Sparrow Road

by Sheila O'Connor

  Mama was a long time in Viktor’s office—so long I walked back to our cottage, climbed the stairs up to my bed, slid my sketchbook from my mattress, and told Lyman the terrible story of my day. Lyman was half diary, half person—someone who would listen, and someone who would talk.

  What’s wrong? I wrote. Why does Mama make me stay so close? Why won’t she let me go like other kids? Why was she worried about Comfort?

  I waited, but Lyman wouldn’t answer.

  Lyman? I closed my eyes. My lids were hot, my skin itched from the heat. Everything about the day seemed fever strange—the long bike ride through the valley, Josie’s crazy plan for the Arts Extravaganza, the painter on the street, the way he turned back and barely waved. Mama’s sudden date. Viktor forcing me to leave while everybody watched.

  Why did Viktor make me leave? Why didn’t he let me stay in town with Josie? What are he and Mama talking about now? Why did Mama move us here this summer? What secret are they hiding in that town?

  Well, there has to be a story, Lyman finally said.

  I know, I said. But what?

  What was or what could be? Lyman said. Dream. Maybe your answer will be there.

  Maybe, I wrote. Then I dropped my sketchbook on the floor and fell asleep.

  19

  I woke to muffled voices floating through my window. Mama and Diego, their talk more murmurings than words.

  “I can’t blame Viktor for today,” Mama said. “He was only trying to help. He knows I want to handle this my way. In my own time.”

  “Still,” Diego said. “Did he need to bring her home?”

  “It was probably for the best,” Mama said. “At least until Raine knows; and I want to do it right. When I’m certain Raine is ready.”

  “But isn’t that the reason why you came here in the first place?”

  “It hasn’t even been two weeks,” Mama said. “I wanted Raine to settle in at Sparrow Road before I told her.”

  Told me what? Mama’s voice sounded serious, like something horrible was ahead. Like Grandpa Mac was sick. Or maybe something worse.

  “I think she’s settled in,” Diego said. “Are you sure it’s Raine who isn’t ready?”

  At first Mama didn’t answer. “You’re right,” she finally said. “It’s me.”

  “I know it’s tough, but you can do it, Molly.” Diego sounded like he had the day he’d helped me climb the ladder. “You can. And a good time would be now.”

  When I heard our screen door slam, I lay there still as stone. Downstairs Mama opened the old refrigerator and poured herself a drink. Lemonade. We always had a pitcher in our refrigerator here. Fresh lemonade with blueberries on top.

  “Hey,” I called. The heat from the low ceiling pressed against my skin. I couldn’t stay up here much longer.

  “Raine?” Mama sounded shocked. Before I could go down, she hurried up the steps. “Why are you here in bed in the middle of the day?”

  “I fell asleep. Why were you so long in Viktor’s office?” I rolled my eyes; I wanted her to know my anger hadn’t passed.

  Mama sat down on my bed. “A nap? Sweetheart, are you okay? Are you sick from that long bike ride?” She pressed her icy hand against my forehead. “Looks like a storm is on the way. It’s a good thing Viktor brought you home.”

  “It’s not,” I said. “And that’s not why he made me leave.”

  “Lemonade?” She offered me her glass. I shook my head; my stomach did feel sick. “It’s like an oven in here, Raine.”

  “Why’d you bring me here?” I said to Mama.

  “Here?” Mama glanced away.

  “To Sparrow Road. I just heard Diego say it. He said it’s why we came to Sparrow Road. That thing you should have told me. And why did Viktor take me back from town?”

  “Oh, Raine.” Mama scooted closer. “I know some things seem strange here.”

  “More than some,” I said. “But you won’t ever tell me.”

  “Telling isn’t always easy, Raine.” Mama combed her fingers through my hair. “Sometimes the truth isn’t always what you want. Even when you ask for it.”

  “I want the truth today,” I said.

  Another flash of worry passed over her tight face. “I know you do.” She gave my hand a squeeze. “But I’m not sure where to start.”

  “Just start at the beginning. Why we’re here? What’s going on with Viktor? Why’d he drive me home from Comfort?”

  “All right.” Mama heaved a heavy sigh. “I’ll start with why we’re here.”

