“Why not?”
“I didn’t look that much like him. Different hair color, different eyes. I was better-looking. You know what he believed?”
Of course, I thought that his father believed his mother had an affair with someone, but I didn’t want to suggest anything bad about his mother, so I shook my head.
“He thought I was switched in the maternity ward and my mother didn’t notice. He said I was the child of some teenage girl who got pregnant and was going to give me away anyway. He claimed he knew one was there at the time.”
“But who would make the switch, and why?”
“He said there was a nurse who didn’t like him. Stupid, I know . . . like where was the real me, then, right?”
“Right,” I said. I couldn’t imagine having someone like that for a father, someone who despised your very existence.
“So even when I was little, if I did something he didn’t like, he’d say I was the stupid kid from the stupid girl and not his. His kid wouldn’t be so dumb.”
I shook my head. I had finished my sandwich and my drink. And then I thought of something he’d like to hear. “Maybe he was right. It sounds like it’s the other way around, though. He wasn’t your father.”
“What?”
“He was too dumb to be your father. You were so much smarter than he was.”
He stared at me, and I held my breath. I could see he wasn’t sure whether he liked what I had said. I realized that I was also saying his mother was too stupid to know she didn’t bring home her own child, which I couldn’t imagine any mother doing.
However, his face broke into a wide smile, and he leaned back and laughed. Then he slapped the table.
“I shoulda known enough to tell him that. That’s a good zinger. Damn. I shoulda had you here long ago.”
“I’d have been too young,” I said. I was too young now, but I didn’t add that. Instead, I rose and took my dish and his to the sink.
He sat there finishing his beer and mumbling about the good zinger. He wished his father was still alive so he could stick it to him. “You and I would be some team,” he said. “We’d show him.”
My gaze went to the door. I was almost positive that he hadn’t locked it this time. Could I rush to it now and get up the stairs and out before he caught me? I felt stronger, having rested and eaten, but I would have to do it barefoot, taking off his slippers and running, maybe over gravel or rocks. I’d endure any pain to get away.
My heart was pounding so hard that I feared I might faint before I reached the door. I turned off the water and picked up the dish towel, keeping my eyes on the door. It wasn’t locked. In fact, it looked slightly open. I felt sure I could leap up the stairs, maybe even before he reached the door himself. I was worried again that I could get lost upstairs, not having seen any of it when he had brought me here, but the chances were good that I’d spot the front door quickly. Perhaps one of the infrequent cars would be going by on the road below. Someone would see me running frantically and stop to help me. I’d be saved.
I put the plate down, and then, just as I was about to lunge at the door, he put his arms around my waist and drew me back against his chest so he could kiss me on the top of my head. I hadn’t heard him get up. I had been too lost in my own thoughts, but now I realized that he surely would have caught me trying to escape if I had lunged for the door.
His hand opened and rose toward my face. In his palm was a woman’s watch. “This,” he said, “was my mother’s, and now it’s yours.” He gestured for me to take it, so I did. Then he plucked it from my fingers and put it on my wrist. “That’s a real tiny diamond over the twelve, you know. This watch is about thirty years old, rose gold. See how well she kept it? My father once tried to hock it, but she stopped him. She threatened him with a meat knife, and he knew she meant business, so he gave it back to her, and from then on, she kept it hidden. Besides her, only I knew where it was. She showed me in case something happened to her. She said, ‘You give it to the woman you marry.’ ”
He stepped back.
“So what do you think?” he asked.
“It’s beautiful. Thank you.”
“Consider my mother gave it to you, not me. Take good care of it,” he warned. “To me, it’s priceless.”
I nodded.
“Well,” he said, slapping his hands together. “I’ll clear off the rest of the table, and we’ll go over the catalogues now, okay?”
“Yes,” I said, and returned to the table, my gaze returning to the partially open door as I sat. I should have moved faster. Now it was too late.
