What the Waves Know

by Tamara Valentine

  “It’s only luck on both fucking counts!” My mother shook her head.

  “Isn’t it always a matter of luck?” My grandmother dabbed at my face.

  “I’m telling you, Iz, I have reached my very last nerve with this.”

  Translation: with you.

  “Zo . . .” Concentrating on wiping the sticky streaks from my cheeks, Grandma Jo didn’t bother to look up. “Why don’t you go back to work? I’ll take care of this.”

  “Why don’t you take care of the hundred-dollar bill while you’re at it?” My mother stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

  Grandma Jo didn’t question what happened even as she stepped back to examine me. “Are you okay?”

  I nodded, even though I was so not okay that it would take me a solid year to tally the damage. It was the first time anyone had stopped to ask.

  “Well, I suppose it’s a good thing I know where to get more honey. And you were worried about the bees.” She leaned back, letting her eyes drift over me to assess the damage. “Okay. You go upstairs and change your clothes. I’ll go in there and change her attitude.” She waved at the slammed door before tossing the towel into the sink with the same soft sigh I have heard my mother nearly deflate from a thousand times. I couldn’t help wondering how three women who shared the same blood could all fall from God’s hand and land on this world as different as snowflakes.

  Grandma Jo was the only one who spoke at dinner that night, recounting stories from Israel and Africa over a pan of stir-fried vegetables and brown rice. About halfway through the meal she turned to stare at me.

  “Do you remember this place at all, Izabella? I mean the island? The house? Anything?”

  I looked at my mother, who was too busy glaring at Grandma Jo to notice me, and shrugged.

  “Well, it will come back to you eventually. Don’t you worry.”

  After the plates had been stacked in the sink, my grandmother folded herself cross-legged onto a sofa cushion she had thrown to the floor. My mother crumpled into the hole the missing cushion had left behind on the couch. Eight years of handling unspoken thoughts made me an expert at reading them, and something was pacing between them so forcefully it nearly took physical form.

  “Homework, Iz,” my mother said. “You need to finish reading the section on Robert Frost and then do your algebra.”

  I looked to Grandma Jo for assistance.

  “‘Some say the world will end in fire / Some say in ice. From what I’ve tasted of desire / I hold with those who favor fire . . . ,’” Grandma Jo warbled as lightly as a lark. “I love Frost. Can I see it when you’re done?”

  Same thing in disguise.

  Letting my eyes volley between them several times before pulling myself from the chair, I headed for the stairs. Luke, who had not left Grandma Jo’s side since she arrived, flopped in front of her and angled his belly toward her fingers. I made my way to the top of the steps and slammed the door to my room convincingly before creeping back to the landing.

  “What is it, Zorrie?”

  “You cannot be here if you’re going to do that.” My mother’s voice was choppy.

  “Do what? The clothing and makeup? For goodness’ sake, honey! I did the same for you when you turned fourteen.” Grandma Jo sounded as though she were placating a jealous sibling.

  “No, Mom. Not the makeup—and, by the way, no, you didn’t. I’m trying to help her, not retraumatize her. You, and that whack job down the lane; you’re all prodding her to remember. Stop it; just stop. She’ll come to it on her own when she’s ready. Don’t you understand that?”

  I rested my head on my knees, pulling them tight to me, and pinched my eyes closed. Was that true? That I could remember if I wanted to? That I had erased it all on purpose? I wasn’t sure.

  “No. I do not understand that. She was a young child. What do you remember from when you were six? Do you remember the time we went lobster trapping off the coast of Nova Scotia? Do you remember Mr. Dixon dressing up as Santa Claus and leaving little baby powder reindeer hoof prints on the carpet? Do you remember drinking lighter fluid in Mr. Tildridge’s garage because you were thirsty, and me rushing you to the emergency room? We lose important things from our childhood just as quickly and easily as loose teeth, which I am willing to wager you also do not remember. Have you tried just sitting down and talking to her? Just tell her what happened.”

