Songs of the Humpback Whale: A Novel in Five Voices

by Jodie Picoult

  During our talk, Hadley had said, “I’m sure you can remember when you had a good time with him.” So I thought. But I could only remember when he had bought me a bicycle. He came with me into the street to show me how to ride it. He told me how to pedal and what balance was, scientifically. A couple of times he ran down the street beside me, yelling, You’ve got it! You’ve got it! Then he seemed to fall back. I kept pedaling and pedaling but I reached a hill I could not manage. I kept thinking, I want Daddy to notice me, how well I do. When I fell off the bicycle I watched it roll down the hill, dented and busted, and I did not notice I was bleeding. I needed stitches in my wrist and forehead that Christmas. My father had gone inside to take a business call.

  Hadley didn’t say anything at all when I told him that. He changed the topic. He told me if you handle apples like eggs and pack them just right, they will not bruise.

  I tried to talk about it again. Once I had gotten started, there was no stopping me. I told him about the time Daddy hit my mother, and about the plane crash. He stopped the tractor in the middle of the field to listen. I told him that I didn’t love my father.

  “Everyone loves their father.”

  “Why,” I had asked. “Who says that they’ve got that coming to them?”

  And Hadley started the tractor again and didn’t say much for the rest of the afternoon. He didn’t eat dinner with us. And now this.

  He thinks that I am a spoiled brat. That there is something wrong with me. Maybe there is something wrong with me. Maybe you are supposed to love your parents, no matter what.

  It is easier with my mother; it has to do with the way we both think. I feel I must be following in her footsteps, because every time I turn around she knows exactly where I stand. She doesn’t really judge me like my friends’ mothers do; she just takes me the way I am. Sometimes she really seems to like that, too. We’re more like equals, I suppose. She listens to me, but not because she’s my mother. She listens to me because she expects me to listen to her.

  When I was little I used to pretend my father had a pet name for me. He called me cookiepie and he would tuck me in at night, every other night, alternating with my mother. I believed in this so hard that I would shut my eyes tight under the covers until I heard footsteps, and someone stuffing the sheets under the mattress. Then I’d peek, and it was always my mother.

  As I got older I tried to see what held his interest. I’d snoop through the drawers in his study, holding charts this way and that. I’d steal his whale tapes and play them on my Walkman. Once I spent a week looking up all the words I didn’t get in an article he’d written. When he came home from his trip and saw that I had gone through his drawers he called me into the study. He made me bend over his knee and he spanked me. I was twelve.

  I went through a period then where I tried to see what other things might possibly hold his attention. I watched the way he moved around my mother. I expected to see it-love-but it was strange. They lived in the same house and could go for an entire day without saying anything to each other. I tried to see what I could do to make him notice me. I wore skirts that were too tight. I insisted on wearing makeup to school. I had my best friend’s older sister buy me a pack of cigarettes and I left them on top of my textbooks, right where my father would see it, but in the end he said nothing to me at all. In the end, it was my mother who grounded me for a month.

  There is only one time that I can remember my father in command of a situation. When I was five we sailed to Bermuda as a family-my father for work and my mother and I for pleasure. We visited many tourist attractions and we roasted hot dogs on the beach. We went out on my father’s rented boat to record the whales one day. My mother held onto the rail and I held onto my mother. My father ran around the boat, calling to the men who worked for him to change course and to raise the speed to so many knots. He paused only for a moment at the bow with his binoculars and when he saw what he was looking for he smiled so wide. He smiled like I had never seen him smile. I got scared and buried my face in my mother’s side.

  Without Hadley around there’s nothing for me to do at this orchard. Uncle Joley has gone to town with Sam and I don’t know any of the other workers by name. They are polite, but they don’t take time to explain.

  I’ve been walking aimlessly, and to my surprise I find my mother in the commercial section of the orchard. My mother, who doesn’t know and doesn’t care about farming at all. It’s a lazy kind of day. “You can feel the heat just hanging here, can’t you,” she says when she sees me. “It’s enough to make you want to go back to California.”

