See No Color (6 page)

Mom and Dad must have felt like I couldn't handle that kind of information when I was so young. That must have been their reasoning for not showing me the letters.
That's nobody's business but ours.
I pulled my legs tighter to my chest so that I could barely feel their circulation. My throat tightened further.
But they still should have told me. How could they have kept it from me?

I turned away from the filing cabinet and saw myself. The one break in the built-in bookshelves was for a floor-to-ceiling mirror. After a film session, Dad didn't want us to have to go far to start applying corrections to our mechanics, so I'd spent hours in front of that mirror with a bat in my hand. I was a slightly open-stance hitter with fast hands and a swing that took a long, smooth cut through the zone. Maybe I wasn't powerful, but I would make good contact. The mirror had shown me that thousands of times. Now, I saw a scared girl who may have been faking it on the field and in front of the plate the whole time. A girl who only got the long, hard hits, who caught all those rogue fly balls because she listened to her father, who was now a confirmed liar. And the worst part about this girl was that she was only realizing this now. Paddington's thick, hot tongue licked my face clean. I hadn't even heard him come into the room. He wagged his tail.

“Hi,” I said, and he wagged his tail more.

I scratched behind his ears, and he sat down lazily, eager to accommodate me. “Good boy,” I said, and then I pushed myself up, back onto my haunches. I gathered the letters together and stacked them up neatly in the folder, the way I had found them. If secrets were what this family kept, then I could keep my own. I stood up and dusted myself off. The folder should go back in the drab gray filing cabinet; no one except Kit needed to know I had seen it.

I spotted the family photo hanging on the downstairs wall and stood on tiptoe in order to inspect it. Jason was smiling brightly in the photo but a little too carefully, the checkered sweater vest Mom had picked out for him sagging over his trim adolescent torso. I stood beside him, a little bit behind him actually, my wild hair pulled back into a somewhat tame bun, a dowdy violet dress hiding most of me. I looked into my eyes, and they were carefree, without any hint that something was amiss. I was surprised to notice that I envied that girl, even though I didn't want to be her now. To her right stood Kit, quietly clasping her hands, her mouth in a tight thin line, her eyes looking into the camera questioningly. Mom and Dad perched behind the three of us, Mom's torso turned a bit to the right, and Dad's facing the camera straight-on. Mom looked as happy as she always did, her right hand placed on Kit's shoulder, probably at rest after stroking and fixing Kit's long blonde hair. She could never do the same with my curls, which had a mind of their own, so by this time she hardly ever touched them anymore. Dad's arms stretched wide around us all, and his face was just
satisfied
. That was the word that came to mind, and as it entered my consciousness and attached itself to Dad, so did a fierce anger that made me want to break the picture entirely. Instead I dug around in one of Dad's desk drawers and found a Sharpie. I approached the photo gingerly this time, uncapping the marker and trying to imagine what my birth father might look like. When the marker touched the surface of the glass, I felt free for just a moment, drawing a figure slightly taller than Dad, standing right behind him. A shadow. I could see him, just barely, with curly hair, a mustache, and high, defined cheekbones. I stood back and stared for a moment. I could still wipe it away, but after a minute, I decided to leave the shadow there, for everyone to find it, and for no one, as well.

CHAPTER TEN

M
om has her, deep in the belly. Tables and chairs and ends of things come at Mom. She is too round. Her whole body pink when she gets up or down. Always saying,
Terry, can you bring me an old washcloth? Terry, can you make me a thick vanilla shake with melon and cantaloupe?
Dad running in the house, up the stairs, in the kitchen, to the store. I like to go with him to get things for my little baby sister who is coming.

Alex, I have to get something for Mom,
he says, bending so that he is small like me.
I don't have time to play with you right now.
I want to play Tonka trucks. Either that or Big Wheels.

I pull on the ends of his moustache until he takes my hands. This is a game we play.
But I can help
, I say.
I can wet the washcloths; I can carry the melon.

Jason begins to cry because Dad won't play. He's acting like such a baby.

Terry, I'm so hot
… she says from the couch. She is wearing a wavy white dress, the sound of the same words every day at the same time. She does not change, except for getting bigger and louder. Even with my sister in her, she is empty, and we can't make her full.

