Two White Queens and the One-Eyed Jack

by Heidi von Palleske

  She was still young. Barely seventeen when she had the twins, that would make her what now? Clara and Blanca had to be about twelve. So still under thirty. Still in her youth, really. There was time. Time enough to live again. Time to make things right.

  Except that she threw a stone at her brother’s head. She hit him. She drew blood.

  Faye remembered the rage that had suddenly consumed her. She was upset, yes, that the girls had suffered such a bad sunburning but that was tempered by the joy they had shared. One emotion was overlapping the other, like the coming and passing of waves. But then she saw him there, hands on his hips, and her heart started to pound in her chest. It echoed in her ears and she could feel the lava of resentment rise in her to a crescendo where she had no control over it. It was heating and rising and rising and heating and filling her, consuming her until it had to burst through in a violent eruption.

  She had felt that panic and rage before. It was no stranger to her. One moment she would be fine, coping, even happy and, the next, she’d react without thought or censure. Her emotions could always take hold and spiral her away, whether that hold was one of happiness or despair. But the power her emotions had over her was fed and given supreme power the day of the big incident.

  She was just sixteen. She was juggling two emotions, desire and trepidation, and desire was winning. Timothy was lying across her, mouth on hers. Her breasts were bare and his hands were all over them, cupping them, stroking them, pinching their pale, small nipples. She could feel herself giving way, lost in the moment of experience, losing her sense of what if? Then a shadow fell across her. It snapped her back, and there he was with his hands on his hips, judging her. She grabbed at Timothy’s back, as if by pulling him closer to her she could hide from the imposing shadow. But a larger hand was there, as well, on Timothy’s back.

  There are parts of the story she has blanked on. Parts that have been erased with treatment and time. She has a flash of Timothy being lifted away. Timothy being thrown down the stairs and his leg twisting at an extreme angle, making it impossible for him to run from the blows, but she didn’t see that. Only heard the stories, the rumours afterward. She never witnessed Bob raining down on his head, pummelling him till blood spilled from his nose and his lip split. That’s a part of the puzzle that is missing for her now. And so is the moment that her brother, Bob, returned from beating Timothy.

  Faye was lying on her stomach, her head in her pillows, crying. She felt a tender stroke on her head. She felt his hand rub her cheek.

  “There, there now. Don’t cry. He’s gone. It’s all okay now. You’re safe.”

  But cry she had. Her whimpers had grown louder and louder as she gulped for air.

  “Shh. Quiet now. No more crying. Hush.”

  He hadn’t bothered to turn her over. Just pressed her flat with his wide palm on her slender back. He’d kept the other hand on the nape of her neck as his knees pushed her thighs apart. He unzipped himself but didn’t pull down his pants. He just took his penis out and began pressing it into her.

  “It’s not right. Not right,” he had told her. “First time’s gotta be with someone who loves you.”

  She’d struggled but his weight was upon her and he was so much bigger, so much stronger than her. And the more she struggled the harder his grip, the more he pulled her hair and pushed her face into the pillows so she could hardly breathe.

  “Gonna hurt if you struggle. I want it to be nice for ya. So just relax and enjoy it. It only hurts a bit at first. Then it’ll feel nice. Real nice.”

  And once she’d stopped struggling, once she was exhausted with all her fighting, only then did he take his hands, lift her hips upward, and start to fuck her from behind. At first, he was almost gentle but after a few thrusts, he intensified his efforts, ramming her as hard and as deeply as he could, all the while breathing in her ear, “You’re my sister. Mine, not his! Mine! Who loves you, Faye?”

  Faye had said nothing. It was as though her spirit had left her body and was watching from above.

  “I said, who loves you?” And he thrust hard into her. When she didn’t respond he asked again and again, each time ramming into her all the harder.

  “I said, who loves you?” he had yelled at her as he slapped her backside with an open hand.

  “You do. You love me,” she finally had whimpered.

