Sing Them Home

by Stephanie Kallos

  “It did?”

  “You listened. You helped me figure something out.”

  She stands and stretches and inspects Mouse Town. “Okay. Let’s take care of these guys.”

  “What do we do with them?”

  “First we name them.” She consults with a small notebook on her worktable. “I alternate gender names, you know, like hurricanes. Right now we need a boy’s name beginning with ‘M.’”

  “Okay.”

  “Then we take them over to the ravine and let them go. There’s lots of cover there, places to burrow, so they have a better chance of surviving predators.”

  Gaelan thinks about asking his sister how she’s sure that she’s not just catching the same mice over and over again, but thinks better of it. He’s sure that, to Bonnie, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference.

  They leave without saying good-bye; in all likelihood they’ve forgotten he was here.

  He’s not offended; this kind of thing happens all the time. Blind Tom’s experience indicates that, when people are in the presence of someone who can’t see, they believe themselves to be invisible. This gives him access to all kinds of useful information.

  Middle C has been glued and clamped to the keyboard. His work is nearly done.

  Before leaving, he retrieves a wrapped gift and sets it inside Bonnie’s half of the store. He hopes she likes it. Consumer Reports says that the Vita-Mix 5000 (with its 1380 power wattage, sixty-four-ounce jar, and seven-year warranty) gets raves from owners, who testify that, for those who uses a blender daily—particularly for tough jobs—this is the one to get. It pulverizes whole fruits and vegetables, turns ice to snow in seconds, crushes wheat berries into flour, and its blades spin quickly enough to turn room-temperature ingredients into hot soup in about five minutes—all of which Blind Tom finds tremendously reassuring, since it gives him reason to believe that Bonnie’s days of thunking will finally be over.

  Viney has been waiting all day for this moment.

  Weeks ago, she moved Welly’s shoe boxes over from his house and arranged them on the floor on his side of the walk-in closet: boxes containing shoes are grouped in one area; boxes containing liquor occupy another.

  Viney is in the walk-in closet now, sitting on the floor. Closing her eyes, she reaches into one of the liquor boxes at random and pulls out two bottles: Bailey’s Irish Cream and Kaluha.

  From her side of the closet she brings a wrapped box out of the garment bag where it’s been hiding for the past month. The tag on the box reads: TO WELLY, WITH ALL MY LOVE, V.

  She opens the box. It’s a new pair of golf shoes. They were expensive, but he needed them.

  “Merry Christmas, honey,” she says, raising her bottle. “Here’s to us.”

  Hope’s Diary, 1968:

  The Censorship Capital of the World

  I fell down the stairs today.

  Not all the way, thank God, just the last few steps. It was just after I’d finished reading to the children and tucked them in for an afternoon nap.

  Not all of it can be blamed on the glass of wine I poured for myself as soon as we got back from the library (another trip to Italy!). I was walking too quickly and wearing toe-numbing high heels. Also, I was still distracted and angered. Bad combination.

  Late afternoon now. Waiting for L. to get home for dinner and assess my bruise.

  We’re on the back porch, Larken and Gaelan playing in the sandbox, Mommy holding a package of frozen peas and carrots to her hip.

  I can’t believe I actually dressed up for that bitch. Not just high heels either but a skirt and blouse and hose and even hair spray and makeup.

  Began the day with such high hopes. When I told L. of my plan he said, “You might want to reconsider.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Think about it, Hope. There’s a reason the library’s collection is a little …”

  “Archaic?”

  “Conservative.”

  I laughed. “It would be nice if the people of Emlyn Springs had the option of reading something that was written in the twentieth century.”

  “Don’t be sarcastic. You’re not going to make any friends talking like that.”

  “I’m not making any friends, period,” I reminded him. “Except Viney.”

  L. shrugged. “Good luck.”

  So, feeling like Mrs. Claus (in high heels), I loaded the books and the kids into the car first thing this morning and drove into town.

