On Home Page 6

  “Cassidy, you know what I mean. We were going to tell you once everything was settled. I didn’t think you would go to her house first. I thought you’d come here.”

  “Where is this place?” Cassidy asked brusquely, and her mom, when she responded, sounded hurt. Good. She should feel bad. She listened to her mother’s directions and tried to imagine the route. Buckhannon’s roads were so much a part of her psyche that though she didn’t know all their names, she could imagine the drive perfectly. Rain began to patter against the rooftop.

  “Okay, we’ll be there after we see Grandma Jane.” Cassidy placed the heavy receiver into its delicate holder.

  Cassidy locked the door and walked back to the street with Noeli toward the huge SUV, both of them hunching their shoulders to minimize contact with the raindrops. Cassidy navigated and Noeli steered, moving her whole body with the steering wheel. Her friend was so out of place in this car and in this town, but it was no more out of place than Cassidy felt in her own life right now. “Past these streets. Yeah, over the bridge. I think it’s around here.”

  Below them, the Buckhannon River clouded with the rain, morphing into the milky green of a mood ring. Serenity Care Home stood on the left, exactly where Cassidy had expected it, a wide green field stretching in all directions beyond the squat brick building. Outside an apartment complex in a low bank across the street, a woman with a gelled pixie cut and a Mountaineers shirt hung clothes on a line. Cassidy wondered if she realized it was raining. Beside the woman, a toddler tried unsuccessfully to pedal up the short, steep sidewalk.

  Entering through the care home’s glass doors, they found themselves in a small entryway, walled off from the main home by another set of glass doors. A sign warned visitors not to proceed if they were experiencing symptoms of cold or flu. On a table on the right were a box of surgical masks and a large bottle of hand sanitizer. The small anteroom smelled of Softsoap, and Cassidy was transported to the summer she turned fourteen, religiously cleaning her new belly button piercing. When her dad was still alive. He had hated her belly button ring. He had hated the idea of his daughter as an emerging sexual being. What would he have thought of her now? Cassidy suppressed a small stabbing sensation in her lower belly.

  After rubbing sanitizer into their palms, Noeli and Cassidy entered the home, where the busy nurses failed to greet them. Directly in front of them, a lobby filled with couches and recliners faced a brick fireplace adorned with a large collection of jack-o’-lanterns and a TV tuned to the Hallmark Channel. None of the women were her grandmother, not that Cassidy expected them to be. Grandma Jane had lived alone for thirty years and had unfavorable opinions about most residents of Buckhannon. Cassidy doubted she’d been socializing much. Cassidy signed her name in the guest notebook on the counter and waited for a moment to see if anyone would direct them. When no one acknowledged their presence, she began walking down a hallway to the left, glancing at the whiteboards outside each room. It was like a dorm, if you ignored the names that decorated each board—Ruetta, Betty Sue, Lorna. They arrived at the board marked Jane, and Cassidy knocked quietly.

  “Mmm, come in,” Jane’s gentle voice called out.

  Cassidy opened the door and stepped in, almost stumbling with the grief of it. On the left was a large industrial-looking bathroom, wheelchair accessible, smelling of bleach. A plastic three-drawered bin labeled Jane sat next to the sink containing her grandma’s shampoos and face creams. A plastic shawl hung on the wall, and Cassidy’s throat tightened as she realized this was for the employees to help her grandma wash.

  Jane sat in a plush maroon chair by the window. On the wall next to her was a framed picture of Cassidy from her WVU graduation. The bed across from her was covered in a coordinating maroon quilt. It wasn’t a real quilt, though—not something someone had made, but something store-bought—a print made to look like a quilt. Cassidy hated it.

  Jane sat, quiet and staring. She had no music playing, no crossword puzzle in her lap, no book at her side. Cassidy whimpered as she ran to her.

  As she approached, Cassidy realized that the chair was a lift chair, bulky with wires and a remote control. She could not get close to Jane, not in the way she wanted to, without crushing her small frame. She could only lean over her in an awkward half hug. Still, Jane took Cassidy’s head in both hands and kissed her forehead.