  Faye never did return to school. She did not say anything about her brother. She remained inside and in shock. And then she missed her period. And then another. And as her belly began to swell she tried to cover it by wearing long, flowing dresses. She tried drinking peppermint tea to get rid of the baby. Tried punching herself in the stomach. Over and over again as hard as she could. She tried everything. She stopped eating and drinking. She closed off, shut down. Became catatonic. She lost weight, began fainting almost every morning. And so she was brought to the doctors. That was when her pregnancy was divulged to her father. He told her he would like to beat her senseless if only she weren’t pregnant. He made her pray, many times a day, on the hard floor. She said she was going to kill herself. She had a plan. And that was when she was first brought to the cottages. That was when she had her first treatment, assured that the electroshock would not affect the pregnancy.

  Although she can’t really remember her more recent treatments, that first one she would always remember. Pads on either side of her head. Something to brace her neck. Gauze in her mouth. And then her body in an epileptic convulsion that went on and on and on until every muscle in her body ached. No anaesthetic then. No muscle relaxants. Those luxuries would come a few years later.

  When she returned home from that first treatment, she had told her father the truth, wanting him to protect her and accept her. But he could not, would not, believe her. It had to have been those treatments muddling up her mind. He always knew it was that good-for-nothin’ Timothy who had knocked up his darling girl. Either she was protecting her lover or she was mad. Madness was the easiest option. There was no way that his son was such a depraved monster. Not his first-born. Not possible. He was married to a nice girl and she had a child on the way, as well! He was sure that, although the treatments helped her emotional being, it did rattle her brain quite a bit.

  “Faye,” Nurse Elaine called out to her, snapping her back to the present. “Last time. Get away from the water. You’re up to your thighs!”

  Faye backed away. Knew there would be a time. A time when there would be a disturbance elsewhere and the focus would shift and she could be one with the lake. She retreated and sat on the shore, feeling the solidity of the earth under her. She felt around her. She was centred. She was sure in her memory.

  She picked up a rock, not unlike the one she threw at her brother. She put it into her pocket. Every day, she vowed, she would take another rock and sneak it to her room until she could fill those pockets with dull, smooth grey rocks. Then, she would wait till the gaze turned from her. And then, all she would take with her would be the memory of the sound of her girls singing.

  FOUR

  “THERE IS A WILLOW GROWS ASKANT A BROOK,

  That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream.

  There with fantastic garlands did she make,

  Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples,

  That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,

  But our cold maids do dead men’s fingers call them.

  There on the pendant boughs her cornet weeds

  Clamb’ring to hang, an envious sliver broke,

  When down her weedy trophies and herself

  Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide,

  And mermaid-like awhile they bore her up,

  Which time she chanted snatches of old lauds

  As one incapable of her own distress,

  Or like a creature native and indued

  Unto that element. But long it could not be

  Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,

  Pulled the poor wretch from
her melodious lay

  To muddy death.”

  Mr. Birch closed the book, peered at his class, and waited for a response. Gareth shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He had heard of such a thing. A deliberate drowning. Heard his mother telling his father about it in hushed tones a couple of years ago. Gareth couldn’t quite comprehend it, being so young, but it stayed with him like a haunting. His mother’s sobs sounded in his head because he had never heard her cry like that before. Crying, Gareth had assumed, because she had walked away from the lake in order to tend to another patient who was making a fuss, crying and screaming. Then the woman with the long red hair was gone, nowhere to be seen. There was nothing but the sound of the hungry waves.

  “What do we know from this speech?” Mr. Birch asked the class.

  Johnny put up his hand. He seemed more confident now with his glass eye. No longer did he look away when his name was called. No longer did he slide along his chair to hide behind his desk when a question was asked. He was far more present. And this eye didn’t weep or crust over. It sat confidently alongside the other. Not matching it exactly, but as a complement.

  “John?”

