My Jane Austen Summer

by Cindy Jones

  "What?"

  "That Texas didn't get me."

  "Really. Not get you." He smiled as if he knew better.

  "I was so certain England would get me. That Literature Live would get me; that we would all only connect." An odd look crossed Willis's face, reminding me that Forster's only connect did not mean, as I had mistakenly believed, relating to others with greater gusto. "But the truth is"--I dug myself in deeper--"I can only only connect with people who are dead or fictional, and can only be happy in places that exist in an author's head. My best friend is--" I gestured to where My Jane Austen would be if she were there listening as I felt she was, but stopped myself and turned back to him.

  "I'm sorry?" he said.

  "It's nothing." I crossed my legs; wild horses could not force me to tell him about My Jane Austen.

  "So," he said, "you're a reader." Then Willis shrugged and looked sideways at me. "Ever consider ditching all this and living in a novel?"

  I blinked. He might be pulling my leg, hard to tell. I considered this attic full of junk, murky light struggling through the dirty window, this conversation with a handsome Bronte icon in a house reeking of Jane Austen, and him getting it. It seemed increasingly less likely I was conscious. Perhaps I was dead, this was heaven, and murder should be added to Magda's crimes against me. "Yes," I said, leaning forward.

  He smiled at me. "Life in a novel would be so much easier than this constant necessity to sort things out for oneself, don't you think?"

  Whereas my life had been going from left to right in a general clockwise motion up until that moment, everything suddenly came to an abrupt stop--and resumed a fraction of a second later in the completely opposite direction--with a marked increase in tempo. As if I had crossed the prime meridian or the Continental Divide, suddenly there was a new way for everything to be. Looking into his eyes, I said, "When I was ten I wanted to be the Witch of Blackbird Pond."

  "A witch." His eyes lingered on my face, and for a second, not only did we share The Look, but I really felt like a witch. No one else had ever come close to understanding such thoughts. Not Martin, not my friend Lisa, certainly not Karen, not even my mother; no one but My Jane Austen. I felt so comfortable with this man, as if we were resuming a conversation we'd been having in a previous life. He appeared to feel the same energy.

  "But then authors would be God," he said.

  "Ah." I sat up straight. "In that case, I could live my literature the way religious people live their faith." I flinched inwardly as I said "religious people" Mary Crawford came so naturally when I wasn't on stage.

  "Interesting," he said, with emphasis that made me feel brilliant. Willis folded his hands behind his head and propped his feet on my bench. Just as he opened his mouth to speak, Bets's cell phone, incarcerated in my JASNA bag, began to ring. Willis's mouth froze open, his next word unsaid.

  "I'm so sorry," I said, rummaging for the phone. Bets had annoyingly left a lot of her stuff in my bag. I found the phone and turned off the power. "My roommate's phone," I said, slipping it back in the bag, wondering if the caller was Karen. Willis looked different when I returned my attention to him. His body remained in the chair opposite but his face was somewhere else, seeing something I couldn't see.

  His feet hit the floor as he looked at his watch. "I'll have to excuse myself." Those were not the words he had been planning to say before the phone interrupted. "I've got to run," he said, standing, thrusting arms into his jacket.

  I held my ground, watching his face, hoping to grab him by the eyes, but he did not look at me. Instead, he pushed his laptop and some papers into a case. He slung the strap over his shoulder and paused for a moment, drumming fingers on the table, apparently trying to remember what he needed to take.

  "A pleasure meeting you," he said to his desk.

  "Are you associated with the festival?" I asked. I'd just met my other half; I didn't want it to end. Would I ever see him again? Stumbling upon him in the attic would only work once.

  "No," he said, followed by a pause during which his eyes glazed, giving the impression he couldn't think and talk simultaneously. He stuffed pink message papers from a drawer into his pocket. "I'm not with the festival." He looked at me, finally. "Enjoy your time here," he said, smiling politely.

