“What? That’s it?”
I open the doors to the sitting room and turn on the lights. “You tell me the best thing to do. I’m too broken to function.”
“Scream,” she says.
“Nope. Too broken.”
“Here you go.” Nate hands Finn a glass of juice.
“What do say?” Eli looks down at his son.
“Merci.”
“We’re not in Quebec, Finn. This is New York. Here, bring the juice over here and don’t spill it on the floor.”
Nate grins and follows them into the sitting room. “You travel a lot?”
“Too much,” Eli says.
“We went to Disney and I hugged Mickey,” Finn says. He sits at one of the tables, feet swinging under the chair. The frog takes a pretend drink of juice before Finn takes a sip. “Nana sends us on scavenger hunts and we find her. We went to the ocean and up in the sky on an airplane. Then we find her and she cries.”
“She cries?” I question.
“Yes. She’s sad. But she said I don’t have to cry. Then she gives me candy and we go home.”
Eli puts his hands in the back pockets of his jeans and looks out the window. This is not an easy silence. I wear a cheerful smile, stay optimistic, but the fact that he doesn’t recognize me fractures what should be a joyous moment. He moves closer to the window to observe the snow-covered tangle of dead weeds encasing the backyard.
“Did you have a tornado recently?” he asks.
“No,” I say, embarrassed.
He taps the glass. “That hippo on its side … it looks familiar. And the pool … I bet we stayed here when I was a kid. When did this place open?”
“In the sixties,” Joss says.
Nate waves a hand for her to shoo. He removes the coffee pot and bumps my hip to get the coffee grounds ready.
“This is crazy. I don’t know how long I’ll be able to hold it together,” I whisper.
“It’s him. Right?” Nate whispers back.
“He remembers Annabelle. I’m positive it’s him.”
Nate checks him out again. “You couldn’t ask for anything better than this.”
“I know, but I’m dying to say something. And Virginia … I’m going to strangle that woman. Nate, she did this. She took him from us.”
“I know. Play it cool, beautiful.”
“Easier said than done.” I scoop the grounds into the filter and wait for Nate to take care of the rest.
Eli studies the room, his hand on his clean-shaven chin, index finger pointed upward. His eyes lock on the octagon window near the ceiling. Finn cranes his neck to see what’s up there, noticing the mica sparrow centered on the pane.
“A bird, Daddy.” He points.
The mole on Finn’s chin is identical to the one on the boy in the photos, the photos I thought were of Eli.
“I see it.” Eli frowns as he stares at it.
“It’s fat,” Finn says.
“Yep, must’ve had too many worms for breakfast.”
I have a pile of photographs of Eli, and now of Finn, but Eli has none of me, of our family, of the lodge. He grew up without an image to connect me to his past. Like Nate said after my nightmare, without a photo, the faces of the people we once knew are often a blur. No details.
Nate can’t picture his dad without a photo, and yet other images surface. I can remember a doll I once had, as Eli remembers Annabelle, as Finn might remember his stuffed frog one day, but chances are he’ll forget this room, Nate, and me.
Nate comes in with a pot of water. After the coffee machine is set, he leafs through a box of sugar packets, pretending to count them as he lurks. Joss shadows him. She places a container of creamer next to the sugar packets and whispers, “I have every right to be in here, too.”
“So you travel a lot?” I ask, moving closer.
“Yes.” Finn kicks his legs. “To funeral homes.”
“Finn, shh,” Eli hushes.
“One time Nana was in a casket. She opened her eyes and laughed. She cried and laughed. She said her friends are dead.”
“No more stories.” Eli sits next to Finn. He takes out his cell and scrolls through his messages. “They wouldn’t understand.”
I shift my gaze between them, my words submerged, swimming with wild desperation to break the surface. “She had a funeral,” I manage to say. “I do understand if you want to talk about it. I’d love to know what happened to her.”
Eli looks up through thick eyelashes. “She already had the funeral? It’s over?”