  Wanted to get Larken and Gaelan busy in the children’s corner before talking with the librarian, so I set them up with viewfinders. Sitting on the floor holding those oversize, ungainly devices to their eyes, they look like chubby exotic bugs. They love the “Wonders of the World” collection:Larken prefers the architectural wonders (Notre Dame, the Parthenon, etc.) while Gaelan loves the natural ones.

  Taking up my box of books, I wobbled toward the front desk and greeted Mrs. Burchett by saying, “I’m here to make a donation.”

  She peered over the top of the box. “That’s nice,” she answered. As librarians go, Myrtle Burchett is a caricature of repression. Hard to believe she’s married and has kids.

  I forged on. “I thought you’d like having some of these newer titles.”

  “Thank you.”

  For the next hour or so the children and I looked through the viewfinders, did wood puzzles, read. I found a couple of lovely picture books and a collection of American folktales for them, and for me, Hazel Williams’s self-published “History of Emlyn Springs” and a how-to on raising exotic hens. Figured it was time to explore what it means to be living in the former Fancy Egg capital of the world.

  Near noon, the children starting to get hungry, we took our selections to the front desk. My box was still sitting there. Clearly the contents had been examined; the books were now spines out and alphabetized by author.

  Mrs. Burchett started stamping due dates with a grim, measured determination. “I’m afraid we won’t be able to use those,” she said.

  She pushed the box toward me as if it contained decomposing roadkill.

  “What’s wrong, Mommy?” Gaelan asked.

  “Nothing, sweetheart. Here are your books.”

  “Let’s go,” Larken said, tugging my hand.

  “In a minute, honey.” I turned back to Mrs. Burchett. “Could you tell me what your objections are?”

  “Well, this volume of poetry, for instance. It’s obvious why we can’t accept this.”

  “It’s not obvious to me.” I swear I was trying to keep my voice civil.

  Mrs. Burchett clenched her teeth and opened the book. “This title,” she whispered, pointing. “ This word. I’m sure you can understand what’s inappropriate about that.” She then busied herself with stacking books on a small wheeled cart.

  “Can I have these?” Larken was foraging through my jacket pockets and found some after-dinner mints.

  “Yes. Share with your brother.”

  Mrs. Burchett looked up. “There’s no food allowed in the—” she began, but then stopped herself. She must have decided to make an exception for my poor dears because they’re being brought up by a woman who’s familiar with the word masturbate.

  Putting herself at the helm of the cart, Mrs. Burchett sailed out from behind the desk toward thestacks.

  “How about this,” I said, chasing after her with Harper Lee in hand.

  “The library board has already reviewed that one. There are issues of content.”

  I reminded her that “To Kill a Mockingbird” won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, but she moved on, stranding us among the library’s vast Harlequin Romance collection. I spent a few minutes de-alphabetizing. Larken threw a tantrum. Gaelan peed on the floor, I snatched up my box of censored books, and we made our exit. At home, lunch and Paul Bunyan tales and naps for them, a glass of wine and a tumble down the stairs for me.

  Back to my bruise: It’s spectacular. I’ve never seen anything like it. I regard its gorgeous mottled purples wi
th awe. I have a perverse desire to mentally replay the incident, watch it in slow motion. The physics of my fall must have been fascinating, the arrangement and movement of my limbs as I fell could have supplied the curriculum for a whole course at the university.

  It hurts to breathe—I slid down part of the way on my side, the wooden stair treads hammering against my ribs—but I don’t think I’ve broken anything and there are no bruises anywhere but on my leg. Hence-forward I will behave more sensibly when wearing unsensible shoes.

  Must go now. Children calling for me to come play.

  Chapter 19

  The Gatekeeper Deserts Her Post

  The cab does not come. This affirms Larken’s chronic anxiety about putting someone else in charge of her transportation; moreover, it’s ominous: If a cabbie is this unreliable, how can she feel unfettered, enthusiastic confidence in the pilot of a transcontinental jet?

  She creeps upstairs and knocks on the door. Jon answers. She’s not sure what she expected of his sleepwear—BVDs and a T-shirt maybe—but it wasn’t plaid flannel pajamas. He looks disturbingly adorable.

