What Could Be Saved

by Liese O'Halloran Schwarz

  “You told us you threw yours away,” said Laura.

  “I lied,” Bea said without a trace of shame. “I said that so I could take yours.”

  “You were such a shit,” said Laura, shaking her head.

  “They let me in to see him for a minute right after they took the tube out.” Bea was beaming, taking no offense. “I showed it to him and he recognized it immediately, just like you did. He laughed and said, ‘I should have known.’ ”

  “You just happened to be carrying this?” Laura asked Bea. “You came this morning, and found he was awake, and you just happened to have this with you?”

  “I’ve been carrying it,” said Bea, taking the little horse back from Laura and tucking it into her purse. She didn’t specify whether she meant she always had, like a talisman, or had been doing so only recently, in case Philip woke up. “I’m very sorry,” she said, looking Laura in the eyes, her voice soft and sincere. “You recognized him, and I didn’t. I should have listened to you.”

  “Well, it was kind of crazy,” said Laura, dazed. Not only by the apology: it was nice to see Bea happy. Like the doctors’ worry revealed only in retrospect, it was suddenly clear how anxious Bea had been, and for how long.

  “We’ll have to figure out how to tell Mum,” Bea said. This task, which Laura had expected to be a bone of contention between them, now appeared to be simply a bullet point on a joyful agenda.

  * * *

  Within the week, Philip was moved from intensive care to a regular floor, where the nurses took his meditation hours very seriously; twice a day, they put a sign on his door and kept everyone out. The twins came to visit, Dean and Dustin shaking his hand solemnly, Hello, Uncle Philip, as their mother blinked back tears.

  “I met you when you were asleep,” said Dean shyly.

  When a social worker made noises about eventual discharge to a rehabilitation hospital where Philip could regain his strength, Bea squashed that idea: home meant the Tudor. She began mobilizing forces to get a bedroom prepared, and arranging in-home therapies: physical, occupational, respiratory.

  Dr. Gomez stopped the sisters in the corridor one day, warned them He’s not ready to talk, but it was an unnecessary caution. Bea had pivoted completely on that subject; she seemed to have lost the need to know what had happened to Philip on the day he went missing, or all the years he was gone. She instead threw herself into the task of telling Philip what had happened to them during that time, bringing photo albums to the hospital and marching him through the pages.

  “That’s Great-Aunt Patricia,” said Beatrice, pointing to a woman with heavy eyebrows. “Do you remember her? She used to pinch us if we did something wrong.”

  “I remember the pinching,” said Philip.

  “These are Mum’s parents,” said Bea, turning a page. “They had that big house in Chevy Chase. We saw them for holidays before.” Before meant before Bangkok, the time they’d lived in the Tudor as small children, Bea for eight years and Philip for four and a half, Laura for barely three. “And these are Dad’s parents. They lived in England. They didn’t visit very often.”

  Page after page, photo after photo, Washington and then Bangkok. Christmas in the long living room of the Tudor becoming Christmas in the party room, baby Laura mouthing a candy cane on Robert’s lap becoming five-year-old Laura opening a package while Philip and Bea watched. In the backgrounds of both, the fuzzy lights of a decorated tree.

  “I used to think you’d be an engineer or architect,” Bea told Philip, pointing to a snapshot of him building with Tinkertoys. “When the boys were small I thought about how much you would have loved Lego.”

  “Don’t do that,” he said, the first sharp words they’d heard from him. “Don’t talk about me like I died.”

  “But I thought you were dead,” said Bea, surprised into frankness. “We all did.”

  A fragile silence jittered between them all.

  “I’m sorry about that,” said Philip.

  Another beat of silence, and then Bea turned another page in the album. A monochrome photo of Genevieve and Robert at a Bangkok party, her perfect bouffant, his crew cut, cigarettes and cocktails in their hands. They were smooth-faced, beautiful, young. On the facing page were color snaps of Laura and Bea in their new uniforms for the school in America.

