Tell Me What I Am, page 26
Nessa?
It was Catherine, an intern working with them for six months. Nessa had forgotten she was in the office. She lifted her head.
Are you okay?
Tired, said Nessa.
She hadn’t slept. She was afraid now to shut her eyes, afraid that if she closed them she would see submerged cars or bodies bogged down in water, chained, attached to stone, trapped. She didn’t know how to still these thoughts. If she did sleep, she woke in her bed after nightmares, gasping, desperate for light and air.
She turned her attention back to the catalogue, concentrated on trying to read the words. The artist quoted Walter Benjamin’s ‘Theses on the Philosophy of History’, a despairing analysis inspired by a Paul Klee print – the angel of history, Benjamin called it. Nessa knew it, an abstract monoprint of a scrawled angel, large head and teeth and spread wings. Benjamin saw an angel caught between the past and the future. The angel is looking toward the past, appalled, his mouth open. His back is to the future, where he is being propelled by a storm. Beholding the wreckage, the angel wishes to resurrect or wake up the dead and fix all that has been destroyed. Nessa understood Benjamin differently now. He couldn’t move on. Neither could she. There was nothing she could experience except through the lens of what had happened to Deena. Nausea surged up her throat. Her right eye pulsed with the momentum of pain.
Sorry, Catherine, she mumbled. Really feeling like I might be sick. I need to step out for a few minutes.
She walked along the Schuylkill, the museum and the city behind her, and kept going until the arches of the Strawberry Mansion Bridge were visible. When they’d driven over it as children their mother used to tell them how she had taken a trolley across it many times as a young girl. On the water between the trusses a lone rower glided under the bridge and disappeared. For the moment, Nessa was alone. She turned around and headed back toward the city.
She’d always believed Lucas had killed Deena. Could she have been wrong and it was someone else entirely? Could Deena have driven into the reservoir? Nessa had been through every scenario. Could Mathilde have discovered something? An anonymous person who had information and had been brought in for something else? In TV procedurals there was always someone bargaining with information to get a charge reduced. Ahead of her along the river, more angels. Three tall slender pillars held up childlike figures, each bronze body balancing on a single foot as they played instruments against the open sky. The Playing Angels. Every day they were there, forever about to totter to their deaths. Instead of exuberance, lightness or heavenly bodies flying against an open sky, Nessa had always seen an act of endurance. The exhaustion of being on display, always keeping balance. Watching them from underneath gave her vertigo, as if she were the one falling.
The blaze of the sun was reflected in Philadelphia’s silver skyline. More rowers appeared on the river, clusters of boats, probably college teams, the coxes hunched low but saying nothing, the rowers keeping beat as their blades silently swept through the water, just the sound of the oars against their locks. They held time beside her for a few feet, before pulling ahead. Ruby rowed like that, at that kind of level.
Ruby, a fleeting picture, a toddler. After a day at the shore, the coconut smell of sunscreen, sand caked in all the creases of her naked body – neck folds, underarm crevices, gaps between fingers and toes. Ruby, hoisted above her, one hand gripping Nessa’s, the other outstretched. Nessa lying on her back, her legs and feet under Ruby’s stomach, holding her weight.
And Ruby laughing deep from the belly.
Ruby shouting, I’m flying, Nessa. I’m flying.
27
Ruby
2018
The lane was in bud. Green shoots, small spurts of growth lit by the late-afternoon sun. Her face smarted from hours on the river. First day back on the water and her whole body held the good of it. Sophie had given her a ride as far as the post office after rowing and an envelope was waiting for her. Penn had said yes. She didn’t know how she would get there but she would figure it out. Clover would help. Philadelphia had become a lodestar, like if she returned she could resolve some mystery within herself. Beside her the bloodroot’s first blooms in small patches, clusters of white unblemished flowers, upright and alert. In freshman biology they had cut the stems wearing gloves. The flesh had bled a deep-deep-red poisonous sap. The flower had one leaf like a parent that went to sleep at night, closing in around the flower when the dark came. There was a word for it: nyctinasty.
