The Peculiar Miracles of Antoinette Martin: A Novel (12 page)

“I used to dream about being you,” Lily said shyly. “Everything seemed easy for you. You were the one everyone liked. You had all the friends. You were the pretty one.”

“Everyone wants to be someone else sometimes,” Rose said, her voice sounding young and wistful. Then her tone transformed into that of a woman who knew the weight of sorrow: “I dream about staying right here. Having more time with my daughter.”

The anguish in Rose’s voice finally pulled Lily across the room. She sat next to her sister, so close that their knees touched.

“Are you scared?” Lily asked as she reached for her sister’s hand. It was so warm and real it seemed impossible that one day soon Rose’s heart would stop.

Rose twined her fingers through Lily’s and squeezed as if their linked fingers were enough to keep her in this world. “Terrified,” she said as the distance that had existed between them collapsed and they became sisters again.

ROSE’S JOURNAL

September 2005

THE OAK-LEAF HYDRANGEAS
surrounding the library playground are still blooming even though it’s late September. Lily has taken a few days off work and is visiting. She and I sit on a park bench across from the swings, while Antoinette twirls on a small patch of grass. The blades under her feet are green, but everywhere else, they’re brown. The summer has been hot and dry.

Antoinette stands on her toes and stretches her arms toward the sky. Other than the crook in her elbows and the way her head lolls back, she looks like any other child.

Except she looks younger. Antoinette is two and a half but looks half that age.

My heart clenches as I compare her to the other children on the playground. They hang on the swings and climb up the slide. All of them—even the babies—seem bigger than Antoinette.

Most of them speak.

A switch flipped when I became a mother. One day I didn’t worry about anything; the next, everything became a concern, a possible source of danger.

Most of all, I worry about leaving her. Who will take care of her when I’m gone?

“Does she always do that?” Lily asks, staring at Antoinette as she turns in circles.

I look at Antoinette and notice a clump of out-of-season daisies blooming at her feet. How did I miss them before? It’s a strange but beautiful picture.

“She likes to spin,” I say. I keep my voice casual, as if Antoinette’s constant movement doesn’t bother me. But it does. As a mother, I find that everything bothers me.

I sleepwalked through Antoinette’s first year. Suddenly, I was a single mother and a college dropout diagnosed with severe heart disease. The changes were overwhelming and I emotionally checked out. I wasn’t a
bad
mother, but I wasn’t the mother I wanted to be.

I hope I’m making up for that now.

Across the playground, a little boy laughs as he climbs the steps to the slide. He moves so easily I have to look away. Antoinette wears her body awkwardly, always on the verge of falling.

“How long will you be home?” I ask before anxiety claims me. Mom told me not to compare Antoinette to other children. Someday I’ll listen.

Lily’s visits have grown less frequent. After graduating early, she accepted a job as an actuary for a life insurance company in Cincinnati and bought a home on the Kentucky side of the Ohio River. When I asked why she moved, she said she needed a change of scenery. She didn’t mention the breakup with Seth at all.

“Just the weekend,” she says.

“Have you talked to S—”

She cuts me off. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

We both like to ignore our problems.

The sound of laughter sweeps over us. I look across the playground to see a group of preschoolers scrambling up the slide.

“Do you want to play with the other kids?” I ask Antoinette.

She doesn’t stop spinning, and I wonder if I should make her quit. No one else is turning in circles. I want to ask Lily what she thinks, but she’s watching Antoinette and counting.

“Rose,” Lily says, without looking at me. Her voice is so soft I almost miss it. “I think something’s wrong.” She nods toward Antoinette.

I follow her gaze. Antoinette has stopped spinning. Her head hangs to one side, and she flicks her fingers in front of her eyes. Her arms are bent at the elbows. She looks like a marionette.

Lily is giving voice to my own concerns, but I can’t listen. If I do, my fears will become so big that they’ll swallow me. My chest burns as I stand. “I need to get Antoinette home. Nothing’s wrong with her.” If I say it enough, maybe I’ll believe it.

Eli and MaryBeth Cantwell come out of the library when we’re almost at the car. MaryBeth sees us and waves. She is solid, like Mom.

“How’s my favorite girl?” MaryBeth asks as she kneels in front of Antoinette. A strand of Antoinette’s hair hangs in her face, and MaryBeth gently tucks it behind her ear. I try to focus on the joy in Antoinette’s face instead of the pressure building in my chest.

“She’s getting big.” When MaryBeth looks up, I see longing in her face. I hurt for her. If anyone should have had children, it’s MaryBeth.

“You think so?” I ask. “She seems small to me.”

“You see her every day,” Eli says. “Trust me, she’s growing like a weed.” He stands behind his wife and puts a hand on her shoulder. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them apart.

Eli pulls a bunch of wrapped hand-pulled taffy from his pocket. “We’re trying something new at the bakery. Let us know what you think. You too, Lily. Are you home to stay this time?”

“Not yet,” Lily says as she accepts the taffy. She is easy around the Cantwells. We’ve known them since we were little and they were newly married. “But if I can’t find a decent bakery in Cincinnati, I might have to move back.”

“Sooner rather than later,” MaryBeth says. She sits on the sidewalk and pats her lap. Antoinette plops down and flaps her hands.

My heart squeezes the air from my lungs. The flapping is another strange thing Antoinette does.

MaryBeth laughs and waves her hands. “Are we birds?” she asks.

