The Different Girl (6 page)

But maybe we’d spent too much time talking about the parrot to forget Robbert’s lesson about looking, because I saw how all of Irene’s questions pointed the same direction—how together they formed a cage and how behind them lay a thing that didn’t need saying to be felt.

When I stretched out on my cot, I asked Irene where Robbert was sleeping if the girl was in his bed.

“In the attic of the classroom,” she said. “It won’t be for long.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s only temporary. Now, while you’re asleep I want you think of something.”

I nodded. Irene often gave us ideas to think about before falling asleep and asked us about them in the morning. Caroline always had an idea. Sometimes the rest of us had things to say, and sometimes we didn’t.

“I want you to think about all the ways we could use the sailcloth Caroline found. Will you do that?”

I nodded, but still had my question. “Irene?”

“Yes, Veronika.”

“What should we do if she comes to look at us?”

Irene smiled at me. It was a nice smile, and all the answer I got.

• • •

I don’t know why I asked. Maybe at the chance we might get sick as well, that one of us could be tangled up on Robbert’s bed. But the next morning, while we helped with breakfast, I saw Eleanor staring at a floor tile near the door. On purpose I dropped the spoon I was holding and bent to pick it up, so I could look at the tile more closely. At Eleanor’s feet lay a fresh smear of dirt and grass, which might have come from Irene’s sandal or Robbert’s sneaker if it hadn’t been topped by the dusty dots of small round toes.

4.

That morning
our class was in the kitchen. Irene had us study temperature and the barometer and the satellite map on Robbert’s notebook, so we could carry numbers in our heads to compare with how things would feel outside later on. After helping her make lunch—miso soup, from a waxed paper pouch instead of a can—the five of us took the red gravel path to the dock. We listened to the wind and the water, and peered at the seaweed and mussels and barnacles. We measured the speed of the wind and the position of the absent moon and the exact point the tide would turn. That these were questions we could answer—that the answers were numbers—made a change from the walks about deciding what to say, walks where we had too many answers and had to find, like guessing a bird from its shadow, a question that fit them.

Yet, especially since I’d found the girl, we had become more used to stories and guessing, like we’d turned a page in a book, so when this walk with Irene seemed like everything we’d almost stopped doing, we were confused. But doing numbers instead of stories was just another parrot in a cage: while part of me tracked the moon, another part saw it as one task I did instead of another and then, because this was our new habit, I asked myself why. So there were always two questions, or always one question more—since sometimes Irene’s problems got complicated—than we’d been directly asked.

We didn’t mention this out loud. That was a test, and to ask Irene was either to pass or to fail. The true test was knowing before you asked what the answer would be—and since we couldn’t work it out, none of us said a word.

Caroline and I walked back on either side of Irene, holding her hands, since Isobel and Eleanor held her hands on the way down. Holding Irene’s hand was different every time: her skin was soft, but also just a little loose, so exactly where it would wrinkle and where it would stretch was always special. Sometimes we squeezed too much and she would ask us to be more gentle, but usually she just held out her hands for us to take, and one of us would say “And no pinching!” Irene would always smile and reply, “That’s right” to whoever had spoken.

The path back climbed a small hill before the rocks changed to scrub and grass—just before you could see the kitchen roof. Irene released our hands and told us to wait, then kept walking for another thirty yards, until the top of her head disappeared. Then we saw Irene’s hand in the air, like a moth flapping back and forth. She was waving to Robbert.

I looked at Caroline. “Irene said you found something else on the beach that you’re not supposed to talk about.”

Caroline only nodded, as if answering out loud would be against Irene’s instructions.

Eleanor tugged on Caroline’s smock. “What was it?”

“What was it?” echoed Isobel.

“I can’t say,” whispered Caroline.
“
I
can’t.”

“Why
not
?” asked Isobel.

“We have to guess,” said Eleanor. “Was it alive?”

Caroline shook her head, but before we could ask more questions we saw Irene coming back.

Caroline and I took her hands again. Robbert waited on the kitchen steps, and even held the door open as we went inside. Across the yard, the classroom door was closed.

