Mourning In Miniature Read online

  Maddie and I rolled our eyes. “Boys never grow up,” I warned her.

  It was a dream come true for me when Maddie had decided she’d like to be part of my Wednesday-night crafts group. During the school year she stayed overnight with me and I drove her back to her home in Palo Alto early on Thursday mornings in time for classes. We’d all agreed that we’d keep this schedule as long as her schoolwork didn’t suffer.

  “Not likely,” I’d told my son, Richard, Maddie’s father. “She’s a genius.”

  “So you say,” said the orthopedic surgeon, a man of few words who knew better than to argue with his mother.

  For our group project this summer, we crafters borrowed from a Bolivian tradition, Alasita. We’d learned about it from Beatriz, a woman who joined us briefly while visiting her mother in Lincoln Point. We were fascinated by the concept: during the Alasita festival, people made or bought miniature versions of what they hoped for in the coming year.

  “In the markets you find everything,” Beatriz told us. “Tiny cars, houses, and food, and even little bitty marriage certificates, passports, and money. Men buy hens and women buy roosters in the hope of finding a partner before the year’s end. If you buy these things or make them, it’s supposed to bring them into your life in the next year, as long as it is blessed by a shaman.”

  “Do you think there’s a shaman in Lincoln Point?” Karen Striker asked now, as we sat around a large table in my primary crafts room. (According to my late husband, and everyone who was familiar with my house, the whole rest of our four-bedroom home was a secondary crafts area.)

  Karen, five months pregnant, was building a lovely nursery, augmented by the one-inch-scale baby carriage I’d picked up for her this morning in Benicia. “I want to send good vibes into the air on every possible wavelength,” she told us.

  “I know a priest,” Mabel, our oldest member, offered.

  Her husband, Jim, the only male in our group, grunted, conveying doubt that a Catholic blessing would work as well. Mabel and Jim were working on a ship’s cabin, a model of the luxury version they hoped to occupy on their fall cruise to the Mediterranean.

  Maddie enjoyed playing hostess on these evenings and tonight she seemed to have fun refilling glasses of ice tea and plates of cookies, running back and forth between the kitchen and the atrium of my Eichler home. It took the record-breaking heat we were experiencing to get us to move all our supplies from my crafts room to the cooler atrium, and this week had qualified.

  For her own project Maddie had chosen to build a miniature soda fountain. She’d worked diligently on a sign that named flavors after her own friends and relatives. In her red-striped shop, one could “buy” Ginger Grandma, Pistachio Porter, Strawberry Skip, Tutti-Frutti Tracey, and so on.

  “Does this mean your goal for the year is to eat all the ice cream you can?” Karen asked.

  “For now,” Maddie said.

  I was happy that my granddaughter considered her life so good that all it needed was more ice cream. I also loved that she worked the spectrum of creativity, from computer programming in the morning to crafting tiny ice cream sodas in the evening.

  Of all the projects, Rosie Norman’s was the most interesting and packed with meaning—she was building a half-scale room box replica, one-half inch to one foot, of the hallway of lockers at Abraham Lincoln High School.

  “It’s where David Bridges, the star quarterback, kissed me,” was her only explanation the first week.

  Rosie, who owned the bookstore in town, was a student of mine during my first years teaching English at ALHS, right after Ken, our three-year-old son, Richard (Maddie’s father), and I moved to California from the Bronx. Rosie had also become a good friend who sometimes watched Maddie when I had undisclosed errands at the police station across the street from her shop.

  Rosie’s class was holding its thirtieth reunion at the end of the week. At first I questioned the math, but finally grasped the reality—it had been three decades since I helped distribute diplomas to my first graduating class. Faculty, current and retired, like me, were also invited to the gala weekend, most of which would be spent at the beautiful, old Duns Scotus Hotel in San Francisco. (Apparently, no one wanted to party at Abe’s Beard and Breakfast, the only motel in Lincoln Point.) Rosie had talked me into going so she wouldn’t have to walk into the opening cocktail party alone on Friday night.

