Shadows 02 Girl in the Shadows (12 page)

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"Well, ain't this a pretty kettle of fish," Mrs. Westington said. She glanced at Echo and then relaxed her embrace. "You probably don't remember who that is. Echo.
It
almost takes a divining rod for me to determine her identity, but that there is your mother or what passes for her," she said.
"Now let's not start out on the wrong foot. Mom," Rhona said.
"We've been on the wrong foot for some time, Rhona. Too late to get off that." Mrs. Westington said.
"Hi, Echo." Rhona said. "I wouldn't have recognized you. You've grown so. Don't you want to give me a kiss and a hug?" She held out her arms.
Echo stared up at her, unmoving, her hand tightly clasping Mrs. Westighton's. Did her own mother forget her daughter was deaf?
A tall, thin man with
a
grubby beard stepped up beside Rhona. He was wearing a white button down shirt that looked like it had last been washed ten years ago and a pair of torn, ragged jeans with black sandals. His toes were so dirty, it was hard to tell where they were and where the straps of the sandals were. The strands of his dull brown hair resembled broken springs shooting off in every direction. When he smiled, his thin lips practically disappeared, producing a dull slice above his slightly protruding cleft chin. His neck looked like it needed a good scrubbing.
"This is Skeeter." Rhona said, lowering her arms.
"Hi there," he said, saluting quickly at Mrs. Westington. I glanced at her. She looked like she had just swallowed some sour milk. "You have a very nice house and great property. Love this old door. Oak, isn't it?"
"Skeeter? Didn't your parents give you a real name?" she asked.
I laughed to myself. Mrs. Westington wasn't one to hold back her thoughts and criticisms, even when she faced a complete stranger.
"Well, my real name is Sanford Bickers. but
I
never saw myself as a Sanford."
"Everyone knows him as Skeeter. Mom. No one knows him as Sanford."
"Then you two have something in common. You're both running away from yourselves," Mrs.
"I never knew you to be inhospitable. Ma," Rhona said.
Mrs. Westington looked at her askance.
"You're happy to see me at least, aren't you. Trevor?" Rhona asked him, her voice sweet and syrupy.
Trevor's eyes shifted quickly to Mrs.
Westington and then he looked away.
"All right. Rhona." Mrs. Westington said sharply. "to what do we owe the pleasure of this visit by you and Mr. Skeeter?"
"I've just been through hell. Mom. Skeeter helped me a great deal, I would have thought you would be a little more considerate since you knew what I've been through," Rhona whined.
"I'm sorry to say it. Rhona, but I doubt very much you're through with hell," Mrs. Westington said. She turned to Echo and me. "Let's get our things inside and up to your rooms, girls," she told me. I signed quickly to Echo, who was just standing there and gaping at Rhona.
"Who is she?' Rhona asked, nodding at me.
"This is April Taylor. She's been helping me with Echo. You can thank her properly later," Mrs.
"Is she staying in my room? I see it's being used."
"Your room? You gave up that room and a lot more years ago, Rhona."
"Well, where are Skeeter and I going to stay?"
"Who says you're staying?" Mrs. Westington retorted, and urged Echo and me to get our things again. I moved quickly, taking it all out of the station wagon. I glanced at Rhona, who had folded her arms petulantly under her breasts and stepped to the side, glaring at her mother. Skeeter kept a small smile on his face. They watched us enter the house and then followed.
"Now listen to me. Mom." Rhona began. "Please."
Ignoring her. Mrs. Westington turned to Trevor and nodded at the living room. "Would you be so kind as to turn that television set off. Trevor? We don't need the noise right now. Seems we have enough static already."
"Yes, ma'am," he said, glanced at Rhona, and then went into the living room to do it.
"Go on up. April. Help Echo put her things away. please.'
"Okay," I said. I looked at Rhona again. Her eyes were inflamed with indignation and resentment and it looked like it was all directed at me, as if I were the cause of all her lifelong problems.
Trevor stepped back into the hallway. "I've got something waiting on me back at the winery." he told Mrs. Westington, nodded at Rhona, and hurried out.
I gestured to Echo for us to go up the stairs.
"Wait a minute." Rhona said, reaching for Echo, who couldn't take her eyes off her. "Don't you want to say hello to your mother. Echo? Give her a proper greeting?"
"You forget the little signing you knew?" Mrs. Westington asked her.
