Two or Three Things I Forgot to Tell You (20 page)

 

So hungry!

In a girls' restroom far from the senior corridor, where she wasn't so likely to encounter anyone she knew, Nadia hid in one of the stalls to eat—try to eat—the canned tuna she'd brought for the little lost cat. Clumsily she managed to open the can with an opener she'd brought from home, but the strong fishy smell was unappetizing—though Nadia was faint with hunger, she couldn't eat more than a mouthful.

Making sure that no one was in the lavatory to see, she tossed the can and its smelly contents in the trash.

How bizarre it would seem, to girls entering the restroom! Such a strong smell of canned tuna fish! If Nadia hadn't been so miserable, she'd have laughed.

The remainder of the long day passed in a blur. Fifth period, sixth period, seventh . . . Nadia was so distracted with worry about Mr. Kessler and the painting she scarcely noticed people glancing at her curiously—some of them, rudely.

Boys? Boys she knew? Or—boys she didn't know, but who seemed to know her?

A guy named Hawkeye—that was his nickname, a friend of Rick Metz's, standing in front of Nadia, blocking her way on the stairs, she wasn't sure why.

Her natural response was to smile back—to say
Hi!

But no, better not. Hawkeye was not a friend.

The guys' smiles were not friendly smiles but bared-teeth smiles like the smiles of robots in video games.

Felt too sickish to go to girls' chorus rehearsal—this was the third time in a row Nadia was skipping practice. Hannah texted her
WHERE R U?
but Nadia shut up her phone without replying.

And on her way out of school, on the walk behind school where, almost twenty-four hours before, she'd stood pondering whether to leave the gift for Mr. Kessler in his Subaru, Nadia saw several senior guys looking at her and slyly smiling—“Hiya, Nad-ee—how's it going?”

Nadia turned quickly away. A blush rose into her face.

Walking quickly away. Blindly.

Not hearing a derisory chanting in her wake—
How'd Nad-ee like suckee my cock?

Nadia didn't hear this. Rude laughter drowned out whatever she might have heard, except she was walking so quickly away and without a backward glance.

Did not hear the chanting after her—
Slut-tee Nad-ee. Hey-hey, slut-tee Nad-ee like suckee?

Did not hear. Not any of it.

 

Just to help me sleep, honey. Sleep, sleep, sleep is the most wonderful gift you can give another.

It isn't that Mommy doesn't love you. Mommy loves you.

But Mommy is so very tired now, honey.

If you love Mommy, please do not wake Mommy. Please promise!

Nadia had promised. Nadia had wanted to sleep curled in Mommy's arms on Mommy's bed beneath the beautiful hand-sewn quilt from Mommy's mother that looked like apple blossoms, but Mommy had sent Nadia away this time, for Mommy was
so very tired, and needing to sleep
.

Nadia had promised, and so she did not wake Mommy up, and in the morning of the next day—or was it the next day—or another day—the housekeeper came to take Nadia away because Mr. Stillinger was just returning from Bangkok and his plane had been delayed for several hours. And still, Nadia did not break the promise she'd made to Mommy, she had never broken the promise she'd made to Mommy, nor did she confide in anyone the promise she'd made to Mommy; and soon, she forgot the promise she'd made to Mommy, for it was safest that way.

In this wintry time of the year when Mommy
went away
.

 

“Nadia, where the hell have you been? Are you always so damned
late
?”

Amelie spoke so harshly to Nadia, her eyes glared with such undisguised dislike, Nadia was stunned. She'd just entered the house—as usual, through the kitchen—though noting, absentmindedly, that there was something wrong in the kitchen, something
not right
—only a single light burning above the sink, and—where was Mariana?—having been preoccupied with a growing sense of shame, misery that Mr. Kessler didn't care for her really—(unless there was some mistake, some misunderstanding, and Mr. Kessler really did care for her but knew he must not show his feelings in public)—when her stepmother came rushing into the kitchen, furious as Nadia had never seen her.

“There's an emergency situation here! There's been a theft here! Your precious Mariana—always pretending to be so goddamned
nice!
—has been stealing from us! I've asked her to leave our employ.”

Nadia stared at Amelie, uncomprehending.

Mariana? Stealing? And had she been—fired?

“Don't look for her—she's gone. She's been stealing from us, and she denies it—lying to my face. Your father will deal with her; I can't. And she won't be paid for this week!”

In her fury, Nadia's stepmother no longer spoke with her
charmant
French accent. How confusing this was!

