What We Keep - Elizabeth Berg [48]
We kissed again, then again; and then I heard the sound of someone walking, and froze. “Just keep still,” Wayne whispered. “They won’t see us. Keep quiet.”
I did, but I kept my eyes open. And what I saw through the door of the tepee was my mother, standing in the backyard, dressed in her nightgown and slippers. She was talking softly, saying something I couldn’t make out. I looked for someone near her, but saw no one; it appeared she was talking to herself. She quieted, then held still, lifted her chin as though she were being addressed by someone above her. Then, unbelievably, she began flapping her arms like wings, and walking about in circles. I was horribly embarrassed. I turned to Wayne, who was quietly watching. “She’s never done this,” I whispered. “She has never done this.”
He nodded.
“I don’t know what she’s doing!”
He shrugged. “She’s not doing anything. She’s just goofing around.”
I looked back at her. She was still now, facing Jasmine’s house. And then she walked toward it, disappeared into the darkness.
I cleared my throat, laughed a little. And then I lay down, covered my face with my hands. I felt Wayne leaning over me; he was trying to pry my hands off my face. “Ginny,” he said.
“No!” I kept my face covered. I wanted to talk to Sharla. I needed my father.
“Hey, Ginny,” Wayne said. “Look! Quick!”
I pulled my hands off my face.
“It’s me,” he said, smiling.
I smiled back in spite of myself. “I know.”
“Come on. Let’s go outside.” We went around in back of the tepee, sat on the ground.
He picked a blade of grass, then pulled gently at it as though he were persuading it to stretch. “They just act crazy sometimes,” he said. “Mothers. It’s just that most people never see them acting that way—they do it alone. If you hadn’t been out here with me, you wouldn’t have seen it either.”
“I’ll bet your mother never acts like that,” I said.
“My mother …”
“What?”
“Nothing. Never mind.” He laid the piece of grass across the palm of his hand, blew it away. Then, “Hey,” he said. “You want to see a magic trick?”
“I don’t know. Sure.”
“Give me something,” he said.
I handed him a twig.
“No,” he said. “Something that means something to you.”
I looked down at the pearl ring on my hand, then up at him.
“Yes,” he said. “That.”
The ring had been my mother’s when she was a child, and her mother’s before that. I loved it, and since I’d been given it, I’d never taken it off; I feared misplacing it. But I handed it to Wayne, then covered the newly naked spot with my other fingers, protecting it.
Wayne pulled a small box from his pocket, put the ring inside it. Then he shook it, and I could hear the ring moving about. He opened the box, showed me the ring lying there.
“Okay?” he said.
I nodded.
He closed the box again, began moving it slowly about. “The earth is a strange and wondrous place,” he said. “Think of all you can’t understand. I mean, even … look up at the sky.”
I looked at the box. I wanted the ring back.
“No,” he said. “Trust me. Look up at the sky.”
I looked up.
“How did those stars get there?” he asked.
“God.”
He laughed. “Who’s God?”
I couldn’t believe he had said this. I feared, momentarily, for his life: lightning. A small flood. A boy heart attack, Wayne lying on his stomach, his hands reaching out uselessly, his face purplish blue. I said loudly, “What do you mean who’s God, God is God.” I waited; nothing happened. Well. I had saved us.
I looked again at the box. Wayne shook it and I heard the reassuring rattle of the ring. “Sometimes you see something that isn’t there,” he said. “And sometimes …” He put his hand over the lid of the box. “You don’t see something that is there.” He opened the box. It was empty.
I burst into tears, surprising myself. “Give it back!”
“Oh, no,” he said, “don’t cry!”
“I’m not crying.”
A moment. I snuffled, wiped at my nose with the back