Chapter Five #2
Her mother turns away. The little girl chatters on, pointing out various objects, oblivious to her mother’s disinterest. Next to me, Harriet steps closer, nodding along like the child-version of her can feel her enthusiasm.
But the little girl eventually notices the absence of her mother and grows quiet, her small voice trailing off.
“Why are we here?” Harriet asks, her attention fixed on the children.
The younger Harriet has her head against her sister’s shoulder as the train goes around and around, their arms looped together.
Somewhere behind us, her parents are arguing about familial responsibilities, the name Matilda cropping up again and again.
Harriet knits her fingers together, pressing them under her chin. “Why did you choose this memory?”
“I don’t choose the memories. My magic guides us.
We see what we need to see,” I answer solemnly.
I don’t control this part. I’m just a chaperone.
I accompany my assignments to their past and guide them through the worst of their decisions.
I hold up a mirror to their actions and let them see the damage their poor choices wrought.
But none of this seems like a poor choice. She’s just a little girl, watching a train.
“Harriet! Samantha!” It’s their father this time, bellowing at the insistence of the woman next to him. She’s tapping one heeled foot against the marble, staring out the front windows, exasperation and impatience rolling off her in waves.
Samantha dutifully begins to retreat from the train set but Harriet stays close, examining the tiny village and the fleet of wooden boats beneath a bridge constructed out of Popsicle sticks. She touches one of the boats lightly, delighted when it bobs up and down in a sea made of bubble wrap.
“C’mon, Harry,” the other little girl implores, shooting nervous glances between her parents and her sister. She tugs lightly on the back of her dress.
Harriet twists away. “I just want to watch the train one more time.”
Samantha inches closer. “But they’re getting mad.”
Harriet reaches her hand across the set again, small fingers stretching for the tops of the trees. “They’re already mad,” she says in a voice that sounds far too old for such a young girl.
“They’re getting more mad, though,” Samatha whispers, urgent. Behind her, her mother is striding across the floor, heels clicking with purpose. Next to me, Harriet releases a breath that sounds like a laugh.
I turn halfway. She’s watching her mother stomp her way across the lobby, a wry smile twisting her lips.
“I remember this part,” she says.
Her mother pulls at little Harriet’s arm, guiding her up and away from the train set with insistence. The little girl tries to turn back, but two perfectly manicured hands hold on to her shoulders, twisting her in the direction of the exit.
“Why must you make things so difficult for me?” her mother snaps.
“I don’t mean to,” little Harriet says, in stereo with the older version at my side. Harriet offers me a tight smile and I get that twisting feeling again. That scratch of recognition, at the very back of my mind.
“You embarrassed me at the party,” her mother continues, marching little Harriet across the lobby. She stumbles, and her mother sighs like that’s an inconvenience, too. “Is it truly so hard for you to behave for one evening? Look at your sister.”
Harriet turns in her mother’s grasp and gazes at her sister. Samantha angles her face away, pretending to be interested in her shoes instead.
“Samantha,” her mom says, “always makes the right decision.” Harriet wilts. “I’m sorry,” she says, subdued. “I’ll make good decisions. Just like Samantha, I promise.”
Her mother arches an eyebrow. “I sincerely doubt that.”
I do, too. Because as soon as Harriet’s mother moves around her to the door, I see a small wooden boat clutched in Harriet’s hand. She tucks it quickly in the large bow at her back and fixes her face in a demure, apologetic frown.
I laugh. A tiny little con artist in a velvet dress.
“In my defense,” Harriet says, “I probably wouldn’t have stolen it if she just let me look.”
I snort. “A right little beastie, you were.”
The family disappears through the front door. Next to me, Harriet collects all of her wild hair, twisting it back in a loose knot. “I don’t even remember that boat.” She stares at the train garden. “I feel bad. Someone worked hard on that display.”
I hum and rock back on my heels. Harriet shoots me a dark look. “What? You think I wanted to destroy the Christmas display?”
“I said nothing.”
“Your face says enough. The boat didn’t even go to a good cause.
My mother probably found it and destroyed it.”
“She didn’t let you keep your treasures?”
“What do you think?”