  Here was another before and after, with nothing to mark the transition. No gap in the photographs, no blank pages. The images simply changed from black and white to color, Robert and Genevieve stopped appearing together, and Philip no longer appeared at all.

  * * *

  The doctor was beaming when she signed off on Philip’s discharge.

  “You’ll live another thirty years,” she said, then added in an earnest rush, “If you take your meds and wear your seat belt and don’t smoke.”

  Philip said nothing during the drive from Northern Virginia into the District. Not a sound as the car navigated the sweep along the parkway with the monuments in the distance, postcard landscapes that predictably elicited cries from tourists. No reaction as they got closer to home, turning off Beach Drive and driving up Brandywine, emerging among the plush lawns and spreading trees.

  Noi stood in the entrance of the house like a tiny Cerberus, watching them come up the long slate front path. When they reached her, Philip made a wai, spoke to her in soft Thai. She blinked tears, her mouth working as she returned the wai.

  “Madame napping,” she said as they went inside.

  Philip stood still in the middle of the foyer and looked up. Laura watched him. Was there a spark in his memory, of this house he’d last seen when he was four? Superficial things had changed since then, but the bones—the wood, the slate, the wall of mullioned windows in the sitting room straight ahead—would be the same. He climbed to the center landing, looked to the dining room on the right, the living room on the left, then stepped forward into the sitting room that jutted out from the back of the house, twenty feet above the sloped backyard.

  “Who cleans those windows?” he asked.

  “Intrepid people with enormous ladders,” said Bea. “This house is ridiculous.”

  “But it’s beautiful,” said Laura.

  Yes, they all agreed. It was beautiful.

  They went slowly through the rest of the main floor, Philip occasionally pausing in front of something and his sisters providing commentary, There used to be wallpaper here, and We took out that wall when the kitchen was redone.

  Philip stopped in front of the elevator at the back of the kitchen.

  “We put that in four years ago,” said Bea. When Genevieve was diagnosed, although she had no mobility issues at the time, Bea had arranged for the old back staircase to be hollowed out for a small lift, saying I’m thinking ahead.

  Clem and the boys arrived in a hubbub of unloading: flowers, stacks of food containers, a large chest cooler. Edward’s silver sedan pulled up and he got out, wrestled a case of wine from its trunk into the house. Bea called orders from the kitchen; minions Laura and Clem and Edward ferried silverware and glasses and napkins out to the screened porch, where Philip was already seated at the long table, while the boys filled the cooler with ice and buried cans of soda and bottles of beer.

  “Oh my God, can you do this please?” Beatrice said to Clem, laughing, gesturing to the large watermelon into which she’d sunk a knife. “It’s like the sword in the stone.” She sounded purely happy. Had Laura ever heard her laugh like that?

  On the screened porch, everyone was chatting as they went about the final tasks, Clem and Bea placing serving bowls on the sideboard, the twins filling the water glasses. Laura and Edward were switching on the electric candles down the middle of the long table when the chitchat noise died away and Laura turned to see Genevieve standing in the doorway from the living room. She was holding Noi’s arm, and her eyes were on Philip.

  “It’s Philip, Mum,” said Bea. Gentle, as if every word were a sharp object being placed into their mother’s hand.

  “Of cou
rse it is,” said Genevieve, without a flicker of amazement.

  Noi helped her navigate the step down onto the porch, and Genevieve walked the rest of the way alone, seated herself in the chair beside Philip. “Did anyone get you a drink?” she asked him in a brisk hostess voice. The sisters looked at each other and shrugged: who knew what she understood.

  * * *

  Before the meal everyone raised their glasses to Philip; then Dustin made a charming toast to “our grandmother and matriarch,” dipping his head to Genevieve. Hear, hear, everyone said; Laura watched Genevieve sipping with the others. She would never have made the faux pas of drinking to herself—she had not realized that she was the grandmother mentioned in the toast. Bea’s eyes caught Laura’s: she had noticed too.

  “You’re trending, Uncle Philip,” announced Dean, looking down at his phone. “They’re using the hashtags #returnedfromthedead, and #miracle, and #nevergiveuphope. Barf.”

