Tide King (35 page)

“You'll get into a college,” he answered. “There's no need to cry about that.” The voice, sweet, like a child's but rich, honeyed, filled the car, and her father snapped off the radio. Heidi wondered whether her father waited to hear ‘Lil Cindy on the radio, only to be overwhelmed when he finally did. He had told her many years ago who her real mother was, and she had allowed it to be true, in small increments, like ipecac. That way, it had not hurt. It had not even mattered that she had come from the womb of that tiny dead singer, that the tiny dead singer who rejected her own child, her father, to be loved by strangers. At least, Heidi told herself that. In small doses, she had looked at articles about her mother on microfiche at the public library, mostly record reviews and concert listings. She had listened to her records with headphones in the media section, pouring over the pictures on the albums, trying to find something that she shared with the tiny dead singer. She felt she saw something in the eyes, the nose, not of Cindy, but Dwayne Johnson, the guitar player. It had occurred to her then, the summer of her fifteenth year, who her real father was.

“I wish I'd had the chance to go to college, but there was the war.” Her father coughed and spat phlegm out the window. “And I got a real education, then.”

She felt the burn of the salt in the corner of her eyes as her father began to talk about the war. He talked about it so much, she actually knew scant little; her worst grade in history, ever, was her score on the tenth-grade unit test for World War II. And yet, if he suddenly were to die, she would know nothing about him, the definitive experience of his being. She promised herself she would listen one day, although, she decided, this was not the one.

There were other things to worry about. Like the racing green Volkswagen that had been following them from school. Ms. Webster's 1966 Squareback, the coolest car, according to the boys, at school. It wasn't for its engine, which was loud and slow, or its chassis, which was essentially a VW Beetle, but because it was in almost factory condition, the result of Ms. Webster's father storing it in the garage and presenting it to her as a college graduation present. She knew these things because she remembered everything Oliver Truitt, her crush since seventh grade and Shauna Beck's boyfriend, had ever said, in reverse proportion to everything her father had ever said.

She wondered whether Ms. Webster wanted to find out where she lived, whether she would park the car at night up the road from their house and watch in the darkness, wondering whether Heidi was okay. Whether she would let herself be rescued by Ms. Webster. To what length Ms. Webster would go to show her concern, her devotion. Whether she would plead with Heidi's father to surrender her to her care so that Heidi's life would reach its correct trajectory, radiate correctly, and explode like a perfect snowball in a 4th of July sky.

Heidi's stomach knotted as they lumbered in the gravel driveway, spinning stones that she hoped would miss the Squareback's pristine paint job. She watched the Squareback park on the side of the road, away from the gravel, and Ms. Webster emerge.

“My backpack.” She said to her father as Ms. Webster held up the dark blue Jansport backpack. “I left it at school.”

She hurried stupidly over to Ms. Webster, hoping her eyes would not telegraph all of her fantasies.

“Thanks,” she said as Ms. Webster held it out to her. “This is…where I live.”

“What a beautiful old farmhouse.” Ms. Webster looked up and apparently did not see the broken shingles, the chipped paint and soggy wood window frames, the sagging of one side of the porch. The weeds, the junk her father had dragged for the past twenty years from the dump to the front yard. “It reminds me of my family's old place.”

“Did you…want to come in? For tea?” Heidi was stunned that her lips moved and sound came out. A few packets of Lipton, probably moldly, awaited in the cupboard.

“Oh, I can't today. I've got to run. But I'm taking a raincheck.” Ms. Webster backed toward the Volkswagen, her arms wrapped around herself, gave Heidi's father a little wave with the flick upward of her right palm. “See you tomorrow, Heidi.”

“Bye, Ms. Webster.” She was not leaving forever—Heidi would see her the next day. And yet, as the Squareback spun around tightly on the road and zoomed away, that's exactly what it felt like.

“She'll be home at 4:30.” They sat in the study. Palmer had the handsome carriage of a doctor—clean shaven, a tanned, lined face and wavy hair layered with silver and dark locks. “But shall we get started?”

That afternoon, Johnson had taken off work. Kate had brought some clothes she'd picked up for him at Pierre Cardin, which he changed into at the apartment. He absently petted the soft corduroy of his fitted camel-colored blazer. She had also bought him two pairs of smoky gray wool slacks, slightly flared as was the fashion, and a mulberry-colored V-neck sweater, which he wore along with a crisp white oxford shirt. He slid the buttery soles of his new leather loafers on the Persian rug, feeling like a child at church as Kate lit a cigarette in the leather-backed chair opposite him.

Papillary serous cystadenocarcinoma. A form of ovarian cancer, she had explained to him over dinner that night. A late-stage diagnosis from a routine checkup. She was dying as soon as she knew. It seemed so strange that she could be so composed, a black-stocking leg dangling over a knee, her hair tucked neatly into a bun, as she inhaled and exhaled through her nostrils, a half smile, reassuring, for him. The faintest frailty had begun to show, like ivy in a crack—strands of grey hair, a fold of fabric by her waist that had been filled with flesh previously. She worked four days a week at the museum, the other reserved for doctor's appointments, treatment. How many months would the vacuum inside her continue to grow, suck in her cheeks, the fat from the bone, the moisture from her eyes?

“Do you think there is more of this herb, in your friend's family?” Dr. Palmer sat at his desk, palms spread on the blotter, the placid expression of a poker player.

