We are all silent, perfectly still. “I’m so sorry,” Benjamin finally says.
“So am I,” Elena says matter-of-factly. After a few more moments of silence, Elena says, her tone softening, “Tell me more about Kristoff.”
I tell her what I know, how he came to California in search of Frederick, and maybe her, how he found my grandparents and fell in love with my mother instead. “Gideon Leser was your grandfather?” Elena smiles for the first time. “He saved my father’s life.”
“My father’s, too,” I say. I wish Grandpa Gid were still here, that he could see this moment. He would take credit for nothing, none of it, though it is his to own. I wish Gram had walked out with us at least, so she could hear this.
“I tried to write to my father, after the war,” Elena says. “But I never heard anything back.” I tell her what Gram said about how Frederick, Charlie, only lived another year or so after he came to San Diego. “Well,” she says. “At least he did not die like a dog watching his country be destroyed. I am forever grateful for that. My mother wasn’t so lucky, she died in Mauthausen. I made a terrible mistake sending her that stamp, and I have never forgiven myself.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” I say. There were thousands and thousands of names on the Red Cross lists I’d read on microfiche, so many innocent people murdered. “So many people died in camps.”
But she just shakes her head, sadly, like she doesn’t believe me. “I tried to look for Miriam after the war, too, before the wall went up, but we never had the money to go to the UK to search for her, and then after the GDR took over, I doubt any of my letters ever even made it out of the country.” She turns to look at me. “You have actually talked to her? Seen her?” I nod, and she smiles again. She’s beautiful when she smiles. Her entire face comes alive—all the years of war and hardship haven’t stolen her beauty from her.
“I have her contact information in my purse.” I pull it out and hand it to Elena. I’ve already added the information to my address book at home, so I don’t need this copy that I’ve been dragging around with me since our trip to Wales.
She takes it, thanks me, stands. “I’d better get back. The women will start to worry.” And she begins to walk back toward the café. Just like that.
“Wait,” I call after her. “Your letter.” I pick it up from the bench where she left it.
She shakes her head. “I haven’t been Elena Faber in so many years. Perhaps your father might want to hold on to it still?”
“No.” I shove it at her. “He wants you to have it. And he’d love to see you,” I add. I really want to keep the promise I made to him that if I found her, I would bring her to see him. “He’s living in a nursing home in California, LA. He wouldn’t be able to make the trip out here. But maybe you’ll come to him?”
“Oh.” Her body deflates. “He’s in a home? He’s ill?”
“Physically he’s fine. But his memory isn’t . . . well, he was losing things, time. He has Alzheimer’s and he couldn’t live alone any longer. But the Willows, where he lives, is a beautiful place,” I assure her.
Elena looks down, then takes the letter and puts it in her bag. “He lost me. We lost each other so long ago,” she says. “Perhaps it is better just to leave it all in the past.”
Now that we found her, I don’t want to let her go. I want to drag her back to California with me, present her to my father at the Willows, like a prize I might have been overjoyed to win at the pier as a little girl. Here’s your gem, I might tell him.
But she moves to walk back inside the café, and I realize there’s nothing I can do to stop her. I grab one of my cards out of my purse and shove it at her. “Here, please. Stay in touch at least.”
She smiles wanly but takes the card. “You seem like a sweet girl, Katie,” she says. “He got very lucky to have you. Lucky to have such a wonderful and free life with you in America. He doesn’t need me.”
“But . . . he does,” I stammer. I want to tell her how he’s been drawing her lately, remembering the past, remembering how he loved her.
“No,” she says before I can say anything else. “I am nothing but an old ghost. And he has you.”
Los Angeles, 1990
I SPEND THANKSGIVING MORNING at the Willows with my dad. They serve a lunch in the atrium at noon for residents and their families: turkey and mashed potatoes and stuffing—all catered and surprisingly good. My dad and I eat at a table for two, and we talk about Thanksgivings past. We talk about my mom, and how she once set a turkey on fire when she tried to get creative and deep-fry it. It’s one of those memories that I’m not even sure I really remember, but it’s become a story I’ve told so many times that sometimes I feel like I’ve invented it. My mom used to laugh about it, years later, and remembering that is our favorite part.
I haven’t told my father about the trip to Germany yet, and I’m not sure if I ever will. Part of me wants so badly to tell him that Elena is alive, but then I realize I’ll have to tell him the rest, about how she got there and what Josef did. And that, even knowing he’s alive, she didn’t want to come to see him. She’s a different person now. So is he, of course. But her memory is intact. She’s living her life in the future, in a Germany that’s finally free after so many years of her fighting. My father, on the other hand, is living his life in a muddled past.
“Where’s your husband?” my father asks, forgetting both Daniel’s name and the fact that we’re divorced. He looks around the room, as if maybe Daniel is here somewhere, and he’s gotten misplaced.
“Oh, he’s not here,” I say. “We’re divorced, remember?”
“Ahh, yes, of course.” He always smiles when I tell him that now, as if he still holds on to the memory, the feeling, that he always knew deep down it wasn’t going to work out between Daniel and me.
