It said so little to be so important.
Mother takes the envelope. “They let you sign for it?”
“Sí,” Martia says. Martia is local, trusted. I’m sure the postman knows her better than anyone else who stays in Blauwe Huis, probably even better than the owner.
A smaller envelope is tucked inside the larger one, like a wedding invitation. It is stamped with a seal, protecting the contents, like one of the medieval parchments written in old Italian that Dad would sometimes translate for a history scholar.
Mother’s fingers slide under the flap and break the seal. She opens it, peeks in, almost as if she’s seeing if it will bite. She tugs out a page.
“What is it?” I ask.
“I can’t read it.” Mother turns the paper over, as if she expects a translation on the back. “It’s all in Dutch.”
“Martia can translate,” I say.
Martia shrugs. “Sí.”
Mother doesn’t hand the paper over. Instead, she beckons Martia to come read over her shoulder.
Martia mouths the words silently before she starts speaking. “It is from the lawyer here. Just closing out the files, passing along a copy of the commissioner’s final report on Mr. Walters’s death, that the incident was wholly accidental.”
Mother shifts in her chair. “Well, this is ridiculous. They concluded all of this last year. Why would the lawyer send out another letter?”
Kammi looks at me. Maybe she thinks I can answer the riddle.
Martia says, “This is what the lawyer says, just closing the file. Formal.” She shrugs, as if to apologize for the bureaucracy that sends a letter a year after the fact.
“Why does he have to stir things up again?” Mother takes another swig of her blue drink. “I paid his fees.”
“He’s not even right,” I say.
“What?” Mother asks.
“It wasn’t wholly an accident. Was it?”
Mother blanches. She let down her guard and asked a question she didn’t want the answer to. “Cyan, please stop. We’ve been over this before.”
Yes, we’ve been over it before. Mother says what happened was an accident. The articles published in the local paper after it happened said it was an “incident.” An incident is not the same as an accident. An accident is a mistake. I don’t know if what happened was a mistake. No matter what the commissioner’s report says.
Martia steps between Mother and me. “Miss Kammi, please come in, we will have dinner now. You, too, Cyan.” Martia touches Kammi on the shoulder and Kammi follows.
“I’m not really hungry,” she says. She slides her straw bag onto her arm and slips into the house. “The gelato...”
Martia follows her like a mother hen. I don’t move.
Mother snaps her head in my direction. “What are you doing? Are you trying to make things hard? After everything that’s happened, why can’t you just be nice?” Mother keeps talking, not waiting for—not wanting—an answer from me.
“You know all about it, do you?” Mother’s voice turns as icy as the drink she’s guzzling. “We’ll talk about this later.” With trembling hands she struggles to force the paper back into the envelope. After a moment, she closes it as if it contains some evil spell.
Mother stalks inside and up the stairs to her studio. Even from out here, I can hear her footsteps clang on the metal staircase.
Martia flutters between the kitchen and the dining table, where I go to sit, alone. Dinner is ruined. The fish, cooked too long, has turned to rubber. The fried cornbread congeals in my mouth. It doesn’t want to go down, but I swallow it anyway, piece after piece, until it’s all gone. Every crumb.
Chapter Seven
JUST AFTER DAWN the next morning, when I slip in from the beach, my pockets weighted down with shells and sea glass, I hear Mother’s footsteps going up the metal staircase. I catch her glance as she’s closing the door to her studio. I can’t tell what she’s thinking and I don’t care. The damp hem of my skirt drags on the floor and my flip-flops squish as I walk through the kitchen, leaving a trail of sand. Martia doesn’t scold, though. She lets me squeeze past her and into Mother’s still-warm chair. Without speaking, she hands me a plate of pancakes topped with coconut syrup. My favorite breakfast.
Mother paces upstairs. No matter how softly she walks, I always know when she’s up there. If she’s aware of my ventures into her studio, she hasn’t let on. She hasn’t mentioned the missing tubes of oil paint. Maybe she hasn’t noticed yet.
Kammi tiptoes into the kitchen in her bare feet, her pink toenails like small shells, ever so quiet on the woven rug. She must not realize Mother is already awake and she’s afraid to disturb her.