  “Well, first of all, it is interesting that it is Gertrude who is telling Hamlet about the suicide because Hamlet was once close to his mother, but now he feels betrayed by her because she married so quickly after Hamlet’s father died. Every son hates the idea of his mother being with someone other than his own father …”

  Johnny was old enough to know that there had been little passion between his parents for some time. He felt much closer to his mother than his father but still, still, he could sense that when they were in Germany she was different in the presence of the ocularist. He liked Siegfried, really liked him, but he wasn’t his father. That is what made it all the worse. He liked Siegfried a lot. The first year he was unaware of the flirtation between his mother and Siegfried, but, during the subsequent trips to Germany, Johnny became aware that there was, perhaps, something between them. Maybe it was because he was starting to become aware of girls himself. And so his glances, his appreciative looks, were more apparent when echoed in the ocularist. Those weeks they spent in Germany his mother seemed more awake and alive. When she was home, in Canada, she was merely counting the minutes, the hours, the days until she could return to the home of her youth.

  The truth was that since Johnny had returned from his first trip his father had been kinder and more attentive to him. He had started to include him in his activities, even let him join the bowling team. And Miss Argyle was there, looking as fetching as she had when he was in first grade. No wonder all the boys loved her. Now he was her peer, bowling alongside her. Almost an equal. Johnny did wonder why she was there and not his mother, but he excused it as a cultural difference. His mother just could not understand the value of bowling. Besides, his father was probably protecting her from ridicule. All those years in Canada and she still had that heavy accent. Changing her y’s for j’s and her w’s for v’s. How hard could it be to make some simple adjustments? The fact was that his mother just wasn’t trying hard enough. Yes, Johnny could understand how Hamlet would turn against the mother who had given him life. The mother whom he’d adored. Hamlet’s mother had betrayed him when she betrayed his father.

  “John, I think you are missing the point. We have already discussed Hamlet’s relationship with his mother, but what do we know of Gertrude’s relationship to other women?” Mr. Birch wanted to keep Johnny on track. Johnny was a deep-thinking student, more so than any of his classmates. One insight always led to another for him. Was that because of his accident as a child? Did those feelings of seclusion and otherness make for a more thoughtful student? If so, was it worth it?

  “Oh, she doesn’t care about other women. Ophelia is insignificant to her, even if she might have made her son happy. She doesn’t care about her son’s happiness; only her own needs. The thing is that Gertrude’s passions are not pure of heart. Gertrude is warning Hamlet that there is no place in her world for the pure of heart. Ophelia is a delicate flower. Her mind may have been polluted but her soul remains pure. Even in death.”

  “That’s a very romantic notion, but, at the time, suicide was considered a crime. It was a sin against God.”

  “Only if it was done in sound mind. But if someone is mad they cannot be responsible, and so Shakespeare has once again proven that her soul is pure and without sin.”

  Was there any woman, or girl, in Johnny’s life who was as pure as Ophelia? Surely not Miss Argyle, as much as he might wish it. She was such a flirt with everyone, especially his father. His sisters were not pure. Too self-serving and hurtful. One of them, Margaret, actually said to him, “You think that Dad missed you and that’s why you get to go bowling with him? No, it’s just because your new eye isn’t as embarrassing now. You almost look normal.” And there it was, a truth he did not wish to admit. His father could only love him because of the acceptable glass eye that the man his mother desired had created for him. Without Siegfried, his father could not accept him and yet with Siegfried, his mother’s affections were elsewhere.

  “An interesting take, Mr. Wagner. Anyone else?” Mr. Birch looked at Gareth, daring an answer.

  Gareth thought about the woman who walked into the lake with rocks filling her pockets. Did she float at all or did the rocks make her sink under the water right away? Was there a moment when she thought, No, I have changed my mind. I cannot do this.

  “Gareth, do you have anything to add?”

  “Yeah, I think suicide is dumb. How did drowning help anything? Didn’t help her. Didn’t help Hamlet. It crushed Laertes, and, well, Polonius, but he was a fool, anyhow.”

  “Polonius was already dead at that point.”

  “Oh. Yeah, right. Well, probably a good thing because hearing that his daughter offed herself would’ve killed him, anyhow. Imagine having to tell a father that his daughter drowned herself on purpose.”

