Edward's Eyes (4 page)

The hospital lights
were dimmed, and patients were asleep. Nurses moved down the hallways on rubber-soled shoes. No one cared that we were there in the middle of the night. The nurses acted as if children arrived every night, very late, to eat chips and drink cold soda out of machines and nap on tan couches.

No one said:

“You're too young to be here.”

“Visiting hours are over.”

“Who are you?”

“Go away.”

“That is not allowed.”

The nurse on duty told us that Maeve was
in the delivery room. The nurse's name tag said Angela Garden. She had long red curly hair, caught back in a barrette. Wisps of her hair fell down, touching her neck and her cheek.

“Does your father know you're here?” Angela asked with a smile. “And that you arrived very dramatically in a police car? I saw out the window.”

We grinned at her, and she found us blankets and made us lie down.

“It could be hours,” she said.

“It won't,” said Edward. “It will be soon.”

“Oh?”

Angela looked at me.

I shook my head.

“Don't ask me how he knows. He just knows,” I said.

Angela looked at Edward.

“Some people just know things,” she said thoughtfully.

Suddenly, she leaned over and kissed Edward, then me.

Edward smiled. I smiled, too.

Then Jack plunged out through the swinging doors and hugged us both.

“It's the middle of the night. How did you get here?” he asked.

“In a pumpkin coach,” said Angela, “drawn by six white horses.”

“I believe it,” said Jack.

“We were walking. Tom picked us up,” I said.

“Siren?” asked Jack.

“Lights!” said Edward happily.

“You know, I'm glad you're here,” said Jack. “I usually don't have much company when a baby is born.”

“There's always me,” said Angela.

“Oh yes, there's always Angela,” said Jack with a smile.

A nurse opened the door.

“Jack?”

“Oops, have to go. Later!” said Jack.

“Soon,” said Edward. “You'll see us soon.”

And as it turned out he was, Edward was, right again.

 

Edward was sleeping. I must have been sleeping, too, because all of a sudden there was a shadow over me. I opened my eyes. Angela. Jack stood beside her, the smallest thing in his arms, wrapped in a blanket.

“Edward.”

I whispered his name. But Edward sat up as if I had yelled to him.

Jack sat down on the couch.

“I think you know already who this is,” he said.

The baby was dressed in white, a small white knitted hat on her head.
Her?

“Sabine,” said Edward.

“Sabine,” said Jack.

Edward smiled.

“We'll buy her red poppies,” he said. “Sabine will love red poppies.”

“I think it's Edward who loves red poppies,” said Angela Garden.

And when Jack handed Sabine to Edward my throat felt tight. I remembered that day when I was three years old and Maeve had put Edward into my arms. Edward touched Sabine's face. And I didn't realize until Angela Garden put her arms around me that I was crying.

 

Night is almost over when Jack drives us home from the hospital. After we have said good-bye to Maeve and Angela Garden. After Edward has hummed “O Canada” to Sabine many times. Once, during that time, she opens her eyes and looks at Edward. Her eyes remind me of Edward's, not so blue as his, but as sharp and steady.

Jack turns into our driveway and parks the car. Early light touches the water.

And because Edward has asked for it, Jack walks down to the water. There is a whoosh of noise and a rocket shoots up above us all. A shower of sparks fills the
sky. Fireworks. Sola, Wren and Will come running out of the house.

“Sabine is here!” calls Edward. “And she is more beautiful than any of us!”

Sabine was noisy and funny.
She liked music. Emmylou Harris excited her, and James Taylor. She waved her arms in a wild way when Carly Simon sang. She calmed, though, when Edward hummed “O Canada” to her. He hummed it softly and slowly, like a hymn. Sabine's eyes widened when she saw Edward.

“When will she smile?” asked Edward.

“She's too young,” said Maeve. “But she'll do it one day. Don't worry.”

“Do you think I could take a year off from school?” asked Edward very seriously. “So I could spend more time with her?”

Maeve was just as serious.

“No, Edward. That's not your job. Your job is to get educated. My job is to take care of Sabine.”

“I like your job better,” said Edward.

But it turned out that we all got more time with Sabine.

There was a huge water leak at our school. It would take a month or more to repair the fallen ceilings, the walls, the buckled floors. And to repair the pipes.

“A month more with Sabine,” said Edward happily. “We will have baseball games when we can,” he told her. “It's warm enough during the day. Baseball,” he intoned loudly.

“She may be a baby, Edward. But she can hear you,” said Sola grumpily.

“At least
you
can go to school,” Maeve said to Sola.

Sola shrugged her shoulders.

