“Gunfire. Hey, Sylvie, what’s up?”
“We’re not using your photos,” Sylvie said. “There’s no way to sugarcoat it. They’re not good enough.”
She couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. “Shit. You’ve got to be kidding me. I’m better on my worst day than most of the assholes you use.”
“These are worse than your worst day, kiddo. What’s going on?”
Nina pushed the hair out of her eyes. She hadn’t had a haircut in weeks, and her hair was so dirty that when she pushed it aside, it stayed. The water in her hotel—in the whole block—had been out for days. Ever since the fighting had escalated. “I don’t know, Sylvie,” she finally said.
“You shouldn’t have gone back to work so quickly. I know how much you loved your father. Is there anything I can do to help?”
“Getting the cover always makes me feel better.”
Sylvie’s silence said it all. “A war zone is no place to grieve, Nina. Maybe you’ve lost your edge because there’s somewhere else you need to be.”
“Yeah. Well . . .”
“Good luck, Nina. I mean that.”
“Thanks,” she said, and hung up.
She looked around the dark, dingy room, feeling the echo of machine-gun fire along her spine, and she was tired of all of it. Exhausted. It was hardly surprising that her latest photos were crap. She was too tired to concentrate, and when she did finally fall asleep, dreams of her father invariably wakened her.
His last words nagged at her lately, the promise he’d elicited. Maybe that was her problem. Maybe that was why she couldn’t concentrate.
She’d failed to keep that promise.
No wonder she’d lost her mojo.
It was back in Belye Nochi, in the hands of a woman she’d promised to get to know.
In the first week of May—only a few days earlier than she’d planned—at just past seven in the morning, Nina drove into the Wenatchee Valley. The jagged Cascade Mountain Range was still covered in snow but everything else was dressed for spring.
At Belye Nochi, the orchard was in full bloom. Acres of apple trees boasted bright flowers. As she drove toward the house, she imagined her father there, walking proudly between the rows with a small, black-haired girl beside him, asking questions. Are they ready yet, Daddy? I’m hungry.
They’re ready when they’re ready, Neener Beaner. Sometimes you have to be patient.
She’d matured alongside those trees, learning along the way that she wasn’t patient, and that farming didn’t interest her; that her father’s life’s work would never be hers.
In the driveway, she pulled up in front of the garage and parked.
The orchard was alive with workers who moved through the trees, checking for bugs or rot or whatever it was they looked for.
Nina slung her camera bag over her shoulder and headed for the house. The yard was a vibrant green so bright it was almost hard to look at. All along the fence line and on either side of the walkway, white flowers grew in clumps.
At the house, she didn’t bother knocking. “Mom?” she called out, flipping on the entry way light and taking off her boots.
There was no answer.
She went into the kitchen.
The house smelled musty, vacant. Upstairs it was as quiet and empty as below.
Nina refused to feel disappointed. She knew when she’d decided to surprise Mom and Meredith that it might be a little dicey.
She went back out to the rental car and drove up the road toward her sister’s house. At the vee in the road, a truck came toward her.
She pulled over, waiting.
The truck slowed down and stopped beside her, and Jeff rolled down his window. “Hey, Neens. This is a surprise.”
“You know me, Jeff. I move like the wind. Where’s Mom?”
Jeff glanced in his rearview mirror as if someone were coming up on his tail.
“Jeff? What’s wrong?”
“Meredith didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
He finally looked at her. “She had no choice.”
“Jeff,” Nina said sharply. “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. Where is my mom?”
“Parkview.”
“The nursing home? Are you kidding me?”
“Don’t rush to conclusions, Nina. Meredith thought—”
Nina gunned the engine and spun the car around in the dirt and drove off. In less than twenty minutes she pulled into the nursing home’s gravel driveway and parked. She grabbed her heavy canvas camera bag off the passenger seat and marched across the parking lot and into the building.
Inside, the lobby was defiantly cheery and obscenely bright. Fluorescent bulbs stretched like glowworms along the beige ceiling. To the left was a waiting room—with primary-colored chairs and an old RCA television. Directly in front of her was a big wooden desk. Behind it, a woman with tightly permed hair talked animatedly on the phone, clacking her polka-dot fingernails on the fake wood surface of the desk.
“I mean it, Margene, she has really packed on the pounds—”
“Excuse me,” Nina said tightly. “I’m looking for Anya Whitson’s room. I’m her daughter.”
The receptionist paused long enough to say, “Room 146. To your left,” and then went back to her conversation.
Nina walked down the wide hallway. On either side of her were closed doors; the few that were open revealed small hospital-like rooms inhabited by elderly people in twin beds. She remembered when Aunt Dora had been here. They’d visited her every weekend, and Dad had hated every second. Death on the layaway plan, he used to say.
How could Meredith have done this? And how dare she not tell Nina about it?