• • •

For two days we worked on numbers, preparing in the morning and then walking one day to the beach for waves and the next to the woods to study palms. Both days, on our way back, Irene left us at the spot on the trail just before we could see the buildings and went ahead to wave. It was only returning from the woods, when I saw where I’d stood behind Robbert’s building, that I understood what she was doing. We knew we weren’t supposed to see the girl, but the girl was being kept from us as well. We hadn’t noticed that our singing on the steps had been skipped three nights in a row—we’d all just gone to bed early. Eleanor and I had told Isobel and Caroline about the footprint. We knew the girl had seen us twice—us by her bed, and her standing over ours. We would have mentioned the footprint if Irene or Robbert had asked, but for those days it was as if the girl didn’t exist, and we were just too good at focusing to talk out of turn.

But that night, after the woods, we were helping Irene with dinner—folding napkins and setting out chopsticks and spoons—when Robbert came in. Irene said everything was almost ready, but Robbert just poked his chin up at Irene’s room, then climbed the stairs ahead of her. Irene sighed and turned down the burner flame and wiped her hands and followed. Since there was no door, we could still hear, even though they spoke quietly.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“We have to decide.”

“We have another week, don’t we? I thought we agreed . . .”

Their footsteps went farther from the stairs. We could only hear murmurs and the purr of burning gas.

Irene hadn’t run out of mustard yet, but I wondered if another week meant the next supply boat. I didn’t know what else could happen in a single week, unless another storm had been predicted.

From the darkened yard behind us came the faintest squeak, a metallic sliver of sound we all recognized as the screen door of the classroom. The murmurs kept going upstairs. They hadn’t heard.

All four of us crept to our screen and looked out. The girl was outside. She slipped down the classroom steps into the yard, and then she stopped, hunkering down. She looked at our door, maybe even at our shapes, shadows with the light behind us. In a burst, like a rat from under a palm frond, she darted toward us, right under the kitchen porch and out of view. Robbert and Irene were still talking. The water had begun to boil.

“Watch the pan,” I said. I opened the door.

“What if they come down?” whispered Eleanor.

But I didn’t answer. I’d already seen the girl and she’d seen me—so what could be the harm? The others caught the screen so it closed without a sound. I went down the stairs, holding the rail like always. At the bottom I looked under the building. She was on her knees in the weeds, peeking past the middle stilt. We watched each other.

“Hello,” I finally whispered. “Are you feeling better?”

The girl didn’t answer.

“I found you on the beach,” I said.

She kept crouching there.

“I’m Veronika.”

“What
are
you?” Her voice was as different as the rest of her, close to a croak.

“I’m Veronika. This is our island. What’s your name?”

It took her a little while to decide, but she finally did. “May.”

“That’s short,” I said. “Our names are longer. Are you sure that’s all of it?”

“What are you?” she asked again. I had no idea what to say.

“I’m Veronika. The other girls are Isobel and Eleanor and Caroline.”

“Girls?”

“Why don’t you come into the kitchen?”

“He told me not to.”

“But you already did, didn’t you?” She nodded. I nodded back to be friendly. “Don’t worry. Now you’re safe.”

“Who are they?”

“Irene and Robbert. They take care of us. Why don’t you come out?”

I’d been too long. When I looked up, Irene and Robbert stood in the doorway. I went back to my crouch and called to her.

“Everyone wants to meet you, May. And it’s dinnertime. Aren’t you hungry?”

• • •

Irene and Robbert left it to me. Eventually May came out and up the stairs. I waited and held out my hand for her to take, which she did, hesitating and looking at Irene and Robbert to see if it was okay. I knew not to squeeze (or pinch) and just let her fingers do the feeling. She looked different than she had in the beach grass or on the bed, much closer to how she looked in the photograph, even if she didn’t smile. Most of the zebra bandages were gone from her arms, but her feet still had a few, so she wore the flip-flops from her bag. Her shirt had been in the bag, too, short-sleeved with colored flowers, so someone must have washed it. We climbed into the light and I saw her more clearly than ever. May’s hair was as black as Eleanor’s but thick and curled where Eleanor’s just hung. Her skin was almost the color of Irene’s peanut butter, but darker. Her face had a long patchy scab, like a paintbrush had been dragged down her cheekbone to her chin.

