Arcadia Falls

23


The sun is already setting when I come out of the library. The clocks were set back last weekend and I’m not used yet to the earlier dusk. I hurry along the ridge trail, not wanting to be caught in the woods in the dark, especially not on the part that goes past the clove, where one misstep could send me skittering down to the rocks below. When I reach the clearing above the clove, though, the view is so spectacular that I have to stop for a moment to watch the sun sink in the west, turning the mountains into waves of blue and indigo and the clouds above them into strips of pink and lavender, like a higher range of celestial mountains. The scene is so reminiscent of the last picture in The Changeling Girl that when I turn back east to face the campus, I half expect to find all the landmarks of that fairy tale place: the farm the peasant girl grew up on, the orchard of gnome trees, the bloodred beech that harbors changelings in its roots, and the witch’s cottage in the pine woods. And I do—it’s all there. Briar Lodge is the farm; the apple trees are the gnomes; the great copper beech, ablaze in the last rays of the sunset, looks as if its roots are drinking blood; and, peeking out between the dark forest of pines, is the chimney of the cottage where I live, Fleur-de-Lis. The witch’s cottage.
I looked at the picture in that book so often when I was little that it feels like home. Better than home, it’s the home I always dreamed of. I suppose that’s why the story exerted such a pull on my imagination. Perhaps every little girl fantasizes sometime or another that her real family is someplace else, that these strangers raising her are not her real parents and someday she will be returned to her genuine birthright—the kingdom she has lost. If I indulged in that fantasy more often than other children, perhaps it was because of the bareness of life in my grandmother’s tiny Brooklyn house with its postage stamp–size yard bound by concrete sidewalks and the daily routine hemmed in by my mother’s teaching hours and my grandmother’s economies. It wasn’t that I didn’t love my grandmother and mother; it was just that I sometimes felt as though we were refugees living in exile from our true home. And while I knew that they loved me, they sometimes seemed frightened of what I might become. Like the changeling girl, I belonged elsewhere. When I learned that the place in my favorite fairy tale was real—and that my mother had almost gone to school there—I knew I’d have to go there someday. Maybe I’d hoped that here Sally and I would find a peace together that my own mother and I had never found. Instead, Arcadia has only driven us farther apart.
As the last light from the sun leaches out of the west, a full silver moon rises above the fringe of pine trees in the east and I turn toward the cottage. I can’t think of it as home. It certainly doesn’t look like one. It still smells musty and unlived in when I open the door tonight. Since Sally moved into the dorm, the only cooking I’ve done is microwaving the frozen meals I buy at the Stop & Shop on Route 30 and heating Dymphna’s scones in the toaster oven.
Maybe if I made a real meal, I think, opening the refrigerator, the place would begin to feel like home. But there’s nothing but a bag of apples, half a loaf of bread and a wedge of cheddar I bought last week at the farmer’s market, and I’m too tired and dispirited to drive into town to do shopping. While I watch a Lean Cuisine revolve in the microwave, I promise myself that this weekend I’ll go to the farmer’s stand and buy fresh vegetables. I’ll insist Sally have dinner here once a week. I’ll lure her with her favorite foods and I’ll somehow make her understand that I’ve never regretted for an instant having her instead of finishing art school.
I’m just taking out the tray when the phone rings. I’m so startled by the old-fashioned clang of it that I drop the tray, spilling boiling hot sauce on my hand—on the same spot, in fact, that’s tender from when Chloe doused me with hot wax.
I pick up the phone and cradle it between my ear and shoulder while running cold water over my hand. I can barely hear the wispy voice on the other end over the rush of water.
“—in class. I thought you’d want to know.”
“What? Who wasn’t in class? Who is this?”
“Oh, sorry, it’s Toby Potter. Your daughter’s in my Art History class. Lovely girl. So much potential. A bit distracted, perhaps …”
“I’m sorry, Toby, is this a progress report?”
“A progress report? Oh no. Sorry, didn’t I say? Sally wasn’t in class this afternoon, and she was scheduled to do her oral report on Fragonard today. Then when I was driving into town—I live in town, you know, we must have you over someday—I saw her hitchhiking with Chloe Dawson—”
“Hitchhiking?” I ask, appalled. I instantly picture Sally climbing into a derelict van filled with homicidal maniacs.
“Yes. Luckily I picked them up before anyone else could. I gave them a very stern lecture. After all, it’s not the sixties anymore—”
“And where did you take them?” I ask, hoping against hope that he deposited them on campus.
“They asked to be let off in town—said they were going to the art supply store, but I couldn’t help noticing as I turned the corner that they were heading into our town pub, the Hitchin’ Post.”
“Shit.”
“Exactly. Anyway, I came right home to call you. I hope you don’t think I’m interfering.”
“Not at all. I appreciate it. I’m heading out the door to go get her right now.”
