of her annoyed face as she turned it off before taking it away as punishment for fighting with his brother.
“Oh, my goodness,” said his grandma, still staring at the screen even though there was nothing else to see.
“Mom?” The voice startled them both.
Oliver looked up to see his mother standing in the door. She was wearing her running clothes, cheeks flushed, her shirt damp with sweat.
“What are you guys looking at?” she asked. But Grandma just shook her head. A tear fell from her eye and Oliver felt awful, looked at his mom. He’d made his grandma cry. He felt the heat of his own tears coming. He fought it back, because he already knew that boys weren’t supposed to cry. Man up, Oliver, his dad would say if Mom couldn’t hear.
“You guys,” said his mom, moving in, sounding scared herself now. “What is it?”
THIRTY-TWO
Pearl
The girl Pop brought home was mousy and pale. She had a strange, glassy look to her, as if she might shatter into a million glittering pieces. As Pearl drew tentatively closer, she could see that the girl was shaking a little. Quaking really, a kind of full body vibration. There had never been anyone in their house before. And Pearl didn’t love it. In fact, she hated it. It felt like a terrible invasion, a broken promise.
“Gracie here,” said Pop, as Pearl put down her things. “She’s in a dark place. We’re going to take care of her for a while.”
“Oh?” said Pearl.
The girl looked at her, then quickly looked away. A single tear trailed down her face from an eye as vague as a morning sky—a kind of palest blue. Barely a color at all. She wasn’t beautiful, not in the way Pearl knew herself to be. But then again, she was just a girl, doughy, small-breasted. Unformed. Maybe Pearl herself had been so, before Pop taught her how to be what she’d become.
“She’s a diamond in the rough,” said Pop, as if reading Pearl’s mind. He glanced worriedly over at the girl. There was an untouched cup of tea steaming in front of her.
“I see that.”
“Don’t be unkind,” he whispered. “She’s just lost her mother.”
There’d been another girl, one who’d interested Pop. Where had they been that time? She couldn’t even remember—someplace bland and humid. But it hadn’t worked out. Pearl wondered if there had been girls before even her. If there had been, they were gone without a trace.
“Once upon a time,” said Pop, directing himself to Gracie, “when tragedy struck, I took Pearl in. I cared for her and helped her to move forward. Now we’ll both take care of you, okay, sweet girl?”
That was a lovely little narrative, if not quite the whole truth. But what is the truth after all? Just a story we all agree upon.
Gracie nodded, seemed to straighten a bit. She ran a hand over her thin hair, cleared her throat. Pearl thought she might say something. But after a moment of them all staring at each other, Gracie leaned over and threw up on the kitchen floor. This was followed by a coughing fit, one that turned into terrible, uncontrollable it seemed, sobbing.
Pearl looked on in horror—something churning in her middle. Disgust.
“Okay, okay,” said Pop, going to Gracie tenderly. “You’re okay. Let’s get you some rest.”
He wrapped the girl up in his arms. The sobbing subsided some, replaced by whimpering. The girl, already tiny, seemed to shrink and disappear into Pop as he ushered her from the kitchen. He glanced back as they left.
“Pearl? Get that—will you, honey?”
He still called her Pearl when they were at home, though he never ever slipped when they were out, or on a job. And when she was home with him, she still thought of herself by that name. Even though she called herself Elizabeth at that time. Not Liz. Not Beth. Elizabeth, common but still regal, elegant. She had a boyfriend at school; someone she’d kept from Pop. He wasn’t a mark. They went to the movies, and he took her to dinner. They studied together. They’d fooled around, heavily, but not made love. He called her Elizabeth, and it had a nice sound when he whispered it in the dark. Maybe he was a mark, in a way. Her con was that she was a normal girl, a student, his girlfriend. She had a waitressing job, a cash situation at a pizza place. She didn’t want anything but to be the girl he saw when he looked