Twisted Roots (3 page)

All my friends knew what that meant, and all turned to me. Massy's face a scowl of pity. I quickly gathered my books and hurried out, head down, my heart feeling more like it was growling than beating.
"Your stepfather is waiting for you in the lobby." Mrs. Margolis said as we walked down the hallway. "Congratulations," she added. and I muttered a thank-you and hurried along.
Miguel stood smiling proudly near the front entrance.
"I told you it would happen quickly. Little Claude has arrived," he announced,
"How's Mommy?" I asked.
"She's doing fine, but..." he added letting the but hang for a while as we walked out and to his car.
"But what?"
"Your little brother is smaller than we had expected him to be because he's technically a premature baby even though he weighs enough. He's doing fine, but to be on the safe side, the doctor would like to keep him there a little longer than they usually keep newborns."
"Oh." I said, caught in a rainstorm of different feelings and thoughts. A part of me hoped he staved there forever, but
a
larger part of me felt very sad for Mommy and for Miguel.
"Naturally, your mother is concerned. so I thought it would be very good for you to visit, see little Claude, and tell her how beautiful he is," Miguel said. 'I'm sure you understand," he added.
I
nodded. but I also always believed Mommy could tell if I was not sincere about something. Even my father believed she had a second set of eyes that slipped in front of her regular eyes and pierced through any mask of deception.
"She ought to work for the CIA." he quipped on more than one occasion.
When we arrived at the hospital, we did as Miguel wanted and went to see little Claude first. He was in a bassinet that looked like it was built for a baby ten times his size. I couldn't believe how small he was and that this tiny creature in that miniature form was a full human being related to me. His head looked no bigger than an apple, and his hands and feet were so doll-like,
I
couldn't help doubting he was real. He was crying with such intensity, his face was actually the hue of a ripe apple. Despite his being only hours old, his skin around his tiny wrists and even under his eyes and his neck resembled skin wrinkled with age.
I
saw nothing beautiful about him and was actually happy about that. How could they make such a fuss over something like him?
"Isn't he remarkable?" Miguel asked, standing beside me and looking through the window.
"Yes,"
I
said "But you're right... he's so tiny."
"But he'll crow fast. In a few weeks you won't believe you're looking at the same child." he assured me. ''He has my hair, although not much of it yet, huh?"
"Dipped in ink." I said. and Miguel laughed, When I was little, it was something he used to tell me about his hair and his beard.
"Right, right. Well, let's go see your mother," he said. and
I
followed him to her room.
Maybe I had a second set of eyes. too, because it only took one glimpse of her to know she was wading about in a pool of worry.
"Did you see him?" she asked almost before I stepped through the door.
"Yes. He's so tiny, but he has Miguel's hair." I said quickly. Miguel laughed, but Mommy held her expression of deep concern.
"I did every
^-
thing I was supposed to do. I ate right. I don't smoke. and I didn't even have a glass of wine for nearly nine months. Those vitamins," she told Miguel. "we should have them analyzed. Vitamins and health foods are not inspected and analyzed by the government. Maybe they weren't what they were advertised to be."
"It's not the vitamins," Miguel said softly, closing and opening his eyes. It makes no sense to flail about searching for some demon, Willow. You gave birth and that's it. He'll be fine. The doctor assures us."
She raised her eyebrows and looked at him with the face
I
knew my real father hated, the face that made a liar, a dreamer, a procrastinator swallow back his or her words. Miguel called her "lie-proof."
"Fibs and exaggerations bounce off and come back at the people who send them in her direction." Miguel told me often, leading rue to think he was trying to warn me never to attempt to deceive her.
He raised his arms. "What?" he cried.
"They don't keep a baby as long as he wants to keep Claude under observation. Miguel. Too early is too early. Please. You're not talking to an idiot."
"All right, all right. Still, it will be fine. You will see."
"I hope so." she said and turned to me and finally smiled, "He is beautiful, though, isn't he. Hannah?"
"Uh-huh," I said even though my idea of a beautiful baby were the babies
I
saw in television commercials.