“I’m going to Gram’s for dinner tonight,” I say.
I plan to drive down after I leave here. I called and invited Benjamin last night, on a whim, but I left him a message, and he hasn’t called back. We’ve talked a few times since we got back from Germany. I called him once to thank him for all his help the past year and to ask if he had any ideas for what I might do with the rest of my father’s collection. It’s taking up an entire closet in my tiny apartment. He called me last week to tell me how another client of his had a genuine Faber in his collection, and asked if I wanted to see it before they auctioned it off. I said I would, but we had yet to arrange a time. And then last night, I offered up the invitation to Gram’s. It felt weirdly personal in the face of our other interactions these past few weeks and months, but he was so sad this time last year, and I didn’t want him to be alone.
“You’ll give her my best,” my father says. Then he adds, “I’m afraid I won’t be able to make it back. I’m needed here.”
“Of course,” I murmur, not sure who’s speaking to me now, Ted or Kristoff, what world he has lost himself to at the moment inside his failing mind. I lean over and kiss his balding head. “I’ll see you next week,” I tell him.
When I get back to my apartment, Benjamin is sitting by the front door, reading a book. He jumps up when he sees me, and I smile. “You said you were leaving at one in your message, but then when I got here and you were gone, I thought maybe I’d already missed you.”
“Nope.” I unlock the door and let us both inside. Lucky glances at me, then jumps on him, and he pets her until she calms down. “Just visiting my father first. They had a lunch over there. So you’re coming to Coronado with me?”
“I don’t know. I thought I was. But then I got here and I thought I probably won’t be the greatest company.”
“When are you ever the greatest company?” I deadpan. He laughs a little. “You’re coming,” I say. Not a question, a command. “What are you going to do here by yourself except for wallow? And that’s not what Sara would want you to do. She loved Thanksgiving, right? And besid
es, Gram adores you. She’ll be upset if you’re not there.”
“Really?” His face softens. He likes Gram. I could tell by the sweet way he looked after her on the plane rides back from Berlin, carrying her suitcases, helping her into her seat, offering her his headphones.
“Yes,” I say, though I haven’t told Gram I’ve invited him. But I also know she will be thrilled to see him.
Two hours later, Gram welcomes us both into her cottage with a hug, then ushers us into the dining room, which is already packed with her bridge friends. I put Lucky in the backyard, and when I get back Gram has already pulled out all the photos Benjamin took in Germany (which apparently he printed and sent to her, unbeknownst to me) to show all her friends during dinner. The ladies who, six months ago, were dying to set me up with their sons, offer me approving nods and basically leave me alone, so I don’t bother explaining to them that Benjamin and I are just friends.
Everyone eats too much, drinks too much wine, including me and Benjamin, and Gram offers up her guest room so we don’t have to drive back tonight. She has only one bed in there, so Benjamin offers to take the couch. Gram simply says, “Everyone sleep wherever you want. I don’t judge.” Then she kisses us both and heads off to bed.
“She’s funny when she drinks,” I say, though I don’t know how much she really drank. Gram would wholeheartedly make that comment sober. But Benjamin laughs, and starts washing some of the dishes Gram left in the sink.
I go over and help him. He washes. I dry. Until everything is clean and out on Gram’s counters. “You going to bed?” Benjamin asks me. He dries his hands on a dish towel and turns to look at me.
“Probably not.” The kitchen clock tells me it’s after ten, but I’m still a little buzzed from the wine, and I don’t feel remotely tired.
“You want to take your dog for a walk? I’m still full from dinner, I could walk around a little.”
“Sure, we can head across the street to the beach. Grab your jacket. It’s cold down there this time of year.”
I get Lucky and we head out front, and walk down the street by the Hotel del Coronado, which is lit up, this beautiful historic beacon by the sea. Benjamin hasn’t seen it like this, and he stops for a minute to take it in. We walk down another block, toward the ocean, and I shiver a little as wind shifts off the water, and the temperature drops.
“You know what’s weird?” Benjamin says as we walk along the beach. “I never expected any of this.”
“What?” I take my shoes off and let my feet sink into the sand, and we walk down toward the water where the sand is harder, colder, but easier to walk on.
“Your grandmother. This dinner. You. I mean, when you walked into my office a year ago with your father’s collection, I didn’t even see you.”
“Gee thanks.” I laugh a little. “Guess I just blended in with his stamps.”
“No, I don’t mean that,” he says. I can’t see his face. It’s too dark, but I guess he’s blushing, embarrassed.
“I know what you mean,” I admit. “I almost didn’t get out of my car and go into your office that first morning.”
“I’m glad you did,” Benjamin says.
“Yeah, me too.”
“I’ve been thinking these past few months about Kristoff and Elena’s story, about what happened to them, what the stamp meant to them. But this morning when I got your message, I realized what their stamp meant to me.” He’s talking quickly, and he pauses to catch his breath. “If it hadn’t been for that stamp, I never would’ve seen you. I never would’ve really looked at you.”
