Interim Summer 2017

The summer Wilhelmina was fifteen was her upside-down summer. Instead of Wilhelmina living with the aunts, Frankie came to Massachusetts for a clinical trial of some cancer drug that someone had decided was a good idea, but that seemed, from Wilhelmina's perspective, mainly to make Frankie nauseated and tired.

She lived in an apartment near the hospital, which was in Boston. This arrangement had surprised Wilhelmina, who'd imagined Frankie living with them, probably taking Delia's room while Delia slept on the couch.

"Why do I have to sleep on the couch?" Delia had said when Wilhelmina had proposed this. "You sleep on the couch!"

"No one needs to sleep on the couch," said Cleo, who was, during this conversation, alternately nursing baby Philip and sneezing. Every time she sneezed, Philip's tiny mouth froze in place and he stared up at her, wide-eyed with amazement. "It's better for Frankie to be close to the hospital."

"Alone?" said Wilhelmina. "I could live with her."

"Esther and Aunt Margaret will be coming up a lot, and we'll be in touch with her every day. We'll bring her here for dinner all the time."

"But she might not want to live alone."

"She might not want to live in a chaotic home with a baby, far from where she needs to go for the trial, hon," said Cleo. "This Boston apartment is frankly a miracle."

"That's not what Dad says."

"He knows it's a miracle," said Cleo. "Grace Mardrosian can be difficult, and she tires Dad out. That's all."

Grace Mardrosian was Theo's boss at the library and, with her husband, the owner of the Boston brownstone containing the apartment in which Frankie would be staying. The Mardrosians' son lived in the apartment normally. Felix Mardrosian, a graduate student in archaeology, would be spending the summer at a dig in Iceland that his mother disapproved of, because Felix was in a relationship with the director of the dig, whom his mother also disapproved of, for reasons Wilhelmina didn't know. Thanks to Theo, Wilhelmina knew a lot of details about Mrs. Mardrosian's attempts to control the people around her, but she didn't know everything. What she did know was that Mrs. Mardrosian had let it slip in a conversation with her son Felix that one of her librarians who was constantly requesting time off was most recently requesting time off in order to drive his aunt into Boston repeatedly for a clinical trial. And Felix had asked who, and Mrs. Mardrosian had said, "Theo Hart." Felix had asked which hospital, and Mrs. Mardrosian had told him. And Felix had said, "That hospital is right near me. Maybe I'll ask Theo Hart if his aunt would like to house-sit while I'm in Iceland. She could feed my cats. You don't mind if I let her use the apartment, do you, Mom?"

Hence, every day at work, Mrs. Mardrosian hovered over Theo's desk, dropping weird, vague hints that she blamed Theo for her son's unsuitable relationship, and intimating that once Felix got his head screwed on straight, he would leave the dig and need his apartment back.

"I just hope the apartment doesn't turn out to be like a frat house," said Cleo.

But Felix Mardrosian's apartment was not like a frat house. It was, in fact, bigger than the Harts' apartment, despite being located in a pricey part of the city and occupied by only one man and two cats; it was the first floor of a beautifully maintained building with a tiny back garden; and the decor was consistent with what one might expect from an aspiring archaeologist. Old stuff. Little bits of metal and clay that had probably lived aboveground for a brief flash of time long ago, then slept inside the earth for eons, until some patient human with an aching back had dug them out again. Books. Dark wooden tables and leather chairs. Lamps, everywhere; Felix really had a thing for pretty lamps. Weird random stuff, like an array of taxidermied animals that included a fox, a chipmunk, and a wolf. African violets in the windows.

"This will do very nicely," said Frankie on the day they all helped her move in. She rested in an armchair while Theo and Wilhelmina carried things and Esther and Aunt Margaret unpacked and made up the beds.

"There is, for sure, a feeling to it, the minute you walk through the door," called Esther from Frankie's bedroom, where she was hanging Frankie's shirts beside Felix's in the closet. The cats were in there with her; they followed Esther wherever she went. "Some of it feels like ‘powerful young man of means,' but I don't think it'll hurt you."

"A lot of the objects in this apartment will steady you, Frankie," said Aunt Margaret, surveying the living room with her hands on her hips. "The lamps are very healing, and the violets, of course. These old things have a low, steady power. Very balancing." Aunt Margaret touched a series of small triangular stones arranged in a row on a shelf.