Numbly Nadia set her backpack on the counter. Numbly moving her fingers, fumbling with the zipper of her quilted dark-rose jacket as her stepmother raged:

“Imagine! Stealing right out of my closet! And I'm sure she's taken jewelry of mine, too—a pair of earrings I've been missing for months, and it never occurred to me that Mariana might have taken them—and my Dior scarf, remember, when we came back from Nantucket—”

Horror washed over Nadia. Her heart began beating so hard, she felt she might faint.

“What—did Mariana t-take?”

“My beautiful bag! The gold bag—it was one of my favorites. I went to look for it and couldn't find it anywhere, and I asked Mariana, and the way she looked at me—I can detect guilt when I see it—and subterfuge—and of course she denied it, she said she has never taken anything from any house she has worked in, ever. And she kept denying it, that's what makes me furious. I can see that someone like Mariana, who has so little, might be dazzled by such a bag, and thinking that I haven't been using it lately, thinking, ‘Maybe Mrs. Stillinger won't miss it,' but I'm not that naive.”

Nadia was feeling faint. And she was feeling sick to her stomach.

“I—I—took the bag. Not Mariana . . .”

“
You?
You did not. You're covering for Mariana, I can see it in your face.”

“No—I'm not c-covering for Mariana. I—took your bag . . . I'm so sorry, I didn't think you would c-care. . . .”

“Believe me,
ma petite amie
, your room was the first place I searched—and the bag isn't there. And I can see in your face, you're lying now.”

“Amelie, no—I did take your bag. It wasn't Mariana—please believe me.”

“Where is it, then?”

“I—I don't know. . . .”

“You took the bag, but don't know where it is?”

“I'm not s-sure. . . .”

“Well, if you took it, and you don't have it, where did you see it last? Where did you leave it?”

Nadia stood frozen, staring at the floor. Her brain seemed to dip, whirl, sink.

“I—I d-don't remember. . . . But maybe I can get it back. . . .”

“You ‘don't remember' where you left it—but ‘maybe you can get it back'?” Amelie laughed harshly. Nadia could see that her usually composed and
très chic
stepmother would have liked to seize her shoulders and give her a very hard shake.

“Just, it wasn't Mariana. Please don't fire Mariana. I—I'm so sorry. . . .”

“No. I don't believe you. You and precious Mariana—I hear you laughing together in the kitchen, and when I come in, you both go
silent
. Well, she's no saint—she's no more a mother to you than—than—anyone else.” Amelie began to stammer, so angry. Before Nadia could plead with her further, she turned and stalked out of the kitchen. Nadia stood forlorn and abashed, not daring to follow.

Upstairs in her room Nadia sank onto her bed. Her backpack fell to the floor; her cell phone tumbled out and she made no move to pick it up. A gathering roar of angry hornets in her brain. She was trying to remember—what? Trying to hear—whose words?

Sleep, sleep, sleep is the most wonderful gift.

It isn't that Mommy doesn't love you.

Mommy loves you. . . .

6.

SHAME

“Nadia? What on earth are you trying
to tell us?”

Nadia tried to speak—but could not. Nor could
she bear to look at her father's face, contorted with incredulity and anger.

Summoned by his hysterical wife, Mr. Stillinger had
driven home from work early. He hadn't believed the situation to be the emergency Amelie
called it until on a sudden impulse he searched the house to see if any of his own valuable
possessions were missing—and soon discovered that the Kandinsky painting was gone.

“Whoever stole my painting was trying to be
clever—covering her tracks by putting another work of art in its place. But only an idiot
would confuse a pastel drawing by Prendergast with an oil painting by
Kandinsky
.”

“But why—why would Mariana take a
painting
? And why that painting?” Amelie was still determined to
believe that Mariana was the thief.

“Well—she isn't very bright.
Obviously! She's just barely a ‘legal' alien—she isn't educated.
Maybe she thought she could sell it—somehow. Still, it doesn't seem like something our
housekeeper would take, like your Neiman Marcus bag.” Mr. Stillinger's fingers were
twitching as if he'd have liked to get hold of someone. “We'd better call the
police and report it now.”

And so, Nadia had no choice except to tell her father
what she'd done.

Provoking the red-faced man to turn his fury on
her
.

Nadia tried to summon the right words, stammering and
faltering. That she'd wanted to give a
gift
to her science
teacher, Mr. Kessler—that she'd taken a painting that resembled a photograph of
protozoa. Mr. Stillinger stared at his daughter, shaking his head in disbelief.

“You couldn't have thought of this theft
on your own, Nadia! Who is this science teacher? Did he put you up to it?”

“No! Oh, no. Mr. Kessler doesn't even
know. . . .”

