18
In anticipation of Haylee’s arrival, Mother was up before either Irene or me; she was even up before the sun. I heard her moving through the house, but I remained in bed. It had taken me longer than usual to fall asleep.
I had done as much as I could to occupy myself the night before. After Irene suggested that Mother go to bed so she would be fresh for tomorrow, Mother had kissed me good night, something she always hesitated to do because Haylee wasn’t here to get a kiss as well. But now I saw the excitement in her eyes. It was on the tip of my tongue to warn her not to expect everything to return to what it was, but at this point, I was even afraid to look worried or pessimistic.
A song by Charlie Chaplin that Haylee and I would play on our pianos together flowed through my thoughts: Smile . . . Hide every trace of sadness . . . Smile, what’s the use of crying.
“You go to sleep, too, Kaylee. It’s a big day tomorrow,” Mother had said.
“I will,” I promised.
Irene had escorted her up, assuring her that everything was set for Thanksgiving dinner. I heard their chatter die away and then sat and stared at the two pianos, remembering Haylee when we were only eight, beaming with pride at how well we sounded together. Perhaps she was only proud of herself.
Now, when I rose in the morning, showered, and fixed my hair, I pondered what to wear when I greeted Haylee. When my father had taken me to visit her, I had deliberately chosen that sexy dress. Dr. Alexander had picked up on it immediately. She knew I wanted not only to rub my survival in Haylee’s face but also to emphasize that I looked better than she could look at the moment. I wanted her to be jealous of me. I wanted her to hate herself.
I had no intention of doing that now. In fact, I chose one of the dresses Mother had bought for us that Haylee thought did nothing for our figures. She even hated the color, a shade of beige that she claimed was blah. I put on no makeup or jewelry, either. Then I slipped into the plain-looking low-heeled beige shoes Mother had bought to go with our dresses and went down to breakfast.
Irene was at the kitchenette table having coffee alone. Before I could ask where Mother was, Irene nodded toward the dining room. I looked in and saw Mother intently studying the table settings like a champion chess player, adjusting a fork a little to the right, a knife a little to the left.
“Good morning, Mother,” I said.
She looked up with an odd expression for a moment and then smiled. “Oh, I’m glad you’re up. I was thinking of having the two of you sit together rather than across from each other as usual,” she said.
“It’s only the four of us, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then it won’t matter, Mother. The table looks picture-perfect. It could be in a magazine, especially with all the holiday decorations.”
“Could it? It’s so important that everything goes well, Kaylee.”
“It will. Let’s have some breakfast. Daddy’s picking her up in an hour.”
“I hope he doesn’t start lecturing her and getting her in a terrible mood before she arrives,” she said, looking like she was going to growl.
“It will all be fine, Mother. Don’t worry. Let’s join Irene.”
“Yes. I’m so happy you feel that way,” she said.
I turned and walked away. Seeing her smile, hearing her words and the way she wanted to sugarcoat everything that had happened, churned my stomach. I had all I could do just to eat a bit of cereal and a slice of toast and jelly. Mother was so energetic this morning that she insisted on doing everything, clearing the table and rinsing off the dishes and silverware before putting them in the dishwasher, something she always had insisted Haylee and I do. She returned to wipe down the kitchenette table. Irene and I looked at each other, neither wanting to say anything that might put a hole in Mother’s balloon of happiness. Irene winked at me, and I retreated.
A little more than two hours later, I was in the living room reading one of our assigned novels for literature class when I heard the front door open and knew she was here. Was that the sound of my heart pounding or their footsteps?
I heard my father talking to my mother about the weather. I expected that he was waiting for me to appear before he would leave, waiting to see my reaction to Haylee and her reaction to me. I hated that I might appear nervous or afraid. With my head high and my shoulders back, I took a deep breath and stepped into the foyer.
Anyone, even the best detective, would have had to employ a microscope to see any evidence of Haylee being nervous. She burst into a smile of glee the moment she set her eyes on me.