A car was parked at the end of the lane. Ruby stopped walking, a surge of fear flooding her stomach and chest. It was green. What would Lucas do? She took a few further steps and saw that it was the Vermont State Police. She approached cautiously. Criminal Division was written on the door. A trooper sat inside, the window down. He saw her but didn’t move. She turned to walk up toward the house and took a step back. A whole line of cars was blocking the driveway. Police. State police. Other cars. At the top of the drive, vans. Clover? She started to sprint but stopped about a hundred yards away. Clover was sitting on the porch, staring back out at her. A stranger in a suit was coming out of the house carrying a computer.
Wait! Ruby shouted. Just next to her something moved. Lucas. He was sitting in the backseat of a dark-blue car. She banged on the window.
Lucas!
He didn’t turn. Stared straight ahead. She banged again and again.
She hit the window with her school bag. He didn’t move. Ruby wiped the window with her hand. It was as if he were underwater; on the surface of the glass she could see the reflection of the trees, the sky, herself, but her father was submerged. He was only shadows, like fish, and he didn’t seem to see her.
Lucas!
Dad! she roared.
He put his head in his hands and she saw then that they were cuffed.
At the bottom of the steps a woman introduced herself. She was not in uniform but had surgical gloves on and what Ruby assumed was a bulletproof vest. A detective, she said. Philadelphia Police Department. Ruby started at the mention of Philadelphia. What did this mean? Ruby was not allowed to enter the house. They had search warrants and were authorized to remove material important to the investigation.
What investigation? Why is my dad in the back of the car?
A liaison officer is here for you. She’ll explain.
Ruby dropped her bag and sat on the ground next to Clover’s chair on the porch. Clover was zipped up in a green down jacket that belonged to Lucas and a pink snow hat. A blanket was thrown across her lap. Since she’d come home from hospital she found it hard to get warm. Her lips, still not their own shape, looked blue.
Clover, what’s happening?
Clover’s good hand went to her mouth, as if to stop herself from speaking, and like Lucas she just stared ahead. Strangers were inside their house, ransacking their rooms. A procession of boxes, filing cabinets, laptops, cameras and electronic devices came through the door and were packed into car trunks.
Beyond the cars someone was walking up the lane. Blue denim overalls. Adelaide. She came up the steps and sat in the chair the other side of Clover.
When did they get here? I went up to St Albans to see my sister this morning.
Four or five hours ago. Clover’s voice was just a whisper.
Okay, it’s happening, Adelaide said. She took Clover’s hand. I know this is so hard.
What? Ruby straightened. Alert. What’s happening?
A man came up the steps. He was tall, clean-cut.
I’m sorry, Mrs Chevalier. We thought we’d be finished by now. I know this isn’t what you wanted. He glanced at Ruby and Ruby knew he meant before she got home.
Clover lifted her shoulder and let it drop but said nothing.
Someone called the man over. Frank.
Ruby started to ask how did Clover know this man, but a woman was introducing herself. The liaison officer from the Criminal Division, Vermont State Police. She explained that she was here to support them, that multistate agencies were cooperating today.
I know you must have some questions …
No, said Clover.
Yes, said Ruby, standing up. Why are you here? Why is my father handcuffed in the back of a car? Why are you taking our— Wait!
A uniformed officer was carrying a milk crate filled with the large yellow envelopes. Ruby followed him down the steps, pointing.
Wait! Stop. Those are mine.
The liaison officer followed her and took her by the elbow. You need to come back up and sit on the porch with your grandmother.
They’re my letters. Addressed to me. They’re from my mother.
Clover looked distressed, her mouth open now. What did you say?
My mother.
Everyone was looking at her and Ruby suddenly saw how implausible it seemed to them.
