The Whole World: A Novel - By Emily Winslow Page 0,7

little. That’s all. I said to her, “I had a baby dress like this. The plaid one.” I said it in a nice voice, and in a complimentary way. Gretchen asked, “What dress?” which was a reasonable question, except that the way she asked it was like a wild animal sniffing the air. She was looking for a fight immediately. “I didn’t have a plaid dress.”

“It looks like a Christmas picture,” I described, trying to be helpful. “You’re sitting on a couch, holding an ornament, I think. You’re maybe … two?”

Gretchen pressed her lips together, then squeezed out the words: “I remember that. I wore a plain purple dress. No pattern. It was my favorite.”

Liv kicked my ankle. She’s the kind of person to always defend the right to speak one’s mind, except around Gretchen. She wanted to please her.

“There must be an unpatterned dress photo as well. We’ll let you know when we find it,” Nick said. I didn’t think there was one, really, but there could have been, I guess.

Gretchen’s breathing got hard and fast.

“I know the photograph,” she insisted. I shrank down and Gretchen stood over me, taller in that way that angry people appear to grow.

The silence stretched on until it was taut. At breaking point, Gretchen abruptly left the room.

Liv went after her. I busied myself neatening a stack of photos that was only slightly askew.

“She didn’t mean anything by it, Polly,” Nick said.

“I know,” I said curtly.

“It must be frustrating to have one’s only visual memories be so old,” he explained, as if I didn’t understand that.

“Everyone’s memories are vulnerable that way,” I said. “You don’t have to be blind to remember things wrong and get really freaked out about it.”

“I don’t think you’re being charitable, Polly,” he said.

My head snapped up, indignant. I hadn’t heard a tone like that since my fifth-grade teacher.

I opened my mouth to tell him off, but his ridiculous sternness cracked me up instead. I laughed at him. I opened my mouth and laughed out loud.

Now his head snapped up. He leaned back, surprised.

For a moment, I wasn’t sure what would happen. Would he stand up and leave?

“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “Sorry.” And he laughed too.

Gretchen’s house was full of souvenirs. Not postcards or plates or thimbles, but carved wooden sculptures and thick-daubed paintings. Maybe they were Harry’s, or maybe Gretchen got something out of touching them, feeling the brushstrokes. My first time among all those touchstones of adventure and achievement I’d felt intimidated, but they became familiar. There was an Asian ceramic dog by the front door. By my third visit I was ready to scratch his ears and bring him a biscuit.

Gretchen sat down with us the next time we went over.

“I want to apologize for my … possessiveness sometimes about the photographs. You’re being my eyes for me and it’s just … difficult sometimes to give up what I remember seeing. I want to thank you for all the work you’re putting into it. I knew the photos were in a state, but I didn’t realize how bad of one. I only thought: All I need is a pair of eyes.” She pushed her eyebrows together. I could tell how hard that was for her to say. “I’m sorry it’s turned out to be so difficult.”

Liv said, “They must be very special memories for you….”

Gretchen teared up. “It was magical, those youngest years. Not just seeing—though seeing was good, of course—but it was what I saw! Mother had such a way of creating moments. She lived a life then that was … exotic and exhilarating … hotels and airplanes…. I tagged along. Did you see the picture? At the Prater? On the horse?”

There had been several photos on horses, but Nick knew the one she meant. “The white one?” he suggested.

“Yes! It was a carousel made of living horses. I’ve always remembered that, though I didn’t learn it was the Prater in Vienna until much later. I just remember the child’s view of things. I remember sitting on the back of a white horse, and it wasn’t carved or painted, it was real.” She sighed ecstatically.

A bird flew suddenly past her face, coming to cling to the edge of her cup. It was steel blue, and she swatted at it. Her husband, Harry, came softly behind it, coaxing it with clicks and twitters. It hopped onto his finger and he took it back upstairs.

I found one of the Whipple’s pretty compasses in Liv’s room.