The Memory House

by Rachel Hauck

  “Impossible. I just decided an hour ago.” A ghostly chill swirled through her.

  “It’s my job to know. You best get going while there’s a bit of daylight. I’ll check in on your mama for you. She’ll be just fine.” He beamed with confidence.

  “I don’t . . . Who are you again? Did Don send you? But no, how could he? Daddy . . . Were you a friend of Daddy’s?”

  “Indeed I was. You go on in and say good-bye to your mama. She’s got something to tell you. Go easy on her.”

  Everleigh turned in stunned obedience and walked back to the house, calling for Mama as she stepped inside.

  “There’s a man out there. So strange. Do you know a Josh—”

  Mama raised a finger, standing in the kitchen, phone pressed to her ear. “I never should’ve listened to you, Sher Callahan. Well, yes, I know but—” She cast Everleigh a sad, sheepish look.

  Well, she didn’t have time for this. She needed to get on the road before she lost her nerve. Now that she’d decided to go to Don, she experienced a sense of freedom. Boldness.

  In her room Everleigh shoved the doors closed over her nearly empty closet. So this was it. She was dislodging her heel, as it were.

  But taking the courage to go to Don left her none to tell Mama. Everleigh picked up the note she’d written Mama.

  Dearest Mama,

  When you read this, I’ll be gone. This may seem the coward’s way, but if I told you face-to-face, I’d never leave.

  You’ve been my partner, my friend, my rock for the last seven years, but I have to go to Don. Hurricane Donna has made me realize how much I love him, and if I’m to lose another man in a storm, then let me go with him.

  I’m going to marry him, Mama. If he’ll still have me.

  Please call Mr. Reed for me. Tell him how much I appreciate all the opportunity he’s given me. In fact, it would be nice if you’d fill in for me since you’re a jewel at floral arrangements.

  There is a hundred dollars in the freezer coffee can. The bank books are in the locked secretary drawer. The bills are paid for the month. I’ll call you from Florida to go over everything.

  I’m taking the car, so ask Tom Jr. to help you purchase one for yourself. There is about seven hundred dollars in savings. You should be able to purchase a right nice car with that.

  I know Tom and Alice are always asking you to come to Austin, but you turn them down on account of me. Well, Mama, be free. Move near your son if you want. Play with your grandchildren.

  Let’s both leave this dull, dark widows’ world behind, shall we?

  I feel God is with me, so don’t worry. But do pray. I’m terrified yet invigorated. It feels good.

  I love you so very much. Thank you for everything. For my life.

  Your loving daughter,

  Everleigh

  With a piece of masking tape, she anchored the note to her mirror. For Mama.

  With a final glance at her childhood room, she backed out, closing the door. Her plan was to tell Mama she was going to dinner and a movie with Myrtle.

  “I need to talk to you.” Mama stood at the end of the hall, foreboding and dark.

  “W-what about?”

  “Let’s sit. Please.” Mama moved to the living room, shutting off the TV and turning on the end table lamps.

  Everleigh sat in her chair while Mama perched on the edge of hers.

  “That was Sher Callahan on the phone.”

  “So I gathered.”

  Mama wrung her hands, stood, then sat, her gaze darting about. “There’s a bit of a situation.” She pressed her fingers to her temples.

  “Mama, whatever it is, you can tell me.”

  “You would think so but—”

  “Remember when I was little and too scared to tell you something?”

  “I’d go around the wall so you could say it without me glaring down on you.”

  “What if I do that now?”

  “Yes, that might work. Just go around the kitchen door.”

  When she was on the other side, Everleigh gave Mama the go-ahead. “By the way, I’m going to dinner and a movie with Myrtle tonight.”

  “That’s nice, dear. She’s a lovely girl. Listen, Everleigh, Sher called with news about, oh mercy, I can’t believe I’m about to say this. She called with news about our baby. I suppose he’s a boy now. Nearly seven.”

  “The baby?” Everleigh stood in the doorway. “My baby? What about him, Mama? How does Sher Callahan know anything?”