And just like that, my heart is lighter. Make-believe. How had I missed it? The pressure in my chest eases, and I fill my lungs with air. I forget Lily’s concerns. I forget my own. I watch my daughter without fear, and for the first time I think we might be okay.

LATER THAT NIGHT,
when the sky seems low enough to touch, I sit on the porch swing with Mom. Antoinette sits at my feet, waving her hands in front of her eyes.

The peace I felt earlier vanishes, and an image flashes through my mind: Lily in second grade, sitting on the edge of the school playground, counting blades of grass while everyone else whirled around her.

“Are Dad and Lily still out there?” I ask Mom. I know the answer. The hills around the farm are draped in red and gold; they’ll be digging up dahlias until the sky is black.

After we got home, Lily disappeared into the fields. I haven’t seen her since. She’s different. Distant. Losing Seth changed her. She never trusted easily, but now it’s like she’s built a wall around herself.

Antoinette stops waving her hands in front of her face. She stares out over the fields as if counting the blades of grass. “Pretty, isn’t it?” I say.

As usual, she doesn’t answer.

“Antoinette.” I tap her shoulder, but she ignores me and starts rocking. The uneasy feeling I had at the playground comes back.

“Mom,” I say, trying to sound casual. “When did I start talking?” The books I’ve read say Antoinette should be talking by now.

My mother looks up at the porch roof. The white paint is flaking. She sighs. “One more thing to do.” She closes her eyes, then says, “You were an early talker. You said your first word at nine months and never stopped.”

I can’t breathe. Antoinette is thirty months old.

“Lily was a different story,” Mom says. “When she was four, her pediatrician thought something was wrong because she wasn’t talking yet.
Mental retardation
, he said. He sounded like he was talking about a dog, not my daughter.”

Lily is the smartest person I know. Different, but brilliant. Hearing the doctor’s words makes me angry. Lily might have a few quirks, but nothing is wrong with her. That’s the thing about being sisters. We fight, but love always wins in the end.

“I never went back there,” Mom says. “Lily started talking in complete sentences a few months later.” She pats my knee and smiles. “Antoinette will talk when she wants to. And if she doesn’t . . . well, we’ll love her anyway.”

I try to nod, but I’m drowning. The air is too thick. I gasp, trying to force my lungs open. Then I feel a small hand around my ankle. My daughter, who doesn’t even babble, starts humming. I’m so shocked, I forget my panic.

Her voice is clear as a glass bell. I am lost in her sound, and the pressure in my chest eases. I stare at her until her voice trails off.

Then her hand loosens. Her eyes gently close.

And I realize how much love feels like falling.

Chapter Eight

The sisters sat folded together on the couch for so long that Rose fell asleep with her head against Lily’s shoulder. Lily leaned down, pressed her nose to Rose’s thin blonde hair, and breathed in her scent. It was the same after all these years: peaches and warm soil.

Once, when they were girls, Lily had told Rose this was how she smelled. Rose put her nose to her arm and sniffed. “I don’t smell like dirt,” she said. Then she stomped out of the room before Lily could explain that the scent of freshly tilled soil made her feel safe.

Family legend had it that Rose was born perfect. She didn’t look wrinkly like other babies. Her skin was smooth, and her eyes morning-glory blue, as if she knew from the beginning she was special and wanted the world to know it too.

Lily never saw Rose in that perfect baby stage, but their mother told the story of Rose’s birth so often that Lily could recite it by the time she was four.

“What about my story?” Lily had asked once, sitting at the kitchen table while her mother pounded out biscuit dough.

“What story?” her mother said.

“You know,” Lily said, impatiently kicking her feet against the rungs of the chair. “The story of when I was born.” This was where she would find out why she was different. Why she felt like the world spun wild around her, and she needed to hold on tight.

Her mother shrugged. “Not much to tell. You were an easy baby. Three little pushes and you slid right out. No fuss at all.”

That wasn’t what Lily wanted to know. “But what did I
look
like?” She pictured herself as a baby. Maybe her fists were clenched so tight her mother had to pry them open.

“Look like?” her mother said, only half listening as she pounded the dough, sending puffs of flour into the air.

“You know,” Lily said. “Rose had pale blue eyes like she just came from heaven. What about me?” She held her breath.

Her mother went to the sink and rinsed her hands. “I’m busy, Lily. You’ve seen your baby pictures. You know what you looked like. Go on outside and play.” She dried her hands against her frayed apron and went back to work.

Lily had seen her baby pictures, and unlike Rose, she
did
have wrinkly skin and black baby eyes. There was nothing in those pictures that explained her fear that gravity was not enough to keep her from floating away.

Rose shifted in her sleep, drawing Lily back to the present. Her sister had welcomed her home, but Lily felt like the bond between them was tenuous, as if they were held together by spider’s silk.

She slid out from under Rose and went into the kitchen. Here everything was the same—yet different. The white cabinets. The blue tile backsplash. The bleached oak floor. That was the kitchen Lily remembered from childhood, but small things were off. The canisters where her mother stored lavender and flour weren’t to the right of the sink anymore. Now they were on the opposite end of the counter—all the way down by the refrigerator. The speckled ceramic container that sat beside the stove holding spatulas and wooden spoons was gone. The braided rag rug that lay in front of the sink was also missing. These small changes made Lily feel off balance, and she was overwhelmed by homesickness. She was a guest in her own home.