Dad looks at her and then at Jason and me, sweating. Since our family is being made, we are starting to grow into people, and Dad is always tired. But also smiling. He presses my hands harder and whispers in my ear.
Little Kirtridge
, he says,
I almost forgot that I do need your help at the supermarket. I need you to pick out the roundest, sweetest cantaloupe for your mother.

I clap my hands together and jump up. Dad stands up, looking for his wallet so we can go. His arm muscles are strong and bursting from his T-shirt. Baseball has made him this way. When he reads to me, I touch his arms. His muscles are the hills and valleys of his body.

Jason can help, too
, I say, turning to him and grabbing his cheeks. Then I kiss Jason, wet and hard on the lips, and say,
I love you.
Jason starts to smile and Dad says,
Well, all right then.
Jason would be so sad without me.

When we are in the car, on our way to Kroger's, I whisper to Jason,
You love me best of all. Best of anyone. I'm your sister.

He is four and loves his own jokes.
I'm your sister
, he says, hitting his chest.

I laugh.
No, no.
Me, I say, pointing to my chest.
Sister.

Dad looks back at us, from the front seat.
But you'll be getting another sister soon
, he says.
In two months.

Jason and I stare at each other. I grab his fingers and he screams.

Dad frowns.
Jason!

I let go of his fingers, and Jason closes his mouth and smiles.

What's her name, Dad?
I ask.

Your mother and I are still deciding between Danielle and Katherine. What do you guys think?

I want to think hard, so I put my head in my hands like Dad when there is a big thought in it.
Katherine
, I say.
Katherine is better.

Our car comes into the parking lot.
You think so?

I nod.
Yes,
I say.
If I have a sister, she should be called Katherine.

Dad laughs, a laugh I do not like.
Why do you say that?

I lean to him.
Dad. Will Katherine be coming from the same place I came from?

I hold the story in my mind, the one that Mom tells me sometimes before bed, the one that Dad tells me more. A woman is going to have a baby, but she is poor and she is sad and she has no money to take care of the baby. She doesn't know how she will feed it, buy it clothes, take it to the doctor. The father is also poor and does not know how to take care of the baby. He and the woman don't love each other, so they can't get married, which the baby will need to be taken care of properly. So, the woman decides to find a home for the baby where the parents can take good care of it, where they will love it as much as she and the father do. The baby is born in the hospital, and after it is born, the woman gives it to the couple. This is what happened to you. It makes you special because it means that we really wanted you, that we picked you out ourselves because you were so special.

More special than Jason?
No, not more special than Jason. Equally special.
How can we be equally special if he just came out of you and you picked me out?
He didn't just come out of us, we made him out of love. We made him together.
But you didn't make me together.
No, your birth mother and father made you together.
But they didn't make me out of love. They made me out of something else.
They did make you out of love. But sometimes love doesn't last.
Why did you pick me then?
I told you. Because you're special.

Will we get to pick Katherine out?
I can see the babies in tiny cribs beside each other. There would be ones with curly brown hair like mine and tiny big toes. We can pick one with holes in her cheeks when she smiles.

Dad frowns.
Alex, you know your mother's pregnant. You know where your sister's coming from.
We are stopped in the car now. In a minute, we will walk into Kroger's.

She is not empty, I see now; there is something inside her. Katherine will be pushing out soon enough. Like Jason, she will not be picked out.

I unbuckle Jason's seatbelt.
Katherine will be born from Mom
, I say slowly.

Jason gets down from his car seat. Dad comes over to help us.
You know, I never said that her name was Katherine, Alex. I said that we're thinking about Katherine or Danielle.

I step away from him, cross my arms.
You'll choose Katherine
, I say.
That's her name.

Dad was about to take my hand, but I'll never forget the way he stopped after I said that, the strange gaze he gave me. I like to think that he began to realize that I could create her just as much as he and Mom could, that I was already a part of who she was even before she was born. I would find a way to choose her, one way or another.

I got away from him and put my arm through Jason's. We were halfway to the front of the store before he caught us.