“It was a few days ago.” I search the stack of old newspapers and pull out her obituary with the scheduled services, placing it in front of him. “Our funeral director said some people have living funerals. Except he didn’t expect to ever see one in our small town.”
Eli pushes the paper away and clamps his lips tight.
“Daddy, is Nana dead?”
“Not for real.” He spins his cell on the tabletop.
“Are we going to see a casket?”
“Not this time.”
Finn burps. “Can we see a casket next time?”
“This is the last time.”
“Why?”
“It’s the third town, the last one. Number three.”
“Three.” Finn holds up three fingers. “I’m three.”
“Almost four.”
Finn holds up another finger.
“That’s right.”
“She’s done this before?” I ask.
“Unfortunately.”
Nate sets a cup of coffee and the creamer in front of Eli. He passes on the cream, tastes the coffee, and gives his cell a second spin.
“My mom planned a funeral in every town she’s lived in to see who’d show up. So far, no one has.”
I sit across from him. “No one showed up here either.” My voice is dry. “That’s why she said her friends are dead?”
Finn lifts his hands in the air. “They are all dead. Then she cries.”
“What about other family? A husband?” I ask.
“She never married.” He squints at my face, flashes over my hair. “I was adopted after my family died in a fire.”
“You were not—” Nate sticks a sugar packet in Joss’s mouth before she can finish her sentence.
She spits the packet at him. “Screw you.”
“Give her time to sugar the pill,” Nate says.
“What does that mean?”
“Enough. Both of you, please, out.” I point to the door. “I apologize,” I say to Eli. “There’s a little tension between friends this morning.”
He nods, combing his fingers through Finn’s hair, parting it to the side and off his forehead. My worst nightmare would be for them to walk out and disappear like Virginia.
“My mom’s lonely,” he continues. “I moved out last year once I felt that I could care for Finn on my own. His mom”—he kisses the top of Finn’s head—“my girlfriend … she died of sepsis after her C-section. I needed all the help I could get when he was a baby.”
Finn looks up. “I’m not a baby.”
“Not anymore.”
“I’m a big boy.” He swings his legs under the chair.
Eli looks at the table. He splays his hand across the Tilford Lake map under the thick layer of epoxy. A slight smile appears. He lucked out. With no storm in his eyes or thunder passing through his lips, he doesn’t suffer from the menacing Whitfield jitters—a nervousness Connor and I picked up from our parents. Eli’s more relaxed. And Finn … he’s the same. He imitates Eli’s actions, putting his feet on his dad’s legs, offering up a toothy smile. Adorable. If it weren’t for Virginia’s baffling game, one that I’m unwillingly at the center of, Eli and Finn might be here for a visit, for Easter, for every holiday, every birthday, every forever.
“I got a text from my mom yesterday morning to come to Tilford Lake. She said she was staying here, but she hasn’t returned
my calls. It’s the same as the other two times she did this. When was the last time you saw her?” he asks.
“Two days ago. She just walked out. Left her car, even.”
“I saw it when I came in. Sorry you had to deal with all this.”
“I looked everywhere.” I pause. “I told the cops.” Another pause. “No one has seen her.”
“That’s typical.”
“Is it?”
“She’s been saying she’s invisible now that she’s old.” He traces the rim of his cup. “I think she thought the funerals would help, but they only proved her right. This last one in her hometown was going to be the grand finale, and it failed like all the rest. She must be pretty upset.”
“Maybe it didn’t fail.”
“Daddy, I’m done.”
“Good.” Eli sits up, puts his cell in his pocket. “The sun’s coming up, go put on your boots and get our coats. We’ll head out to get Nana.”
Finn runs out of the room spinning his frog. My head spins with it. The possibility that they may leave and never come back constricts my throat to a pinhole.
“I can help you look.” I stand.
“We’re good, thanks. If the funeral is over and she’s not in her room, I know where she’ll be.” He stands and pushes in the chairs.
