off the shuttle.

  Now, Audrey, you’re always talking about God’s plan. For the first time, I understand what you mean. I would have thought God was forsaking me when he made me walk three blocks in the pouring rain. But it turns out there was something on that third block that God intended me to see.

  Elgin, Pablo, and I were scurrying along Fourth Avenue, heads down, clutching closed our hoods over our faces. I happened to glance up, and what do I see? Bernadette Fox asleep in a pharmacy.

  I repeat, Bernadette Fox just lying on a couch with her eyes closed in the middle of a compound pharmacy. She might as well have been in the window at Nordstrom for all of Seattle to see. She wore dark glasses, trousers and loafers, a men’s shirt with silver cuff links, and some kind of vest underneath her raincoat. Also, she was clutching a fancy purse with one of her silk scarves tied to it.

  Pablo and Elgin were up ahead on the corner, turning in circles, wondering where I had gone. Elgin spotted me and marched over, looking irate.

  “I—” I stammered, “I’m sorry—” It was my first day on the job. Whatever was going on with Bernadette, I wanted no part of it. I ran to catch up, but it was too late. Elgin had already looked in the window. His face went white. He pulled open the door and went inside.

  By this time, Pablo had come over. “Elgin’s wife is asleep in there,” I explained.

  “It’s really coming down,” Pablo said. He smiled and refused to turn his head toward the pharmacy.

  “I already know what I’m going to order for lunch,” I said. “The salt-and-pepper calamari. It’s not on the menu, but they make it for you if you ask.”

  “Sounds good,” he said. “I’m probably going to have to check out the menu before I order.”

  Finally, Elgin came out, looking shaky. “Change my flight to D.C.,” he said. “I want to leave in the morning.”

  I wasn’t completely up to speed on Elgin’s schedule. But I did know his presentation was in D.C. at four p.m. I opened my mouth to explain that with the time difference—

  “Just—” he said.

  “Fine.”

  Then, wouldn’t you know, a Connector passed by. Elgin darted into traffic and stopped it. He conferred with the driver, then waved me over. “He’s taking you back to Redmond,” Elgin said. “S-plus me my new itinerary.”

  What choice did I have? I boarded the shuttle. Pablo did bring me back an order of salt-and-pepper calamari, but it didn’t travel well.

  *

  From: Audrey Griffin

  To: Soo-Lin Lee-Segal

  This will have to be quick because I’m up to here with party preparations. The real “flash update” is that you’re starting to realize that God is driving the bus. (In your case, literally. Honk, honk!) I’d love to talk to you more about it sometime. Coffee, maybe? I can come out to Microsoft.

  *

  Email from the guy outside the library to his architecture professor at USC<
br />
  From: Jacob Raymond

  To: Paul Jellinek

  Dear Mr. Jellinek,

  Remember how I told you I was going to Seattle on a pilgrimage to see the public library, and I joked that I’d let you know if I had a Bernadette Fox sighting? Well, guess who I saw outside the public library?

  Bernadette Fox! She was about fifty, her hair was brown and wild. The only reason I looked twice was because she was wearing a fishing vest, which is something you notice.

  There’s the one picture of Bernadette Fox taken about twenty years ago when she won her award. And you hear all the speculation about her, how she moved to Seattle and became a recluse or went crazy. I had a really strong feeling it was her. Before I could say anything, she abruptly volunteered, “Bernadette Fox.”

  I started gushing. I told her I was a graduate student at USC, and had visited Beeber Bifocal every time they opened it to the public, and that our winter project is a competition to reinterpret the Twenty Mile House.

  I suddenly realized I had said too much. Her eyes were vacant. Something was seriously wrong with her. I wanted to get a picture of me with the elusive Bernadette Fox. (Talk about a profile pic!) But then I thought better of it. This woman has given me so much already. The relationship has been one-way, and still I want to take more? I bowed to her with my hands in prayer position and walked into the library, leaving her standing outside in the rain.