"The taxidermy is too bad," said Esther, coming in from the bedroom. The cats came with her, pressing themselves against her ankles and watching the rest of the group suspiciously. "How does it feel to you, Margeleh?"

"Mm," said Aunt Margaret, going to the wolf that stood snarling in a corner near an old-fashioned record player. "The most steadying objects are the ones best able to resist Felix's belief that he owns them. This wolf is confused, I'm afraid."

"I will try to befriend her," said Frankie. "I'm often confused."

Wilhelmina was letting this peculiar conversation wash over her the way she often did with the aunts, because she was focused on her own perceptions. Namely, that it was deeply, deeply strange to imagine Frankie living in this home that was brimming with someone else's objects—and also something more unsettling. The aunts were passing a feeling back and forth, from one to the other. They were scared.

Wilhelmina had a job that summer. She made sandwiches at a sandwich shop on Main Street a few blocks from the library. She liked it well enough. Her boss was easygoing, nothing like Mrs. Mardrosian, and she could get into a zone, layering sandwich ingredients or mixing capers into tuna and forgetting about how upside-down she felt. It hurt her hands and neck sometimes, but she was allowed to stop and stretch. Occasionally she worked a shift that ended at a convenient time to walk up Main Street to the library and deliver a sandwich to her father.

The walk took her past the Lupa Building, a building she liked because of its stylized wolves and the glimpses of chrome and marble through the tall glass windows. Also the doughnut shop, of course, Alfie Fang's, which had a black-and-white checkered floor and a mural of a forest on the wall and, occasionally, a cute boy cleaning the tables with a wet rag. She didn't know him. She figured he must go to a school somewhere besides Watertown High School. Wilhelmina had a heightened consciousness of cute boys that summer. A cute guy at school named Thomas had fallen hard for her last winter. It had been…educational. He'd seemed very sweet, and she'd liked being liked. Until they'd kissed, and it had felt like having her mouth excavated by a hagfish. Before kissing Thomas, Wilhelmina had never even heard of a hagfish, but the kissing had eventually inspired her to google "slimiest thing on Earth," which had led her to the hagfish, an eel-shaped fish that exuded large quantities of a milky and fibrous slime.

She'd tried the kissing a couple more times with Thomas. She'd tried to make alterations to the approach, the point of contact, the follow-through, et cetera, but it had been the same. Thomas, who was very enthusiastic, hadn't seemed aware of the problem, or of her attempts to solve it. So then she'd tried to talk to him about it, which was when his sweetness had turned sour.

"If you don't like it, maybe there's something wrong with you," he'd said with a new, hard set to his jaw. At which point Wilhelmina had decided that this educational opportunity had run its course, then done the googling that had led her to the hagfish. Julie hated Thomas now, like despised him, and Bee wanted to talk to him sternly about how to respect people. Her elephants. Wilhelmina had had to ask them both to stand down, which they'd done, of course. Their anger on her behalf was a comfort to her. It made her feel loved. But it didn't soothe her worries. Was there something wrong with her? This was one of the questions Wilhelmina was sometimes able to stop asking herself when she was in the sandwich zone.

Another was: What was wrong with everyone else? It wasn't just an upside-down summer; it was an upside-down world. Since the inauguration of the new president in January, a part of Wilhelmina was always dizzy. It was the part of her that processed cruelty and lies, and it was overwhelmed. It couldn't keep up. Wilhelmina, Julie, and Bee went to protests now regularly; they sought them out, because surrounding themselves with other people who also saw through the lies and hated the cruelty made them feel a little less crazy.

Often Julie and Bee came with her to see Frankie, the three of them taking the bus to the train into the city and going to the bookstore on Newbury Street first, or, on hot days, a movie. Once, they dressed up, made their makeup extra spectacular, and had high tea at the library.

Sometimes when they got to Frankie's, Esther or Aunt Margaret or both were visiting, and sometimes it was just Frankie. Either way, the visits always involved a certain amount of amazed poking at Felix Mardrosian's eclectic treasures. Entire shelves in his living room were full of small shards of pottery, or those triangular rocks, or short metal rods.

"He should label his stuff," said Julie, with her nose to a piece of petrified wood.

"I know, right?" said Wilhelmina. "For those of us who feel like we're in a museum."

