Searching for Sylvie Lee

by Jean Kwok

  Oh, so we’re the stupid, misguided family members. Majority of the time! No reason to suspect! Trying to stay calm, I tell her about Filip, how suspiciously he’s acted, how there’s a missing fortune in jewelry.

  She says, “Well, men do strange things sometimes when they meet an attractive woman. Sadly, there is no proof the jewelry ever existed. And if he was involved in a murder, why would he lead you to the body?”

  “I don’t know. That’s your job,” I grind out through clenched teeth. “Maybe he tampered with the evidence underwater. He was the first one to reach the car and he was alone. He misled me for our entire relationship and pretended he didn’t know either one of us. Don’t you think that’s a bit suspicious?” I am growling into the phone. I bite back the words: You imbecile. You uncaring bitch.

  “It would be if there was a possible motive. Lying in a personal relationship is not very honest but it is also not a crime. Perhaps he thought you would not like him if you knew he was acquainted with your sister. Now if there is not anything else . . .”

  She’s going to hang up on me. Getting angry won’t get me an autopsy. I somehow need to convince this idiot of a police agent. I have to be smart, like Sylvie. “Look, Sylvie was a young, healthy, successful woman. Our family needs to know if she was drugged or under the influence of alcohol. Her husband was here. They were having trouble. Maybe they had a fight . . . were there any bruises on her body? I am not accusing anyone of anything but there are still so many questions. Even if she died of a heart attack or stroke and lost control of the car, for example, I need to know that for my own health reasons.” I hold my breath, waiting for her answer. Please, please, please. I can’t be left never knowing what happened to Sylvie.

  The silence over the phone is long and heavy. Then she says, not unkindly, “I am very sorry. The case is closed. Amy, let me give you some advice. It is over. Stop asking questions, stop pushing. Find your peace. Just go home and live again. Not everything in life has answers.”

  I hang up and want to scream. That’s easy for her to say. Lose the person you love most in the world and see how accepting and peaceful you are then. I am no longer the Amy who would have crawled back to Ma and Pa and pulled the covers over her head. No more.

  I try to think everything through. Is it possible Sylvie killed herself—but then why? The problems with Jim and her job had started before she left for the Netherlands. Something must have tipped her over the edge. If she didn’t do it, did someone drug her and place her in the car? Did it have something to do with Grandma’s jewelry? No matter what the Dutch police say about the gold, my Chinese instincts tell me it existed—and what about Jim? He had come to the Netherlands and Lukas said that Jim had asked Sylvie not to destroy his life. Jim had threatened Sylvie. But that was probably because Jim didn’t want Sylvie to leave him; he must have felt desperate at the thought. Jim has enough money of his own and I can’t think of another reason he would want Sylvie gone. Helena? Out of rage, if Sylvie had indeed taken Grandma’s gold? Willem? He’s so strange and creepy. Could he have done something to Sylvie as a child and she’d threatened to come forward?

  Then there were the two men, Lukas and Filip. Perhaps Lukas wanted the gold for himself? He’s said how much he wants to own his own place, and there could have been some kind of tussle or an accident. But his grief has been so desperate, so vicious. I can’t believe anyone is that good of an actor. Between the two of them, Filip is the obvious suspect. I still can’t believe he’d known Sylvie and manipulated a meeting with me. He must have jumped on my bicycle knowing full well who I was. The flesh on my forearms breaks out in goose bumps. I’d thought he was cute, open, and vulnerable. I’d thought he liked me. Fortunately, I am so exhausted from my grief and rage that I have little emotional space left for embarrassment. Did he have a relationship with Sylvie? Did he need the money? Or was there some sort of love triangle and things got out of hand?

  I’ve been calling and leaving messages for Filip. I think over everything I’ve learned since coming to the Netherlands. What had Helena said about a trip to Venice? Who did Sylvie go with? I could ask Helena and Willem about it, but Sylvie might have lied to them. I am realizing that my sister hid so much more of herself than I ever knew. Sylvie, I pray, I am ready to sacrifice my imagined ideal of you if only I can find out who you really were. Please help me.

  Then the answer comes to me. Estelle.

