“Don’t comfort her, Lucky!” shouted Papa when he saw my mother’s arms go protectively about Vera. He grabbed hold of Vera and shoved her into a kitchen chair so forcefully that she began to wail. “That smart-mouth was stumbling along the highway when I saw her. When I stopped and ordered her into the car, she told me she was going to become a whore and shame us all. Ellsbeth, if you don’t know how to tame your daughter, then I’ll use my own method.”
I hadn’t even noticed my aunt had slipped into the kitchen, wearing one of her plaid cotton housedresses that seemed so cheap and ordinary compared to the pretty clothes my mother wore.
“Vera, go upstairs and stay there until I tell you to come down again,” barked Papa. “And no meals until you can apologize to all of us. You should be grateful you have a place at all in this household.”
“I’ll go, but I’ll never be grateful!” Vera picked herself up and trudged out of the kitchen. “And I’ll come downstairs when I get good and ready!”
Papa rushed forward.
“Momma, don’t let him whip her!” I cried. “She’ll only do something to hurt herself if he does.” Vera always caused her own accidents soon after she had enraged Papa so much he had to punish her.
My mother sighed and looked more fatigued. “Yes, I guess you’re right. Damian, let her go. She’s been punished enough.”
Why didn’t my aunt speak up to defend her own daughter? Sometimes it seemed she disliked Vera as much as Papa did. Then I filled with guilt. At times I, too, absolutely hated Vera. The only time I liked her was when I pitied her.
Upstairs Vera was screaming at the top of her lungs. “Nobody loves me! Nobody cares! Don’t you dare ever hit me again, Damian Adare! If you do, I’ll tell! You know whom I’ll tell, and you’ll be sorry, you will be!”
In a flash Papa was out of the chair and flying up the stairs. That stupid Vera kept right on screaming until he threw open her door, and then there was a thud. Next came the loudest and longest howl I’d heard her make yet—and her lifetime had a long record of howls and screams. My blood chilled. Another loud thump … and then total silence. All three of us left in the kitchen stared up at the ceiling, which was the floor of Vera’s room. What had Papa done to Vera?
A few minutes later, Papa came back to the kitchen.
“What did you do to Vera?” asked Momma sharply, her eyes hard as she glared at him. “She’s only a child, Damian. You don’t have to be so harsh with a child.”
“I didn’t do a damn thing!” he roared. “I opened the door of her room. She backed off and tripped over a chair. She fell and started howling. She got up and started to run to hide in the closet where she put that lock on the inside, and darn if she didn’t trip and fall again. I left her on the floor crying. You’d better go up, Ellie. She may have another broken bone.”
Disbelievingly, I stared at Papa. If I had fallen, he’d have run to help me up. He’d have kissed me, held me, said a hundred loving things, and yet he did nothing for Vera but walk away. And only yesterday he’d been so nice to her. I looked at my aunt, almost holding my breath, wondering what she would do to Papa for being so heartless.
“After breakfast I’ll go up,” answered my aunt as she sat down again. “Another broken bone would spoil my appetite.”
Momma rose to go upstairs and see to Vera. “Don’t you dare!” ordered Papa. “You look tired enough to faint, and I want you well rested and pretty for the party tonight.”
Shaken again, I got up and started for the stairs. Papa ordered me back, but I continued on, taking the steps three at a time. “I’m coming, Vera,” I called.
Vera wasn’t in her room lying on the floor with broken bones as I’d thought she’d be. I ran about, wondering where she could be. Then, to my utter amazement, I heard her singing in the First Audrina’s bedroom.
Only a playroom, safe in my home,
Got no tears, no fears,
And nowhere else to roam,
’Cause my papa wants me always,
To stay home,
Safe in my playroom, safe in my home …
I thought I’d never heard such a pitiful tune, the sad way she sang it, as if she’d sell her soul to the devil to be me, and to be forced to sit in the chair I despised.
