Impossible

by Nancy Werlin

  And then his form went transparent. The transparent form rippled. The ripples twisted, slowly, into another huge form that, although it stayed translucent, was clearly a different being.

  This new being rapidly shrank down to normal human size.

  It was a pretty, young redheaded woman. She wore a long, old-fashioned gown made of some heavy, coarse brown material. She lifted one hand and blew Lucy and Zach a kiss. And though her lips did not move to speak, somehow, words from her formed themselves in their minds.

  From all of us Scarborough girls, greetings and, thanks. This task required two, working together, trusting each other. It required the "us," not the "I." For that is true love, is it not?

  The woman turned misty. And, as the final traces of her dissolved into nothing, abruptly, the storm outside stopped as well.

  Every trace of the Elfin Knight was gone from the cottage.

  Only the little family was left.

  CHAPTER 57

  On a Sunday morning two weeks later, Lucy waltzed around the kitchen with Dawn on her shoulder, while her foster mother checked off the list for the family brunch. "She's just burped again," Lucy announced.

  Soledad gave Dawn a professional glance. "Keep rubbing her back in case there's a little more to come. Now let's see. Coffee cake. Eggs and fillings for omelets. Bagels and cream cheese and smoked salmon. Sausage. Quiches. Salad. Juice—Zach and the Greenfields are out getting that. And of course Leo got the champagne—"

  Lucy interrupted. "Did you get blueberries?"

  "Yes, and they cost the earth. Although not as much as the chocolates."

  "Those chocolates that come with the little map?" asked Lucy. "Excellent." She sang to Dawn. "Chocolates with a map, they're the best, oh, yeah, chocolates with a map to the ones with caramel filling, those are mine, oh, yeah." As she twirled with the baby, she saw Soledad take champagne flutes out of a box that said Waterford. "Are those new? They're gorgeous!"

  Soledad blushed. "Yes. They were on sale. Your father surprised me with them yesterday. He felt the occasion called for something special."

  Lucy came closer to look. The glasses were slender and sparkling and delicate. "I can't wait to use one."

  "You can't have more than a sip of the champagne," cautioned Soledad. "You're nursing. But I can put juice in one of the flutes for you."

  "Between you and Zach's mom," Lucy said, "I'm not getting away with anything these days." It was true, but Lucy didn't mind. It was all a miracle, every bit of it, every day, even when her mother-in-law displayed doubt (which, Lucy had to admit, was warranted, if annoying) about Lucy's competence with the baby.

  Carrie and Nate Greenfield, and Gina, had arrived from Arizona three days before. They were staying with Lucy and Zach, and Carrie planned to stay on with Gina a full month afterward to help out with the baby while Lucy caught up at school.

  What would happen after that was still under debate. Lucy knew that there would be some rough times ahead, juggling the baby and also, of course, the years of college for both her and Zach. There had also been some terrible, terrible hours with Dawn screaming and fussy and Lucy getting just the merest glimpse of how hard it was going to be, taking care of a baby, and of how the adults had all been right that, under normal circumstances, marriage and a baby would possibly not have been the right choice at this time in life. It might even be best for her and Zach and Dawn to move in with Soledad and Leo again, and she knew that she'd likely end up thanking God on her knees that this was an option. That they didn't have to go it alone.

  But that could all be decided in the future. Right now, she was finding it ridiculous to worry about anything beyond how Dawn was eating and sleeping.

  It was a relief—no, it was pure joy—to have the normal problems of being a married teenage mom of a newborn. Even the constant tiredness was somewhat welcome.

  Lucy had told Soledad, privately, a couple of days ago, that it really wasn't the baby keeping her up at night. "It's like I'm beyond tired. I have the chance to sleep, but all I want is to lie awake in bed and look at Dawn or listen to Zach breathe or whatever. I want to lie there and count my blessings." She'd laughed ruefully. "You know what? Sometimes I do math problems in my head. Like it's a guarantee of sanity to be able to take a square and figure out a hypotenuse."

  "If you can't do complex math," Soledad had said, "blame the baby, not yourself. There's many a new mom who can't add two and two."