“Oh, I love the way your hair has come back! Mine, too, don’t you think?” She turned around, like someone modeling a new style. She had made it sound as if both of us had gone through chemotherapy or something. Of course, it was on the tip of my tongue to say, I didn’t want mine to be cut, but I swallowed back the words. I would gobble down my feelings and thoughts all day and night, for sure.
“Very pretty,” Mother said. “Both of you.”
Haylee glanced at her, flashed a smile, and then picked up her overnight bag and hurried over to me. “Let’s go upstairs. I have a lot to tell you,” she said, seizing my left hand.
“Wait. I didn’t introduce you properly to Irene,” Mother moaned.
Haylee looked back at her, then at my father, and began to apologize vociferously. “Oh, I’m just so excited to be here. I’m sorry. I didn’t even notice you. Your name is . . .”
“Irene Granford, dear,” Irene said. I could see from the look of amusement on her face that she immediately recognized Haylee’s insincerity but at the same time was amused at her performance. She was also seeing us together for the first time, and like everyone else who did, she was quite astonished by the mirrored faces. It was as if the turmoil, tension, and agony we both had endured were equally damaging.
“I want to know all about you,” Haylee said.
I fought back a laugh. Since when did she ever care more about listening to someone else’s story than she did about reciting her own? But it was the perfect thing to say. Mother’s smile brightened. My father looked sufficiently skeptical and cautious. He glanced at me, and I gave him a small nod so he would understand I was fine.
“We’ll have much to talk about at our Thanksgiving dinner,” Irene said. “We’ve planned it for three o’clock. Is that all right?”
“Absolutely,” Haylee said. “I’m going bonkers. I haven’t had a home-cooked meal for ages. Did you make your famous pumpkin pie, Mother?”
“Of course,” Mother said.
“With gobs and gobs of whipped cream on top,” Haylee reminded me. “I’ve been dreaming about it.”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s practically all I’ve been dreaming about.”
I said it as dryly as I could without sounding sarcastic. Mother clapped her hands and brought them to her chin as if she were about to give a Hindu greeting. To Hindus, it meant, “I bow to the divine in you,” and I had no doubt she meant that, too, when it came to us.
She turned to my father with that See? They are still so alike look.
A wave of pessimism swept across his worried expression.
“We have to think about what to wear to dinner,” Irene told me. She looked back at Mother, expecting to hear her dictate our clothing down to the very socks.
“Oh, go up and choose whatever you wish,” Mother said. “Surprise us.”
Haylee raised her eyebrows and looked to me for some confirmation.
“Yes, why don’t we do that?” I said.
“Thank you for bringing me home, Daddy,” Haylee said.
“I’ll be here at ten tomorrow morning,” he reminded her sternly.
“Why so short a visit?” Mother asked, her face wrinkling with displeasure.
“Baby steps,” my father said. “That’s how her psychiatrist, Dr. Alexander, described it, Keri. Let’s not do anything to sabotage the efforts.” That warning carried many different meanings, the primary one being Don’t return to the way things were.
Mother nodded quickly and turned to Irene. “We have so much to do,” she said.
My father gave me one more look to assure me he would stay on high alert in case I needed him.
“C’mon,” I told Haylee, and we started for the stairs.
I heard my father leave. We walked up quickly. I was most eager to see Haylee’s reaction to her room.
The moment she saw it, she dropped her bag and stood in the doorway, astonished. “What the hell . . . Is this some sort of punishment?” she asked me.
“Don’t ask Mother that. She thinks it’s beautiful and perfect. She had the help of a professional decorator.”
“Did she do this to your room, too?”
“Oh, no. Mother’s been in therapy, remember? She’s trying to be different, treat us differently.”
“It looks like a room made of candy. How am I going to fall asleep in here? I’d be ashamed to bring anyone to it. Maybe when I’m back, I can get it changed.”
“Maybe,” I said, shrugging.