  "I'm sure I will," I said, following him out, hoping to continue talking as we walked. But our interview had ended, perhaps forever. I stepped over damp cardboard and tripped down the uneven steps trying to keep up, but Willis walked so fast I lost him after the second floor.

  Nine

  How do you know it's Dad?" I asked Karen, talking from a bench in the rose garden behind the manor. The "evidence" Karen had found was a picture of my dad with Sue. I looked up as a patron snapped my photo, Portrait of Regency Girl Talking on Cell Phone. My talk with Willis in the attic had changed my perspective, like sun shining inside me after a violent storm, and I didn't feel like dealing with my dad's bad weather. For a change, I was taking Karen's cautious approach, pushing bird flu and TB.

  "He's wearing the shirt you gave him for Christmas," Karen said.

  "The red plaid one?"

  "Yes," Karen said. "And the banner behind them says 'Happy New Year.' They're obviously at a party."

  "Do you recognize anyone else in the picture?" I touched a pink rose and bent to sniff.

  "No." Karen sighed. "Not a one."

  "So," I said, touching the chilly stone robe of St. Francis. "What does this mean?"

  "A couple of things," Karen said. "It means they knew each other before Mom was sick."

  A thorn pricked my back.

  "And someone wanted me to know they knew each other." Karen had already told me she'd found the picture on the counter near the kitchen phone. Sue had put it there on purpose. I could see Sue sorting pictures, choosing one for its power to convey specific information, and then placing it where she knew Karen would see it. "Was Sue there when you found the picture?"

  "Yes."

  Sue would watch Karen pick it up, maybe holding it in better light as she talked into the phone, the information in the picture too ridiculous to connect with what she knew. But the shock would gradually take hold as she struggled to finish her conversation with her husband or friend. All the while Sue would be watching, just like the old man in the car. The man asked me for directions. I was ten years old, walking home from the playground. He watched my expression as I realized his pants were open. Karen would take her children and leave the house in shock, exactly as Sue planned.

  Karen sounded so tired. "I just can't believe Dad would have an affair. I just can't believe it."

  "Well, maybe it wasn't an affair," I said. "Maybe it was an office party or something and Mom was there, too." I remembered how my dad would accompany me to the park after the exposure incident, protecting me, even though I continued to go alone when Dad was away on business.

  "Lily." Karen paused. "They're kissing."

  "What?"

  "On the lips."

  The weakness came into my arms first. I felt the trembling and my breath choked in my chest. "You didn't tell me that." I slumped down on the pea gravel, my forehead pressing too hard against the base of the statue, Regency Girl Petitions St. Francis. "And I didn't tell you about the last time I saw him," I said.

  "When?"

  "The night you called to tell me they planned to marry."

  "Oh, Lily."

  "I couldn't help it," I said. "When you told me Sue cleaned out the garage to make room for her stuff it was like a bomb exploded inside me." I told Karen the story of how, that night, I'd hung up the phone and run to my car. I could barely catch my breath, knowing in my heart it was too late. Driving as fast as possible through darkness, neighbors' urgent flaming carriage lanterns lit my way like torches in a Romantic horror version of my life. My mind raced and I imagined Sue walking through my parents' garage, touching things, peering inside boxes where bits of our family life lay in storage. Standing on the balls of her feet, the toenails
painted deep burgundy to complement the purple veins in her always-bare legs, she would have pulled boxes from shelves.

  The light turned red, forcing me to stop. I opened my window and groaned at the empty street as I imagined Sue touching my mother's Christmas wreath that lay in storage, or the antique chair waiting to be re-caned. My stomach swooped and my arms felt weak as I pulled into my dad's driveway, headlights illuminating the path through his side yard, past his dark house, to the garage entry. My door clicked open and keys still in the ignition sang their warning as I crossed the grass, dew soaking my bare feet, crickets yapping. Entering and reaching for the light, my hand trembling, I felt everyone telling me to stop--go home, get help. But I couldn't stop. I needed the pain to hit me full force.