I hang up and grab my purse and keys, my hand still dripping wet and stinging. It stings all the way into town, but I grip the steering wheel all the harder, preferring the physical pain to the thought of Sally sitting at a bar next to some sex offender. Already some pervert could be luring her out to the back parking lot. Although I once would have trusted her intelligence and judgment, it’s clear that she’s so pissed off at me these days that she might do anything to get back at me—for what, I’m not even sure anymore. It goes beyond bringing Callum Reade to the equinox or telling the class about dropping out of art school. Last year I’d begun to wonder if she somehow blamed me for her father’s death, but lately it feels like she blames me for being alive when he isn’t.
I pull into the parking lot of the Hitchin’ Post, spewing gravel and raking the lot with my high beams. I surprise a family of raccoons raiding the Dumpster, but no Sally. I park crookedly, next to a 4 × 4 with souped-up snow tires and a bumper sticker for the NRA. Great. Sally could have fallen in with redneck survivalists by this time. When I swing open the front door with all the force of a gunslinger entering a Western saloon, I find two old guys nursing beers at the bar and a meeting of the town’s knitting circle. No sign of Sally. The bartender, a woman in her twenties with a short buzzcut and nose ring, looks up from the glass she’s polishing.
“Let me guess,” she says. “You’re looking for two underage girls wearing too much mascara. I never can figure out why these girls think painting their faces like raccoons will make them look older.”
“Were they here? Do you know where they’ve gone? Did they leave with anyone? How much did they have to drink?”
“Whoa—twenty questions! Yes, yes, no, and nothing but ginger ale and grenadine. I made them for underage right away despite their rather artfully forged IDs, gave them two Shirley Temples, and called Sheriff Reade. They left before he could get here, but they were going right next door so I imagine Callum’s caught up with them and brought them to the station.”
“Next door? You mean to Seasons?”
“’Fraid not, honey. They were heading to Fatz Tatz. I think they just stopped here for some liquid courage. The tall girl looked pretty nervous. The little one was telling her it didn’t hurt a bit.”
“The tall one’s my daughter…. you told Callum where they went?”
The bartender narrows her eyes at my use of the sheriff’s first name. “Yep. As soon as he got here. He was out on Fog Hollow Road when he got the call, though, so it took him half an hour. I don’t know as he was able to get next door before Fatz did his thing.”
“You know it’s illegal to tattoo a minor in this state—” I start, but then seeing the bartender’s eyes cool I stop. It’s not her fault that my daughter is out of control. “Thank you for calling the police. And for serving them nonalcoholic drinks. Did they at least pay?”
“Yep. The tall one even remembered to give me a tip,” she says, smiling. “You must’ve raised her right.”
Great, I think, leaving the bar and heading down the street. So Sally will no doubt remember to also tip the tattooist after he gives her hepatitis B. I pass Fatz Tatz but it’s closed now, so I go on to the police station. When I open the door, the scene is as solemn as I feared. Sally is huddled on a bench along the wall, her knees drawn up and tucked under an oversized sweatshirt. She looks up and I see that her face is swollen and tearstained.
“Finally!” she cries, jumping to her feet. “I thought I was going to have to spend the night in jail. Where were you?”
“Where was I?” I begin, my voice climbing into the registers of disbelief and outrage as quickly as if a switch had been turned on. “I was looking for you, young lady—” I stop myself because I’ve just heard my mother’s voice coming out of my mouth. I can feel, too, the force of someone’s gaze. I turn and find Callum Reade leaning in the doorway to what I presume is his office, smiling at me. No doubt because I sound like every hysterical mother come to collect her reprobate offspring.
“I would have appreciated a call to let me know you had my daughter,” I say.
The smile vanishes from his face. “I left a message and called the school. Shelley Drake just left with Chloe Dawson, but I presumed you’d want to come and take your daughter home yourself.”
“Oh,” I say, realizing that he’s done exactly the right thing—giving me a chance to talk to Sally alone. “Are there … will there be …”
“No charges,” he says, and then adds, lowering his voice an octave, “this time. Although, as I have explained to Sally, using a false I.D. is a class A misdemeanor. And we’ve had a long talk on the evils of Demon Rum and the risks of hepatitis B infection.”
I look at Sally and she shudders. “He showed me pictures of drunk-driving accidents. Honest, I didn’t even want a drink. I just wanted to get out of the fracking nineteenth century and into the modern world for five minutes.”
“Next time have your mom take you to the mall in Kingston,” Callum says, and then to me, “Could I have a word with you, Ms. Rosenthal?”
I nod and turn back to Sally. She’s pulled the hood up on her sweatshirt and sunk deeper into its voluminous folds. I notice that it has NYPD written in faded, peeling letters on it and realize that it must belong to Callum. I squeeze Sally’s shoulder and tell her I’ll be right back.
