I pick out the emotions knitting in me like loose threads: anger at his carelessness, guilt that I wasn’t there, and sadness for the things he will never see, like elephants. And all of these seasoned with relief that he will no longer have to suffer.
Usually, when the “hounds of drink” dragged Ba to the dark place, he wouldn’t speak for days. But after Mum died, he stopped not only speaking, but listening. Ba tried so hard, but like all visionaries, the world was set against him. I hope his next life in Chinese heaven is easier.
“You laid him by Mum?”
I shook my head. “Her parents wouldn’t allow it. But I found him a spot at East London Cemetery.”
Jamie snorts. He shifts, and I can feel his eyes worrying me. “What’s wrong?” he asks.
“Every night I dream that Ba’s in trouble. It doesn’t make sense. He should’ve already moved on to the next life. He’s trying to communicate something. Something to do with you.”
He scoffs, and I feel something close in my face, like a door on a traveling salesman.
I stick a foot in the door. “See, you’re in the dreams, too. But you never help him. You’re always staring into space.”
With another scoff, he points his nose up.
“Exactly like that.” I poke his nose, and he jerks away.
“What are you doing in these dreams?”
“Trying to help him. But it’s not me he needs. It’s you. Whatever you’re miffed about, you need to forgive him.”
He shifts, causing the planks to groan. “He never asked for forgiveness when he was alive. Why care now?”
I lean against his shoulder, which gives as much as a steel post. “Because he’s stuck.”
Jamie clamps his eyes as if to shut out my words. “She wasn’t even a week in the grave when he pawned her wedding ring and used it on gargle juice.” I wince at Ba’s euphemism for his cheap gin.
“That’s what you’re on about? He needed the money to pay off our debts. Remember the bee farm?”
“How could I forget?” he mutters, nudging my head off his shoulder. “Sometimes you can’t forgive because it cheapens the people you love.”
“But Mum would want you to. ‘Don’t spend too long looking behind you, or you’ll miss out on what’s ahead.’ Remember?”
“No way, Val. Don’t ask me again.”
A bitterness has crept into his voice that I don’t remember hearing before. Jamie seems to have grown heavier, and not just from his new coal-shoveling muscles.
We were still grieving over Mum when he left, and I hoped the boiler rooms would at least give him a place away from the memories to heal. But perhaps down there, without enough air to vent them away, his troubles only compounded.
I decide to let it go for now. I’ll keep tugging little by little, and like the boats that coaxed the Titanic to sea, eventually I’ll get Jamie to budge. There are more time-sensitive matters that need solving, matters that require Jamie and me to be on good terms.
I point at one of the brighter stars. “What’s that big red one?”
“The White Tiger to the Chinese. Westerners call it the Bull.”
Isn’t that like life? Two people look at the same object but see two different things. I look at shoveling coal and see a job. He sees a calling.
“So why do you like those boiler rooms so much? It’s so dark down there.” I shiver.
“How would you know?” he chides.
Jamie knows well my fear of dark, confined spaces. He’s the one who found me after I fell into the coal hole, only six years old and spindly.
He shifts around again, pulling at his clothes. Finally settling, he sighs. “When Drummer bangs out the beats, and we get into a rhythm, I feel content, peaceful. Sometimes when the weather’s good, we’ll string hammocks on the deck, and I’ll lose myself in the stars. I couldn’t sleep all night when Halley’s Comet came around.”
I soak in all the constellations, like so many grains of spilled salt. “That is one savory stew.”
“It’s mad, right?” His voice becomes animated. “In London, we’re lucky to see a few stars a month. But out here, they’re everywhere. I still can’t get over it. I feel like if I reached high enough, I could scoop out a whole handful, then blow them away like dandelion seeds.”
When we were children, Jamie and I blew wishes off dandelions, like all kids. But one night, our parents were quarreling in the kitchen, and a dandelion just wasn’t handy. Jamie, lying next to me in our half bed, said that if we blew anyway, the heavens would still hear us, even without the dandelion, and maybe grant our wish. He took my hand, and together we blew, just a puff. My parents quieted. Then just like that, Mum laughed. After that, we didn’t need dandelions to wish. We’d just blow. And every time a wish came true, I’d hear Mum’s sweet laugh.
More quietly, he adds, “I see her up there, too, you know.”
“What’s she doing?”
“Dancing with her shoes off. Remember?”
I smile. “Yes.”
Mum loved singing bawdry tunes and kicking up her heels while the bread baked, though I never found out where the vicar’s daughter picked up such songs.
“But sometimes, she’s quiet. Like she’s just watching us from the window.” His sigh takes its time leaving.
Jamie and I competed for our mum’s affections, but he adored her the most. We both picked her flowers whenever we passed a good patch, but he did it even in the pouring rain.
I squeeze his hand, and he squeezes back.
“Jamie?”
“Hmm?” His gaze is still pointed to the stars, but his brow is knitted in thought.
“There are stars in New York, too.”
We’ll fly the Stars and Stripes on our foremasts, leaving the Union Jack behind. A new start for us, and a peaceful ending for our parents. I reach into the sky as if I am grabbing some stars, then blow them like dandelion seeds off my palm.
10
April 11, 1912
Ba is tied to a live oak growing in the middle of a wide, water-filled ditch. Jamie stands on the oak’s highest branch, his shirt billowing like a sail moving in the wrong direction. The water rises, as if an underground spring has burst.
I wade to Ba, my movements sluggish. At last, I reach him. My fingers frantically dig at the knots. But the ditch is filling too fast.
“Help me, you goat!”