Tilda's Promise Read online

  Now Tilly was clearly sighing and rolling her eyes.

  “Grandma, it’s Saturday, not English class.”

  “Okay, kiddo—you’re right. I’m not your grandpa when it comes to storytelling. Let’s get going.”

  In the car on the way to Stamford on I-95, Tilly, who had been quiet, asked, “What was your name when you were growing up? What did the kids at school call you?”

  Tilda stole a glance at her granddaughter, not believing she was interested in the subject, yet here she was, bringing it up again.

  Looking back at the road in front of her, she replied, “First, I’ve always been Tilda, but by the time I was in junior high, I was Bones, even to my friends.”

  “Bones. That’s terrible, Grandma,” said Tilly. “I’d hate it if my friends, or anyone, actually, called me that. But I do get teased for being skinny. The boys at school call me Tic Tac sometimes, but I don’t care.” She lifted her chin as she looked out the window. “They’re such a pain.”

  “Are they a pain? Really? You’re not interested in boys?” Tilda asked, feeling as though she were skating on verbal ice that might crack at any moment.

  “I don’t know, Grandma. Can we talk about something else?” Tilly began shifting uncomfortably in her seat, tugging on her shoulder strap, as though it were too tight. Tilda thought that was the end of the conversation, but then Tilly continued.

  “I don’t know about boys, about liking them, I mean. But they don’t like me, that’s for sure.”

  “How do you know? What makes you say that?”

  “They make fun of me. I look like a boy. That means I don’t have boobs. That’s what Tic Tac means, no boobs. They’re a pain, boys. That’s all. That’s what I mean.” Tilly turned to look out the window again.

  “Is there anything else you want to tell me?”

  “No, Grandma. I don’t want to . . . I mean, there’s nothing else to say.”

  “You know you’re still growing, right? You know you’re not through developing.”

  “There’s nothing more to say, honestly,” said Tilly.

  Tilda was pretty sure that wasn’t true, but she knew not to push her granddaughter. Laura had always talked about whatever was on her mind at that age, but Tilly was different. She talked when she wanted to let you in, but she could and would just as easily shut you out.

  As they neared their exit, Tilda said, “My maiden name was Marrone. Did you know that? Pronounced as though it had an i on the end, so the way I got to be Bones was that at first I was Bony Moronie. Have you ever heard of Bony Moronie?”

  “Um, yeah. Grandpa had an old record of it.”

  “Wow. Good memory, Tilly.”

  Harold had an extensive collection of old albums and 45s. He and Tilly used to go through them for hours. Tilda found it hard to believe a young girl like Tilly would be interested in Harold’s “oldies but goodies.” But there she was with Harold as he took his old Jensen out of the closet, and he’d let Tilly put the yellow disks in the 45s so they could listen to his singles. She seemed to be fascinated by the cumbersome process and the old machine.

  “Yeah, Grandpa told me about it. Now I remember. He said it was your nickname, but I never thought about it as being something the kids called you to be mean, about you being skinny.”

  “Well, it didn’t bother me so much,” said Tilda. “Grandpa had all those old rock-and-roll songs. He liked ‘Bony Moronie’ even before he knew it was my nickname, but once he found that out, he couldn’t stop playing it, over and over, every time we were together at his place before we were married.

  Tilda saw Tilly looking at her out of the corner of her eye.

  “You used to go to Grandpa’s when you were dating? Wasn’t that . . .”

  “It was the ’60s, Tilly. You know about the ’60s, right?”

  “Oh, yeah, ‘drugs, sex, and rock and roll.’”

  “Well, drugs, not so much.”

  “Grandma. You’re shocking me.”

  “Okay, okay,” said Tilda. “Anyway, Grandpa used to call me Bony Moronie all the time. Still does . . .” Tilda caught herself in one of those familiar moments when, for her, Harold was still very much alive.

  “Still did, I mean, until recently,” she said, correcting herself. “Oh, there’s the exit,” she said, swerving a little too quickly into the exit lane.

  Tilly was silent as they got off the highway and continued on toward the mall.

  When they got out of the car, she grabbed her grandmother’s hand, something she never did anymore, not since she’d become a teenager, anyway.

  “Thanks, Grandma,” said Tilly, “for our talk and all that stuff about your name. It was pretty interesting.” Then, spying a few teenagers heading for the entrance not far from them, she quickly dropped Tilda’s hand.

  A few minutes later, as they walked toward the dance store, Tilly said, “Will you think about it, Grandma? About Harper, I mean? I may need your help when I talk to Mom. I’m thinking about legally changing my name.”

  Tilda agreed to think about it, but that was all.

