Paperquake (8 page)

Violet wasn't wearing a watch, but she felt certain more than twenty minutes had passed. The burritos were dripping salsa through the white paper onto her hands. She pressed forward, crossed the street, and walked back up the steep hill to the stall where she'd left Rose.

The stall was crowded with potential customers, all oohing and aahing over the feathered-and-beaded jewelry. But Rose wasn't there. Violet rushed across the street, dodging a group of high-spirited boys, to check the Mexican food stall once again. No Jasmine.

The next stall was selling needlework kits. Violet hesitated, for a moment distracted from her search. She gazed with admiration at the display of intricately stitched tapestries. The feeling of holding a needle in her fingers returned. Maybe she'd be good at needlework. Maybe she should buy a kit and make a pillow—just as she'd been doing in the dream....

Someone shoved a piece of paper into Violet's hand and she glanced down in surprise. It was a leaflet printed in large green letters:
THE EARTH TAKES CAKE OF ITSELF
! read the headline. Needlework pillows forgotten, Violet read the text in smaller print:

 

The Gaian Principle teaches that our Earth is an entity who will not let itself die. It cannot be destroyed by mankind's folly, ignorance, and malice. The Earth gets even. It keeps itself healthy and balanced by changing conditions to counterbalance the man-made influences that weaken it Killer diseases, plagues, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, and earthquakes are all simply the Earth's attempts to readjust itself after mankind has wreaked havoc. Our job is to live in harmony with the Earth.

 

Violet felt a chill pounce up her spine.
The Earth gets even,
she thought.
Is that what's going on with all these quakes?
She shoved the leaflet into her pocket with the two letters from Hal. This was her day for receiving all sorts of strange messages. She turned away from the needlework stall and stood in the middle of the street. There was still no sign of her sisters.

Back at the shop on Chance Street she had felt powerful and strong. Now she felt weak again, and alone. What was the best thing to do? Go ahead to the BART station and see if her sisters were there? Call her parents?
But Dad will never let us come to the city alone again, if I call and tell him what happened,
Violet thought. Should she keep searching?
But I've
already wandered all over the place. If I go off to check the book stall again, then Jazzy and Rosy might come back here, and we'll just keep going in circles.

She stood by the needlepoint stall and opened one of the burritos. She ate with nervous bites, looking down the street. People jostled against her as they passed. The music from half a dozen different bands engulfed her. She felt smaller than ever. Smaller—and more vulnerable.

The aromas from the different food stalls merged into one overpowering stench. The groups of people on the street were too loud, too large. What had, moments before, seemed a good-humored crowd of San Franciscans enjoying a weekend street fair now seemed a threatening mob. A man stumbled against her, and Violet gasped as if the contact, had been an assault.
I'm lost,
she thought in sudden panic.

The fluttering in her chest made her feel weak, and she stepped back up on the curb and crossed the sidewalk to lean against a building. She glanced at the sign above the door:
UNITED STATES POST OFFICE
. Her thoughts were muddled. She wished she could just go inside the post office, slap on a stamp, and mail herself home to Berkeley. If only she were a letter...

A letter. Violet reached into her back pocket and drew out the two letters from Hal and the leaflet. She unfolded them and read each one through.

Remember the time you were lost in the crowds—how frightened you were ? Yet you overcame that fear and prevailed.

"I will prevail," she whispered.

The Earth takes care of itself!...The Earth gets even....

She scanned the street. Then she laid the two uneaten burritos on the ground next to the blue mailboxes. Straining, she hauled herself up onto one of the mailboxes by gripping the top of the mailbox and using her knees to shinny up far enough to lodge one knee on the shelf. Then, with extra effort, she was able to pull the other knee up.

She crouched there atop the blue box for a moment, then slowly raised herself to stand, one foot on the little shelf in front of the metal door, one foot on the rounded top of the mailbox. She could see above the heads of all the people in the street. She could see Sam, the dark-haired boy from Chance Street, walking toward her with a grin.

"Hey, it's the Maid-of-All-Work! What are you doing up there?"