"Museum labels are boring," said Bee, who lay on the floor, communing with the taxidermied wolf, one of the cats climbing around on top of him. "I like it better without them. If a volcano erupted and our bodies were petrified in lava, like, until archaeologists dug them out centuries later, what activity would you want to be found stuck in?"

"Hm," said Frankie. "Picking tomatoes."

"Reading a really excellent book," said Julie.

Protecting Frankie,Wilhelmina thought but didn't say.

"Hanging out with you guys," said Bee. "Do you have a favorite treasure in this apartment, Frankie?"

"It depends which room I'm in," said Frankie. "In here, I love the lamps. Sometimes if I'm up in the night, I'll come in and turn on every single one and just sit for a bit in their glow. It's soft light, you know? Nothing harsh, just a lot of little warm suns."

"It doesn't keep you awake?" said Bee.

"It makes me sleepy," said Frankie, "like a bath."

Julie was counting. "Wow. There are twelve lamps in this room."

"Yes," said Frankie. "In the kitchen, I love the violets."

"Can we do anything for you?" said Bee. "Water the violets?"

"I'm perfectly content, but thank you, dear," said Frankie, smiling across the room at Bee. Frankie's smile had lost none of its power, but Wilhelmina wasn't sure what was fueling it. No, that wasn't quite right; she could feel the well of power inside Frankie burning strong. But Frankie's body, the container around the well, felt thin-walled and tired. Old. Her inner heat was too hot, too close to the surface. Whenever it was time to leave and the other aunts weren't there, a fear would grip Wilhelmina that Frankie wouldn't be okay on her own, that she would burn herself up.

Frankie seemed to know. "You don't need to worry about me, Wilhelmina," she would say, reaching a hand up to Wilhelmina's face. "Want to go for a walk sometime, just you and me?"

"Here?" said Wilhelmina, who was having trouble picturing this version of Frankie walking extensively anywhere. "Around your block?"

"Oh no, somewhere beautiful," said Frankie. "Next time I come to your house for dinner, let's go to Mount Auburn Cemetery."

"Okay, but I can't drive yet," said Wilhelmina, who couldn't picture this version of Frankie taking the bus from the Harts' apartment to the cemetery.

"I can drive, Wilhelmina," said Frankie. "Have you forgotten? I'm sure your parents will lend us the car."

It was, in fact, a great comfort to drive the short distance from home to Mount Auburn Cemetery with Frankie in the driver's seat, then get out and walk. Frankie seemed strong the day of their walk, maybe not eager to aim for the highest hill, but not frail either. She seemed like Pennsylvania Frankie, gardening Frankie. Maybe there was nothing different about her and it was all Wilhelmina missing Pennsylvania?

"Ah, that beautiful sun," said Frankie, closing her eyes and stretching her arms out, like a flower opening its petals to drink in the light.

All the birds came out for their walk. They saw robins and sparrows in the trees, blue jays and cardinals, crows and ravens (Frankie knew the difference), turkeys, ducks. A hawk soared above, then dropped like a stone, then climbed and dropped again. Frankie chattered, mostly naming the trees, exclaiming over the flowers. Finding shapes in the clouds. Wilhelmina was quiet, because she had too many different things she wanted to say.

"How are you coping with all of your pressures, dear?" asked Frankie.

Surprised tears sprang to Wilhelmina's eyes. "I don't have any pressures," she said.

"Oh, everyone has pressures," said Frankie. "And I remember being fifteen, Wilhelmina, and I see the shape of the world around you."

The shape of the world,thought Wilhelmina. I've gotten more political? I'm going to protests? I have a job? I'm worried about you? "I'm worried there's something wrong with me," she said, a tear sliding down her face.

Frankie made a sympathetic noise and nodded, as if this was a normal thing to say and people were saying it to her all the time. "I know that feeling," she said. "What do you think is wrong with you?"

Wilhelmina's face was hot and pink. "Do you promise not to tell anyone?"

"I do," Frankie said, with such simplicity that Wilhelmina felt safe suddenly, like this conversation was possible.

"I kissed this guy," she said. "It was disgusting."

"Oh, I'm sorry," said Frankie. "That sounds very unpleasant!"

"But," said Wilhelmina, "I like guys. I liked that guy. So, wasn't I supposed to like it?"

Frankie stopped, then turned to face her niece. "There is nothing you are supposed to like," she said. "Not one single thing. That's a myth, and an unfair expectation. Do you hear me?"