"She knows what I'm saying."
"I doubt that," Mrs. Westinton told her. "I'm not deaf and I don't know what you're saying,"
Rhona held out her arms, again expecting Echo to come to her for an embrace. Echo looked at Mrs. Westington and then she turned and started up the stairs with her boxes and bags.
"Echo! Echo, you listen to me."
"Lardy Dee. Did you forget the child is deaf?" Mrs. Westington asked her. "She doesn't recognize you. probably. She was barely out of infancy when you deserted her.'
"Look, Mom. I came here because I need you to help us and
since you helped me get past my recent troubles. I thought you would have a different attitude, especially when you hear and see how I would like to make things right and to do the right things from now on."
"Mending fences, are you?"
"Yes."
"Turning a new leaf, are you?"
"Yes, Mom," she said in a tired voice. "With Mr. Skeeter?"
"Can we sit down and talk like two adults. please?" Rhona pleaded.
"Two? Are you saying Mr. Skeeter or you ain't adult?"
"Mom?"
"I'll make some tea," Mrs. Westington relented. You can use the guest room at the end of the hall upstairs. It's clean. My girl cleans it once a week no matter if anyone uses it or not, so don't mess it up so it looks like that pig pen you're driving out there. Put on some decent clothing, clean yourselves up so you're both fit to be in the same room with decent people, come down to the living room and get you get down to brass tacks."
"Brass tacks?" Skeeter asked, smiling widely and looking at Rhona.
"Mom has a colorful way of speaking. We already brought our things to that room, seeing mine was messed up."
"Messed up? It's twice as neat as your best day in it."
"Okay, Main. Just come on," she told Skeeter, and headed for the stairs.
I had been climbing slowly so as to hear their conversation. I sped up behind Echo and continued toward her room with her to help her put away her new things. I could see she was quite stunned with her mother's unexpected appearance.
"That's my mother." she signed to me as soon as we entered her room and she had put her bags and boxes down on the bed.
"I know."
"She looks different," she told me.
"People change. You haven't seen her in a long time," I said. "Let's put your things away."
I began to hang up clothes for her and she began to put things in her dresser drawers. She was full of questions, of course. Her hands were moving too quickly for me to follow, so she began to write. "Is my mother staying here now?"
"I don't know."
"Who is that man? Is he my father?"
Again. I wrote. "I don't know. I don't think he's your father. however. I think she met him long after you were born. Echo."
"I don't like him." she wrote. and I laughed.
"I don't think your grandmother is particularly fond of him either."
She thought a moment and then wrote. "Why didn't Tyler say hello to us?"
"He was in a big rush. As I explained to you, something must have happened at their business," I told her. She thought about my answer and for the moment that seemed to suffice.
I was going to ask her about her nightmare last night and her coming to my bed, but on second thought. I decided she had been through enough turmoil already today. It could wait for a time when we had a quiet moment together. I told her I was
going to put my new things away.
^-
When I entered my room. I found Rhona there, rifling through her closet, tossing garments onto the bed. She turned as soon as she realized I was standing there,
"These are my things," she said. "I'm not taking anything that belongs to you."
"I know."
She stared at me a moment and then turned to me completely, her hands on her hips. "Who are you anyway? How come you're living here?" she demanded.
I began to explain, describing how I arrived at the vineyard after Uncle Palaver's death. I told her who he had been and what we had done together.
"So that's why there's a motor home and a car back there. My mother just took you in?"
"Yes." I said.
"What about the rest of your own family?" I told her about Brenda, about my parents. "This is ridiculous. Now she's turning this place into an
orphanage," she said. Her eyes narrowed with suspicion again. "Did you touch any of my things, my clothing?"
"Your mother wanted me to wear one of the nightgowns, but other than that, I..."
"I don't know why I even asked. You couldn't possibly fit into anything of mine anyway. but I assure you I don't intend to let you just take over my possessions," she warned. "My advice to you is to find another elderly old lady to take advantage of."
"I am not taking advantage of anyone."
"Right. I've been on the road myself, you know. I know what's what. I'm sure it wasn't hard for you to pull the wool over the eyes of an old lady and a deaf girl, and Trevor Washington's head isn't exactly filled with lightbulbs."