Reluctantly, I returned to the kitchen again, where an inexplicably jovial Papa was telling a grouchy Momma a party was indeed just the thing she needed to lift her spirits. “How’s Vera?” Momma asked. I told her Vera was fine and not broken, though I didn’t mention she was using the rocking chair and must have stolen that key from Papa’s keyring.
“Didn’t I tell you?” said Papa. “Lucky, as soon as Audrina finishes her brunch the two of us are taking a stroll down to the river.” He stood, and it seemed he deliberately tossed his linen napkin so it fell into his half-full coffee cup. Momma plucked his napkin from the cup and gave him an expressive you-have-again-proved-your-self-a-slob stare. But she didn’t dare to reprimand him. It wouldn’t have done any good. Papa did as he wanted and always would.
He led me by the hand to our back lawn, which gradually descended to the river. Its sparkling ripples made the day seem wondrously fine. He smiled at me and said, “Tomorrow’s your ninth birthday, darling.”
“Papa,” I cried, staring at him, “how can tomorrow be my ninth birthday when I’m only seven today?”
Momentarily he seemed at a loss for words. As always when he lacked ready explanations, he caressed my hair, then lightly rubbed his curled fingers over my cheeks. “My sweet, haven’t I told you many times that’s why we don’t send you to school? You are one of those rare individuals who has no sense of time at all.” He spoke precisely, looking directly into my eyes as if to engrave his information, “we don’t celebrate birthdays in our house because somehow it confuses your own special calendar. Two years ago, or one day short, you were seven years old.”
What he said was impossible! Why hadn’t he told me that I was eight years old and not seven? Was he deliberately trying to make me crazy? I put my hands over my ears to shut out anything else he had to say. My eyelids squeezed tightly together as I racked my brain to remember someone telling me I was eight years old. I couldn’t remember anyone mentioning any age but seven.
“Audrina, honey, don’t look so panicked. Don’t try to remember. Just trust what Papa tells you. Tomorrow is your ninth birthday. Papa loves you, Momma loves you, and even shrew-tongue Ellie loves you if she’d dare to admit it. She can’t because Vera is there, and Vera envies you. Vera could love you, too, if I showed her more affection. I’m going to try, really try to like that girl just so you won’t have an enemy living in your own home.”
I swallowed, feeling a sore throat coming on and tears filling my eyes. Something was weird about my life. No matter how many times Papa told me about my specialness, it wasn’t natural to forget an entire year, it just couldn’t be natural. I’d ask Arden. But then he’d know something awful was wrong with me and he wouldn’t like me, either.
So it seemed I’d have to believe Papa. I told myself that I was only a child, and what difference did it make if I lost just one year in the process of growing up. And if time skipped past quicker than I could keep track of, what difference did it really make?
Sometimes unconscious fears tried to sneak out, whispering slyly, disturbing me, threatening my tentative acceptance. Inside my brain, colors were flashing and I felt the rocking motion of my body, to and fro, to and fro, singing voices whispering to me of birthday parties when I had been eight years old and I’d worn a white dress with ruffles tied round with a violet satin sash.
But what did rocking chair dreams mean, except that the First and Best Audrina had worn a ruffled white dress to her party. All those visions of birthday parties were her parties. Where could I go to find the truth? Who was there who was totally honest with me? There was no one who would tell me the truth because I might be hurt if they did.
Papa drew me down on the grassy slope beside him. The sun was high over
head and burning hot through my hair as I sat on and on with Papa. Every word he said washed clear images from my brain and replaced them with smeary blots. I watched the geese and the ducks that were using unseen paddle feet to swim like mad to where Momma liked to feed them. They had a fondness for eating her tulips and daffodils in the spring.
“Let’s talk about what you dreamed last night,” Papa said after we had been silent for a long time. “Last night I heard you moaning and groaning, and when I went to check on you, you were tossing in your bed, mumbling incoherently in your sleep.”
Feeling panicky, I looked around to see a red-headed woodpecker working on one of our best old hickory trees. “Go ‘way!” I cried. “Eat the worms on the camellia bushes!”
