“For a world traveler, you complain a lot,” Meredith said, leading the way up the dock.
“Remember when she was little?” Mom said to Meredith. “If her socks were wrinkled inside her shoes, she’d just sit down and scream. And if I put too much ketchup on her eggs—or not enough—out would come the lip. ”
“That is so not true,” Nina said. “I was the good daughter. You’re thinking of Meredith. Remember that fit she threw when you wouldn’t let her go to Karie Dovre’s slumber party?”
“It was nothing compared to the way you made us all pay when Mom didn’t wave good-bye to you before that soft ball tournament,” Meredith said.
Nina stopped in the middle of the dock and looked at Mom. “It was the train,” she said. “You couldn’t put me on a train and watch it go, could you?”
“I tried to be strong enough,” Mom said quietly. “I just couldn’t watch . . . that. I knew it hurt you, too. I’m sorry. ”
Meredith knew that there would be dozens of moments like this between them. Now that they’d begun the reparation process, memories would have to be constantly reinterpreted. Like the day she’d dug up Mom’s precious winter garden. It was as if she’d pulled up headstones and thrown them aside. No wonder Mom had gone a little crazy. And no wonder winters had always been difficult.
And the play. Meredith saw it all through the prism of her new understanding. Of course Mom had stopped them from going forward. She and Jeff had been blithely acting out Mom’s love story. . . . The pain of that must have been awful.
“No more apologies,” Meredith said. “Let’s just say it now—once—we’re sorry for all the times we hurt each other because we didn’t understand. Then we’ll let it go. Okay?” She looked at her mom, who nodded, and then at Nina, who nodded, too.
They walked into Sitka and found rooms at a small bed-and-breakfast at the edge of town. From their decks, they could look out over the placid bay, to the green humps of the nearby islands, and all the way to the snowy peak of Mount Edgecumbe. While Nina took a shower, Meredith sat out on the deck, with her feet up on the railing. A lone eagle circled effortlessly above the water, its dark wingspan a sliver coiling around and around above the midnight-blue water.
Meredith closed her eyes and leaned back in her chair. As had been true all day, her mind was a jumble of thoughts and memories and realizations. She was reassessing her childhood, taking the pieces apart, reexamining them in light of her new understanding of her mother. Strangely, the strength she now saw in her mother was becoming a part of Meredith, too. Jeff’s comment, You’re like her, you know, took on a new significance, gave Meredith a new confidence. If there was one thing she’d learned in all of this, it was that life—and love—can be gone any second. When you had it, you needed to hang on with all your strength and savor every second.
The door behind her slid open and clicked shut. She thought at first it was Nina, here to tell her the bathroom was free, but then she smelled the sweet rose scent of Mom’s shampoo.
“Hey,” Meredith said, smiling. “I thought you’d gone to bed. ”
“I cannot sleep. ”
“Maybe it’s the color of the night. ”
“I cannot sleep with the tapes in my room,” Mom said, sitting down in the chair beside Meredith.
“You can put them in our room. ”
Mom coiled her hands together nervously. “I need to give them away tonight. ”
“Tonight? It’s nine-fift een, Mom. ”
“Da. I asked downstairs. This address is only three blocks away. ”
Meredith turned in her chair. “You mean this. What’s wrong?”
“Honestly? I do not know. I am being silly and old. I know this. But I want to be done with this task. ”
“I’ll call him. ”
“There is no listing. I called information from my room. We are going to have to just show up. Tonight is best. Tomorrow maybe he will be at work and we’ll have to wait. ”
“With the tapes. ”
Mom looked at her. “With the tapes,” she said quietly, and Meredith saw the vulnerability Mom was trying to hide. And fear; she saw that, too. After all that Mom had been through, somehow holding on to the physical evidence of her life was the thing that had finally scared her.
“Okay,” Meredith said. “I’ll get Nina. We’ll all go. ” She got up from her chair and started to go back into the room. As she passed Mom, she paused just long enough to put a hand on her mother’s shoulder. Through the cable-knit wool of the hand-knit sweater, she felt the angular sharpness of bone.
She couldn’t walk past her mother lately without touching her. After so many barren, distant years, that was a miracle in itself. She opened the sliding glass door and went into the small room. Inside, there was a pair of twin beds, both dressed in red and green plaid, with moose-shaped black pillows. On the walls were black and white prints of Sitka’s Tlingit past. Nina’s bed was unmade already and piled with clothes and camera gear.
Meredith knocked on the bathroom door, got no answer, and went in.
Nina was drying her hair and singing Madonna’s “Crazy for You” at the top of her lungs. With her short black hair and perfect skin, she looked about twenty years old.