The Friendship Doll (20 page)

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Showing Gloria Jean all around Klamath Falls kept Lucy busy through the summer. On her birthday, July 12, she and Gloria Jean went to a double feature at the Star Theater in nearby Bly. Pop brought them home and they ate ham sandwiches with grape Nehi sodas for lunch—they each got their own bottle. Gloria Jean’s mother had baked a birthday cake they were all going to share after supper that night. The girls were sitting on the front steps of 318 Oak Avenue sipping on their sodas when the mailman stopped. “Pretty fancy return address,” he said, handing Lucy a letter.

After reading it with Gloria Jean, Lucy showed the letter to Pop and Miss Olson—rather, Mrs. Evans—but no one else. It was so special that she didn’t want to tarnish it
by waving it around like one of those jokes on a bubble gum wrapper. The letter went into Mama’s Bible for safekeeping, but Lucy brought it out every now and again when she needed comfort or encouragement.

Lucy never missed a Saturday at the museum, sometimes going with Gloria Jean but most often by herself. She found a good listener in Miss Kanagawa; she was able to talk to her about anything, even things she couldn’t tell Gloria Jean. Like that one August day when she’d been thinking about Mama.

“Aunt Miriam says that it gets easier the more time that goes by. But it’s been two years. And I still miss Mama. Still wish she was here,” she’d told Miss Kanagawa. “Do you ever feel like that about folks?” She looked into those deep almond eyes. “I suppose dolls don’t, really.” Lucy shrugged her shoulders. “I’d miss
you
, if you went away,” she said.

I recall a time, in my early years, when I would not have been able to understand what Lucy was talking about. But I am older now, wiser. I know about the empty spaces left when dear ones leave our lives. My heart may be doll-sized, but when it comes to feeling, it is larger than a giant’s.

When Lucy noticed that Miss Kanagawa’s dress—she learned it was called a kimono—was getting dingy, she and Pop made a wood and glass case, which they
presented to the museum. As a gift. Dr. Evans was so pleased, he hired Pop to make some more display cases. There was soon so much work, in fact, that Pop asked Gloria Jean’s father to help, and before they knew it they had a side business going. Lucy still longed to see the ocean, so Pop got it in his head to get a house for her there one day. “I may be an old man before it happens,” he’d tell her as he looked over his bank statement, “but it’s going to happen. I promise you.”

One early December day when the town was decked out in green and red and gold for Christmas, something unspeakable happened. The Japanese navy bombed Pearl Harbor. Lucy and Gloria Jean held each other close as they sat transfixed in front of the radio, listening to the news.

A few days ago, Dr. Evans stood before my display case, holding a newspaper in his trembling hand. Tears fell from his eyes like wet cherry tree blossoms. I couldn’t imagine what had saddened him so.

He has now returned, at the back of a clump of men in felt fedoras and thin ties tight against their white-collared necks. I determined that they were members of the museum board.

“It’s unpatriotic,” one man said, his lips as thin as his dark tie. The other hats bobbed in agreement. “Everything in this room’s got to go.”

“Everything?” Dr. Evans asked.

The man with the thin lips frowned. “You could stash it all out of sight for a while. But it’s probably best to get rid of it. Either way, we expect our decision to be carried out pronto.”

When the men had gone, Dr. Evans walked from item to item in the Land of the Sun room. Then he stood in front of my case, head bowed, for a long time. I tried to let him know I understood. That I thought all would be well, someday. I do not know if my message was received.

He lifted me from the display case, gently set me inside my steamer trunk, and patted my cheek as if I were an anxious child. He said nothing, but I knew he meant to keep me safe. He quickly closed the lid of the trunk, and my world grew very quiet, very still.

I did not let myself think about Lucy. There are some things even a doll’s small heart cannot bear.

Mason knew every board in the dock that led to Seal’s place. And he usually ran all the way. Today, he walked, slowly, looking at but not really seeing the two rows of houseboats bobbing in the damp spring mist on either side of the wooden pier. Six on this side, five on the other. All of them looked pretty much the same, like day-old vanilla sheet cake with the frosting slumping off, except for the one on the far end, owned by a retired actor who’d fixed it up to look like a real house. A fancy house. It stood out like a peacock in a flock of chickadees.

He caught up with Mom in front of the fourth houseboat on the left. A yellow kayak hung like a happy-face smile from hooks under the eaves. A lace-leaf maple tree
in a big wooden container stretched out its limbs next to the kayak.