“We'll do something fun every single day,” said Jack. “I promise.”

“Jack, Sabine needs a diaper change, I think,” said Maeve. “Would you?”

“I'll do it!” cried Edward. “She likes it when I change her. We count her toes in French. Un, deux, trois…”

Wren rolled her eyes and Will counted with Edward.

“…quatre, cinq, six, sept.”

Edward grinned and plucked a diaper from a pile on the counter.

As he left, we all called after him:

“Huit, neuf, dix, onze…!”

 

We had baseball games because it was very warm for the fall. Sabine would sit on Albert Groom's lap as Edward called out his pitches to her from the pitcher's mound.

“Knuckleball!”

“Slider.”

“Change up.”

“That's a very bad habit, Edward,” said Albert,
Sabine on his lap, looking at all that was in front of her: baseball, seawater, Weezer, and her favorite Edward.

“I won't do that when I pitch in the big leagues,” called Edward, making Albert and Trick laugh.

“No, you won't,” said Trick, making Albert laugh more.

For a while we could still have picnics and cookouts on the front lawn after baseball games, Sabine in her baby seat, waving her arms at us.

Edward sang a French song to her when he tired of “O Canada.”

But Sabine was never tired of “O Canada.” Finally Jack taught us the words and Edward made us all sing it before every baseball game.

And then it got too cold for baseball, though Edward would have played through northeasters and snow.

Edward and I took Sabine for walks in her stroller, with her snowsuit and knitted hat, down the sidewalks of the town, stopping every so often as people called “Sabine! Sabine!” from doorways and from across the street, running over to see her.

“Remember that night?” I asked Edward.

Edward knew what night I meant. It had been a month and a half ago.

“Yes,” said Edward. “That's the night we met, Sabine. Do you remember that night?”

His voice rose and Sabine turned her head to find his face.

“And Angela Garden,” I said, and Edward and I both laughed and couldn't stop.

Edward tried to teach Sabine how to throw a ball, but she was too young to care. Thanksgiving had gone, then Christmas. And Sabine smiled at
Edward all the time. Edward wrote that on his wall calendar. He also began to mark off the days until spring.

“Spring,” he whispered to Sabine. “Baseball begins.”

Edward marked off
the calendar days one by one. And then it was spring. Edward tried to teach Sabine how to crawl. Sabine got up on her hands and knees now and rocked.

“She'll crawl soon enough,” said Maeve. “And there will be trouble.”

“For now she's stuck in neutral,” said Jack.

It rained in the morning of the first day of spring baseball, and then the sun came out. On the front porch Edward was having a discussion with Sabine about rainbows.

“Colors, we're looking for,” he said. “Colors!”

He held her up, but all Sabine looked at was Edward. I could see the clouds and blue sky in
her eyes—little globes of the world around her.

“Look, Sabine,” said Edward. “There! Above the water. See? Blue, red, green? A sign!”

Sabine's drool fell on Edward's cheek, sitting there like a teardrop.

I laughed and leaned over to wipe it away.

“You and your signs, Edward.”

Edward looked at me, Sabine's cheek next to his.

“You'll see one day, Jake. You'll see,” said Edward.

Maeve banged pots in the kitchen as Nanci Griffith sang “Gulf Coast Highway” above the noise: “And when we die we say we'll catch some blackbird's wing.”

 

Trick and Albert arrived early for lunch before the first afternoon baseball game.

“Opening day,” said Albert happily.

Trick took Sabine's tiny hand in his big one.

“She's a lot bigger. And she looks like you, Edward,” said Trick.

“Do you think?” said Edward.

Trick nodded.

“I think,” he said.

Trick took some papers out of his jacket pocket.

“Here. Some pitching information. From the computer.”

“Trick can find out anything. Anything in the world,” said Albert. “Something for you to remember.”

“You just have to ask the right questions,” said Trick. He looked at me and winked. “Remember that, too. It's kind of magical, you know. You type in a question. It answers you. But you have to ask the right question.”

Trick sat on a chair on the porch and took Sabine on his lap.

“The right question,” he whispered to Sabine.

Her head bobbed as she stared at a button on Trick's shirt.

 

Things happen fast sometimes, Jack says that. Albert says it, too. On this day everything changes. It changes too fast; before anyone can say the things we should say.

Or see the things we should be looking at.

Or understand anything.

Or ask the right question.

 

Maeve brought out food for all of us on the porch, a big salad in a wooden bowl.

“Look at you, Sabine, with Uncle Trick!”

Jack brought a platter of sliced ham, with spiced apples scattered around the edges.

