“That’s him,” said aunt Gertrude. My mother nodded.
“He had your address in his pocket,” said the man in white. This unsettled my aunt. Considering that they hadn’t heard from him in thirty years, it seemed odd that he’d know exactly where she lived.
Later, in hearing this story, I thought of the line from Father Brown (and quoted in Brideshead Revisited). “I caught the thief,” said Father Brown, “with an unseen hook and an invisible line which is long enough to let him wander to the ends of the world and still to bring him back with a twitch upon the thread.”
“What do you want done with the body?” asked the man in white. “Shall we release him to you?”
My mother and my aunt looked at each other. It didn’t take them long to decide. “We don’t want him,” said my mother. “He abandoned us; now we’ll abandon him. See how he likes it.”
They left the morgue and got back on the train and went back to Philadelphia without him.
My grandfather was buried in the potter’s field of New York City, a small island off the Bronx called Hart Island. Prisoners from Rikers Island bury the dead there in pine boxes, one stacked up on top of the other.
In my twenties, I had gone to Hart Island to do a story for a magazine. It was a spectacularly haunted place, accessible only by a ferry run by the Department of Corrections. In addition to the potter’s field, the island featured an abandoned mental hospital and the remains of a nineteenth-century village. The prisoners from Rikers, dressed in orange, shoveled the graves as guards stood there with guns trained upon them and the sun shone down.
I had no idea at the time that I was standing upon the grave of my grandfather.
“Wir müssen nach New York zuruck gehen, Gertrude,” whispered my mother. She clutched my arm fiercely. “Wir einen Fehler gemacht. Wir müssen ihn retten.”
We have to go back to New York, Gertrude. We made a mistake. We have to rescue him.
It appeared as if my mother was having second thoughts—fifty years later—about having abandoned my grandfather. This wasn’t completely out of character, either. Of all the people I have ever known, my mother is the one least likely to bear a grudge. At age ninety-four, just as when she was a child, my mother was still trying to pull her father out of the pigpen.
I imagined going up to New York, retrieving my grandfather’s body from Hart Island. When I’d written that story, back in 1984, I’d learned that people did that all the time.
The world is full of second thoughts.
Zachary entered the room. He was sleepy. “Good morning, Grandmama,” he said. My son wrapped his arms around my mother.
“Hello, Zach,” she said, in English. “I understand you’ve been looking at colleges.”
“Yes I have,” he said. “I’m thinking of majoring in biology and theater. And I want to start an Amnesty International chapter.”
My mother looked at him proudly.
“I wish you’d known your grandfather,” she said. “He’d have been so proud of you, Zachary. So proud.”
Then her eyes fell to me. “Oh, Jenny,” she said. “When did you get here?”
“I just flew in from Maine,” I said. “And boy are my arms tired.”
She gave me a familiar, exhausted smile. “Always with the jokes,” she said, and looked at Zach. “The two of you. I don’t know which one’s worse.”
“She’s worse,” said Zach.
“Well, you’ll be glad to know I’ve been talking to real estate agents,” said Mom. “I’ve decided I don’t want you to take me back to my house. I’m buying a new house. I’m moving to a place I’ve never been before.”
Zach cast a worried glance at me. “That’s good, Mom. We really didn’t want you going back to the old house. We don’t think you’d be happy there.”
“So you admit it,” Mom said. “This is a room you had built onto the hospital. And filled it with all of this duplication furniture.”
Monica looked at me. She nodded and mouthed the words, Say yes.
“Okay,” I said. “I admit it.”
“It was a very, very sweet thing to do,” Mom said, squeezing my hand. “I just don’t understand why you couldn’t tell me the truth.”
“We thought it might upset you,” said Zach.
Mom thought this over. “Yes,” she said. “I see. But it’s going to be all right now. I’m moving on. Don’t you think that’s exciting? I’m making a new beginning.”
“I’m glad you’re moving, Mom,” I said. I felt my heart in my throat. “It will be nice to have a new house.”