  I feel bad because I think I might have messed her up. Anyway. In case you were wondering: Bernadette Fox is walking around Seattle in the middle of winter wearing a fishing vest.

  See you in class,

  Jacob

  *

  Mom and Dad went out to dinner that night without me, to some Mexican place in Ballard, which was fine because Friday is when a bunch of us go to Youth Group and they have fried shrimp, plus they let us watch a movie, which was Up.

  Dad left at five in the morning to catch a plane because he had Samantha 2 business at Walter Reed.1 Claire Anderssen was having a party on Bainbridge Island, and I wanted to go out to our house there, plus I wanted Kennedy to spend the night. Kennedy gets on Dad’s nerves, and there was no way we could have a sleepover if he was there, so I was happy he was gone.

  Mom and I had a plan. We’d catch the 10:10 to Bainbridge, and Kennedy would take the passenger ferry after gymnastics, which she tried to get out of, but her mom wouldn’t let her.

  SATURDAY, DECEMBER 11

  Cliff Mass blog post

  This storm is turning into a complex weather event. I will need some time to describe it because the media is not fully comprehending its implications. The cloud band leading the approaching weather system hit western Washington yesterday afternoon. The latest high-resolution computer models show sustained winds of 40–50 mph with gusts of 70–80 mph and the low going north of us instead of the southern trajectory predicted earlier.

  On the radio yesterday, I expressed extreme skepticism at yesterday’s track for the low center, and the latest satellite pictures confirm that the center of the low will cross southern Vancouver Island and move into British Columbia. Such a position allows warm, moist air to move right into western Washington with the potential for heavy rain.

  Yesterday, the media shrugged off my serious weather warnings for Seattle as a Henny Penny false alarm. This is no false alarm. The unforeseen storm path has allowed a low-pressure system to move north of Puget Sound and warm temperatures to abound.

  In Seattle, warm temperatures, associated with moist, Pineapple Express air, have already produced a rainfall of two inches between 7 PM yesterday and 7 AM this morning. I am now going out on a limb and projecting that this flow will stagnate over Puget Sound and the deluge will continue for hours. We are in the midst of a most notable weather show.

  *

  See, that’s what I mean about loving Cliff Mass. Because, basically, all he’s saying is it’s going to rain.

  *

  From: Ollie-O

  To: Prospective Parent Brunch Committee

  REAL-TIME FLASH!

  The day of the PPB has come. Unfortunately, our biggest get, the sun, is going to be a no-show. Ha-ha. That was my idea of a joke.

  It’s imperative we run tight. It would be death-dealing for Galer Street if the prospectives felt their time was being wasted, especially during the holiday shopping season. Our objective is for the Mercedes Parents to see and be seen, and then spring them so they can storm U Village and take advantage of these astonishing fifty-percent-off storewide sales.

  10:00–10:45—MPs arrive. Drinks and food passed.

  10:45—Mr. Kangana and parent Helen Derwood arrive with kindergarteners, who enter, quiet as church mice, through side door and situate themselves for marimba performance.

  10:55—Gwen Goodyear gives short welcoming speech, then directs MPs to sunroom. Mr. Kangana leads kindergarteners in marimba performance.

  11:15—Closing remarks.

  Gwen Goodyear will be stationed at the door, bidding adieux, and handing out Galer Street swag. There is no way to overemphasize the importance of this. Just because they’re Mercedes Parents doesn’t mean they’re not highly receptive to free shit. (Excuzey-moi!)

  Cheers!

  *

  From: Soo-Lin Lee-Segal

  To: Audrey Griffin

  GOOD LUCK TODAY! I just spoke with Pizza Nuovo. The rain doesn’t affect their wood-burning oven. They will set up a tent in the backyard. I’m stuck in Redmond because Elgin is making a presentation in another city and he wants me at my desk to troubleshoot any glitches. No comment.

  *

  From: Ollie-O

  To: Prospective Parent Brunch Committee

  Crisis. Enormous billboard hovering over Audrey’s house. Erected overnight by crazy neighbor. (Fellow Galer Street parent?) Audrey hysterical. Husband calling city attorney. I don’t do black swan.