“Where? I can take you … I can drive…” I sound like a stupid kid. I falter and look around for something to help me find my bearings in this rabid dream, but I’m it. It’s up to me to level out and stop freaking out. I can do this. “I offer free tours of Tilford Lake and free rides to town if you’re interested.” Nate leans alongside the doorjamb, smiling at my awesome recovery. “I can take you anywhere you’d like to go.”
Eli gives me the once-over. I love it that he’s looking at me, even if it’s with suspicion.
“That’s okay. Finn and I can handle it. I need to get him breakfast first, then—”
“I can make breakfast,” I offer.
“No. No. Just no,” Jim says from the lobby. “She can’t make you breakfast. This is a lodge, not a hotel. She doesn’t serve breakfast here.”
“He’s kidding,” I say.
“Daddy, catch your coat.”
“Hold on, Finn.”
A coat drops from the balcony and lands in a clump. Keys jangle and sunglasses somersault onto the floor.
“You’re supposed to catch it,” Finn says.
“Did you lock the door?”
“Yes.” He races down the stairs. “Will Nana give me jelly beans today?”
“You didn’t finish the last bag she gave you.”
“I don’t like the white ones. You have to eat them.”
“I don’t like the white ones either.”
“Your dad likes only black and purple jelly beans.” I press my lips tightly together.
Eli gives me a sharp look. “How’d you know that?”
I shrug. “Lucky guess?”
He picks up his sunglasses and slips into his coat, one eye on Finn getting a bit too close to the fire. His head rises from hearth to ceiling of the fieldstone fireplace before he makes a sudden turn to face the private quarters. He blinks. Ollie barks to come out. He blinks repeatedly and touches his neck as if to feel for his missing key.
“Doggy!” Finn blurts. Eli looks around with suspicion. He takes Finn in his arms and carries him to the door.
“Nice place. We’ll be back at four when you reopen for the night.”
“Four,” Finn says, four fingers sprouting up.
“You can come back anytime!” I shout at the closing door. “Dammit.” My emotional brain zaps, waiting for relief.
“No one ever sees me. Not even my own son,” Virginia says from the chair behind the reception desk.
Joss jumps. “What the fuck?”
“Where the hell did she come from?” Jim asks.
I step forward, but Nate puts his hand on my shoulder to stay back.
“He walked right past me. Not a hello or a goodbye,” Virginia says.
“He’s not your son!” I blaze, ready for a fight. “I hate you, Virginia. I hate you!” My limbs shake with rage.
She buries her face in her hands and starts to cry. Her chest jerks with each breath. I’m sickened that my first thought is to comfort her, but I’d never.
“Stop it. You have no right to cry. No right!” I rage.
She lowers her hands. There’s not a tear on her sunken cheeks. “I’m not sorry,” she says in a smooth voice. “I’m not.” She smiles.
“Were you laughing?” I step forward. “You weren’t crying. You were laughing?”
“Salem”—Joss pushes past me—“call the cops. Tell them I killed Virginia Pullman.”
twenty-six
Watching Virginia smile is bad enough, but what’s worse are her words. She’s not sorry. She has no soul. Not a smidgen of guilt shows in her eyes, no pity or shame, no sympathy for my family. It seems like a decade has passed since the morning in the sitting room when she mentioned a fog had rolled in. Little did I know she was referring to herself. Ghost-gray. Noiseless. Sauntering through Tilford Lake like a “mild” alcoholic.
She must be the devil.
It makes sense that the devil would take on the shape of a frail older woman who drives a Cadillac sedan and walks through town in a robe and bootie slippers. And it makes sense for the devil to taunt me with laughter, not tears.
I fell for it. I was drawn to her maternal ways. I thought she fit in with the rest of us at the lodge. But I was wrong.
Dead wrong.
I smack the desk with my palm. “How dare you laugh!”
My words sink beneath the turmoil in the room. Jim and Nate carry Joss kicking and screaming into my private quarters to keep her from pouncing on Virginia.
“My laughter is pure delight. There’s nothing sinful about it,” she says.
