House Arrest (21 page)

“I hope so.” I disconnected the medication tubing, then flushed the catheter with saline. “The antibiotics are finished. Anything else you need?”

Mrs. Grover patted my arm. “Are you okay, dear? You look troubled.”

This old woman had been so sick. Maybe I missed the early signs and she got sicker. And she was worried about me.

“Thanks, Mrs. Grover. I’m doing okay.” I bent down and kissed her cheek and let myself out of the apartment. It made me wish I had a grandmother or mother to talk to. All I had was Aunt Ruth.

Anna had after-school duty at work this week, and she arrived home just as Zoe and I put the stuffed zucchini boats on the kitchen table. After dinner, while Anna and Zoe washed the dishes, I took the telephone onto the sun porch. Wrapping myself in the old quilt, I dialed Maine.

When Aunt Ruth answered, I skipped the small talk. “For the first time in what, twenty years, I wish I could talk to my parents.”

Silence. Then, “Can I help?”

I shook my head, even though Ruth couldn’t see. “I don’t know. I guess I need advice. I’m thinking about doing something. It’s sort of against the law, but I think it’s the right thing to do. I don’t know. It freaks me out.” I stared at the empty black squares of the sun porch windows. I imagined Ruth sitting on the plaid sofa in her living room, across from the picture window facing the island harbor. It would be dark now. “That’s what they did, isn’t it?”

“Your parents followed their conscience, Emily. They knew there might be consequences.” Aunt Ruth paused for a long moment. “I guess you have to follow your conscience, too.”

“But what do you think?”

“The times were different. We were at war and people did desperate things.” Aunt Ruth paused again. “I think it’s time to grow up, Emily, and make a difficult decision for yourself.”

I mumbled a goodbye, pressed the disconnect button, and drew the ratty quilt over my head. Inside the cocoon, I squeezed my eyes closed, wishing I could cry. I heard footsteps and lifted the quilt to peer out.

“How can you even think about it?” Anna asked.

“You eavesdropped on my private conversation?”

“What if you get caught?”

“I haven’t decided anything, Anna. I’m thinking about Pippa. Trying to figure it out.”

“If you help her sneak out to that ridiculous ceremony, you could go to jail. What’s so important about helping her dance naked in the woods?”

“They wear robes,” I corrected her. “But it might be right, even if it’s wrong. Can you see that?”

“What I see is the risk. Don’t you care about that?”

“Anna, why don’t you mind your own business?”

“It is my business. You’re my cousin and I love you. How do you think it would feel to us if you go to jail? What about your responsibility to Zoe?”

Images flooded my brain. A little girl in the kitchen watching men in suits lead her father away in handcuffs. Sitting with Momma at the orange table in the sickening roll of the ferry, hearing about firebombing a draft board office in the middle of the night. Hiding in a tree house under a canopy of dying autumn leaves.

But that girl was me. Not Zoe.

“Zoe has you. And Sam. Anyway, I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

“Please don’t do anything stupid.”

She meant stupid like my parents. Anna towered over the sofa, her mouth twisted into an angry frown. She had inherited the same tall giraffe build as me. But inside, we might be different.

“What if what they did wasn’t stupid? Just because the consequences were awful, doesn’t mean it was wrong.”

“I can’t believe you’re saying that,” Anna said, stomping back into the house and pulling the door closed behind her with a loud clunk.

I couldn’t believe it either.

30 ~ Pippa

The greenhouse was ready. Potting tables pushed against the walls to make room for the circle of pillows on the floor. The large cardboard box filled with earth. Two dozen candles, each hand-stamped with the image of Bast’s paw print, burned in a spiral pattern on the cinderblock and plank shelf. Pippa and Jeremy looked at his drawings, hung between the windows. Anyone could see the kid had talent. Would the family nurture his gift?

Jeremy leaned back against Pippa’s chest. “How did Bast die?”

“We don’t know exactly. Someone killed her.”

“No, the real Bast. The Goddess.”

Pippa tried to think of a smart answer, but nothing came.

“If she was alive, she had to die, right?”

“I guess.” Pippa rested her chin on his head. “I don’t know.”

Jeremy kneeled next to the carton, scooped out the dirt slipping back into the hole. “Why do we have to bury our Bast two days later?”

Pippa shrugged. “Francie will know. It’s almost time to start. Go find Timothy.”

After he left, Pippa sat cross-legged on a pillow, resting her hands on the early swell of her belly. Maybe if she could chant for a few minutes before the service, she could quiet her own questions and say a proper goodbye to Bast.

“We grow from your earth; we share your fruits,” she started, but her mind was still on Jeremy’s question. Why two days? If she had lived, Abby would be asking her own questions. How could Pippa be a good mother with so few answers?

