With Love from London(46)

“It was sweet of him, yes. I hope you liked The Time Traveler’s Wife? It’s a favorite of mine. The way the author weaves the past and present is—”

“Wait,” she says, interrupting me with a little laugh. “You actually think I’ve already read it? With a schedule like mine?”

“Oh, I…I just thought that—”

“Eric thinks I read it, and that’s all that matters. But, just between us girls, he has no idea that I saw the movie years ago.”

“Fiona, sorry to interrupt,” the male photographer interjects. “We need to set up a bit farther down. The light isn’t quite right here.”

“We won’t keep you,” I say quickly. I wave politely, but our interaction has left me conflicted. Who would lie to their significant other about anything, much less whether they’ve read a book or not?

“She’s a piece of work,” Liza says when we’re a good distance away.

I shrug. “I’ll admit, she’s not my favorite.”

“What, you don’t know D Magazine? The most important publication of the modern era!”

I laugh as we make our way to the other side of the park. “Enough of that. Let’s go find Matilda!”

The fountain isn’t far, just around the bend, and when I see the iconic statue, I instantly understand my mother’s infatuation with it.

“She’s…beautiful,” I say, eyeing the woman made of bronze. Her dress is delicate and feminine, and her face is so lifelike—even if it’s cast in metal and not flesh. She holds her hand to her forehead, perhaps to block the sun, but I can’t help but wonder if she’s searching for something—or someone—just like me.

Liza senses my curiosity and follows the trajectory of the statue’s eyes, which seem to gaze out at a patch of grass ahead.

Ask Matilda, and she’ll offer you her velvet green blanket.

I follow Liza and spread the blanket out on the grass, smiling at the thought of my mother sitting on this very same patch of grass, looking out at the park toward Matilda—each of them with their secrets, and me with mine.

It was too soon for daffodils to bloom, so I looked around for other clues.

…but do keep an eye out for the foxes wearing gloves: They’ll show you the way to the little house. I’ll be waiting…

I hand Liza a croissant and help myself to one, too. “I don’t see a little house, or have any idea what foxgloves look like.”

“They’re purple,” she says. “But you won’t find them this time of year.”

“Oh,” I say, crestfallen.

“Wait,” she says, leaping to her feet and walking ahead. I follow close behind, watching as she kneels beside a thyme-carpeted garden bed and lifts up a pale brown twig. “Look, a foxglove seed pod.”

We found the foxgloves, but where’s the little house? I survey the soil around the garden beds, but there are only pine cones and shriveled leaves.

“Have you lost something, miss?”

I look up to see an older man in coveralls holding a rake, presumably a park gardener.

“No,” I say, quickly standing up and walking closer. “But I am trying to find something. Before my mother died, she left a sort of scavenger hunt for me, with one clue leading to the next. The most recent one led me here, to Matilda, and the flowers.” I pull the note card from my pocket, and when I show it to him, his eyes get big.

“Why, you must be her daughter,” he says, astonished.

“Eloise’s daughter, yes.”

His smile is warm. “She said you’d be coming. Your mother was a regular here. She loved this corner of the park.” He points to the blanket on the lawn where Liza is. “She’d sit there for hours, just like that, reading.” He extends his hand. “I’m Louis.”

“Valentina,” I say with a smile, before turning back to my mother’s note. “She wrote something about a ‘little house,’ see?” I point to the line. “Do you have any idea what she might have meant?”

“Ah yes,” he says. “Let me show you.”

I follow as he walks ahead, our collective footsteps producing a symphony of gravel crunching beneath our feet. He stops in front of an old oak tree, its trunk thick and knotted.

“Here we are,” he says. “The Little House.”

I shake my head, confused. “But what is it?”

“If your mum were here, I suspect she’d tell you to use your imagination,” he says with a wink.

And she would. I think back to my childhood, when we’d collected colorful rocks together on the beach in Santa Monica. I’d ask her where each one came from, and she’d encourage me to make up a story for every one of them, and together, we did. “This is Sam, the gray stone. He’s a very serious rock, who doesn’t like it when people pick him up. And this is Ethel, the beige rock. She has four children, and nine baby grand-rocks.” I can almost hear the waves crashing onto the shore as the wind rustles the branches of the oak tree, and it makes my heart ache.

I banished her voice from my heart for so long, but now I can hear it: “Use your imagination.”

Steadying myself, I survey the base of the trunk, where the tree’s roots bulge out of the soil, like octopus’s appendages. My childhood voice echoes in the breeze: “Mummy, do trees have eight roots like octopuses have eight arms?” I place my hand on the trunk, imagining a well-worn face in the jagged edges of its bark, before reaching higher up, where I press my finger against a large, rounded knot just above my head. To my surprise, it releases, as if held in place by a hinge.