I have walked as slowly as possible up the switchback, but even at this pace I get there before I want to. I drag myself up the steps to Piper’s front door and push the bell. Willy One Arm answers with Molly on his shoulder. He makes the sign of the cross, his empty sleeve flapping in the breeze.
I follow Willy into the dark living room. The drapes are shut tight. No light shines anywhere. And the smell of sickness is all around like bandages and rotting fruit. I wonder why Willy can’t get rid of the smell. Men are no good at cleaning even with two arms, my mom says.
I don’t even begin to know what I’m going to say to Piper. And I’m a little annoyed with Mrs. Mattaman for sending me on this impossible mission. Why is it I’m the one everyone always decides can handle these things?
It’s the curse of niceness, I swear.
“What are you doing? Go away.” Piper’s voice comes from the shadowy stairwell where she sits, huddled on a step.
My hand forms a fist around a nickel shoved deep in my pocket. “Why don’t you come down to the canteen? I’ll buy you a pop,” I suggest.
“I heard it’s closed.”
“It is.”
“Then why’d you ask?”
“Bea Trixle will open the canteen.”
“Not if it’s closed.”
“For you she will-”
“Oh,” Piper says in a voice so small it sounds like somebody stepped on it.
I don’t know what to do with myself or what to say. Maybe I’ll just open my mouth and hope the right words come out.
“Piper, what’s your, um… What are they going to name the baby?”
Piper’s eyes are closed and she’s leaning back on the steps. I think she isn’t going to answer and then her eyelids flutter.
“It,” she whispers.
“Your parents are going to name the baby It?”
“I’m going to call him It.”
“It Williams. Were you thinking of a middle name?” I ask.
“Ee-It,” she says.
“It Ee-It Williams?”
“Yep, Idiot Williams.” Piper smiles, which feels to me like a small victory.
But now what do I say? “Mrs. Mattaman had Rocky and it all worked out okay.”
“Mrs. Mattaman didn’t get sick like this.”
“No,” I concede, “she didn’t.”
“I wanted
I put my arm around Piper. It feels like there’s no place for my arm on her shoulder. Why is it when you see this done in the movies, it looks so natural?
“The best, the very best I could hope for is…” Her voice breaks. “… a little sister like Theresa Mattaman. That is pretty bad.”
“C’mon, Piper. Theresa’s okay.”
“Theresa’s a brat.”
“You could do a whole lot worse than Theresa Mattaman.”
“Yeah.” She glares at me. “I could end up with a Natalie.”
“A Natalie?” I take my arm back. My teeth grind so hard I’m pulverizing them to dust in my mouth.
“What gives you the right to say something like that? I’m trying to be nice here and you just turn on me.”
Piper snorts. “You can’t even say you’re looking forward to her going back.”
“Because I’m not.”
“Yeah, you are. And so is your mom.”
“Shut up!” I shout.
“You’re not as nice as you pretend to be, you know.”
“I’m not pretending.” My voice squeezes out of my chest.
Piper is staring off in another direction, oblivious to how much she’s hurt me. “My dad wants a son.” Her voice is thick. “Why are boys so special anyway?”
“We can do more things.”
“Annie plays ball as well as you do.”
“No, she doesn’t.”
“Yes, she does. It’s not fair,” Piper says.
I snort. “Lots of things aren’t fair. Are you just now finding this out?” I ask, still stinging from her comment about Natalie.
“They should be. Everything should be fair,” she says, the tears spilling over. Her hands try to push them back, wipe them off, make them go away.
“Come on,” I tell her. I want to get away from this dark and silent house, away from the smell of sickness and away from Piper, but I know Mrs. Mattaman will have my head if I leave her here. “Let’s go down to the Mattamans’,” I suggest.
“They don’t like me.”
“They shouldn’t like you,” I say. “After what you did, they should hate your guts. But they don’t.”
“I don’t want to go.”
“Too bad,” I tell her.
She squints at me. I don’t think she’s going to move, but she does. She gets up and follows me out the door.
Mr. and Mrs. Mattaman are both in their kitchen doing dishes when Piper and I arrive. I swing through the door first. Piper, a few lengths behind me, walks slower and slower like she hopes never to reach their apartment.
For a second the shadow of something dark crosses Mrs. Mattaman’s face, but then it’s gone and she dries her hand on her apron and hurries out to where Piper is reluctantly wiping her feet on the Mattamans’ doormat.
She gathers Piper into her arms. Piper seems to crumble, like a log burned to the core. She folds into Mrs. Mattaman as if she’s been holding herself together until this very moment.
Mrs. Mattaman’s lips press together until they are almost purple. She cradles Piper between her two short arms and ushers her into the warm living room with its good baking smells.
On the couch Piper gasps for air. Mrs. Mattaman holds her while she cries.
It’s probably only a minute or two, but the sound is like nothing I’ve ever heard before.
“Now, now.” Mrs. Mattaman strokes Piper’s head gently and lovingly. Piper Williams, the girl who tried to get her husband fired.
Mr. Mattaman is in the living room now too. Piper’s face seems to crumble all over again when she sees him. She buries her head in Mrs. Mattaman’s lap. But then something inside of her forces her head up.
She grabs hold of her arms, wraps them around herself. Her eyes dart toward Mr. Mattaman. “You were never drunk,” she whispers, the sadness making her tongue too thick for her mouth. “I guess you know that.”
“Yes,” Mrs. Mattaman says softly. She has hold of Mr. Mattaman’s hand now too, as if the three of them are linked in something larger than themselves.
The tears flow across Piper’s face like water lapping against the dock. “I’m…” Piper is trying to say something else, but she can’t get the words out because her chest is heaving too hard. “Sorry,” she finally says as Theresa comes in, her hands on her hips, her mouth ready to burst.
“Theresa.” Mrs. Mattaman lets go of Piper and holds a hand out to Theresa. “Piper has apologized. We’ve forgiven her, haven’t we?”
Theresa looks from her mother to her father, both of whom are directing their chins up and down as if they are nodding for her. Theresa’s mouth opens to object, but the force of her parents’ will carries her head along. She nods in the same beat and time as they do.
Piper is curled up next to Mrs. Mattaman on the couch with Theresa on her other side. Piper puts her head on Mrs. Mattaman’s lap and falls fast asleep with Mrs. Mattaman’s hand on her hair.
31. THE WARDEN’S PARTY
Friday, September 13, 1935
It’s tense this week on the island. No one knows what’s happening with Piper’s mom, and the warden spends all of his time at the hospital. With Warden Williams gone, Associate Warden Chudley is in charge. But the warden has never left his post before, so Chudley has no idea how to handle the island without him. In the kitchen, I hear my dad and mom discussing this. “Can’t make a decision which shoe to put on first,” my dad tells my mom. “He shouldn’t be in charge. Let’s just hope nothing happens… ”
Luckily on Friday, when Jimmy and I get back from school, the warden is down at the dock. “A boy! It’s a boy!” he crows, handing out cigars to every man getting off the boat, no matter his rank. “I have a son! Walter, his name is Walter William Williams.” His voice full of joy, his big face beaming with delight, he looks like another person entirely.
“What happened with Piper’s mom?” Jimmy whispers.
“Beats me,” I say.
It’s not until Jimmy and I get to the Mattamans’ apartment that we find out the full story.
