Part 5 (1/2)

She didn't have much to say and seemed business-like. She cooked supper in the kitchen and didn't speak about Miss Remlinger or the calling she'd done or ask where we'd gone with our father. I informed her, however, that we'd left with the promise of visiting the fair, but it'd been too crowded. I didn't stray into finding the money under the seat or Berner crying and wanting to go to Russia, or the two policemen following us. I felt I should put all that off until later.

Berner, as usual, went in her room when we got home and closed the door without saying anything to anyone. Her radio was tuned low to music, and I could hear her moving around, sc.r.a.ping metal clothes hangers in her closet and talking to her fish, which must've made her feel less lonely. I believed she was packing clothes for her getaway. I wouldn't be able to talk her out of it, and I couldn't tell our parents. It was the way we'd always done things. Twins didn't cause one another trouble. But if she ran away I thought she'd come back. n.o.body would hold it against her.

I sat in my own room with the window cracked open, feeling the shush of wind as the light fell, rain slas.h.i.+ng the house s.h.i.+ngles and spattering inside. There was no thunder or lightning, just whipping summer rain. From time to time it would stop, and through the wall I could hear my father snoring, and my mother in the kitchen and crows up in the wet tree limbs, squawking and hopping around, resettling themselves before the rain began again. I gave thought to the fair shutting down, rain drenching the sawdust and the tents and exhibits, workers dismantling the rides, loading them on trucks, and the bee exhibit and the gun display locked up and taken away. I got down my World Book letter ”B” and read about bees. Everything in the hive was an ideal, orderly world where the queen was honored and sacrificed for. If this didn't happen, everything fell into confusion. Bees, as I'd read before, were the key to everything human, because they responded perfectly to their environment and to other bees. This was something specific I could write a report about right at the start of school and get off on a good footing. I put a pencil in at the page and closed the volume. I'd be more relaxed when school started and my father was back to work and my mother was teaching.

After a while my father's sleepy voice began speaking in low tones. His sock feet b.u.mped the floor. The noise of dishes and pots and pans were clattering in the kitchen. My mother spoke, also in low tones. ”. . . A fish in deep water,” our father said. ”. . . In the best of all worlds . . . ,” she said. I wondered if they would talk about the money behind the car seat, or how my father's pistol had gotten lost, or where they'd gone, or my mother's suitcase on the bed. Lying on my own bed in the soft night breeze, rain dampening the bottom of my bedspread, the line of hall light below my door, such questions swirled around. They were very close to me, then just as suddenly very far away, so that I grabbed the sides of my mattress and held it. I felt the way I felt when I'd been sick with scarlet fever, years before, and couldn't completely be awake. My mother had come in and sat by my bed and laid a cool finger on my temple. My father had stood in the doorway-tall, shadowy. ”How is he?” he'd said. ”Maybe we should take him.” ”He'll be all right,” my mother said. I'd pulled the spread up to my chin and squeezed.

I listened to an owl out in the dark. I wanted to think my thoughts through again. But there was no holding back sleep. And so for a time I let it all rush away from me.

Chapter 26.

”Do you want your supper?” my mother said softly, leaning over me. Her gla.s.ses lens caught light from somewhere behind her. Her palm was on my cheek; her fingers smelled of soap. She brushed my hair, held the helix of my ear lightly between her thumb and forefinger. I'd twisted into my sheets and couldn't move my arms. My hands were asleep. ”You're very hot,” she said. ”Do you feel sick?” She went to the foot of my bed and touched the bedspread. ”It rained in on you.”

”Where's Berner?” I was thinking she was gone.

”Ate and went to bed.” My mother pulled the window closed.

”Where's Dad?” Something strenuous had pa.s.sed through me. My mouth was pasty-weedy, my hair stuck to my scalp. My joints ached.

”He hasn't gone anyplace.”

She moved back to the doorway. Amber light was in the hall. Water was trickling behind the walls, or outside. ”It rained and rained,” she whispered. ”Now it's stopped. I made you a sandwich.”

”Thank you,” I said. She pa.s.sed back out the door and disappeared.