  “Why are y’all bothering to go?” Susan Giles asked, her heavily accented “y’all” referring only to Rosie. “You always say how you weren’t very popular in high school.”

  “You wouldn’t get it,” Rosie told her.

  Rosie was probably right. Susan’s voice betrayed a lack of understanding, and I pictured her as a class officer and prom queen of her Tennessee high school. Rosie, on the other hand, had had a reserved personality and an almost matronly body even as a teenager. Thick glasses and a slight lisp hadn’t helped.

  “Well, I just think you have to be realistic,” Susan said. “People don’t change, and if you think you didn’t fit in then, you probably won’t now.”

  Harsh words from someone whose “realistic” hope was to win a trip around the world. Susan was working on a set of miniature luggage, using tweezers to manipulate in place tiny pieces of floral brocade and minutely thin strips of leather. I hoped the trip would be all expenses paid; otherwise the life-size version of this seven-piece luggage set would cost a fortune to check at the airport.

  Over the summer weeks, as Rosie had added scuffed sneakers and spiral binders to the three-inch-tall (six feet in real life) lockers, and posters, photos, and mirrors to the insides of their doors, she’d revealed more and more about her history with David Bridges.

  “I had a huge crush on him,” she’d told us. “And one date, almost, which had a sorry end, but it wasn’t his fault.” She promised us all more details on that later. The important thing was that now, out of the blue, after thirty years, David was sending her presents and notes about how eager he was to meet her again during the reunion weekend. He’d sent flowers, candy, and jewelry. “I don’t want to wear the bracelet he sent until the reunion weekend, but I’ll tell you it’s really, really beautiful. Tiny emerald and diamond stones. David did not spare any expense.”

  Sooner or later in their four years at ALHS, every student, some more memorable than others, passed through one of my English classes. My memory of David Bridges was of a good-looking and popular young man. A star athlete, but not a very engaged student. He was immature for his age, as were the boys in his crowd, if I remembered correctly. For Rosie’s sake, I hoped that the responsibilities of adulthood had brought him more wisdom and perspective.

  The chatter during this last crafts meeting before the big weekend seemed to be completely devoted to what Rosie would wear to the opening cocktail party on Friday night. Something classic, but not dowdy. Flattering, but not trashy. Bright, but not gaudy. We talked as much about Rosie’s dress as we did when one of us needed help designing a canopy for a miniature Victorian bed or a yarn rug for a log cabin kitchen.

  Rosie had been invited to David’s room for a private party on Friday night after the cocktail party. I, of course, would be her guest. That gave me only two days to come up with an excuse for getting out of it.

  “What’s David doing with his life now?” Karen said.

  That question, intended or not, sparked a very long response from Rosie. “David has the title of chief engineer at the Duns Scotus, which you all know is the premier hotel in San Francisco.”

  This was a very responsible job, Rosie explained, often meaning he was the only manager on duty for days at a time. How else did we think her class was getting such a good rate on rooms? He’d been married briefly but was now divorced, with one son, Kevin, whom he hadn’t seen in a long time. He lived in South San Francisco.

  “I thought you lost track of each other a long time ago. How do you know all this?” I asked.

  Rosie blushed. She lowered her head to apply a seal
ant to the floor of her room box. She’d achieved a decent semblance of the ALHS first-floor hallway, with ugly linoleum on the floor and steel gray lockers lining one wall. “I haven’t talked to him in all this time, but I volunteered to put together the booklet that has information on everyone’s life at the present time. It’s like a yearbook, but updated.”

  “And you got that input from him? Even the part about his being estranged from his son?” I asked.

  “Uh-huh. He filled out the form I sent to everyone in the class and he just drew a line next to the question about children’s occupations. So, I’m assuming they’re estranged.”

  “Maybe the kid’s just unemployed,” Susan offered.

  Rosie waved her hand as if to say, “So what?” She smiled broadly. “I want you to know he didn’t just fill in the blanks; he added a personal note that said, ‘Thanks, Rosie.’”