  Telephone Call

  Sunday, May 15

  Estelle: I am so very sorry. My parents saw it on the television. I see you rang me a few hours ago but I was flying. We just landed in Kuala Lumpur. I am in shock. I could barely concentrate on the flight.

  Amy: Thanks.

  Estelle: Sylvie was the loveliest, most loyal person. Many people only saw her from the outside. I cannot believe it. [Voice breaks] And I was with her so recently.

  Amy: Yes, that’s what I wanted to ask you about. Did you know about that trip she took to Venice?

  Estelle: Of course. I was there. I arranged the tickets.

  Amy: Really? Who else went with you?

  Estelle: Lukas and Filip. We had a wonderful time. Well, except for a terrible fight the guys had.

  Amy: What did they fight about?

  Estelle: Nothing. It was stupid. Something about a show we had just seen—came out of nowhere.

  Amy: Actually, Filip introduced himself to me without telling me he knew any of you. We saw each other a few times.

  Estelle: What?

  Amy: To be honest, it’s kind of creepy. Do you know why he would have done that?

  Estelle: Amy, I do not have any idea. But Filip is a good man. You should ask him.

  Amy: I’m trying, but no one’s talking to me. Lukas has disappeared; Filip’s not picking up.

  Estelle: Yes, Lukas is not answering my calls either. Filip can have a terrible temper too. Lukas, well, he and Sylvie have always had a special relationship.

  Amy: I don’t mean to pry, but does Lukas disappear on you often?

  Estelle: Sure. There are often long periods when I do not know where he is, because we both travel so much. But usually he returns my calls. I imagine this must be horrible for him. I am worried.

  Amy: Estelle, were Filip and Sylvie romantically involved?

  Estelle: . . . Honestly, I do not know the answer to that, but if they were, it was only a surface love. I think you better ask him yourself. I have no idea where Lukas is right now but I can tell you that most weekends, Filip performs with the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra. I am so sorry, Amy. Truly I am. But I am sure that neither of them had anything to do with Sylvie’s tragic passing.

  Chapter 25

  Sylvie

  Monday, April 25

  The house felt strangely empty when Lukas and I opened the front door—and where was Isa’s coat, which she normally hung on the rack? Perhaps she was at the store. Lukas and I tiptoed upstairs, in case Grandma was sleeping. I clutched her present, the white-gold keychain and Murano key, in my hand. Her door had been left ajar. I pushed it all the way open and a sudden wave of cold swept over me. Her bed was made and empty. Her medicines and oxygen tank were gone. No, it could not be. If there had been an incident, Helena and Willem would have called us.

  Lukas stopped midstride. Then he was calling over the staircase, “Ma, Pa! Where is Grandma?”

  Willem emerged from their bedroom, unshaven, still wearing his pajamas.

  Something was wrong. I could not get enough air. I pressed my knuckles against my sore, aching heart. My voice was small and tight. “Did you move Grandma to a hospice?”

  He shook his head and his crimson, swollen eyes said enough.

  Lukas whispered, “No.”

  I gripped the left side of my head as if to cover my ear, as if that would stop Willem from confirming what I already knew. My breath rasped in my chest. I started to lurch into Grandma’s bedroom but my knees gave way and I bumped into the doorframe, the glass key digging into my palm. I staggered forward
until I fell facedown, arms splayed, onto Grandma’s bed, where I had spoken to her only a few days ago. The key fell from my stupefied fingers, hit the wooden floor, and shattered. I pressed my face into the coverlet that had once warmed Grandma, and that was still here while my grandma was dead, and sobbed.

  The bed shifted, there was a weight beside me, and then Lukas was stroking my back. He said, “Oh, Sylvie,” in a voice clogged with tears. Poor Lukas. Grandma had cared for him his entire life.

  He sniffed, and I pushed myself upright so I could wrap my arms around him. We held each other while we convulsed with grief.

  Then Willem’s arms were around us both and I stiffened. He smelled of sweat, his flesh too warm through his thin pajamas. The embrace was intimate and I shifted away.

  Lukas asked, his face tear-stained, “How? Why did you not call us?”

