Scattered Leaves (3 page)

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How could everything be fine? I wanted to ask him. but I didn't want to seem ungrateful either, so I turned instead to look at the scenery and play another one of the games Ian had taught me to play whenever we were trying to ignore a long ride. We'd each choose a color and then claim a point for anything that was that color. Somehow, he always won; he always chose the right colors and got the most points. I didn't mind it. To me it seemed Ian should always win, always be right and correct. It was truly like having a big brother who was solid and strong in very important ways. Maybe he couldn't beat up other boys with his hands, but he certainly could destroy them with his words. He could even do it to adults.
I think I was more frightened about being without him beside me than I was about being without my parents.
Despite the game I tried to play and the beautiful sunny day, the ride began to feel dreary and long.
I
was going to start reading Ian's letters, but usually when I read in the car. I got carsick faster, and I wanted to save them for when I would be alone.
Twice Felix asked me if I needed to stop or wanted him to stop to buy me something to eat, candy, gum, anything.
It
surprised me because Grandmother Emma never permitted us to bring gum or candy into her limousine. She insisted on it being kept spotless. It was years old but looked like it had just been built. I wondered if she would ever ride in it again.
Finally. Felix announced we were in the community in which the farm was located. I felt like we were descending into another world, a world stained with shacks and run-down houses, overgrown farm fields, a village with most of the stores boarded up and buildings needing fresh paint. Children along the way gaped in awe at our passing limousine as if they had never seen a car so big on their broken highways. It made me feel as if my grandmother's car had been a space ship and I'd been an extraterrestrial.
Felix pointed out the school, an old-fashioned looking redbrick building of three floors. I caught a glimpse of the playground and the parking lot. School hadn't started here either yet, so there were only a few cars there and no students around the building,
"It's not too far from your great-aunt's farm." Felix told me.
"I have to ride a school bus," I said. I knew that much. Ian and I had always been driven to our private school and back.
"Well, you'll like that. It's how you can get to know other kids your age, too. I rode a school bus to school until I had my own car."
I couldn't imagine Felix as a young boy. Some people just couldn't be diminished in your mind. They would always be the same size. It was just as impossible, if not more impossible, to imagine Grandmother Emma as a young girl even though I had seen some pictures of her. She looked so different, softer. happier. Were they really pictures of her? Maybe she used someone else's pictures.
It was as if the world was really frozen in time. I was always this age and size, and so were my parents and grandparents. everyone. Everything else, the albums, the stories, all of it, was just makebelieve.
We turned dawn a very long highway where there were fewer and fewer houses, and these, too, weren't very nice. Most were small and old and didn't look well cared for, because their lawns were not neat and there weren't pretty bushes and flowers like there were at Grandmother Emma's home and the homes around it.
Those I saw were far apart from each other. Felix pointed out what he called some working farms and one horse farm, where there were dozens of horses in corrals.
"It's beautiful country here," he said. This time he really did sound as if he was saying that to himself.
Maybe he really does want to live here now, I thought, even though the houses don't seem as nice as the houses in Bethlehem. What if Grandmother Emma never came out of the hospital? Would he remain working for my father, or would he retire? Once he dropped me off now, would I ever see him again?
"Daddy told me he's getting a special car that he will be able to drive," I said. I said it to see what Felix would tell me. Would that mean he wouldn't be needed to drive Daddy anywhere anymore?
"Hmm. so I hear," he said. He didn't sound very convinced or at all worried about keeping his job. He sounded confident that my father would always want someone to do things for him. "Okay," he announced a moment later. "get ready. It's right ahead on the left side."
I leaned forward, then slid myself to the left side of the car as we drew closer to the old farm. The property began with a fieldstone wall not much taller than I was. Looking closely at the wall. I saw how weeds and mold had invaded it. Some of the stones appeared ready to topple, and in some places, they had crumbled. Why didn't anyone fix it? I wondered.
Grandmother Emma would be very upset.
At the foot of the driveway, there was a tall iron gate. It was wide open and quite rusted. The gate looked somewhat bent, too, because the hinges had come apart toward the top. The bottom of the right side was stuck in the ground and looked like it hadn't been closed for a hundred years. Was Felix sure this was Great-aunt Frances Wilkens's home? He said he hadn't been here for some time. He could be making a mistake.
