The Memory Keeper's Daughter Part 8

He didn't answer, conscious of his lungs moving, the deep unsteadiness of his breathing. He'd had this same feeling when he opened Caroline's letter, addressed to his old office in her scraggy hand, half covered with a forwarding stamp. It was postmarked Toledo, Ohio. She had included three pictures of Phoebe, an infant in a pink dress. The return address was to a PO box, not in Toledo but in Cleveland. Cleveland, a place he had never been, a place where Caroline Gill was apparently living with his daughter.

"Let's move away from here," he said again, at last. "Let me take your picture."

She nodded, but when he reached the safe center of the bridge and turned, Norah was still near the edge, facing him, arms folded, smiling.

"Take it right here," she said. "Make it look like I'm walking on air."

David squatted, fiddling with the camera dials, heat radiating up from the bare golden rocks. Paul squirmed against him and started to fuss. David would remember all this-which went unseen and unrecorded-when the image rose up later in the developing fluid, taking slow shape. He framed Norah in the viewfinder, wind moving in her hair, her skin tan and healthy, wondering at all she kept from him.

The spring air was warm, softly fragrant. They hiked back down, pa.s.sing cave entrances and sprays of purple rhododendron and mountain laurel. Norah led them off the main path and through the trees, following a creek, until they emerged in a sunstruck place she remembered for its wild strawberries. Wind moved lightly in the long gra.s.s, and the dark green leaves of the strawberry plants shimmered low against the earth. The air was full of sweetness, the hum of insects, heat.

They spread out their picnic: cheese and crackers and cl.u.s.ters of grapes. David sat down on the blanket, cradling Paul's head against his chest as he undid the baby carrier, thinking idly of his own father, stocky and strong, with skilled blunt fingers that covered David's hands as he taught him to heft an ax or milk the cow or pound a nail through the cedar shingles. His father, who smelled of sweat and resin and the dark hidden earth of the mines where he worked in the winter. Even when David was a teenager, boarding in town all week so he could go to high school, he had loved walking home on the weekend and finding his father there, smoking his pipe on the porch.

Doo, Paul said. Free, he immediately pulled off one shoe. He studied it intently, then dropped it almost at once and crawled off toward the gra.s.sy world beyond the blanket. David watched him yank a fistful of weeds and put them in his mouth, a look of surprise flashing across his small features at the texture. He wished, suddenly, fiercely, that his parents were alive to meet his son. Paul said. Free, he immediately pulled off one shoe. He studied it intently, then dropped it almost at once and crawled off toward the gra.s.sy world beyond the blanket. David watched him yank a fistful of weeds and put them in his mouth, a look of surprise flashing across his small features at the texture. He wished, suddenly, fiercely, that his parents were alive to meet his son.

"Awful stuff, isn't it?" he said softly, wiping gra.s.sy drool from Paul's chin. Norah moved beside him, quietly, efficiently, taking out silverware and napkins. He kept his face turned; he didn't want her to see him so stirred by emotion. He took a geode from his pocket and Paul grasped it in both hands, turning it over.

"Should he have that in his mouth?" Norah asked, settling down beside him, so close he could feel her warmth, her scent of sweat and soap filling the air.

"Probably not," he said, retrieving the stone and giving Paul a cracker instead. The geode was warm and damp. He gave it a sharp crack on the rock, splitting it open to reveal its crystalline purple heart.

"So beautiful," Norah murmured, turning it in her hand.

"Ancient seas," David said. "The water got trapped inside and crystallized, over centuries."

They ate lazily, then picked ripe strawberries, sun-warmed and tender. Paul ate them by fistfuls, juice running down his wrists. Two hawks circled lazily in the deep blue sky. Didi, Didi, Paul said, lifting a chubby arm to point. Later, when he fell asleep, Norah settled him on a blanket in the gra.s.sy shade. Paul said, lifting a chubby arm to point. Later, when he fell asleep, Norah settled him on a blanket in the gra.s.sy shade.

"This is nice," Norah observed, settling with her back against a boulder. "Just the three of us, sitting in the sun."

Her feet were bare and he took them in his hands, ma.s.saging them, delicate bones hidden beneath the flesh.

"Oh," she said, closing her eyes, "that's really really nice. You'll put me to sleep." nice. You'll put me to sleep."

"Stay awake," he said. "Tell me what you're thinking."

"I don't know. I was just remembering this little field by the sheep farm. When Bree and I were little we used to wait for our father there. We gathered huge bunches of black-eyed Susans and Queen Anne's lace. The sun felt just like this-like an embrace. Our mother put the flowers in vases all over the house."