  Mama said it was a story we had to settle in for, a story she couldn’t tell me in the weight of all this heat, so first she made us go downstairs. Outside, the meadow sky was a sickly shade of green. “The calm before the storm,” Mama said as she closed the cottage door and latched the lock. Then she sat down on the couch and took a long, slow breath. “You know how mad Grandpa Mac was about this job? How upset he was with me the day he drove us to the train?”

  “Yes,” I said. Even now, his letters only came for me. “He didn’t want us to leave.”

  “He didn’t,” Mama agreed. “He certainly did not.” Storm darkness loomed over the room. Drops of rain plinked against the roof. “But mostly Grandpa Mac was mad because there was someone here he didn’t want you to meet.”

  “Here?” I said, confused. The only people here to worry Grandpa Mac would be Eleanor or Viktor, but Grandpa Mac didn’t know either one.

  “Sweetheart.” Mama tucked my hands inside of hers. “You have a—” She stopped like the word was stuck down in her throat. “I mean—you have a father, Raine.” She pressed hard on my hands like she was afraid I’d pull away, run out in the storm.

  People think we didn’t have parents. We had parents. Lyman’s voice echoed in my brain. I had a father. Everybody did. “I know,” I said, like it wasn’t even news. I didn’t want Mama to know how much it made my throat ache to hear her finally say it, after years and years of saying that I didn’t.

  “You do?” Mama reared her head back in surprise.

  “I guess,” I said. “I know I have one someplace. Everybody does.”

  “Oh,” Mama stammered. “Yes, of course. Of course you’d know that, Raine.”

  A gust of wind blew back the kitchen curtains and thunder shook the walls. The sky moved from day to night.

  “So?” I said. “Is that the person Grandpa Mac didn’t want me to meet? Him?” I couldn’t stop my heart from pounding, so fast and hard I heard it in my ears.

  “Yes.” Mama’s eyes held mine. “Yes,” she said again.

  That man was here at Sparrow Road? “Is it Diego?” I heard the hope squeak out in my voice; Diego would be the perfect dad. Maybe that’s why he told Mama she should tell me. And why he’d asked about my dad the first day that we met. And why he spent all that time with Mama. Maybe Mama brought me here to meet Diego. “Mama, is it him?”

  “Diego?” Mama gave a small, sad smile. “No, but Diego would be lovely, Raine.”

  Suddenly my heart lurched inside my chest. If my dad wasn’t Diego, that only left one man. I slapped my hands over my ears; I didn’t want to hear it. Not another word. The root beer float rose up in my stomach. “I don’t want to know,” I said.

  “Raine.” Mama rubbed a circle on my back. “Sweetheart, you said that you were ready for the truth.”

  “But I don’t want it to be Viktor.” His name came out like a choke. My father was the Iceberg. A silent, sunken man as old as Grandpa Mac.

  “Viktor?” Mama’s eyes grew huge. “Oh, heavens!” She shook her head. “Raine, it isn’t Viktor!”

  “No?” I let my hands drop from my ears. “You’re sure?”

  “Absolutely.” Mama gave a little laugh. “I’m sure it isn’t Viktor.”

  “Then who?” There wasn’t another man at Sparrow Road.

  Mama stared out at the storm. “Gray,” she finally said. “Gray James.”

  “Gray James?” The words sounded like the weather. “Gray James? Is that
some kind of name?”

  “Yes,” Mama said. “It’s his name.”

  “Gray James?” I said again, confused. “But I don’t know him, Mama.”

  “Not yet.” Mama lifted up my chin. “But he wants to know you, Raine.”

  20

  For the first few minutes, Mama let me sit in silence with that name. Gray James. It was a name I’d never heard. Not anywhere. Not at Sparrow Road. Not even in Milwaukee.

  “He’s here?” I shook my head. “Where?” I stood up and looked out the open window. The storm had settled some, a bruised sky stretched over the field. Gray James wasn’t here at Sparrow Road. Wasn’t living in the attic or in some silent wing. If he was here, I would have seen him.

  “In Comfort,” Mama said.

  “In Comfort? Gray James lives in Comfort? Is that why you wouldn’t let me go to town? Why Viktor took me home today? So Gray James wouldn’t see me? Or so I wouldn’t see him?”

  Mama gave a guilty nod. “More or less,” she said. “Yes. All those things.”