Please sit down. The liaison officer gestured to one of the chairs. It’s important you understand. I need you to listen. Your father has been arrested today on suspicion of a serious charge.
Clover wouldn’t look at her. Adelaide started to say something and stopped.
Is it something to do with my mother? Clover, tell them what you told me. Tell them you were there and you know he didn’t do anything.
The detective with the vest and gloves stepped onto the porch carrying one of the boxes from under Lucas’s bed, the ones with the notebooks. Now she would never get to see what they were. They were taking them away.
Adelaide always had something to say, but now it was only a single word; she held Clover’s hand and kept repeating it: Okay. Okay. Okay. Ruby thought her head was going to explode. She wanted to scream Make them stop, somebody make them stop. She stomped down the steps but the driveway was full of police and people carrying boxes. She turned and raced across the lawn, toward the shore. Two men were crouching in Lucas’s boat, searching. She ran back up toward the sheds. The door of the tool shed was open. Lucas always kept it closed – she shut it behind her. The police had rummaged through everything. Toolboxes were flung wide, seed bags emptied, bait boxes taken apart. Even the camping equipment had been ransacked, the tent left in a heap. It needed to be folded and precise. For a moment she worried Lucas would see it. Then she thought she might laugh, or that maybe she should laugh. She sat on the floor and waited. What were they looking for?
It was getting dark when she heard engines start. Outside the dusty window, the dark car Lucas had been sitting in was moving down the driveway, following a line of vehicles, their headlights glittering in the dusk. It was like a distorted version of her first memory of her mother leaving. A motorcade. She watched the line of receding cars, her cheek against the glass.
*
Adelaide and Clover were in the kitchen. Mugs of coffee in front of them. Ruby didn’t know who to trust. They had done something. Ruby hesitated in the doorway.
Ruby, why don’t you sit down. Adelaide said it.
No.
Ruby, I think you should hear your grandmother out. Listen to what Clover has to say.
Ruby. Clover’s new stroke-voice dragged her name.
No.
Adelaide stood. This isn’t just about you. Or Lucas. Her voice had sharpened. Your grandmother has been through hell and she’s trying to do what’s right. Before she …
Adelaide trailed off. Crossed her arms. She was upset.
She did this for you.
Ruby pushed past her and went upstairs. Lucas’s door was wide open. It wasn’t like their house anymore. Everything was gone. The shelves were empty. They had even sliced open his mattress. The stuffing was pulled out in multiple places, white explosions where the incisions had been made. The doorknob and lock were missing.
The police had been in her room, through her drawers, had moved the mattress against the wall. She lowered it back onto the frame and saw that they had cut hers open too. Four diagonal cuts and the foam pulled out. She flipped it over and went and got a sheet from the closet in the hall. They’d been there. She covered the mattress. She didn’t want to sleep against where their hands had been rifling. In the closet her old school notebooks and textbooks were still stacked in the corner. In the middle of these were the Memory Games notebooks. Untouched. She lay on the sheet under the comforter but couldn’t get warm. She put on a hat and scarf and thick bathrobe and burrowed under the covers again. A chill had seeped into her marrow. She lay there without moving all night, her head spinning.
At six thirty her phone pinged. Ruby, this is Suzanne Meyers, your father’s attorney. I am messaging on his behalf. Can you take a phone call? Ruby sat up. Texted back: Yes. She turned off the ringer and held the phone in her hand, waiting.
Hello?
Suzanne said she had to be brief but that Lucas had been brought to Philadelphia and he wanted Ruby to come straight away.
Your father says you know where the spare key for the truck is hidden? The police took his set. In the lockbox there is money. Take it. You will need it for gas and food. And, Ruby, your father said he’d prefer you don’t talk to your grandmother and her friend. Just come to Philadelphia and he will explain.