No, I don’t think Harriet’s mother let her hold on to much of anything at all. Maybe that’s why she has her antiques shop now, the shelves crowded with so many trinkets you can hardly find your way through. Maybe that’s why her house is an explosion of color. A dragon hoarding her gold.
“What?” she asks. “What’s that look about?”
“Nothing.” I school my features back into a neutral mask and hold my hand out, palm up. “Ready to go?”
“That’s it?” Harriet frowns, glancing around. “I expected something more … substantial.”
I don’t know how to tell her that I did, too.
That a little girl stealing a boat doesn’t exactly fall in line with the transgressions I usually bear witness to.
But I don’t know how much of what she’s showing me is an act and how much is true.
The past will eventually reveal her secrets, even if it takes the long way around.
I can be patient.
“Is that why you’re here?” she asks. “Because I stole a toy boat?”
“I’m here for a reason,” I reply evenly. “Perhaps this is the precursor to a lifetime of larceny.”
“Larceny?” She laughs.
“It’s possible. You’re a stranger to me, Harriet. You could be hiding all sorts of secrets.”
Her smile fractures and her eyes drop from mine. I frown. There’s something out of place, but I can’t figure out what it is.
“Maybe you’re right,” she says. She gazes out the doors where her family disappeared. “Maybe I messed it all up.”
I hesitate. My job isn’t to make her feel better, but I don’t like the look on her face or the way she’s holding herself. Hands at her elbows, shoulders hunched forward. She looks smaller here, in the past. Diminished.
“For the record,” I admit slowly, “I don’t believe stealing boats from train garden displays makes you a bad person.”
Her eyes slant toward mine, suspicious. “You don’t?”
I shake my head. “No.”
A timid smile breaks across her face and the itchy feeling rattling around my rib cage is replaced with a firm pressure. Something heavy and uncomfortable, like I’ve been pushed.
If I’m a ghost, maybe she’s a witch. Stranger things have happened. “See?” She flicks my chest. “Was that so hard?”
“What?”
“Being nice. You catch more flies with honey, you know.”
I roll my eyes. “Are you the fly in this scenario, or the honey?”
“Well, that lasted all of thirty seconds.” The smile wilts off her face. “You’re sort of a jerk, do you know that?”
“And your true colors will reveal themselves shortly. They always do.” I thrust my hand between us. “Time to go.”
I couldn’t get her to grab on in the present, and now she’s waffling in the past, too. I’m starting to think Harriet York’s true purpose is to be a giant pain in my ass.
Maybe this is my karmic reckoning. Not hers.
She ignores my hand between us and rolls out her shoulders instead. She stretches one arm across her chest and then the other.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m preparing myself for the tornado of time, or whatever the hell that magic swirly thing is. And you’re being bossy.” She lowers her voice. “Let’s go, Harriet. You can’t avoid your fate, Harriet. What are you—”
“I’m trying to do my job,” I defend sullenly.
She raises her voice, talking over me. “What are you hiding, Harriet? What’s your secret, Harriet?”
“What are you hiding, Harriet?”
“I’m just saying,” she continues, ignoring my question, “it wouldn’t kill you to be a little nicer.”
It wouldn’t kill me. “You do realize I’m already dead, right? It wouldn’t kill me because I’m— Harriet. I’m dead.”
A small grin quirks at the corners of her mouth. “Then you can afford to be kind.”
I huff. Her fledgling smile broadens to a grin. Done with her warm-up routine, she taps one foot against the marble floor, pretending to glance at an imaginary watch. I wish I didn’t find it as charming as I do.
“Harriet,” I try, softening my voice. I place my hand palm up between us. I’m always reaching for this woman. “Would you please grab my hand so we can leave this place and return to the present?” I add a sarcastic half bow. “If you don’t mind terribly.”
“It needs work,” she says. “But it’ll do for now.”
She takes one last look around the lobby, her gaze lingering on the train. It’s still chugging merrily around the reception desk, the bridge rocking slightly as it powers over it.
“Harriet.”
“Yes,” she says, dragging her eyes away. “We can go.”
“Wonderful.”
She snickers. Her hand reaches for mine.
“Hold on,” I tell her.
The last thing I see is her smile, subdued but still shining through, like the last slice of sunshine before it melts into the horizon. A flash of light and then—
And then nothing.