  Willem straightened and raked his fingers through his disheveled hair. “She instigated the euthanasia procedure the moment you were gone. She did not want you to be notified. Do not feel bad. She planned it that way. It was what she wanted.”

  At this, I hid my face in my palms. Grandma did not want me with her. Even she had rejected me in the end. She had died with only Willem and Helena around her. I had taken her Lukas away too. Because of me, she had died essentially alone.

  Lukas croaked, “But we did not get to say goodbye.”

  Willem raised his arms as if he wanted to comfort us once again, thought better of it, and let them drop to his sides. “She wanted to go with as little fuss as possible. She arranged it months ago with the euthanasia commission once she knew she was terminal.”

  I managed to ask, “How did it happen?”

  “Very peacefully. She started the procedure as soon as you left. Two doctors came yesterday—her own and the one from the commission. They spoke to her separately to make sure she was doing it out of her own free will, and that she was in her right mind.” Willem was rubbing the back of his ear, a nervous tic he had.

  Yesterday: while Lukas and I were dancing and kissing, and I was off having fun with my friends. I can barely squeeze out the words. “And did it go quickly?”

  “Two shots. One to put her to sleep and the other to stop her heart. She did not suffer at all. She is at peace.”

  A hard, brittle voice came from the doorway. “Did you enjoy your time in Venice?” It was Helena, her eyes aflame, skin pale and blotchy, jaw clenched as if to hold back her anger and grief.

  Lukas said, his voice breaking, “Mother, we did not know. We never would have gone.”

  She came over to the bed and put her arms around him. “I am not blaming you.” Her eyes were on me. It was clear who she blamed.

  I longed to have Grandma or something of hers in my arms again. I looked around the bare room. “Where is Tasha?”

  “Who is that?” asked Helena.

  I said in a quiet voice, “You know. The doll Grandma made for me. She was on the bedside table when I left.”

  She shrugged. “We must have thrown it away by accident.”

  I recoiled as if she had struck me. I pressed my fist to my mouth to keep from crying out. Tasha, Grandma gone. It was just like the day I had left the Netherlands, losing everyone I had loved. I realized suddenly, of course Helena had taken Tasha then too. What a cruel thing to do to a child. Now she knew I had Grandma’s treasure and had stolen Tasha from me. Lukas looked between us and reached out for me but I stood suddenly. If he touched me, I would break down again and I refused to do that in front of this woman, who had always hated me.

  I stumbled out of the room and let the grief take me once I was alone in my attic room.

  Venice had been a beautiful dream but now I was confronted by reality again. Grandma was gone. Her things had been either thrown away or hidden somewhere and Helena would never allow me access. Tasha, the doll Grandma had made for me with her own hands, had been tossed in the trash. I had not been here for Grandma for all these intervening years and was not here to hold her when she died.

  I lay on my bed all day and night. I sent Filip a text message canceling the rest of my lessons. Lukas tried to see me, but I would not let him in. I loved him, but it could not go any further. I had been burned enough. I savored our time in Venice: the longing, the awareness of him, his skin, his smell, his touch . . . but after this came passion and then, inevitably it seemed, betrayal. I knew this desire, to edge closer to the cliff, to tempt fate. I had leaped off before and barely survived it. I was not sure I had. My grief consumed me and I could not bear any more risk to my wounded heart.

  Estelle left me messages, but I did not respond. Friendship had failed me. In a way, I was angry at all three of them for tempting me to go to Venice, though I knew it was my own fault. Besides, I had already done enough damage to our group.

  When I could speak again, I called Ma and told her that her mother was dead. She keened, each cry hitting a tender spot inside of me. I did not dare tell her that I had not been there at the end. I failed in my original purpose in coming to the Netherlands. When Amy’s voice came on the phone, I said, “Take care of Ma for me,” and she promised, “I will.”

  Two days later, it was King’s Day, the birthday of King Willem-Alexander. Even though I stayed inside the house, I had to endure the knowledge that hordes of Dutch in fluorescent orange clothing were celebrating and drinking throughout the land. They painted Dutch flags on their faces; dressed in orange boas and huge sunglasses that read king; wore hats that could hold a liter of beer, which they then piped to their mouths with a siphon. It was an excuse for the ever-controlled Dutch to cut loose. Some people saved up the entire year for their partying on this day. It was the worst day for grieving.

