The Vanishing Year (27 page)

I just never knew it.

•  •  •

“Zoe.”

I blink my eyes open, startled awake. I'd been dreaming, but it flits away faster than I can catch it. Penny stands at the foot of my bed, her purse hugged tightly across her middle. Her eyes twitch from the window to the door and back to my bed. I struggle to sit up.

“Penny.” My mouth is dry and cottony. She moves to my bedside and refills my water cup. The pitcher wobbles in her hand. “Thank you.”

The chair scrapes the tile floor as she pulls it closer to the bedside. “Will you be all right?” she half whispers. “I'm sorry.”

“You saved my life.” I stare at her face, willing her gaze to settle, just for a moment. She fidgets, her hands smoothing her pants, rifling through her purse. I reach out, touch her hand, and for a second, she stills. “Did you know I was there? At that house?”

She shakes her head, vehement. “No. No, Zoe, I didn't. He fired me. It's . . . all my fault he got away with all of this.” She takes a gulp of air, like a half-sob.

“You've known.” Of course she has. I hadn't thought of it until this very moment, but Penny knew Tara. Joanie. The shock of seeing me, for the first time, then. A flood of half-­overheard conversations rush back.
Henry, but it isn't right. It doesn't look proper
. The way she couldn't look at me, never said my name. “How much did you know? That we were twins?”

She nods slowly, for once, leveling her gaze. She clears her throat. When she speaks, for the first time, her voice is clear and steady. “Frank and I lived in that cabin behind the Whittakers' property.” The surprise must register on my face
because she halts, and coughs, a resonant, wet sound from deep within her chest. “Henry grew up at Fishing Lake. They bought it from the Vizzinis. Frank and I worked for the Whittakers for years.”

I knew much of this, that Penny worked for Henry's family. That the Fishing Lake house was Henry's parents'. I close my eyes, smooth my eyebrows with my index finger. I wave my hand around for her to continue.

“In the back, at the edge of the property, used to sit a guest house. Much like the one you saw. It was almost an apartment, really. I tended the Whittakers' house, affairs, bills, and social calendar, and Frank was an accountant at Mr. Whittaker's law firm. Mrs. Whittaker was in advertising. They were nice people. They just had one very troubled teenaged son.” She rummages in her purse, pulls out a tissue, and dabs her eyes.

I remember then: a fire. And I know what's coming before she says it.

She shakes her head. “I saw the smoke from the upstairs bedroom. I came running down the lane, Frank was in the house. He'd been sick with shingles. By the time I got to our walk, Henry was there, just sitting on a rock, watching it burn. I screamed at him. Told him Frank was in there, that he was trapped, but it was like he didn't even hear me. Or didn't care. He just watched it burn, mesmerized.” Plump tears fall down her cheeks, one after the other, and she blots them as they drip off her chin while she speaks. “By the time Frank knew there was a fire, he'd tried to come down the stairs. They collapsed underneath him. His spinal cord was severed.” She pauses, pours herself a drink of water from my pitcher into a fresh Styrofoam cup. “The Whittakers were traumatized. They took Henry to every psychologist in the tristate area. They were good people. They kept me on until they died. Could never apologize enough, never pay for enough. Rebuilt a house for us, bigger, on another patch of property,
farther down the trail, the one you found. Said we could live the rest of our days there, rent free. Henry wasn't allowed back there as a teenager.”

“How did they die?” I set my cup down on the nightstand, shocked to realize that I don't know. God, there was so much I didn't know. I can almost see Henry, the flame alight in his eyes. I imagine his barely there smile. I recognize it.