  I hardly recognized the garage. The floor previously covered with boxes, tools, and expiring lawn furniture lay bare. Nothing but overlapping oil stains. I searched the rafters. The Christmas wreath and the old tent, both in storage last week, were gone. Paint cans in residence since my high school art projects were gone. Even the boxes of toys kept for Karen's kids vanished. I searched on the chance she'd taken pity and kept our things--in a new location. But Sue had erased us from the premises. My family never existed in this garage.

  I sat on the concrete floor, holding my knees to my face.

  "Lily." My father, slumped in his bathrobe, stood just inside the door. A sob wracked my chest and all I could manage was a high-pitched moan while he stood there, hands fumbling for pockets he couldn't find.

  "Our things are gone," I said.

  He turned sideways in the door. "I don't know anything about that," he said, annoyed. "And it's too late to be rattling around here looking for more hurt."

  "I'm not looking for hurt," I screamed, emotions spinning out of control. This, too, was somehow my fault. "Why did you let her throw away our stuff?"

  "You need to go home." He stepped outside the garage but I couldn't bear for him to leave. I screamed at the top of my lungs, scorching my throat, stopping him in his tracks. "Where is our tent?"

  For just an instant, he feared me. "You know, Sue thinks you need help; your mother's death has been a shock for you." He sighed. "I think she's right." His hand left the door and he walked away.

  Sitting on the hard floor, the soles of my bare feet touching an oil stain, I cried until I couldn't cry anymore. She dragged our stuff to the curb to be sure the garbage truck collected it before my dad could interfere. Like a hearse, the garbage truck hauled our things to a dump outside of town. A family's life rots beneath a sea of coffee grounds and eggshells in a county landfill near some prison.

  "The universe no longer functions rationally," I told Karen. "Mother is lucky to be dead."

  I heard the sharp intake of Karen's breath, and knew she was crying. "It's not the end of the world."

  "You keep saying that."

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  Back in my room that evening, Bets sprawled on her bed watching TV. Gary, who had replaced me in the job of shadowing Bets, preventing any sudden trips to London during the workweek, parked at our table, eyes glued to the little TV. Bets's car keys sat in plain view.

  "I'm not playing Mary Crawford anymore," Bets said during a commercial break.

  "No?" I pulled books from my JASNA bag, wondering how I could read with that nonsense blaring.

  "Just get a new color highlighter and start learning Maria Bertram's lines." She shrugged. "Sorry, I know you would have preferred the bigger part."

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  In the office two days later, I sat at my desk calculating the optimum time to abstain from Willis's attic--that moment beyond which my absence would provoke not fond memories but no memories at all. I had decided my next move would be a return appearance in the attic, but Claire's nervous bouncing made it hard to think. Every time someone approached our door, she popped up. Then she interrupted my calculations to announce, "I have a meeting." She grabbed her clipboard. "But I'll be right back. I need to see Nigel when he gets here."

  Claire was up to something. When she and Magda weren't engaged in covert phone conversations, Claire sat hunched over a stack of top secret papers. She clicked into her screen saver if I walked by, covered papers she was working on, and stopped me with her eyes if I got too close. I waited five minutes before visiting her desk to use her stapler. While there, I stealthily lifted the books obscuring her top secret papers.

  She'd been working on a grant proposal. Looked like a grant proposal for Literature Live. What's so secret about that? Just to be sure, I dug deeper into the pile but found nothing of interest. Suddenly, I froze, sensing a shadow on my arms, an approach from behind. Looking down, I saw stealthy white satin slippers, the sort that move over wooden floors noiselessly. Turning, I stared into the needy eyes of Mrs. Russell, black curls escaping her mobcap.

  "The ballroom is free on Wednesdays from four to six," she whispered.

  "Good," I said. "Can each of your volunteers furnish four place settings and a teapot from their personal china?"

  Mrs. Russell hesitated. Her face brightened. "How lovely," she said breathlessly. "A room full of china patterns." She looked at me. "Like a china shop."

  "Will they do it?"

  She considered. "Some will want to bring more than one pattern." Her eyes darted back and forth. "They'll have to take turns."