“You like that she did this to me, don’t you?” she asked, her whole demeanor changing, returning to what I expected it to be.
“She’s doing her best, I guess. Just wear sunglasses,” I added.
She stared at me a moment and then burst into laughter. “Very good. You are different. You’ve got to tell me everything about your new school, the girls there, and the boys, of course. Did you meet anyone? I mean a boy, of course.”
She entered the room and dropped her bag at the foot of her closet.
“Before you start, I’ll tell you why my life has changed, and it has nothing to do with the dumb treatments or Dr. Alexander, either.”
“Really? What changed it, then?”
“I met someone I really like,” she said, her eyes wide. She ripped the comforter back and flopped onto the bed. “I know I’ve said that many times before, but this time I really, really mean it, Kaylee. But let’s make a pact first, just the way we used to. A pinkie promise,” she said, holding up her hand. I looked at it suspiciously. “You can break the promise if you just can’t stand keeping it.”
I moved slowly to the bedside and entwined my pinkie with hers.
“I promise not to talk about the terrible thing I did to you, and you promise not to talk about what it was like or how you suffered.”
“No wonder you came up with that one. That’s all good for you,” I said.
“No, no. You must have been told, just as I’ve been, that reliving the past, the gruesome past, does neither of us any good now. I’ll just say I’m sorry. I was stupid and selfish and never realized how serious it was. It started out as a joke and just exploded into something so terrible I was terrified of anyone discovering that I was responsible. And when they did, I went a little nuts. That’s an explanation, not an excuse,” she added.
“Whether I believe you or not is another thing.”
“Okay. Let’s leave it at that. You’ll decide, but in the meantime, let’s be sisters again.”
I didn’t speak.
“For Mother, if not for ourselves,” she said. She was holding my pinkie tightly in hers. I hated to think it and certainly wasn’t going to say it, but to get through this dinner and this night, she was right. I shook our pinkies, and she let go of mine.
“Now, let me tell you all about it,” she said, pulling her legs up so she was in a lotus position, the way we sat whenever we were talking intimately with each other in her room or mine. She patted the bed, and I sat. “There’s this boy in the nuthouse. We both call it that. Neither of us cares how it makes us look, which was one of the first things that attracted me to him. His name is Cedar Thomas. Can you imagine anyone naming their son after a tree?
“He’s half Cherokee, and it comes from one of their legends describing how God created night and day. The people first asked that there be no night, but that got them exhausted, so they asked for no day, and that caused them to starve, from lack of crops. Many died. So then they said it was all a mistake, and God created night and day. He felt bad about the dead, so he created the cedar tree and put the spirits of all the dead in it. So when they smell a cedar, they smell their ancestors. That’s pretty neat, right?”
“Yes,” I said, impressed. “But why is he there?”
“He tried to kill his little brother because he thought he saw an evil spirit in him,” she said with stunning nonchalance.
“Saw an evil spirit in him? How?”
“Cedar was into some crazy stuff like peyote. But he’s so sexy-looking. He has these onyx-black eyes and a kind of olive complexion, with ebony hair he keeps long, down to his shoulders. They wouldn’t dare cut it. He’s very proud of his Indian heritage and keeps himself in great shape. He talks a lot about the aura around people. He says an ancient medicine man taught him how to see it. Fascinating, right? We spend every free hour together. It’s hard to do much more than talk, because everyone’s watching you breathe,” she said, her voice full of frustration. “He hates one of the attendants because he calls him Chief. We play around and plan how we’d like to kill him. Just kidding,” she added quickly. “But remember, it’s better to release your aggression in nonviolent ways. He pumps iron. I’ve done some great work in arts and crafts.
“He couldn’t go home for Thanksgiving,” she concluded. “That’s why I’m not so terribly upset about going right back. Don’t tell Mother any of this.” She paused, but before I could say a word, she added, “You look good. You look . . . older. You have something to tell me, too, don’t you?”