She reached up and squeezed my arm. She sang, “Du, du liegst mir im Herzen! Du, du liegst mir im Sinn. Du, du machst mir viel Schmerzen, weißt nicht wie gut ich dir bin!”
Which of course means, You’re in my heart, you’re in my mind. You cause me such pain! You don’t know how good I am for you.
“Is that German?” Zach asked me.
“Prussian,” I said.
Mom looked at Zach proudly and turned to me. In German she said, “I’m so proud of my son.” Meaning Zach. Then she looked at me. “Es tut mir Leid für dich, Gertrude,” she said. I’m sorry for you, Gertrude.
She didn’t say why she was sorry for her sister, but I had a guess. My aunt Gertrude had never had any children of her own.
LATER, I SAT by myself in the living room in what had once been my father’s chair. The piano sat silently in the corner. It was as if the whole house was waiting now, preparing itself for what was about to happen.
I looked up at the mantelpiece. Just before Christmas in 1985, some carolers had come to the front door and sung for my mother and me. Said the north wind to the little lamb, do you hear what I hear? There were footsteps on the stairs behind us, and down the steps came my father, bald from the chemo, wearing his bathrobe. “Oh, Dick,” my mother had said. “You shouldn’t be out of bed.”
“I wanted to hear the music,” he said.
My mother and my father and I stood there in the front hallway, listening to the carolers. Some of the people singing were in their twenties. When we’d first moved into the neighborhood, they were little kids.
Said the king to the people everywhere, listen to what I say. A child, a child, slumbers in the night, he will bring us goodness and light.
My mother guided my dad back up the stairs when the singing was done. I heard their footsteps go down the hallway, the springs in my father’s bed groaning as he lay back down.
I stood and leaned against the mantelpiece, and the tears poured out of me. It was a few months later that the maestro came for my father, in his tie and tails, and asked him to come away and conduct his orchestra.
Now I sat in his chair as my mother drifted through time and space. There were footsteps as someone came down the stairs. For a moment I half expected to see my father in his bathrobe. How are you, old man?
Instead, there was my son. “Are you all right?” he asked.
“Oh, I’m sad, Zachy,” I said. “I’m just so sad.”
He gave me a good, long hug. “I know,” he said.
I blew some air through my cheeks. “I am glad that you are with me, Sam,” I said. “Here at the end of all things.”
“Mr. Gandalf told me not to let you out of my sight,” my son replied, right on cue. “And I don’t mean to. I don’t mean to.”
I TALKED TO Deedie on the phone. She and Sean arranged to fly down to Philadelphia in order to say good-bye. Then the two of them and Zach would get in our car and drive back to Maine. I would wait with Mom. My sister was on her way from the UK. Time was running swiftly now.
As we waited for Deedie and Sean to arrive, Zach began to sketch out his college admissions essay, sitting in the library of the old house.
This is what he wrote:
Oprah Winfrey asked me what my family was like.
It’s 2001, and I was seven years old. We were sitting around the dining room table. I looked over at my father and said, “We can’t really call you ‘Daddy
’ any more now, can we?” She said, “No. I don’t suppose you can.” She was a year into her transition. “But you could call me Jenny. That’s the name I’m using now that I’m female.” I laughed. “Jenny?” I said. “That sounds like the name of a girl donkey.” “Well,” she said. “What would you like to call me?” I thought about this for a moment. “What about—Maddy?” I said. “That’s half mommy and half daddy—Maddy.” I sat back in my chair, satisfied with my work. My younger brother, five at that point, sat up in his chair and said, “Or Dommy.” We all laughed at this.