He stops walking, and so do I. He turns to face me, to look at me now. The moon is full, glinting off the water. I can make out the shape of his face, the downturn of his lips, his serious expression.
“And what do I look like?” I ask.
He puts his hand to my cheek, slowly, as if he expects me to pull back. But when I don’t, he strokes my cheek with his thumb. “You’re really beautiful,” he says. “And smart. And you’re kind. And you love your family a lot. The way you look after your father and Gram . . .”
I don’t know why but I feel like I’m about to cry. “You’ve had too much wine.”
“I’m not drunk,” he says. “Well, maybe a little.”
I laugh. I’m a little drunk, too. “You know,” I say, feeling bold from wine, from Benjamin’s sweet words. “We could go to dinner sometime back in LA. Talk about something other than stamps, maybe.”
“I’d like that,” he says. He leans in a little closer, like he’s going to kiss me, but instead he brushes his lips against my forehead briefly and then steps back.
But I pull him back close to me, and I stand up, lean in, and I kiss him on the lips. It’s been a while since I kissed anyone, but I can’t remember it ever feeling exactly like this, warm and perfect, and new, and like my entire body is sighing with relief, finally. I hadn’t realized how long I’ve been wanting to do this until right this very moment.
“That’s what I meant to do,” he says when we pull back.
“I know,” I say.
“And not because I’m drunk.”
I laugh. “I know,” I say again.
Maybe my father was right. There isn’t just one ending, one answer, one person who can make us happy, or not. Maybe we can all begin again, become different people.
Benjamin takes my hand, and he and Lucky and I walk back to Gram’s house.
Los Angeles, 1991
ONE MORNING AT THE END of January, I wake up to my phone ringing at seven. Benjamin. But I open my eyes, and he’s sleeping here next to me. I smile for a second, before I worry that something is wrong with Gram or my father, and I jump out of bed to run into the kitchen to answer the phone.
“Miss Lawrence,” the woman on the other end of the line says. “It’s Gretchen from the Willows.”
“Is my father okay?” I ask, alarmed. Sally got married, then moved away and left her job at the end of last month and I don’t know Gretchen yet, or how fast she is to call me if my father is agitated.
“Yes, yes, your father is fine. Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.” I glance at the clock, wondering if I’d misread the one in my bedroom, but no, it is definitely seven a.m. “It’s just . . . someone’s here, demanding to see your father. She’s not on the approved list, and as you know, visiting hours don’t begin until eight. She got really annoyed with me and started yelling in another language. I wanted to call the police, but she said I should call you . . .” Her voice trails off, as if she’s considering if that was a mistake, and maybe she should’ve just called the police.
My mouth is open, but for a moment I can’t speak. Elena?
“I mean, should I call the police?” Gretchen asks.
“No, no, don’t call the police. I’ll be there as soon as I can,” I say.
Fifteen minutes later Benjamin and I are rushing into the lobby of the Willows. Benjamin came here with me once, last month, when the Willows decided to light a menorah on the first night of Hanukkah and I’d invited him to come and meet my father. They talked stamps, and my father’s face had lit up, though I’m pretty sure he had no idea that Benjamin and I are dating, and I doubt he’ll remember Benjamin today. But I’m glad he’s here.
As we walk inside, I convince myself that maybe I read too much into what Gretchen said on the phone. “Maybe it’s not her?” I say to Benjamin.
“What, some other woman yelling in German that she wants to see your father?”
“Gretchen didn’t say German. She said another language. I assumed.”
“It’s her,” Benjamin says, and of course, calm, rational guy that he is, he’s right. As soon as we turn the corner into the main lobby I see her sitting in a chair. She’s wearing a long floral dress, the colors too bright. Her hair falls in long gray waves, all around her face, and she clutches her giant black bag tightly i
n her lap, seeming afraid Gretchen or one of the other nurses might steal it.
I wave to her, and she stands, and frowns at Gretchen. “See, I am at the right place.”
I realize I have met Gretchen before—last week when I was here. I just didn’t know her by name yet. She’s a petite woman who looks too young to already have her nursing degree. I would’ve pegged her as no more than sixteen, and she looks terrified of Elena now.
“It’s okay,” I say to her. “Ms. Faber—wait, March—does know my father. I didn’t realize she was coming or I would’ve added her to the list.”
“I told you,” Elena practically spits in her face.
“There are rules, ma’am,” Gretchen says. “I have to follow the rules.”
“Rules,” Elena grunts. Elena doesn’t follow rules.
“And visiting hours still don’t start for thirty minutes.” Gretchen taps her watch and looks pointedly at me.
“Come on.” I touch Elena’s arm. “We can go across the street, get a cup of coffee, and then we’ll come back at eight.” She stares at me skeptically, and I still can’t believe she’s here. “I promise,” I say.
We sit in the smoking section at Pete’s so Elena can have a cigarette. She lights one as soon as we slide into the booth, and then she exhales.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you here,” I say to her. “You should’ve called. Told me you were coming.”
The Lost Letter Page 25