"You finally have a little brother, When
I
was growing up.
I
longed so for a sister or a brother. Most of my friends had one or the other, and even though they were always teasing or arguing with each other.
I
knew they at least had someone, had family. I'm sorry we waited so long to give you a sibling, honey. But you will be older and wiser and almost a second mother to him."
"When he's my age. I'll be thirty-four." I said. "I'll probably have my own children by then."
"Yes." she said. "But he will love having nieces and nephews, too. You'll see. If I've learned anything from marrying Miguel, it's how important and wonderful family can be. You'll see." she promised.
"I was thinking I would run back to the college and attend that faculty union meeting. It's important." Miguel said. "I should only be an hour or so."
"It's fine. Miguel. Hannah can stay a while with me." "You're not tired?"
"I'll doze on and off. I imagine, but I wouldn't mind the company, if you wouldn't mind staying a while. Hannah.
^-
"No. I want to stay," I said quickly.
"Fine, then." Miguel said. He walked to the door, turned, and raised his shoulders and puffed out his proud father's chest.I'll be back." he added. pretending to be Arnold Schwarzenegger,
Both Mother and
I
laughed at his poor imitation, and then he left.
"Are you going to have Miguel bring Uncle Linden here to see him?" I asked her.
"No. I think it would be better if we just waited until we bring Claude home, Then we'll either have Linden over or take the baby there."
"Why? He can come out and go places." I said sharply. "We take him to restaurants, don't we? Why can't we bring him to a maternity ward?"
She scrunched her nose like she had just sipped some sour milk.
"I don't think it's a good idea to bring him to hospitals of any kind. Hannah. He doesn't feel good about that. Too many unhappy and unpleasant memories from his time in clinics and such. Why do that to him?" she asked.
"We leave him out of too many things," I complained. She smiled. "He's not being left out."
"Yes, he is," I insisted.
No one stands up for Linden like you do. Hannah. That's very nice."
"He doesn't have anyone but us," I said. "He's not related to Miguel and you're very busy. He's always saying you don't visit him as much as you used to visit him."
She shook her head. "He doesn't remember when I do.'' "Yes, he does." I insisted.
"All right, honey, all right. Don't get yourself so upset about it. We won't leave Uncle Linden out of anything. I promise."
"I don't know why he's still in that place. He paints beautiful things. People buy them! He doesn't bother anyone. Why don't we just have him came home and live with us? Our house is certainly big enough, even with a new baby. We have rooms that have been shut up for as long as I can remember."
He does well where he is. Hannah. Everything is organized for him, and he doesn't have to be reminded of bad memories, memories that made him sick."
"You have said that often before. Mommy, but
I
still don't understand what that means. What bad memories? What's in our house that would remind him of them anyway?"
She closed her eyes and let her head sink back on the pillow. The nurse came in to check her blood pressure and see how she was doing. Mommy introduced me to her. and I could see by the expression an her face that she was surprised my mother had a child as old as I was. Anyone looking at the two of us could see that I was really her daughter, too. She hadn't married Miguel and inherited me. We had the same nose and mouth.
My eyes were my father's blue, but my hair was Mommy's light brunette shade. I had a slightly darker complexion. I was about an inch or so taller than she was, and I had a fuller figure. Some of my girlfriends were jealous of that. but I always wished
I
was more diminutive even though they thought I would be more attractive to most boys.
I've had boyfriends on and off since the ninth grade, but no one I would drool over or suffer heartbreak over when we went our separate ways, no one until this year. His name was Heyden Reynolds, and he was a new student in our school and very much a loner. Massy said he was weird and blamed it an his having a mother whose family came from Haiti and a father who was white and from New Orleans, His father was a musician with a jazz band and traveled a great deal. He had a fourteen-year-old sister. Elisha, who attended a regular public school, but being he was a talented songwriter and guitar player, Heyden came to our magnet school when he moved to West Palm Beach. He came every day on an old moped that other students teased him about, but he didn't seem to care.
