Where You End (5 page)

six

I'm going to look for her black hair. My bike is parked against the wall of the Bishop's Garden, where I hope nobody will steal it. These are church grounds, after all, and I'm supposed to have a little faith. The gardeners have left the hydrangea heads on, like skeletons of summer. In the sun it's still warm, so I take my jacket off, wrap it around my waist, and walk inside the garden. We used to come here all the time when I was little, and I wish I was here to count carp in the koi pond. Boxwoods line the path right and left, smelling like dust and new earth.

A woman with huge shears trims the hedges. She's not wearing gloves, and the skin on her hands is a thin map of freckles and veins. The roses look embarrassed behind her; they're all chopped stubs with the occasional thorn.

I used to know this place pretty well, but I haven't been here in years. I walk past the empty gazebo onto a wide lawn. This is where we'd have the occasional picnic, or toss a ball with my dad. I try to remember when exactly we stopped doing all that. I haven't caught a ball in years, I think, just for the sake of it, to see if I can, to feel that kind of surprise.

My watch says it's almost time, so I head for the side doors of the cathedral. Walking up the steps reminds me of running from the sculpture, and I consider how maybe you can get away with something but how stupid to think you can get away
from
it. It's Sunday, two full days after I pushed the sculpture, and my hands still tremble when I think of it.

Paloma picked the right place for her mystery. There are only a handful of people wandering around inside the cathedral, and a dozen more whispering prayers in the pews. Most of the morning worshippers have made their way back to their corners of the city. Senators find the time to cut their grandkids' pancakes while polite ladies wipe the bacon grease off their lips and the choir debates over next week's hymns. Christian or not, we all succumb to Sunday's tune: the promise of the morning, the sad afternoon.

The church itself is as impressive as I remembered it. Once in a while, when we used to come to the gardens to play, I got to go inside, but I had to be really quiet. I remember holding my breath, because I thought that was the only way to be totally silent. I was not allowed to touch the water—it's holy—and we could not be blessed in this place. We were only here to look and, maybe, think. This is a place people come to reflect. This is a place for repentance. Like I said, Paloma chose well.

The afternoons are getting shorter, so the sun has already lit the stained glass on fire. Men, sheep, crosses, constellations—all the stories and symbols come out at once, and the cautionary tales share the light with the miracles. It's hard to look away. I settle into a pew near a stone column and wait. I reach out my hand to touch it, and it feels cold and smooth.

“Can't keep your hands to yourself, huh?” Her voice startles me.

Paloma, or whatever her real name is, slides next to me and smiles. She's wearing the same clothes she was wearing at the Air and Space, white T-shirt and jeans. She must be cold. Her hair is up today, so her cheekbones stand out more. There's something ancient about her face. I don't mean that she looks old, more like the lines and bones haven't softened over generations as they have with most of us. She looks like she belongs in an old photograph, like she comes from some unmistakable place. Her face is too strong to just be pretty.

“Hi,” I say, worried I've been staring too long.

“Hang on a second,” she says, as she lifts a huge bag onto her lap and loses half her arm in it, pulling out every item and setting it on the bench. A pack of baby wipes, a pair of sunglasses, a bunched-up scarf, a bursting wallet, broken crayons, a thousand paper napkins, keys, a rubber tiger, and a book. Maybe she babysits. The book is a poetry paperback, lots of cracks in the cover. It's obviously been used plenty. It's called
Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair
, by Pablo Neruda, translated by W. S. Merwin.
She puts everything back in except for her phone and the book, which she keeps on her lap. I try to forget about last night
's text.

“Have you read him?” she says.

I shake my head.

“Really? They don't make you read this at Sterling?”

“No.”

The fact she knows my school still bothers me. It reminds me of her power.

“What do you read over there? Shakespeare, Yeats, Donne, Frost, Poe, Blake, Eliot, maybe a few of the Beats if you get a teacher who's a real rebel? No girls, I bet. Maybe Emily Dickinson.”

I try not to let on that she's sort of right. I remember at least three of those guys from last year, and the only poetry book I actually own is an Emily Dickinson anthology.

“Don't get me wrong,” she says. “I do like some of those guys. The realistic Yeats is heartbreaking, and no one can do sadness and space like Emily. I'm just surprised they didn't give you at least one Neruda. He's the easiest brown guy to include.” She says “Neruda” like she speaks Spanish.

Paloma fiddles with her hair and ends up locking it in the same clip she started with. I notice a tattoo on the nape of her neck. It looks like a date: 6/10/11. She catches me looking and turns her head.

“Anyway, he's great,” she says. “Not my all time favorite, but he's up there. Do you read any poetry?”

I shrug. “Not much.”

“You can borrow it.” She hands me the book. “Give it back to me the next time.”

What next time?
I think. What exactly does she have in mind?

“Thanks for coming,” Paloma says.

“Right,” I say. “I wasn't going to come. At first.”

She nods and looks up at the flags draped over our heads, one for each state.

“That makes sense,” she says. “I know this is a little strange. I didn't mean to scare you the other day.”

“You didn't scare me,” I say.

“Good,” she says. “I just wanted you to know right away.”

I nod, but she doesn't finish her sentence. “Know what?” I ask, whispering.

“That I saw what you did.”

I take a breath and change course. “So why did you want to see me?”

“You go to Sterling, right?”

I don't answer. I go to Sterling. We've been over this.

“That's a good school, right? Do you like it?”

“It's a good school,” I say.

“Your grades are good?”

“Pretty good,” I say.

“You've got a nice family?”

“Yes,” I say, wondering if she already knows something about them, wondering where she's going with this.

“So, why would a girl with a nice family, a good school, and decent grades decide to push a Picasso and run away?”