  “Oh, I love you, darling,” the old woman said. “How are you?”

  “I’m okay, Grandma Jane.” Tears stung Cassidy’s eyes.

  “Don’t cry, baby.”

  “Sorry.” Cassidy wiped her tears and sniffed, then returned to standing.

  “Don’t apologize.”

  “Sorry.” Cassidy sniffed again and laughed.

  Jane laughed, too. “Oh, I love you,” she repeated.

  “How are you?” Cassidy asked. Had anyone even told her about her dad? Would she remember?

  “I’m fine, baby.” Jane lifted a hand from the mountain of blankets piled on her lap and held her long dainty fingers in the air, raising her index finger slightly in a gesture that meant she wanted Cassidy to take her hand. Cassidy sat on the arm of the lift chair and obliged. If Jane didn’t remember, Cassidy didn’t want to remind her.

  Grandma Jane’s hand felt cold in her own. Her skin was so thin—translucent like wax paper, that she could easily feel each bone beneath it, and when she examined their clasped hands, she could see the bones as well. As the thought struck her that her grandma’s skeleton was right there, Cassidy loosened her grip and allowed Jane to gently stroke the back of her hand with a thumb, something she had done since Cassidy was a child. She would age like this. She would grow weak and wrinkled. How long could she stay attractive enough for people to care about her? Would the men who showered her with attention drop her all at once or would they fall away like leaves as she aged?

  The metal heater under the window began to roar, filling the room. Who had decided to put her grandma’s chair right by the heater? It would have been her mom, no doubt. Grandma Jane didn’t belong here.

  Noeli stood, small and awkward, in the doorway, until Grandma Jane noticed her.

  “Who is this young woman?” Jane yelled over the heater.

  “This is my friend, Noeli.” Noeli stepped forward and took Jane’s free hand.

  “Hello, darling,” Jane said, and Noeli smiled warmly.

  “I actually need to use the restroom,” she said, leaving Cassidy and Jane alone. Cassidy tried not to think about her utilizing the gray handled seat that balanced above the toilet.

  “I would trade places with him in a heartbeat, Cassidy. In a second,” Jane said. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart.” Jane’s milky blue eyes filled with tears and Cassidy had to turn away. Her chest constricted and once more she found it hard to take a good breath. She wouldn’t cry. Jane’s thumb, still rubbing the back of her hand, threatened to thwart her efforts, so she pulled her hand back, placing it under her leg on the chair.

  “I remember when my daddy died,” Jane said. “I don’t know which is worse, baby. Fast like this, or slow like he went.” Cassidy hadn’t thought about this—that this was something Jane had experienced, too. The deaths in her life—her parents, her siblings, her husband, all seemed so long ago that it was easy to imagine Jane hadn’t actually had to go through them.

  Her grandma’s life, Cassidy thought, had the glow of a forties movie combined with the charm of an old-time mountain string band. Her mom’s held the romantic haziness of Bohemia. What was hers? This was the first real thing that had ever happened to her. Everything up to this point, even her sex life, had been pretend.

  Jane went on. Her eyes drifted out the window as she spoke—she was somewhere else. On the sill sat three plastic figures with solar panels on their bases—a hula girl whose hips swayed side to side, a daisy whose leaves bounced up and down, and a black cat who popped in and out of a jack-o’-lantern. “Daddy�
��s cancer sharpened knives in his belly. He was in so much pain.” She shook her head. “Mama prayed and prayed and Daddy got frailer and frailer, whiter and whiter. It was the same damn time they came to cut the tops off our mountains. Daddy sold the mineral rights, not thinking anything would actually happen, and then as he’s lying there dying, these men in big machines come and barely speak to us, digging and digging—every day another layer gone from the hill and Daddy weaker and weaker. It seemed then like they were doing it to him—digging right into his insides, wasting him away.”

  Cassidy leaned her head against the back of the chair.

