Looking for Jane (24)
Nancy’s fingers fumble on the wall just inside the door until she finds the light switch and flicks it on. She strides across the rug toward her mother’s dresser. If her parents are hiding something, she has a feeling that it will be in The Drawer.
The Drawer is a family reference of sorts, her mother’s hiding place for special birthday gifts, important documents like her parents’ marriage certificate, her father’s chequebook, and her mother’s two expensive pieces of jewelry: her engagement ring, too tight to be worn now, and a pearl necklace Grandmama gave her on her fortieth birthday. Nancy looks over her shoulder again, ears straining for the sound of a car door opening, a key in the lock, her father’s deep booming voice echoing up the stairs. But there’s nothing and no one to stop her.
She half wishes there were.
Nancy licks her dry lips and pulls The Drawer open with some difficulty. It isn’t often used and the mechanism doesn’t slide smoothly. She’s only opened this drawer once—back when she was a child and at her mother’s request—to retrieve the pearls. Her parents were off to “the fanciest damn wedding we’ve ever had to attend,” as her father put it. Nancy recalls that moment now as she looks down at the navy velvet box that holds the necklace.
There’s an assortment of other items: important-looking envelopes, a few sets of lace gloves, and the purple box Nancy assumes must contain the sapphire engagement ring that, with a strange twinge in her gut, she realizes will one day be hers. She takes note of the placement of the items and tries to commit it to memory so she can return everything to its proper place once she’s finished. Then, heart banging in her throat, Nancy lifts out the jewelry boxes and gloves, and inspects the envelopes one by one, careful not to tear any of the unsealed flaps. But it’s just the documents she already assumed were in there: wills and house deeds and other boring adult paperwork. She stacks them in a neat pile on the dresser, then checks the back of The Drawer. As she pushes aside her own ivory lace christening gown, her hand brushes soft leather. Nancy wiggles her fingers into the tight space and nudges the little case forward. With a leap in her stomach, she sets it on the carpet and kneels beside it.
She stares at the box for a moment. It’s unfamiliar, a small brown leather case with a little handle, not in keeping with her mother’s delicate, feminine taste, and she wonders if it’s her father’s. Tilting it up, Nancy sees the metal dials along the mouth of the box, not unlike the combination lock on a man’s briefcase. She tries to depress the latch, but the lock won’t open.
“Shoot.”
This must be it, Nancy thinks. Her parents don’t even have a lock on their own bedroom door. Generally speaking, they don’t have anything to hide. Or at least, that’s what Nancy had thought all her life, right up until this moment.
Nancy examines the box again. There are six brass dials, each with the numbers 0 through 9. Six digits. She sits back on her heels and chews her lip. What could possibly be so secret that her parents went to the trouble to lock it up and tuck it away from her, their only child? This box has something to do with her, she knows it. But what could it be?
Her school report cards aren’t important enough to be under lock and key. Old love letters from an ex, maybe? She can’t imagine either of her parents ever exchanging romantic letters with a lover, let alone keeping them after the flame was out. Is it her birth certificate, the one her mother says got lost and needs to be replaced?
Her birth certificate.
Her birthday?
Nancy holds her breath and spins the first dial to 0. She exhales and enters the remaining digits: 4—2—5—6—1. She jams her finger against the spring lock.
It doesn’t budge.
“Seriously?” she mutters. She was sure her birthday would work. Her mother isn’t very creative. Nancy’s legs are getting pins and needles from kneeling. She tries to stand, but stumbles and throws her arm out, catching the edge of the chest of drawers for support.
“Bloody foot.”
Bracing herself against the chest with one hand, Nancy reaches down and massages her toes, wincing against the discomfort. Then she smiles to herself. She may well be her mother’s daughter; the English slang has certainly rubbed off.
There is one beat of shivering time, just one tick of the clock on the wall before the thought slides into place in her mind. Nancy throws herself back down onto the carpet next to the box. Her foot is painful, but she hardly notices.
Her breath is suspended as she spins the first four dials again, entering her birth date first, then the month, the way the English do.
2—5—0—4—6—1…
CHAPTER 8 Evelyn
SPRING 1961
“Well, then,” Sister Teresa barks, “it’s time for you to go to the hospital. Stay here and get your birth bag from underneath the bed. We will call you a taxi.”
Evelyn holds her belly as a wave of panic washes over her aching body. “A taxi? Does—does someone come with me? What do I do?”
Without answering, the Watchdog sweeps from the room, her habit whispering along the floorboards. Evelyn takes shallow breaths, squirming to get comfortable on her hard mattress. She looks at Maggie, sitting up in bed with her legs crossed, her huge belly resting in her lap like a heavy sack, arms wrapped around it. Louise and Anne peer over at her from their beds, their eyes reflecting Evelyn’s fear in the golden light of their bedside lamps.