Colette and the Silver Samovar (5 page)

“Where's Dad?” I asked.

“He has left for the airport,” she said. “His friend, Marco, came and picked him up an hour ago.”

“Gone?” I said. “
Gone?
”

“Yes. You knew he was leaving this morning.”

“He promised to wake me up and say goodbye,” I told her.

She held out her arms. “Come here,” she said.

I folded my arms over my chest.

“Colette,” she said, “he didn't want to wake you. He thought you needed to sleep so you would be able to concentrate this morning in school.”

“
School!
” I said. “He promised!”

My mother dropped her hands. “Well, you will just have to forgive him. He changed his mind.”

“When I'm a parent, I am never going to make a promise I don't keep. I am never going to change my mind about anything!”

“Sometimes we have to be flexible,” my mother said.

“Never!”

“Don't sulk, Colette,” my mother said. She beckoned. “Would you like to see the picture I drew?”

I inched toward her. Once she drew a picture of a homeless old person that was so sad, I got tears in my eyes. My mother loves people. If it was up to her, my father says, we would have an apartment full of street people.

She showed me her sketch. It was a picture of my mother, my father and me. There were my dad's handsome brown eyes, his serious expression and the little freckle just below the line beside his mouth that made it look like a question mark. She had drawn herself with her hair falling into her eyes and her red cape swirling out beside her. I was carrying a notebook and looked like I was trying to memorize something. All of us had wings! And paintbrushes! And we were painting the leaves of the big tree that grows beside the community garden in the park.

“You drew us painting the leaves!”

My mother smiled and pulled the drawing out of her sketchbook and gave it to me. “I thought we could use a little magic today.”

“You're right,” I said, putting the drawing carefully on the chair beside me. “Let's have pancakes. I'll make them!”

The sun was just starting to rise, pale and watery, by the time we sat down to our breakfast. My mother poured me a cup of tea and said, “Let's make a plan for every night while your father is away. This afternoon we'll go to the art gallery and look at the paintings.”

“Okay,” I said.

My mother waved me off to school. “I'll meet you at the front entrance at three thirty,” she said. I ran all the way across the community garden. Spike didn't appear, which seemed like a good omen.

Oprah was talking with Zain. She waved when she saw me. Zain gave me a sour look, but I remembered my father saying the best way to handle someone who was mean was to kill them with kindness, so I told her that she was wearing a cool sweater. The look of shock on her face was worth the effort it took to be nice. At lunch, I turned my marooned seat around and faced toward the class. Everyone laughed, and the lunch monitor started calling me
Teacher
. With the art gallery to look forward to, the day zipped by, and before I could even finish my independent reading, the bell was ringing and it was time to go.

There was no sign of my mother, but that wasn't so unusual. She doesn't pay attention to time all that well. I hung around until most of the kids had gone home. Mrs. Muncie saw me as she was leaving.

“Still here, Colette?” she asked.

“My mother's late,” I said. It had started to drizzle, and I shivered.

Mrs. Muncie said, “I go in your direction. How about we walk together?”

“What if my mom comes and wonders where I am?”

“Is there a route that you always take?” Mrs. Muncie asked. “We could go that way, and then if your mom is coming, we'll meet her.”

“That sounds all right,” I said.

As we crossed the park and headed down the alleyway, the graffiti on the walls seemed even scarier than usual. There were giant dragons and wizards. And knights carrying lances and riding horses with wild eyes. There were dinosaurs and a vampire that looked like it was about to jump out of the wall and grab me.

Sirens wailed in the distance. My mother hates the sound of sirens because they sound ominous.
Ominous
means bad things are about to happen.

When we came out of the alley and headed toward King Street, the flashing lights of an ambulance blinded me. Mrs. Muncie
tsk-tsked
under her breath. I guessed she thought sirens and flashing lights were ominous too.

The sidewalk and the street were clogged with cars and people trying to get around the stopped traffic. As Mrs. Muncie and I crossed to the other side of the street, I looked over my shoulder and saw Auntie Graves. She was wearing a triangle scarf that bobbed up and down as her chin trembled. Tears streamed down her face.

“I know that lady,” I said to Mrs. Muncie.

Mrs. Muncie looked toward where I was pointing.

She gasped. Her face went gray.

I turned and looked back at the street.

One of the ambulance drivers stood up, and I saw something red spread out on the ground.

“Come with me, Colette,” Mrs. Muncie said. She pulled me toward the coffee shop on the corner.

I wrenched my hand away and started running.

“Colette!” Mrs. Muncie screamed. Before anyone could stop me, I was kneeling at my mother's side, staring into her face.

There was a puddle of blood under her head, and her red cape was torn and dirty. The paintbrush that she stuck in her ponytail was broken in two. I picked the pieces up and put them in my pocket.

“Get this kid out of here,” yelled one of the ambulance drivers.

A thin brown hand touched my arm. It was Auntie Graves. “It's her mother,” she said.

The driver's face changed. “Can you take care of her?” he asked.

Mrs. Muncie appeared beside Auntie Graves. “I'll help,” she said.

Someone began to cut my mother's cape, and I started to scream.

Mrs. Muncie pulled me away. I clawed and fought, but she was stronger than I was. I heard Auntie Graves telling the policeman my mother's name and where we lived.

Then they loaded my mother onto a stretcher and drove her away.

Chapter 6

My mother says that sometimes we have to accept things without knowing why they happen. She says that's faith. My father says it is better to take things on faith only if you know the reason why. Then my mother says that isn't the point of faith. My father just nods and says that you have a duty to prepare yourself for life, and faith can't do that.

My mother believes in ufos. My father doesn't.