“Audrina,” said Papa impatiently, “forget about the trees. The trees will be here long after you and I have come and gone. Tell me what you saw in the rocking chair.”
If Papa believed in Mrs. Allismore’s string-and-ring trick, it seemed only right that I could use the same method to please him. I was about to speak and tell him when I felt the hackles on my neck rise. Turning my head quickly, I glimpsed Vera in the room where the rocking chair was. Still up there, still rocking. Let her rock on and on forever; there was no gift but the one imagination concocted to please somebody who wanted magic in his life. And maybe in the long run imagination was a special gift.
“Okay, darling. I’m not going to plead further. Just tell me what you dreamed last night.”
I spoke the name of the stock my pin had touched on twice, and then twice again. Papa looked incredulous, then angry. Immediately from his reaction I guessed I’d done the wrong thing.
“Audrina, did I ask you for a stock tip?” he asked with annoyance. “No, I did not. I asked you to give me your dreams. I’m trying to help you restore your memory. Don’t you realize yet that’s why I put you in the rocking chair? I’ve tried to make it seem your loss of memory is natural, but it isn’t. All I wanted you to do was regain what you’ve forgotten.”
I didn’t believe him. I knew what he wanted. He wanted me to turn into the First Audrina! That’s why he had all those books about black magic and psychic powers hidden away in his study.
Pulling away, I stared back at the house again, terribly upset now. Back and forth Vera was still rocking. Oh, God, suppose she had the only dream the chair ever gave me? Would she scream? Would Papa go running to save her?
Or just suppose everything Papa had told me was true, and there was a gift to be gained. Then, any second, she might replace me in his heart. Breathlessly I gushed, undecided no longer. “There I was, Papa, a grown-up woman, working in a huge place with business machines all around. They glowed, changed colors, talked in strange voices and sent messages through the air. I was up front instructing a large class how to use them. So that’s why I thought—but, of course, I should have let you decide what it meant. The letters I told you were on all the machines, every last one, Papa.”
IBM.
For a reward, his smile came tight and thin, though he did embrace me. “All right, you’ve tried to help me financially, but that’s not what I wanted. Memories, Audrina, fill the holes in your brain with the right memories. We’ll try the rocking chair again later and see if the next time doesn’t skip the woods and put you down in the right place.” I was about to cry, for I had had a funny dream about machines, and the pin had wanted to stop on those initials four times. “Don’t cry, my love,” he said, kissing me again. “I understand, and I might even put some money on that stock, even though it has had a thirty percent run-up and is due for a sell-off. Still,” he went on thoughtfully, “it wouldn’t hurt to wait for the profit-taking to end, and then buy in heavily before another climb. She is intuitive and her heart is pure even if—”
Jumping to my feet, I ran to escape his embarrassing ruminations. Now he was going to put money on that stock. What if it continued to go down after the profit-taking? Poor Momma was slaving in the kitchen, preparing for a stupid party she didn’t need to have when she was feeling so rotten. I ran to a window where I could watch Papa still down by the river, standing now and skipping pebbles across the water as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
Momma didn’t say a word about tomorrow being my ninth birthday. Was that because tomorrow truly wasn’t my birthday? I went to the closet under the back stairs and checked the newspapers. Tomorrow was September the ninth, and just like me, I forgot today was the eighth. Was reaching the age of nine really so meaningful? Yes, I decided as the day wore on and no one but Papa mentioned my birthday, reaching nine was dangerous.
The party began at nine-thirty, not long after I was sent to bed. The noise made by the crowd of twenty of Papa’s best friends drifted up to me even though my room was far from the party rooms. I knew there were bankers down there, and lawyers, doctors and other affluent people with aspirations to become richer. They liked our parties; the food was elegant, the liquor plentiful and, the best thing of all, the moment Momma sat down to play the piano the party came alive. Because she was a musician, she drew other musicians who liked to perform with her, so that the doctors and lawyers would bring their teenage sons or daughters who knew how to play some musical instrument, with considerable skill. And together, with Momma as inspiration, they’d have a “jam session.”