“I like the school. It’s called Littlefield.”
“Yes, Daddy told me. Not too snobby?”
“I get along with the girls I want to get along with.”
“And? Come on. I told you my secret. Tell me something no one knows.”
“It’s not a secret. I’ve been seeing one boy.”
“Good. Let’s hear about that. He’s not coming here for Thanksgiving, is he? I mean, I hope he is.”
“No. He has a family, Haylee.”
“Right.” She shrugged. “Some other time, maybe. So? Don’t just sit there like Buddha, Kaylee. Talk.”
How much should I tell her? I wondered. My memory of our sharing secrets and dreams was somewhere inside a fog. Too much had happened for me simply to return to the comfort we’d once had when we revealed intimate thoughts to each other.
“I didn’t get into any social life for a while, Haylee. It wasn’t easy getting used to being away.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Anyway,” I said, ignoring her, “we’ve gone out only a few times, so there’s not much to say other than I like him. He’s very bright, witty, and—”
“Good-looking, I hope.”
“Yes.”
“What’s his name? You know that by now, right?” she asked, smirking.
“Very funny. Troy.”
“Troy.” She sat back and repeated it as if she were trying it on for size. “I like it. I hate boys with ordinary names. It shows that their parents have no imagination. At least Mother came up with interesting names for us. Everyone says so. What kind of dates did you have?”
“Rides, pizza.”
“And?”
“I’ve been to his home.”
“And?”
“That’s it,” I said firmly.
Her eyes pooled with disappointment, but a new thought brightened them. “What do you know about Daddy’s girlfriend? Are they living together? He didn’t talk much when he brought me over here. He could have been a limo driver. So?”
“She’s very nice, witty, and funny.”
“Can’t you come up with more? Witty. What’s witty, anyway?”
“Someone with interesting conversation, insights. Not boring to talk to,” I explained. “Loquacious.”
“Very funny. Always the English teacher.” She looked down. “I’ve probably fallen so far behind in school. They have classes, but they’re run by teachers who look terrified most of the time. And so many in my classes are so backward that most of the time is spent on remedial work. Anyway,” she said, getting off the bed, “I don’t want to think about it. Let’s just think about what to wear at dinner. Who’s going to be here? Not Daddy and his girlfriend, so who?”
“Just us, Mother, and Irene.”
“Who is this Irene? She looks like she belongs where I am.”
“She’s very nice, Haylee, and has done Mother a lot of good. She’s a psychiatric nurse.”
“I knew it. More analysis and eyes full of microscopes. Okay. We’ll make the best of it.” She opened her closet. “What to wear, what to wear. I haven’t had that to think about for some time, although Cedar said it wouldn’t matter, I’d look great in a sack. That’s where he would like to get me, by the way. We’re working on it.”
“Why don’t we each choose something and then see what we’ve picked?” I suggested.
“Testing? You expect we’ll miraculously choose the same thing? Want to see if we still would?”
“Maybe,” I said nonchalantly.
“You are different.” Her eyes narrowed. “And you’re not telling me everything, but you will,” she said. “You will.”
She hadn’t lost her self-confidence. That was certain.
“I forgot what I had in this closet. And these colors Mother chose for my room are making me nuts. Maybe I’ll sleep with you tonight.”
“That would really hurt Mother. Not a wise thing to do, Haylee.”
“I suppose you’re right. Pretend, pretend, pretend. I thought those days were gone. You’re actually very lucky to be living away from this place.”
“I had no choice,” I said. She was bordering on forcing me to break our pinkie promise, and she knew it.
“Well, I’m taking a shower and doing my fingers and toenails, something I haven’t done since I don’t know when. I want to put on some makeup, too. We’re not permitted to do that. We’re lucky to be able to brush our teeth.”
I stood there waiting to see just how much she was going to tell me about her treatment and life in the institution.