"That's nice too," David said, releasing one of her feet and attending to the other. He ran his thumb, lightly, over the thin white scar the broken flashbulb had left. "I like thinking of you there." Norah's skin was soft. He remembered sunny days from his own childhood, before June got so sick, when the family had gone hunting for ginseng, a fragile plant hidden in the dusky light amid the trees. His parents had met on such a search. He had their wedding photo, and on the day of their own marriage Norah had presented it to him in a handsome oak frame. His mother, with clear skin and wavy hair, a narrow waist, a faint, knowing smile. His father, bearded, standing behind her, his cap in his hand. They had left the courthouse after the wedding and moved into the cabin his father had built on the mountainside overlooking their fields. "My parents loved being outside," he added. "My mother planted flowers everywhere. There was a cl.u.s.ter of jack-in-the-pulpit by the stream up from our house."

"I'm sorry I never met them. They must have been so proud of you."

"I don't know. Maybe. They were glad my life was easier."

"Glad," she agreed slowly, opening her eyes and glancing at Paul, who slept peacefully, dappled light falling on his face. "But maybe a little sorry too? I would be, if Paul grew up and moved away."

"Yes," he said, nodding. "That's true. They were proud and sorry both. They didn't like the city. They only visited me once in Pittsburgh." He remembered them sitting awkwardly in his single student room, his mother starting every time a train whistle sounded. June was dead by then, and as they sat sipping weak coffee at his rickety student table, he remembered thinking bitterly that they did not know what to do with themselves without June to care for. She had been the center of all their lives for so long. "They only stayed with me for one night. After my father died, my mother went to live with her sister in Michigan. She wouldn't fly, and she never learned to drive. I only saw her once, after that."

"That's too sad," Norah said, rubbing away a smear of dirt on her calf.

"Yes," David said. "Too sad indeed." He thought of June, the way her hair got so blond in the sun each summer, the scent of her skin-soap and warmth and something metallic, like a coin-filling the air when they squatted side by side, digging up the ground with sticks. He had loved her so much, her sweet laughter. And he had hated coming home to find her lying on a pallet on the porch on sunny days, his mother's face drawn with concern as she sat beside her daughter's limp form, singing softly, husking corn or sh.e.l.ling peas.

David looked at Paul, sleeping so deeply on the blanket with his head turned to the side, his long hair curling against his damp neck. His son, at least, he had sheltered from grief. Paul would not grow up, as David had, suffering the loss of his sister. He would not be forced to fend for himself because his sister couldn't.

This thought, and the force of its bitterness, shocked David. He wanted to believe he'd done the right thing when he handed his daughter to Caroline Gill. Or at least that he'd had the right reasons. But perhaps he had not. Perhaps it was not so much Paul he'd been protecting on that snowy night as some lost version of himself.

"You look so far away," Norah observed.

He shifted, moving closer to her, leaning against the boulder too.

"My parents had great dreams for me," he said. "But they didn't match my own dreams."

"Sounds like me and my mother," Norah said, hugging her knees. "She says she's coming to visit next month. Did I tell you? She's got a free flight."

"That's good, isn't it? Paul will keep her busy."

Norah laughed. "He will, won't he? That's her whole reason for coming."

"Norah, what do you dream about?" he asked. "What do you dream for Paul?"

Norah didn't answer right away. "I suppose I want him to be happy," she said at last. "Whatever in life makes him happy, I want him to have that. I don't care what it is, as long as he grows up to be good and true to himself. And generous and strong, like his father."

"No," David said, uncomfortable. "You don't want him to take after me."

She gave him an intent look, surprised. "Why not?"

He didn't answer. After a long, hesitant moment, Norah spoke again.

"What's wrong?" she asked, not aggressively but thoughtfully, as if she were trying to puzzle out the answer as she spoke. "Between us, I mean, David."

He didn't answer, struggling against a sudden surge of anger. Why did she have to stir things up again? Why couldn't she let the past rest and move on? But she spoke again.

"It hasn't been the same since Paul was born and Phoebe died. And yet you still won't talk about her. It's like you want to erase the fact that she existed."

"Norah, what do you want me to say? Of course life hasn't been the same."

"Don't get angry, David. That's just some kind of strategy, isn't it? So I won't talk about her anymore. But I won't back down. What I'm saying is true."

He sighed.

"Don't ruin the beautiful day, Norah," he said at last.

"I'm not," she said, moving away. She lay down on the blanket and closed her eyes. "I'm perfectly content with this day."

He watched her for a moment, sunlight catching in her blond hair, her chest rising and falling gently with each breath. He wanted to reach out and trace the delicate curved bones of her ribs; he wanted to kiss her at the point the bones met, stretching away like wings.

"Norah," he said. "I don't know what to do. I don't know what you want."