  “And risk her never speaking again—ever? Really, is that what you want? Don’t you think I’ve tried to help her? She just walks away. She doesn’t want to speak to me. I can’t remember the last time she sat and just talked to me—even on paper—the way she does with you. She doesn’t want anything to do with me.”

  “That is simply not true,” Grandma Jo interjected.

  “It is true. She hates me. Somewhere along the way, she came to believe it was my fault he walked out that night. She just loved him so much. It’s like she can’t breathe without him; like they were two halves of a whole. She blames me for what he did. How in the hell do I fight a phantom? I don’t know how to move her forward. Half the time she just wants me to go away.”

  I heard a sob catch in my mother’s throat, pinching me through with guilt. It was not true that I hated her, but the second half was true. It was not that my life wasn’t complete without my father; it was that I was not complete without him. I still stared out my window at night listening for the Nikommo, begging them to lead me back to him. I didn’t want to move forward. Didn’t want to leave him behind.

  “She doesn’t hate you. She’s scared of you, that you might confirm her worst fear—that this is all somehow her fault. The longer you let that fester, the worse it will be. Just say whatever needs saying, once and for all, and let the chips fall where they will.”

  “My God, she’s lucky he didn’t kill her, lucky he didn’t take her with him like all the other times.”

  As if someone turned a fire hose on my gut, my stomach turned all watery and cold and for a minute I thought I might vomit. Burying my head in my knees, I squeezed my eyes tighter until a kaleidoscope of colors swam inside my lids. But the tears came anyway, stinging my throat and nose. In what universe was a thing like that lucky?

  “Zorrie, he was a good man and he loved her beyond reason. He loved you. Don’t let anger rob you of the good memories. The rest wasn’t any more his fault than yours or Izabella’s; you know that.”

  “Why don’t you explain that to Remy or Thomas? Does it matter, really? It doesn’t undo a goddamn thing.”

  I didn’t know what that meant, but I did know Grandma Jo was right. Like fireworks inside my head, memories began exploding: good and bad, beautiful and ugly. The three of us hiking Stepstone Falls and my father running my mother piggyback up the peak to watch the sunset. Making popcorn over the fireplace and forgetting the top of the pan until we were chasing exploding kernels from one end of the living room to the other as if they were Mexican jumping beans. My mother slumped on the back step like a dropped rag crying when he disappeared for three days.

  It was dizzying.

  “Don’t you think I know that?” my mother yelled. “Does one single person understand that I loved him, too? I loved him first. I love him still.”

  I tilted my head, taken aback by the deep ache swelling up in my chest. Wiping my nose with the corner of my shirt, I swallowed hard, trying to force my throat back open.

  My mother sighed. “I don’t even know how to start. I have no idea what she remembers, or if she’s scared, or angry, or sad. I just don’t want to push her, don’t want to drive her to . . . That’s why I got her that damn dog, so she would at least have something she could be close to. So she wouldn’t be so—alone in there. She’s so goddamn like him sometimes it hurts to look at her. I don’t want . . . What if she . . .”

  I did not pretend to understand my mother. But I did speak silence, and there was something about the way she couldn’t force the words out that sent a storm of butterflies bouncing around ins
ide me. What if I what? I didn’t know what words, exactly, she was laboring to give birth to. But even with them all locked up in her voice box, I knew what they meant. What if one day I tilted my head into the sun and got the urge to fly? What if I listened to the wind just right on a summer night and heard the Nikommo singing? What if those embers she didn’t know what to do with inside my father finally puffed to life inside me and set what was left of our world on fire?

  “Zorrie, I am going to say this once, and I want you to hear me. . . . She is not Ansel. That is not what this is. She is not going to break down. She is not going to break, period. And she knows there is something here. She feels it. She thinks she’s going crazy. Do you understand me? Your child thinks she is insane. . . .”

  What’s the matter with her . . . she a retard or something? . . . Silent Sam plays with ants because nobody else w-ants to play with her. . . . Specialized programming . . . children with unique needs . . . The words broke loose with such force I felt bruises forming from them bouncing off the corners of my brain. My stomach lurched again, sending bile biting and burning the back of my throat. The world spun all topsy-turvy. Luke oozed into my lap, licking my fingers as if spatters of pain could be mopped up in the same manner as a drippy ice cream cone.