  She is sitting with her back pressed against a tree, one that I know has been sprayed recently. It will make her pretty cotton skirt smell like citronella. I don’t mention this, though. It is already too late. “Where have you been hiding yourself at this wonderful Club Med?”

  “Not much to do, is there? I was off with Hadley but he’s ignoring me today.” I try to sound nonchalant. “Acting like a big shot with Sam gone.”

  “Oh, please,” my mother says. She lolls her head backwards so that her chin points into the breeze. “Don’t even mention his name.”

  “Sam?”

  “The man is a fool. No social graces whatsoever. And rude-” she rubs her neck with her right hand, “-rude like I can’t tell you. I was in the bathroom this morning, and you know the way there’s no lock? Three guesses who comes waltzing in when I’m in the shower. And he has the audacity to stand in front of the mirror and lather his whole face with shaving cream before I can say, Excuse me. So when I do he turns around-turns around!- and looks at me. He gets all pissed off and says he isn’t used to having women around who spend half their lives in the bathroom.”

  I think this is hilarious. “Did he see you?”

  “Of course he saw me.”

  “No,” I say. “Did he see you?”

  “How should I know? And why should I care?”

  “Uncle Joley says Sam’s a really good businessman. He’s made the place three times as profitable as it was when his father was around.”

  “He may be a great businessman for all I care, but he’s a lousy host.”

  “We didn’t exactly come here invited.”

  “That’s not the point.” I want to ask her what the point is, but I decide to let it be.

  My mother stands up and twirls the cotton skirt. Citronella. She doesn’t seem to notice. “What do you think?”

  She had been raiding a closet in the room she’s sleeping in- Sam’s mother’s, I assume, all her extra clothes she didn’t take to Florida. The two women are not the same size; my mother has been wearing most things with a belt of Sam’s that she added another hole to.

  “Mom,” I ask, “why do you and Sam hate each other? You don’t know him well enough for that.”

  “Oh yes I do. Sam and I grew up with these stereotypes, you know? In Newton we used to make fun of all the tech kids who couldn’t get into colleges-not even state schools. It seemed every mechanic and carpenter had come from Minuteman and was proud of it, and we couldn’t understand it; you know the value of a good education. There’s no denying that Sam Hansen is an intelligent man. But don’t you think he could do a lot better than this-” She sweeps her arm out over these one hundred acres, green and wild and polkadotted with the heads of early apples. “If he’s so smart, why is he happy running a tractor all day?”

  “That’s not what he does all day,” I protest. “You haven’t even walked around this place. They work so hard! And it’s all orchestrated, you know? Season by season. You couldn’t do it.”

  “Of course I could. I just don’t want to.”

  “You have got some chip on your shoulder. Honestly.” I roll over onto my stomach, breathing clover. “I don’t think that’s why you hate Sam. My theory is you hate him because he is so unbelievably happy.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “He knows exactly what he wants, and he goes and gets it. You may not want the same thing, but h
e’s still a step ahead of you.” I stare up at her. “And that is driving you crazy.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Freud.” My mother sits down on the cool grass and hugs her knees to her chest. “I’m not here to see Sam. I’m here to see Joley. And we’re having a wonderful time together.”

  “So now what?”

  When she begins to speak she stutters. “We’ll just stay for a little-while. Stay and figure out some things, and then we’ll come to a decision.”

  “In other words,” I say, “you have absolutely no idea when we’re leaving.”

  My mother shoots me a look that suggests she still has the power to punish me. “What is this all about, Rebecca? Do you miss your father?”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “I don’t know. You can tell me if you do. I mean, he is your father. It’s natural.”

  “I don’t miss Daddy.” My voice goes flat. “I don’t.” Humidity slides across the hills and hangs on the tree branches. It presses against my throat and makes me choke a little. I don’t miss my father, not even when I am trying to miss him.