The watch read 1:34. Maybe I was better off not knowing the time, I thought. That way, I wouldn’t be looking at the minutes and hours and wishing they’d move faster. I couldn’t stop believing that my rescue was coming. If I did, I might as well be dead, I thought.
I opened one of the carpet catalogues and began slowly to peruse the samples.
“A tightly woven rug might work better down here,” I said, running my fingers over a sample. “It’ll be easier to keep clean. Mr. Moccasin sheds hair. We’ll need to vacuum all the time, and if the padding is thick, it will feel soft enough.”
He nodded, looking a little impressed.
“We won’t choose curtains until we choose the carpet color, of course,” I said. “Everything should coordinate. We might want to paint where there’s no paneling and rethink the colors in the bathroom.”
His eyes widened even more. “Right, right. Good. I didn’t think of that.”
“Of course, I don’t know anything about doing this yourself. Nobody in my family is handy that way.”
“Oh, I do. I’ve done it for many people.” He looked around. “The room is a good size, twenty-five by seventy. I know just how many square feet we’ll need. I’ve got all the tools. I even have knee pads for us both. We’ll work side by side. We’ll clean the subfloor first, see, to make it smooth, and then we’ll install tackless strips and the carpet pad, a good thick one like you say. I’ll do the trimming and notch the corners. I’ll glue the seams, stretch the carpet using something called a binder bar, and then do the finishing touches.”
“You do know a lot about it. Is that what you do for a living?” I asked.
“I’m an all-around tradesman. I do electrical work, too, got a license and all. And plumbing. I’ve even done some roofing lately. Didn’t think you had such a smart guy, huh?” he said, leaning back proudly.
“Do you work for a company?”
“I did, a few, but now I work for myself—or, I mean, for us,” he said.
“How do people find out about you? Do you advertise in newspapers, on the radio?”
“Naw. Word of mouth’s enough. Don’t worry about it. I can get as much work as I want.”
I nodded and turned another page.
I had hoped to find out something more specific about him, but then I thought, what good would it do me? I couldn’t get a message out to anyone. A part of me, however, was truly curious about him. Maybe I would learn something that could help me fashion an escape. He didn’t seem to mind my questions. In fact, he thought it meant I was more accepting.
“Did you learn all this from your father?”
“Hell, no. He had no patience for me, and besides, as soon as I was old enough, I left school and went to work and got to know more than he ever knew. My mother would usually ask me to fix things around the house.”
“I bet he didn’t like that.”
“You’re smart. He hated it. Sometimes I think he’d go and break something I fixed just so he could say I didn’t do it right.”
“Do you have carpet upstairs?”
“In every room but the kitchen,” he said. “I laid the tile for the kitchen floor, too.”
“Maybe you want a color similar to what’s upstairs, then.”
“No,” he said emphatically. “This is our place. It’s got to be different. I’ll tell you if we can do the color you pick out.”
It took
until we reached the middle of the third catalogue before he approved the color, a medium-green cut pile.
“I knew you’d make the right choice for us,” he said. “I can get this pretty quick.”
“Why don’t we start on the floor today? I need exercise,” I said. What I really wanted was for him to leave again and maybe, just maybe, forget to lock the door behind him.
His smile widened. “Start today?” He thought a moment. “Yeah, good. We’ll start by preparing the floor. I’ll go up and get the equipment and the vacuum cleaner and all.”
“Don’t you have to go buy things?”
“No, not for step one. I told you, I do this for a living. I got all we need here.”
He stood and leaned down to kiss me.
“My own little homemaker,” he said. “We’ll make this place cozy and beautiful together. Then it will mean more. To both of us.”
I watched him carefully as he left. This was possibly still very good. He hadn’t locked the door behind him, and I was sure he had to have his tools somewhere other than in the house, perhaps in a shed or in the garage. I might not get as good a chance as I have now, I thought. I took some deep breaths and went to the door.
Mr. Moccasin followed me, as usual. I tried to wave him back. He didn’t retreat.