  “Sorry,” Larken whispers. “I’m so sorry.”

  “What?” Jon says. “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s late, I mean, it’s early, but my cab hasn’t arrived and I’m supposed to be at the airport”—she glances at her watch—“fifteen minutes ago.”

  “You gave the cabbie the wrong address, didn’t you?” Jon teases.

  Larken considers this. It’s not out of the realm of possibility. “I don’t think so. Anyway, so sorry, but could you drive me?”

  “Of course.”

  She waits on the threshold while he shuffles back into the apart-ment—on argyle slipper socks!—and pulls a bathrobe on over his PJs; it’s one of those old-fashioned ones that looks like it’s made from a blanket. He dons a vintage cashmere wool coat over the whole ensemble, slips his feet into faux-fleece snowboots, and tugs a knit hat onto his head. He scribbles a note and leaves it on the kitchen table. Only after he finishes putting on his gloves does he turn to face her.

  “Shall we?” he says. His face—the only uninsulated part of his anatomy—is flushed in places, full and smooth, and makes her think of ripe nectarines. Suddenly he looks very alert; but then, of the two of them, he is the morning person.

  “Right,” Larken replies. “Do you mind driving?”

  There’s a small sniffle; the two of them turn to see Esmé padding out of her room, half-asleep, tangled in her blanket and holding her orca whale by one worn fin. Blearily, she takes in the two of them. “Up,” she says, and—letting blanket and orca slide to the floor—holds out her arms.

  “Oh, no,” Jon sighs. “I’ll never get her back in bed now.”

  “Up,” Esmé murmurs again, arms and head and eyelids drooping.

  “We can take her,” Larken says, scooping Esmé into her arms. “I’ll grab her car seat if you can get my luggage.”

  “Okay, I’ll just tell Mia what’s going on.”

  Larken hoists Esmé onto one hip, grabs the blanket and bundles it around her, picks up the car seat, and heads downstairs and outside.

  “It’s dark,” Esmé says as Larken climbs into the backseat with her and starts buckling her in. “Where are we going?”

  “You and Daddy are taking me to the airport.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m going on a trip, remember? I told you about it.”

  “You’re always saying good-bye to me, Larkee.”

  “I know it must seem that way, sweetie, and I’m sorry to be going.”

  “So why are you?”

  “Because I made a promise to a friend.”

  “But you promised to come to my party, too.”

  “I know, sweet pea. But my friend got very sick, and he needs my help.”

  Esmé ponders this statement for a while. She grabs a section of her flyaway hair and starts twirling it.

  Larken goes on. “You know I love you very much, and I’m very, very sorry to be missing your party.”

  “You’re going to where Daddy was born.”

  “That’s right. I’m going to England.”

  “Wait, wait! Where’s Grentha?”

  “Here she is,” Jon says, arriving next to Larken and handing Esmé her orca whale. “And here’s a hat and slippers for cold toes.”

  Esmé submits to being shod and capped. “Larkee’s going to England, Da,” she says.

  “That’s right.”

  “And you know what?” Larken adds, giving Esmé a kiss. “I can write you an e-mail every day while I’m gone.”

  “Okay.”

  Jon and Larken settle into the front of the car, Jon cranks up the heat, and they’re off.

  After a few blocks, Larken glances over her shoulder. “She’s asleep.”

  “Remember how we used to have to drive her around for hours so she’d go down for a nap?”

  Larken laughs. “And then she’d wake up the minute we got in the house.”

  Jon smiles, but he seems subdued, melancholy.

  “Did she like her present?”

  “Oh my God, Larken, it was brilliant. She played with those puppets all day, acting out little dramas. Thanks to you she’ll probably believe in Santa until she’s thirty.”

  I hope so, Larken thinks. She swivels around. Esmé is snoring a little now. One of her hands rests on the pillow near her earlobe; she’s been rubbing it in her sleep. She’s always done this: It’s an unconscious gesture that she discovered in babyhood and has remained reliably self-comforting when she’s tired or anxious.

