The Unwelcomed Child (36 page)

When it came time to visit my grandmother, Uncle Brett hesitated. “Maybe it would better if I didn’t come along, Prescott,” he said.

“No, no. At first, she’ll think you’re gloating, but let her see that family is stronger.”

Uncle Brett smiled at me. “You’re having a good influence on him, Elle. Guess I have to find time to hang around with you more, too.”

He talked about my visiting him in Vegas one day.

“You can come to one of the big shows. I think I’ll be there a while. Feels good to stay in one place for a change,” he said. “I don’t guarantee your mother will be there,” he added.

When we visited Grandmother Myra together, she had the initial reaction that Grandpa Prescott had predicted. She took one look at Uncle Brett and, by now able to dramatically change her expression, mumbled something that sounded like, “I’m sure you’re glad.”

Uncle Brett laughed at her and surprised us all by lecturing her about getting herself better and up and at it again. “This is the wrong time to get sick and dependent,” he told her. “You’ve got a granddaughter to help get on her way to some good schooling and a good career. She’s a bright young lady. And Prescott could never take care of himself.”

I could see the surprise in her face. She seemed at the end to be buoyed by our visit. Her therapist told us she was making good progress. He thought she would need a wheelchair for sure, but the possibility of getting up out of it and using a walker was, in his opinion, quite real.

Afterward, all three of us feeling better about everything, we went to a wonderful dinner at the most expensive restaurant in Lake Hurley, Très Mystique, where I had my first lobster fra diavolo and, thanks to Uncle Brett, a glass of expensive red wine. He paid for our dinner, but both Grandpa Prescott and I laughed at the thought of Grandmother Myra seeing the prices. I had chocolate soufflé for dessert.

“She’s spoiled now,” Uncle Brett told Grandpa Prescott. “You can’t take ’em back to the farm once they’ve seen Paris.”

“Then she’ll have to marry someone rich,” Grandpa said.

“What other choice is there?” Uncle Brett joked.

He stayed late into the following day and left promising to come back the first chance he got but only if Grandpa would agree to let me come to Vegas on one of my school vacations. He agreed.

The final weeks of summer seemed to have twelve hours per day and not twenty-four. I spent as much time as I could with Mason and Claudine and did have dinner at their house when their parents were up for what was their final weekend of the summer. Afterward, Mason and I went off alone. Claudine understood.

We rowed out to the little island and sat on the sand under the evening stars. I could already feel the air getting cooler. The coming fall was sending out feelers to find out where and how it would bring in the northern winds and begin to work on changing the colors of the leaves. The ducks and geese were already planning on leaving. One thing about the lake was that it revealed the onset of seasons faster than the land. The water was cooler, and even the color seemed to take on a subtle change.

When I told Mason that, he said, “Of course you would see that. You have an artist’s eyes now.”

Did I? I wondered. I hadn’t gotten back to my painting for some time.

We lay back, and I cuddled in his arms. He kissed my hair and my forehead and worked his lips over my nose to my lips. I wanted to do more, and so did he, but we didn’t. There was something precious about the moment that was more important. We could feel it solidifying into a wonderful lifelong memory.

“Wherever we go and whomever we’re with twenty years from now, we’ll always remember this night, Elle,” he said. “You’ve missed a lot of your childhood and youth, but you’ll make up for it.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“You have the hunger for it. Both Claudine and I agree about that.”

“Maybe I do.”

“After we’re gone, for a while, at least, feel free to use the rowboat. Just walk up to the house. It’ll be tied to the dock. We come up to winterize the house in November.”

“Nothing will be the same without you, Mason.”

“It won’t be the same, but it will be something, Elle. This whole thing was your first real art studio, don’t forget.”

I laughed and thought maybe he was right.

“I’m not saying good-bye tonight,” he told me when it was time to row back. “We’re leaving tomorrow, but I’ll be up the first weekend I can. Let’s just say
à bientôt
like the French do.”

I nodded but didn’t say anything. I was afraid of crying.

Claudine came out onto the dock as we approached. She wanted to assure me that she would be coming up with Mason whenever she could, too.

“After all, you’re going to need your social tutor and romance advisor,” she said.

“She’ll be too involved with someone to do that,” Mason assured me, and they went at it for a few minutes, before breaking into a laugh and this time, maybe for my benefit, a hug.

Mason decided to row me back to the shore by the woods just like the first times. He wanted to carry me over the rocks and then walk through the woods back to the house with me.

“It’s the way I always think of you,” he said.

Claudine hugged and kissed me and went back to the house.

We rowed to the shore, and he carried me, kissing me just like he used to. On our way back through the woods, we heard something nearby, and there, in the moonlight, was my doe. She stood there watching us.

“About time you came by to say hello,” Mason told her.

I laughed, and her ears went up. She nodded and trotted on through the darkness to disappear to wherever deer went to be safe and content.

At the back steps, we paused.

“Thank you, Mason,” I said. “You helped open the world to me.”

“Maybe I did, but you opened it up a lot for me, too. I’m not letting you get away so fast. I know I’ll be competing with a lot of guys soon.”

“As I will with a lot of girls.”

“The next girl I kiss will have your eyes and your hair whether she does or not,” he said. “And the girl after that, and after that.”

“Then kiss me now so you won’t forget.”

He did.

It was as if everything around us stopped to watch, especially the stars. I walked up the stairs to the back door.

“Keep a ribbon on the railing,” he whispered.

“Always,” I said.

He turned and walked into the shadows, disappearing like a dream to find its place where it could be safe and content.