I don't know what to say. I have no idea where to start, or whether I want to answer at all. I stay quiet.

“Did you tell anybody else?” she asks.

I shake my head.

“You just walked away,” she whispers, almost to herself, as if she's dreaming of something with potential.

Her Neruda book is still in my hand, so I open it up because I'm tired of sitting still while she thinks of what she can do with me. I read to myself:
“So that you will hear me / my words / sometimes grow thin …”

Feeling Paloma's eyes on me, I carry on and read every word until the end. It all seems to speed up in the middle and take me along with it:
“You occupy everything, you occupy everything.”

I turn that line over and over in my head, and the words ring so true I realize maybe I've been hungry for them, in a way that night pictures, or music, or gray Atlantic Ocean walls cannot satisfy. Paloma smiles.

“You like it, huh? It's called ‘So That You Will Hear Me.' It's a good one. It's better in Spanish though.”

She takes the book from my hand and points to the opposite page, where the original poem is written.

“Like this part,” she says, pointing to a new line. “In English, it makes no sense. In Spanish, it's different. It's more, you know, strong. Every word is stronger.
Now. Want. Hear.
It sounds so weak in English, but in Spanish it has force. It's like this. Let me try to translate. It's like,
Now I want these words to say what I really really mean so that you can hear me the way I want you to hear me.
Shit. I guess that's the same,” she says. “Maybe you can't do it in English.”

A woman in a purple robe shushes us. Paloma covers her mouth, but I can see her eyes laughing. I want to laugh too. She raises her eyebrows and gives me back the book.

“So, they're going to start playing the organ soon and we should really shut up then,” she says.

I nod.

“You want to know the reason I know about the organ?
”

“Sure,” I say, because I want all the clues I can get.

“My mom used to bring me here on Sundays sometimes, for the rehearsals. She loved all kinds of music, but she always said the organ was the most serious instrument out there, and we should listen to it so we can feel close to God. Plus it's free. We'd take the bus from home and sit on the side where no one could see us, because she was always afraid. I don't know what she was scared of. Maybe those guys … ” she says as she points to the purple-robe ladies. “Anyway, we didn't go to Mass, but we came here. We loved it. We would just sit super-quiet and listen.”

Rituals. I think of my own mom at home, of how I can't possibly tell her what I did. Paloma's mother loved music like my mother loves art. It's like I smashed an organ. At church. I could smoke a thousand cigarettes, get drunk every Saturday, screw boys right and left, but this will really break my mother's heart. She's going to think it's her fault. She's going to think I was messing with her, that I pushed the statue just to hurt her.

“So,” Paloma says, “let's talk. You know I followed you into the museum … ”

“Right,” I say.

“ … and you' re not going to tell me why you pushed the sculpture. At least not now.”

“I don't really know … ”

“That's okay. We have time. The thing is, I'm in trouble. I have been for a while, and when I saw you push the Picasso, well, I knew you were in trouble too. After you ran, I went down there to look at the sculpture. Everyone was freaking out, but nobody seemed to know what happened. Nobody was looking for you. I couldn't believe it. Then I saw you on the stairs, and started thinking maybe I was the only one who saw. That's why I followed you.”

“Because you saw me or because you're in trouble?”

“Both.”

“What kind of trouble?” I ask.

“My kind of trouble,” she says.

“Got it,” I say.

“I had to leave the house,” she says.

“Oh,” I say.

“My mom got sick, and it was too much.”

“I'm sorry,” I say.

She nods. “She moved us all in with her brother and my aunt, but I couldn't take it anymore. Not right now. I had to go for a few days.”

“You left?”

“Yeah, sort of. I just had to go.”

“How long have you been gone?” I ask.

Paloma looks at me, but she doesn't answer. A few, long, cold seconds go by.

“So what do you want me to do?” I ask.

“I'm not sure how this is gonna work,” she says, thinking, as she bites her fingernails one by one and spits them in her palm. I try not to stare and wait.

“I have a little brother,
” she says, louder than I expected.

“Okay?” I nudge.

“He's little. He's only four. My aunt and uncle have to work, and I don't know who's taking care of him.” She stuffs her fingernails into the pocket of her jeans.

“Isn't your mom there?” I ask.

“I told you,” she says, “my mom is sick. She can't take care of anybody.”

“Okay. Well, is he in school, or is four too little? I don't—”

“Yes, he's in school,” Paloma interrupts, “but I usually take him there, and tomorrow's Monday, and I don't think I'm going back.”

“Ever?”

“I don't know. I don't know.”

“Well, I
'm sure your uncle will figure it out, and won't you—”

“Just be quiet for a second,” she snaps, cupping her ears and squeezing her eyes shut. “I can't think. Let me think.”

I shut my lips and think about what to do. Although she's already blackmailed me and snapped at me, I feel the urge to comfort her. Something about this girl and her trouble, whatever it may be, is pulling me in. I try not to look at her as she thinks.

“You said you haven't told anybody about the sculpture, right?” she asks.

“I don't think I said that,” I whisper.

She smirks. “Yes you did.”

I shake my head.

“You did. And anyway, you wouldn't be here if you had told someone. You'd be getting a job, or doing time, or begging somebody for forgiveness, because that thing was on the ground the last time I saw it, and they don't retire Picassos for nothing.”

The tone has definitely shifted.

“What do you want?” I ask. “Why did you ask me to come here?”

“I want someone to check on him while I'm out.”

“Your brother?”

“Yes, my brother. I need to make sure he's coming back home every day, after school.”

“Is he in danger or something?”

“I don't think so. Not as long as he's home.”

“Where else would he be?” I ask.

“Don't worry about that. I just need to see him. I just need to make sure.”

“Why don't you call or something?”

“I can't call. They'll tell me to come back, and I can't go back there right now.”