  “Hashtag no phones at the table,” said Bea. She took Dean’s phone, looked at the screen, tsked and clicked it off. “Where are they getting their information? I presume none of us talked to a reporter.” She looked around the group; everyone shook their heads no.

  “I’m sorry,” said Philip. “Hashtag?”

  “You’re like a time traveler,” said Dustin, slipping his napkin from its ring.

  “Please let me be the one to explain the internet to him,” Dean said to no one in particular.

  As the long table naturally broke into groups of conversation, Laura watched her mother talking to Philip. She seemed relaxed with him, familiar—was it simply the unguarded friendliness of Genevieve 2.0, or did it signify recognition on some level? Or did she think he was Robert? At the other end of the table, Beatrice laughed at a story Dean was telling. Noi, who’d sat for a brief time at the table but had soon found a reason to get up, was standing beside her seat, talking with Clem. Dustin was deep in a discussion with Edward. It could be any homecoming, any happy reunion with a soft spotlight on the returned one.

  “Edward,” called Bea down the table. “Would you mind choosing another bottle of wine from that lovely selection you brought? Laura, could you help him?”

  “Subtle,” said Laura, rolling her eyes, but she got up and they went together to the pantry, stood in front of the wine rack. “She wants us to make up,” she said.

  “We have,” he said. “Haven’t we?” He selected two bottles, stood studying them. “California or Spain?”

  “We have,” she said. She felt a surge of huge affection, watching him frown down at the labels. “I’ve been really stupid,” she said. He looked up. “You’re a brick.” It was something Robert had used to say, a high compliment for strong character and loyalty.

  “Thank you?” Edward said.

  “After all, we are both going to die,” she said. He raised his eyebrows and she added, “Someday.” Then her mind went blank; the thoughts that had seemed so eloquent in her head the moment before had curled in on themselves, away from her tongue. “You don’t disappear for me,” she said.

  “How drunk are you?” he asked, smiling, setting the bottles down and putting his arms around her.

  “I couldn’t drive home,” she admitted. “But in another way, I feel extremely clear.” She leaned against him, spoke muzzily into his chest. “What I’m trying to say is, okay. Let’s jump off the curb. Let’s get married.” She added quickly, leaning back, “But no fuss.”

  “No-fuss curb jumping toward certain death,” he said, kissing her. “Sounds excellent.”

  * * *

  Laura and Edward didn’t announce anything—no fuss, she repeated to him—but when they returned with the wine, Bea gave them a little smile. The rest of the meal was a gauzy blur. In a rush of sentiment, Laura found herself telling the story of Philip’s birth to the table, Genevieve listening with an expression of delighted interest, as if she’d never heard it before. At the just like a little Dutchman part, Philip rounded his eyes and batted his eyelashes, and everyone laughed.

  “That must have been scary,” Dean said to Genevieve.

  “Oh, yes,” she said. “You remember,” she told Philip, and everyone laughed again. Again, the sisters’ eyes met.

  It was full dark when the event began to wind down, the boys in the living room on their phones, Edward on a call in the dining room, Clem and Laura clearing the table while in the kitchen Bea battled with Noi over the washing-up. Laura, get the napkins, we need to put them in to soak said Bea, and Laura went out onto the porch, which was empty now except for her mother and Philip. They had their backs to her and were carrying on a murmured conversation, the candle flickering on the table in front of them. As Laura came up behind them, Genevieve put a hand on Philip’s forearm and leaned toward him. Laura stood still, the words she’d been about to say dying on her lips.

  “The girls must never know,” Genevieve said.

  At that moment, Bea came through the French doors.

  “Laura, did the night nurse call you?” she said. She seemed agitated, all the soft ease of the day gone. “I totally lost track of time. She should have been here half an hour ago.” She bent toward Genevieve. “Mum,” she said, “it’s time for bed.” She drew back Genevieve’s chair, helped her up. Looked at Laura pointedly. “Philip, do you need help getting up?”