  “Sssh,” my other says, pulling me closer. We sit beneath the heavy arms of an old McIntosh tree that has been grafted to bear Spartans. She is holding me for the wrong reasons and still it feels nice. Far away, I see the Jeep drive up with Sam and Uncle Joley. They get out and begin walking towards where we are sitting. At a certain point, Uncle Joley notices my mother and me. He says something to Sam and points. They stop walking and Sam’s eyes connect with my mother’s for a moment. Uncle Joley continues to walk towards us but Sam turns sharply to the left. He does not follow.

  At dinner that night, Uncle Joley tells us about the buyer for Purity, a woman named Regalia Clippe. Although Sam had mentioned her, Uncle Joley hadn’t met her until today. She was five feet tall and weighed over two hundred pounds. She loved gossip and the story today was about herself: she had just returned from getting married at the Church of the Living Gospel in Reno, Nevada. Her brand new husband ran the only sod farm in New Hampshire and (could they tell from the circles beneath her eyes?) she hadn’t been getting a lot of sleep.

  “I don’t know, Joley,” my mother said, laughing. “I think people like that follow you around. You’ve met more than your fair share.”

  Hadley, who had come for dinner, asked me to pass the zucchini. It was more than he’d said to me all day.

  “ I met Regalia Clippe. She’s my buyer. It has nothing to do with Joley,” Sam says.

  “I didn’t mean anything by it.” My mother looks at me.

  “The Church of the Living Gospel,” Uncle Joley says, and my mother laughs. He leans his elbows on the table. “You’ve got a really nice laugh, Jane. Like bells.”

  “Church of the Living Gospel Bells?’ Sam says, and everyone cracks up. I try to catch Hadley’s eye, but he’s staring at his food like it’s something he has never seen before.

  “We’ve got to do something about the weeds in the west corner,” Hadley says to Sam. “They’re out of control. If you want we can let the sheep in-now that they’re sheared there’s no reason to keep them penned.” Sam nods, and Hadley grins at his plate. He is pleased, I can tell, to have made that decision.

  “Well, the good news,” Sam says, “is that Regalia Clippe renewed our contract for Red Delicious.”

  “That’s great,” I say.

  Hadley looks up. “Yeah, but how many others is she buying from, Sam?”

  “Sure, Hadley, just knock the wind out of my sails.” Sam is smiling; he is not really angry. “I don’t know. I didn’t ask her. But she was real happy to have us back again and last year we made up Collins’ shipment when the aphids hit him, so that’s that.”

  For dinner we are having zucchini and almonds, fried chicken, peas and mashed potatoes. It is really very good. Sam cooked it all in a matter of minutes. Hadley says Sam always does the cooking.

  “So what did you two do today?” Uncle Joley asks. My mother is about to answer when she notices that Uncle Joley is staring right at Hadley and me. Hadley’s face turns bright red. My mother folds her hands in her lap.

  Sam drops his fork, which clatters on the edge of his plate. Finally Hadley looks up at my uncle. “We didn’t do anything, all right? I had a lot of stuff I had to get done.” He rolls his napkin into a ball and whips it across the room. It misses the garbage pail; instead, it hits the dog. “I’ve got somewhere I have to go,” Hadley mutters. He scrapes his chair back and runs out of the kitchen.

  “What’s his problem?” Sam helps himself to a mountain of potatoes and shakes his head.

  “Sam,” my mother says, “I was wondering why you don’t grow anything but apples here?”

  I kick her under the table. It isn’t any of her business.

  “Apples take a lot of time and effort.” I get the feeling he has been asked this before.

  “But couldn’t you make more money if you diversify?”

  “Excuse me,” Sam says quietly, “but who the hell are you? You come in here and two days later you’re telling me how to run things?”

  “I wasn’t-”

  “If you knew a damn thing about farming maybe I’d listen.”

  “I don’t have to take this.” My mother is near tears, I can tell by the thick of her voice. “I was just making conversation.”

  “You were making trouble,” Sam says, “plain and simple.”