"What happened here?" Felix muttered to himself when he slowed down.
"Maybe this isn't it. Felix."
"Oh, this is it. I'm sure."
The driveway itself was nowhere as pretty as Grandmother Emma's. This one was just dirt and crushed stones with ditching on both sides. Weeds grew up out of the ditching, too. Felix had to drive very slowly because there were large potholes to avoid.
"Well, this is gone to the dogs," he said.
I looked to the right and saw the uncut grass frill of tall weeds. There was another, much smaller house with a small tractor parked off to the right of that. I could see it had a flat tire and leaned so far to the right that it looked like it might topple. An oldlooking, dirty blue car was parked in front, parked on what looked like what little lawn the house had.
The grass on my left wasn't as tall but looked like it hadn't been cut for some time either. There were weeds and untrimmed bushes everywhere. A sick maple tree in front was having an early autumn and dropped its leaves like tears, crying about itself. There was a wheelbarrow turned on its side beneath it, the inside streaked with rust. It looked like it had been left there fifty years ago.
But my attention went quickly to the
farmhouse. This was a very different house from the mansion in which we had all lived with Grandmother Emma, and not just because it was much, much smaller. It was still a large house with two stories and an attic. There was a small tower on the right side with arched windows and the front had a wide porch, but it didn't look very nice and certainly not what I'd expect to be the home of Grandmother Emma's sister.
"This was once quite a house," Felix remarked. The way he emphasized "once" told me he didn't think that much of it now either. The wall cladding and roofing were composed of continuous wood shingles that had long ago faded and graved. As we drew closer. I saw that some windows had just window shades drawn down or a little ways up, but few had curtains. Some spindles in the porch railings were missing and some hung loosely and looked as if they would fall out any moment. I could see that the second step to the porch was broken.
Because of the way the porch roof shaded the front of the house now, the windows were dark, more like mirrors.
As we came around. I made out the side of what looked like a small barn behind the house, but the grass was wild and uncut around it as well.
I'm going to live here? I wondered, I suddenly remembered the tale of The Prince and the Pauper. I had left the grand castle where I had lived like a princess and now I was going to live like a poor little girl. Why did Grandmother Emma leave her one and only sister in such a place? Didn't she care that people would see how she had left and treated her only sister? How could Grandmother Emma not know how dilapidated and rundown it was? Exactly when had she been here last? Surely it must have been a long time ago, and it must have been beautiful then or she wouldn't have sent me. Maybe she knew but didn't care. And now she was sending me here. too! Wasn't I a March anymore?
Or maybe being sick had made her so unhappy that she wasn't worried whether or not I would be.
When Felix stopped the car, he just sat there staring at the house, shaking his head slowly. He couldn't believe it either. It was all a mistake. He remained seated. For a moment I wondered if he was going to get out at all, or if he was just going to start the engine, turn around, and take me back.
Finally, he opened his door and got out. He stood there for a few moments with his hands on his hips, gazing at the property. He shook his head more vigorously this time, then finally reached for my door and opened it for me.
"I'll get your things," he said. "Just wait here."
I got out slowly while he went to the trunk to fetch my suitcases. There was still no sign of anyone either at the farmhouse or the smaller house to my right. Perhaps everyone left, I thought. That could be it, Everyone left a long tune ago. No one lived here anymore and Grandmother Emma just didn't know yet. I couldn't help wishing that was so.
Felix came around and started for the front porch.
"Come along," he said. "but watch the step." he warned. I could hear the underflow of anger growling in his throat. He stepped over the broken step, glaring back at it.
Closer now. I could see that even some porch floorboards were cracked, a few broken enough to have fallen in, leaving gaping holes. The front windows were stained with dust and dirt. There were pieces of bushes and tree branches scattered over the porch floor. No one had swept it for some time. There was a flannel shirt crumpled in the corner.
Felix lowered my suitcases carefully to the porch floor, as if he thought the weight of them might cave it in. He searched for a door buzzer and found a hole with a wire. He plucked it and glanced at it, and then at me, with disgust before turning to the door and knocking hard on it-- so hard that the panel windows rattled. I thought they'd fall out and shatter. Again, he looked at me, his face dark and gray with displeasure.