Edward ran down the yard and turned for a moment.

“I'll be back. I have to get something in town.”

“What?” I asked.

“Come with me, Jake!” he called to me. “You'll see. We'll be right back.”

“No, Edward. I don't want to. It's almost lunchtime.”

Edward looked at me.

I shook my head.

“Why are you going?” I said.

“A surprise,” called Edward happily. And he turned and ran down to our bikes, lying on the grass.

“Don't take your bike, Edward!” I called to him. “We never fixed those brakes.”

Edward got on his bike and waved both of his hands in the air as he rode away.

“Edward!” I called.

His hands went up in the air again. I couldn't tell if he'd heard me. And then he was out of sight.

Out of sight. I think about riding after him for a moment. But Maeve calls to me and I don't follow him.

I don't follow him.

“Where's that boy?” asked Maeve.
She was dishing salad onto plates. “He's been gone for a long time.”

Sabine sat on Albert Groom's lap. He bounced his knees lightly, chanting to her.

Sabine's mouth opened with happiness.

“Edward said he'd be back soon,” said Wren. “Right, Jake?”

I nodded.

“He'll be back soon,” said Will. “He loves ham.”

“And baseball,” said Albert Groom, smiling.

“And Sabine,” I said.

Mary Brigid and Caitlin walked up the hill to our yard, Caitlin tossing her glove up and catching it. Weezer left his napping place under the porch, wagging his tail at them.

“He'd be back if I'd gone with him,” I said, my voice fading as I watched a police car slowly drive into the yard. It stopped at the bottom of the yard.

“Is that Tom?” asked Jack, putting down his plate.

Jack began to walk down the yard. And then it was Tom who got out of the car. He stood by the hood, not moving. He had a small bag in his hand. Maeve went down the steps and caught up with Jack.

“Tom?” she said.

Her voice sounded very far away, as if she knew something she didn't want to know.

I stood at the edge of the steps. Sola moved next to me, so close our bodies touched. I could feel her begin to shake.

When Tom reached Maeve and Jack he took Maeve's hand and leaned down to speak to her. And then Maeve's knees buckled; she would have fallen if Jack hadn't gathered her up in his arms. Tom looked up at us up on the porch and started walking up the hill. Jack's arms were around Maeve and they stood there, not moving.

I started to walk down the stairs, but Albert Groom stopped me. He handed Sabine to me and he walked down to meet Tom. Sabine's head nestled in my neck. She was warm and smelled of something sweet. All of these things seemed so clear.

Tom touched Albert's arm gently as he
talked, Albert's head down as he listened. Then Tom handed Albert the paper bag. Behind him Maeve and Jack got into Tom's car, and they left. I thought, suddenly, maybe to keep other thoughts away, of the night that Edward and I watched a car leave and we walked to the hospital to see Sabine.

Albert stopped at the bottom of the steps. His face looked old and more lined than it had looked before.

“Edward's gone,” he said.

He looked up at us then. Tears came down his face.

“I'm sorry,” he whispered. “He's gone.”

He handed me the paper bag and I opened it. It was a small blue baseball cap.

I couldn't speak. Gone where? I wanted to ask. But I knew. Before I began to cry I showed it to Sabine.

“This is for you,” I said, my voice cracking into pieces. “From Edward.”

 

We didn't eat. We couldn't talk. No one knew what to say. We moved past each other, putting food away. Trick and Albert swept the floor and cleaned off the table. And later Weezer, as if he knew something was wrong, came up to sit on the porch, leaning against Albert.

When Sabine began to fuss, Sola handed her to me.

“Sing to her,” she said to me.

“But that's…,” I began.

A terrible silence filled the room.

Everyone knew what I was about to say. I was about to say that was Edward's job.

“I can't,” I said. “I can't sing to her. It's my fault. It's all my fault!”

Sola put her arms around me.

The phone rang.

Albert answered.

“Yes? We're fine. All right.”

He handed the phone to me.

“She wants to talk to you,” he said.

“Hello?”

“Jake. It's Angela. Angela Garden. You remember?”

“Yes.”

My voice didn't sound like mine.

“Your mother and father are on their way home. They had to make some decisions. But they're coming home.”

I thought of Angela's red hair and how it lay against her cheek. Why was I thinking that?

“All right,” I said.

“Jake?”

“Yes.”

“I'm sorry. About what happened.”

“Yes.”

“Edward was a wonderful boy.”

Was.

I hung up the phone without saying anything. Without saying good-bye or thank you.

All I could think of was that little word. So small.

Was.

So small.

And so big.