Sing for Me (5 page)

THREE

S
o this is what they mean by the morning after.

Not that I drank more than an accidental gulp of that gimlet. But I can barely keep my head up, for the weight of it. I didn’t get a few hours of sleep. I got none. By the time I’d shed my magical dress in the backseat of Rob’s car, and changed back into my everyday wear (leaving the dress, purse, and makeup in Rob’s safekeeping), snuck through the alley and up the fire escape, climbed through the bedroom window, and settled down by my sleeping sister, I was wide awake. I couldn’t even keep my eyes closed. Now it’s seven in the morning, and I’m so weary my bones ache.

“Tuesday,” Rob said as I got out of his car. “You’ll audition, and then we’ll stay and hear the Chess Men play. You just have to sneak out. I’ll be waiting right here to take you.”

“No,” I said.

But I want yes. Not yes to any old audition. (Never mind the money I could earn. Never mind it.) Just the ability to listen to the Chess Men’s music again. I want yes to that.

Instead, I’ve got this. The morning after and Sophy in the bath, the water already cold, and me sitting beside the tub, bathing my sister, keeping her safe like I should.

Sophy sighs, happy to be here, happy to be with me, happy to
be
, and my heart aches, remembering who she is, who I am, who we are together. I take a deep breath, my inhalation mirroring her inhalation, as if we’re one being, as sometimes I believe we are. I force a smile, because a smile makes everything feel better, I’ve been told. Never mind music or what I want. I’m holding Sophy the way I do, the way I have to. I’m keeping her safe like I should, like I should have last night, when I was nowhere near.

“Sing.”

Sophy’s voice startles me, which startles her. She twists in my arms. I hold her tight to help her settle down. Mostly this works. It works now. She settles down. The water ripples around her. If I weren’t tired to the bone, this moment might be peaceful.

“Sing,” she says again, not quite clearly, never quite clearly, but I understand her. I understand my sister better than I understand anyone, better than I understand myself. Better, yes. Sophy often seems like the better part of me.

“Sing.”

Sometimes
she seems like the better part of me, the girl I should aspire to be—like someone in a Bible story, a child whom Jesus didn’t choose to heal, for there must have been those children in the crowds, reaching for the hem of His garment, never quite touching. Mustn’t there?
Why Sophy?
I want to ask, and sometimes I do.
Why not me?
The better to teach us on this earth. (That’s how Mother sees it; Dad has no answers.) The
better to show us the way. Which Sophy does most of the time. Mostly she’s that kind of girl.

“Rose! Sing!”

But sometimes, like right now, Sophy is just a typical kid, wanting her way.

“Patience,” I mutter to her, to myself.

Impatient, Sophy chops the water with her hands until her breasts bob on the scummy surface. At fourteen, she has bigger breasts than me at twenty-one. She could be mistaken for a calendar girl (God forgive me). If her shoulders didn’t curve in so. If her spine didn’t twist. If she didn’t have cerebral palsy. If she wasn’t an invalid from birth.

God forgive me.

“Sing!”

Once in a blue moon, Sophy’s able to say more than one word at a time; once in the bluest moon of all, she stutters out a sentence. But usually not when she’s whining.

Blue moon

You saw me standing . . .

The man who knows my name. Last night he saw me just like that.

“We’re not going anywhere,” I say to my sister. “We’ve got plenty of time for a song.”

Sophy jerks her narrow, lathered head, insisting. “Now!”

“I’ll sing, for the love of heaven. Just give me a minute, before soap gets in your eyes.”

“Sin!” Sophy catches her breath and tries again. “Rose! Sing!”

Sophy thrashes. She could drown herself, she’s that strong,
flinging herself about, all because she said the wrong word—the very wrong one.
Sin
. And because in this moment, as in nearly every moment of her life, her desires are frustrated, her wishes out of her reach.

“It’s all right.” I blink water from my eyes, hold my sister tighter yet. I’m drenched. I might as well have gotten into the tub with her.
Not her fault, not her fault
. “It’ll be all right, sweetheart.”

But Sophy jabs her elbow into my jaw. She scratches my arms (time to trim her nails), and it’s not all right—not at all. And it could get worse. Now that’s she’s been roused there’s risk of a full-blown seizure.

I lock hold around her chest and she howls.

“Hurts, Rose!”

She goes quiet then; the fit passed as quickly as it came. We’re breathing hard, in perfect time. The water is even murkier than before.

“Ouch,” Sophy whimpers.

“You’re fine.” I sound snappish. I’m not, though. I’m not angry. I’m just anxious, fearful for her health, her survival.

But her breathing is slowing to normal. That’s a good sign.

I study her skin. I’m always checking, afraid of hurting her, trying to help. But I’m the one who’s scratched and bruised now, not her. All that’s different now about Sophy is that she’s tired, exhausted. And her middle looks puffier than usual. Usually her belly dips down, a shallow bowl between her sharp hipbones. She must have taken food when Mother fed her breakfast.

“You’re fine, Sophy. See? I told you it’d be all right.”

Just look at the water slicking the floor, the small white tiles
fairly gleaming in the sunlight. I can’t let go of her to wipe it up. One of us will probably fall, struggling out of the tub.

“Sing.”

I have to laugh. She never gives up, this one. Laughing, I grope for the empty jelly jar on the floor, dip the jar into the bathwater, tip back Sophy’s head, and begin to rinse her hair.

I sing:

Shall we gather at the river,

Where bright angels’ feet have trod?

When I’m singing, and Sophy is calm, I can rinse her hair with my eyes closed—the task is that familiar. So I rest my tired eyes.

Shall we gather at the river,

That flows by the throne of God?