  “Bea,” said Laura, the words covered by the scraping noise of Philip’s chair as he pushed it back. She put out an arm to him, helped him get to his feet. “Bea, I have to talk to you.”

  “Whatever it is, it can wait,” said Bea, one arm under her mother’s, going with her into the house. Laura and Philip followed; when they were all in the living room, Bea said, “I can stay, but Clem is flying out in the morning.” The airport was a quick drive from Bea and Clem’s house, an impossible journey from the Tudor through DC morning traffic. “And I’m sure Noi wants to get back to her own family.”

  “I’ll stay too,” said Laura. “Edward can go home. We’ll make it an all-Preston night. You and I can sort out the nurse situation together tomorrow.”

  Bea’s face softened, surprised.

  “Okay,” she said.

  “I can use the stairs,” said Philip, realizing that they were making their way toward the elevator in the kitchen.

  “Not on your first day,” said Bea in a voice like a general’s. “Mum and I will wait here while you and Laura go up.”

  “I’d love a hot toddy,” said Genevieve as the elevator doors closed.

  “Do you think it’s solely birth order that made Beatrice so bossy?” Philip asked Laura as they were creaking upward. “I mean, what if you or I had been born first?”

  “Bea would never have allowed that,” said Laura, and they shared a smile.

  Philip’s room had been in use as a guest room until recently. Bea had had it whipped into shape, new clothes put into the closet and fresh navy paint on the walls. An adjustable bed stood beside a nightstand, upon which sat the black box of the CPAP unit, a gooseneck lamp, and a small brass bell.

  “If I ring this, does a butler come?” said Philip when he was settled in bed. He touched the bell. “Or maybe a genie?”

  “If you ring that tonight, I’ll come,” said Laura. “I’ll be just down the hall.” In her old bedroom; but had it actually been his once upon a time, she wondered, had her crib been in this room next to the master? She couldn’t recall anything from her years in this house before they left it for Bangkok. “Bea’s probably working on an intercom system.”

  His smile was weary. It had been a long first day home. She had intended to ask him about his conversation with Genevieve on the porch, but decided: not now. She wished him goodnight, left his bedroom door ajar.

  At the end of the upstairs landing, Bea and Genevieve were just getting out of the elevator; Noi was coming up the front stairs.

  “Laura and I are staying,” Bea told Noi. “The night nurse hasn’t come.”

  “I fire them all,” said Noi.

  “When did
you do that?” said Bea, as Laura said “Why?”

  “Too noisy,” said Noi, flapping a hand. “Watching TV, talk-talk-talk on the phone. Madame not sleeping.”

  “Who’s been with Mum at night?” asked Bea.

  “Mai pen rai,” said Noi. She ducked under Bea’s arm and replaced Bea’s body with her own, put an arm around Genevieve’s waist. The two of them went down the hall, Laura and Bea staring after.

  “Nighty-night,” called Genevieve as they turned into the master bedroom.

  “Noi has been sitting at Mum’s bedside all night?” said Laura. “And then she’s up all day? When does she sleep?”

  “I vote for one crisis at a time,” said Bea. “We can deal with it tomorrow.”

  * * *

  Sometime after dropping off to sleep, Laura woke again in her old bedroom tucked into the corner of the second floor. Through the partly open door came the rushing noise of Philip’s CPAP machine. She realized that down the hall were her brother and mother and on the other side of the bathroom, her sister. She felt something like vertigo, as if history had rolled them all back into the past. All except her father. With the miracle of Philip’s return, and the rest of them restored to the house, it seemed deeply unfair that Robert was not there too.

  She slipped out of bed, and went down the front stairs.

  Bea was in the sitting room, in one of the chairs that looked out the windows, drinking brandy from a balloon glass.

  “There’s more of this,” she said, lifting the glass; Laura shook her head.

  “My mouth feels like sand,” Laura said. She got a glass of water from the kitchen and brought it back, took the other chair. They sat for a minute in the darkness.