“You want out as much as I do, don’t you?” I said, and then I opened the door, keeping my body between the cat and the opening. I listened for a moment. The stairway, as short as it was, loomed before me, looking formidable. What if I was only halfway up and he opened the door above? The very thought gave me shivers. I listened. I’ve got to try, I thought when I heard nothing. I’ve got to risk it. I slipped out of his too-big-for-me slippers, closed the door behind me, and started up the stairs. When I reached the top, I realized that I had held my breath so long that I might faint and topple back down. I steadied myself by gripping the banister.
As quietly as I could, I opened the upstairs door. Again, I paused to listen for him. Hearing nothing, I opened the door a little more and saw that I was in a short, narrow hallway. It was lighter on my right, so I imagined that was the way out. Directly across from me and the basement door was a bedroom, its door wide open. I stepped out and turned to the right, but something caught my eye in the bedroom. I paused to look, and this time, I really did come close to fainting.
I did not enter the bedroom. I stood just outside the doorway and gazed in amazement. A coffin had been placed right on top of the bed, which had a rosewood headboard. The coffin was made from the same wood but had an unfinished look to it. It took up most of the bed, which had a cream-colored top sheet with rosebuds and two large matching pillows. There was a small, working grandfather clock on the right nightstand. On the opposite side was a vase with what looked like freshly cut roses. The light-blue shag carpet appeared recently vacuumed. The darker-blue curtains were fully opened. Looking through those windows, I could see a thick wooded area. Between the house and that was a browned, spotty lawn with a rusted table and two rusted chairs.
Whose coffin was it? Was it meant to be mine? Was that why it was unfinished? Why had it been put on a bed? I was trembling so hard that I didn’t think I could continue, but I walked down the short hallway and saw the front door. It was open, but there was a screen door, too. The sight of a sunny sky with only a patch of clouds restored my determination.
Carefully, I approached the screen door. The front porch had only a few wooden steps. I saw Anthony’s van parked on the right. The gravel driveway did go down a small incline. I’d have to step out to see the road, but I was sure the best escape was to run down the driveway and take any direction once I reached the road.
I started to open the screen door. The hinges weren’t rusted, but they needed some oil, because they began to groan the moment I pushed out. I had the door more than halfway open and had taken a step out when I heard what sounded like a door slamming and looked to my left. Anthony was pushing a wheelbarrow loaded with equipment toward the house. I knew he would see me the moment I started down those porch steps. I could run only so fast barefoot on gravel. He’d catch me for sure.
I backed up, closing the screen door as softly as I could, but I wasn’t disheartened. There was still a good chance, I thought. I would stay out of his view, and as soon as he started down the stairs to the basement apartment, I could run out and down the driveway. I might even be able to hide somewhere off the road until a car came along.
So I turned and went first into the small kitchen and then into the living room, where I knelt behind a large brown sofa to wait and listen.
11
Haylee
Never, from the moment I could realize anything until now, had I ever seen or heard Mother confuse one of us for the other. Although I sensed it never bothered Kaylee as much as it did me whenever anyone confused us, especially when we were younger, one of us was often quick to correct the person. I did notice that sometimes Kaylee didn’t seem to care at all. It was barely worth a shrug. When I complained, she said, “Oh, they’ll eventually realize who’s who.” That was never good enough for me. I grew to hate the word eventually anyway. So many things were eventually in our house. Mother would use it to justify everything she believed about us.
“Eventually, the two of you will think more and more alike. . . . Eventually, you’ll want the same things. . . . Eventually, you’ll appreciate how I brought you up. . . . Eventually, people will see how perfectly alike you are.”
If I asked when I could have something on my own, something just mine and not duplicated for Kaylee, whether it was clothes or shoes, anything, Mother might simply say “Eventually” and leave it at that.
Who didn’t confuse us sometimes? Teachers, Mother and Daddy’s friends, relatives, our grandparents, even other students often would call me Kaylee or call her Haylee. Most of the time, they corrected themselves quickly when they saw the reaction on my face. Those who were trying to be my close friends got to the point where if they were momentarily unsure, they would keep their traps shut.