“Your wings protect us.” This time her concentration was interrupted by the itching under the ankle monitor strap. She chanted louder. “Strengthened by your power, we reach for the stars.” She scratched her ankle through the thin white sock. After her shower, the fat red splotches had bloomed on her skin, spreading up her leg and down over the top of her foot. Pippa pulled down the sock to check. Still pink, but fading. She should tell Emily the rash was getting worse.

Emily was hard to figure out. She dealt with gravely ill people all the time, but a dead cat sent her flying. Still, if Emily had negative feelings about the family, she hid them well at the hearing. The lawyer said Judge Thomas listened to the professionals.

She couldn’t blame Emily for running away; there likely weren’t many beheaded cats in her own family history. But Emily seemed to like her as a person, not just a patient. She had even thought Emily might take a chance and help her with the solstice. Now that didn’t look so good. She closed her eyes and tried again. “Strengthened by your power, we reach for the stars.”

•

The spiral of candle flames blazed. The square window reflected and magnified the flickering lights against the charcoal gray world outside. The wind rattled the loose corner pane, the one Marshall kept promising to fix. The seven of them sat cross-legged on a circle of sofa pillows, the tips of their knees just touching.

Nestled in the box of earth at the center of the circle, Bast’s small form lay wrapped in a white sheet. Tall white candles planted at the four corners of the box represented air, earth, fire and water. The twins sat shoulder to shoulder, Newark draped across their laps. To their left sat Marshall, with Adele and Liz on his other side. Francie was already in meditation position with eyes closed and an angelic expression on her face. Pippa envied how she could open herself to Isis so quickly.

When they joined hands, the empty pillows between Pippa and Liz broke the ring. “Tian and Murphy are sitting with us in spirit,” Francie said.

“How can a spirit sit without a butt?” Timothy asked, but his brother elbowed him and Francie didn’t answer.

How could they have a ceremony this important without Tian to lead them? When they honored Abby and Terrence, Tian knew what to do, even though the bodies had not been released for burial.

Francie started quietly. “We grow from the earth; we share your fruits,” she chanted alone. “Your wings protect us. Strengthened by your power, we reach for the stars.” She let the soft sizzle of the “s” whisper into silence.

Then she turned to Jeremy on her left side, smiled, and lifted their clasped hands high like a mountain peak. She squeezed his hand and Jeremy joined her in the next round of the familiar words. With each repetition, with each smile and lift and squeeze, the prayer passed from person to person, growing in strength, mournful and joyful at the same time.

When it was Pippa’s turn, Liz had to stretch across the gulf of the empty pillows. Pippa reached out to grab her hand halfway. When her voice joined the rest of her family, Pippa felt an echo of the connection that had been missing for months. When they sang together, their voices filled the greenhouse.

Their song faded into silence.

“Bast was more than a pet, wasn’t she?” Francie looked around the circle. “More than a member of the family. She connected us to Isis. Her spirit will live on with us, in our home. Just like Abby and Terrence are with us.”

They were all quiet until Francie spoke again. “What I remember most is how Bast liked to burrow under the blankets. Her fur was softer than a cloud.” She looked at Jeremy.

“Sometimes when I draw, it’s like Bast is walking on my paper. Like she pushes my pencil with her nose, like she’s telling me how to make the line right.” Jeremy gulped. “I mean, she used to do that.”

Timothy shook his head, buried his face in Marshall’s chest.

Marshall pulled the boy close. “What I remember most about Bast is how much she hated a closed door.”

Timothy’s voice was muffled by Marshall’s sweater. “We’re not supposed to have closed doors.”

“Yeah, well, when I closed the bathroom door for a little privacy, she would yowl and scream.”

“That wasn’t about privacy,” Jeremy said. “That was to warn us about the stink.”

“Can’t we forget the toilet talk for one hour?” Adele asked. “What I’ll miss most is Bast waking me every morning with her nose in my ear.”

Liz grinned. “Do you guys remember how she used to like to walk in the damp clay?”

“Before the Health Department said no cats at the Tea Room,” Adele added.

“Right,” Liz said. “And she would leave her paw prints in the clay, and that’s how we got the idea for our logo.”

Pippa hadn’t known that story.

Jeremy sniffled. “That’s another way she’s still with us, isn’t it?”

Pippa was last. She whispered, “I imagine Bast snuggled up with Abby.”

For a minute, no one spoke. Then Timothy and Jeremy covered Bast’s body with earth, hands patting the small mound. Their fingers left a pattern like ferns in the dirt.

Francie stood up. “Blow out the candles, so we don’t torch our greenhouse, and let’s have lunch.” She leaned over to wipe a smudge of soil and tears from Jeremy’s cheek.

