Don’t you want to be private? Wendy asked. The driver can see in the rearview mirror.
I’ll never see him again, said Violet. Anyway, some cabdriver seeing my tit is the least of my problems.
Violet’s building was in a not-so-great part of town next to a gas station. The good part is that anytime you need to make a phone call or buy chips, it’s handy, Violet said. They walked up to the third floor, taking it slow. Wendy was carrying Violet’s overnight bag, along with the diapers and the starter kit they’d given her at the hospital.
It was just one room, but with one of those mini refrigerators in a corner and a hot plate. There was a mattress on the floor, and a shelf with a boom box on top and a pile of folded clothes. There was a brand-new crib and a table set up with a box of Huggies and diaper wipes set to go, and a TV and a beanbag chair. There was a poster of a couple of kittens playing with a ball of yarn, and another one of Madonna, the same one Wendy had, with the cowboy hat.
I love her, too, Wendy said.
She had a baby a little while ago, and she got right back into shape, said Violet.
Here, she said. Let’s take a look at him. She carried Walter Charles over to the mattress and laid him down. She picked a spot where the sun was coming in the window.
I bet that feels good to him.
She unwrapped him slowly, like a present. First the blanket, then the little undershirt with the snap in front. I always hated it when I was little and my mom pulled my shirt over my head, Violet said. I still remember the feeling.
She bent his arms through the holes, first one, then the other. They looked as if they could snap off. Don’t worry, Wally, she said. I’m here.
Then it was just his bare chest and his diaper left. Wendy hadn’t expected his legs to be so skinny. He still had the booties on but they were too big. The air against his skin, even though it was warm, seemed to make him shiver.
He wriggled on the mattress, waving his arms like a bug trying to right himself. His mouth was making little sucking sounds, as if he was looking for something—Violet’s nipple, probably. You could see the rise and fall of his chest, his lungs filling with air, a single blue vein in his forehead, where the skin looked almost translucent. The beating of his heart even, faster than regular people.
We can take off his diaper, said Violet. It was as if they were thieves, sneaking in someplace they shouldn’t.
He wasn’t even wet, but they took the diaper off anyway and looked at him. His tiny penis was red-looking and sore from the circumcision, and white where the nurses must have put cream on him before he left the hospital. Wendy knew about that from Louie. There was a piece of plastic clamped onto the last inch of his umbilical cord.
They said the dead skin will fall off in a few days, Violet said. When it does, I’m going to put it in his baby box with all the other keepsakes, so I can show them to him someday when he’s grown up. She hadn’t taken his hospital bracelet off yet. I have his footprint, too, she said.
Tomorrow morning when you wake up, do you think you’ll remember right off that he’s here or forget? Wendy asked her.
I sure hope I don’t forget, she said. It seemed like my mom forgot all the time. Even when I was like fourteen, it was like she didn’t always remember she had a kid.
Sometimes when I first wake up, I forget things for a second, said Wendy.
It must feel pretty strange. That you’re just sixteen and still you’re a mom.
I thought it would be weirder than it is, having him, said Violet. But once you actually have the baby, everything changes. You started out being this person that all they care about is getting the coolest jeans at the Gap, and all of a sudden you start wanting things like a musical mobile to hang over the crib and a stroller with good tires so the ride won’t be too bumpy for your kid.
What made you change your mind about giving him away? Wendy asked her.
There were these people in San Francisco that were supposed to take him, she said. A lawyer I met from an ad introduced me to them. The wife was one of those people that wanted to wait till she had her career and a bunch of money before she decided to have kids, and by the time she was finally ready, it was too late. She and her husband wanted to know a whole lot of stuff about my family background and how tall I was and if anyone in my family ever had mental problems, but I still figured it would be good for the baby, going someplace where they could buy him nice things and send him to college and stuff.
I was listening to this song one time. You like Led Zeppelin?
She went over to the boom box and turned it on. The volume had been set really loud. Walter Charles looked startled. Violet turned it down.
“Babe I’m gonna leave you,” the singer was saying.
For a few bars, the song was slow and almost pretty, like something Wendy could imagine her mother liking, but then the guitars got really loud and the drums started crashing. You could tell from the words that the singer wasn’t talking about leaving a baby; he was talking about leaving a woman. The point was, someone was leaving and somebody’s baby was going to be left behind.
Violet was holding Walter Charles while she listened to the song, dancing with him, as much as a person could dance to a song like that. His head flopped over a little. From the look of her, Violet hadn’t held too many babies.
I was thinking I was going to do all this stuff, she said. A friend of mine knew this person that could set me up working at Disneyland. Then I started wondering if there was anything I could do that would end up being more important than doing a good job raising my kid. Not like my mom did with me.
I just wasn’t all that sure that these people in San Francisco with all the money were going to care about him the right way, she said. They kept on wanting to know things like my IQ and if I had a weight problem or pimples.
Your mom should be the type of person who loves you no matter what you’re like, Wendy said. Even if you aren’t all that smart or cute.
