Stolen Secrets Page 12

  “Actually I have a PhD in Cork Crudology,” I said.

  Mr. Schiller had the same wide grin as his son. He raised a thumb to Mrs. Schiller, giving his vote of approval.

  I considered the problem and asked for a flour sifter. Holding it to the lip of the bottle, I poured the wine through. Chunks of cork tumbled into the mesh screen. I repeated the process a few more times until the liquid ran clear.

  “Livvy saved Shabbat,” Mr. Schiller announced. “You can’t have Shabbat without blessings from the vine. It’s a sin, you know.”

  Franklin D. popped his head into the kitchen. “Hey, everyone, time for the big show.”

  We moved into the dining room. There were five unlit candles on the mahogany table.

  I thought about what I’d read last night about the lighting of Shabbat candles. “Aren’t there supposed to be two?”

  “In our house, we light a candle for each person in the family,” explained Mrs. Schiller. “The first one’s for our youngest, Toby. He’s on an outdoor ed trip with his fifth grade class.”

  “That’s why it’s so peaceful around here,” Mr. Schiller said.

  “The other one’s for you, Livvy,” Franklin D. said in response to my unspoken question.

  “You’re a member of our family tonight,” Mrs. Schiller explained.

  Something like cork stuck in my throat.

  “Where are the matches, Mom?” Franklin D. asked.

  “Oh, Curtis! Did you forget to pick them up yesterday?”

  “Did I forget to pick them up?” Mr. Schiller said. “I’m sure you could have paused Oprah long enough to run to the store.”

  “That talk show hasn’t been on in, what, half a decade?” Mrs. Schiller laughed. “My poor husband is out of touch.”

  It took me a second to realize they weren’t arguing. When Mr. Schiller thought I wasn’t looking, he gave his wife a playful pat on the behind. Franklin D. blushed redder than the miniature roses on the buffet.

  The thing was, I liked it. The roses. The house. His parents. Everything.

  Franklin D. left and came back with a butane lighter. The flame shot out, melting beads of wax down the sides of the candles. Mrs. Schiller covered her eyes and raced through a Hebrew prayer. Because I was prepared, I had my “Ahh, men” ready.

  After the fruit of the vine blessing, Mr. Schiller poured some wine into a misshapen ceramic cup that looked like a kid’s second grade art project. He took a sip and passed it to me. I let the liquid play against my lips but didn’t let it go further. For me, wine was the enemy. I hoped God wouldn’t hold it against me.

  There was one more prayer, and then we each ripped off a chunk of warm challah with toasted sesame seeds on top. I bit down, my face melting into a puddle of ecstasy. Mrs. Schiller looked amused. “I’ll get you the recipe. It’s not hard to make.”

  Dinner was a bizarre mishmash of foods. According to Schiller family tradition, each person prepared a different part of the meal. Apparently no one knew what the others made until it was all laid out on the table.

  “More fun that way,” Mr. Schiller said, removing the tinfoil from a bowl of mashed potatoes. Mrs. Schiller heaped whole-wheat pasta with Alfredo sauce on my plate. Franklin D. yanked a cloth napkin off his offering: banana bread.

  Once I got over the eclectic assortment, it was surprisingly delicious.

  After we cleared the table and had moved into the living room, the question popped uninvited from my mouth. “Did you ever know anyone who was in a concentration camp?” I turned red, embarrassed by the intrusive question.

  Mrs. Schiller looked unfazed. “Two cousins from my father’s side were killed at Treblinka—an extermination camp in Poland.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said, wishing I could come up with something more original to say.

  “I often think about how one murdered life affects an entire family line. Someone’s child never had the opportunity to be born, or to create future generations,” she said.

  My breath hitched in my throat. Fifty thousand people had died at Bergen-Belsen. What if Oma had been one of them? Mom wouldn’t be here right now. I wouldn’t be here right now.

  A timer went off in the kitchen. A rich smell of chocolate filled the room. Franklin D. sniffed appreciatively. When Mrs. Schiller returned, plate in tow, he tried to snag a chocolate meringue. She slapped his hand away. “Guests first.”

