Change Places with Me(22)

“She doesn’t have feelings.”

“Clara! That’s not my girl!”

“Read,” Clara would say, as she did every night, asking to hear the Brothers Grimm fairy tale “Little Snow-white”—that was its proper title, with the word “Little” and a hyphen between “Snow” and “white.” Of course, Clara, at eight, could read it herself, but this was something she and her dad had always done, way before he met someone and married again. When he read, Clara always held tight to the elephant that had been her mother’s favorite childhood toy, loved so hard its fur was gone. If her room ever caught fire, this was the prized possession Clara would rescue.

These were the best times, hearing the story at night, no matter what might’ve gone wrong during the day. On that particular brisk September afternoon, her dad had taken her to the zoo. But Clara found animals so alien—they couldn’t talk, so how did you know what they were thinking?—especially the nocturnal creatures at the back of the House of Primates, in an exhibit dark as night. Ugly bats hung upside down and a weird thing called a slow loris had eyes as big as saucers. A woman who fed purple grapes to shrieking monkeys told Clara what “nocturnal” meant, though Clara hadn’t asked.

“Phil, she’s got to get some sleep. She’s got school tomorrow,” her stepmother said, standing now in Clara’s doorway, arms folded, a stern expression on her face, dark-blue eyes focused like a laser on the scene before her. She wore one of those dumb kimonos she always had on at home, black and white, tied at the waist, and she had that long hair, thick as vines. What had her stepmother been doing, before trying to ruin story time for Clara? Probably reading a book so thick the title fit across the spine instead of down it, or watching an old black-and-white movie. Clara didn’t understand that. Movies were supposed to be in color. Life was in color, wasn’t it? Clara didn’t understand anything about her stepmother.

“Read,” Clara said again.

“Phil, she’s had such a long day at the zoo.”

“Clara didn’t like it,” her dad said. “Just like you.”

No, it wasn’t at all the same, Clara was sure, even if they both happened to feel the same way about something.

“I’m not a fan of zoos, it’s true,” her stepmother said, unfolding her arms. “I know they’re all ecological and environmental and animal conscious and all that. Still, I don’t like to see animals in cages. Humane cages, but cages.”

Which meant her reason wasn’t the same after all.

“Time to call it a night,” her stepmother urged him, still in the doorway, tugging on a gold necklace with a heart-shaped pendant, a gift from Clara’s dad. The stepmother wore no other jewelry except for a thin, delicate wedding band. They’d gotten married just that spring, and by a clerk at city hall. The ceremony, her dad had told her, took all of five minutes. “She likes things quiet,” her dad had said. “No big shindig for her.” Clara had never known her mom, who died so long ago, but there were pictures, including a large one in the living room, where she was laughing. Her dad said of her, “She was so much fun.” The stepmother wasn’t.

“Daddy, don’t stop reading,” Clara pleaded. “The Queen killed Snow-white after she failed three times.” Clara kept careful count. First the Queen ordered the huntsman to kill Snow-white, but he took pity on her and wouldn’t do it. Then the Queen disguised herself as an old woman selling lace, and tied Snow-white up tightly in a lace bodice, but Snow-white was with the seven dwarves by then, and they unlaced her. Then the Queen disguised herself again and created a poison comb that she put in Snow-white’s hair; again the dwarves saved her, removing the comb. Finally, again in disguise, the Queen tempted Snow-white into eating a poisoned apple. The dwarves were at a loss and pronounced her dead.

“But she’s not dead, not really,” Clara’s dad said. “She’s in a kind of trance.”

“Can she see?”

“Her eyes are closed.”

“If she opens her eyes?”

“She’s in a glass coffin. Things would look far away, blurred.”

“Like clouds?”

“Something like that.”

“Can she hear?”

“Sounds would be muffled, too.”

“Like when you’re under water? In the tub I can stick my whole head under and hold my breath.”

“She asks these questions so she doesn’t have to go to sleep,” her stepmother broke in, still in the doorway, no closer. Sometimes Clara thought there was an invisible barrier there, keeping her out. Which was good.

“She’s always been full of questions,” her dad said, sounding proud.

“Stubborn,” her stepmother said.

“Strong willed.”

“How does it end?” Clara asked, of course knowing exactly how it ended.

But it was her stepmother who said, “Snow-white’s in the glass coffin a long, long time. A prince falls in love with her on sight and takes her back to his castle, and on the bumpy ride home the piece of apple in her throat comes unstuck and she wakes up and they get married. Strange ending, though. At the wedding, the Queen is forced to put on iron slippers that have been heated by fire, and dance until she dies. Whose idea was that? Snow-white’s?”