I wake with a start. As the fog of sleep recedes, strains of music filter through the darkness, dancing into my room. It has been years, many, many years, since the notes of that song lifted into the air, and I begin to weep at the memory come to keep me company. I lie back against my pillows and let the sounds wash over me.
We were on the beach, the black volcanic sand warm beneath our bare feet. The Lake was calm and chatted quietly as it breathed between the rocks. Emily was there, but it could have been just the two of us; he with his violin and me braiding the purple beach-pea flowers into a garland for my hair. He was standing on the point, his brown hair tousled by the wind, his canvas pants rolled to the knees, fiddling like an ancient Greek siren, drawing not sailors but the young lightkeeper’s daughter under his spell. It was a tune I hadn’t heard before. Sweet, airy. The song was captured by the trees, filtered by the sand, and shared with the waves, but I didn’t mind. My pulse quickened with every phrase.
“Do you like it?” He flopped down on the sand beside me, resting the instrument on his knee, grinning.
I looked at Emily. She was lying on the rocky outcrop, staring into a pool of water that had collected in a crevice. White pearlwort nodded in the breeze, clinging to the exposed, lichen-stained surface with a tenacity that never ceased to amaze me. I knew the pool would be teeming with tiny insects; mosquito larvae, water beetles, pond skaters. Emily was completely absorbed in her world, surrounded by the living creatures that sustained her.
I looked back, squinting against the late-afternoon sun into his tanned face. His bright blue eyes were twinkling, mischievous. “Yes,” I answer. “What is it? I haven’t heard it before.”
“It’s new. I just wrote it.” He took his eyes away from mine; cast his gaze out over the water. “I call it ‘Lizzy’s Song.’”
So long ago. So very long ago. I allow the tears their freedom; feel them emerge hot to escape down my cheeks, arriving as cool puddles that fade into my pillow. What nonsense, this, after all these years. But the music continues. It has not dulled with the world of dreams, but remains sharp and persistent. I climb out of bed and cross the room to my window, sliding it open. The music comes from the garden. The melody is unmistakable. “Lizzy’s Song”—my song—played with the same intonations, the same catches in each phrase, the same resonant tone. There is only one person who can play it.
My bare feet make little noise on the cool tile floor as I follow the handrail along the hallway to the entrance that leads to the courtyard. I am drawn by the music. I push the door open and step out onto the flagstone walkway, stumbling sightless into Marty’s garden.
20
Morgan
I’m standing on the picnic table. It’s a stage. My hair is floating loose, and the wind pulls at it just like it does the few leaves that remain clinging to the trees. My god, it’s fucking cold out here. I can see my breath hanging in the air in front of me, and my fingers are stiff on the bow. I know this, but I don’t feel it because all I can do is play. When I’m playing, I don’t feel anything except the song. The same song, over and over and over. It was his favorite.
I don’t remember it being foggy when Derrick drove away, but it’s foggy now. Everything is blurry. My face is hot and wet, my forehead damp. Through the mist, I can see a ghost in the garden, walking toward me. I’m being haunted. The ghost is white on pale, translucent. I consider whether or not I should be frightened of the ghost. I pause, my bow hovering above the strings. Perhaps it’s death, coming to visit me. Death with white hair. Death dressed in a nightgown. Death walking in bare feet. Death stumbles.
Death is blind.
I start to laugh and collapse onto the table. I’m such a fool. Such a fucking fool. “Oh my god, Miss Livingstone. You scared the shit out of me!”
The vision stops and speaks. “Morgan?”
I jump off the table and don’t quite land like I planned—my feet are unsteady—but even though the ground beneath me moves, I’m able to stand up. I spread my arms open wide, my fiddle in one hand and bow in the other, and start to laugh. “Miss Livingstone, I thought you were a fucking ghost!” I can’t stop laughing. I’m laughing so hard I catch my breath, and then I realize I’m not laughing, I’m crying. I can’t stand up anymore; the ground reaches up for me, and I embrace it, the tears streaming down my face. “I thought you were a ghost . . .”
21
Elizabeth
I reach out, my hands searching for the form of the girl who lies crumpled on the sidewalk at my feet, weeping. I can smell the whiskey, strong and pungent. I can hear the commotion behind me; the faint pinging of the alarm, the scatter of feet, the shouts between members of the staff. The door opening would have set that all in motion, but I pay it no heed. My hands find the fiddle first, and I linger, briefly, so very briefly, before reaching the face of the girl. I wipe the tears away, sweeping the loose hair off her face and tucking it behind her ears. I try to hold her as she sobs, cradling her head in my lap, whispering, “I thought you were a ghost, too.”
*
Marty’s footsteps make their way down the hall and stop at my door, his round frame blocking the small amount of faded light that suggests the entrance to the open door of my room. I am sitting in Pa’s chair, the afghan wrapped around my legs and a thick woolen cardigan draped over my shoulders. Dawn is still a few hours away; they must have called Marty in. He will know by now that he is listed as my next of kin. He knows more about me and my life than anyone. I suppose they didn’t know what to do with me. I insisted they let the girl stay. It is my room, after all. In spite of the safeguards and administrative structure supporting this place, I am a tenant, not an inmate. I had to remind them of this. I asked them to put the violin in Marty’s office, along with the bottle of whiskey. She cried herself out—something, I suspect, she has not allowed herself to do for quite some time—before falling into my bed. I can tell by the rhythm of her breathing that she is asleep.
“She can’t stay here, Elizabeth.”
“She can and she will.”
“Her family—”
“Has been informed.”
“What happened?”
I shrug. “She was drunk. She was babbling on about this and that, but the gist of it is, she got dumped.” I don’t bother to mention the part about the drugs and the cops and that “goddamn fucking prick” who always disappeared when there was any sign of trouble, leaving her literally holding the bag. “Not the first time a young person drank too much after getting dumped.”
Marty comes all the way into the room and pulls out one of the chairs from the table. By the way the air moves past me and from the sounds of feet on the carpet, he has turned it around and is straddling it, leaning over the back as he often does. He has something in his hands. Papers.
“No. I got that. I meant you.”
I shift, pulling the cardigan closer around my shoulders. The staff has not spared him any details of the night. “I heard her.”