It’s 2008, and I was fourteen years old. It was the day before I started my first year of high school. I was nervous, not just because this was high school, but because I’d finally left the public school I’d been attending for nine years. Would I be able to handle all the work? Would I have friends? Maddy sensed that I was worried, and told me to come down to the dock. We live on a lake in Maine, in a small town called Belgrade. We walked down to the dock in silence, and sat in the Adirondack chairs by the water. Together we gazed upward at the vast mystery of space. Stars twinkled in the sky; the Milky Way was just barely visible. A few clouds drifted across the almost-full moon. There were no human noises; we heard the chirping of crickets, the hooting of great horned owls, the long mournful call of loons. We sat there looking at the sky and at the water for what seemed like a long time. Although not a word had been exchanged, I felt like things were going to be fine. We walked back to the house together.
It’s 2011, and I’m seventeen. It was a beautiful summer day. The family had decided to go to our favorite local tavern, The Village Inn, across the lake. It was the first time that our family had been together for what seemed like a long time—my brother had been at music camp for the last three weeks, and I a camp counselor for eight. My mother was sitting next to my brother, and Maddy was in the stern with a smile on her face. As my brother took the wheel and guided our slow aluminum boat across the lake, the sun reflected off the water of Long Pond and illuminated the four of us, each one contented by the presence of the others.
It’s 2010, and Oprah was having a “Most Memorable Guests” Special. “So Zach,” Oprah asked, “what’s your family like?”
I smiled. “My family is good,” I said.
SEAN SAT BY his grandmother’s side. She was very sensible with him. Mom wanted to know all about the pieces he was playing at summer music camp.
“It’s Handel, and Vivaldi,” said Sean. “And Grieg.”
“Grieg, what pieces by Grieg?”
“In the Hall of the Mountain King,” said Sean.
My mother started singing it, softly and slowly at first, then more loudly and swiftly. It was alarming to watch her singing it. “Dee-dee, dee-dee, dee-dee-dee, dee-dee-dee, dee-dee-dee.”
“Mrs. Boylan,” said Monica, “we don’t want you to get riled up now.”
Mom relented. “Oh,” she said. “I used to think that was the scariest music in the world.”
Sean took this in. “It’s fun to play, though,” he said.
Hildegarde thought this over. “Is it?” she asked.
THE NEXT MORNING, just before dawn, the boys and Deedie prepared to head back to Maine. Mom was still asleep.
“We love you, Hildegarde,” Deedie whispered. She had known my mother for twenty-four years; her own mother had died when Deedie was twenty-four. Sean looked at her, his lips tight. Zach’s eyes shone.
“I appreciate you understanding about my staying here,” I said to the boys. “I’m glad you’re okay about my having to spend time with her now.”
“It’s all right, Maddy,” said Zach. “Someday, you’ll be the one who’s all old and feeble. And then it’ll be my turn, to stay with you.”
It was a nice thing to say.
I stood in the doorway and watched as the three of them piled into the van and headed down the driveway. There was a flash of headlights against the neighbor’s house, the sound of tires shushing against the wet street, and then they were gone.
For a moment I stood there, listening to the silence. I thought about how many times I had passed out of these doors, on my way to some adventure. I remembered climbing into the Oldsmobile Omega at dawn on the first of September 1976, the car packed full with my steamer trunk, a pair of stereo speakers, a coffeepot, all of the things I’d use in my freshman dorm room at Wesleyan. As I walked out to the car, I saw Orion rising in the sky above the cherry tree. A way a lone a last a loved a long the
My parents came outside. Dad was jangling his car keys. One of his arms was around my mother’s waist.
“Okay, old man,” he said. “You ready?’
LOTS OF THINGS happened after that. My sister arrived, and we spent a week sitting by my mother’s bed. We had been estranged, the two of us, ever since I came out as trans, but without putting the details of our truce into words, we put our differences aside. It was only the second time in eleven years that we had been in the same room together. The first time hadn’t gone so well.
Mom switched over to German for long stretches, then she fell silent. One day, she just cried softly, without using words. Then she closed her eyes. A few days later, I was sitting by her side, holding her hand, when all at once she said:
“Oh!”
It was as if, after ninety-four years, something had finally taken her completely by surprise.
I turned to Monica. “Get my sister,” I said.