Irene opened the door. May let go of my hand, and at a nudge from Robbert I went to Isobel, Caroline, and Eleanor, all of us staring at May as nicely as possible.

“May has met Veronika already,” said Robbert. “This is Isobel, Eleanor, and Caroline.”

May just looked at us.

“Isobel has blond hair,” said Robbert. “Caroline has brown hair like Irene, and Eleanor has black hair, just like you.”

May didn’t say anything about hair. Robbert touched her shoulder, gently.

“Everything is fine, May.”

“What can you girls say to make May feel welcome?” asked Irene.

“Do you eat soup, May?” asked Isobel. “We made soup for dinner.”

“Do
you
eat soup?” May’s voice was still raspy.

“We
make
soup,” replied Caroline. “And all kinds of things. Tonight there’s noodles.”

“Why don’t we set another place?” said Irene. “Come to the table, May, take a seat.”

Irene pulled a stool from the counter and set it between her chair and Robbert’s. May sat down, hugging her arms even though it wasn’t cold. We all fetched another table setting—spoon, chopsticks, plate, bowl, cup—and set them down in the proper order. Robbert poured water from the filter jug into her cup, and then shook a yellow pill from a plastic bottle.

“May needs to take this after she eats,” he told us. “It will help her sleep, so she can heal more quickly.”

Along with the soup we had opened a package of noodles with sauce and a package of vegetable protein that Isobel had cut into cubes and put into the noodles so Caroline could mix them up. Caroline brought the bowl to Irene and Eleanor used the tongs to put noodles onto Irene’s plate, then Isobel used a spoon to pour more of the protein cubes and sauce on top. They did the same for Robbert and then brought the bowl to May.

“Would you like noodles, May?” asked Eleanor.

May nodded, watching Eleanor dig with the tongs and extract just the right amount of noodles, then push aside the noodles to make room for the spoon to get the sauce. When they were done, Caroline carried the bowl back to the countertop, and I held the pot for Isobel to ladle soup into their bowls.

“Would you like soup, May?” asked Isobel.

May nodded again. Her hands were in her lap, even though Robbert and Irene had gone ahead and started to eat. When we were done I carried the pot back to the stove, which was where it lived if someone still might decide on seconds. May stared at everything we did, and then at the kitchen around her.

But May wasn’t eating.

“Where am I?” she whispered. “What is this place?”

Robbert put down his spoon and sniffed. He scraped his chair backward, just enough to cross his legs, and studied May, like she hadn’t figured something out in class.

“No.”

May looked up at him—not knowing how Robbert thought—since “no” wasn’t strictly an answer to either of her questions. The four of us did know, of course, and though we wanted to help her, we’d learned it was best to stay quiet.

“Answer your own question, May,” Robbert said. “Where are you? You’re a stranger sharing our meal. I’m glad you’re feeling better—good enough to go exploring despite being asked to do no such thing. I’m also glad because this means you feel good enough to answer some questions yourself.”

May held still, like a lizard trying to hide. Irene nodded to Robbert, and her eyes were different than the softness in her words, as if they had silently decided something between them.

“Now, Robbert—” she began, but Robbert shook his head.

“I’m speaking to May, Irene. I think she owes us an explanation . . .
all
of us.”

May swallowed and the swallowing bobbed her head, even though her eyes kept staring at her soup. I saw the stripe of freckles below her eyes and wondered if they’d always been a part of her face, or if they were like the scab—something no one had expected but that, from then on, she had to remember.

I walked to the counter, to where we cleared the table for dinner. By the time I crossed back to May everyone was looking at me. I set the zipped rubber pouch next to her plate.

“I found it with you, May. We looked at your pictures and asked ourselves a lot of questions. But now that you’re awake, we can all look together.”

May pulled the bag onto her lap, one thumb rubbing back and forth along the zipper. She looked up at me. Her words got tangled.