The Truth about Mary Rose (8 page)

I carried the box down the stairs with me to my bedroom. I locked the door, and spread them out one by one on my bed. They didn’t all fit, so I put some of them on the floor, and sat in the middle of Mary Rose’s treasures. Some of them had faded, on others the paper was stiff, and beginning to crumble. But most of them were still as bright and shiny as when she first cut them out of the magazines thirty years ago.

I didn’t know what I was going to tell Pam— I mean about how I opened Mary Rose’s box and didn’t wait for her. I never should have promised. I know that. It’s like promising you’re not going to breathe or you’re not going to sleep.

That night, when it was bedtime, I put everything back in the box. But I couldn’t sleep. It came one o’clock, and I listened to my parents’ conversation as usual. Daddy said OK about the house, and Mom kept saying was he absolutely sure it was all right. She wouldn’t mind at all living in Manhattan, and she realized that living up here in the Bronx would mean a long trip for him every day on the subway. He said no, the studio was fine, and if she liked the house and the neighborhood, that was fine too. Then she said well how did he feel about living so close to her mother. He said that was fine too. And then my mother said, “What’s wrong, Luis?”

It seemed there were a whole lot of things wrong.

First of all, my father was disappointed in what was happening between him and his son, Philip. He had been looking forward to New York because he thought it would give him a chance to spend a lot of time with Philip. But although he still wanted to spend a lot of time with Philip, Philip didn’t seem to want to spend much time with him. And when they were together, there didn’t seem much to talk about.

Then there was the New York Art World. My father hated it. He hated the people and the talking and the parties and the money, and most of the work other artists were doing. I guess he hated just about everything. He had just sold another three paintings, and tomorrow a reporter was coming to see him from an art magazine to do an article on him, and he hated that too. And then, he wasn’t painting. He hadn’t painted since we came to New York.

My mother said she thought most of the problems would fall into line once we were settled in our own place. But if not, she wanted my father to remember that we weren’t married to New York and could always go back to Lincoln next summer.

They talked for a long time, but the important thing was that we were going to live in that house up here in the Bronx, and be close to my grandmother. Which made me feel pretty good.

But I still couldn’t sleep. So after they were asleep, I got up, and opened Mary Rose’s box again. I took everything out, one by one, and tried everything on that was meant to be tried on. Mary Rose had cut most of the jewels out so that she could wear them. If it was a ring, she cut out the center part so it would fit around her finger. With the necklaces, she usually pasted on extra strips of paper and attached the ends so she could slip them over her head. Sometimes she used clear tape or stamp hinges. Just about all of them had fallen off or hung there, dry and brittle. But I could slip them over my head and hold them with one hand. Some of the bracelets were like the rings. You could slip your fist through them. The pins, I guess, she just held up to herself, although some of them had dried up pieces of tape on the backs.

There was a diamond tiara that Mary Rose had pasted on a paper band that must have fit on her head. It was crushed flat by the weight of all the other cutouts that rested on top of it. When I opened it out, the paper on the sides looked like it would crumble. I slipped the tiara on my head, very carefully, and I looked at myself in the mirror. The tiara had a huge diamond in the center, and spears of diamonds that grew smaller and pointier toward the tops. All of the tops drooped now, but I squinted my eyes, and made myself blurry in the mirror, and there was Mary Rose, pale and beautiful, wearing her sparkling, pointed tiara, and looking like a queen.

Then it came apart. I thought about taping it back together again. It didn’t seem right to put today’s tape on Mary Rose’s treasures. I put it down, and went back to taking out the other things.

There were a few whole ads from magazines. There was one of a man and a woman kissing. The woman had her arm around the man’s neck. The arm had a watch on it, and the advertisement said, “A thousand tender words in one—$35.”

There was another one of a sexy, red-haired woman with a tight, low-cut dress, holding out her hand and smiling at a ring with a great big diamond. The advertisement said, “Jewelry of the future—
RHINESTONE—
clear-cut and dazzling as an iceberg in sunlight—modern, unashamedly enormous—This supercolossal ring
only
$10.

Mary Rose had written something on this ad. It was the only one where she had. She had made an arrow pointing to the woman’s head, and above it, she had written “Me.” She had written the “Me” with lots of swirls, and there was an exclamation point after it that was also fancy. The whole thing looked like this

It was beautiful. It was the only writing I had that came from Mary Rose herself. I couldn’t figure why she wrote “Me” over that red-headed woman because I knew Mary Rose didn’t look anything like
that.
Maybe it meant that she wished she had a diamond ring too, or maybe she wished she was a grownup. Probably there was something about that woman in the picture that Mary Rose knew, and I didn’t know, that made her write “Me.” Like she might have been someone who was a famous musician, or maybe a rich lady who gave lots of money for starving children.

There was no point in thinking about it. I was so happy to have her writing. It was the greatest treasure to me in Mary Rose’s box. Her own writing!

There was something else in the box that I couldn’t figure. There were about thirty of those paper rings that go around cigars. They are really paper bands that keep cigars wrapped up in clear plastic paper. When you pull off the ring, the paper comes off too. There were thirty of them in Mary Rose’s box, all of them the same. They had the name
EL
CAPITAN
stamped in the middle, and they were all red with gold borders and a picture of a gold lion holding a gold banner in the center.