That’s how a mom should be, definitely, Violet said. My mom keeps telling me what a loser I am. I’d never say something like that to Walter Charles. It would be nice if he had a dad, too, but he’ll have me anyways.
And he might have a dad sometime, Wendy said. Like my mom. When I was seven, she met this really great guy, and he was just like a dad to me.
So where is he now? Violet asked. If he’s such a great dad, why’d he let you drop out of school?
For a second, Wendy couldn’t think what to say. Violet was right. She had never met Josh, but even she could tell a good father would never let a thing like that happen.
He died, Wendy said. He was on one of the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center.
Oh my God, said Violet. I can see why you’d be shook-up. How’s your mom taking it?
I don’t like talking about it, if that’s all right, said Wendy. But that’s why things are a little unusual at the moment.
Listen, said Violet. You can come over here and hang out with Walter Charles and me anytime.
They sprinkled some baby powder on him and picked out a fresh shirt, even though the old one was clean. Then they put on a fresh diaper. They tried to think if there was anything more they needed to do but they couldn’t. Violet laid him in his crib and he fell asleep.
He sleeps a ton, she said. I kind of wish he’d be awake more often, so I could do stuff with him.
They listened to the rest of the Led Zeppelin CD, and after that, they looked at a magazine article Violet had about the Madonna tour.
It says she has twenty-three different outfits for the show, Violet said. And every single night she performs one of her concerts, she throws one of her special custom-made hats into the audience, and the person that catches it gets to take it home. Imagine if it was you.
Someone would probably pay a thousand dollars just for that hat, Wendy said. In the magazine article, it said if you wanted to see Madonna on the Drowned World Tour, tickets cost three hundred dollars apiece.
But
listen to this, said Violet. Those people in San Francisco? They were going to pay ten thousand dollars to adopt Walter Charles. And still I decided to keep him. They had all that money, but they don’t have anything as special as him.
I think you made a good decision, said Wendy.
It’s the one thing I have, Violet told her. I never had a family before. Now he’s it.
When Wendy got home, Garrett was already there. We knocked off early today, he said. Lumber shipment didn’t come.
He was out back, putting charcoal in the birdbath. I thought I’d make us a little barbecue tonight, he said. Carolyn’s coming over.
Sounds good, Wendy said. Shiva was sniffing her right in the place she’d been holding Walter Charles when he spit up a little on her lap.
Good day at school? he asked.
The usual, she told him.
He unwrapped a packet of meat and sprinkled barbecue sauce on it. Hope you worked up an appetite out on the playing field. I’ve got us some sweet porterhouse steaks here.
I might not eat a whole one, she said.
I guess Shiva can figure out what to do with your leftovers, he said. He looked at her.
You wearing baby powder, Slim? he asked.
I sometimes put it on after my shower, she told him. I like the smell.
It was bringing back memories, he said. You know how smells do that sometimes. I was remembering when you were a baby, if you want to know the truth.
Wendy thought about a picture from their old album, of her mother looking very young, and holding Wendy, wrapped in one of the goofy-looking buntings she crocheted back then. Wendy had seen this photograph a hundred times, but for the first time, she imagined who the person must have been taking it: her father.
Just so you know, he said. Your mother and I were happy then.
I could read your palm, if you feel like it, Carolyn said.
They were sitting in the backyard, waiting for the coals to get hot. Garrett was inside boiling potatoes.
Sure, said Wendy. She wondered what would have happened if someone had read her mother’s palm on the tenth of September. If they had, would the person have seen anything in her mother’s hand? What if she did and she said, Whatever you do, don’t go to work on the eleventh. Stay out of the towers.
Does it ever happen that you look at somebody’s hand and you can tell something bad’s going to happen to them? Wendy asked her. Like you look at their lifeline and it stops in about three more days?
It’s not like that exactly, Carolyn said. It’s more likely to be a case where you can tell what the danger areas might be, and you talk about those with the person.
There was one time, though, she said. There was this guy I knew. I was reading his palm, and the lifeline just stopped, right at the place where you’d expect it to branch. Instead of a line for love and prosperity and health and all that, there was nothing but smooth skin.
What did you do?
I asked him what his plans were for the next few days, she said. Whitewater rafting down the American River, he told me.
You raft much before? I asked him. I was stalling for time. Trying to think how I should handle it.
Never, he said. But I’m going with my son, and he’s been plenty of times. You could tell he was really proud of the kid. Nineteen years old. Training to be a river guide.
Listen, I told him. I’ve never said anything like this before. But you shouldn’t go.
But if the lifeline stops like that, could you do anything about it? Wendy asked her. Isn’t it something that’s already set up, that you can’t change?
That’s what I was thinking, Carolyn told her. But you’ve got to remember that I don’t know everything, either. I’m still figuring out how it all works myself. It’s a lifelong process.
So he didn’t go?
