Help for the Haunted(63)

“Plus, she’s got that dainty gold bracelet twisted tight around her wrist. Looks like somebody—one of you, I guess—has been hating on her and loving her at the same time.”

My sister said nothing, and neither did I.

“Well, unless I want to end up with fingerprints on my neck, I better get back to my tables,” Shawna told us. “Nice to meet you girls. Hope your mom feels better.”

And then we were alone in the restroom. Once more, I asked my mother if she was okay. This time, her voice sounded stronger when she told me to stop worrying, that she just felt queasy from so much driving in a single day. As she spoke, I looked to my sister, but Rose stared down at her hands.

“Is that woman gone?” my mother asked from inside the stall.

“Yes,” I called back.

“She didn’t touch Penny, did she?”

Rose was still studying her hands, so I gave my mother the answer she wanted and told her the waitress had only looked. With that, my sister walked to the sink farthest from Penny. I watched her crank the hot water and pump the soap dispenser before scrubbing away. When I asked what she was doing, she said her hands were greasy from the popcorn and chocolate at the movies this afternoon. But I knew better.

I walked to the trash can and pulled out the red yarn, which I’d slipped in my pocket before leaving the car, since I didn’t want my parents to see. Beneath the humming fluorescent lights, those strands appeared brighter, more alive than they had while driving in the dark. I moved my hand over the trash can and let go of the doll’s hair so it landed on top of the waitress’s damp paper towel. As I crossed to a sink and washed up too, I couldn’t help but stare over at Penny.

“You could do surgery with those mitts,” my sister said when I kept pumping the dispenser and worked up a good lather. “Let’s go.”

“What about Mom?”

“Alive in there?” Rose called out.

“No need to wait,” my mother said after a moment. “Go on back to the car. I’ll be there shortly. Keep Penny where she is, though.”

I worried about leaving her, but there seemed no other option but to listen. Rose and I left the bathroom then weaved among tables, spotting that waitress who looked up while pouring coffee and winked at us. We passed the register, where my sister scooped a handful of pinwheel mints out of a donation box. Outside, our father was waiting in the car, all buckled in and ready to go.

“What happened to your mother?” he asked.

“She’s inside,” I said.

“Is she okay?”

“So she says,” Rose told him.

It took a while for my mother to emerge from the doors with Penny in her arms. As I watched her get closer, I couldn’t help thinking again that she seemed not herself. When she got in, my father asked if everything was okay. Her answer was the same: motion sickness brought on by so much travel in a single day. He started the engine, and as the wheels began to turn, I told Rose, “I’m surprised you remembered those names.”

“What names?”

“The ones I gave my horses.”

“Well, I pay more attention to things than you might think, Sylvie. Sabrina’s the white one with blue eyes and a genuine horsehair tail. Esmeralda is black with rippling muscles and glowing green eyes. Am I right?”

I nodded, more surprised than before. “How do you remember that?”

“It’s all you used to talk about. I can tell you about the others if you want.”

Something told me to let the moment be. And soon Rose closed her eyes again and drifted off. Despite my mother’s insistence that she felt fine, as we drove on in the dark, it became apparent she was anything but. In the course of my childhood, I couldn’t recall another occasion when she came down with anything more than a case of sniffles. My father was the one who fell prey to the flu and bronchitis and strep, not to mention the troubles with his back. Rose and I carted home the expected stomach bugs and fevers from school. Always, my mother had been the one to deliver ginger ale and soup to our bedsides, to smear VapoRub on our chests and slip a thermometer in our mouths, so it felt strange to see her so ill.

For the remainder of the trip, the radio stayed off. Instead of preachers bellowing about how to avoid an eternity in hell, my mother’s soft, suffering moans filled the car. She pressed her cheek to the window, because the glass felt cool against her skin. Thirty or forty minutes a stretch—that’s the most we were able to drive before she asked to pull over. Each time, my father clicked on the emergency flashers and stopped on the side of the highway. In a frenzy, my mother unbuckled her seat belt and burst from the door. Cars and trucks roared past, headlights brightening and receding over her as she carried that doll—more loosely than before—into the tall grass. In the silence between passing traffic, we could hear her heaving, until growing quiet and emerging from the shadows to climb into the car once more. Somehow, my sister managed to stay asleep the entire time. But my father and I remained alert, silent except when it came to asking my mother if there was anything we could do.

“Let’s just get home.” That was her response each time. “I’m fine.”

And so, after making countless stops, we turned into our driveway just as the sun began sifting daylight into the sky. More wearily than before, my mother unbuckled her seat belt and climbed out of the car. I woke Rose, and we got out too. My father took my mother’s arm and led her to the door, where he found an envelope wedged between the knob and the frame. He squinted at the words before shoving it in his pocket.