  “Those years were such a blur. I got married, then your dad was here, and then my daddy got sick. We would sing and pray to drown out the noise. Even your dad sang the old hymns.” Jane laughed. “They didn’t even use that mine. Tore up our hill and left. We had a day of quiet and then Daddy asked Mama to stop singing.” Jane sighed and closed her eyes. “She stopped and he was gone.”

  Cassidy was quiet. She looked at the paper calendar of events on the bookshelf next to them. Saturdays were “Ladies’ Nail Painting,” Sundays were Bible study, Wednesdays were bingo. After a whole, full life, how did someone end up here?

  Jane spoke again and Cassidy returned her gaze to her hands. “You know Grandma Arzella was religious—she even thought playing cards was a sin. But I never believed, really, till then. I still don’t call myself a Christian. I don’t know if it was God, Cassidy, but it was something. It was love.”

  Noeli returned, her Chuck Taylors squeaking on the tile floor.

  “Not now, please. My granddaughter is visiting,” Jane said, and waved her fingers at Noeli.

  “Grandma, this is my friend,” Cassidy said. Was she supposed to correct her? Had she embarrassed her?

  “Oh, right! Cassidy’s friend. Finally.” Jane smiled warmly. Noeli smiled back politely.

  “We have to go see Mom.” Cassidy stood. She kissed Jane’s head and her white hair was so thin, Cassidy could feel the shape of her grandmother’s scalp on her lips. She smoothed her own hair. “I love you, Grandma Jane. We’ll be back.”

  “I love you too, darling.”

  Cassidy left before her grandma’s warbling voice could make her cry, Noeli following behind. In the lobby, a father-son duo sang “Praise the Mighty Name of Jesus” and strummed matching acoustic guitars.

  In the sloping parking lot, Cassidy hoisted herself into the giant car. “You like that music?” Noeli asked as she pressed the button for the ignition and stuck her face right in the path of the heat, letting the vent blow her curls, which had grown frizzy.

  “God, my grandma must hate it here.” Cassidy shivered.

  “Why?”

  “She hates religious stuff. I’m sure she feels like she’s surrounded by idiots.”

  “Isn’t she religious?” Noeli released the emergency break and backed up slowly. The SUV was almost as big as the parking lot. “I heard that story she was telling you.”

  Cassidy sniff-laughed. “Yeah, that was weird coming from her. Like prayer can actually keep people alive.”

  “That wasn’t the point of the—”

  “There’d be a lot more people alive if that were the case.” Cassidy smirked.

  “It’s not stupid to acknowledge it’s pretty fucking weird that anything exists at all. Science explains what does exist and how it works. If the universe was some other way, science would have to figure out how to explain that.”

  “But science has already explained that some things don’t exist.” Cassidy looked at Noeli as she backtracked toward the river. Was her smart, radical friend really arguing for the power of prayer? “For example, I’m fairly certain magical thinking has been disproven.” They approached the bridge.

  “You can’t prove a negative,” Noeli said matter-of-factly. “You know how I feel about all the crazy Catholic shit I grew up with, but the universe is still pretty mind-boggling. And my grandma has told me some wild stories about brujería her mom did. I thought your grandma’s story was cool.”

  In the face of mortality, Cassidy’s dad had resorted to Buddhism, her grandma thought prayer could keep people alive, and even Noeli was superstitious. Cassidy pinched her thigh through her jeans, wondering at how the world around her had turned absurd overnight. The river, still splattering with raindrops, was now a muddy brown.

  Jane

  Jane awoke to a train whistle and bolted upright. She had to catch the train. She was supposed to be in the Capitol in time for dinner.

  Stumbling in the darkness, she made her way to the dresser and began throwing clothes on the floor, searching for stockings.

  “Jane?”

  “I’m almost ready.”

  “Ready for what?”

  “The train.” Light filled the room, disorienting her. The maroon armchair, the walker, the wheelchair. This wasn’t her room in the farmhouse.

  “Jane, you were dreaming. There’s no train to catch, honey.”

  The present rushed back, and Jane sat on the bed, embarrassed. “Oh, I . . .”

  “It’s all right. Try to get some sleep. You need anything?”