Callum is in his office, leaning against the front of his desk. He motions for me to close the door and then uses his foot to push a chair in my direction. I ignore it and remain standing. “I’m grateful that you found Sally and that you’re not pressing charges—”
He waves my thanks away. “She’s a good enough kid,” he says, “just pissed at the world for taking her dad away. I don’t blame her. The one I’m really worried about is Chloe. When I got to Fatz Tatz, she was telling Fatz how she could make anyone do whatever she wanted with black magic. She wanted Fatz to give her a tattoo of a figure falling off a cliff because she’d made a girl jump off a cliff just by picturing it in her head.”
“She thinks she made Isabel jump off the ridge?”
Callum nods and runs his hand through his hair, now looking very tired. “I’ve never been one of those locals who bad-mouth the school. Live and let live is my motto. But something weird is going on there this year. When that girl threw herself at me on the ridge, I thought she was going to take us both over the edge. It wasn’t just that she was angry, it was that she was crazy-angry. I felt like she wanted to kill us both. If I were you, I’d keep my kid away from Chloe and her little circle.”
Sally sulks all the way back home. When I glance over at her, I can’t even see her face because she’s pulled the hood of her borrowed sweatshirt down so low it shadows her face. As we pass the rusty old sign advertising the long-gone White Witch speakeasy, I recall the first morning we drove here. I remember the fleeting enthusiasm she’d shown when she recognized her old favorite fairy tale in the landscape and the short-lived hope I had that coming here would somehow heal us. I wish now that I had a story to capture her attention. And then, as I turn up the sycamore drive, I realize I do.
“It’s true that I dropped out of art school when I got pregnant with you,” I say. “I thought it was what I was supposed to do. What it took to be a good parent.”
She doesn’t say anything, but at least she’s not yelling at me, so I go on.
“I thought I’d go back when you were older—and I could have. Your dad would have been happy to pay the tuition and get me the childcare I would have needed. He used to pick up catalogs from Pratt and Parsons and the School of Visual Arts and leave them around the house.”
“Why didn’t you go, then?” a small voice comes from the depth of the hooded sweatshirt.
“I think I was afraid that I wouldn’t be any good—that too much time had passed and I had lost my edge—”
“You mean because being a mother ruined you?”
Although I’m tempted to lie, I don’t. “Yes. Being a mother does change you. Before I had you I would lose myself drawing and painting, the way you do now. Hours would fly by—”
“Like minutes,” Sally finishes for me.
“Exactly,” I say. “I was afraid to lose myself like that when you were little. What if I wasn’t there when you needed me? Then later, I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to do it anymore. Your dad still encouraged me to go back to school, so I did, when you were older, but to study literature and fairy tales. But I never regretted having you for an instant.”
“And what about Dad? Did he give up his big dreams because of me?”
I sigh. I’d hoped to avoid this part. “He quit Pratt and went to work at Morgan Stanley where Grandpa Max worked. He wanted to make sure there was enough money.”
“But Grandpa Max and Nana Sylvia were pretty well off. Wouldn’t they have helped him?”
I shake my head. “They were of that generation who lived through the Depression—like my grandmother. Grandma Miriam saved everything. She even washed and reused wax paper! So even though Grandpa Max and Nana Sylvia had money, they were always afraid that they could lose it all. They wanted your father to work in business. When he went to art school instead, they cut off his allowance.”
“That’s awful! You wouldn’t do that to me, would you?”
“I don’t see why you shouldn’t be able to make a living in the arts. I want you to do something you really love. But don’t blame Grandpa Max and Nana Sylvia for doing what they thought was best for your father, and for you when you came along. When we knew we were having you, Grandpa Max offered to help us get the house in Great Neck if your dad would go to work with him at Morgan Stanley.”
“So he gave up art school because of me, too?”
“He just wanted to be the best father he could be. And I know he never regretted it either.”
I say the last part firmly, telling myself that it’s not technically a lie. Jude never did regret his choice to give up art school for Sally. He thought he’d done the right thing. “And,” he’d say whenever the subject came up, “there’ll be plenty of time for me to take up painting again when I retire.” So it’s not a lie. He just didn’t know that he was wrong about how much time he had.
We’ve arrived at the cottage. Luckily, I left the lights on, so it doesn’t look too desolate. It looks almost cheerful. I’ll make grilled cheese sandwiches and a pot of tea. We’ll dig through the boxes of DVDs and watch an old movie. One of Sally’s favorites: Casablanca or Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, which always makes her cry when Jimmy Stewart briefly gives up hope in the American Dream.
I’m about to turn to Sally to ask if she’d like to stay when I see a black silhouette appear at the lit living room window. The reason the cottage doesn’t look desolate is because it’s not empty. There’s someone in the house.