He went, she said. On the second day the two of them were on the river and they opened up some dam upriver without telling people and it made the water three times as fast and higher than usual. The commercial rafting companies weren’t even putting in on the American that week. But this guy and his son had their own raft, so they didn’t know anything about it.
And the man drowned?
They got him out. It was the son who didn’t make it. But the father was destroyed after that from what I heard. Started drinking really bad. Then his wife left him.
If you saw something bad on my lifeline, would you tell me?
Honey, I think the bad part already happened. The part from here on is likely to be better.
This was the first time Carolyn had referred to what happened back in New York.
But that man in the raft, Wendy said. First one bad thing happened. Then it just got worse from there.
He was a different type of person, Carolyn told her. The give-up type. Like a fern. You’re sturdier. More of a cactus-type girl.
How can you tell?
Because you’re sitting here talking to me, she said. Some people would just lock themselves in a room and make the world go away. You’re still out here living.
How’re those coals looking, you two? Garrett called out.
Another ten minutes, I’d say, Carolyn told him.
So let’s see what you got, she said.
I’m looking at the family line, Carolyn told her. It’s full of love. Lots of good things there.
That’s my future?
The funny thing is, it’s like I see two different figures looking out for you, but from different places.
Maybe one was her mother. From someplace, who knew where. In the sky or under the rubble—she wasn’t sure. She was thinking that, but she didn’t say anything.
There’s all this male energy, Carolyn said. It’s from your father house, but it’s coming from two different directions.
Wendy wished Carolyn could tell her something about her mother. You see a woman anyplace? she asked.
There’s this one, and she’s coming your way. But I’d be on my guard with her if I were you. She’s not a very positive force for you.
Garrett walked out into the yard just then.
Hell, Carolyn, you scare me sometimes, he said.
What are you talking about, Garrett? My hair that bad?
That woman heading our way who my daughter needs to watch out for? he said. My mother called this afternoon. She’s coming out here for Thanks-giving.
Seventeen
Alan was right that she’d like the book he gave her, The Member of the Wedding, by Carson McCullers. The girl in it, Frankie, was around Wendy’s age. She lived in a little town in the South with her father and a black cook with only one eye. Her mother had died when she was born. She wanted to run away from home and have adventures. She also made up stories—not because she was a dishonest person, just so she’d have a different life that she liked better than the real one. Her older brother was getting married, and she kept thinking he was going to take her along with him and his bride. Wendy knew right away that this would never happen.
One thing she liked about Frankie was how, like herself, Frankie had felt a terrible and unexplainable contrariness overtaking her the summer she was twelve.
“This was the summer when Frankie was sick and tired of being Frankie,” the author had written. “. . . It was the year when Frankie thought about the world. And she did not see it as a round school globe, with the countries neat and different-colored. She thought of the world as huge and cracked and loose and turning a thousand miles an hour.”
If Wendy had read that page a year ago, she wouldn’t have understood how Frankie felt. Then September happened and the planet she lived on had seemed more like a meteor, spinning and falling.
Hey, Kitty, how’s tricks? Alan asked when she leaned Garrett’s bike up against the front of his store. I was just boiling water for tea.
For the first time since she’d been in California, she’d been thinking it would be nice if she had a clarinet out here. Not to play the pieces they’d been working on at school for the Chri
stmas concert back in New York, but a couple of the jazz numbers Josh had been teaching her. If she started playing clarinet again, maybe Josh would pick up his bass.
I was working on my clarinet, she told Alan.
Clarinet, he said. Now that you say it, I can see you with a woodwind instrument. Clarinet goes with your personality.
Josh used to tell her that, too. Any kind of person you meet, he said, there’s an instrument that suits them. Could be nothing more than the triangle or a har-monica, but there’s a piece of the band someplace in everybody, even the tone-deaf types who couldn’t clap along with “Jimmy Crack Corn” to save their life.
Your brother, for instance. He’d be baritone horn. Loud and a little bit of a grandstander, breaks right into the action and stirs things up. Class clown. Your mother’s more of a flute type. Dancing over the surface. Light as air. You, clarinet, right on the money. Low and thoughtful and crucially important to the sound of the band, without making a big show about it. Playful at times. Very subtle and deep.
And what’s a bass player? she asked him.
Steady and loyal, he said. Doesn’t carry the melody, doesn’t have to be the star, but he’s always there holding things together. Some people think it’s the drummer, but really it’s the bass player who’s the heartbeat of whatever group of instruments he’s playing with. Slow and steady, keeps on pumping. And handsome, naturally. Did I forget to mention that part? Same as you clarinet people are beautiful.
Yeah, right, she said.
You don’t know it yet, but you’re going to be a knockout, Josh told her.
Now that I know you like the clarinet, Alan said, I have the perfect piece of music to play for you. He was at the front counter, where the cash register and the CD player were, flipping through discs. She figured maybe he’d have Woody Herman, Josh’s favorite, but the CD that he chose for her was classical.
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