  “No, no.” Jane shook her head, trying to shake the confusion from her mind. The aide turned off the light. That morning in 1944 felt so real—more real than the scene around her.

  She had hugged her parents, the engine steaming and huffing behind her, more massive than she had imagined. The colossal machine had seemed to Jane evidence of mankind’s dominance over the natural world.

  When John Henry was a little baby, she had hummed to herself, thinking of the tall tale—the man as large as an ox who challenged a steam engine and fell dead on his face. That was another example of what West Virginia would do to a person. But not Jane. She was boarding this train, and she was leaving.

  Philip and Arzella, stoic as always, stood before their daughter, the train’s metal reflecting cold and gray on their pale faces. Arzella’s voice betrayed only the smallest of quavers as she spoke. “You be good now.”

  “Always,” Jane assured her, hugging her mother again.

  “Come on!” Ding called.

  They boarded, shuffling to their seats.

  “It’s awful silly, isn’t it?” Ding asked once they were settled. “That we didn’t take the Washingtonian from Martinsburg. We’ve gone west to go east. It’s just wacky, is all.”

  “I suppose it’s a bit queer.”

  “You know what else is queer?” Ding asked.

  “Mmm?”

  “That you’re going to work for the FBI, and I’m going to be stuck pushing a typewriter for the notification bureau.”

  “Ding, you failed your exam. You should be counting your lucky stars you’ve got an assignment at all.”

  “Well, you know what they say—if you can tell a typewriter from a tractor, they’ll take you in Washington.” She said it without a trace of embarrassment. It was why she’d be great for the notification department, Jane thought. Only Ding could manage to shrug at being sent off to type condolence letters.

  “You want my theory?” Ding asked, opening her train case and reapplying her lipstick. She didn’t wait for Jane to answer. “The proctor told the Civil Service Commission how pleasant I am. I’m sure the men in that department could use a morale boost.”

  “You know, I bet you’re right.” Jane smoothed her own hair. It had always been this way—she, the smart one, and Ding, the beauty.

  They arrived in Parkersburg and transferred to the West Virginian, which was packed with federal workers on their way back to Washington. The girls squeezed in next to two men in dark suits and a woman knitting. Across the aisle, four more Government Girls giggled and gossiped.

  “Mr. Smith went to the party all alone is what I heard.”

  “Better than with his secretary.”

  “He wouldn’
t have thought a thing of bringing his secretary if he didn’t have anything to hide.”

  Jane listened, enthralled.

  When they arrived, finally, at Union Station, Jane’s stockings sticking to her legs from the heat, the passengers rose as a unified mass and pressed toward the exits. They jostled past Jane, who began to panic as her cousin was swept away with the crowd.

  She let the wave of bodies carry her toward the door as she clutched her train case to her chest. Outside, the passengers split and dispersed, her car mates immediately lost in a swelling ocean of hats and curls. Jane spotted Ding waiting for her just ahead, waving frantically. When she got close enough to reach her cousin’s hand, Ding grabbed it and led her to retrieve their luggage and then to the sidewalk, where they could have a better view of the monkey house that was Union Station.

  Taxi drivers in their caps leaned out of windows, surveying the crowds—folks elbowing one another out of the way to get their attention. The drivers slowed, reaching back to open their doors, and people poured in, piling one on top of the other, five or six to a car.

  Jane and Ding stayed close as they scurried to the median between the rows of cabs. Standing on her tiptoes, wondering what to do next, Jane could see through the station’s large arch opening to the cyclopic dome of the Capitol Building. They were to meet their boarder, Mr. Plunkett, outside, though how they would find one another in this swarm, Jane had no clue.

  As they lugged their bags out of the station and into the warm Washington evening, Jane breathed a sigh of relief. The crowd parted and through the briskly moving slacked and nyloned legs, she saw a green Nash Ambassador parked, and in front of it, a green-shirted man holding a sign that read “Jane and Christine.”

  The girls ran to the man. He was older than their parents, round as an egg, and stylish. His bow tie seemed to cover what small neck he possessed, and he had topped off his ensemble with an olive-green bowler, which he tipped as the girls approached.