“It's possible—I don't know. I'm going to visit him.” Johnson looked at Kate. “If that's all right.”

“Of course.” She touched the top of his hand, withdrew. He thought he felt the tremor of her fingers, but perhaps it was the medication, the barbiturates he'd seen in the plastic amber tumbler in her purse. “I'll do whatever I can to help.”

There was a knock at the study door. The cook brought tea on a silver service. She was followed by a young, dark-haired girl in plaid schoolgirl jumper, white knee socks, and patent leather Mary Janes. She did not carry herself with the slinking shyness of a grade-schooler; she strode to the left side of Palmer's desk, piercing him with her dark eyes before gazing at them like they were curiosities in a shop window.

“My new parents?” She clasped her hands at her waist as the cook set out the tea. Johnson concentrated on the steaming liquid filling the china rather than look back at her, eyes dull blades.

“No.” Dr. Palmer stood up. “This is Kate Strauss and her friend, Calvin Johnson. Calvin Johnson has a lot in common with you, I think you'll find.”

“How old are you?” She walked to him, grabbed his palm and ran her fingers over its smoothness.

“I'm 53.” He leaned forward as she looked in his eyes, touched his chin with clinical dispassion.

“You are baby. According to Palmer, I am 169 years.” She stepped back, hands on her hips, rocking with pride. “I come here in 1964. I am in the last grade of your schooling here, and then what do I do? I am nine-year old girl in body, not mind.”

“Ela's been asked to stay on full-time at my institute after high school, for observation, but she'd like to go home.” Palmer leaned back in his chair, playing with a pen. “My wife, frankly, thinks this is a good idea. Of course, I'm reluctant to let Ela return to Poland unless…”

“You have another subject,” Kate answered. She looked at Johnson. “Of course, it's preposterous. Calvin can't be a lab rat.”

“I'll do it.” He took her hand. If Polensky could not cure him, perhaps he could cure Kate.

“He'll think about it,” Kate said, blowing on her tea.

“The herb you get from Poland, Dr. Palmer say,” Ela spoke to Calvin. “Where from Poland?”

“I don't know. A fellow gave it to me during the war. I don't know where he got it from. Named Polensky. From Baltimore.”

Her eyes widened. She nodded to Palmer. She plopped on an overstuffed chair by the fireplace with a Chips Ahoy! and her tea and attacked them hungrily.

The room was not quite what he imagined for a girl—green walls onto which were painted murals of trees and forest creatures, glowing eyes and sharp claws grasping tree limbs. A thick brown shag carpet covered the floor. There were no toys, no dolls, but of course, she was not a girl. It was easy to forget until she looked at you, until she spoke. Ela sat on the canopy bed munching on her final Chips Ahoy! Her shoes, no bigger than his hands, rested against each other on the floor. She had explained to him about the lightning, the herb—burnette saxifrage—Stanley's mother Safine, they understood now, taking it to America. Johnson filled in the rest. Stanley to Johnson. It all seemed so random, so unremarkable in the cosmic scheme of things. They had not saved lives, heralded a new age. They couldn't even hurt themselves. The origin of the herb's magic didn't bring them closer to God, any god, but it did not push them closer to hell. They remained suspended, the frame in which the gyroscope spun wildly before them.

“What's wrong with us?” He sat on a desk chair made for a grade-school girl, his knees almost grazing his ears. “Is Palmer helping you?'

“He knows nothing.” Ela shook her head derisively. “If he cannot put numbers on a sheet and make sense, it is not real. And if he cannot make money from it, it is not important. The herb with your Stanley—it is what is left of the only herb. The bewitched herb, the one my mother gave me so long ago. If you could get it to me, perhaps I can figure it out yet.”

“You don't want Palmer involved?” He scratched his ankle. He thought of Kate, the years he was robbed of her, the years he would be robbed of yet. “Can we test it on others?”

“Too dangerous.” She shook her head. “It is not clear how we upset the order of the world, but we do, and more people will upset the world more.”

“I can't watch her die.” He pleaded with her, as if she held the key to Kate's fate. But she didn't; Stanley did.

“This is only the beginning for you.” Ela stared at him. Her eyes softened, a glimmer of moisture on her rims, before they returned to that vacant place. “You wait until your first hundred years.”

“What are you going to do with the herb?”

“Take it back to Poland.” She pointed at him. “You get the herb. You take me to Poland. We will go back to Reszel, and I will have what my mother had to make tinctures. No one will bother us.”

He did not mention to her that the little village she had remembered from her youth did not even exist, possibly, especially after the Nazis decimated most of Poland. But he had no other plan. If they found the herb, it should go to the person who knew the most about it, he thought.

“How will we get to Poland?”

“The Palmers do not want me here anymore. Mrs. Palmer is scared, think I will put spell on her. They do not understand what I want. I don't want to make miracle drug for Americans. I want to die. I miss my mother. I miss Ferki.”

“All right, then.” He slapped his hands together, stood up gingerly from his semi-squat. The chair had not broken, and he smiled. A chair made for him. “I'll see if I can find old Stanley and the herb. You get us some plane tickets to Poland. Get us three now, okay? I think there might be one more.”

“There is one more of us?” Ela looked at him incredulously. “How do you know?”

“Stanley might have taken it, you know,” he said. But that was not what he was thinking. He was thinking of Kate, immortal, warm-fleshed, her hand in his as they ordered sirloin tips from the stewardess. “Just try to get three in case.”