Hagar's Mother (The Bridge Daughter Cycle Book 2) Read online

  Judging from the open house guest sheet, only two other people had dropped by so far. It was nearing four o’clock and the open house would soon come to an end. Shame, Hanna thought. The house was of sturdy construction and laid out with a practical eye. It was a great starter home for a nuclear family, no doubt about it, a one-story with enough space for a mother and a father and one or two children.

  The sellers of the house had not hired a stager to come in and make the place sparkle. This was the owner’s furniture, Hanna could see, their couches and stereo equipment and beds and pillows. This was their dust on the cabinet shelves, their toothpaste droppings in the sink, their curled flip-flops on the backyard patio. Two children lived in Hanna’s old bedroom now, one with a comic book hero bedspread and the other with a checkerboard quilt of naval battleships. Two sons, Hanna guessed.

  The self-guided tour of the house produced a wash of childhood memories within Hanna. Good memories of time with her parents. Acidic memories of her parents yelling at one another across the table or in the bedroom, followed by doors slamming and her father roaring out of the driveway in the family car. Her mother never cried, at least not in front of her, but often, after he’d stormed out, she’d come into Hanna’s bedroom and hold her, even lie with her in bed, whispering how much she loved her.

  Her parents’ marriage began breaking down when Hanna was six. It continued to smash apart when she was seven. She was still too young to understand she was sleeping in another girl’s bed. The first Hanna Driscoll slept there first, her bridge mother, the thirteen-year-old who gave birth to her and for whom she was named. Hanna looked exactly like the first Hanna Driscoll, a perfect genetic duplicate. She wore the first Hanna’s bedclothes and curled up under the first Hanna’s bedspreads.

  Hanna’s parents, like most parents, saved the first Hanna’s baby clothes and toys and linens. Once the first Hanna passed, they dug out the old things to clothe and care for the new baby Hanna. It was not a matter of thrift; it was time-honored tradition. Even British royalty delighted the world by dressing their infants in the dated baby fashions their bridge princesses wore thirteen years earlier.

  “Was this your room?” Cynthia asked Hanna.

  “My desk was here and my bed was over there, beneath the window,” Hanna said. “It was my little world.”

  “Did you have sleepovers?” Ruby asked.

  “Some,” Hanna said. Later, after she and her mother moved to the farm, Hanna had few friends. She couldn’t recall a single sleepover on the farm in the Marin redwoods.

  “Did you have pets?” Ruby asked.

  “Oh, your grandmother doesn’t like pets,” Hanna said.

  “Why not?”

  “She didn’t like having animals around the house,” Hanna said. She touched the girls’ backs to guide them toward the bedroom door.

  The realtor greeted them in the living room. “Isn’t it adorable? Perfect for a new family.” Looking over the two girls, she said to Hanna, “Have you seen the bridge room?”

  “What bridge room?” Hanna said. There was no bridge room when she lived here with her parents.

  “It’s behind the kitchen,” the realtor said. “Like most homes.”

  Hanna followed the realtor, a touch confused and wondering if another owner had added the room after her parents sold the place. Certainly her parents never had a need for a bridge room. Hanna’s mother was dead-set against such archaisms. She taught her bridge daughter to read and write, to wear normal clothes, how to handle money, and more.

  The real estate agent led them to the rear of the kitchen. She twisted the knob on a slender door, revealing darkness beyond. She flipped up a light switch on the wall next to the refrigerator. Fluorescent light shimmered up, revealing a tight bald room of dark corners and bare sheetrock. A deep sink and a toilet stood in the far corner with a floor drain nearby. Otherwise, the room was unfurnished, as the family no longer raised a bridge daughter.

  Hanna needed a moment to remember this was the laundry room when she was growing up. Her parents kept the washer and dryer in here. The deep sink was for scrubbing persistent stains out by hand or to let delicates soak in cold water. She remembered the latch on the door, although her parents never used it. Today a loose padlock hung on it to signal to potential buyers the bridge daughter could be secured inside at night.