  We crowded onto the couch to watch a documentary called Who Killed the Electric Car?

  An hour and a half later, as the credits rolled, I whispered to Franklin D., “Your mom and dad are awesome.”

  “They take after me,” he said.

  I thanked his parents, and then Franklin D. and his dad gave me a ride home. I was quiet, letting them fill the car with witty repartee. How was it possible to feel joy and longing at the same time? It felt like homesickness for something I’d never had.

  His dad stayed in the car while Franklin D. walked me to the door. “Shabbat was great,” I said. “I think I feel a Jewish stirring inside me.”

  A smile played on his lips. I took a wild stab at his thoughts and blushed. No, Livvy, don’t go there.

  When I said good night, we looked everywhere but at each other.

  CHAPTER

  FIFTEEN

  THURSDAY AFTER SCHOOL, I POUNDED ON A PIANO in a practice room as Elizabeth belted out “My Favorite Things” from The Sound of Music—her song for play auditions next week. When she traipsed off to Environmental Club, I parked myself on the steps outside the history classroom and waited for Franklin D. to finish a make-up test. Today was our last chance to practice for the euthanasia debate. We were going to my house, but already, I was having doubts. We’d get there around five, the start of my shift with Oma. It might be hard to work, but a part of me wanted him to meet her. I’d met his family, after all.

  As we got off the bus, I warned Franklin D., “My grandmother isn’t always the easiest …” I bit back a yawn. The last few nights, I hadn’t started my homework until after she was in bed and the day’s mess had been cleaned up.

  “So you told me. I like old people, Liv. Besides, we need to practice the con part.”

  He was right; we were going to be the final group up in the last class of the day at the end of a very long week, and I’d barely had time to review the note cards we’d made. On top of that, the words didn’t fly from my mouth the way they did for him.

  “Oh, I almost forgot,” I said when I reached the bottom step of Oma’s porch. “I ran across this article last night. Thought it might be helpful for your side.” I pulled a printout from my binder that listed the ten most common diseases along with the odds that the average person would suffer from each by the age of eighty. Franklin D. looked touched, and I skipped up the steps to hide my blush.

  His phone chirped. He checked the text. “Rats. My mom says we’re going out to dinner in an hour to celebrate my brother’s first soccer goal last weekend.” His thumbs flew across the screen. “The restaurant’s in the Marina. I can walk to it from here.” He glanced at his phone again. “She asked if you want to join us.”

  I did want to go out with the Schillers. When I was with them, I could almost convince myself that they were my family. But they weren’t. Mom was. And Oma.

  Before I could say anything, Franklin D. remembered. “Oh, right, your shift. Never mind.”

  I inserted the key in the door, hoping that Oma wouldn’t do anything embarrassing in front of Franklin D. Last week, I found her dancing in the hallway, wearing a knit sweater and panties. A German polka, she’d said. Actually it had been a lot of fun learning it, even though I was pretty sure she made most of it up.

  Vickie was at the kitchen table, paying bills. She jumped when we walked in. “Oh, you scared me!”

  What did I care if she did her business while Oma was napping? I glanced down and saw Oma’s bank account statement. Beside it was an open checkbook. Vickie followed my gaze.

  “I’m paying the phone bill. I thin
k we should cancel the home service since we all have cell phones. No point in throwing your grandmother’s money away. What do you think?”

  I was confused. “I took care of that bill already, remember? I told you a few days ago.”

  “Oh, right. I guess I’m just used to your mom trusting me to handle them. I forgot you offered to take some of them over.”

  There was an awkward pause before I said, “No, you can do it. I haven’t sent it off yet, so no problem.”

  Vickie shut the laptop as if that put an end to the conversation, which I guess it did. I quickly introduced Franklin D. “I hope it’s okay if he and I work on our—”

  “I’m not your mother. You can do what you want,” she said.

  “We have a debate tomorrow.” I wasn’t sure why I was justifying myself to her. “He’s just a friend.”

  Franklin D. hiked an eyebrow. “A very, very good friend.”

  I sent my elbow into his side.

  “I gave Adelle a quesadilla and green beans for dinner,” Vickie continued without reaction. “It took me ten minutes to find the stove handles.”