My father never smoked cigars, but I had seen those paper cigar rings before. I knew you could slip them on your fingers. Mary Rose had glued the backs of them, and they were all flattened out and looked mashed.

It seemed strange that she would have kept them in the midst of all those real jewels. I mean they weren’t real either, being paper, but they were pictures of real things, and the cigar rings were only cigar rings.

My mother came up the next day, and looked at all the jewels in Mary Rose’s box. She began shaking her head. I knew she was going to start again about Mary Rose being a “poor, little thing,” and I didn’t want to hear that. So I said, “Mom, where did these cigar rings come from?”

“Ralph smoked cigars,” my mother said. “Not that often, but on special occasions. I guess he must have given her the rings. I don’t really remember.”

That evening, Uncle Stanley called. This time he had some other news to tell. Aunt Claudia was in the hospital, and there was a new addition to the family. His name was Ralph Edward, and he weighed 8 pounds 2 ounces.

“About time too,” said my grandmother. But then she began to cry, and said she was happy that it was a boy, and she was even happier that his name was Ralph.

She and my mother drove to the hospital, and I couldn’t help noticing that my grandmother walked very quickly down the stairs, and didn’t really seem to need her cane at all.

Uncle Stanley came back with them.

“I never saw a baby like this one,” said my grandmother. “He’s the image of Stanley, and has the most beautiful, little face you ever saw. All those people looking in the nursery window, you could just see they couldn’t take their eyes off him.”

Uncle Stanley laughed. “Oh, Mama, you know that’s not so.”

“Now, Stanley, it’s not because he’s mine. You know I’m not like that. I always say what’s true, and I tell you I never saw such a gorgeous baby in my entire life.”

“And when Margaret was born ... ?” Uncle Stanley said.

“Well, it was true. She had a head of curls on her, Veronica,” said my grandmother. “I wish you could have seen her. And I know newborn babies aren’t supposed to smile, but I tell you that Margaret was smiling.”

Uncle Stanley laughed some more. He was very happy. My mother got up, and hugged and kissed him, and he didn’t seem at all embarrassed.

“I’ll get a few things together, Stanley,” my mother said, “and we’ll go. Come on, Mary Rose.”

“Where are we going?”

“Oh, I forgot to tell you. Stanley’s baby-sitter can’t stay tonight or tomorrow. She’ll come back on Saturday, and I thought we’d go along and fill in. There’s plenty of food here, and both Manny and Ray are planning to be home tomorrow. Manny can cook— I know he’d enjoy staying with Grandma—right, Manny?”

“Right,” Manny said, in a low voice with a tight smile.

“And Ray too,” said my mother. “Right, Ray?”

“Oh, sure,” said Ray.

“I could stay,” I said. “I
like
to take care of Grandma.”

“That’s all right,” said my mother. “I know how much you look forward to seeing Pam, and how much she looks forward to seeing you. The boys can manage, and Daddy will be in and out too.”

“I’m so lucky,” my grandmother said, reaching out, and taking Manny’s hand. He kept smiling, but he wasn’t exactly looking at her. She turned and smiled at Ray, and reached out a hand for him too. So he came over after a minute, and took her hand, and stood sideways near her chair.

“I’m a very lucky woman,” my grandmother said. “My children are good to me, and my grandchildren can’t do enough for me.” She started crying. “I’m so lucky ... if Mary Rose could only have lived ...”

I put Mary Rose’s box in my overnight bag. Sooner or later, Pam was going to have to know, so I might as well get it over with. I just hoped she wouldn’t stay mad. I couldn’t live if she stayed mad.

Jeanette was not playing her violin when we arrived. All the girls were in the kitchen putting blue frosting on a cake.

“It’s for you to take to the hospital tomorrow for Mom,” Jeanette said.

“We’re going to put blue sugar over it,” Olivia said.

“And the baby can have a piece too,” said Margaret.

She really was a very pretty little girl, and did have a wonderful head of dark, shiny curls.

My mother picked her up, and hugged her. “And who’s going to be a great big sister, and take care of her little baby brother?”

“Me!” said Margaret, looking shy, and laying her cheek down on my mother’s shoulder.

“And me too,” said Olivia. She’s six, and not as pretty as Margaret, but everybody says she’s brilliant. She can read any book in the house, and knows all the multiplication tables. She’s very jealous of Margaret, even though Margaret doesn’t seem at all smart —just pretty. She pulled my mother’s arm, and pushed at Margaret’s feet.

So Uncle Stanley picked Margaret up, and my mother sat down, and took Olivia into her lap.

I looked over at Jeanette. After all, she’s only eight. But she was busy sprinkling blue sugar over the cake, and didn’t seem at all jealous.

“Congratulations,” I said to Pam.

“For what?”

“For having a baby brother.”

“Oh that!”

“Aren’t you happy?”

“Sure.”

“You don’t look happy,” I said as we started upstairs.

“Oh, it’s all right,” she said. She was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “So what’s so special if it is a boy? They’re all acting like they never saw a boy before in their lives.” She kicked one of the steps.

She was hurting. I loved my cousin, Pam, so much I could feel the hurt inside me too. “It’s not that he’s a boy,” I told her. “It’s just that he’s different. I mean, they have four girls, so naturally they wanted a boy. I mean, if they had four boys, they’d want a girl. I mean, it’s nothing personal.”

She nodded, and her mouth shook a little bit. Then she said, “Mary Rose, I’m so glad you came.”