  She'd paused, and then said tentatively, "Lucy, are you afraid to sleep?"

  "No," Lucy said. She bit her lip. "It's just that sometimes I—I think about Miranda. That's all."

  Soledad nodded. "Me too."

  That one thing had not changed, Lucy reflected now. Miranda was the shadow on their lives that she had always been. Lucy tried not to think of her, still in the Elfin Knight's power. Still trapped.

  Would they see her again, from time to time, seemingly insane, as they always had? Or was she dead now? What had happened to Miranda when the curse was broken?

  Lucy did not know. And she'd had the thought that, if Zach hadn't been with her at the Bay of Fundy, with her in the little Canadian cottage, she might believe she had dreamed everything. A horrible, detailed nightmare, or a psychotic delusion.

  It was also strange to realize that, even if her own particular nightmare was over, she now knew there was another world, close to theirs, a world of magic and curses and uncanny things, a world that was not rational.

  Lucy did not like to think about this, but there was no other conclusion to be drawn. And what else might be out there, in that world?

  She shivered.

  "Um. Still no word about Padraig Seeley at the hospital?" she asked Soledad. She knew what the answer would be, but she wanted to hear it again.

  Soledad shook her head. "Phone disconnected, apartment abandoned. Jacqueline is furious. We're scrambling to try to continue his initiatives with the teen fathers."

  "You'll find someone."

  "I hope so. We've got two men interviewing next week." A shadow passed over Soledad's face. "I just can't believe I actually hired him."

  "Stop that," said Lucy. "It wasn't your fault, any more than it was your fault that the storm stopped you and Leo from making it to the Bay of Fundy. You were charmed. And if you hadn't hired him, well, he would have found another way to hang around here."

  "I suppose," said Soledad. "I blame myself, though. He learned so much from me."

  "Mom," said Lucy slowly. "You know what I've been thinking? I might even one day be glad about him. Because listen, if not for the Elfin Knight, maybe I wouldn't be with Zach. I'd like to think we'd have come together when we were older, anyway, but I don't know if that's the case. I sure wouldn't have Dawn.

  "I'm not saying I'm glad it happened. Not exactly. But I'm not sorry to be the person I am today, and to have the life I have now. Even though it's not what I thought I wanted for my future, a year ago, it is what I want now. And even about Miranda—I'm glad for the truth. I'm glad to know the truth about her and how brave and loving she was."

  It took Soledad a moment to speak. Then: "So am I," she said softly. She watched Lucy's face. Lucy wasn't a girl anymore, she thought. She was a woman. A very strong woman.

  Any mother would be proud.

  Just then, excited frolicking from Pierre alerted them to the arrival of the rest of the family, plus Sarah Hebert. Within minutes, the extended Markowitz-Greenfield family had settled in around the laden dining room table. They all lifted their glasses.

  Leo said, "To baby Dawn, to Lucy and Zach, and to us, the experienced and often, if not always, wise parental units—"

  Pierre barked a split second before the doorbell rang. It was the kind of long, sharp ring caused by someone putting a finger on the bell and simply keeping it there for several seconds.

  Everybody's heads turned. Leo quirked an eyebrow at Soledad. "Expecting anyone else?"

  "Not unless Mrs. Spencer changed her mind and decided to come." Soledad
looked at Lucy, who was shaking her head.

  "No. She was awfully nice yesterday, and so grateful, it made me cry, but I doubt she'd feel up to all this." Lucy gestured at the table.

  The finger on the bell came down again.

  "I'll go," said Zach. He had Dawn balanced easily over one shoulder, and he disappeared into the living room. Leo put his glass down and headed after him. Two seconds later, the others heard the front door open.

  Pierre stopped barking.

  A husky feminine voice said, very clearly, "Hello, Leo. You'll never know how great it is to see you. And you. Lucy's husband. Forgive me that I don't remember your name. I've had a peculiar few days. Actually, a peculiar eighteen years."

  In the dining room, Soledad looked dazed. Her lips moved. Three syllables.