  One thing crafters were good at—talking and working at the same time. Fingers were busy gluing, cutting, trimming, painting, and sewing while questions and answers continued to fly. There was also a fair amount of snacking from the potluck bowls that had arrived with my guests.

  “And these presents—do they come with a note, or a phone call, or anything?” Karen asked.

  “How do y’all know these presents are from David?” Susan jumped in.

  “You both sound like my dad. He’s the only other one who knows about this. I’ll tell you what I tell him. I know it’s David, that’s all there is to it. And besides, there’s a card with each present, signed Love, D. B. That’s for David Bridges.” Rosie rolled her eyes. “Who else?”

  I saw that we were all tiptoeing around a warning to Rosie that there was something not quite right about this reunion within a reunion. Mabel gave it the best try.

  “Have you called him, to thank him for the presents?” our polite, most senior citizen asked.

  “Of course not,” Rosie said with a tense laugh. “Our meeting is supposed to be romantic and dramatic. And besides, girls don’t call boys, remember?”

  “What if it doesn’t turn out the way you think, Rosie? What if he’s toying with your feelings?” Karen asked. “You said your first and only date didn’t go well. Maybe he’s setting you up for another fall.”

  Rosie lifted her eyes from the tiny brush dripping with red paint from the last application of trim on the wall of the school hallway.

  She gave us all a deathly serious look.

  “Then I’ll kill him,” she said.

  Silence washed over the room.

  I forgot that Maddie was with us until I heard her small voice.

  “What do you get when you drop a computer on your toes?” she asked. She waited a beat, then answered her own question. “Megahertz,” she said.

  We all took a breath, followed by loud laughter. I didn’t dare look over to see if Rosie was amused.

  Chapter 2

  The plan was that Maddie would stay with Beverly, my sister-in-law and best friend, for the weekend. For once, Maddie didn’t complain about being left behind. The arrangement would put her at the center of attention in yet another Lincoln Point household, with a surrogate grandmother whom she loved and ready access to her Uncle Skip. The better to nag him about giving her junior detective status with the LPPD.

  Nick Marcus, Beverly’s companion for the last several months, had learned the rules early on: “Love me, love Maddie.” Not that that was hard to do, he told us, and he was welcomed immediately into our extended family.

  On Thursday evening, Maddie and I were packing her new grown-up (non-pink) luggage for her trip across town when the phone rang.

  “I can’t believe this, Gerry.” Beverly’s voice carried both sadness and disappointment. “Nick’s grandfather passed away up in Seattle and the services are this weekend. I’ve never met him, but I think I should be there for Nick.”

  “How sad, Beverly. Of course you should go. Please give Nick my condolences,” I said, at the same time running down my list of usual alternatives to watch Maddie.

  “Skip and June are coming up, too, so the families can all meet. Even though it won’t be under the best of circumstances.”

  “I’m glad you’ll all be together,” I said, meaning it, but also mentally crossing two more people off my list.

  Rosie Norman, another loyal backup, was de facto out of the picture. My friend Linda Reed was on call at the Mary Todd retirement home where she worked as a nurse, meaning she’d be sleeping in their nurses’ lounge over the weekend.

  I could try to get Maddie to Tahoe where her parents were, four hours away even with no traffic, but that seemed like a lot of trouble for everyone.

  “Gerry?” I wondered if Beverly had been talking the whole time. “I’ll bet you’re going through your list. I feel awful about this. I suppose we could take Maddie with us, but—”

  “No, no. Don’t give it another thought. I’ll just take her along. You get ready and I’ll see you next week. And, again, please tell Nick I’m sorry for his loss.”

  Why did I think I’d have trouble breaking the news to Maddie? She was always at least a step ahead of me. She’d figured it all out from my side of the conversation and was ready for me.

  “Is it as hot in San Francisco as it is here?” she asked.

  How quickly my granddaughter adjusted.

  I thought of the quote often attributed to Mark Twain: “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.”

  “It’ll probably be freezing,” I said.