  “But why didn’t you just tell me? Right from the beginning?”

  “It’s complicated, Raine. Gray and I have things we still need to resolve. Grown-up things. And I needed to be ready.”

  “Ready for what, Mama?”

  “I don’t know.” Mama looked up at the ceiling. “The changes this will bring. Sharing you with Gray, I guess. I know that it sounds selfish, but sharing you with Grandpa Mac has been enough. And our life has been so happy. At least it has been for me.” The way that Mama said it made a lump grow in my throat. “And now all that could change.”

  “It’ll still be happy, Mama.” I didn’t want Gray James to change my happy life.

  “I suppose,” Mama said, like she wasn’t quite so sure. “We just have to see what happens next. What you want to do now that you know.”

  “Do?” I said.

  “Yes,” Mama said. “You’re old enough to make up your own mind. I shouldn’t be in the middle anymore.”

  “Me?” I said again. “Gray James is up to me?”

  “Yes,” Mama said. “You and Gray will have to work it out.”

  “But how?” I said. Gray James was a stranger.

  Suddenly another wave of storm pounded on our cottage, with balls of hail pelting past our windows. Outside looked like a blizzard in July. The whine of the old refrigerator stopped.

  “I hope it’s not a sign!” Mama said. Up at the main house, all the lights were out. A wall of darkness everywhere and it wasn’t even night. Mama lit two candles and set them on the table.

  If I ever sewed a memory patch, I knew what mine would be—Viktor’s truck and hail and root beer floats and Josie, how hot it was this morning biking through the valley. And behind it all a mystery. Gray James? I’d stitch his name in secret letters, or in little tiny print only I could see.

  “But who is he?” I asked. Once, I overheard Grandpa Mac tell Mr. Sheehan that Mama got mixed up with a man who wasn’t worth a dime. A no-good we were better off without. And sometimes after that, I worried he might have been in prison, dangerous, or else Mama would have told me who he was. “I mean, more than just his name? What kind of person is he?”

  Mama stiffened. “What do you want to know exactly?”

  “I don’t know. Like is he dangerous? Could he hurt us in some way? Hurt me?” I’d held that fear inside for so long it almost hurt to say it.

  “Oh no.” Mama brushed my cheek. “Not dangerous. Not in the ways you mean. Most the harm Gray’s done, he’s done to himself.” Mama pressed her lips against my forehead. “In fact, you have his gentle spirit, Raine.”

  It felt strange to hear Mama say I came from someone else, someone who wasn’t an O’Rourke. Maybe I’d inherited his black hair and crooked teeth? His big dark eyes? Maybe he was short like me? So little of my looks came down from Grandpa Mac or Mama. Mama cupped my face with her soft hands. “I’ve always seen him in you, Raine. Every day since your beginning. All the things I loved about Gray James live inside you.”

  “You loved him, Mama?” If Mama loved him why weren’t they together? Why didn’t she ever say his name? Why didn’t she want him in our life?

  “Of course I did,” Mama said. “I loved him for a long, long time.”

  21

  Mama and I stayed camped out in our cottage, the electricity still down, with peanut butter sandwiches and apples for a snack. Mama told me Gray James was a musician from Missouri. A folk singer famous in some circles for the sad songs that he sang. She said they’d met in Amsterdam when she was singing on the street. “My hippie days.” She shook her head. “Back when I was living on that boat.”

  “Before we moved back to Milwaukee to live with Grandpa Mac?”

  “Yes,” Mama said.

  “Well, if you loved him, why didn’t you get married?”

  “Oh, Raine.” Mama blushed, embarrassed. It was a blush that made me worry that Mama was in this love alone. “I don’t want to talk about those things.”

  “But did he disappear? I mean, all these years, where was he?”

  Mama stared into my eyes, the kind of long look she gave before she told me something serious. “Gray has things he plans to tell you for himself. It’s not for me to say.” She lifted up our dirty plates and walked over to the sink.

  “But why?” I said. “And if he wasn’t really dangerous, why didn’t I ever know him before now? Not even his name? Or that he was a singer from Missouri? Things you could’ve told me.”

  “I could have.” Mama stared out at the meadow. “And I know you think I should have. But I wanted you to have a family you could count on. Stable. Steady. And I couldn’t count on Gray. Plus Grandpa Mac didn’t want him in our life. I thought the family that we built would be enough.”