• • •

They put Jason's old baby crib near me, and Dad pushes my bed in the corner. They pile my toys on one side of the room.

She'll be very delicate
, Mom tells me at bedtime.
You'll have to be very careful with her.

Careful is ugly to me. Why can't she stay in Jason's room?
I ask.
That's the baby room. This is the big kid room.

Mom's face is beside me, laughing.
Jason's just a year younger than you; he doesn't have the baby room.
Her soft, shiny hair tickles my chin. I want to touch it. It is clean and slippery in my hands until she takes it away.
I'm sorry, that hurts, honey.
She sighs. Will it be like taking a pin to a big balloon when she goes to the hospital? Will she just pop like that? Everyone says that Katherine is inside her, but how? No person, even so small, could fit there. If it
is
true, Mom will shove her out, or she will shove herself out of Mom. Like a war, where each good guy wants to get away from the other.
It'll be fine
, she says.
You know, I always wanted a sister to play with when I was a girl.

I stick my fingers under my butt. I have to stop them from pulling on her hair again.
Well, why didn't you, then?

She razzes my head.
Because I didn't have one, silly. You know it's just me and Uncle Eddie.

I feel stupid. I look away from her, outside into the dark.

She'll look up to you, your sister. She'll need you and you'll need her. Plus, you'll be able to tell her things that you could never tell Jason.
She looks at me, almost sad.
That's what's so great about having a sister.

Is she really talking to me? Would she even notice that I was gone if I floated away and left only my head peeking out from the covers? No. She would never know the difference.

• • •

But when my sister arrives, nothing is the same. The house turns green with flowers and potted plants, then red with candies, then pink with visitors. I like it in Jason's room, playing Lincoln Logs and reading him stories. The baby is tiny and soft and hardly ever makes a sound. Everyone who comes says she is the sweetest baby they have ever known. When Grandma Jordan meets the baby, she asks me if I don't feel like the luckiest girl in the world. She hands me a soft caramel and I nod.

But on the inside, really I hate the baby. Late at night, when everyone sleeps, I jump out of bed and watch her chest move up and down, her eyelids swish-swash back and forth. Her toes twitch as she sleeps, and her hands grab at nothing. I lean down to her, so my face is almost touching hers, and I breathe on her. I blow back air I save in my lungs for her, air which is
bad
. Then I pinch her little ears and pull the thin, white hairs around her head. Sometimes, she wakes up screaming, and Mom rushes in, asking,
What's wrong? What happened? Is she hungry?
I throw my pillow over my head and pretend that I heard none of it, that sharing a room with my sister is the worst thing that has ever happened and will ever happen to me.
I don't know what is wrong with her
, I tell Mom.

It makes no difference, of course. She stays.

Then one night, I am asleep and I see rows and rows of baby cribs in the hospital. I am walking there, in my sister's baby clothes, and I am thinking I am going to pick one out; I am going to pick out a baby for myself. I tell them that I just want to pick one of them to take home, but they say no, that I already have a sister. I open my eyes. My hands are pee pee wet. The ceiling above me white, the fan still making circles in the corner. Tomorrow I will go to kindergarten and draw and play with the other kids, even though this is exactly what I did the day before. No day will be different from another, except for the fact that I
feel
different. Right at that moment, I know I am another person than I was even a moment before; I also know that no one will be able to understand this if I told them.
I am different.
I flex my hand.
The white fear. It's coming for me.
That is what I name it. The ceiling above me white, the fan still making circles in the corner. Tomorrow I will go to kindergarten and draw and laugh with the other kids, even though this is exactly what I did the day before.
This is all there is,
says my mind, or someone in it. And the thought is an echo, repeating into nothingness.
This is all there is.
I touch a hand to my leg, and I know that it isn't real, that I am not real.
This is all there is. This can't be.
The walls and the ceiling make a storm around my head, and yet, they keep me here. Someone opens my mouth. I hear a short shout. From who? For what? Another cry is coming, but I know I cannot let this one come out. Mom or Dad might hear, and then what? They will come and ask what's wrong, and there will be nothing to say. I pull off the sheets and run to my sister's crib. She is lying there with no sounds, but her eyes are open. She has heard me.