Impossible

by Nancy Werlin

  Lucinda, be smart. Be fierce. Be brave. And do what I say. Ha! Doesn't that sound maternal?

  Perform the tasks in the ballad. Do this.

  With all my love and liking, always.

  Your mother,

  Miranda

  By the time they finished reading the letter, Lucy was shaking. Zach put his arm around her shoulders and held her tightly. He didn't know what he thought, except that he was fascinated and wanted to go on reading, to turn from Miranda's letter to the pages she had torn out of her diary.

  But Lucy was still holding the letter and she clearly wasn't ready to go on. Her head was down, and her hair had fallen over the side of her face so that he couldn't see anything except the tip of her nose.

  "Luce?" he said.

  Her voice came out husky and desperate and needy. "What do you think?"

  An answer came to him. "I think she loved you very much. I think she would have raised you and been with you all your life if she could have."

  "Yes," said Lucy. And he heard in her voice that grateful amazement that you feel when someone tells you something you instantly know is true, even though you might not have had the ability to see it by yourself.

  Lucy asked in a low voice, "But do you think she was already crazy, when she wrote this?"

  Zach realized again that only the truth would do. "I don't know. She expresses herself very well in this letter. She's logical. She has a sense of humor. We'll see what's in the rest of it." He frowned. "But I wonder why she just didn't leave the whole diary here. Why'd she rip out pages?"

  "Maybe she wanted to keep her diary," Lucy said. "Maybe she thought she'd write more in it. There were lots of blank pages at the end."

  "Or maybe she wasn't thinking clearly," Zach said.

  Lucy bit her lip. "Yes."

  There was a little silence. Then Lucy said, "Zach? She says that when I'm her age, I'll be pregnant with a daughter. And here I am, pregnant. What do you think of that?"

  "We don't know the sex of your baby."

  "My doctor knows. I didn't want to. But I can find out anytime."

  "Even if it's a girl, it's a fifty-fifty chance that it would be anyway. It won't mean anything. Just coincidence."

  "But the pregnancy?" Lucy insisted. "She knows I'll be pregnant at eighteen, and she knows it before I'm even born?"

  “That's freaky," Zach admitted.

  After another few moments of silence, Lucy said grimly, “All right. Let's read the rest.”

  She turned to the first of the pages that had been tom out of Miranda's diary. She held it out so that Zach could read beside her.

  CHAPTER 28

  As I get ready to be a mother myself I keep remembering my own mother, though of course I barely knew her. I'd rather not think about her, but it's like she haunts me.

  My mother was insane. She was completely cracked. That scares me and it always has.

  I first learned about her from the people I lived with when I was a kid. Every time I did something wrong, they would whisper that it was because I was “weak-minded."

  "Like her mother. Might end up going down the same road too. Loose and easy. You have to expect it. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. There's only so much we can do. Nobody can expect more."

  They never said more than this and I never asked. I didn't want to understand more. I knew they didn't like me and that it was something to do with my mother. And then of course when I got older, I figured out what they meant by "loose and easy." First, it turns out that my mother got pregnant with me when she was very young, a teenager, and of course she wasn't married. Also, nobody ever knew who my father was because she wouldn't say when she was pregnant and then she went nuts after. People figured maybe she didn’t know.

  Her name was Deirdre. She was a bag lady, and you saw her a lot at the supermarket and the pharmacy. She'd wander the aisles until the police took her outside. In the winter, sometimes you'd see her sleeping in doorways on Main Street. Sometimes she went to shelters, but she never stayed there long. And then nobody would see her for months or even years at a time, and then she'd be back again. Nobody knew where she went when she disappeared. Some other town, I guess.

  I didn't know Deirdre was my mother until I was ten. Some kids at school told me. They were not kind. These days, now that I m pregnant too, I keep remembering the laughter and the jeers. They hurt so much, and I had to pretend not to care.

  Deirdre used to follow me sometimes when I was coming home from school. I'd see her lurking. She always looked like she wanted me to talk to her, but I'd run really fast to get away. Once she called after me to stop, but I didn't.

  But then one time, a year ago, when I was sixteen, I waited for her. She looked both happy and sad to see me, when she turned the corner and there I was. It breaks my heart to think of it. I held out my hand and she took it and we walked a few blocks together.

  That was the very last time I saw her. I wonder where she went, and what happened to her.

  I wonder if she's dead.

  She didn't speak much that day, but she gripped my hand hard and sang to me. It was like being sung a lullaby. The song had our name in it, Scarborough. She sang it to me several times, and she made me sing it with her, so I wouldn't forget. She told me I must never forget. She said that her mother sang it to her, and that we Scarborough girls needed to always keep trying to do the tasks in the song, and that it was her job to teach me the song.

  That always stuck with me. Her job?

