Every Last Cuckoo (16 page)

“I made some trees, just like you showed me,” Hannah announced, pulling him toward the kitchen. She had run to the barn wearing a short-sleeved T-shirt and denim overalls, oblivious to the chill in the April air. “Come on, I'll give you one. I made some pictures for
everybody
! I even drew Boojus, he's for Vivi. Vivi showed me how to weave and she bought me a book, it's about a cat named Henry who has to cross-country ski to get away from a
coyote
!”

David entered the house, shaking his head and chuckling. “Slow down, slow down, Hannah.” He hugged Sarah and ducked through the door, with Hannah skipping at his side. Sarah had never seen the child so excited.

Tess reappeared a few moments later, her long hair pulled back and tied at the nape of her neck with a watercolor silk scarf. She wore slim black pants and a blue silk shirt. Elegant and understated without makeup or jewelry, she carried the faint scent of lavender. As she greeted David with a light kiss, her wrists crossed behind his neck, something in her reserve seemed to Sarah more intimate than any passionate embrace. Her quietude was knowing as a whisper, and Sarah looked away as Sylvie and Ruckus came in from her office, awakened, no doubt, by David's deep voice amid the altos and sopranos they'd grown used to.

“How did the work go?” David asked.

“Fine,” Tess told him. “I think we're finished, aren't we, Sarah? But there are a
lot
of boxes to stash or haul. We'll need some muscle.”

“Sure. Tomorrow. When's dinner and who's coming?”

At six thirty-five, half an hour late, Charlotte and Tom drove
in with Lottie and Luke. It wasn't like them to be late; Charlotte never allowed that to happen, so she must be the one who had held things up—a disheartening sign. She had objected strongly to Tess's helping with Charles's personal possessions.

“Mom, she's not part of this family! She barely knew Dad.”

“Oh, Charlotte, honey, I know that, but I can't refuse her. People feel so helpless after someone dies. Tess just wants some practical task to do.”

“And what about me? What about Tom and the kids? Weren't you even going to
ask
?” Her voice had been tight, whether with resentment or with grief half swallowed, Sarah couldn't tell.

She'd sighed and said, “I'm sorry. Really, I am. Why don't you come and help us? Can you?”

But Charlotte couldn't, or wouldn't. And tonight, having finally dealt with all of Charles's possessions, Sarah was suddenly contrite. She hadn't anticipated how powerfully his personal belongings would invoke his presence, how intensely they would echo his entire personality, all his expressions, his passions, his scent and voice, his way of moving. She had kept her daughter at a distance and denied her a final, physical connection with her father. A last farewell.

Sarah realized that if Stephie or David had been available to help with the sorting, she'd have invited them without prompting. But she was more comfortable with Tess, whom she barely knew, than she was with Charlotte, so she had accepted Tess's offer the minute it was made, without a second thought.

Shame inexplicably brought to her mind the long-ago cold spell in her marriage. With new and jarring clarity, Sarah saw that Charlotte had had her father to herself from the age of five until she was more than nine years old. Her estrangement from
Sarah, which had begun with the loss of baby Andrew, had only intensified when Sarah and Charles had grown apart during David's infancy. Charlotte had been old enough by then to sense the tension between her parents and to choose sides, drawing ever closer to her father. What a shock, then, to watch numbly as her parents slowly reconciled. What a loss to her, and what jealousy she must have felt! Why had this thought never entered Sarah's head, either at the time or in all the years since?

Shaken, Sarah felt more responsible than ever for her daughter's unhappiness, not only on this night but in their whole history together. Meanwhile, Charlotte was chilly with Tess, as if Tess were overstepping yet again by hosting a family dinner on only her third visit to this house. Sarah watched with dismay, hoping Charlotte would not keep taking out on Tess the anger that properly belonged at Sarah's own feet.

David took drink orders as soon as the coats were hung. Everyone stood about awkwardly, aware of change and strangeness. Sarah held herself apart from them and watched their slow jockeying as if her home were a stage and none of these people were known to her. She was the audience now, not the director. Always, before, she'd have placed those who were at odds far enough from one another for the taut cords between them to fray, thread by thread, until the tensions slowly gave way. Now she was startled by distance, suddenly unconcerned even about Charlotte's mood. There was nothing Sarah could do about Charlotte tonight. She could only let the evening unfold as it would.