  *

  From: Helen Derwood, PhD

  To: Galer Street Kindergarten Parents

  Cc: Galer Street All-School List

  Dear Parents,

  I assume your little ones have told you snippets about the shocking events at today’s brunch. No doubt you are concerned and confused. As the only kindergarten parent in attendance, I’ve been inundated with phone calls asking what really happened.

  As many of you know, I’m a counselor at Swedish Medical Center, specializing in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I went to New Orleans after Katrina and still make frequent trips to Haiti. With the permission of Head of School Goodyear, I am writing both as a parent and PTSD counselor.

  It’s important to root our discussion in the facts. You dropped off your children in front of Galer Street. From there, we boarded the bus, and Mr. Kangana drove us to the Queen Anne home of Audrey and Warren Griffin. Despite the rain, the setting was lovely. The planters were full of colorful flowers, and the smell of burning wood filled the air.

  A gentleman by the name of Ollie-O greeted us and directed us to the side entrance, where we were asked to remove our raincoats and rain boots.

  The brunch was in full swing. There were approximately fifty guests in attendance, who all appeared to be enjoying themselves. I noted palpable tension coming from Gwen Goodyear, Audrey Griffin, and Ollie-O, but nothing a kindergartener would be able to detect.

  We were led to the sunroom, where Mr. Kangana had set up his marimbas the night before. The children who had to go potty did, then kneeled behind their instruments. The shades were drawn, leaving the room quite dark. The children had difficulty locating their mallets, so I began to raise the shades.

  Ollie-O materialized and grabbed my hand. “That’s a nonstarter.” He turned on the lights.

  The guests packed in for the performance. After a short introduction by Gwen Goodyear, the children started in with “My Giant Carp.” You would have been so proud! It was going delightfully. About a minute in, however, a commotion erupted in the backyard, where the caterers were.

  “Holy s——!” someon
e shouted from outside.

  A few guests reacted with good-natured titters. The children hardly noticed, they were so absorbed in their music. The song ended. All the little eyes were on Mr. Kangana, who counted them into their next song, “One, two, three—”

  “F——!” someone else shouted.

  This was not OK. I dashed through the laundry room to the back door, with the intention of shushing the raucous caterers. I turned the handle. A strong, dull, consistent pressure pushed the door toward me. Immediately sensing a terrible force of nature on the other side, I attempted to close the door. The inhuman force wouldn’t allow it. I stuck my foot against the bottom of the door. I heard an ominous creak. The hinges began pulling loose from the frame.

  Before I could compute any of this, the marimba music suddenly stopped. A series of pops and pings erupted from the sunroom. A child squealed in distress.

  I abandoned the threat at the door and hurtled to the sunroom, where I was met by the shattering of glass. The children were running, screaming, from their instruments. With none of their own parents to run to for comfort, the kindergarteners collectively burrowed into the crowd of prospective parents, who in turn were trying to squeeze through the one small door leading to the living room. It’s a small miracle nobody was trampled.

  My daughter, Ginny, ran to me and hugged my legs. Her back was wet… and muddy. I looked up. The shades were now eerily raised of their own accord.

  And then came the mud. In it sloshed, through the broken windows. Thick mud, watery mud, rocky mud, mud with beveled-glass shards, mud with window muntins, mud with grass, mud with barbecue utensils, mud with a mosaic birdbath. In a flash, the sunroom windows were gone, and in their place, a gaping, mud-oozing hole.

  Adults, children, everyone, was trying to outrun the wreckage, which now included furniture. I stayed behind with Mr. Kangana, who was attempting to rescue the marimbas he had brought with him as a young boy when he emigrated from his beloved Nigeria.

  Then, as suddenly as it began, the mud stopped. I turned. An upside-down billboard was flat against the hole in the sunroom, forming a dam. I have no clue as to where this billboard originated, but it was bright red and vast enough to cover what had been a wall of windows.