The Bird House A Novel - By Kelly Simmons Page 0,13

old, and had already passed through her magical phase. I’d have to ask her come spring.

I turned the pages. All the family homes featured beautiful gardens, especially my mother’s first “rose cottage” in Nantucket, before it was sold to pay taxes. I ran my hand over the photo, feeling the warmth and minerals and salty air that combined to make that corner of the island magical enough to allow roses to climb up walls. I remember how much it hurt my mother to give it up, how she cried over it twice; once when she sold it, and once, years later, in her hospital bed, knowing she’d never go there again. That was the last thing she wanted to see, imprinted on her for eternity: pink roses and blue sky. It proved as ephemeral as the fairy garden, though, didn’t it, Daddy?

That little garden started a lifelong love of flowers and plants, though, so I suppose I should thank my dear departed dad. I fill my own flower boxes, plant my own bulbs, pull my own weeds, but I know none of the other women in my family had ever actually touched soil. (Or diapers, or dishwater, for that matter.) My mother creamed her hands and slept with cotton gloves on; she even wore gloves when she drove a car, as if to protect her hands from leather. When she died and they folded her hands across her chest in the casket, they still looked alive, as if they could reach out suddenly and touch me across the cheek.

No, “Gardening” was probably not destined to be Ellie’s “aspect,” either. After several hours of searching, the best common theme I could come up with was “Architecture.” Two architects in the family, after all—my father and Theo—and every house in every photo elegant and grand. Even mine, so leaky and imperfect, so inappropriate for old age with its sets of steep stairs—even mine has the high tin ceilings, the deep windowsills, the three miniature fireplaces Theo was so proud of. We are a people, all of us, who love the great bones of a house. Even when it’s drafty and expensive to heat. Even when it sits on the auction block. The last year of my mother’s life, I would sit with her in her little room, me in the armchair, and she on one edge of the bed, working the trim of the matelasse coverlet between two fingers like a talisman. Suddenly, she’d stand up and walk over to the dresser, pick up her silver mirror or brush, then stop, one hand in the air, and spin around. “Where’s the drawing room?” she’d cry. “Where is the foyer?” She looked at me the way children have looked at parents since the beginning of time. Expectantly. Assuming I would know the answer to even an unanswerable question.

“That’s in the other house, Mother. This is your pied-à-terre.”

“Ah,” she’d say, and smile, lulled by the information, or merely soothed by the sound of foreign words.

Architecture; that would be my recommendation. The cover, I thought, would be easy for Ellie to redraw. A door perhaps, or a charming door knocker. Why, I could give her all of Theo’s old blueprints to use! They were in one of the dark trunks, I think.

When I reached the attic stairs, the momentum of the creaking floor sent the light cord swinging slightly over my head. I could feel the breeze on my scalp as my eyes landed briefly on the green trunks in the corner, the ones I didn’t dare open.

I turned off the light, climbed back down, and went to bed, much as Ellie must have the evening before, thinking I had it all planned out.

February 17, 2010

Ellie was still in her Langley uniform when she arrived, carrying a canvas bag as if she knew she’d be taking things home. Tinsley didn’t come in, but watched and waved to me through the car window, as if she was in a huge hurry to be somewhere else. Though a welcome change—I would endure no questions about sodium content of foods or whether I planned to screen a PG-13 movie—this was unusual, completely unlike her, and it struck me enough to note it here.

We sat in the dining room, where I’d already spread out the scrapbooks, and arranged the macaroni and cheese casserole, plates and forks, and tea sandwiches I’d made. Nothing too fancy; nothing that would damage our artifacts or distract us from our task. She started with