  Lucy half rose from her chair, but then gripped the back of it with one hand, unable for the moment to move farther.

  She had not even dared to dream of this. She had not even dared to let herself hope.

  "I'm your mother-in-law," the clear but somehow also shy voice went on. "That is, the other one. I'd like it if you could think of this as being the first time we've met. I wasn't myself before." All at once there was an audible catch of breath. And then the voice said, "The baby! Is that—could that be—"

  In the dining room, Soledad could get the name out now, if barely. "Miranda!"

  But Lucy had already raced away. And as Soledad spoke, she was flinging herself into her mother's open arms.

  Scarborough Fair,

  OR, THE LOVERS' PROMISE

  [Lucy:]

  Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

  Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme

  Remember me to one who lives there

  Always he'll be a true love of mine

  Tell him I've made him a magical shirt

  Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme

  Without any seam or needlework

  Always he'll be a true love of mine

  [Zach:]

  Tell her she's found me an acre of land

  Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme

  Between the salt water and the sea strand

  That makes her a true love of mine

  Tell her she's plowed it with just a goat's horn

  Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme

  She's sowed it all over with one grain of corn

  Yes, she is a true love of mine

  And her daughter forever a daughter of mine

  [Together:]

  Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

  Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme

  Remember us to all who live there

  Ours will be true love for all time

  AUTHOR'S NOTE

  Impossible began taking shape as a novel for me in 1997. For reasons I can't remember (Did the song come on the radio in my car? Did I sing along? Where do ideas come from?), I found myself thinking about the lyrics to the ballad "Scarborough Fair," as recorded by Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel thirty years before. My oldest sister, Miriam, had played it often when we were kids. I had then found the song beautiful and sad and oh-so-romantic. I was a big believer in romance and true love, and, of course, in having a good cry over same.

  But thinking about the ballad's lyrics as an adult—and focusing fully on the words themselves, rather than the gorgeous melody and harmony or the mood evoked by the music—I found myself puzzled and then a little horrified. The man, singing, demands one impossible task after another from the woman, and if she doesn't deliver, then she's no "true love" of his. (I later found out I was not the first person to have these thoughts about this ballad.)

  It's really a pretty cruel song, I thought. There's no way that the woman can prove herself to that man. He's already made up his mind. I listened some more, and then suddenly I thought: He hates her.

  I wondered what exactly she had done to lose his love. How was it that he had come to despise her? Could it have been a misunderstanding? Or did she deserve his hate? Had she betrayed him? There was plainly some kind of story there.

  Then my mind drifted off into the particulars of the lyrics again: the impossible tasks. And it suddenly occurred to me that probably you could make a shirt "without no seam nor needlework" (the Simon and Garfunkel lyric). Chemicals, I thought. Modern chemicals. Couldn't you just whip up a shirt in a vat nowadays, if you really wanted to? I wasn't sure, but I thought so.

  Wouldn't it be interesting to construct a puzzle sort of novel around the lyrics? Let's say that, for some reason—I didn't know what that reason would be, but why worry about that to start with-—a girl has to prove her love by actually performing the three tasks. I'd use a modern setting, I planned, and I'd have her figure it out using technology. Surprise him. He's wrong, it turns out. She does understand true love. She can prove it.

  I felt that this was the germ of something … some thing I found very intriguing. But I also knew it wasn't nearly enough to make a novel. For one thing, I'd have to figure out the technological puzzle beforehand, and I was stumped after the shirt. (And I still don't know about chemical shirts; obviously, I ended up choosing felting as my shirt-making method.) For another problem—a more important one—I couldn't quite imagine the situation under which the puzzle-solving would occur. The characters, the plot, the impetus, the urgency … love was clearly involved, somehow, but … I just didn't know enough. And time passed, and nothing promising occurred to me, and I didn't feel this was the kind of novel I could simply plunge into writing and figure out along the way. I needed at least a little more information up front.

  And so I gave it up. But unlike other vague, half-formed ideas for novels that have come and then gone over the years, this one stuck with me. And a couple of conversations about it—one back in 1998, and another in 2006—with friend and fellow writer Franny Billingsley were pivotal as well.