A second later, the two of us were sitting on either side of Mom’s bed, each of us holding her hand. My sister ran her fingers through my mother’s hair.
“Good-bye, Mom,” she said. “Good-bye.”
“We’re both here,” I whispered. “We’re together. It’s going to be all right.”
Mom took another little gasp, once again surprised by something she had not foreseen. Then she didn’t breathe anymore.
IN THE DAYS that followed, neighbors and friends came over with station wagons filled with corned beef. My nieces and nephews arrived from England. They were such smart and beautiful young men and women. Oh, how I wished that I had known them for the last decade, and that they had known their cousins. Zach and Sean hung out with them, a little nervous. All six of them went out to the swimming pool.
Zach was a little reluctant to take off his shirt. “I’m the only cousin who isn’t buff,” he said regretfully.
Later, my sister and I walked arm in arm across a cemetery, holding an urn in our hands. We placed orchids in the tomb.
At the memorial service a few days later, Deedie read a poem my mother had chosen for the occasion. My sister delivered the eulogy. I did not speak, but I did sit down at the piano and play “Träumerei” from Schumann’s Scenes from Childhood. She had always loved that song. In German, the title means “Dreaming.”
Later that night, Sean somehow convinced everyone to go to a Japanese teppanyaki house. The adults drank sake. The cousins caught pieces of shrimp tossed adroitly into their mouths. We all sat there in a new and unfamiliar world, watching smoke puff from the cone of an onion-ring volcano.
Nine months later, Zach directed Our Town. He cast his own brother as Simon Stimson, the troubled choirmaster who takes his life. There in the graveyard, my younger son looked out at the living and said, “That’s what it was to be alive. To move about in a cloud of ignorance; to go up and down trampling on the feelings of those about you. To spend and waste time as though you had a million years. To be always at the mercy of one self-centered passion, or another.”
Deedie and I sat next to each other, holding hands, softly sobbing. It was just as I’d promised my son the summer before: All the adults were weeping out their brains. Interestingly, a couple seats over from me was a person whom I could not immediately read as male or female, as mother or father. I’d never seen him or her before.
I looked back at the stage. The Stage Manager said, “Everybody knows in their bones that something is eternal, and that something has to do with human beings. All the greatest people ever lived
have been telling us that for five thousand years and yet you’d be surprised how people are always losing hold of it. There’s something way down deep that’s eternal about every human being.”
When the play was over, there was a brief moment, as the house was plunged into darkness and all the adults sat there crying. Then the lights came on, and our children were alive again. They stood there, bowing and grinning, as they basked in the applause of their mothers, and their fathers, and everyone in between.
The cast called out for their director to join them on the stage, and there was Zach, standing before the crowd.
It was just a few hours before his eighteenth birthday. I thought about the night he was born, all those years before. Snow faintly falling. Charles Ryder reaching forward to touch a plover’s egg. Uh-oh.
The audience cheered. Zach smiled. His eyes searched the house for his parents. It took a moment, but he found us in time.
MY MOTHER HAD DIED on the fifth of July. The night before this, Independence Day, my sister and I sat together on the back porch of the old house, drinking white wine in the dark, together again after all the lost years.
“I always thought this house would last forever,” I said, looking up at the ramshackle mansion. “No matter where I lived, or what happened to me, I always knew it was here. Like the mother ship. I could always come home.”
“I know, Jenny,” she said. “Now, after all this time, this whole world is about to go psshhhhh.”
I sighed. She was right. Everything was about to go psshhhhh.
“I don’t know that I’ll be coming back to America anymore,” she said softly. “After she’s gone. There isn’t any reason to, anymore. There’s nothing for me here.”
In the next room, my mother lay quietly dreaming. Where did she go, that last night of her life? What did she see, as she slowly traveled farther away from shore? Did she see her own father, standing by the sea with his nine fingers? Did she tell him she was sorry that they’d left him on Hart Island?
That’s all right, he said. I’m sorry I wasn’t around, when you were so small.
Stuck in the Middle with You Page 21