“A car accident. Some kind of brake malfunction. I've always wondered . . .” Out in the hall, an alarm sounds, and a clatter of orderlies and nurses rush by with a gurney. We both turn our heads to watch. When it returns to silence, she continues, “Then there was Tara and as an adult, he always claimed that fire was an accident, and he was in shock. But I . . . I saw his face that day. He was gleeful. All that light, reflected in his eyes, it was like Christmas to him.” Her voice hardens, takes a sharp edge. “Well, anyway, he was charming as an adult. He brought me back. Apologized again and again. Paid me more than I had any right to take for what work he gave me.” She studied the tile floor. “I needed the money. Frank's disability benefits were dwindling. All we had was social security. And then Henry got married, and Tara was so wonderful, so quiet, polite, respectful. A delight. And then she died and he comes home three years later with you. Zoe, believe me,” she says, and leans forward, pulling my hand into hers, her palms cold and her nails digging into my wrists. “I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I tried to ask him about it. He told me to mind my own business. I told him that it just wasn't right, that you didn't know. He said he was going to tell you, but he was in love with you and thought you'd leave him. That he deceived you. He swore he just stumbled on you one day, that you had done the flowers for a company event.”

I nodded. “That's true. But, he set it up that way. He found me, knew it was all . . .” my voice cracks, “a lie.”

“He said he was captivated by you, by your spirit. He can
be very convincing. Could be, I mean.” Her mouth twists, and I see this for what it is. A confessional. Penny feels guilt for accepting me at face value. For not questioning it. I remembered overheard conversations, Penny's voice.
It just doesn't look proper, Henry.
Oh God.

“How didn't you know I was there? Didn't you come back?” I press, needing all the puzzle pieces with newfound urgency.

She shook her head. “He fired me. He was unraveling, I think. He called me a liability. The last day I worked for him is the day he brought you back to Fishing Lake. He asked me to clean the house, set up a spread. I did that. He said you were sick, that you'd been threatened. I begged him to tell you who he was, who your sister was. He screamed at me to mind my own business. Told me to go home. So I did.” She folds up her tear-dampened tissue into a neat little square and tucks it back into the pocket of her purse. “I did come back once. It was evening. He was sitting on the back deck, drinking a glass of brandy. He said you'd left him. Gone back to the city, stolen some of his money. You were furious about Tara. He blamed me. He was angry as hell.” She shakes her head, a quick snap like a self-admonishment. “I'm afraid of my own shadow most days. Henry Whittaker scared the living daylights out of me.”

I touch her hand. “I forgive you, Penny. And I'm forever thankful.”

She stands up, waves her hand in my direction, and turns to leave. At the door, she pauses and turns back.

“I have nightmares about that fire. Do you know, a week prior to that, I had caught him cutting off the tail of one of the neighbor's farm cats with a hacksaw? I told his mother.” She retrieves the tissue from her purse, blots her chin and cheeks. “I always thought that fire . . . was retribution. Frank is paralyzed because I snitched on Henry.”

“Oh, Penny,” I say, softly.

“I was scared, Zoe.” She stands in the doorway, backlit by the bright hall lights, looking diminutive. A hunched rounded figure. “I spent years looking over my shoulder. I considered telling you about Tara myself. But I always stopped to wonder, what would he have done to me?”

EPILOGUE

SIX MONTHS LATER

It was Lydia's idea. In fact, she made all the calls, talked to all the right people. I come home from the CARE office one day, she's running circles around me like an excited puppy. She grabs my hand, leads me into the living room, and sits me down on the couch, her hands flat on my shoulders.

“Please don't be mad, okay?”

We've moved in together, a different apartment in Hoboken, bigger, more luxurious. Warm and rich colors, browns and oranges. Decorating it has been a form of therapy.

I'm a rich woman now. New York is an intestate succession state, which means that because Henry died without an updated will, as his current wife, I inherited everything: all his liquid assets, his apartments, his stocks and bonds. I'm sure he never counted on that. His will was hopelessly outdated, still named Tara as his sole heir.

“I won't be mad.” This is all so unlike Lydia, who generally has one lukewarm mood, forever perfecting her bored face. She's giddy, pushing her palms against her knees, starting and
stopping sentences until I finally say, “Oh God, just say it!” out of frustration.

“I found Evelyn.” She takes a deep breath, her hands grasping mine. “The state pays to cremate unclaimed bodies but the funeral homes don't always do anything with the remains, in case anyone ever wants them.”

I shake my head, nothing about that made sense. I remember that spastic little estate lawyer and his tiny closet office. He said they disposed of her ashes. “What? You're crazy, Lydia. Evelyn died more than five years ago . . . Anyway, they said that wasn't true. Most funeral homes' policy is a few weeks. I talked to a lawyer at the time . . .”