Frankie wasn't usually this fierce. It helped. "I do hear you," said Wilhelmina. "But—" Another tear slid down her cheek. "What if I wanted to like it?"

"Oh, Wilhelmina," said Frankie, pulling her into a hug. "Then I think you probably will like it, some other time, with some other person." She paused, then smiled an inward smile, as if remembering something inside herself. "Tell me," she said, "this boy you kissed. Did you talk to him about it?"

"I tried," said Wilhelmina, who felt like she was hugging a bird. She didn't want to squeeze too hard. "I was as nice about it as I could possibly be. He's the one who told me there was probably something wrong with me."

Still hugging Wilhelmina, Frankie snorted. "Sounds like a classic bad kisser to me. A good kisser is going to be someone who cares whether you like it, Wilhelmina. Among other qualities, like not blaming you. Like wanting to communicate about it."

"Okay," said Wilhelmina. "I guess that makes sense."

Frankie took a step back so she could look into Wilhelmina's face, still clutching her arms. "Do you talk to Julie and Bee about these things?"

"Yes," said Wilhelmina. "They call him Hagfish."

"Hagfish?" said Frankie. "Is that an animal?"

"It's an eel-shaped fish that secretes a milky and fibrous slime."

Frankie let go of Wilhelmina and hooted so loudly that a bird burst out of a nearby tree. "Good heavens," she said. "Fibrous slime? Wilhelmina, you poor dear!" As she howled with laughter, she was luminous, and bigger somehow, ferocious and strong. A honking noise interrupted her. Together, they turned.

"Oh!" whispered Frankie. "Wilhelmina, it's a snow goose!"

The bird was standing with its feet submerged at the edge of a pond, watching them and honking, as if it wanted to join in the laughter. Its honk was so long and silly-sounding that Wilhelmina did begin to laugh.

"Let's back up," said Frankie. "Give her room."

Wilhelmina was happy to back away. The snow goose was a beautiful bird, long-necked and white with black-tipped wings, but geese were big, powerful creatures, and they could bite. It opened its wings and flapped, showing off its dark inner feathers. Then it lifted into the air and drops of water rained down, sparkling like sequins.

That summer, it was hard for Wilhelmina not to tether herself to news headlines. In August, a rally turned deadly in Charlottesville, Virginia. It was called "Unite the Right." The participants were openly neo-Nazis, white supremacists, white nationalists, members of the alt-right and of the Ku Klux Klan, marching together in protest of the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee. As they marched with their torches, weapons, shields, and Nazi and Confederate flags, they met counterprotesters. Fights erupted. Then a rally participant plowed his car into a crowd of counterprotesters, killing a woman named Heather Heyer and injuring lots of other people. "Some very fine people on both sides," said the president.

In Boston, a public event was planned for the following weekend, called a "free speech" rally, but really a gathering of members of the far right. One of the scheduled speakers was a Holocaust denier. Another was the founder of the Proud Boys. When Wilhelmina heard that a counterprotest was planned, she knew she wanted to go.

Frankie was at dinner with the Harts when Wilhelmina told Theo and Cleo her intention.

"Oh," said Cleo, putting her fork down and looking across the table at Theo. "I have an event that day, and your father needs to care for Philip."

"What does that have to do with it?" said Wilhelmina. "I can get there on my own."

"What is it?" said Delia, who was seven. "Can I go?"

"Oh, honey," said Cleo to Delia, then stopped, looking sad and tired.

"Actually, Delia," said Frankie, "that's the exact day I was hoping you would come visit me in my apartment."

Delia considered Frankie suspiciously. "You mean just me?"

"Yes, you, and only you," said Frankie. "And the cats, of course."

"I want a cat," said Delia.

"Let's ask your parents, shall we?" said Frankie. "Theo and Cleo, could Delia be my special guest on Saturday?"

"Wilhelmina, hon," said Cleo, not even looking at Frankie. "This one feels different from the others."

"You mean because of Charlottesville?" said Wilhelmina.

"Yes."

"But if anything were to happen at this one," said Wilhelmina, "the chances of it happening to me are infinitesimal."

"What's Charlottesville?" said Delia.

"I'll explain to you about Charlottesville, dear," said Frankie. "Are you done eating? May I have the honor of doing your bath?"

"You don't have to do that, Frankie," Theo interjected. "You're our guest."