In my nightgown, on bare feet, I raced to peek at her sitting on the piano bench. She was wearing a red silk gown that had a cowl neckline that drooped so low it showed more than Papa would approve. All the men gathered around the piano, leaning over Momma’s shoulders, staring down into her bodice as they encouraged her to play on, play faster, put more jazz into what seemed to me jazzy enough. Her fingers flew; she bounced with the tempo that quickened. Smiling and laughing in response to whispers in her ear, Momma played with one hand and sipped the champagne her other hand held. She put down the empty glass, signaled a boy of about twenty to play his accordian, and they both began some wild version of a polka that no one could resist dancing to. According to Papa, Momma was all things to all people and true to no one, not even herself. If her audience wanted classical music, she gave them that; if they wanted popular ballads, she could give them those, too. If you asked her what kind of music she liked best, she’d answer, “I like all kinds.” I thought it was wonderful to be so open-minded and so versatile. Aunt Ellsbeth didn’t like any music that wasn’t by Grieg.
From all the fun Momma seemed to be having, who would ever guess she’d complained all day about having to slave for people she didn’t even like? “Really, Damian, you expect too much of me. I’m in my sixth month, really showing, and you want them to see me like this?”
“You’re gorgeous and you know it, pregnant or not. You always look sensational when you put on your makeup and wear a bright color and smile.”
“You told me this morning I looked awful.” Fatigue had made her sound hoarse.
“And it worked, didn’t it? You jumped out of bed, shampooed your hair, polished your nails, and I’ve never seen you look lovelier.”
“Damian, Damian,” my momma had whispered then, her voice choked with emotion, and then the door had banged shut. I’d stood alone in the hallway outside their bedroom, wondering what they did after Papa kicked the door to.
All of the words exchanged between them echoed in my head as I watched Momma at the piano. She was so beautiful. My aunt looked dowdy in comparison in her print dress that seemed right for the kitchen but nowhere else.
I yelped from the pain of a pinch on my arm. There was Vera in her nightgown, and she was not supposed to come downstairs until Papa told her she could—and so far he hadn’t. Vera never came near me that she didn’t hurt me in some minor way. “Your mother is nothing but a big show-off,” she whispered. “A woman as pregnant as she is shouldn’t show herself.” Yet, when I glanced at Vera, I saw admiration in her eyes as she, too, caught the rhythm of Momma’s music.
“The First Audrina could play piano just like that,” said Vera in my ear.
“She could read music, too, and the watercolors she painted! You can’t do anything in comparison.”
“Neither can you!” I flared back, but I was hurt again. “Good night, Vera. You’d better disappear when I do, or else Papa might see you and punish you again.”
I headed back for my room. Halfway up the stairs, I looked back to see Vera still hiding behind the beaded portieres, clinging to them for balance as her feet shuffled in rhythm to the music; watching until the very end.
It wasn’t until the noise below stopped that I was able to fall into a deep and dreamless sleep. It was my way to toss restlessly, and Vera’s way to sleep soundly. I was wishing I had that knack when I drifted off, only to be awakened what seemed only seconds later. My parents were arguing violently.
No wonder Momma didn’t like parties with Papa. Every time we had a party it ended this way. Lord, I prayed as I slipped out of bed, today is my ninth birthday and this isn’t a good way for it to start. Please let it be like March and go out like a lamb.
Vera was already kneeling on the hall carpet, peeking through the keyhole. She held a cautioning finger before her lips and silently gestured for me to go away. I didn’t like her spying on my parents and I refused to leave. Instead, I knelt beside her and tried to shove her away. Papa’s strong voice came right through the solid oak door. “And in your condition, too, you danced like some cheap little tramp. You made a fool of yourself, Lucietta.”
“Leave me alone, Damian!” cried Momma, as I must have heard her cry a hundred times or more. “You invite guests without telling me in advance. You go out and buy liquor we can’t afford, and flowers, and champagne for them to drink, and even hand me a glass, and when I get drunk you become enraged. What am I supposed to do at a party? Sit around and watch you perform?”