  It was a bridge room and had been all along. Her parents had refashioned it as a statement. They insisted their bridge daughter lived in a real child’s bedroom and not a servant’s. Bridge rooms were designed to lock a young girl inside and ensure she did not run off at night. They were usually located behind the kitchen because it was the bridge daughter’s duty to cook, clean, and mind the larder. In traditional homes, the kitchen would be cut off from the rest of the house by a heavy swinging door so the rest of the family was not inconvenienced by the bridge daughter’s preparations. This kitchen, however, opened onto the entry hall and the dining room.

  “It’s small,” Cynthia said of the room.

  “Smells funny,” Ruby added, scrunching her button nose.

  The realtor peered down at the girls disapprovingly. They were used to speaking without permission.

  “Mind yourselves,” Hanna said to them both.

  “I know it’s not the fashion anymore,” the realtor said, meaning the bridge room. “Parents say they don’t want a room like this, but you know what?” The realtor sidled close to Hanna and lowered her voice. “Most parents I’ve sold houses to want the peace of mind that a bridge room brings. It provides…” She searched for the word. “Definition. Security.” She glanced to Ruby and Cynthia. “I know it’s a small room for two bridge daughters, but with a little imagination, they could both fit in here comfortably—”

  “That’s fine,” Hanna said. “I think we’re to be going.”

  As she directed her daughters out of the bridge room and through the kitchen, the realtor continued. “Can I give you my card?” She hurried ahead of them to the side table in the entry hall. She offered a card and a sell sheet. “Do you have an agent yet?”

  Hanna halted at the kitchen entry. She ran her fingers down both sides of the jamb until she found what she sought, a painted-over depression in the wood where hinges once were screwed in. Dad removed the door, she thought, further proof her parents didn’t treat their bridge daughter like the help.

  “It could be a great utility room,” the realtor said. “I think a previous owner used it for the laundry.”

  Ruby tugged on Hanna’s shirt sleeve. Hanna leaned down and Ruby whispered a request into her ear.

  Hanna asked the realtor, “Could my bridge use the restroom?”

  The realtor pointed the way. Ruby hurried in and shut and locked the door. Cynthia remained off to the side, brooding and suspicious of what she’d seen so far.

  “Your bridges are lovely,” the realtor said. “They seem so close in age.”

  “Twins,” Hanna said, aware that most people thought Ruby a year or two younger than Cynthia.

  “I would never have guessed.” The realtor nodded to Cynthia. “She’s so much more rugged than the other one. And the little one is just darling.”

  Cynthia bristled at asking to speak to adults, but she minded her manners and whispered to Hanna for permission to speak. “I’m carrying a boy,” Cynthia told the realtor. “My sister is carrying a girl.”

  Ruby emerged from the bathroom with bright eyes and sparkling cherry-tipped cheeks. She’d washed her face and fixed her hair. Her percolating hormones and the hormones of the female gemmelius within her made a potent potion. The mixture bestowed a fresh youthfulness she would enjoy until her death seven weeks later, when she gave birth to Hanna’s daughter. Beaming, Ruby bounded across the living room and twirled into position behind Hanna, her dress flaring up.

  Hanna thanked the realtor for her time. She was tempted to ask to see the backyard before they left, to see if her mother’s flower garden was still tended by the current owners, but Hanna le
t it drop. She doubted there was much in the way of good news to be found at this house.

  Hanna led the girls to the car. She hoped they might have time to do a little shopping on the way home. The shopping mall by the highway had a Gap Bridge. She could pick up some socks and maternity wear for the girls.

  “Your bridge mother lived in that room,” Cynthia said a tad accusingly. Although Cynthia and Ruby were the same age, Cynthia had a bold way about her that Ruby lacked. Cynthia could puff herself up and broaden her shoulders the way a schoolyard boy might.

  “Your grandmother would never have done that,” Hanna said.

  “Did she live in your bedroom?” Ruby asked.

  “I believe she did.” Hanna unlocked the car doors and helped the girls inside. “I wore her clothes growing up. I even found in the closet a bag of origami cranes she’d made.”

  “Origami?” Cynthia said.

  “Paper birds,” Ruby explained.

  “I know,” Cynthia said to her.