But Mother never confused us, at least never until now.
Right now, she had the same look on her face that she’d had when she came down and asked where Kaylee was. Only a little while ago, she was asking how Kaylee could have done all this. Thoughts were bouncing around in her head like ping-pong balls.
I looked at Mrs. Lofter, who closed and opened her eyes to signal that I should be gentle, understanding. Then, perhaps afraid that I didn’t appreciate what she was subtly suggesting, she shook her head emphatically to tell me not to contradict Mother.
She must have seen the displeasure in my face and how close I was to correcting Mother. I had to remind myself that Mrs. Lofter was trained in how to read people’s faces and sense their emotions. Of course, I didn’t know exactly what she expected me to say. Should I contradict her with a little amazement? Oh, no, Mother, I’m Haylee. Or should I pretend I hadn’t heard her? Mother was the only genuine nutcase I knew. I didn’t have the experience.
“Yes, I’m home,” I decided to say. At least I didn’t say I was Kaylee. All I said was that I was home.
Anger slipped in beside Mother’s gleeful surprise. I didn’t need psychological training to realize that; I had seen it too often. “We’re going to have a good old-fashioned mother-daughter talk about all this, young lady,” Mother said. “You go get your sister and meet me in the living room in two minutes. And I mean two minutes. I don’t want to have to go looking for either of you.”
“Looking for us?”
“Exactly.”
This ought to be amusing, I thought. Go get my sister? What did she think was happening here? Who did she think Mrs. Lofter was? Why was this stranger in her room? Was this emotional or psychological breakdown she was having going to get worse? Had it gotten seriously worse in a matter of minutes? I looked to Mrs. Lofter for instructions.
She didn’t look pleased with the way I had reacted and ignored me. “Perhaps you should rest a bit now first, M
rs. Fitzgerald,” she said. “You’ve been through quite an emotional shock.” She smiled at Mother. “Most of the time, we are simply unaware of how much of a toll our emotional turmoil takes on us. You want to be strong for your girls, don’t you?”
Mother looked up at her, blinked rapidly, like someone with dust in her eyes, and nodded.
Mrs. Lofter moved forcefully to get Mother to return to bed, seizing her arm and guiding her out of the chair. “We have a little something that will help you rest,” she said, and handed Mother a glass of water and a pill after she had her lying down. “There’ll be lots of time to address the things you want to address.”
I was amazed at how Mother did what she asked without any resistance. Mrs. Lofter fixed her blanket and her pillow, and Mother closed her eyes. I thought she was going back to sleep, but then her eyes opened quickly and she started to sit up.
Mrs. Lofter kept her hand on Mother’s shoulder and stopped her. “Now, now, just give it some time, Mrs. Fitzgerald. You have to be strong for everyone, just as we agreed, and you can’t be strong if you’re not well rested.”
Mother looked at her suspiciously for a moment and then relented and lay back again. I had never seen her so firmly manipulated. I couldn’t recall her ever doing anything she didn’t want to do, especially if Daddy had asked her or even her own mother. I seriously considered learning the things Mrs. Lofter had learned, perhaps making it my career, too. I’d have loved to have the sort of power that let her control and influence others. I knew I was simply too impatient and definitely too intolerant with people. I often snapped my sarcasm at some of the girls and most of the boys in school, like a verbal whip. It didn’t help make me Miss Popularity.
Kaylee had always criticized me for being clumsy and overbearing when it came to making and keeping friends or speaking with teachers and other adults. “You get more with honey than you do with vinegar,” she’d say, mimicking Grandmother Fitzgerald. Especially when we were both younger, Kaylee liked to lecture me. She’d take on Mother’s or one of our grandmothers’ posture and tone of voice and pace back and forth, tossing out these tidbits of wisdom and instructions the way we tossed peanuts to monkeys at the zoo.