  “She thinks she’s crazy, and she’s not.” Grandma Jo’s voice was stern and soft all wrapped up together. “Is that better than a hefty dose of reality? She is half him, all the best parts. She feels the magic in this world the way he did. But she is half you, too—solid and strong and smart. I know it’s scary—”

  “Do you really, Mom? Do you know what it’s like to watch your child disappear inside herself like she’s slipping into a dark empty cave? To never, ever know what she’s thinking or feeling? Never to hear her laugh or dream aloud? It’s like watching her drown below an inch of water and her foot is stuck in the rocks and no matter how fucking hard I pull, I cannot get her to air. I’m her mother. I should be able to pull her out.” I could not see her, but I could tell my mother was crying in earnest now, could hear her words catching on the sharp edges of what she said.

  “Yes, I do know what that’s like.”

  “It’s not the same, Mother. You don’t live with Iz day in and day out, watching her caught up in this hell.”

  “I’m not talking about Izabella.” Grandma Jo’s voice was soft, and level as a steel rod, and it was as if she’d hit my mother over the head with it, stunning her silent for a good long time. “She will be okay. The question is, will you?”

  When my mother did speak again the tears were gone and anger filled her words. “I told you, I’m fine.”

  “Well, I happen to be a mother, too. And I am more worried about the other child in this house. You are thin as a blade of grass, angry as a wasp at this world, and burying yourself in a mausoleum of work. But if you prefer to speak about Izabella instead, Zorrie, fine. Give her some credit, will you? She’s not as weak as you want to believe. How long do you intend to keep her in this bubble? That child needs to understand that she is a whole person with or without language, with or without her father. She needs to know she can take care of herself—without you choreographing each breath she takes. And frankly, I am not all that sure you want her to be able to. Is it possible somewhere deep inside you’re trying to keep her dependent on you so she doesn’t slip away completely?”

  “Hey,” I heard my mother’s heel scuff the floor as she turned on Grandma Jo, “I am the one who brought her here, remember?”

  I got to my feet, intending to go find a tissue and change, but my feet crept me down to the second-floor banister instead, peeking around the corner. For the first time in a long time, I felt the need to see my mother. I’d spent years looking at her as an empty shell, a robot that tallied up numbers and moved through the tasks of the day without feeling much about them. But she wasn’t. She was cracked all over from the force of everything she’d stuffed inside herself, like me.

  “And now you’re frightened.”

  Silence.

  “You think you may have pushed one notch too far. That she will not be able to handle this. Or worse, if she does, that somehow she’s going to disappear on you like Ansel.”

  The world spun into slow motion then paused. When it kicked back into orbit, my mother crumpled to the stonework in front of the fire. She was crying, and Grandma Jo padded over to sit beside her, brushing the hair from my mother’s face and tucking it behind her ear.

  “Listen to me, Zo. You are doing the right thing. Trust that girl. She will not leave you, or hate you, or murder you in your sleep. She has carried this around for eight years. Enough. Let her get on with things.”

  My throat tightened; my stomach tumbled.

  “Did you really think this would be more difficult for her than you? Coming back here, facing the other family, reliving what happened? Perhaps Izabella is an excuse to face this yourself?”

  “Fuck,” my mother said. Just like that. “Fuck, fuck, fuck! What did any of us do to deserve this? Why does he get the easy way out?”

  Then my mother did something I have never seen her do before: she laid her head in Grandma Jo’s lap and sobbed. They were speaking perfect English, and yet, it was more like trying to decode Gaelic, with too many pieces missing to make sense of it all. What did she mean by the easy way out? Because if there was one, I wanted to know where that door was. Living life with chunks of it shattered into little pieces that you cannot figure out how to put back together is a thing most people do not understand. I knew it was up to me to make sense of what happened, but the memories were broken beyond recognition.