"No," she said. "You don't."

"You could tell me."

"I suppose I could. Maybe I will. Were they very much in love?" she asked suddenly, without opening her eyes. Her voice was still soft and calm, but he was aware of a new tension in the air. "Your father and your mother?"

"I don't know," he said, slowly, carefully, trying to determine the source of her question. "They loved each other. But he was away a lot. Like I said, they had hard lives."

"My father loved my mother more than she loved him," Norah said, and David felt an uneasiness stir in his heart. "He loved her, but he couldn't seem to show love in a way that was meaningful to her. She just thought he was offbeat, a little silly. There was a lot of silence in my house, growing up.... We're pretty silent in our house too," she added, and he thought of their calm evenings, her head bent over the little white hat with the ducks.

"A good silence," he said.

"Sometimes."

"And other times?"

"I still think about her, David," she said, turning on her side and meeting his gaze. "Our daughter. What she would be like."

He didn't answer, and as he watched she wept silently, covering her face with her hands. After a moment, he reached out and touched her arm; she wiped the tears from her eyes.

"And you?" she demanded, fierce now. "Don't you ever miss her too?"

"Yes," he said truthfully. "I think about her all the time."

Norah put her hand on his chest, and then her lips, berry-stained, were on his, a sweetness as piercing as desire against his tongue. He felt himself falling, the sun on his skin and her b.r.e.a.s.t.s lifting softly, like birds, against his hands. She sought the b.u.t.tons on his shirt, and her hand brushed against the letter he had hidden in his pocket.

He shrugged off his shirt, but even so, when he slid his arms around her again, he was thinking, I love you. I love you so much, and I lied to you. I love you. I love you so much, and I lied to you. And the distance between them, millimeters only, the s.p.a.ce of a breath, opened up and deepened, became a cavern at whose edge he stood. He pulled away, back into the light and shadow, the clouds over him and then not, and the sun-warmed rock hot against his back. And the distance between them, millimeters only, the s.p.a.ce of a breath, opened up and deepened, became a cavern at whose edge he stood. He pulled away, back into the light and shadow, the clouds over him and then not, and the sun-warmed rock hot against his back.

"What is it?" she asked, stroking his chest. "Oh, David, what's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"David," she said. "Oh, David. Please."

He hesitated, on the edge of confessing everything, and then he could not.

"A problem from work. A patient. I can't get the case out of my mind."

"Let it go," she said. "I'm sick and tired of your work."

Hawks, lifting high on the updrafts, and the sun so warm. Everything circled, returning each time to the exact same point. He must tell her; the words filled his mouth. I love you, I love you so much, and I lied to you. I love you, I love you so much, and I lied to you.

"I want to have another baby, David," Norah said, sitting up. "Paul's old enough now, and I'm ready."

David was so startled he didn't speak for a moment.

"Paul's only a year old," he said at last.

"So? People say it's easier to get all the diapers and things over with at once."

"What people?"

She sighed. "I knew you'd say no."

"I'm not saying no," David replied carefully.

She didn't answer.

"The timing seems wrong," he said. "That's all."

"You are are saying no. You're saying no, but you don't want to admit it." saying no. You're saying no, but you don't want to admit it."

He was silent, remembering the way Norah had stood so close to the edge of the bridge. Remembering her photographs of nothing, and the letter in his pocket. He wanted nothing more than for the delicate structures of their lives to remain secure, for things to continue just as they were. For the world not to change, for this fragile equilibrium between them to endure.

"Things are fine right now," he said softly. "Why rock the boat?"

"How about for Paul?" She nodded to him, sleeping, still and peaceful, on his blanket. "He misses her."

"He can't possibly remember," David replied sharply.

"Nine months," Norah said. "Growing heart to heart. How could he not, at some level?"

"We're not ready," David said. "I'm not."

"It's not only about you," Norah said. "You're hardly home anyway. Maybe it's me who misses her, David. Sometimes, honestly, I feel like she's so close, just in the other room, and I've forgotten her. I know that must sound crazy, but it's true."

He didn't answer, though he knew exactly what she meant. The air was thick with the scent of strawberries. His mother had made preserves on the outdoor stove, stirring the foaming mixture as it cooked into syrup, boiling the jars and filling them to stand, jewel-like, on a shelf. He and June had eaten that jam in the dead of winter, stealing spoonfuls when their mother wasn't looking and hiding under the table's oilcloth cover to lick them clean. June's death had broken their mother's spirit, and David could no longer believe himself immune from misfortune. It was statistically unlikely that they'd have another child with Down's, but it was possible, anything was possible; and he couldn't take the risk.

"But it wouldn't fix things, Norah, to have another baby. That's not the right reason."