“I'll call him. I'll call him
first, and then I'll call the police. This isn't petty theft, this is grand theft. Do
you know how much that painting is worth, Nadia?”

“N-no . . .”

“At least three million
dollars.”

“Th-three million dollars?”

“Wassily Kandinsky is a major artist of the
twentieth century! What were you thinking?”

Nadia could barely think, there was such a roaring in
her ears. Her father was looking at her with such
hatred
, she wanted to
hide her face and run from the room.

“I—I wasn't
t-thinking. . . . I didn't think you would miss it, and Mr. Kessler
would—appreciate it. . . . He likes beautiful things.”

“Oh, he does, does he—like
‘beautiful things'?”

“He has photographs of the Earth as a
biosphere. And colored plates of single-celled organisms, and the human
brain. . . .”

“And you took Amelie's bag, to put the
painting in? To give to him? Why on earth?”

“I—d-don't
know. . . .”

Because the bag looks like gold.
Because the bag is beautiful too and was discarded in the closet with other expensive things and no
one ever saw it.

And the painting on the
wall—no one ever saw.

Because I love Mr. Kessler and
wanted him to know. And I don't love you.

Nadia begged, “Please don't call anyone,
Daddy. Please! Especially not the police—
please!
”

“You don't seem to understand, Nadia.
This Kress—Kressler—received stolen goods from you, a minor. This isn't a
misdemeanor, this is a felony. The man must have encouraged you—urged you on—you
wouldn't have thought of such a thing yourself. You're just a girl—a very
young, naive, impressionable girl. But it isn't like you to be dishonest, in any
way—that, I would swear to. You agree, Amelie?”

Glowering, Amelie, taken by surprise, had no choice
but to agree.

“This man—this science
teacher—has had a corrupting influence on you. I will certainly call
him
, and I will call the
headmaster
at that fancy school of
yours—the tuition and fees we pay, we might as well be sending you to
Princeton!”

It had long been a household contention that Quaker
Heights Day School was an expensive school, even more expensive than the Quincy Academy in
Connecticut. Yet Mr. Stillinger would not consider allowing his daughter to enroll at the public
school, though it had an excellent reputation. Nadia had had no choice about which school to attend,
since her father had been transferred to Quaker Heights, but she was made to feel guilty about the
situation.

“Oh, Daddy, please—don't call
anyone! It's all my fault, not Mr. Kessler's fault at all. He doesn't even know
that I—that I'm the one—I didn't s-sign my
n-name—exactly. . . .”

“Didn't sign your
name—
exactly? What are you trying to say?”

“I l-left the painting in Amelie's bag
in the back of his car—with a card—but I signed the card with another
n-name. . . .”

“You didn't even sign your
name
? You gave away a three-million-dollar painting by Wassily Kandinsky to
your
science teacher
? Without even telling him who you are? Whose
painting it is?”

“I—I had a reason. . . .
I'm so sorry! I'm so very sorry! Just let me call him, Daddy—I can
explain—please don't call him, or the headmaster—it might get Mr. Kessler in
trouble, and he's such a wonderful man. . . .”

Nadia saw that her father was both furious and
thrilled—Mr. Stillinger had a penchant for strife, combat, and litigation. He had not
ascended the highly competitive hierarchy of the corporate world by being reasonable and forgiving
of wrongs committed against him.

Always it had seemed to Nadia, as far back as she
could recall, when her mother was still alive, that her father had taken a kind of grim satisfaction
in “wrongs” committed against him—whatever action he took then was
justified
.

“It was Mr. Kessler's birthday this
week, so I thought I would give him something. And I wanted it to be
s-special. . . .”

“His
birthday
? How
on earth did you know that?”

“He mentioned it in class.”

“Mentioned in class—his
birthday
? What kind of arrogant behavior is that? Telling
adolescents—susceptible adolescents—that it's his
birthday
? So his students will bring him
presents
? This is
outrageous.”

“Oh, no, Daddy—you're
misinterpreting it. Mr. Kessler only just happened to mention his birthday, I can't remember
why—he's always talking about personal things if they are
‘representative' and relate to scientific ideas somehow. It's the way all our
teachers teach, they're not arrogant, they're
friendly
. . . .”

“Yes, I'm sure they are very
friendly
. Did everyone bring him presents?”

“N-no . . .”

“And why did you, if no one else
did?”

Nadia's brain seemed to stop dead. She knew
that she should be very careful what she said, that her indignant father was avid to seize her words
and misuse them for his own purpose, yet she continued, stammering, “He—talked to me
about death. . . . I was feeling kind of bad about M-Mommy . . . thinking about the time of year she went away . . . though I didn't tell him much. And I
guess I started to cry, and—we were in his office, after school—and Mr. Kessler
touched my hand
—and it made me feel better right
away.”