  Franny, coincidentally (except I have come to understand there are no coincidences in writing; the information you need comes to you when you are ready to receive it), had unite a bit of knowledge of folk songs and their history. It was she who explained to me that "Scarborough Fair," as recorded by Simon and Garfunkel, was only one version of a ballad originating probably in 1670 in Scotland, which is known more formally as "Child #2: The Elfin Knight." There were many versions of this ballad collected in the nineteenth century from Scotland, England, and America by Francis J. Child. More, there were doubtless many dozens of other versions lost along the way over the centuries. (And indeed, over a year later, Franny was also invaluable in helping me write this novel's versions of the ballad.)

  Readers who are interested can research "The Elfin Knight." Wikipedia's entries on both "Scarborough Fair" and "The Elfin Knight" provide an excellent place to start, to learn more about the different versions and their lyrics. One fascinating tidbit is that there are versions of "The Elfin Knight" in which the woman replies with her own list of impossible demands, thus putting the man neatly in his place. Another is that the recitation of herbs may (or may not) have magical significance.

  But though I found these items and many others intriguing, when I got down to serious research on Child #2 in the spring of 2006, I was looking for something else. I just didn't know exactly what it was—until I found it.

  "This ballad first appeared as 'A proper new ballad entitled The Wind hath blown my Plaid away, or A Discourse betwixt a young Woman and the Elphin Knight.' This was a black-letter ballad (broadside) that was printed circa 1670. In later variants the elfin knight is replaced by the devil." (www. contemplator.com/america/blowind.html)

  I saw the word devil, and within one minute and the next, I knew about Lucy Scarborough, and I knew about her mother, her grandmother, her great-grandmother, and her great-great-grandmother. I knew about the "true love" curse that had been maliciously inflicted upon these women by an unearthly being that, if not actually the devil, was not some small playful "elf either. Instead, he would fit the English and Scottish definition of an elf: a full-size, glamor
ous, cruel yet magical creature that uses humans as playthings, but who absolutely can be defeated.

  But only by the reality of true human love.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This book is dedicated to my mother, Elaine Sylvia Romotsky Werlin, but I want to thank her again here for her love and care in the past and the present. There really are no words, just gratitude—and of course, a gift of the love story she has long wanted me to write.

  I am greatly indebted to my first-round readers: Pat Lowery Collins, Ellen Wittlinger, and Lisa Papademetriou, and to my second-round readers: Jane Kurtz, Rebekah Mitsein, and Franny Billingsley. Their intelligent commentary was vital to the shaping of this book, and I will always be thankful for their effort, encouragement, and enthusiasm.

  For help with figuring out the solutions to the puzzles, credit must go to Kathleen Sweeney (the shirt), Jim McCoy (the Bay of Fundy), and Franny Billingsley (the grain of corn).

  Thanks are due also to the management and staff of the Panera Bread cafes of Danvers, Woburn, Saugus, Burlington, and Waltham, Massachusetts, where the majority of this novel was written and where my laptop computer and I always felt welcomed.

  For emotional and practical support during the writing and rewriting process, I owe warm thanks to Toni Buzzeo, Amy Butler Greenfield, David Greenfield, Jennifer Richard Jacobson, A. M. Jenkins, Ginger Knowlton, Jacqueline Briggs Martin, Dian Curtis Regan, Joanne Stanbridge, Deborah Wiles, Melissa Wyatt, and—last but far from least—Jim McCoy.

  Finally, and as ever, I wish to express appreciation to my longtime editor, Lauri Hornik. This wasn't the novel I'd originally said I would write next, but when I suddenly pulled a family curse and an evil elf out of my writing hat, she didn't even blink. I continue among the most fortunate of writers in my editor, and I know it.

  NANCY WERLIN's previous novel, The Rules of Survival, was a National Book Award Finalist, among other honors (see below). She won an Edgar Award for The Killer's Cousin, which was also named one of the "I00 Best of the Best for the 21st Century" by the American Library Association. A graduate of Yale College, she lives near Boston, Massachusetts. Visit her website at www.nancywerlin.com.