  Leo sang a similar song the other day and that's why I in thinking about it again now. I realized as I heard him that his lyrics were different from the ones Deirdre sang. He told me that he was singing a Simon and Garfunkel song called "Scarborough Fair.” He said that it was a "Child ballad." He said that there are many different versions of it, some of which were written down by a man called Francis Child over a hundred years ago. When I asked, he said yes, there were probably many other versions that were not written down. He assumed I was interested only because of my last name, and I didn't mention Deirdre.

  Here is the version that Deirdre sang to me. she called it "The Elfin Knight."

  Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  Remember me to one who lives there

  She must be a true love of mine

  Tell her she'll sleep in a goose-feather bed

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  Tell her I swear she'll have nothing to dread

  She must be a true love of mine

  Tell her tomorrow her answer make known

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  What e'er she may say I'll not leave her alone

  She must be a true love of mine

  Her answer it came in a week and a day

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  I'm sorry, good sir, I must answer thee nay

  I'll not be a true love of thine

  From the sting of my curse she can never be free

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  Unless she unravels my riddlings three

  She will be a true love of mine

  Tell her to make me a magical shirt

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  Without any seam or needlework

  Else she'll be a true love of mine

  Tell her to find me an acre of land

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  Between the salt water and the sea strand

  Else she'll be a true love of mine

  Tell her to plow it with just a goat's horn

  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

  And sow it all over with one grain of corn

  Else she'll be a true love of mine

  And her daughters forever possessions of mine

  Here is what I remember about the night I got pregnant.

  It was a Friday night, last May, and Jimmy Delacroix's parents were away, so he was throwing a big party at his house. Kia s
aid that even though we weren't invited personally by Jimmy, it didn't matter because everybody was invited, it was that kind of party. She begged me to go. She had a crush on—well, it doesn't matter who—and she said if I wouldn't go with her, she couldn't go either. Basically, she guilt-tripped me into it.

  But I also wanted to go. I don't know why. Just to see if I could belong, I guess. I never went to parties. Nobody ever asked me. And it was exciting to think about a party. I didn't know what I would wear at first, but then Kia said if I would come, she'd loan me this shirt she had, a really pretty teal blue shirt. It looked great on me. It didn't even matter that my jeans were so old and the wrong style. Even they looked right when I was wearing that shirt with them.

  I had to sneak out of the house because THEY wouldn't have let me go. Kia had her car and we went to Jimmy's, and it seemed like everybody from school was there, plus lots of kids I'd never seen before in my life.

  The music was so loud that the whole house sort of pulsed. There were kegs of beer outside in the backyard, and in the bathtub inside the house too. There was no furniture at all in the living room and people were dancing there, and it was crowded and hot. Then Kia saw the guy she had the crush on, and I was alone.

  I drank a beer because it was something to do. I thought about dancing by myself—there were a few girls doing that but they were also sort of dancing together, like a group, and they were friends with each other, and so I couldn't. I started wondering if I could walk home. I felt like people were looking at me and thinking, what's SHE doing here? We don't want HER.

  Then I felt someone come up next to me.

  I knew immediately that he was important. I can't explain it. He didn't feel like just anybody. I could feel him next to me, and I knew he was looking at me, and that he liked what he saw. And my heart just raced.

  I knew I looked good in Kia's shirt. Before I ever turned and saw his face, I was so glad about that. So glad to look pretty and sexy.

  Especially once I dared look at him. He wasn't a boy. He was a man, a young man. He was the most beautiful person I had ever seen or even dreamed.

  I couldn't speak, looking at him. But he smiled at me and I knew he understood and it was all right.

  He cupped his hand around my elbow. He leaned down. He whispered in my ear—his breath was so warm, so sweet, and he had a wonderful accent, Irish, I guess. He said, "Come outside with me."

  He squeezed my elbow, tight, but not too tight. He began to thread his way through the people on the dance floor, heading toward the front door of Jimmy's house, and I went with him.

  His hand was so warm. I remember that. And I remember how his shoulders looked So broad, so straight, so strong. He was tall. The top of my head came up to his shoulders. His hair was thick and dark.

  I was aware that some of the girls were looking at him, as he took me away. Looking at him, and admiring him, and then looking at me. Me, Miranda Scarborough, the town joke. Me.

  He picked me, I thought. HE picked ME.

  I wasn't drunk. I had had only one beer. But I felt drunk.

  Then we were outside in the moonlight, and I looked up into his face again.

  He was not just handsome. He was beautiful. And he had the most gorgeous eyes.

  And he was looking at me like I was beautiful too. And suddenly I was. I could feel it. I was.

  * * *

  I put asterisks there on purpose. It is not because I don't remember the rest. I do.

  But I can't write it down. I can't describe how it was that I ended up with that other boy, the one the beautiful man introduced me to. The boy was someone I had never met before and whose face I can't even recall. All I knew was that if I went with this other boy, it would please the beautiful man. I wanted to please him. I don't know why.

  I knew what I was doing. At least, I think I did. But now I write it all down, and read it over, and think that this was how I got pregnant—because some gorgeous man I'd just met seemed to want me to—to—

  It's really bizarre, isn't it?