It was a good six weeks before Grandmother Myra was released from the hospital. Just before that, Grandpa Prescott had the mechanical chair installed on the stairs. She had gotten to where she could stand and had begun to take steps. The hope was that she would be able to use the walker in perhaps six more weeks.

Grandpa had decided that it would be better if he told her before she left the hospital that he had moved me into my mother’s room. I was with him when he told her. She looked at me, but she didn’t have as bad a reaction to it as both of us had been anticipating. She just nodded, and he went on to talk about other small changes he had made in the house. Then he told her about the new car he had bought. It was an SUV with plenty of room for a folded wheelchair.

She didn’t look displeased when she saw it. She watched me carefully fold up her wheelchair and get it into the rear of the vehicle, while Grandpa and the nurse helped her into the rear seat. The nurse strapped her in, and then Grandpa and I got in, and we drove home. He talked most of the way, telling her about some people who had called. He didn’t think she was ready to greet visitors yet but promised he would let them know when she thought she was ready.

Arrangements had been made for a private-duty nurse to be at the house most of the day. Her therapy at home would occur five days a week in the afternoon. When we arrived at the house, I went around and unfolded the wheelchair. Then Grandpa and I got her into it, and he wheeled her while I went ahead to open the door. A wooden track had been built and attached to the stairway so she could easily be wheeled in and out.

Inside, Grandpa proudly showed her the mechanical chair. He even went up and down in it himself to demonstrate. I thought she was smiling, but it was still hard to interpret her expressions. The private-duty nurse was there to help get her situated once she was brought to her bedroom. I went into the kitchen and prepared lunch for her and brought it up. Grandpa Prescott took his lunch with her. I sat and had lunch with the nurse. It was decided that Grandmother Myra would get the day off from any therapy, assuming the trip from the hospital would be tiring enough. She didn’t seem all that tired to me. She was interested in everything Grandpa told her about the house and my preparations for beginning school.

We both thought the transition had gone well. When she expressed something she didn’t like now, she would make a very harsh, long, guttural sound. Because it was so disturbing, that alone made us both move quickly to please her. Her nurse took her vitals, and then she slept until it was time for dinner. Again, I brought the tray up to her. She looked over everything carefully and seemed to be pleased, even impressed. Grandpa Prescott praised everything, of course.

After dinner, the nurse washed and brushed her hair and got her ready for the night before leaving us. Grandpa Prescott stayed with her until she fell asleep and came down to watch some television before going to bed himself. I was with him for a while, and then I went upstairs, expecting only to go to my room to sleep, but I looked in on her and saw that she was sitting up, her eyes wide open. With her good hand, she beckoned to me. I listened for Grandpa Prescott and then entered the bedroom. She patted the bed, and I walked over and sat.

It was always going to be difficult to understand her, I thought, but she had made enough progress for me to figure out some of her words, especially when they were short sentences. I listened hard. I believed she asked, “What have you done?”

I knew she wasn’t talking about the house or my moving into the bedroom. I knew that Grandpa Prescott had told her about Mason and Claudine and how much he liked them. I was present when he told her some of it, but he told me that he had told her I had gone to their house for dinner. He said she was fine with it now. I wondered if he was mistaken.

“You mean making friends with our neighbors?”

She shook her head and repeated her question, but I did pick up the added words, “With them.”

All sorts of possibilities ran through my mind. I knew Grandpa Prescott wouldn’t want to tell her about my trip to Albany, but she seemed to know something more. It was always my belief that she could read thoughts and sense things going on. Perhaps it was my imagination, my fears, or perhaps she knew me better than I thought.

I shook my head again, and she closed her eyes and almost clearly managed the word “Albany.”

I stared with disbelief. Grandpa surely had lied to me. He had told her.

“Grandpa told you?”

She shook her head.

This was something she had obviously been waiting impatiently to know. I nodded and then began. I told her first about my mother revealing my father’s name and then how Claudine, Mason, and I had located him and confronted him. She listened intently, not wanting to miss a word. When I told her what I believed, she nodded.

The information seemed not so much to please her as to bring her some closure, to answer the same questions I had, perhaps. She closed her eyes, and then, when she opened them, I thought she had managed a good, full smile. She took my hand and held it.

We sat there like that for a while, neither of us trying to speak. Then she closed her eyes again and lowered her head to the pillow. I fixed her blanket and said good night. She moved her lips but didn’t open her eyes.

She wouldn’t be with us much longer, I thought. Whatever journey she had begun was coming to an end. She surely had many regrets, but when I left her that night, I thought she had found some comfort, some satisfaction. I was confident that her mind was full of her own memories, recalling her own youth, her parents, her difficulties, maybe the hope her marriage promised and my mother’s birth seemed to bring. All those disappointments dwindled until they were so tiny they couldn’t be resurrected.

The following day, while she had her therapy, I went for a walk and turned into the driveway to Mason and Claudine’s summerhouse. I went out back to the dock and untied the rowboat. I rowed smoothly and comfortably to our small island, took off my shoes and socks, rolled up my jeans, and pulled the boat onto the shore the way Mason always did.

Then I just sat there looking out at the lake, watching the boats and hearing the shouts and laughter. In many ways, I was born on this island. I felt myself move into my womanhood and my independence. For most of my life, I had felt I was unwanted. I was someone’s mistake. I had no reason to be here, but surely no one who could enjoy and understand the beauty in the world could possibly be unwanted.

We were needed.

We were needed because we understood how to bring happiness and how to bring love back to those who needed happiness and love.