  "We need scones, sandwiches, and cookies," I said.

  "We've made assignments."

  "Clotted cream, sugar, and lemon."

  "That's all under control," Mrs. Russell said, raising her palm to stop me. "I'll handle the food if you handle the entertainment."

  "What entertainment?" I asked.

  "I don't know. That's your department."

  "Yes, of course. I'll do the entertainment," I said.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  After she left, I sat at my desk contemplating tea entertainment. Tea-theatre. When Nigel finally arrived, Archie came with him and they closed themselves in Nigel's office. With the door shut, I couldn't hear anything. When Nigel's door was open, I heard everything he said on the phone, in meetings, and in casual exchanges. By simple osmosis, as long as his door remained open, I was privy to the ins and outs of Nigel's concerns, my finger on the pulse of the festival. I learned who was making the keynote address at which important upcoming conference, which distinguished scholar would edit the next important volume of what British novel, and where Nigel stood on many issues. Things he could not endure: elegiac yearnings and transgressive assumptions. I regularly consulted the dictionary on my desk for unfamiliar words in Nigel's conversations, Elegiac: expression of sorrow for something now past. Thereafter, I watched the costumed Janeites, cutting roses or pouring tea, for signs of sorrow. If they were sad for something now past, I would be more sympathetic. The few times Nigel closed the door, I felt cut off, aware of missing something good.

  When Archie left, I stepped into Nigel's office.

  "The volunteers would like very much to have a tea in the ballroom," I said.

  "They told you?" Nigel feigned surprise.

  "Yes," I said, glad for his indulgent mood. "And I was wondering if they could do it, with my help, on Wednesday at four."

  "I don't see why not," Nigel said, "especially if that will satisfy their ball cravings." Nigel looked past me and I turned to see Claire standing in the doorway. "You'll keep track of the details, I assume."

  "Yes," I said. "Income and expenses, volunteer hours and all that."

  "What is it, Claire?" Nigel asked, less indulgently.

  Claire approached the desk tentatively, a book in her hands, willing me to exit with every step. But I held my ground, thrilled to be in the right place at the right time to learn why she'd been so anxious to speak with Nigel. Claire gave me one last dirty look before proceeding.

  "I've discovered something very interesting," she said, handing Nigel her highlighted text, her eyes flashing stop in my direction. Nigel looked at the book and passed it to me, as if Claire had mea
nt it for show-and-tell. In the acknowledgment section of Jane Austen's Letters edited by Deirdre Le Faye, Claire had highlighted, "There are a few letters still in private hands, with whose owners it has proved impossible to make contact."

  "And your point?" Nigel waited as I returned the book.

  Claire's expression dimmed at his failure to grasp the importance of unexamined letters written by Jane Austen. She looked as though she'd lost sleep on account of the highlighted words. "Why are these letters being held?" she asked. "Is someone keeping a secret from the world?"

  Nigel sighed. "What do you hope to discover, correspondence concerning Jane Austen's secret marriage?"

  "Of course not," Claire said. "I just wondered if you knew of any attempts to force those letters into the public domain," she asked. "Don't we have a right to read them?"

  "The letters are not being kept secret; they are simply private property of people who don't wish to share. They will become public someday," Nigel added, straightening a sheaf of papers. "The owners will die and the heirs will cash in."

  Claire pressed her lips together and looked at her book. "But what if those letters explain what she meant when she wrote the novels."

  Nigel paused and I hoped he might suggest she check her twenty-first-century filters at the door, or launch into Jane Austen's opinion of women whose imaginations overcome their reason. But he said, "Jane Austen reveals us to ourselves in many ways in her novels, revelations that require neither act of law nor detective to access."

  All the same, I couldn't wait to tell Mrs. Russell about the missing letters, fairly certain Literature Live owned another copy of Le Faye's book. Claire gave up and I didn't shadow her further because I spent the rest of the morning planning my tea-theatre.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  Omar explained Claire's squirrelly behavior over lunch. "Magda is plotting a coup," he said.

  "What?" The pub was noisy.