“It doesn't matter. I talked to the funeral home director. He said he has metal boxes in his basement from the seventies. They can't bring themselves to dispose of them, although they have every legal right to do so. He said most funeral homes have a basement full of ashes. Which is so sad, when you think about it. But Zoe,” her eyes were shining, bright blue, “they have one labeled Evelyn Lawlor.”

My heart stops, time itself stops. The idea that I could go back, fix the worst thing I ever did . . . I can't even wrap my head around it. “There has to be a mistake. I don't even know what funeral home she was sent to.”

“I just called every funeral parlor in the Bay area. It wasn't that difficult. I think it was maybe the eleventh one I called?” She scrunches up her face, eyes to the ceiling in thought, then shrugs. “It doesn't matter, the point is, she's there.” She extends a piece of notebook paper with a name, address, and telephone number.
Howey Funeral Service
. I stare at it. I could have a memorial for Evelyn. My mom. The only one I've ever known. I could think about her without this hollow, empty feeling in my stomach.

“Would you come with me?” I ask softly.

“Of course.” Lydia hugs me, her metal bangle bracelets
clattering against the back of my neck. My hair is short again. Some kind of emotional protest. Truthfully, I miss the length.

I've become someone else yet again, although Dr. Thorpe—my psychologist—agrees this is what should happen. I can never be my pre-Henry self, but Henry has changed who I would have become. She assures me that this is what life is: a sum of experiences. That I cannot grieve for the woman who may have existed had Henry not come into my life. Or rather, if I had not let him in. She assures me that I will be whole again, that a person cannot simply vanish because of one traumatic year. I'm convinced I have. She assures me that I will heal. And that is, for now, enough.

I am not without my scars: I have wretched nightmares, night terrors really, where I'm asleep but am wandering the house, screaming, terrified, sweating, until Lydia finds me trying to cut off imaginary plastic handcuffs with pinking shears from the kitchen. I'd be terrified to live alone.

I went to the dentist not that long ago and had a panic attack at the sight of the Novocain needle. Yes, there are remnants. Dr. Thorpe, whom I see three, sometimes four times a week, says I have post-traumatic stress disorder, which is often medically treated with antidepressants. Since I won't take any medication, we use a combination of hypnosis and cognitive therapy, and I do think it's helping. It's hard to say. I don't make a move lately without consulting Dr. Thorpe, caught once again in this limbo between the person I was, and the person I might be should I ever find my way back to her.

Most of my sessions revolve around two topics: Evelyn and Henry. I have guilt about Evelyn, of course. My issues with Henry are layered and complex. Sometimes, in the early morning space between sleep and consciousness, I miss him. I miss his vacation hair and his large, capable hands. I miss the way he took charge, dealt with complications for me: money and finances, bank issues, insurance. I'm grieving for the Henry I thought I knew. I'm grieving for the caretaker I've lost. Then I alternate between self-loathing and frustration.

When I tell her about Evelyn, she clucks her tongue once and says, “Zoe, I think that'd be lovely.” Dr. Thorpe is the kind of person who uses the word “lovely” freely, usually in combination with the word
simply.
She's also the kind of person who wears
slacks
and
blouses.
Her burgundy acrylic nails tap rhythmically on her notebook. Her teeth are capped and her gold hoop earrings glimmer as she shakes her head.

“Do you think the plane will be hard?” I ask her. If she says yes, I'll have a panic attack. The people. Ironically, I have a hard time with crowds. I see Henry's face, or Jared's, and sometimes I shake so bad I can't see, my teeth clatter and my vision swims.

“Do
you
think the plane will be hard?” She drums her pen against her watch, a subtle time-is-almost-up signal. I don't know what to say.

•  •  •

Lake Tahoe in the fall is a rainbow of colors: the leaves a shock of red and yellow against the cerulean blue of the lake. The air is crisp and clean, and our New York lungs are a little shocked from it, high, like we've been sucking pure oxygen. The canoe bobs and wheezes in the water, aimless; the weight of all three of us may be too much for it. Lydia pulls her life jacket around her, checking and rechecking buckles. Cash eyes me, wary and nervous.