  “Oh, this is a mess.” Mama dropped down to her chair again. “She knows who adopted him.”

  “How could she?” Had the world gone mad? “The adoption was closed. Through the agency.”

  “Except Sher went behind our backs and put a couple forward. Her cousin’s girl. Aimee.”

  “And she’s just now telling—” Everleigh gasped. “Is this why you two fell out?”

  “Yes.” Mama lowered her head. “She never said a word about having a connection with the adoption agency when she suggested perhaps you might like to—” In the soft light tears slicked down Mama’s face. “I don’t think she thought of Aimee and Lou until you agreed, but still, she was a sneaky harpy.”

  “How long have you known?”

  “Almost from the beginning.” Mama pulled a picture from her pocket. “This is him about two years ago.”

  Everleigh stayed by the kitchen, unable to feel her limbs, her heart beating with wild curiosity. After a moment, Mama dropped the black-and-white image on the table.

  “I didn’t know if you wanted to see him. He’s lovely, Everleigh. Built like Rhett.”

  She eyed the picture, but her legs would not move. “Why are you telling me now? Why did Sher call?”

  “She wanted to let me know—”

  “I thought I’d never know.” Everleigh brushed away a thin tear. But it was an expression of relief instead of sorrow. “My boy is well. He lives with Aimee and Lou? Where? No, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.”

  “Are you angry?”

  Everleigh considered her interior state and between Mr. Childers, Don’s profession of love, Hurricane Donna, and her secret plan to flee to Florida . . . “No, Mama, I’m not mad.”

  In fact, she was free.

  “But, I need to go.” Everleigh glanced at her watch. She’d mapped out her course with one of Daddy’s old maps and the thousand-mile trip would take sixteen hours if all went well. But if she drove all night, she counted on beating the storm. “I’ll see you later, okay? Don’t wait up.” She kissed Mama’s forehead. “I love you.”

  “I love you too. Goodness, you sound as if you’re dying.” Mama held her arm. “Have fun with Myrtle. But, Ev, there is more if you want to know.”

  “Thank you . . . but I don’t believe I do.”

  The phone rang and Mama went to answer. Everleigh gazed around the kitchen one last time. Then just as she started for the door, she turned back to the living room and snatched up the picture of the boy from the coffee table and exited the back door, racing for her car and a brand-new future with Don Callahan.

  chapter twenty-nine

  Beck

  Saturday afternoon Bruno called. “Mind if I come by?”

  “Please do.”

  Since revealing his father was alive, he’d been on the road. Busy. Since signing Tyvis it seemed all kinds of opportunities had opened up for him.

  And she missed him. His absence made her last week in Florida feel hollow.

  She brushed her teeth and ran a comb through her hair, then picked up her dishes and trash from a Gilmore Girls marathon and carried them down to the kitchen.

  Whatever he wanted, she’d listen. A week from today she’d be home, and while her future with Bruno was uncertain at best, she wanted things copasetic.

  Back upstairs, she paused by the third-floor stairs.

  She’d been meaning to come up the entire time but never made the climb. The stairwell was dark and narrow. Claustrophobic. She didn’t seem as fond
of those kind of spaces anymore.

  Finding the light switch, she flipped on the light and made her way to the top, gently twisting the knob and easing the door open into a small, octagon-shaped room with shades drawn.

  She tugged the chain of the floor lamp, and a low, gold glow brought the room to life.

  The furniture was sparse—a settee under the windows, a stuffed chair and a tall bureau on the side wall, a colorful area rug.

  It was the walls that captured her attention. They were filled with photographs.

  Beck turned a slow circle, the images going from black-and-white to full color, a memorial to days and times gone by.

  It was more than a few family photos, it was history in pictures. Memories captured and framed so as not to be forgotten.

  Drawn into the spell, Beck started with the framed wedding photo, the enormous sun that the other images orbited.

  It was of a young woman in a white dress scooped into the arms of a very brawny, handsome cowboy who carried her down the church steps. Head back, laughing, she had one arm around his neck and a bouquet in her other hand. A setting sun spiked through the church steeple and crowned them in light.