Luke escaped with Hannah after she gave him his drawing of a dog with a ball—a black dog, Sylvie-like. He offered to show her how to make an origami dog, and she followed him happily into Sarah's office in search of colored paper. Lottie sat close to
David and Tess on the big couch but followed the younger children with her eyes. She treated Tess like a big sister, Hannah like a little one, and didn't quite seem to know where she belonged herself. She had turned sixteen only a few weeks after Charles's death, and the occasion had been marked forlornly.

David now crossed the room to a side table. He opened a drawer and brought out a box wrapped in paper the color of paprika. He stood before his niece, tall and lanky in denim shirt and khakis, trying unsuccessfully to hide the box behind his back. “Lottie, I'm sorry this is late, and I'm sorry we couldn't be here to celebrate—but, hey, happy sixteenth, kiddo. This is from both of us, Tess and me.” He held it out, and Lottie's eyes lit up, darting from David to Tess and back. She ducked her head, which hid her face inside a sudden fall of curls. She neatly untied the indigo satin bow, set it beside her, and slid her fingers under the tape at the folds in the paper. Inside the unwrapped box, in layers of tissue, was something soft. Lottie held her breath and slowly lifted a shimmering garment from its crumpled bed. It was a loose, flowing jacket of heavy, rain gray silk, handpainted front and back with Japanese street scenes. Spare, stylized skyscrapers rose beside each lapel and looked down upon a sea of black umbrellas and shiny wet cars and buses. Rain dashed down in slanting streaks, recalling Hokusai or Hiroshige. The only spots of bright color were the Japanese characters on neon signs. Otherwise everything was blue-gray, silver, black, or indigo.

Lottie gasped, and held the extravagant piece of work up to her and stood on tiptoe at the small mirror above the side table. “Oh my God,” she breathed. “This is
gorgeou
s! Uncle David, Tess, thank you, thank you. I
love
it!”

“Put it on, sweetie,” Tess urged. “Here, let me.” She held up Lottie's hair in one hand and helped her slide her arms into the jacket's sleeves. “Let's have a look,” she said, stepping back.

Lottie turned to face Tess. She had on black jeans and a purple T-shirt, which the jacket softly outshone. Tess held her palms together, the tips of her fingers at her smiling mouth. “You are simply beautiful,” she said. She didn't see Charlotte rise from her chair and head for the bathroom off the front hall. Only Sarah saw her go.

When she returned, Tom tried to make up for her moodiness with praise for the table and its burden of beautiful food. Tess's contribution did deserve notice. Otherwise, it was the same table bearing the same china and the same well-laundered linens that were laid out for every festive occasion. Still, the strain lifted. All began chattering as they found their places and sat. Charlotte, though, remained silent as the meal progressed.

Whatever anguish David's adolescent storms had inflicted was finally over. It had taken a long time, but at least David and Charles had recognized and enjoyed each other once more before time had run out. David had been openly defiant well into his twenties. He took the car without permission; he used marijuana, hallucinogens, and too much alcohol; he slammed doors and raged at both parents, parading his existential angst through all the rooms of the house. He treated girls like candy, savoring every flavor he could find. Even holed up in his room, making not a sound and never showing his face, he could infect the household. Most poisonous of all was his contempt for his father—rigid, controlling, oblivious. But David had finally grown into himself with accelerating grace, while Charlotte, at forty-six, held onto old hurts, perhaps without even knowing
what they were. Now her father, her chosen parent, was gone, and where did that leave Charlotte? With a mother she could barely tolerate and a daughter who didn't even try to tolerate her. The thought revived Sarah's guilt—both the old guilt, which spanned forty years or more, and the recent guilt over leaving Charlotte out of family business. For the first time, she wondered which of them had been the first to give up on the other. She had always thought it was Charlotte, but what if it had been Sarah herself?

Lottie waved a hand before Sarah's face, singing, “Oh, Naaanaaaaa. You in there?”