Sometimes I catch him looking at me when he's
not
wary,
not
nervous and all I see is love. In those moments I can see myself loving him back. One day. For now, I mostly feel guilt that he's fallen for someone so ruined. Most of the time, I'm a fragile bird to him. He is gentle and scared and loving and skittish. I don't know when it happened, when he fell in love with me. Somewhere between the diner and the hospital room. One day, I'd like to ask him.

He paddles us out to the middle of the lake, until the shore is a simple hazy line on the horizon, white sand and yellow trees, the lights of our resort glittering in the sunset. Evelyn would have loved this place.
Oh, the money!
I imagine her in my ornate room, with the plush carpeting, the high-rise view of the lake from our wooden balcony, the large, looming gas fireplace that comes to life with the flick of a button. She'd dance around barefoot, scrunching the deep pile between her toes.

Her smile, lipstick on her teeth. The dimple in her right cheek. Her weathered hands, with large knuckles, working hands but painted nails. How she'd touch her nose when she laughed. The way she'd tie her hair in a knot at the base of her neck.

Before we rowed out to the middle of the lake, I'd dragged Lydia and Cash around on a goose chase in our rented car. Up a private drive, on the North Shore of Tahoe Vista until Lydia had gasped.

“This is the house we stayed at. The one Evelyn got from a friend or something.” I stared at the sleek gray lines of the “cabin” and realized she never could have afforded anything like this. No one she knew could have. Where did it come from? The images come to me unbidden: thick, juicy steaks on the pink side of gray, just about to expire. This house, the glass front, the breathtaking views I neither noticed nor appreciated as a teenager. The beaded dresses she'd bring home and try on, and we'd parade around our small living room, only to have it
poof!
disappear the next day. The “borrowed” convertible, the wind in her hair.

In the passenger seat, while Cash and Lydia watched me warily, I started laughing. I laughed so hard until tears squeezed out my eyes. Cash touched my shoulder.

“It was . . . stolen,” I hiccoughed out. “She stole it all.”

Lydia gave a soft, “Ahh, Zoe,” like she was about to console me but I waved her away. “She so badly wanted to live the life she saw every day. She tried to give it to me. With vacations and dresses and steaks and wine, and oh, God—” my voice was strangled and the pain in my stomach was so hot white in that moment, I doubled over. I imagined Evelyn, sliding the keys to Mr. Miska's Tahoe cabin into her purse, the last second before her shift ended, on a weekend she knew he'd be away. I envisioned her saying, “Of course I'll get that dress dry cleaned,” or slipping the slightly slimy paper-wrapped rib eyes into her bag.

I think of these things as I lift the lid to the wooden box. All the memories of Evelyn mix and mingle in my mind; she becomes ageless and timeless and less like a real, once-living person and more like an amalgam of childhood memories. Evelyn, floating free.

A breeze picks up and I gently turn the box over, scattering her dust into the water. At first it coats the surface, then slowly sinks. I think that now, the last thing I ever did for her was out of love. I hope she will never feel unloved again.

“I can't take back the last five years, Ev. And I know you always said
sorry was for sissies.
You didn't do apologies, you forgave without being asked. Well, I'm asking.”

I try to track each speck until it all disperses and I can no longer see anything at all.
Mingle amongst the rich,
I think. She'd always wanted to. The water is calm and sparkling.

We sit awhile longer, till the sun fully sets, the blue lake turning an inky black. Lydia hums “Amazing Grace” and I tell one story, a simple one. My favorite story of my mother, the one that shows who she was as a person, the day she brought Rachel home for dinner.

“Sometimes it's the people who have the least that give the most,” Lydia says, which is the most perfect thing to say.

I think that it's just about as fine a memorial service as a person could ever ask for.

“Ready?” I ask them, and they both nod. They're so patient with me, my friends. As it turns out, I am not, as Henry said, unlovable. Cash paddles us back. Lydia makes a joke about him sinking the canoe, and Cash lightly splashes her with water. I try to pinpoint my feelings.
Content
. I feel content. As Evelyn would say,
Well, I'll be.

Sometimes life gives you a third chance. Who knew?