  My mother’s voice gets husky. I remember a story she likes to tell, about when she worked placing classified ads for the Boston Globe as a college kid, and one man fell in love with her voice. He sold his boat the first week but he’d keep calling her to hear her talk. He placed his ad the entire summer just so he could listen to my mother.

  “Sam.” Uncle Joey touches my mother’s arm. She stands up and runs towards the barn.

  The three of us-Sam, Uncle Joley and me-sit in silence for a moment.

  “Want any more chicken?” Sam offers.

  “I think you overreacted,” Uncle Joley says. “Maybe you could apologize.”

  “Jesus, Joley,” Sam sighs, leaning back. “She’s your sister. You invited her here. Look. She just doesn’t belong in a place like this. She should be wearing high-heeled shoes and clicking along some marble parlor in L.A.”

  “That’s not fair,” I protest. “You don’t even know her.”

  “I know plenty like her,” Sam says. “Would it make it all right if I went out there and apologized? Shit. For a little peace and quiet.” He stands up and pushes away his plate. “So much for a happy little family dinner.”

  Uncle Joley and I finish the zucchini. Then we finish the potatoes. We don’t say anything. My foot taps on the linoleum, fast. “I’m going out there.”

  “Leave them alone, Rebecca. They’ll work it all out. They need to.”

  He may be right but this is my mother we are talking about. I have visions of her like a hellcat, clawing at Sam and leaving him with raw scratch marks on his cheeks and arms. Then I picture Sam’s strength getting the best of her. Would he do that? Or is that only my father?

  I hear their voices long before I see them, behind the shed that holds the tractor and the rototiller. Because Uncle Joley may be right, I decide I should not interfere. I slouch down and feel splinters crack through my shirt.

  “I told you I was sorry,” Sam says. “What more can I do?”

  My mother’s voice is farther away. “You’re right. It’s your house, your farm, and I shouldn’t be here. Joley imposed on you. He shouldn’t have asked you to do something like this.”

  “I know what ‘imposed’ means.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t mean anything the way you take it. It’s like every sentence I say goes through your head the reverse of the way I intended it.”

  Sam leans against the wall of the shed so heavily I think he may be able to feel me there. “When my father ran this place he was real haphazard about it. A stock here, another stock there. Commercial trees mixed right in wit
h retail. Since I was eleven I told him this wasn’t the way to run an apple orchard. He told me I didn’t know what I was talking about, and no matter how much schoolwork I did on the subject I didn’t have as much experience running the place as he did. How could I? So when he retired to Florida, I dug up the younger trees and replanted them the way I wanted them. I lost a couple, and I knew I was taking a hell of a risk. He hasn’t been up here since he retired, and when he calls I pretend the place still looks the way it was when he left.”

  “I get your point, Sam.”

  “No, you don’t. I don’t give a shit if you think this orchard should grow watermelons and cabbage. Go tell Joley and tell Rebecca and whoever the hell you want. And the day I die if you can convince everyone else, go ahead and replant the place. But don’t you ever tell me to my face what I’ve done so far is wrong. This farm-it’s the best thing I’ve ever done. It’s like-it’s like me telling you your daughter is no good.”

  My mother doesn’t answer. “I wouldn’t plant watermelons,” she says finally, and Sam laughs.

  “Let’s start over. I’m Sam Hansen. And you’re-?”

  “Jane. Jane Jones. God,” my mother says, “I sound like the most boring person on earth.”

  “Oh, I doubt it.” I hear, quite clearly, the sound of their fingers pressed into a handshake. It is quiet as night.

  Their footsteps come in fours, and they get closer to where I am sitting. In a panic I crawl to the other side of the shed, away from their voices. The only place to go is into the barn. I try to be quiet when my sneakers scratch against the hay. I press my belly to the floor and pull myself in on my fingertips.

  When I sit up the first thing I see is a bat. It is dark and folded into the corner of the hayloft. I consider screaming but what good would that do me?

  The bat screeches and flies past me. I put my hands up to shield my face and something catches my wrists. When I turn around, it is Hadley.

  “What are you doing here?” I say, terrified.