Sarah blinked and saw all eyes upon her. She shook her head. “Daydreaming, sorry.”

“We're planning Lottie's future,” David informed her. “Since she doesn't seem to have any plans of her own.” He winked at his niece, who made a face back at him.

“Too
many
plans, Uncle David, with which you are no help.”

“Dream big,” he replied. “Drama first, and
then
early childhood development, and
then
medicine. Then produce and star in your own movie about the children's ward in some big urban hospital.” He grinned across the table at Charlotte. “What do you think, Char?”

“It's up to Lottie,” Charlotte answered flatly. “I know
I
don't have a thing to say about it.”

“You don't exactly
ask,
either,” Lottie challenged. She lowered her eyes. “Sorry,” she muttered.

Charlotte looked genuinely hurt. “You don't
let
me ask,” she protested. “If I try, you just roll your eyes and sigh. What do you want from me?”

Lottie rolled her eyes and sighed. “Whatever.”

Luke, who had followed the conversation avidly, mimicked Lottie's gestures and tone of voice as if taking lessons. “Whatever,” he echoed.

“Luke, shut up!” his sister yelled. “Shut the
fuck
up!”

Luke looked slapped. Then, widening his eyes at Lottie, he breathed, “
Whoa!
”

“Lottie, leave the table,” Tom ordered. “Now!” he added sharply, seeing her open her mouth to object. “But first, apologize. And mean it.”

Lottie narrowed her eyes. “I am just so fucking sorry,” she blurted, and ran from the room.

Charlotte wept without a sound. Tom put his arm around her shoulders, and no one said anything for several moments.

Finally Hannah crawled onto Tess's lap and said, “Why is Lottie so mad?” She burst into tears, not soundlessly but with open sobs that diverted everyone's attention from Charlotte and brought Lottie timidly back from the hallway where she'd been lurking.

She scooped Hannah up from Tess's lap. “I'm not mad,” she told her. “I'm just sort of a mess.” She choked back her own tears, trying to soothe the little girl.

Sarah leapt up, surprising herself.

“Oh, for crying out loud!” she exclaimed, then burst out laughing at her choice of words. Amusement bubbled in her throat like champagne, and she let it come, though she couldn't begin to locate its source. “Just look at this family!”

Around the table, angry, bewildered, or sorrowing eyes went blank and stared at Sarah.

“Lottie, you
are
mad. You're furious! You're surrounded by teachers and parents and rules, and they're driving you crazy.
Swear all you want to, I don't give a damn. Just be glad you live in a time when you can do anything you want.”

Sarah circled the table. Heads and eyes turned to follow her. She could read these people. They were verses long ago learned by heart, which now came to her whole. Certainty coursed through her like clear, cold water.

“Charlotte,” she said, “relax. Take the long view. I gave you too much room, I didn't know how to reach you, so I quit trying. I did that, not you.” She stood still a moment, facing her daughter. “But now you're doing just the opposite with Lottie; you're hovering, you're trying to control her. Ease up, she might surprise you. Tom, quit protecting Charlotte from herself, it's condescending. Luke, don't be a smartass, it only makes things worse and you do it on purpose. And David . . . David . . .” Here Sarah broke into fresh merriment. “How did such a sweet little boy turn into
such
a pain in the ass? All that sulking and acting out and oh-my-
God
the superiority. And now look at you. Finally. See, Charlotte? All you can do is trust.”

With this last, she winked at Hannah, who sat bug-eyed on Lottie's lap, her small chin thrust forward, her lips parted.

Sarah dropped back into her chair and surveyed them all. “I should talk. Sometimes I was a
horrible
mother”—here she looked directly at Charlotte—“but we can't any of us afford to get stuck in regret. There's no time for that.” Sarah pushed herself up and started clearing away the last of the dessert dishes. “Let's move on.”

L
OTTIE MOVED IN WITH
Sarah on Saturday. She'd pleaded with Tom, who had approached Charlotte while she was still dazed by Sarah's rant at dinner. Charlotte readily agreed. “Give it a try. Nana's only two miles away. But I want you home for dinner at least once a week. You can't pretend we don't exist.”