“How is she now?” he asked. Seal wasn’t sick, exactly. At least not with anything the doctors could fix with pills. Mom had explained it was Alzheimer’s. Whatever it was, it creeped Mason out. He wanted his old Seal back. He didn’t like this new one, this confused one. The last time he’d come, she hadn’t even known who he was. That was why he hadn’t been to visit in a long, long time. And he wouldn’t have come today, either, except Mom threatened to confiscate his game player, permanently, if he didn’t.

Mom shifted the basket she was carrying to her other arm. The aroma of cinnamon and apples tickled Mason’s nose.

“Honestly, honey, I don’t know. It’s kind of a day-today thing.” She gave Mason a wistful smile. “She knew me the other day. And Gloria Jean said she knew her, too, when she came to visit last week.”

Mason’s cousin, Emma, stood on the other side of Mom. Usually you couldn’t find her “off” button, but today she was as quiet as a broken TV.

“Chin up, everybody.” Mom stepped across the sliver of water separating the dock from the houseboat’s front porch. “Oh, shoot. The key.” She handed Mason the basket, heavy with Seal’s favorite chicken and rice casserole and apple crisp, and fished in her pocket. “Don’t tell me I left it at home.”

“Can’t the nurse let us in?” asked Emma.

“Oh, I hate to bother her. In case she’s busy with Seal.”

While Mom rummaged in another pocket, Mason stepped across to the porch. He lifted a stone from the planter with the tree in it and retrieved Seal’s spare key.

“Brilliant!” Mom moved aside to allow him to unlock the door.

One of the things Mason always loved about Seal’s house was its smell—a heady concoction of garlic, lemons, dust, and lake water. Now, he felt like he was going into a stranger’s home. There wasn’t even a hint of garlic. Mostly what he smelled was sour and mediciney.

He held the door for Mom and Emma. “Such a gentleman,” Mom said. Mason ducked his head. He was no gentleman. He was trying to postpone going inside as long as he could.

“Hello? Abby? Seal?” Mom called. “It’s Diane! And you’ll never guess who’s with me.” She turned and made a face at Mason. “Say something,” she mouthed.

He cleared his throat. “Seal?” He took a few steps toward her bedroom, which was opposite the cozy galley kitchen where he’d probably eaten a million pieces of French toast and a thousand bowls of split pea soup. “It’s me. Mason.” He couldn’t move any closer. It was like a force field was keeping him back.

Abby, the nurse, stepped into the hall. Her face lit up when she saw them. “Oh, you kids will be just the ticket. She needs a bit of a lift today.” She waved Mason and Emma into Seal’s bedroom.

Somehow Mason stepped through the doorway. There was Seal—the person who’d taught him to ski and kayak
and who’d come to all his soccer games—lying as still as a doll in her four-poster bed. Her gray hair looked like some kind of gray moss growing all over the pillowcase. She was on her back, mouth open, breathing hard. What was that awful rattling sound?

Mom nudged him.

He stepped closer. Took a deep breath. “Seal?” he said again.

Seal opened her eyes. Looked right at him. “Delbert?” she asked. “What are you doing here? If you call me Licey one more time, I’ll punch you. I swear.”

Mason stepped back, looked at Mom. “It’s me. It’s Mason.” He had no idea who Delbert was. Who Licey was. “Mason,” he repeated.

Emma had followed him into the room. “Auntie Seal? This is Emma.” She pointed to herself, then went to the far side of the bed and took one of Seal’s knotty hands in hers. “We brought you some supper.”

Seal turned her head. “Are there biscuits? Pop likes biscuits.”

Mom called from the doorway. “Biscuits. And chicken. And dessert. How about that? Better than the Ritz.” She laughed, but it was a fake laugh, pushed out through a tight throat.

“Biscuits,” Seal repeated. Then she turned to Mason. “And not one for you, Delbert.” She laughed a scary, witchy laugh.

Mason bolted and headed for the ship’s ladder. Headed up to his room. Well, not his truly, but his whenever he
came to stay. He grabbed the ladder’s rails and began to climb. He burst through the opening at the top, launching himself into the familiar bedroom, the one he used to think was built for a Munchkin. Small and square, it held the basics: dresser, bed, desk. But the dresser’s legs were cut off so it would fit under the angled ceiling. The “bed” was a mattress resting right on the floor. And the desk was an old door bracketed to the wall under a row of small-paned windows.