All this was whirling around and around inside my head while Mrs. Muncie talked on the kitchen phone to the hospital where they'd taken my mother. She asked Auntie Graves where my father was, and Auntie Graves said that my father had gone away to visit family in Iran. “No,” Auntie Graves said, “I don't know how to get in touch with him.”

Auntie Graves said that she would go and find Mr. Singh and that maybe he knew how to contact my father. Then Mrs. Muncie called her husband and told him that she would be late for dinner because she was taking care of a student whose mother had been hit by a car. I sat at the table holding the drawing my mother had made for me that morning.

Mrs. Muncie lowered her voice and said, “I don't know how bad it is. She is at the hospital, and they are operating. Very serious, I would say.” She looked back over her shoulder at me and gave me a small worried smile.

Auntie Graves brought Mr. and Mrs. Singh into the room. Mr. Singh hugged me, and I started to cry. I cried so hard, Auntie Graves took my mother's drawing out of my hand so my tears wouldn't smudge it.

Mr. Singh said, “Do you know how to get in touch with your father, Colette?”

Mrs. Singh put her arm around me. Mrs. Muncie wiped away a tear.

“No,” I said. “Maybe my mother has it written down somewhere.” I started sifting though all the papers on her desk, but my hands were shaking so hard, I couldn't hold anything.

Mr. Singh said, “Mrs. Singh can have a look. Is there anything you can tell us about where he was going?”

“It's near the mosque in Isfahan,” I said. “That's all I know.”

Mr. Singh rubbed a hand across his face.

“When can I go see my mother?” I asked.

Mr. Singh said, “I will call the hospital and see what they say.” Then he went to speak to Mrs. Muncie, who told him which hospital to call.

“You can stay with us tonight,” said Mrs. Singh.

She went to my room and came back with my pajamas, my toothbrush and a change of clothes. That was when I realized that I might not be coming home for a while.

As if reading my thoughts, Mrs. Muncie told me that she would let the school know I wouldn't be there for a few days.

“The doctor who operated on your mother will call us tonight,” Mr. Singh told me when he hung up. “Think as hard as you can, Colette,” Mr. Singh said. “Can you remember anything else about where your father went? Do you know the names of your father's parents?”

“I can't remember,” I said.

Mr. Singh shook his head. I thought of my mother lying on the pavement with her eyes closed and her skin as white as milk. What if she died? I started to shake, and Mr. Singh had to carry me to his apartment and put me in a chair. Mrs. Singh kept offering me food, but I knew I would never be able to eat again.

At midnight Mrs. Singh put me to bed in her room and stayed beside me, rubbing my back and humming softly. I was so tired from crying and shaking that I finally fell asleep.

A loud ringing woke me. I was dreaming of flying like the pigeons on top of the mosque in my poster. I was talking to all the friendly birds, asking which way I should go to find my father, but they kept saying
go-go
and pecking at the ground. I was so tired from flying that, when I opened my eyes, my arms ached from the effort of flapping them.

For a minute, I didn't know where I was. Then I remembered I was in Mr. and Mrs. Singh's apartment and that my mother was in a hospital.

“She is tired and has finally fallen asleep,” I heard Mr. Singh say. “Can't this wait until the morning?”

“Absolutely not!” said an unfamiliar voice. “She should be with her family!”

“Shhh!” said Mrs. Singh. “You'll wake her.”

“Just as well,” said the strange voice. “I demand you wake her up this instant!”

I crept to the bedroom door and peeked out. A tall man wearing a dark blue raincoat stood in the living room with his back to me. Beside him, a woman with blond hair was speaking to Mr. Singh. “You have no right to delay us another second.”

Mr. Singh's wife put her hand to her mouth. Her eyes widened. She had seen me. Mr. Singh peered around the angry woman's shoulder.

“Well,” he said. “It looks like you won't have to wait until the morning after all to meet your granddaughter.”

The tall couple whirled around. I stepped backward. They looked so upset, I thought they might put a curse on me and I might shrivel up and die.

The blond woman took a step toward me. Her hand clutched a large brown purse. She crossed the room and pushed open the bedroom door.

“Colette?” she said.

The tall man came up behind her. He put a hand on her shoulder.

“Emily,” he began.

“Are you Colette?” the woman said.

The tall man stepped around her.

“Colette,” he said, “my name is Richard Ridley. I am your grandfather.”

I looked from one face to the other. The man's eyes were sad and worried. The woman's mouth was trembling.

“Your mother is our daughter,” he said. He reached out and tried to take my hand. I snatched it away from him.

The woman made a choking sound.

Mr. Singh brushed by them both and gripped my shoulders.

“The doctor found your grandparents' names in your mother's wallet,” he said softly. “They have just come from the hospital.”

Mr. Singh pushed my hair out of my eyes, glanced at the man and continued. “Your mother is in a coma. The doctors don't know how long she'll be in the hospital. Your grandparents have come here so that they can take you to stay with them.”

“No!” I yelled.

“Stop that!” the tall blond woman said.

“Emily,” said my grandfather. He sounded like our school principal when he wants to summon a wrongdoer to the office. “Perhaps you'd better wait in the car.”

Without another word, the blond woman strode out the door and slammed it after her.

“Are you sure?” asked Mr. Singh. “My wife and I would be happy to care for Colette until her father can return home.”

“That will not be necessary,” my grandfather said. “She should be with her family at a time like this. Would you pack her things, please?”

Mr. Singh nodded at Mrs. Singh, and she disappeared into the bedroom. I grabbed Mr. Singh by the arm. “No,” I whispered. “I can't go with them! I don't even know them! What about my father? He won't know where to find me!”