She knew Jazzy and Rosy would have jumped down and chatted to him in an easy, friendly, grown-up way. But she didn't care anymore. She looked out over the crowd.

She drew a deep breath. "Jazzy!" she shouted at the top of her lungs. "Rosy? Where are you? Jazzy! Rosy!"

And then suddenly Sam was climbing up on top of the mailbox next to her. He steadied himself by placing one hand on her shoulder, and added his own voice to hers. "Jazzy!" he bellowed, his foghorn voice sounding out over the noise and music of the street fair. "Rosy! Come to the post office on the corner!" He looked down at Violet. "How am I doing?"

"Great," she said, nearly crying with relief as she saw the two golden heads of her sisters turn toward her. She pointed, laughing now. "There they are!"

Sam jumped down and reached up his arms to swing her down after him. When her sisters ran across the street to her, she embraced them, exultant, then turned to thank Sam. He was already disappearing down the hill on his skateboard.

Jasmine and Rose were furious. "Where
were
you?" wailed Jasmine. "I came back right away to the Mexican food place and you were gone. So I went back to the earring stall, but you weren't there, either!"

Violet scooped up her sisters' burritos from the sidewalk. "Here," she said, holding them out as a peace offering.

"We were frantic," hissed Rose, shaking Violet's arm as she pulled her toward the BART station. "Can't you be trusted not to wander off like a toddler?"

"We promised Mom and Dad we'd take care of you," cried Jasmine. Her face was streaked with tears. "And then we couldn't find you anywhere. All those people—they might have been murderers or kidnappers."

"And it would be our fault if anything happened to you," said Rose, unwrapping her burrito and taking a huge bite. "No one would ever forgive us," she continued, spewing out bits of lettuce."
Dad
will never forgive us for not calling sooner. He's probably worried sick."

"I was fine—," Violet began helplessly, but Rose stalked ahead to a phone booth.

"Don't tell Dad we lost Vi, Rosy," cautioned Jasmine. "We'll be in total disgrace."

"Vi's the disgrace," said Rose. "She made a complete fool of herself with that boy on top of the mailbox." Rose glared back at Violet. "Anyway, you'll probably tell Dad and Mom everything, won't you?"

"I won't tell," Violet said quietly, "—
if
you don't tell anyone about the letters I found."

Rose swallowed her mouthful of burrito and then spoke into the phone receiver in a bright voice, telling their dad they were fine, the quake hadn't scared them. They'd worked hard and were taking the four o'clock train home.

The girls waited for the BART in silence. The train service had been delayed as the cars and rails needed to be checked for safety after the earthquake. Violet could see that her sisters were so upset they would not listen to a word she said. Inside the train, she sat in the seat in front of them—"Where we can keep an eye on you," Rose growled—and read through the letters from Hal again and again until she had them nearly memorized.

His was a voice speaking out to her, promising rescue. How was that possible? How could he help her? Violet glanced over her shoulder at the identical stony faces of her sisters and felt her heart tighten.

I see you as lost in the bosom of a family that tries to control you. They simply do not understand you as I do.

If only Hal could be with her now. She could use someone who understood.

 

The quake that day had measured 3.3 on the Richter scale. Lily and Greg were relieved to have their girls back home safely and asked for a full report of their day in the city. All three girls kept their promises. Violet did not say a word about being lost at the street fair. And Jasmine and Rose did not mention the letters. Instead all three of them regaled their parents with details of the cleaning up and told them how the quake had knocked plaster off the walls. Violet tried hard to keep her account of the quake as breezy and matter-of-fact as her sisters'.

Greg and Lily would be going to the new shop the next day to inspect the damage. Violet was eager to go with them, and asked if Beth could come along, too. Jasmine and Rose begged off, convincing their parents they needed to stay home on Sunday to meet with the Halloween Ball committee at Brett Hudson's house. Violet was glad they wouldn't be coming back to the shop, since they were still so annoyed with her, keeping out of her way and tossing their hair in irritation when she looked in their direction.