  Beck raised her hand to trace the woman’s smile. Joy. Happiness ruled this day. Everleigh? Was this you? Judging by the styles of the cheering guests, she put this image in the early fifties.

  The surrounding photos were more casual. Snapshots in custom frames. They were all of the bride and groom in different settings.

  Next to that cluster was another large photo of the same woman, only older, more seasoned and more beautiful, with another man coming out of a small chapel. She wore a tea-length, flared dress and a hat with a short veil.

  She carried her modest bouquet at her waist, her left hand in her husband’s, a regal-looking man with lean, narrow lines.

  The surrounding photos were of the couple moving into the memory house, of a dinner with no fewer than a dozen people at a long table, of two tanned, freckle-faced children.

  One with frayed ponytails, the other with a mop of dark curls.

  Beck gasped and pulled the stuffed chair over so she could stand on the lumpy seat.

  “That’s me. And Bruno.”

  How were they one of the moons orbiting this wedding photo?

  Beck glanced between the two large wedding portraits. Everleigh, what happened? The woman was the same, but not the men. Who frames two wedding images?

  This secret room raised more question than answers.

  On the opposite wall was another image of Beck with Bruno. They were older here, maybe thirteen, sitting on the front porch, her arm hooked over his shoulder.

  “Two crazy kids.” She loved this image of innocence.

  There was a picture of Beck with Mom and Dad in the backyard by a bonfire, Dad holding up a fish.

  Another of Mom and Dad walking down the beach hand in hand. To her mind’s eye, they were familiar strangers.

  Raising the frame from its hook, she looked for a notation on the back.

  July 2001. Taken by Beck Holiday. Framed by Everleigh Callahan.

  Image after image depicting Beck’s childhood. Scenes death had deleted.

  One of Bruno holding a surfboard twice his size. Another with the two of them sitting in lawn chairs while Dad grilled. Mom, Natalie, Bruno, and Beck, and who Beck supposed to be Don and Everleigh, sitting around.

  Beck teared up at the picture of her as a young teen, shot like a portrait. The sun had spread her freckles across her face and soaked her dark hair with burnished lines.

  Her green eyes, rimmed with long lashes, were filled with confidence and love, and Beck envied her.

  The next photo made her inhale. With the same tone as the one previous, Beck stared at the camera with Dad at her side. They had the same shape face and aquiline nose, the same snap in their green eyes.

  Looking at him was like looking at herself, and the pieces of herself she did not know.

  “Why can’t I remember?” She slapped the wall. “Why?”

  “It’s what you said to your father.”

  She spun around at Bruno’s voice. He stood just inside the slender opening.

  “I think it’s what you said to your father. It’s why you forgot.”

  “What are you talking about? I don’t know what I said to my father.” She pointed to the wedding side of the display. “Did you know about this room? Is that Everleigh?”

  “Yes, a younger version. Probably our age. I don’t know this cowboy, but that’s Mr. Don.” He moved to the other wall, his hand wrapped around his phone. “I’d forgotten about these. Miss Everleigh took up photography as a hobby. In the summer we were her main subjects.” He paused at the portrait of Beck, then looked back at her. “This is the image of you in my head. Even now. You’re still this girl.”

  “I’m a long way from that girl.”

  “Not as far as you think.” Bruno took another tour of the photographs. “Here’s you with your dad.” He laughed. “Me with that big surfboard. These pictures tell a story, don’t they?” He leaned close to one of Everleigh sitting on the steps of a ranch house. “I wish I knew why these pictures are in this room, arranged this way. Why the two wedding portraits?”

  “I wish I understood everything about this house and why Everleigh left it to me.” Beck ran her hand down his arm. “Hey, Bruno, a-are we good? About your dad and all?”