After a moment's silence she stood up, brushing her hands on her shorts, and waded off angrily through the field.

His shirt lay crumpled beside him, a corner of the white envelope visible. David did not reach for it; he did not need to. The note was brief, and though he had glanced at the photos only once, they were as clear to him as if he'd taken them himself. Phoebe's hair was dark and fine, like Paul's. Her eyes were brown, and she waved chubby fists in the air, as if reaching for something beyond the camera's view. Caroline, perhaps, wielding the camera. He had glimpsed her at the memorial service, tall and lonely in her red coat, and he'd gone straight to her apartment afterward, unsure of his intentions, knowing only that he had to see her. But by then Caroline was gone. Her apartment had looked exactly the same, with its squat furniture and plain walls; a faucet dripped in the bathroom. Yet the air was too still, the shelves bare. The bureau drawers and closets were empty. In the kitchen, a dull light pouring in across the black and white linoleum, David had stood listening to the beating of his own uneasy heart.

Now he lay back, the clouds moving over him, light and shadow. He had not tried to find Caroline, and since her letter had no useful return address, he could not imagine where to start. It's in your hands now, It's in your hands now, he had told her. But he found himself stricken at odd moments: alone in his new office; or developing photos, watching images emerge, mysteriously, on the sheets of blank white paper; or lying here on this warm rock while Norah, hurt and angry, walked away. he had told her. But he found himself stricken at odd moments: alone in his new office; or developing photos, watching images emerge, mysteriously, on the sheets of blank white paper; or lying here on this warm rock while Norah, hurt and angry, walked away.

He was tired, and he felt himself drifting into sleep. Insects hummed in the sunlight, and he felt faintly anxious about bees. The stones in his pockets pressed against his leg. Nights in his childhood, he sometimes found his father in the porch rocker, the poplar trees glinting, alive with fireflies. On one such night his father handed him a smooth stone, an axhead he'd found while digging a trench. Over two thousand years old, Over two thousand years old, he said. he said. Imagine that, David. It sat in other hands once, that eternally long ago, but beneath this very same moon. Imagine that, David. It sat in other hands once, that eternally long ago, but beneath this very same moon.

That was one time. There were other days when they went out to catch rattlesnakes. Dusk to dawn, they'd walked through the woods, carrying forked sticks, cloth bags over their shoulders and a metal box swinging from David's hand.

It always seemed to David that time paused on those days, the sun forever in the sky and the dry leaves moving under his feet. The world was reduced to just himself and his father and the snakes, but it was expanded, too, the sky opening vastly around him, higher and bluer with every step, and everything slowing down to the moment when he spotted a movement amid the colors of dirt and dry leaves, the diamondback pattern visible only when the snake began to move. His father had taught him how to go still, watching the yellow eyes, the flickering tongue. Each time a snake shed its skin the rattle grew longer, so you could tell by the loudness of the rattle in the forest silence how old the snake was, how big, and how much money it would bring. For the largest ones, coveted by zoos and scientists and sometimes by snake handlers, they might receive five dollars apiece.

Light fell through the trees and made patterns on the forest floor, and there was the sound of wind. Then there was the rattling, and the rearing head of the snake, and his father's arm, strong and solid, plunging a forked stick down to pin the snake by its neck. The fangs extended, striking hard into damp earth, the rattling wild and furious. With two strong fingers his father gripped the snake tightly behind its open jaw and picked it up: cool, dry, writhing like a whip. He slung the snake into a cloth bag and jerked it shut, and then the bag was a live thing, quivering on the ground. His father flipped it into a metal box and closed the lid. Without speaking they walked on, counting the snake money in their minds. There were weeks, in the summer and late fall, when they could make $25 this way. The money paid for food; when they went to the doctor in Morgantown, it paid for that too.

David!

Norah's voice came to him faintly, urgently, through the distant past and the forest and into the day. He rose up on his elbows and saw her standing on the far edge of the field of ripening strawberries, transfixed by something on the ground. He felt a rush of adrenaline and fear. Rattlesnakes liked sunny logs like the one by which she'd stopped; they laid their eggs in the fertile rotting wood. He glanced at Paul, still sleeping quietly in the shade, and then he was up and running, thistles scratching his ankles and strawberries bursting softly beneath his feet, already reaching into the pocket of his jeans and closing his fist around the largest stone. When he got close enough to glimpse the dark line of the snake, he threw it as hard as he could. The dull stone arched slowly through the air, turning. It fell six inches short of the snake and burst open, its purple heart alive and glittering.

"What in the world are you doing?" Norah asked.

He'd reached her by then. Panting, he looked down. It was not a snake at all but a dark stick resting against the dry skin of the log.