  Larken continues to stare at her, remembering another gesture Esmé had when she was a baby. She did it from the time she was six weeks old until she started talking, and although Larken and Jon were thrilled by the development of Esmé’s verbal vocabulary, they were saddened by the diminishing of her gestural one. Suddenly, her eyes would get a faraway look and she’d bring a cupped hand to one of her ears; and then, with a kind of slow, controlled grace that a newborn baby should not possess, she would start to draw a kind of parenthesis near her ear, over and over, as if she were outlining it in space. The first time Larken and Jon saw her do it, they were in Larken’s apartment; Esmé was in her high chair, and Jon was attempting to feed her a puree of pumpkin and avocado. Her concentration was so complete and deep, it was mesmerizing.

  It’s as if she’s tuning a radio, Jon had whispered. Trying to find the right frequency.

  Larken nodded and whispered back. Like she’s getting a signal from deep space.

  Eventually they found the perfect description: She was getting e-mail from the angels.

  It’s true that 9/11 launched a national period of grief and instilled in many Americans a paralyzing fear of flying—grief and fear being often emotional twins—but Professor Jones’s pathology is much older.

  Growing up, she was rarely called upon to fly. There were occasional family trips to Nebraska bowl games—Florida, California, Texas —infrequent visits to relatives who lived far enough away to make driving impractical. They were uneventful. She doesn’t remember them.

  But after 1978, she started having nightmares, all obvious variations on a theme: She’d be forcefully jettisoned from strange orbed vessels that were surveilling Tornado Alley—a UFO abductee reject!—or find herself skydiving with a failed parachute, released from a giant raptor’s talons, blown from the top of the Eiffel Tower or the Empire State Building. Once she dreamed of being on top of Lincoln’s state capitol building with its huge bronze figure of the Sower, cradled safely at first in his giant sloped sack, so like a hammock, it even swayed gently, but then he reached in without warning, blithely scooped her up, and cast her out as if she were nothing more than a handful of grain.

  Larken’s fear crept up upon her insidiously, like a passenger who comes to sit next to you when you’re sleeping: One minute they aren’t there, the next minute they are, and far too close and breathing in your ear and even being so bold as to r
est their head on your shoulder. Because she and her family never traveled anywhere farther than Omaha after Hope went up (they didn’t dare; unspoken among them was the feeling that she still might show up and come looking for them), it was an unexpressed condition.

  And so Larken didn’t realize how experience and dreams were forging her fear of flying—not until she was a college sophomore and signed on for one of these winter break trips herself. It was a trip Arthur organized and chaperoned when he was chairman. Eloise came, too—then as now, they went everywhere together.

  It began just as the engines revved up in preparation for takeoff. Larken’s palms grew sweaty; her breathing became rapid.

  “This is really your first time flying?” her seatmate asked. A fellow student, he was a boy whose parents had taken him to Europe from the time he was ten. He’d seen all the paintings they were about to see at least three times. Larken had a little crush on him.

  She hadn’t been able to answer. Something was wrong with her lungs.

  “Larken?” he repeated. Then he pushed an overhead button and summoned the stewardess.

  “What’s the problem? We’re about to take off.” Larken saw in the face of the stewardess the extent of her illness, the way a mortally wounded soldier in the field might not realize that his guts were strewn about the field until he looked into the eyes of one of his comrades. She became aware, too, that passengers were staring at her: fascinated, repulsed, annoyed, amused.

  Was there a doctor on board? (A physician! Larken wanted to shout, but the rapidity of her breath wouldn’t allow her to speak.)

  There wasn’t. They had to stop taxiing, turn off the engines. Everything came to a halt.

  It was Eloise and Arthur who came to her rescue. They moved to sit with her—Arthur in the window seat, Eloise in the middle. Eloise held Larken’s hand, gave her a Valium, and got her to breathe in and out of a barf bag.

  Thus sedated, she made it to Europe for the one and only time, barely able to register any feeling at seeing the glorious paintings she’d studied and longed to see, the whole time dreading the inevitable horror of having to fly home. Before they left, a French doctor administered a powerful sedative and she was able to sleep the entire way. She never flew again.