“This man, this
adult—Kressle—
touched your hand
? In his office, after
school?”

“Just for a minute. Just to make me feel
better. It was only just what anyone would do, who was
n-nice. . . .”

“Nadia, let me see if I get this. The science
teacher of yours called you into his office after school, when no one else was
around—”

“Daddy, no! Mr. Kessler didn't call me
in, I just—went in. I went to see him during his office
hour. . . .”

“And was anyone else around?”

Nadia recalled the girls who'd laughed at her.
And Colin Brunner's friends who'd laughed at her.

“Y-yes. Some people. It was after
school. . . .”

“And was the office door open or
closed?”

“Open! The office door was
open.”

Nadia couldn't recall if this was so or not. In
her romantic replaying of the scene, Mr. Kessler's office door was
shut
.

“So an adult man, a stranger, encouraged you to
talk about your private life, your family life, including your deceased mother; he provoked you into
crying; and then, to comfort you, he
touched your hand
? And where else
did he touch you?”

“Nowhere, Daddy. J-just my hand, for a
m-minute . . .”

“And this romantic encounter prompted you to
leave a birthday gift for the man, whom obviously you adore, worth somewhere in the vicinity of
three million dollars? Nadia, this is preposterous behavior! Even for you, so immature for your age!
How did he encourage you?”

“Mr. Kessler didn't encourage
me—I mean, to give him anything. He was just nice to me and—I guess—I like him,
a lot. Please don't call Mr. Nichols, our headmaster—it might get Mr. Kessler into
trouble, and none of this is his fault at all. . . .”

“Yes. Exactly. It might get Mr. Kressler in
trouble—that is exactly what I intend to do.”

Nadia's father stormed out of the room. Nadia
stood paralyzed, looking after him.

Amelie said, disgusted: “And now I suppose I
have to call Mariana!
I
have to apologize to Mariana!” Her
streaked-blond hair was in her face, and there were frown lines in her usually smooth forehead.
“You! Deceitful Nadia!
You
are to blame.”

Nadia murmured an apology, how many times she had
murmured,
Sorry, I am so sorry
, deeply shamed and mortified and
remorseful, but as she moved to edge past Amelie, the distraught woman struck out at her in sheer
frustration, cuffing her on the side of the face with the back of her hand.

“You!
Trompeuse! Et
grosse!
For shame!
”

 

Tink. Where are
you . . .

Tell me what to do,
Tink.

I feel so bad. I have made such
mistakes.

 

Despite Nadia's pleas, Mr.
Stillinger called Quaker Heights Day School as he'd threatened, Nadia would learn
later.

Though it was well past school hours, after eight
p.m., Mr. Stillinger managed to speak with Mr. Nichols.

And Mr. Nichols called Adrian Kessler.

And Adrian Kessler was astonished to learn that his
student Nadia Stillinger was the mysterious “Dani A.” who'd left a framed
painting for him in a woman's gilt tote bag in the rear of his Subaru—“My God,
you mean the painting is
real
? A
real
Kandinsky
?”

He'd discovered it in the rear of his station
wagon and brought it home, of course. At the moment it was on a table in his living room, propped up
against a lamp.

It was a strange, dreamlike, abstract
painting—reminding him of something familiar, though he couldn't have said
what.

“An original work of art? The girl left
for—
me
?”

This was astonishing. Adrian had thought, as he told
Mr. Nichols, that a friend at school—one of his colleagues—had left him the painting
as some sort of birthday joke. The name “Dani A.” meant nothing to
him—he'd been utterly baffled. Of course he'd assumed that it was just a
reproduction, though a very good reproduction, in what looked like an expensive frame. And of course
he'd heard of Wassily Kandinsky, but he wasn't sure that he could identify a Kandinsky
painting.

Yes, he assured Mr. Nichols—he'd made
inquiries. He'd spent hours calling friends and acquaintances to see if one of them had
played the prank on him—he'd asked friends if they could identify “Dani
A.” He'd thought that the card to “Mr. Kessler” had been a trick to make
him think that it had to be from a student—somehow, he hadn't thought that it could be
a student, though probably, in retrospect, he should have suspected that.

“I guess I thought it was a joke that would be
explained soon—like on my birthday. Which is tomorrow.”

Adrian laughed uneasily. Headmaster Nichols, an older
man with a penchant for hypervigilance regarding parental complaints about his faculty, had been
listening in ominous silence.