  “Yeah, we’re good. I’d have done the same thing if I were in your shoes. I’m glad you told me.” His smile crumbled her concerns. “I just had to process. Still don’t know what I’m going to do with the news. Ever since I signed Tyvis I’m getting all kinds of opportunities.” He pushed his chair around the desk and faced her. “I spent most of the day with him. His training is going really well and he said to tell you thanks. Told me not to let you go.” He took up her hand and laced his fingers through hers.

  “I never thought I’d have thirty grand to just give away. Whether he makes it or not, it was worth every penny to give him a chance.”

  “Can we sit here?” He motioned to the settee. “I need to tell you something. Actually, you need to listen to something.”

  “Uh-oh. This feels like the night I had something to tell you.”

  He leaned her way and she waited for his kiss. But he stopped, drawing back with a big breath.

  “Beck, I broke into your dad’s phone.” He held up the old Nokia. “There’re voice mails on here.”

  “Did you listen to them?”

  “I did.” He set the Nokia aside and opened an app on his phone. “Do you want to hear them?”

  “Is what I said to my father on these messages?”

  “Maybe. But if you want to figure out why you forgot, I’d start with these.”

  Beck gripped his arm. “I’m ready.” She stared at the floor, waiting, her heart skipping.

  “Here’s the first one.”

  “Dale, can you bring home a loaf of bread? I’m making hamburger gravy and just saw we were out of the key ingredient.”

  Mom’s voice resonated. It was her former voice. Her younger, lilting, joyful voice. Her before-9/11 voice.

  The next one was a message from Dad to himself.

  “Dale, this is you. Don’t forget Beck’s assembly tomorrow.”

  “Dad,” she whispered.

  Bruno hit pause. “Do you want to hear it again?”

  “No, yes, maybe once. Can you send these to me?”

  She brushed the tears from under her eyes. From the bottom of the stairs, Beetle Boo whined, but he’d just have to wait.

  Leaning close, Beck listened to Dad’s reminder again, his voice like a favorite song she hadn’t heard in years.

  “I miss him,” she said.

  “What assembly is he talking about? Do you remember school at all?”

  “I do. We used to have school assemblies where a professional talked about his or her career. Entertainers. Politicians. Wall Streeters. Lawyers.”

  “Cops?”
/>
  “Cops.” Her eyes rounded with revelation. “Of course, cops. He must have been the speaker that day.”

  “Want to listen to it again?” Bruno said.

  “Please.” Beck listened as Dad reminded himself about her assembly. “Is there a date? When was that?”

  “September 10th.”

  “September 10th?” For a split second, the haze around her memories parted and she saw something. Felt a reminiscence.

  “Anything?” Bruno said. “Let’s play the next one.”

  “Dad, where are you? The assembly starts in fifteen minutes. You were supposed to be here already.”

  Beck jerked to attention. “That’s me.”

  “This is September 11th, Beck.”

  “Play it again.”

  “Dad, where are you? The assembly starts in fifteen minutes. You were supposed to be here already.”

  Her voice flared, anxious and angry. If the word already was a fist, it’d have punched Dad in the face.

  “There’re two more.”

  Beck shifted in her seat, unsettled by a low rumble quaking through her.

  “Dad, call me back! You said you’d be here. You promised.”

  An image flashed, tattered and unframed, faded and washed out. She was in the school office with the phone in her hand.

  “I called him to see if he was coming.” She was on her feet. “He was our speaker, and he was late.”

  “Beck, think back. Was the secretary upset in any way? Anxious? Were people talking with their heads bent together in a hush?”

  She set her hands over her closed eyes, trying to see. “Assemblies were right before lunch, around ten thirty. So the planes would’ve hit by then, but I can’t remember, Bruno. I can’t.”

  “Here’s the next message.”

  A slow burn crept through her as she listened, hovered close to Bruno.

  “Where are you? I cannot count on you for anything. Are you working? Of course work is more important than your own daughter. I hate you, Dad. I really do. You’re a selfish jerk, and I don’t care if you ground me for saying so. Everyone is waiting. I’m humiliated. You’re the worst dad ever. I mean it.”

  Lightning and thunder collided in that small octagon room.