Suzanne had made a reservation for her at a hotel in the city, near where he was, and would meet Ruby when she arrived. Ruby had never gone anywhere except for rowing and was unsure what to pack. She tried to move silently. Toothbrush. She picked up the toothpaste; it would serve Clover right not to have any. Then felt bad and put it back. She’d buy some when she got to where she was going. Shampoo. Hairbrush. Pyjamas. Change of clothes. Phone charger. She put everything into a backpack. She lifted her school bag and then put it down quietly. What was the point?
Adelaide was asleep on the couch in the living room. Ruby tiptoed past and went outside and down toward the shoreline, stopping at the American beech. Lucas had fitted a small lockbox in a tree cavity that faced the lake. Nobody would ever think to look there. Ruby pushed the combination numbers and opened it. There were several keys and a ziplock bag of cash. She took everything, put it in the front section of the backpack and walked back up to the truck. She unlocked it, sat inside and started the engine. From the rear-view mirror she could see Adelaide standing on the porch as she drove away.
*
Ruby walked across the marble floor, past the fake waterfall, to the check-in desk.
A reservation for Ruby Chevalier, please.
Ruby?
A blonde woman was standing at her elbow. I’m Suzanne. I’ve already checked you in and your room is ready. My assistant Carlotta and I are just over there. She pointed to a circle of overstuffed chairs around a low table with two sodas on it. A woman with very red lipstick was working on a laptop. Your father’s arraignment is in the morning so we need to get to work.
Ruby hadn’t slept and had just driven seven hours on highways that sometimes had eight lanes.
Okay. She didn’t even know what an arraignment was.
The two women started talking about the other side.
What other side? asked Ruby. What does that mean?
Well, your mother’s family. Your aunt. Suzanne paused. And I suppose your grandmother and her friend.
I don’t even know my aunt. I don’t know my mother’s family. But my grandmother? I live with her. She’s not the other side.
Just until the arraignment. That’s all.
They didn’t want her to talk to anyone until after she went to court. It was really important. Ruby saying a few words about her father tomorrow might really help him.
I don’t understand why they arrested him. How can they prove my mother is dead? How can they charge him if she’s just been missing?
Suzanne’s arm lifting the soda stopped in mid-air. She put the drink down. Started to speak. She paused, smoothed her skirt, then leaned forward.
Ruby, I am very sorry to tell you this, but your mother passed away a long time ago. Her body was found. Several weeks ago. She has been positively identified. There’s no uncertainty that it is her. She’s been dead for a considerable time. Since she left you.
Air squeezed out of Ruby’s chest as if she were in a vise. The room tilted.
What? she said; her hands gripped the sides of the table, trying to not pitch over.
I’m sorry, said Suzanne.
But there were letters sent to me.
The two women exchanged looks.
Maybe they were from someone else and your father was trying to protect you.
And Ruby knew for sure then, probably had already known deep down, that someone else had sent her packages all those years. The person Lucas was angry about. Interfering bitch. Her aunt Nessa.
Suzanne said, We believe your mother left voluntarily, that her death was a tragic accident, and that your father is innocent.
Ruby nodded. She was trying to absorb it all. Her mother was dead. She had felt her all these years. The words Ruby had read in the journal came back to her. He smashed things. Her mother bruised. Maybe Lucas had done it.
From now until the arraignment, don’t make calls or answer your phone, unless it’s me or Carlotta, said Suzanne.
It’s best for us to stay put in our room tonight, Carlotta said. The way she spoke bugged Ruby – us?
Carlotta is going to come back later with an outfit.
You mean clothes?
Yes. And shoes.
Carlotta looked at Ruby’s feet. What size shoe are you?
Um. Nine. I brought clothes, she said to Suzanne.
Well, there’s a kind of uniform for these proceedings.
No television. No newspapers. In cases like this there’s always trial by media – lies and exaggerations – and it’s important that we don’t look at that. Carlotta again with the we.
They didn’t want her to see the news or talk to anyone. Even now Lucas was controlling what she knew. Suzanne handed Ruby a bag.