  Pulling Luke close, I buried my face in the soft folds of his neck and held him tight until the sick feeling in my stomach started to subside. When it was clear they were done talking, I got up and crept back up the stairs to my room with this last whisper from Grandma Jo caught in my ear: “She won’t leave you.”

  And I knew that was true. After seeing my mother crumpled up like a fallen leaf, scared and sad, I didn’t want to. I knew this, too: this place was deeply connected to me. It understood something about me that I did not

  Later that night, I awoke to Luke whining beside me and pawing at the bedsheets. I pried one eye open to find a thunderstorm breaking over the island. Rain battered the windows in fat silver drops. Every few minutes, lightning cracked the darkness open like a dyed egg the day after Easter. When I was young, I’d thought that was precisely what was happening, that each bolt of lightning cracked open a little corner of heaven and sent bits of it flailing to earth. Luke shimmied closer, trying desperately to dig his way under my arm to escape the storm. Snuggling him under my chin, I covered him with the blanket, rubbing his belly and breathing in the scent of puppy. But all the petting was not enough to stop his shivering, and I felt the worry tickle up my throat and land beside his ear with a soft, “Shhh, shhh,” until his breathing calmed to an even sigh.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The next morning, I woke at dawn to John Denver crooning “Sunshine on My Shoulders” through my alarm clock, but it was not sunshine I felt. It was something wet and stiff pricking at my skin in the spots where my hair had slipped beneath my shirt. With one hand, I gave Luke a shove from where he’d settled himself in to lap the remnants of honey from my hair. While Remy might be right about the moisturizing benefits of honey, it is not an easy thing to rid yourself of. After spending a good hour scrubbing and shampooing the night before, the humidity was still setting my curls into sticky clumps around my cheekbones.

  I freed a pair of jeans from the bed covers and headed for the shower, intent on sneaking out of the house before my mother woke up.

  I slipped into the steam, letting the water pelt my face until it branded small red streaks into my skin, and then stuck my hair under the burning water. The sting ran down my spine in hot fingers, burning their way past my waist.

  The thought of my mother all crumpled up the night before had kept me tossing and turning, with her words b
ouncing and echoing in my head. She hates me. She wishes I would just go away. I didn’t know how I felt, but I knew that wasn’t true. The very words sent shivers straight through me and I wanted to tell her they were wrong. I wanted to explain, but every time I felt the words creeping up my throat, the thought of my father walking out beat them to the starting line and the words fell back inside me like dead butterflies.

  I picked up a cloth my mother had hung from the antique faucet, bit into it, and screamed and screamed until my voice had emptied itself into the fabric and washed away with the water. Even if I wanted to talk, wanted someone to take the secrets out of my hands and carry them away, I couldn’t. I couldn’t tell a soul—not ever. The idea of my mother thinking I blamed her set a flame of guilt burning inside me. She had no idea that it was my fault my father was gone. I loved him first . . . I still love him. I had done this to her, to all of us. And without even trying I was doing it again. She believed I wanted her to go. How many people can one girl send sailing off the planet? I didn’t want to find out. I didn’t want her to leave. . . . I wanted to disappear, wanted to follow my father into the wind and fly away. Taking the cloth from my mouth, I scrubbed angrily at my skin, trying to swab myself into nothingness.

  A year ago, Tuckertown was awash in shock when the high school’s lead cheerleader, Harriett Gleason, disappeared. Just like that. One minute she was eating fried chicken and clam chowder down at Captain Joe’s with her parents, celebrating her acceptance into Tufts University, and the next she was gone. The following day, the truth of things began to unfold like the blocks of a Jacob’s ladder. After her parents had smiled themselves into a deep sleep, she had slipped out her window, hitched a ride to the Newport Bridge, climbed her way to the top, and jumped right off the planet. They’d found what was left of her tangled in the dingy pilings underneath the bridge. Nobody knew why she did it, but some days I imagined that I did. She was holding tight to a secret so heavy it crashed her into the waves and drowned her with the weight of it.