I was overcome and depressed by the same disappointment. When I first had heard I was going to live with Great-aunt Frances on a farm. I immediately envisioned the farms I had seen in my storybooks and on television, farms with whitewashed picket fences, pretty, well-kept corrals and lots of fun farm animals. Surely. I kept hoping. Grandmother Emma and the March family couldn't own anything as dreary as this.
I remembered hearing how my grandfather had gotten the property in a foreclosure, but I also remembered either my grandmother or my father saying he wanted it to be their rural retreat, a vacation home. I knew they had fixed it up. It was all so confusing. If they had fixed it up, how could it look like this? Why or how Great-aunt Frances had ended up living here. I did not know, and I certainly didn't know or understand how she could be living here now.
No one came to the door, so Felix rapped on it again, this time taking care to hit only the solid section, really pounding on the jamb itself. Finally, we heard footsteps and a high-pitched, "Coming, coming. Don't bust a gut"
The door did not open easily. It caught on the jamb as if it hadn't been opened for centuries and looked like it would be torn in half with any effort to open it. Finally, it did, and my great-aunt Frances stepped out to greet us. Felix, who assuredly had seen her before, actually recoiled at the sight of her. I stood there, gaping in disbelief.
I could hear my grandmother Emma's chiding, "Don't stare at someone like that. It's impolite."
But how could I not? Great-aunt Frances's dark gray hair was in clumsily spun pigtails, strands curling off like broken guitar strings. It looked like a poor attempt to make her aged face youthful.
She was about Grandmother Emma's height, but she was heavier, both in her bosom and hips. She wore a dull blue one- piece dress that had a tear in the skirt hem. The sleeves had a frilly white trim and the bodice had a collar that fit snugly around her neck, just opened at the base. She wore a light red lipstick and had some faint rouge on her cheeks, but her eyebrows were untrimmed. I saw she had a gold teardrop earring on her right ear but none on her left. A charm bracelet dangled off her right wrist. However, it looked like a child's toy bracelet made of plastic.
"Sorry. Miss Wilkens," Felix said. "but do you know your door buzzer is broken?"
"Is it? I haven't had anyone come calling for so long, I didn't know." she said, looking at the wires Felix showed her. "Oh, how terrible. Someone could get a nasty shock."
"No. It's dead," Felix said dryly. Then he turned to me. "This is Jordan."
"Jordan?"
"Jordan March. Miss Wilkens, your grandniece. I know you were informed we'd be here today."
"Oh, dear me, is today the day? How did I forget?" She looked at me and smiled, "Oh, good," she said, clapping her hands. "You're not a baby. I didn't know how I could look after a baby."
Felix turned to me. I think we were both thinking the same thing: Look
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after a baby? You don't look like you call look after yourself
"Anyway, hello. Miss Wilkens," Felix said. "How are you?"
"How am I? Oh. I'm doing just fine, thank you. Thank you for asking." She looked at him, obviously just realizing who he was. "Oh, yes. you're Felix. Emma's chauffeur." Her eyes narrowed and then widened, "Never mind how I am. How's my sister?" she followed quickly.
"She's about the same. Miss Wilkens." "Oh?"
She brought her hands to the base of her neck. She looked from him to me and then back to him.
"Does that mean she's not getting better?"
"Not yet. Miss Wilkens."
"Oh, dear. Emma will be very vexed about that. She will give her doctors a piece of her mind if she's not better soon." she added, nodding.
"Yes," Felix said, finally smiling. "She's already done that."
"Well," Great-aunt Frances said after taking a deep breath, "is that all you have, dear, those two suitcases?"
"That's all she has right now," Felix replied for me. I'll bring other things as time goes by and we see what she needs."
I could almost hear him add. "If she stays here, that is."
"No matter. There are so many, many things you can wear. I never threw anything out. Emma was always complaining to our parents about that. 'She hoards everything like a squirrel,' she cried. I even saved my first lost tooth. It's in a little box my mother gave me when it fell out of my mouth. Did you save your first tooth?"