She glanced at me and seemed to snap back into the present. “Oh, I forgot those black suede booties. Remember when I talked Mother into buying them for us? She practically measured the heels on each pair to the tenth of a millimeter to be sure they were exact.”
“I’d better go and consider my wardrobe, or I’ll be influenced about what to choose,” I said.
The truth was that this initial confronting of her and the way she was behaving were making me a little sick inside. I wasn’t sure exactly what I’d been hoping for, but I knew it had something to do with some sign of remorse. She was more like Mother, sweeping the recent past under the rug and finding blame with anyone who made the slightest reference to it. To survive simply meant to forget. Shelve the nightmares and bury the anger, unless you wanted to live with hate and vengeance alive and well at your side. Haylee’s psychiatrist and my therapist were on the same page when it came to moving forward. Maybe my father was right the first time. Therapy and psychoanalysis were all voodoo. No one was guilty. Everything was the fault of some twisted psychological issue. Right and wrong had meaning only on final school exams.
Haylee had said she was sorry, but she had also rationalized it well. I was sure she had used those excuses from the day she was caught and probably believed them all herself now. What point was there in expecting anything more?
I did like those booties Haylee had mentioned, but I also liked my tan suede-tasseled ankle boots with the zippered sides. They had only one-inch heels. I had worn them just once and had not taken them with me to Littlefield. I selected the camel-colored dress to wear with them. It had a tan belt. I decided not to wear any makeup. I was consciously trying to be different from Haylee now. The novelty of miraculously choosing the same things to wear whenever we were left to do it was gone.
Were the Mirror Sisters gone?
Haylee was still working on her makeup when I stepped out to go downstairs. She was sitting at her vanity table in her bra and panties and didn’t see me look into her room. I stepped away quickly.
“I’ll be downstairs,” I called, and hurried away before she could ask to see what I had chosen to wear.
Mother and Irene were changing by now, too. I could smell all the wonderful foods they had prepared and glanced into the oven to see how the turkey was coming along. In the refrigerator, I saw the homemade cranberry sauce. Mother had worked so hard on this dinner. It was as if she believed one meal could work miracles.
Irene was the next to appear. She complimented me on how nice I looked. With both Mother and Haylee still getting ready, I had a chance to talk more frankly to Mother’s caretaker.
“Do you really think she’s ready to live on her own? I won’t be here, and my guess is neither will Haylee for a while,” I said.
“The last few weeks, I’ve deliberately faded into the background to see how she would do. She keeps busy. She has plans to do much more redecorating. I think she believes that if she changes the physical surroundings, she will wash away the bad memories. It’s not unusual. The other day, she met one of her friends, Melissa Clark, in the supermarket, and they talked for quite a while. I heard them make plans to get together in the near future. She’s learned how to handle the questions and the sympathy well. There’s a point where if you don’t get her away from being dependent, she never will be independent. Everyone will check on her. She’ll be fine.”
Her words cheered me. Maybe we could have something close to a nice Thanksgiving after all, I thought. When Mother appeared, she did look beautiful. She wore diamond-studded earrings with her diamond necklace, something my father had given her on their tenth anniversary. It was a good sign that she could handle those memories and not cast out the evidence of what had once been a happier time. Her turquoise pleated A-line dress brought out her healthier complexion. She was always good at being subtle with her makeup.
“You look beautiful, Mother,” I said.
“Thank you, dear. So do you. Where’s Haylee?”
“Coming,” I said. “What can I do to help?”
“Irene and I decided you’d both be our guests today. Just enjoy,” she told me.
“Ta-da!” we heard Haylee sing and looked at the stairway as she descended.
We couldn’t have been more different. She wore a short, silky black dress sprinkled with blue, peach, and red dots over a white turtleneck and a pair of black tights. And of course, her black booties. Her makeup was a little heavy, but she wasn’t unattractive. She paused halfway down and pointed at me.
“Surprised?”
“No,” I said. “You look very nice, Haylee,” I added quickly.