  When I was little, it was called Queen’s Day, since Queen Beatrix still reigned. Grandma loved this holiday. It was the one day in the year when everyone could sell their old junk on the street, without a permit of any kind. She would wake me and Lukas early, so that we left the house by seven in the morning.

  “Quickly, or all of the good things will be gone,” she said. She wheeled her large shopping cart along with us. The square in the center would have been transformed, covered with children and parents huddled against the early morning wind, each guarding a tarp mounded high with old toys, books, teacups, bicycles. People would be sipping coffee bleary-eyed, dressed in unbearably bright orange shirts and hats. Grandma loved a good bargain and would stop at every stand. She always gave Lukas and me some money to spend as well—fifty cents for a puzzle, a guilder for a toy car. Sometimes people sold freshly baked cookies or cupcakes. Lukas always spent everything at once, on marbles, plastic dinosaurs, Lego sets, but I liked to save my money, knowing I might find something more expensive. It was at the Queen’s Day street markets that I bought lavender-scented candles and delicate tea cups for Grandma, Helena, and Willem. Despite my fear of Helena, I still loved her and tried my hardest to please her. Grandma bought us cups of hot chocolate or warm, freshly made caramel waffles to munch on as we shopped. She would fill her shopping cart with miniature china ballerinas, bronze clocks, crystal glasses, and then we would walk home together, with Lukas pushing the cart and Grandma and I following, swinging our hands.

  Before she died, I had spoken to Grandma about Dutch burial laws and her wishes. This was not very Chinese. We did not like to speak openly about death, but I wanted to make sure everything was done in accordance with what she, and not Helena, wanted.

  “What? They can dig you up after ten years? And then throw your bones away?” This had not occurred to Grandma. In China, the burial site was of utmost importance. Families fought for the best spots on the mountain for their loved ones because it was the only place with good feng shui. This way, they believed, the departed could continue to bless the living. The forces of wind, water, and earth were in harmony there. Grandma shook her head. “Barbarians.”

  “Customs are very different here. The burial rights need to be renewed in Holland and within cemeteries because it is so cr
owded. There is not enough room. They often will not permit a renewal after ten years.”

  Grandma leaned back against her pillows, her cheeks and eyes sunken and still. “You decide, Sylvie.”

  A pang went through me at the thought of Grandma’s death. How could it already be so near? I had to pull myself together. The most important thing was that she was happy. “I cannot do that, Grandma. This is too important. I want to know your wish. There is the possibility of a natural grave. That means that you would be placed somewhere in nature, without a tombstone. Many Dutch love this option.”

  She huffed and waved her frail hand around. “Nameless and forgotten, in the soggy mud of this country? I do not think so.”

  I hid a smile. “We could try to transport you to another land.”

  She sat up and I placed a pillow behind her back so she would not tire herself out. “Where? To the Beautiful Country, where I have never been? Back to the Central Kingdom? No, I have been away too long. I would like to fly free, like the phoenix. I wish to see your grandpa again. Dragon and phoenix, yin and yang, man and woman. A death should be floating clouds and flowing water: natural, beautiful, free.” Her voice drifted away. The tirade had exhausted her.

  I took her hand in both of mine. How happy I was that she was still with us. I had to savor each moment with her, no matter how bittersweet. I cleared my throat to rid the thickness. “Would you consider cremation, then?” This was what I would want for myself. Good riddance to this body.

  She thought for a moment and nodded slightly. “Yes. I am a modern woman. Our rituals must fit the lands we live in. Our old feng shui master would have a terrible time here in Europe.”

  On the day of Grandma’s funeral, we drove through a wooded area to a long one-story rectangular building set like a concrete block within a flat meadow. April was sweet but wore a white hat. Despite some initial warm days, this one had turned out to be the coldest in years, closer to the depths of winter than any rebirth of spring. The sky stretched over the horizon, gray and clear, like the iris of an unblinking eye. When Lukas and I stepped from the back of Helena’s car, our breaths turned to mist. We were as cold as newly shaven sheep.