  Gareth thought about how cold the lake had been that October two years ago. There was a constant chilly wind and the water was already colder than usual. There were waves crashing up and an undertow. No, she did not choose a calm exit. It had to be deliberate. A slow walk, step by step, and then she was taken as she threw herself at the water, rocks pulling her down, her lungs filling with water, wanting to cough but unable. Her ears must have filled with the cold, cold water so that the world she was leaving was finally quiet. Her eyes were surely closed, he imagined.

  Gareth never mentioned to his mother what he had overheard that night. His mother felt enough sorrow and guilt as it was. It would be so much easier if he told her how he could hear their conversations, how he pressed his ear to the wall, struggling to make out their secret words. But he would have to keep that to himself. His mom would feel betrayed if she knew. And betrayal was the last thing he wanted to bring into their home. Besides, her talk about work had been his only link to those two girls. His white angels. The twins.

  Johnny had his hand up again. Gareth knew that somehow he would contradict what he just said. He didn’t care about Hamlet and his self-centred whining. Selfish prick with all his introspection and holier-than-thou pronouncements. Blaming everyone else and taking no responsibility himself. It was his fault Ophelia drowned. No one else’s. But no, poor Hamlet! Hamlet was a selfish asshole, plain and simple.

  Gareth thought that perhaps a woman’s demise was always a man’s fault. He knew it wasn’t his mother’s fault that the red-haired woman drowned. It was a man’s fault. It had to be. A monster who was as selfish and as evil as Hamlet. There were whispers. There were things he’d overheard.

  Gareth kicked at the legs of his desk.

  “The tragedy of Hamlet is that we have to spend so much time studying it. Everyone dies, nobody learns a thing. All this self-reflection is worthless. It only brings sadness. Why can’t we study A Midsummer Night’s Dream instead? You know, a comedy with warring fairies. Drinking. Revelry. Fun. The difference between comedy and tragedy
is that in tragedy everyone dies, and in comedy they all get married.”

  “Assuming you don’t think that marriage is a tragedy, Gareth,” Johnny trumped him again.

  Gareth still liked his friend but all this overanalyzing, all this self-reflection and talk of purpose, had become so very boring. Everything had to do with fate and destiny. It was as if Johnny saw himself as some kind of philosopher-king. Some all-knowing pompous guru or something. All Gareth could think was how much more likable his friend was when he’d had his ill-fitting, ugly old crusty acrylic eye instead. Ever since he was outfitted for a glass eye in Germany his friend seemed to have changed.

  Johnny knew he was outgrowing his friend. Their interests were changing and they were growing apart. And when he looked inward, honestly, he knew he was just a little sad about it. But there was nothing Johnny could do. You cannot fight against destiny.

  It was an epiphany. A woman with bleach-blond hair, a raspy voice, and the charisma of the world’s best evangelical preachers was tearing up the charts. She was being featured everywhere from billboards to magazine covers. Bleach Blond. Thus the name of the band: Blondie.

  When the albino twins first saw Deborah Harry on Video Concert Hall, it was as though their own personal goddess had descended with a message for them. There she was, a created version of what they were and could be authentically. They were bleached without the bleach. Blonder than Blondie. And they could sing. They had been developing their own sound. But the rest had to be acquired.

  There had been a history of the bleach-blond goddess: Marilyn Monroe, Jean Harlow, Lana Turner, Kim Novak, Sandra Dee, then later the rock stars and musicians of which Deborah Harry was just one. But she was the one who used her bleach-blond persona as the name of her band. She made her look and her style a part of her sound and it resonated around the world. No longer the pouting, strutting male front and centre, here was a woman baring herself in an utterly raw display of unapologetic verve. If nothing else, that is what Clara and Blanca wanted. To exist without apology. To make no excuses for who and what they were. They had spent too long out of the sun — it was time for them to step into the light. They couldn’t blend, so why try? They would never be accepted. Why remain an apology for a grandfather who was ashamed of them, a project for teachers who pitied them, and a joke to the boys who ignored them? They could be goddesses. Adored. Everyone knew that adoration trumped love every time.