"I want to," said Frankie.

"Can I visit Frankie?!" shouted Delia.

"Yes, honey," said Theo. "You can visit Frankie."

"Yay!" shouted Delia. "Can Frankie do my bath?"

"We can't stop her if she wants to, can we?" said Theo.

A moment later, Theo, Cleo, and Wilhelmina were alone.

"Wilhelmina," said Cleo. "I'm glad you want to go, and we can't argue with your math. But I'm not sure how I feel about this one, especially since we can't go."

"Your mother and I may need to have a conversation, honey," said Theo.

Wilhelmina swallowed a series of sharp retorts. What am I, eight? Since when do I need a babysitter? She was ready to sneak to the protest if she needed to, the way Bee snuck to every protest, telling his mother he had soccer, or babysitting, or something; the way Bee snuck to therapy. Cleo herself had helped Bee find a mental health counseling center he could get to on his own. She'd told Bee to dig up his family's insurance card. "If your mother sees the mail from the insurance and asks you about it, let me know and I'll talk to her," Cleo had said, but Bee's mom never asked about it.

Wilhelmina had observed that Bee's first step in sneaking was to act like he didn't care too much about what he did. "Okay," she said with nonchalance.

Almost visibly, Theo and Cleo closed ranks. Their expressions sharpened and their backs grew straight. "I'm sensing you're very motivated about this," said Theo. "Is that right?"

Dammit. Too much nonchalance. "Do you know they were carrying Confederate flags?" said Wilhelmina. "They were chanting Nazi slogans!"

"Are Julie and Bee going?" said Cleo.

"They want to."

"Let's find out if Maya and Daniel are going," said Theo to Cleo.

"Oh my god, Dad, seriously?" said Wilhelmina. "You need to talk to Julie's parents? Like it's a playdate?"

"We need to talk to Julie's parents like it's a protest where things could turn violent," said Cleo firmly. In a distant room somewhere, Philip began to wail. Cleo stood. "Now, Wilhelmina. Are your hands well enough to do the dishes?"

The day of the protest, Wilhelmina woke to a feeling like her lungs were smaller, her instincts more electric. It was strange. She'd never been nervous about a protest before.

Julie's parents were going to the protest. Theo and Cleo had found a babysitter for Philip so Theo could go too, a decision Wilhelmina had been grouchy about when her parents had told her. It was fine he was going, but did he have to go with her? This morning, she came yawning into the kitchen and found him filling water bottles. When he turned, gave her a delighted smile, and asked her if she'd remembered to put on sunscreen, she rolled her eyes. But she was glad he was coming along.

The plan was for Bee to take the T into the city with Julie, Maya, and Daniel while Theo and Wilhelmina drove Delia to Frankie's apartment, then parked and took the T to meet up with them. Wilhelmina walked Delia to Frankie's building while Theo circled the block. When Frankie answered the door, she looked tired, and a little unsteady.

"Frankie?" said Wilhelmina. "Are you okay?"

"Just a little nausea, dear," said Frankie. "It comes and goes. Delia, I am ever so happy to see you. Come in, say hello to the cats!"

Delia bolted into the apartment. "Wilhelmina," said Frankie, still standing in the doorway, "I just talked to Esther and Margie. We want to go to the protest too. Will you carry us in your heart?"

That day in Boston, a few dozen right-wing ralliers were met by tens of thousands of counterprotesters, though Wilhelmina didn't know this while they were marching. It was one of the funny things about a protest. You knew who was around you: Bee, Julie, Julie's parents, your own father, and hundreds, maybe thousands, of unfamiliar faces. You felt the energy of those people, hot and strong. You shared their anger and their grief. You saw the helicopters above, and you knew you were a small part of a larger organism. But you also remained in your own body, your own thoughts. Inside Wilhelmina's body was Wilhelmina, her sadness, her confusion, her delight at being here with Julie and Bee. Her secret delight at being here with Theo. Her relief that such a massive number of people, more massive even than she realized at the time, had poured out of their homes to be here, regardless of, or maybe because of, what had happened in Charlottesville. And every time she saw a small, smiling woman, or a person with tanned skin and a generous nose—or someone plump like Mrs. Claus, or someone tall with locs—or anyone fashionable, or anyone in sparkly earrings, or a bird—she remembered her aunts. She remembered them over and over again, and brought them along.