“You’re a pathetic woman,” I speak over Ollie’s agitated barks. “You must really hate yourself. I should just let Joss kill you if she wants.”
Virginia snatches up her purse from under the reception desk and places it in her lap. “I don’t expect anyone will kill me today,” she says, then touches her lips as if to suppress her words.
Joss’s malice and Ollie’s barks muffle when the door to my private quarters shuts. Virginia cups her ear and listens to Joss. Her eyes crinkle. “Drab brown birds,” she says.
“You stole my brother,” I hiss angrily. “You took him from us. You broke my parents’ hearts, my grandparents’ hearts.” I squeeze the logo on my constricted chest. “You destroyed us!”
Her throat ripples as she swallows. “Be happy I brought him back to you.”
“What?”
Nate’s hands are on my shoulders, holding me back. I swing my arms to break free, but he locks me in a bear hug from behind. “I’m not gonna hit her, Nate. I just want to spit in her face.”
“Drab brown birds,” Virginia repeats.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Sparrows are like mice, one may escape notice”—she winks at me—“but a community of them can destroy a beautiful place.”
“You better not be referring to my family or me.” I look over my shoulder at Nate. “She’s a horrid nightmare!”
She comes out from behind the desk, clutching her purse in both hands. Her yellow-gray hair flows down her back like breaking ocean waves. Years of secrets hide in her deep-set wrinkles. She continues past me and sits in one of the leather chairs, straining to straighten her back like the high pines. A crack. Her shoulders sag, discouraged by old age.
“I once sold lemonade in the downtown square. Men in suits would stop to chat. But yesterday a young man on the church steps asked me if I had any prescription drugs to sell him.” She looks at us with despair. “The big ending I had always dreamed of never happened. It was supposed to be a reunion with exquisite flowers and longwinded stories lasting throughout the night.
There should’ve been friends and foes at my funeral. How can I renew friendships or offer apologies when no one comes?” She hesitates, pressing a finger to her lips. “I’ve searched for people I once knew. I’ve visited my past. Three funerals. One in each town I’d lived. Not a soul remains.” She lets out a long sigh. “Do I still exist if the people I shared my life with are gone?”
“You can’t be serious.” A burst of adrenaline makes my muscles twitch. “How can you be talking about this right now when you took Eli? He doesn’t even know who I am!”
“He doesn’t remember you because he’s had a good life.”
My legs tighten. “He had a good life with us!”
“Was it? I gave him so much more than this.” She raises her hands. “Salem, Sparrow Lodge is pretty near the likes of a pig shed. Felix would be disappointed if he saw it today.”
“How dare you. How dare you come here acting like a sweet, innocent old lady when all you are is an evil kidnapper.” I roll my shoulders away from Nate’s hold. “I should smack you for being so insensitive. Eli thinks we died in a fire. That’s how my grandparents died.” I walk up to her. “You’re cruel. Your entire life has been a lie, and you turned his entire life into a lie. How is that better for him?”
“Ethan.”
“Don’t call him that. His name is Eli!” I bend in front of her and scream, “ELI!”
My gusty breath sends her hair upward. She leans back, her feet crossed, hands clasped. A minor tiff between Joss and Jim comes from the other room. Ollie barks louder, Nate asks if he should call the cops, and Virginia is unflappable through it all.
She unzips her purse and takes out a travel pack of crackers, tears open the cellophane package, and starts to nibble. After a short while, she swallows and says, “Ethan would’ve become lost in this family and this town. He would’ve ended up just like Felix. A nothing.”
“Oh…” My blood pumps away. “Oh, my granddad wasn’t a nothing. He was a beautiful person.”
“Beautiful in an ordinary sense.”
“You’re such a bitch!”
“Give it to her, Salem!” Joss shouts from behind the door.
Virginia studies me from head to toe, her smile much larger now. “Salem, can we have a conversation like two grown women? If not, I’ll call Ethan to bring Finn back, and he can show you the proper way to throw a tantrum.”
The Release of Secrets: A Novel Page 23