I had spoken to him only a few times. but I sang with him once in vocal class, and the way he looked at me afterward made me tingle inside. I thought he was handsome with his caramel complexion and his dark, curly hair, strong mouth, and black pearl eyes. He was lean and tall like Miguel. I didn't find him weird because of his standoffish manner. I found him mysterious and a lot more interesting than the other boys in the school.
As soon as the nurse left Mommy's room. Mommy turned back to me. I didn't think she was going to say anything more about Uncle Linden. She never liked to talk about him all that much, especially with me, but she surprised me.
"Your uncle Linden has a hate-love relationship with Joya del Mar. Hannah. When you were little, we brought him around often, but he literally trembled as we drove through the gates each and every time."
"Why?" I asked. intrigued. She had never told me anything like this.
You know he and my mother used to live in the beach house after my mother's stepfather practically bankrupted my grandmother Jackie Lee. It was difficult and sad for Linden to be forced to move out of his home and live in an apartment under the help's quarters.
It
made him bitter and he resented the Eatons."
"But you brought them back to the main house and paid off the debts. You fixed everything," I said.
She started to smile and stopped.
"Fixed," she said as if it pained her tongue. "Hardly that. Hannah. It was true that thanks to my father.
I
had inherited enough money and property to bail out my mother and Linden from their debts and make it possible for all of us to return to the main house. but
I
was also a foolish, impressionable young girl who allowed your father to charm and beguile me with his elegance and his promises. Even with your uncle Linden's mental turmoil and difficulties, he was wiser about your father than I was. I should have listened to him."
"If he was so wise and you were becoming a psychologist, why did he end up in a mental clinic?"
She took a deep breath. Was I being selfish by making her talk when she was tired and weak from giving birth? I couldn't help it. It was as if she were finally opening a door to a secret room, a room I had wanted to peer inside all my life.
"You know that his father. Kirby Scott, seduced and performed what amounted to rape of mine and Linden's mother, Linden had a very difficult and confused upbringing. For a while he was given to believe my grandmother was actually his mother.
It
was an attempt to sweep the disgrace under a rug. When he learned the truth about himself, it triggered his manic-depressive condition. He lived on the darkest edges of the world he envisioned. Right from the beginning Mother and he were not treated nicely by the people here. They made him feel freakish, and because of that, he became even more introverted.
"It became very serious after our mother died. He wanted to shut us both up and shut out the world outside our gates. He had something of a nervous breakdown aver it, in fact. So you can see why our home is not the happiest of places for him to be. Hannah."
She smiled.
You can see it in his art. The work he is doing at the residency is brighter, happier than the work he did here. Right?"
I
nodded.
"I
wish, then, that we could sell Soya del Mar and find another place, one where he would be happier."'
"I don't know if that would solve all his problems, honey." she said.
I
sensed that there was more to see and know in this dark shut-up room, but she didn't look like she was going to tell it all to me.
"When I get married and move away, I'll make sure I have a home big enough for him. too," I vowed.
"Maybe you will" Mommy said smiling. She closed her eyes again, "Claude is beautiful." she muttered, "isn't he. Hannah? I hope and pray he'll be all right. You pray, too, sweetheart, pray for your little brother."
I
watched her drift off right in front of my eyes. Her breathing became soft and regular. For a few moments I sat there, pouting, and then
I
rose and went back to the nursery to look through the window at my new brother, at the little being who could bring so much joy to my mother and Miguel simply by appearing.
Looking at Claude caused me to wonder about Uncle Linden, born secretly in that beach house, barely knowing his mother before she was sent
to
my grandfather's clinic. Do babies sense the separation, long for their mothers without even realizing what it is that makes them feel so lost? Was Uncle Linden terrified at night when he cried and was comforted not by his mother, but by his Grandmother?
Something made little Claude shudder, and then a moment later he waved his arms and small fists wildly, screaming. No one seemed to notice. I looked about frantically until finally I saw a nurse go to him. She held him for a moment. but that didn't stop his crying. His face looked even redder, and I thought.
Do something before he chokes to death on his own tears.