  “Oh, yeah, sorry. I took them off so Oma won’t burn the house down. She keeps trying to make cookies.”

  “Well, she’s napping now. See you tomorrow morning.” She stacked the bills on top of the laptop and stood up. When she reached for the baby monitor on the window ledge behind her, my chest tightened. Yesterday Vickie had explained the features of the deluxe model. I told her that we didn’t need it. Oma was plenty loud when she needed help.

  “Your grandmother could choke on something in her sleep or cry out,” Vickie had said. “You might not be listening. You mentioned you slept through your alarm clock this morning. Imagine if you slept through an emergency.”

  I wanted to remind her that she’d slept through her entire shift the night Mom was arrested, but I didn’t want to bring up Mom again. “I fell asleep because I had an essay on progressivism in Roosevelt’s ‘Square Deal’ speech that I couldn’t start until eleven at night,” I told her.

  “Unfortunately, justifications won’t help in a life or death situation. If something goes wrong, I could lose my job.”

  God forbid a family tragedy would affect her paycheck. I glared at her, trying to think of a response but failing.

  “Nice to meet you,” she said now to Franklin D.

  He nodded but didn’t say anything. I got the feeling he didn’t care for Vickie. I was glad. Vickie was bossy, demeaning, and controlling—especially toward my grandmother. But if you asked Mom, she was the Goddess of Caregiving.

  One of the things we’d worked out with Mr. Laramie was that Vickie and I had to share Oma’s laptop. It was a lot faster than my old dinosaur. If I needed it for school, I got priority. “I have an essay due in geography tomorrow,” I said, glancing pointedly at the Dell.

  “I’ll leave the laptop on the mantel like we agreed,” she said and left.

  Franklin D. smiled. “You don’t take geography, do you?” I laughed. “I can’t believe you told her that you’re my ‘very, very good friend’!”

  “I didn’t like how she was talking to you. I’m very loyal to my buddies, in case you haven’t noticed.”

  “She’s usually more friendly. Well, to Mom, at least.” Vickie had changed a lot since Mom was out of the picture. She seemed to resent working with a sixteen-year-old.

  I listened for the front door to shut. “Let’s practice the affirmative and negative before my grandma wakes up.”

  We went to the living room. I tugged on the lamp’s pull chain and was rewarded with a dim glow.

  “I want to ask you something,” Franklin D. said.

  I curled up on the couch and kicked off my shoes, ready to begin debate practice.

  “Where exactly is your mom, Liv?”

  The question caught me off guard, but the words tumbled out as if they’d been sitting on the tip of my tongue, dying to be spoken. “In Vermont. She got a DUI, and she had to go back to a facility to dry out.”

  Why, why, why had I said that? I traced the herringbone pattern on the parquet floor with my big toe. When I raised my eyes, the warmth in his gaze startled me. “Life is messy sometimes,” he said.

  “I do my best to keep it neat whenever possible,” I said softly.

  “You can’t control the whole world.”

  For some reason, I felt an overwhelming urge to share the story. Clinging to the facts out of comfort, I moved through my family history in logical order. How Mom had been so involved with her AA meetings in Vermont; how she’d taken off stone drunk that night in the car; how rehab would be a substitution for prison time.

  Franklin D. was a surprisingly good listener. I explained how I hadn’t even known my grandmother existed until two months ago. I told him how Oma couldn’t answer a direct question without going in a random direction. I even told him how my mom was so traumatized by her childhood that she didn’t want me to know my own grandma was alive. I finished, shocked into silence by my monologue.

  I felt ashamed when I saw the look of pity on his face.

  “God, I sound like you,” I said.

  “In what way?”

  “Have you ever tried to pour water out of a pitcher, and all of a sudden, the ice gives way and the water gushes out?” That came out harsher than I’d meant. I smiled to soften my words.

  He frowned. “I lay it all on the line so everyone knows who I really am.”

  “I’m sorry. I have no idea why I said that. I guess I’m not used to talking so much about personal stuff.”

  “You should try it more often. It takes the guesswork out of communication.” His face smoothed out into a smile.