By the time she reached room 146, Nina was in a rage. It felt good; it was the first real fire she’d felt since Dad’s death. She knocked sharply.
A voice said, “Come in,” and she opened the door.
Her mother sat in an unattractive plaid recliner, knitting. Her white hair was unkempt and her clothes didn’t match, but her blue eyes were bright. At Nina’s entrance, she looked up.
“Why the hell are you here?” Nina said.
“Language, Nina,” her mother said.
“You should be at home.”
“You think so? Without your father?”
The reminder was delivered softly, like a drop of acid. Nina moved forward woodenly, feeling her mother’s gaze on her. She saw the recreated Holy Corner set up on an old oak dresser.
Behind her, the door opened again and her sister walked into the small room, carrying a tote bag bulging over with Tupperware containers.
“Nina,” she said, coming up short. Meredith looked flawless, as usual, her chestnut hair styled in a classic bob. She was wearing crisp black pants and a pink shirt that was tucked in at the waist. Her pale face was expertly made up, but even so, she looked tired. And she’d lost too much weight.
Nina turned on her. “How could you do this? Was it easier to just dump her here?”
“Her ankle—”
“Who gives a shit about her ankle? You know Dad would hate this,” Nina said sharply.
“How dare you?” Meredith said, her cheeks flushing with anger. “I’m the one who—”
“Stop it,” Mom hissed. “What is wrong with you two?”
“She’s an idiot,” Meredith responded. Ignoring Nina completely, she moved toward the table, where she set down a big grocery bag. “I brought you some cabbage pierogies and okroshka, Mom. And Tabitha sent you some new yarn. It’s in the bottom of the bag, along with a pattern she thought you’d like. I’ll be back again after work. As usual.”
Mom nodded, but said nothing.
Meredith left without another word, shutting the door firmly behind her.
Nina hesitated a moment and then followed. Out in the hallway, she saw Meredith hurrying away; her heels clattered on the linoleum floor. “Meredith!”
Her sister flipped her off and kept going.
Nina went back into the pathetic little room with its twin bed and its ugly recliner and its battered wood dresser. Only the Russian icons and candle gave a hint about the woman who lived here. The woman whom Dad had thought was so broken . . . and whom he’d loved.
“Come on, Mom. You’re getting the hell out of here. I’m taking you home.”
“You?”
“Yeah,” Nina said firmly. “Me.”
“That bitch. How could she say those things to me? And especially in front of Mom?” Meredith was in the small, cramped office from which her husband oversaw the newspaper’s city beat. Not that there was much city, or much beat, either. A stack of paper by his computer reminded her that he’d been working hard on his novel. The one she hadn’t yet found time to read.
She continued pacing, chewing her thumbnail until it hurt.
“You should have told her the truth. I told you that.”
“This is not the time for I-told-you-so’s.”
“But you talked to her, what? Two or three times since you put your mom in Parkview? Of course Nina’s pissed. You would be, too.” He leaned back in his chair. “Let Nina spend time with her. By tomorrow night, she’ll understand why you made the choice you did. Your mom will dish up a big pile of crazy and Nina will fall all over herself to apologize.”
Meredith stopped pacing. “You think?”
“I know. You didn’t stick your mom there because it was hard on you to care for her, although it was. You put her there to keep her safe. Remember?”
“Yeah,” she said, wishing she felt stronger about it. “But she’s been better in the nursing home. Even Jim said that. No walking in the snow barefooted or peeling off wallpaper or cutting her fingers. She saved the good stuff for me.”
“Maybe she’s ready to come home, then,” he said, but she could tell that he wasn’t really engaged in the conversation anymore. Either he had something on his mind, or he’d heard it too many times. Probably the latter; she’d spent a lot of time in the last month worrying about her mother, and Jeff had heard it all. Actually, it was the only thing she could remember talking to him about lately.
“I’ve got to run,” he said. “Interview in twenty minutes.”
“Oh. Okay.”
She let him walk her out of the newspaper’s grungy, crowded office and to her car. She climbed into the driver’s seat and started the engine.
It wasn’t until she was at her desk, looking over the orchardists’ pruning report, that she realized Jeff hadn’t kissed her good-bye.
As she drove toward Belye Nochi, Nina glanced sideways at her mother, who sat in the passenger seat of the rental car, knitting.
They were in foreign terrain now, she and her mother. Their togetherness implied a kind of partnership, but such a connection had never before existed and Nina didn’t really believe that mere proximity could give rise to a new kind of relationship. “I should have stayed,” she said. “Made sure you were okay.”
“I hardly expected that from you,” her mother said.
Nina didn’t know if it was a put-down, with the emphasis on you, or a simple statement of fact. “Still . . .” She didn’t know what to say next. Once again, she was a kid, hovering in her mother’s orbit, waiting for something—a look, a nod, some gratitude or grief. Anything but the click click click of those needles.