She scooped up a pile of her clothing and started out of the room. She paused at the doorway and turned to me, her face flushed with fury. "Now that I'm back. I can assure you that you're not going to stay here." she said. "I intend to take back custody of my daughter and get what's rightfully mine. If you know what's good for you, you'll just get out now before there is any more unpleasantness."
She walked out of the room. My heart was pounding and tears had come to my eyes. I put away the clothes Mrs. Westington had bought for me and then I sat by the window, looking
toward the motor home and thinking. I did have some money, Uncle Palaver's cash still in the motor home. I could leave. Brenda was probably right. I should just return to a regular high school and graduate. The equivalency exam wasn't going to work out anyway with Tyler behaving as he was. Mrs. Westington would say "the writing's on the wall.' He'll be giving notice any day now and be gone. I should be gone along with him.
And then I thought how deserted and alone both Echo and Mrs. Westington were going to feel. Would Rhona and that man remain here? I had no right to interfere, of course. but I didn't have to be a fortuneteller to see what Echo's future would be like if Rhona did take custody of her again and Mrs. Westington was unable to prevent it. Who knows where Rhona would put Echo? How lost and alone she would be. No. I thought. Mrs. Westington needs an ally now more than ever and Echo needs a friend. Trevor Washington, as devoted to her and Echo as he was, wasn't enough. It seemed to me I had to stay. It would be totally ungrateful for me to just up and leave right now when they needed me the most.
I heard Rhona in the hallway talking to Echo. She was probably returning to the bedroom for more of her things, and she had stopped at Echo's room.
"I really can't get over how you've grown," I heard her say. "And fortunately for you, you look more like me than your father, whoever he was." She followed that with a thin laugh.
I stepped up to the doorway and saw her enter Echo's room. The door to the west bedroom was open and Skeeter came out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist. I saw he had the tattoo of what looked like a dragon wrapped around a mermaid across his chest. He paused and looked out, catching me looking at him. Then he turned and unwrapped the towel from his waist, exposing his rear end, which looked like it had tattoos on each side of his buttocks as well. I stepped back into my bedroom quickly.
Rhona came in behind me and walked directly to the closet again. She picked out some other garments, sifted through the boxes of shoes, and then went to the dresser drawers. She didn't look at me at all.
"I can fit into all of this. I haven't gained a pound since I left here," she muttered. "I don't know how some women get so plump and lose all their appeal to men. Being fat makes you asexual, you know," she added, finally turning to me. "Skeeter came up with that in one of his poems. 'Your sex sank into your fat like a foot in quicksand.' Men don't like fat women, of course, and even women who like women wouldn't look at them. So where are you? In lard limbo, that's where. How old are you anyway?" she asked. "Were you always overweight?"
"I don't think it's necessary for you to know any more about me."
"You're right about that, since you'll be going now that I've returned."
"I'll go when Mrs. Westington tells me to go."
She will, don't worry." She saw my new black skirt and plucked it off the hanger. Then she held it up in front of herself. "I could get in this with you. I think." She laughed and tossed it at me. "Pack," she said.
Tears came to my eyes, but I drove them back. Brenda would make mush out of her. I thought, and stepped forward.
"I said I'd leave when Mrs. Westington asks me to leave."
"My mother is an old lady. She waited too long to have me and now she's too old for all this."
"She didn't wait long enough," I fired back at her. "She should have waited for menopause."
"Oh, you're a wise guy. too." She piled some undergarments together and smiled. "Did you see how Echo looked at me? It won't be long. She'll want me with her, want to be with me. It's only natural. Skeeter happens to know how to use deaf people's signing language. too. He was a street performer, a mime. He's very educated even though he hasn't been to college. Hers smarter than most college graduates anyway. He'll have Mother eating out of his hand soon. You'll see. He's a charmer."
"Yeah, I could see it the moment I set eyes on his filthy hair and clothing. Won me right over." I said dryly. Brenda would have loved that one.
"Skeeter is like a chameleon. He can adjust to whatever he has to in order to succeed."
"Yeah, he looks very successful."
"He happens to be. You can't judge a book by its cover."
"What cover? I'd say he's down to his last pages, chewed and stained."
She glared at me a moment and then she laughed, shook her head. gathered her thing, and left the bedroom. I stood there, trembling, but keeping it under control and undetected. Then I went to see how Echo was, she was sitting on her bed, staring down at the photograph of her mother she had shown me. She looked up at me when I stepped near her. Her eyes were glazed over with tears. She smiled. however,