  Maybe he could handle the weird parts of me, after all. “My grandma talks about Bergen-Belsen, a concentration camp in Germany, but my mom says she wasn’t there. She says Oma didn’t grow up in Holland, either, even though Oma keeps mentioning it. And my grandma said she had a sister named Margaret, but Mom insists she only had a brother.”

  “Your grandmother has Alzheimer’s,” Franklin D. said. “By definition, a lot of mixed-up things come out of her mouth.”

  “But my mom’s honesty record is in the toilet right now.”

  “Do you think your grandmother didn’t tell your mother the whole truth, because her memories were too painful?”

  “My mom said that Oma was a closed book when she was growing up.”

  “But it doesn’t sound like she’s like that anymore.”

  Yes, I realized, he’d nailed the irony. Alzheimer’s had torn down the walls, causing Oma’s memories to spill out. If only I could figure out which were real.

  “Do you know where your grandma might keep her personal records, like a passport or a birth certificate?” he asked. “Then you would know where she was born at least.”

  He was right. I took off without a word, him tagging behind. In the library, I searched through a squat file cabinet, obscured by a pile of tattered blankets haphazardly thrown on top. The metal rods inside sagged under the weight of paperwork. My grandmother had kept every utility bill from 1992 to 1999. Somewhere around 1996, I found a folder labeled “Records.” But only plane tickets from vacations were inside: Jamaica, Grand Cayman, the Mexican Riviera …

  No passports. Nothing.

  Franklin D. gnawed on his lower lip as if he was biting back the urge to ask something. Predictably his impulse won out. “So if your grandma’s remembering right, and she really was in a concentration camp, that would make you Jewish.”

  “There’s a mezuzah on the door. I don’t know why she’d put it up if she’s not Jewish.” I buried my face in my hands. God, this was nuts. It was like I had a key to a whole new world, but I didn’t know which door it unlocked.

  He lifted a hand in the air. “High-five, baby. You’ve joined the club!”

  I slapped his hand, laughing in spite of myself. What a dork.

  “You can be an honorary member until you get confirmation.” He shook his
head, the curls flying in random directions. “This is a major mystery, worthy of being solved. You’ve got your mother saying one thing, and your grandmother saying something completely—”

  “THAT’S NOT MY NAME!”

  We jerked around. Oma was at the door, hands on her hips. I slammed the file cabinet shut. “She doesn’t like to be called grandmother,” I whispered. To her, I said, “This is my friend, Oma. Remember I told you about him?”

  She blinked twice. No recognition.

  “Oma means ‘grandma’ in Dutch,” I told Franklin D. as we headed back to the living room, where we could all sit down.

  “Dutch?” Franklin D. raised an eyebrow. “Or some other language?”

  I saw where he was going with this. If Oma was from Germany, like Mom said, then wouldn’t she want me to use the German word for “grandma”?

  “Are you from Holland?” Oma asked Franklin D. “Nice people live there.”

  I thought about the poem I’d found in the anthology on Oma’s bookshelf. She’d written about the demise of Anne Frank’s chestnut tree, so she might’ve had some connection with the city of Amsterdam.

  I pulled my phone out of my pocket, typed in the word, and sighed. “Oma means ‘grandma’ in both German and Dutch.” A failed clue.

  I walked over to the window and spread the curtains. The sunset cast an orange glow on Oma’s face.

  “Love your home,” Franklin D. told her. “Edwardian, right? Awesomely antique.”

  Oma’s head swung to him. “I most certainly am not an antique.”

  “I bet you weren’t even born when this house was built,” he said. “So that makes you a spring chicken.”

  Oma lowered her chin and batted her skimpy eyelashes at him. Was she flirting? Franklin D. and I traded smiles. He offered Oma his hand. “I’m Franklin D. Nice to meet you, Mrs. Friedman.”

  “Oma!” she cried.

  “Oma,” he repeated.

  Her coy look switched to wariness. “Franklin Delano was chums with that nasty Winston Churchill.”

  “Well, actually, I was named after my great-grandfather, Franklin Douglas Schiller the Great.”