“My mother never told me about it,” he said. “It was a regular round-the-world tour they did, though, I think. My mom had a lot of pictures from that trip. Other stuff too—ticket stubs, hotel receipts, brochures.”
“Did she?”
“Yeah. She had a scrapbook she used to show me when I was a kid. I don’t know what happened to it, but I always thought it was so cool—seeing pictures of my mom and yours in England, Italy, Morocco, and hearing her stories. It felt like this magical time to me, a time before I existed when my mom was traveling the world. She looked so happy in all those pictures. And she got happy when she talked about the trip, about Mavis. But there was a certain sadness to it too, you know? Wistful is the right word, I guess.”
“They were very close,” I said, waiting to see if he would say anything more, but he remained silent. “And I think… I think that trip was kind of the last hurrah for them, you know? Your mom moved to California not long after they got back. They both got married, got caught up in their own lives. They saw each other and talked on the phone a lot, but they were living on opposite sides of the country, worlds apart.”
He made a little murmur of agreement. The traffic noises had lessened. Had he gotten off the highway? “I remember visiting you guys sometimes in the summer,” he said. “My mom and your parents would stay up half the night drinking and playing cards, and we’d sneak out to spy on them and watch movies we weren’t supposed to. Remember when we camped out in the tent in your backyard?”
I laughed. “You and Ben nearly set it on fire with those bottle rockets.”
“Your dad was so mad!”
“But our moms were laughing, remember?” I asked.
“They were always happy when they were together,” he said.
“They were.”
“I’m sorry as hell to hear about Mavis,” he said again.
“Thanks. I’m sorry about your mom too. And sorry to hear that things were difficult for you growing up. I had no idea. I always thought your mom was the greatest.”
“She could be.” Carter was quiet for a moment. “When she wasn’t telling me what a piece of shit I was, or carving designs on me with a kitchen knife.”
My breath got stuck in my chest. “Designs?” I croaked the word out.
“Sorry. Forget it. I shouldn’t have brought it up. She was a piece of work, my mother. Complicated isn’t the half of it.”
“Please,” I said. “Tell me. What kinds of designs?”
“Stupid Etch A Sketch kind of shit. Shapes. Patterns.”
“Circles?” I asked. “Spirals?”
“Some. Hey. Why do you ask?”
“How about a square with an X in it and dots in the triangles made by the X?”
I heard a wheezing intake of breath. “How…” he stammered. “How did you know that?”
“I—” My voice faltered. “It was just a lucky guess. Look, it’s been great talking to you, Carter. I’m sorry, I’ve really gotta go.”
I hung up before he could ask me any more questions that I didn’t know how to begin to answer.
THIRTY-THREE
THE SCARS ON MYback tingled as I sat in my seat at the opera house, shifting in an effort to get comfortable. I thought of the scars on my brother’s back. My mother had marked us both. And Bobbi had marked her son too. I tried to make sense of it. Did it mean we belonged to the demon? I wriggled again, crossed my legs, then uncrossed them.
Mark squeezed my hand. He leaned in and whispered, “You okay?”
“Fine. Excited to see our little mouse.”
The vast hall felt too small, too crowded. All around us were the parents and families of other young dancers, and so many other people I knew from the community: quilters, artists, shopkeepers, the children’s librarian, the man who owned the taco truck, the town clerk who collected our property tax checks four times a year. They’d all packed into the old opera house to seeThe Nutcracker.
Mark sat beside me and Izzy beside him. She’d brought her camera and was waiting to try to catch some good shots of her sister. She’d sneaked backstage before the show to get some candids of everyone in their costumes, including a great one of Olivia posing with all the other level one mice.
At last the curtain opened. There were Clara and her family, greeting party guests. The adults and children danced, Drosselmeyer arrived with his gifts, gave Clara the nutcracker. Then the strange nightmare scene where everything changed: Clara fell asleep. The clock struck twelve. The Christmas tree grew bigger and bigger, and the mice arrived, followed by the rats. There was Olivia doing her mouse dance across the stage, paws upas she twirled and skittered with the other mice. They cowered in terror as the rats arrived, led by the Rat King. He was especially terrifying in his big papier-mâché rat mask, brandishing his large silver sword. All the little mice were trembling, Olivia most of all. Even from the seventh row, I could see the terror in my daughter’s eyes as she watched the Rat King cavort across the stage, dueling with the Nutcracker and his soldiers. It seemed an unfair fight: the rats were going to win. Then Clara threw a slipper at the Rat King, killing him, and he was carried off by the rats, followed by the mice.