  Rosie was a little less enthusiastic about the change of plans. “I thought we’d have some time together,” she said on the phone, her tone carrying an edge of disappointment.

  Instead of sticking with our initial plan to ride and room together, I now preferred to drive myself with Maddie to have more flexibility. I had to admit that the idea of the hour’s drive to San Francisco talking to my granddaughter was much more appealing than having the love-struck Rosie by my side. I wasn’t sorry about missing excruciating details of a thirty-year-old high school crush. I’d had enough of that during my twenty-seven years of teaching.

  “We can do something special another time,” I said. “Thanks for understanding.”

  “You know, I’ll probably be busy with David, anyway,” she said.

  I wondered if she believed that any more than I did. It wasn’t as though David had to fly across the country for the reunion; he lived in South San Francisco and could have taken her to dinner any night of the week. If he were really sincere about picking up their relationship (if there ever was one), why would he be going about it in such a dramatic way? Unless he was as immature now as he was then.

  It occurred to me also that Rosie’s behavior was not her usual responsible, mature way of dealing with life. She had a degree in English literature, owned and operated a good-size bookstore, and had been on her own most of her adult life. But she seemed to have become a different person, acting starry-eyed and unrealistic, now that a potential boy-friend was in the picture.

  I’d seen a lot of that also during my years with adolescents.

  I picked up Maddie at Rutledge Center after her technology camp on Friday and drove straight up U.S. Route 101 to San Francisco. The weekend schedule called for shuttling back and forth to San Francisco for the cocktail party on Friday night, then back to Lincoln Point on Saturday afternoon for a groundbreaking event for the new ALHS sports stadium, then to San Francisco again for a banquet on Saturday night and a brunch on Sunday morning.

  I got tired thinking about it.

  The inconvenience of managing the disparate locations had been trumped by the desire of the powers that be to break ground for the new athletic field the same weekend as the reunion. I hoped thirty-year alums and their faculty would hold up. What had been a forty-minute drive between Lincoln Point and San Francisco thirty years ago now could take double that time in heavy traffic. When it wasn’t commute time holding us up, it was construction that closed a lane or two.

 
I hoped the payoff for all the driving stress would be worth it, especially for Rosie.

  My old Saturn was loaded with Maddie’s laptop, videos, and enough snacks to make it easy to avoid the expensive refrigerated M&M’s in the hotel minibar.

  “No computer jokes today?” I asked her.

  “Nah. I have to stop that. When I get back to my regular school, no one will like me.”

  “You mean you have to give up something you enjoy to fit in there?”

  “No, no. Don’t get all worried. Forget I said it. My mom is already on me not to sell myself out. Or short. Or whatever.”

  I’ll bet she was. Mary Lou Porter had softened a bit from her activist days at UC Berkeley, but she was still on the watch for signs of inequality wherever it might be. She’d won the battle to get Maddie admitted to this summer’s program even though she was younger than the minimum age of thirteen. All she’d needed to hear was that a ten-year-old boy with less computer experience than Maddie had been allowed to register.

  “Knock, knock,” I said.

  Maddie gave in to a little-girl giggle. “You’re not supposed to start the joke, Grandma. You don’t know any punch lines.”

  “I tried.”

  “We’re totally booked,” said the young woman in an unattractive navy power suit. Pinstripes in polyester seemed an oxymoron to me. I heard click, click, click as she worked the keyboard, conflicting with the clang, clang, clang of a cable car on Powell Street, right outside the door. “We’ve got a wedding and a reunion and a trade show and . . .” She threw up her hands. “It’s an old hotel, you know, with mostly single beds.”

  Above the woman’s head was a large painting of John Duns Scotus himself, in his Franciscan robes. I wondered what the symbolism was. Did he or any other Catholic theologian care about the sleeping arrangements of tourists from the suburbs?

  I all but pointed to the little girl beside me, and Maddie obliged by looking forlorn and temporarily homeless. Never mind that she had a new cell phone, an iPod Touch, and a state-of-the-art computer in her designer backpack.