I was eight and Sophy was barely one the first time I bathed her. We were still living in northern Wisconsin then, outside the little town of Luck. This was on Aunt Astrid’s farm, before our move to the fancy suburb bordering Chicago, and our house there, with its indoor plumbing, electricity, stained-glass windows, heavy oak trim, butler’s pantry, two staircases, and five bedrooms, so that everyone, even Mother and Dad, could sleep alone. This was before the Crash and the hanging-on, until the hanging-on left us hung out to dry.

This was before, in the quiet heart of the country.

Mother boiled water on Aunt Astrid’s monstrous stove, then poured the water into a dented tin washtub. I don’t remember
testing the temperature, or wet heat on my skin. I only remember skinny little Sophy descending through the steam, and me steadying her as she entered the water. And Dad hollering, in the mix of Danish and English he spoke at that time, and still sometimes does, when he’s in a rage: “Tekla! Have you lost your mind?”

Mother took a long look at me. Her eyes were weary, her arms hung limply at her sides. She looked at me, for the first time, as if I were more comrade than daughter.

“Quiet yourself, Jacob,” she said. “Rose is able. She’s her sister’s keeper.”

Mother smiled at me in that special way she used to smile all the time before Sophy was born. Maybe being able would earn me more smiles, I thought, as Mother left the room. “Back soon,” she assured me at the door, nearly giddy, this little breather like a holiday. I held on to Sophy. Held on and on. Able felt scary, alone with my sister.

Then one-year-old Sophy tried to tilt her face toward me. She tried to smile. I tried to smile back, and in spite of my fear, in spite of the past and my terrible mistake, in spite of myself, I began to sing. I sang “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” “My Bonnie Lies over the Ocean,” and “Shall We Gather at the River.” I made my baby sister laugh, rocking her in time in my arms. Singing, I made her happy.

I open my eyes. She’s happy now.

“All done.” I squeeze water from the ends of her hair. Her beautiful hair, white as cotton, glossy and fine as milkweed when dry, goes silvery, wet. She rests her head against my arm. Her eyelashes spread like fans over the dark circles under her eyes. She must have had another restless night, haunted by dreams
and a bed sore we can’t seem to heal. Maybe she was haunted by my absence, too. I pray—oh, I pray—that my night out had nothing to do with her disrupted sleep. I stroke her narrow head, wipe away the drops of water that trickle down her face, her delicate features. Yes, she is an invalid, palsied. But right now, and at other moments like this, when she’s not grimacing or having a fit, she’s also the most beautiful person I know.

A gift from God. A gift better by far than music. Better by far than the notes that cascaded from the piano keys last night. Better, far, far better, than his touch.

Sophy laughs like she can read my foolish thoughts. Sophy sounds like a bird when she laughs. She should have wings to fly away, I think, and then I think,
far, far away, away from me
, and I feel so bad.

“Girls?”

Mother peers around the bathroom door. Mother hasn’t had a bath herself for several days. She hasn’t taken the time. And she’s been saving the little warm water there is for us. Her bobbed hair hangs lankly against her strong jaw. Her hair is usually the same brilliant white-blond as Sophy’s, but you wouldn’t know it today; it’s that dark with grease and sweat. Sweat stains the neck of her blue dress, too, which droops on her frame. She’s been scrubbing the kitchen, ceiling to floor, cleaning as she’s done practically every day since we moved into this place. It’s as if she’s exorcising demons of misfortune or the downtrodden spirits of previous residents. And when she’s not working here, and I’m at home with Sophy, she’s working elsewhere for the Nygaards. Just look at her poor raw hands.

She comes into the bathroom. There’s so little room between the tub and the door, she has to ease herself in sideways. She
looks down at Sophy and me. Then her eyes—a stormier blue than Sophy’s—widen. Mother screams. The sound ricochets off tile and porcelain and bounces around the bath.

I cry out, too, for now I see what Mother sees. Blood, twisting like a red silk cord in the gray water.

Sophy is bleeding from some hidden place.

My sister whimpers. She sounds like a small animal caught in a trap, wounded and afraid. Mother and I go quiet at her bleating, remembering ourselves—who we are, and who we care for, and how we care. I tighten my hold on Sophy. She’s trembling. I’m not able to stop it.

“What’s all the noise?” Dad stands just outside the bathroom door. “Five minutes and I’m off to work. Can’t I have my coffee in peace?”

“Jacob.” Mother hurriedly drapes a towel over Sophy; the towel, instantly sodden, melds to her body. “Wait.”

“I’ll be late, Tekla.” Dad starts to retreat, but Mother grabs his arm and yanks him to a stop. Dad nearly slips—the water spread that far—but then he catches his balance. Dad always catches his balance. He’s a small man; the top of his balding head barely grazes Mother’s chin. He can move with the grace and agility of a cat when he wants to, which is most of the time, even when he’s carrying buckets of paint and plaster, or ladders and scaffolding, or Sophy.

Mother leans over and murmurs something in Dad’s ear.

“Bleeding?” Dad barely whispers the word, but I hear the horror in his voice. There’s panic in his eyes, which turns to blame when his gaze lands on me. I shrink down as if I can grow smaller, so small I disappear. Dad can sit Sophy on the toilet; he can wipe her bottom when she’s done. He’ll accept
Sophy under any condition—naked, dressed, fitful, messed. As for me . . . I’m not someone fragile that Dad cherishes. I’m just someone who takes up the little spare time and energy he has left.

“Hurts.” Sophy jams her fists into the towel across her belly. I catch her wrists to keep her from hurting herself more. Her breasts may be a woman’s, but her wrists are a little child’s. Whimpering, she pushes down against my hold, but I don’t let go, even as I understand. It’s like a message in the water.

Sophy’s time has come.

As never before, she’s going to need me.