At the dining room table, I ate the grilled cheese with a pickle and a leaf of lettuce and French dressing-things I liked. I was hungry and ate in a hurry and drank a gla.s.s of b.u.t.termilk. My father believed it was restorative. My clothes were wrinkled and damp. The house was cool and clean smelling, as if the wind had scoured it. We had scoured it days before. It was ten thirty at night, the wrong time to be eating supper at the table.

I heard my father's boot heels on the front porch boards. His back pa.s.sed by the window. Occasionally he coughed and cleared his throat. Several cars drove past-their slanted lights fell across the curtains, which were partly open. One stopped at the curb. A strong beam of light opened and flashed around the damp yard. You couldn't see who was inside. From the dark porch, my father said, ”Good evening, fellas. Welcome. We're all here, supper's on the table.” He laughed loudly. The light went out, and the car idled away without anyone speaking or getting out. My father laughed again and paced some more, whistling notes that didn't make a tune.

My mother had gone back into their bedroom. From where I sat at the table I could see her. More of her clothes were in her suitcase. She was folding other clothes and laying them on top. She looked out through the door, and for some reason being seen startled me. ”Come in here, Dell,” she said. ”I want to talk to you.”

I came in my sock feet. I was heavy-bodied as if I'd eaten too much. I would've lain on her bed and gone to sleep in front of her.

”How was your sandwich?”

”Why're you packing?”

She went on folding clothes. ”I thought we'd go to Seattle on the train tomorrow.”

”When will we be back,” I asked.

”Whenever we're ready to.”

”Is Berner going?”

”Yes. She is. I explained it to her already.”

”Is Dad?” I'd asked this before.

”No.” She went to the closet and rehung the empty hangers that had been on the bed.

”Why not?” I said.

”He has some business to tie up. He likes being here anyway.”

”What're we going to do in Seattle?”

”Well,” my mother said in her business-like voice. ”It's a real city. You'll meet your grandparents. They're interested to know you and your sister.”

I stared hard at her the way Berner stared at me. She hadn't said why we were going, and I knew I wasn't supposed to ask.

”What about school?” My heart began speeding up. I didn't want it to be that I wouldn't be starting. That happened to boys you never saw again. My throat tightened. My eyes burned as if tears were already in them.

”Don't worry about that.”

”I already have a lot of plans,” I said.

”I know about them. We all have plans.” She shook her head as if this was a silly conversation. She looked at me and blinked once behind her gla.s.ses. She looked tired. ”You have to be flexible,” she said. ”People who aren't don't go far in the world. I'm trying to be flexible.”

I thought I knew what that word meant, but it seemed to mean something else, too. Like ”making sense.” I didn't want to admit I wasn't whatever flexible meant.

Wind rose outside the house and blew water out of the leaves, clattering on the roof. Inside was perfectly still.

My mother walked to the bedroom window, cupped her hands to the gla.s.s and peered out. The window pane reflected the room and her and me and the bed with her suitcase and clothes. She was very small in front of the window. Beyond her, I could see only shapes and shadows. The garage with the pale hollyhocks and zinnias growing beside it. The empty clothesline where she'd retrieved the clean clothes. An oak sapling my father had planted and tied to a stake. His car. ”What do you know about Canada?” she said. ”Hm?” This was a sound she made when she was wanting to be friendly.

Canada was beyond Niagara Falls in my father's puzzle. I'd never looked it up in the encyclopedia. It was north of us. Hot tears were in my eyes. I breathed out as far as I could and held it. ”Why?” My voice was constricted.

”Oh.” She leaned her forehead against the window gla.s.s. ”I have the habit of only seeing things the way they're presented to me. I'd like you to turn out different. It's a weakness of mine.” She tapped the pane lightly with her fingernail. It was as if she was signaling someone in the dark. She took off her gla.s.ses, breathed onto the lenses, and wiped them on her blouse sleeve. ”Your sister's different,” she said.

”She's a lot smarter than I am.” I quickly rubbed my eyes and wiped my hand on my pants leg so as not to be noticed.

”She probably is. The poor thing.” My mother turned and smiled at me in her friendly way. ”Why don't you go back to bed now. We're leaving in the morning. The train goes at ten thirty.” She put her finger over her mouth to signal me not to say anything. ”You don't have to take anything but your toothbrush. Leave everything here. Okay?”