  “I like making origami,” Ruby said. “We did that last year in school.”

  Hanna made sure they were buckled up before climbing into the driver’s seat. She preferred the girls to sit in the back together. If one sat up front, the other would complain it was unfair. Besides, with the extended rearview mirror she’d had installed, she could watch them both at once while driving.

  “Her name was Hanna,” Ruby told Cynthia. “Mom is named after her bridge mother.”

  “Duh,” Cynthia said. “Everyone is named after their bridge mother.”

  “Except boys,” Ruby said.

  Hanna, hand on the ignition, wondered what really had drawn her out to Concord this Sunday afternoon. Scrolling down the Concord real estate listings felt like searching for childhood friends on Facebook, or looking up an old high school crush on a dating web site. Hanna left the house when she was seven, and yet there was a sense of unfinished business as she stepped from room to room. She was searching the real estate web site for a Berkeley townhouse or duplex, not a three-bedroom ranch-style in a town forty miles away. With Cynthia’s and Ruby’s finalities coming soon and two infants on the way, Hanna looked forward to moving from the house they lived in to a more affordable place. Her budget was stretched tight. This was an opportunity to get on top of money matters, get out of the red and into the black.

  “Did your bridge mother write a letter to you?” Cynthia asked from the backseat.

  Hanna turned over the engine but hesitated to put the car in gear. “No. She never wrote me a letter.”

  “I want to do that,” Ruby said. “I want to write a letter to Ruby Jo,” her latest name for the child inside her.

  “Me too,” Cynthia said.

  “I’ll help you both,” Hanna said. “We’ll do it when the time comes.”

  Clock-clock-clock. A figure rapped the window three times.

  Startled, Hanna swiveled and peered up at the woman standing outside the car. She was about Hanna’s age, with bold black hair that fell in waves about her shoulders. Smiling, she waved at Hanna.

  Hanna, confused, rolled down the window. “I’m sorry?”

  “Is your name Hanna?”

  “Yes,” Hanna said.

  The woman leaned down. “Do you remember me?” she asked. Her wide grin was thickened by a generous application of mauve lipstick. “I’m Erica Grimond.”

  Two

  Hanna cut the engine. The name was familiar but not the face. “I’m sorry, I don’t—”

  “I grew up across the street.” Erica indicated the house facing Hanna’s old home.

  Hanna nodded carefully, feeling embarrassed. “I remember you now,” she lied. “It’s been how long?”

  “You moved away when we were little,” Erica said. “We never really played or anything.” Erica peered inside to the backseat. “Are those your girls?” Piecing it together, she corrected herself. “Your bridge daughters.”

  “We’re here for the open house,” Hanna said. “I wanted to show them where I grew up. They thought it would be fun to see how Mommy lived when she was little.”

  “I’m about to make some lunch,” Erica said. “I’d be happy to have you join me.”

  “Oh, we have some shopping to do and I need to get them home.” She was going to add that it was a school night but wasn’t sure how Erica would respond. Hanna didn’t remember Erica but did recall the Grimonds as being conservative people. Their bridge daughters probably couldn’t even read or write. They might view schooling bridge daughters as a failing or a sin.

  “Do you have five minutes to spare?” Erica asked. “I have something you should know about.” When Hanna began to ask, Erica said, “You should come over. It’s just easier to explain that way.”

  The Grimond house smelled thickly of some earlier unappetizing, greasy meal. The paint on the wall was an unappealing gray color broken up by old-fashioned prints of autumnal New England farms. Hanna led the girls inside, intent to keep them close by so they could quickly conclude whatever odd business Erica intended to share.

  The living room was deathly quiet. It took a few moments for Hanna to realize another woman was present. She reclined in a burgundy Barcalounger, footrest extended, this older woman, gray and wrinkled and motionless. Thick macramé quilts were layered over her. Only her slippers and face were exposed.

  “Mother,” Erica shouted. She went to the woman and yelled into her ear. “This is Hanna Driscoll. She used to live across the street! When I was a little girl!”