  How did I let that happen, exactly? Was I drunk after all? Maybe I was.

  * * *

  It is the middle of the night. I can't sleep, even though I ought to feel safe here at Leo and Soledad's. But I don't. I keep thinking about that ballad that Deirdre taught me and how she said that we Scarborough girls needed to always keep trying to do the tasks in the song, and that it was her job to teach me the song.

  I also feel like there is something strange going on. My mother had me at eighteen, and then she went crazy. And here I am, pregnant at eighteen myself.

  I just went downstairs and brought back the Child ballad book that belongs to Leo. I've read through all of the versions now, and some of them are very different from the one I know, though they also contain tasks and talk about true love.

  But my version of the song is very clear. It lays out three tasks.

  * Make a magic shirt without needle or seam.

  * Find an acre of land between the salt water and the sea strand.

  * Plow the land with a goat's horn, and sow it with one grain of corn. (This is really two related tasks, not one.)

  I was trying to think how to do the tasks, and I'm stumped I wish I'd taken that sewing elective at school. And I know even less about farming than sewing.

  Oh, this is ridiculous. I wouldn't dare tell Soledad, even.

  I'd better forget it. Maybe my mother tried to do these things for some crazy reason, such as because her last name was in the song. But I'm not crazy, and I won't.

  * * *

  I saw him today. The beautiful man. I don’t know about elves and faeries, but I also don’t know what else to call him. The Elfin Knight.

  He’s not human. He is evil. He is—I don’t know, exactly. Powerful. Immortal. I don’t know.

  I am in deep trouble and I am very afraid.

  What happened was this. I had just left the nursing home where I help out in the kitchen. The cook is nice to me. She lets me sit down while I’m chopping vegetables.

  I was walking down the hill toward Soledad and Leo’s. The sun was going down, but there was still enough light to see. And then I noticed this man about halfway down the hill, where it flattens. He was standing still and looking up at me. I could see his shape, see his shoulders.

  Somehow I knew it was him, the beautiful man. And I was happy to see him. Thrilled, actually, and excited.

  I am such a fool.

  The baby started kicking like crazy. I knew from Soledad that babies did that, but mine never had before, not like this. I felt like my insides were a punching bag. It hurt, some, but I didn’t care. It felt to me like the baby knew, too, that something amazing was going on.

  I could see the man still looking up at me, waiting for me. I almost floated all the way down the hill to him, with one hand on my stomach where the baby was having a tantrum inside me.

  And then I was next to him.

  He shines like the moon on a dark night. Even now that I know he’s evil, I have to say that.

  But I didn’t know he was evil yet. I knew he’d be interested in the baby, since the baby only existed because he had introduced me to that boy, that night at the party. So I said, “My daughter is kicking.” And then I sort of lifted my shirt. I invited him to feel it.

  So his hands were on me, on my bare skin under my shirt, on my belly. Just for a few seconds.

  And that was when I knew I had been used. Manipulated. That was when I understood everything.

  And I understood it because he wanted me to. As he touched me, he let me see his thoughts. And I saw the past. I saw my mother, when she was my age. And her mother, too. I can’t write it all out, not all of it. It’s too much, and it was too terrible.

  He has cursed us. Me, my mother, HER mother, her mother. The Scarborough girls. It’s all in the ballad. It’s not just a song, it’s a curse. I saw it all; I knew it all in that moment.

  He leaned in close. He whispered to me. “The three tasks. You
must perform those three tasks. You will not be able to, but still you must try, just as your mother instructed you to. It is in your best interest to try. If you do not perform the three tasks successfully by the time your daughter is born, then everything that has happened to your mother will happen to you. And then to your daughter.”

  And then he laughed. He said, “I will enjoy watching you try. I always do. I have enjoyed it ever since your ancestress, Fenella, chose to defy me.”

  It was—it was—it was—

  I can’t write any more.

  But I have to do it. I have to! I don’t want to go crazy. I refuse to end up like my mother. I refuse.

  And then there is my daughter.

  My daughter.

  My daughter.

  * * *

  I spent all this time today looking at fabric. All kinds of fabric. I looked at everything I own, which is actually a lot because Soledad got me heaps of hand-me-down and thrift store maternity clothes from the hospital, and she bought me some new things too.

  Then I went and looked in Soledad and Leo is closet. I looked especially closely at Leo is shirts.

  Here's the thing: It is all woven. All fabric is made up of threads, and those threads are woven together by machines that use tiny needles to do it. When you look closely, you can see it. You can't make a shirt, or any fabric, without needles. It is not possible. It's the simplest of the three tasks—at least, it looks to me like it ought to be the easiest one—but it's impossible.

  Seams, though. It might be possible to make a shirt without seams. A few weeks ago, Soledad was working on an Icelandic sweater, and she was knitting it in the round She showed me; you use these special knitting needles with both ends pointed, and you use three of them, and somehow you work the whole sweater without a single seam that way.

  What good does that do me? Even if I could knit a seamless shirt, I'd have to use needles to do it.