“Very nice,” Mother said. “Both of you. Go wait in the living room,” she ordered. “We’ll ring the dinner bell.”
“I just had to wear this,” she said, hurrying to join me when I turned toward the living room. “I wish there was a way to sneak it back. Cedar would love me in this. You don’t have to wear a school uniform or anything at that place, do you?”
“No, but there are strict rules about what you can and can’t wear.”
“Won’t it be nice when we’re both somewhere where there are no rules?” she asked.
I sat on the settee. She walked around the living room, gazing at everything as if it were the first time she was here.
“There’s no such place,” I said.
“We can hope, can’t we?” She smiled and ran her hand over her piano and then tapped on a few keys. “Seems so long ago,” she said.
“It’s not the time that’s passed; it’s what happens in the time that’s passed. That’s why some days seem longer than others.”
“Who taught you that?”
“My therapist,” I said.
I watched her standing there and thinking. If there was ever a pregnant pause, this was it. She snapped around, and with a grin unlike any I had seen on her face or my own, she asked, “Do you think you’ll ever stop hating me?”
“Do you think you’ll ever truly be sorry?”
“I said I was.”
I saw no point in telling her that what she had said was more rationalization than apology. “I stopped hating you a while back,” I said. “The bigger question is, will you stop hating yourself?”
She laughed. “Don’t you remember what Mother taught us? If we hate each other, we hate ourselves. If you don’t hate me, I won’t hate myself.”
Irene appeared in the doorway. “Your mother says she’s ringing the dinner bell,” she announced.
“Oh, good. I’m absolutely starving!” Haylee cried. I rose and followed her to the dining room. “This table is absolutely a work of art, Mother,” she said when she entered ahead of me.
Mother stood by her chair, beaming. “Take your usual seats,” she said.
Haylee moved quickly to hers. We were sitting across from each other. Mother now sat where my father used to sit, and Irene sat in Mother’s usual place.
“Before we begin,” Mother said, still standing, “I’d like to give thanks. I am thankful that my daughters are safe now and that once again, they are sitting together in our dining room. I am thankful that we will all get a second chance at happiness, and I am thankful that I had such support from people like Irene.” She took her seat.
“I am thankful, too, Mother,” Haylee said. “I am thankful that I am here and we are enjoying your wonderful dinner.”
Mother nodded and looked at me.
“I am as well, Mother.”
“Well, then. Let’s pass everything around, and don’t forget, girls, leave room for pumpkin pie.”
We began eating. Haylee was quickly back to her old clever self, asking Irene questions and showing how interested she was to know about her. I wondered if Irene bought into how fascinated Haylee was in her life story, how she’d had to earn money for herself and her mother and how she’d worked to get her education.
“I swear,” Haylee said, “after seeing how spoiled some people are, it’s refreshing to hear someone describe how she achieved so much with so little.”
Mother was obviously delighted at how well Haylee spoke and how humble she sounded. Haylee then turned to me and asked questions about Littlefield, the facilities, and my teachers. I had to admit that Mother heard more about my school then and there than she had ever heard before. Despite her warnings, both Haylee and I ate more than we should, but everything was truly delicious. When I volunteered Haylee and myself to clean up, Mother refused.
“I’d rather the two of you go into the living room and prepare one of your piano duets for us. I’ve been telling Irene for months how wonderful you both play. Now, don’t make me look like a liar. Go on. Rehearse,” she ordered. “After that, we’ll have our dessert.”
“I’m a little rusty. How about you?” Haylee asked me.
“The last time we played here together was my last time, too.”
“Then we’d better do as Mother asks and rehearse,” she said.
If the food hadn’t been so wonderful, I might have heaved right there at the table, but I smiled instead, rose, and followed her to the living room.
When we sat at the pianos, Haylee looked at me and said, “Let’s make her happy, Kaylee. Who knows when we will have a chance to do it again?”
I should have paid more attention to that, but I was thinking about the music.