  No response at all from the woman. Her eyes were watery and empty. A thread of white spittle hung from the tip of her bottom lip to a washcloth tucked in around her neck.

  Erica patted her mother’s shoulder and stood erect. “I thank God every day my father didn’t have to go like this,” she said.

  “What’s wrong with her?” Ruby said, forgetting bridge etiquette. Cynthia hushed her.

  “Her mind is going,” Erica said with a wistful little smile.

  “Will she be okay?” Ruby asked, and Cynthia hushed her again.

  “Come here,” Erica said, offering her hand to Ruby.

  Ruby, shy and perhaps a bit scared, moved behind Hanna. She took hold of Hanna’s pants legs with the clenched fingers of her right hand. Hanna, sensing a learning opportunity, led Ruby to the Barcalounger. Erica told Ruby it was okay to touch her mother’s hand, to see it was warm and that she was alive.

  “Is she asleep?” Ruby whispered.

  “No,” Erica said, “but I’m afraid she’ll never wake up either.”

  Cynthia approached, curious. She tugged on Vivian Grimond’s ring finger. No response. She tugged again.

  “Why don’t you sit down?” Hanna said to her. “Watch Ruby while I talk to Ms. Grimond.”

  Erica led Hanna through the kitchen and to the back of the house. “Your bridges are precious,” Erica said. “Are they twins?”

  “They are,” Hanna said, surprised Erica had surmised it. Although the girls were identical when they were young, the children they bore had changed them dramatically over the past two years.

  “The taller one’s going to have a boy, isn’t she?” She meant the aloof Cynthia, who stood a full six inches over the sweeter Ruby. “It’s not just her height, it’s her facial structure. Her cheekbones are more pronounced. I see it in her shoulders too. You’re going to have a handsome boy.”

  Cynthia had a way about her, the way she carried herself and the directness of her tone. Cynthia could be so forceful sometimes it gave Hanna pause. Cynthia was once as sweet and girlish as Ruby. She only developed her more masculine qualities shortly before she entered pons anno. At its earliest stages, her hands enlarged and her voice deepened. She even developed a slight Adam’s apple, the pea-sized bulge eagerly pushing itself from her throat. The male infant inside her, her genetic uniform, exerted itself at an early stage, giving Cynthia her own unique cocktail of hormones to navigate.

  The rear corridor of the Grimond house was lined with cardboard m
oving boxes. Thick felt-tip pen scribbles across each indicated their contents. Through a set of dingy brown windows, Hanna could see an untended backyard with a bone-dry concrete fountain in the rear corner.

  The corridor led to a bridge room, although no bridge daughter lived there now. Moving boxes were stacked halfway to its ceiling. An adjoining bathroom housed a shower head but no tub, just a floor drain, and a toilet with water-lime stains in the bowl. No door to the bathroom, but the door to the bridge room itself bore two sturdy locks, both on the outside to keep the expecting girl within.

  “I don’t think my bridge mother was a very happy little girl,” Erica said.

  I’m sure that didn’t matter to the woman lying on that chair, Hanna thought, then scolded herself. It was an ungenerous habit she’d learned from her own mother.

  “I would never raise my bridge daughters like this,” Erica said, although Hanna suspected she was posturing, presenting herself as a modern mother.

  Quit being your mother, Hanna scolded herself.

  “You’re selling?” Hanna said, indicating the boxes.

  “We found a nice home for my mother in El Cerrito.”

  Erica stepped to a shallow cardboard box on the floor. It was filled with an odd assortment, as though someone had taken a catch-all kitchen drawer of loose items and dumped it at once into the box.

  “My bridge mother.” Erica announced it as though the first Erica Grimond was inside the box too. “A little pack rat, she was. When we started packing up the house, we found all kinds of her things hidden away. She had cubbyholes behind the floor trim and in the bathroom vanity. We found a little tin box buried in the backyard. She’s stolen and hoarded so much junk over the years.”

  “Bridge daughters,” Hanna said with a knowing sigh. “That’s what they do.”

  Erica dipped her hand into the box. She produced a stack of audio cassette tapes of varying colors and styles. Most were unmarked, not even bearing paper labels.