•

Jeremy licked a crumb of tofu-burger from his finger. “Okay, Francie. Pippa said you’d answer my questions.”

Francie glanced at Pippa. “I’ll try.”

“Why do we have to bury someone within forty-eight hours? Marshall says that’s what the Jews do.”

Francie shrugged her shoulders. “We have to make this up as we go along. I don’t think any religion has established rituals for how to bury a murdered cat. What else?”

Jeremy looked down at his lap. “Is Pippa going to have to wear an orange suit?”

Timothy broke the silence. “He means will Pippa go to jail?”

“And how long will our papa have to stay there?” Jeremy added.

Marshall answered that one. “We don’t know. But even with Tian and Murphy away, you guys have the rest of us. We’re your family.” He stood up. “Clear the table, kiddos, and let’s get back to decimals.”

Pippa carried a stack of plates to the sink, grateful for something to do. She felt an arm around her shoulders.

“You okay?” Francie whispered.

Pippa shook her head.

Francie hugged her. “I’ve been thinking about our argument last week, after you snuck out to the hospital.”

“You were so mad at me.”

Francie nodded. “I think we were both partly right. Some changes need to be made in this family. If we had done it sooner, maybe we wouldn’t have lost Meg and Enoch.”

“Why did they leave?”

“They said that Tian was too bossy. A dictator, Enoch called him. They wanted to share a bedroom, and Tian said that was against the rules, and Enoch said then let’s change the rules and Tian said absolutely not. After Ari was born, they got even more insular, the five of them. The more they withdrew, the more rigid Tian got. Finally, they moved out.”

“Where’d they go?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why wouldn’t anyone tell me what was going on?”

“Tian said not to, you were too new. Looking back, he was wrong. He should have compromised. Maybe we should have voted. Instead, he saw it all as a challenge to his authority. Maybe it was, but when they left, we all lost.”

Pippa rinsed the frying pan and put it upside down in the drainer. She turned to Francie and crossed her arms. “Okay, what was I right about?”

“About how we weren’t being good to each other.” Francie reached for the frying pan. “And how you had to go outside the family for friendship.”

“Emily hasn’t been such a good friend either.” Her visit that morning had been quick and businesslike, but maybe she was still worried about Zoe.

Francie put down the dishtowel. “I think we need new leadership around here.”

“What about Tian?”

“He’s going to be away for a while. We can make decisions as a group.”

Pippa sat and pointed to the chair next to her. “If we’re going to make decisions as a group, there’s some information I need.”

“Such as?” Francie looked uncomfortable. But if Pippa was ever going to get answers, this was the time.

“Basic stuff, like what happened in Newark and why Marshall wears that dirty rag around his neck like it’s sacred.”

Francie leaned both elbows on the table, cupped her chin in her hands.

“Okay. Tian and Marshall grew up in Newark. They were in opposing gangs. Tian’s little sister was raped, then killed. She was twelve. Tian was pretty sure she was fooling around with a guy in Marshall’s gang, and that her murder was related to that. So he fired his gang up to get revenge. There was a big fight and Marshall’s neck was cut. He almost died.”

Francie rubbed her face with her hands and paused for a moment before continuing. “At the funeral for Tian’s sister, Marshall showed up with this big bandage around his neck. That took balls, you know? Tian’s gang could have finished him off. Instead, Tian and Marshall shook hands. They had both had enough. They decided to quit the gangs and find a different way.”

“And the bandanna?”

“Tian gave it to Marshall, in some kind of forgiveness ceremony.”

That made Pippa smile. Tian loved making up new ceremonies. At first she thought their rituals were handed down from Isis, until she realized that Tian wrote the manual. The bandanna was a nice touch.

“That’s when they started the family?”

“Not right away. Tian did all this library research about utopias, and that’s when he figured out he was descended from Isis. Both guys had to ease out of the gangs. You couldn’t just quit.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I was working in Newark that summer, at the library. I met Tian when he was doing the research.” She looked away for a moment. “His name was Earl then.”

“Why did you have to leave Newark?”

“Because the citizens of Newark were uncomfortable with a cult in their fair city. First it was nasty notes, then rocks through the window. Editorials. It wasn’t too bad until the mayor’s daughter decided the Family of Isis was a perfect adolescent rebellion, and started hanging out with us. Then the vandalism got worse, and we suspected the cops. Tian consulted Isis and she said to leave.” Francie stood up. “That’s it. We came here.”

Pippa stood to face Francie across the kitchen table. “Do you really think we can keep the family together?”

“We have to try. I love this family, Liz and the twins and all of you. Tian got that part right.” Francie’s voice turned softer. “Are you going to stick around?”

“What else would I do?”

“Go home?”

“This is my home,” Pippa said.