It turned out that Beth could not come to San Francisco on Sunday. Her mother's newest boyfriend had decided to take them all sailing on the bay. "It means we can't dye your hair till after school on Monday," Beth said. "But my mom says I have to go along. I'll probably get seasick! At least this guy seems nice—but then, all of them do, at first. Anyway, I'll fill you in on all new developments tomorrow at school."

"I have some new developments to tell you about, too," said Violet mysteriously, and only laughed when Beth pressed for details. That night Violet dreamed she was dancing with that boy, Sam, on top of the blue mailbox. They held each other tightly and seemed to be waltzing. Even in the dream, she thought it was odd that they didn't topple off. When she woke up, she thought how nice it was to dream about something other than earthquakes for a change.

 

Back in the new shop on Sunday morning, her father put his arm around Violet's shoulders. "I'm truly impressed," said Greg. He wandered around the front room, exclaiming over all the work they'd done the day before.

"The place is really beginning to sparkle," Lily added. "I'm proud of my girls."

"Jazzy and Rose helped a little," Violet said modestly. "And it was even cleaner before that last quake." She led the way upstairs. She showed them the back bedroom walls and plaster dust everywhere. Would they notice the niche under the windowsill where the second letter had been waiting for her?

But they were more interested in sweeping up the plaster and mopping the floors. "We want this place clean from cellar to attic," Lily said, rolling up her sleeves.

"What cellar? What attic?" asked Violet.

"Well, the attic is only a crawl space." Greg pointed to the ceiling in the hallway, where Violet could see a small square trapdoor. "Nothing up there but mice. I'm going to put in some insulation, though."

"What about the cellar? We didn't see a cellar."

"The entrance is out back," her father said. "I've only peeked in there, and it's as big a mess as the rest of the place. We'll have to clean it out. We'll need all the storage room we can find."

"Why don't you go open it now, dear," said Lily. "We might as well know the worst. I'll stay up here and do the floors."

"I'm coming with you," said Violet, following her father down the stairs, along the narrow hallway, and out the back door. He rooted in his pocket, finally withdrawing another large old key like the one for the front door. "Here we go," said Greg, and turned it in the lock. He had to shove hard to get the door open. Then he stepped down and, with a grunt of surprise, tumbled away into blackness.

"Dad?" Violet stepped inside after him.

"Careful!" he called, but too late—Violet found herself Ming through nothingness and landing with a teeth-jarring thud on hard-packed earth. She sat, stunned, peering into the dark.

"Baby!" In a flash her father was at her side, lifting her into his arms. "Oh, Vi, I'm sorry. I tried to warn you." Her father put his hands on her shoulders and drew her toward him. "Are you all in one piece?"

"I-I'm okay, Dad. I think." Violet flexed her arms and legs. "What about you?"

"Thought I twisted my ankle, but it seems to be all right." He shook his head. "I should have remembered it was a steep drop."

Violet peered into the windowless space. In the light from the open door, she could make out vague humps and shadows but nothing more definite. She stood up and took a tentative step back toward the door, a full three feet above ground level. "There aren't any steps!"

"There were once, though." Her father kicked the old pieces of wood at his feet. "I'll go back up for a flashlight, and we'll check out what's in here." He hauled himself out of the cellar and looked back at her with concern.

"Go on. I'm fine." Violet waited by the doorway in the rectangle of light from the little yard. She looked out at the trash cans and imagined instead a low stone bench. She looked at the cracked concrete and imagined instead green grass dotted with daisies. It could be such a beautiful garden, given a little love and a lot of time. A birdbath would look nice in the center, surrounded by rosebushes. She would sit out here and work on her needlepoint—

Then her father returned with the flashlight. He jumped down into the cellar next to her and beamed the light into the corners. Immediately Violet could see that the large humps were piles of planks and bricks. The small humps were stacks of newspapers, yellowed and britde, tied with string. A brown leather suitcase, sticky with cobwebs, leaned against one stack. Everything was covered with the grime of years. As Greg swung the flashlight's beam in an arc, Violet caught her breath. There, to the left of the doorway they had fallen through, stood a stone garden bench. Fallen onto its side and covered with cobwebs was an ornate birdbath, intricately carved of stone.