  “It was,” I said. “But I wish he hadn’t been a mystery. I wish I would have known his name at least.”

  “I’m sorry,” Mama said. “But what I did, I did with love.”

  It wasn’t until Diego showed up at our cottage with a plate of oatmeal cookies that Mama remembered the artists needed supper and I remembered that Diego said we had a date out on the lake.

  “We already ate,” Diego said. “A feast of leftovers and cookies we scrounged out of the freezer. The electricity’s still down. And I’m afraid the butter-brickle ice cream melted to a mess. But we can still go on the boat.”

  Mama wrapped her arm around my back. “We’re not up for company tonight. It’s been a big day here.” The way she said big day, I knew she was sending a signal to Diego.

  Diego nodded like he knew the truth was finally told. He stepped back from the cottage. “In that case, our rowboat ride can wait.” He took a little bow and set the plate of cookies in my hand. “And Raine, Josie said to tell you that the rhubarb taffy’s still a go.”

  “The rhubarb taffy!” In all this talk of Gray James, I’d forgotten the Rhubarb Social was tomorrow. Our rhubarb taffy still needed to be made.

  “But first you’ll need electricity,” Diego said. “Josie plans to brew it bright and early. She’ll probably be at your door at sunrise.”

  “Oh,” Mama moaned like she was sick. “That Rhubarb Social is tomorrow.” I knew now why Mama didn’t want us to go. Gray James lived in town. “We might just stay home.”

  “No,” I said. “I have to go. We’ve been planning it all week.” Josie said there’d be people at the picnic who remembered when the orphans lived at Sparrow Road. Maybe someone who knew Lillian. Someone who could tell us the way things used to be.

  “Josie’s got everybody going,” Diego said to Mama. “Even Lillian and Viktor.”

  “Eleanor?” I asked.

  “No.” Diego laughed. “I don’t think she recruited Eleanor.”

  Mama pulled me closer. “Tomorrow’s just too early. Raine doesn’t even know when or where or if she wants to meet him.” Mama had said that just because Gray lived as close as Comfort didn’t mean I’d have to meet him if it wasn’t what I wanted
now.

  “Of course,” Diego said. “Raine will need more time. But that doesn’t mean she has to miss the Rhubarb Social.”

  “But what if Gray is there?” Mama said. “Eating rhubarb pie? And the two of them just meet? I want Raine to have a choice. To meet him when she’s ready.”

  Tomorrow was too early; after twelve long years without him, I needed time to get used to Mama’s news. Figure out what I wanted next. But I didn’t want to miss the Rhubarb Social either. I’d already had one good day with Josie ruined. “Mama,” I said. “We’ve been planning this all week. Can’t you call him on the phone? Ask him not to go?”

  “I can try,” Mama said. “If you’re sure that’s what you want.”

  22

  “Wow!” Josie whistled. “This is guite a crowd for Comfort. You ready for a party, Raine?” She pulled our tins of rhubarb taffy from her backpack and set them on the table with every other rhubarb recipe the folks from Comfort cooked.

  “Sure,” I said. I was, but not as ready as I had been before Gray James became a name, a what-if as close as Comfort. Now I mostly had him on my mind.

  “Well, we’re the only rhubarb taffy!” Josie said. There was rhubarb crisp and rhubarb ice cream, rhubarb bars and cookies, rhubarb cake and bread, rhubarb soup and rhubarb tea brewing in the sun. “We win for originality at least!”

  “True.” I tried to smile. It might have been original, but our taffy tasted terrible—sweet and sour and stringy. I was glad my name wasn’t on the tins.

  “Come on.” Josie yanked my arm. “Let’s go make some friends!”

  The two of us worked the Rhubarb Social as a pair while Mama watched us from a table in the shade. She kept her worried eyes on me like Gray James just might be here after all.

  “And this would be our writer, Raine,” Josie said to everyone we met. She dragged me through the picnic and made me shake so many hands I felt like I was running for election.

  Most the men I saw made me think about Gray James. Was he somewhere at this picnic? Would I shake his hand by accident and not know it was him? That singer from Missouri? That gentle spirit Mama couldn’t count on?