  After a successful spree at the Barre Store, the duo decided it was time to eat. Tilda decided on salad and Tilly, wings. They sat down at a table at the food court. When Tilly pushed up her sleeves to eat, Tilda saw it. The red scratches on her left arm. She thought she saw a dim rendering of a word, but she couldn’t make it out. Laura never described it, just said it was a scratch. Her heart pounding, she knew it would be a mistake to act impulsively, and yet, in that instant, she decided on the direct approach, not for any sound psychological reason, but because she was alarmed.

  She reached over and held Tilly’s exposed arm. “What’s that, Tilly?” she asked, sounding less calm than she had hoped. “Did you . . . is that a word? Were you trying to . . .”

  Tilly immediately pulled her arm away.

  “Grandma, stop,” she said, loudly enough to draw attention from an elderly couple at a nearby table.

  Tilda let go. “I’m sorry,” she said, waiting to see what Tilly might say next.

  But Tilly didn’t say anything. Instead she rewrapped her wings, put them back in the carton, and stood up. “Can we go, please? I want to go.”

  Tilly wasn’t one for drama, but she was visibly upset.

  “Okay, let’s go then,” said Tilda, looking through her bag for her keys while her granddaughter stood above her impatiently.

  They rode home in silence, all the way to the driveway, and then Tilly said, “Don’t come in, Grandma. I’ll just tell Mom you had to get home.”

  Tilda shook her head and started to open the door. “It’s okay, Tilly, I won’t say anything. Honestly, I don’t even know what I would say.”

  Tilly reached over to take Tilda’s hand from the door. “Please,” she said. “I don’t want to talk. I just want to go in myself.”

  Tilda took a deep breath. “Okay, but your mother is going to know something is up, and then she’s going to call me, and then we’ll talk. I just want you to know that.”

  “Sure. Fine.” Tilly gathered up her packages, and, before getting out, she quickly said, “Thanks, Grandma. For the stuff, I mean.”

  At home, Tilda poured herself a glass of wine and sat on the porch in Harold’s chair. The dark mood had settled in with her again. When the phone rang, she decided to let it go if it was Laura. She couldn’t face a call with her daughter right now, even though she had questions of her own to ask. She glanced over to see who it was, and when she saw it was Bev, she answered, relieved to know she could unburden herself with her old friend.

  “So on top of everything I feel like an idiot for thinking I could just waltz right in and get her to confide in me. Instead I made a mess of it, but when I saw the cut into her skin I wanted to scream. I couldn’t control myself.” Tilda was relieved to be admitting not only to mission failure—not getting any information out of Tilly—but to a worse grievance, hubris. She had to admit, she was proud thinking that Tilly would tell her what she woul
dn’t tell her own mother.

  “What’s wrong with me? There’s a real problem here, and I’m patting myself on the back about what a great grandmother I must be.”

  “Okay, enough,” said Bev, who had known Tilda for so many years the two were more like sisters than friends. “All you did was show your real concern. If anything, your reaction proved to Tilly she was messing around with serious stuff.”

  “That’s true, but how do I know she won’t go entirely underground where her family is concerned, me included? At least before she was talking to her mom. Now she may not talk to anyone, and that will be my fault.”

  “Will you please stop blaming yourself?” Bev hardly got the words out before Tilda interrupted.

  “There was a word spelled out, I think. The scratches were pretty shallow, and they could’ve been made with a safety pin, but still they were deep enough and red enough to spell out a word.”

  “A word? Are you sure? That sounds different from cutting. I thought cutting meant deeper cuts, done a lot, like, repeatedly.”

  “I don’t know—I’m not sure. And that’s another thing. When Laura first told me what Tilly was doing, I was so sure of myself, like I knew all about it, but I don’t know anything. I didn’t even tell Laura that Tilly should see someone when she was thinking about counseling.”

  “Okay, I see where this is going,” said Bev. “No matter what I say, your comeback is to dig yourself into a deeper hole, a guilt hole.”

  Tilda sighed. “You’re right. I’ve got to call Laura. I don’t want to, but she needs to hear from me what happened.”

  “That’s not even what I was saying, but yeah, you should probably call her. But before you do, take a minute to give yourself a break.”

  It took Tilda another hour or so to gather the resolve to call her daughter, but Laura called first, and the two talked through the whole food-court episode.

  “I think I saw . . .” Tilda paused to gather courage. “Did you see anything besides the scratches on Tilly’s arm? I think I saw a word, like she was trying to write something.”

  Laura was stunned. “A word?” she asked. “What word?”

  They discussed it further but came to no revelations, and after they hung up, Tilda was left wondering if she had seen anything written on the inside of that pale, soft arm. She wanted to forget the whole thing. Let it be morning again, before the doorbell rang, when Tilly was just a taller, ganglier version of the darling little girl she had always been.

  Tilda had special memories of her granddaughter that she returned to over and over as she contemplated the miracle of her growing up. She saw her at three pushing her little plastic lawnmower all over the carpet, again and again, until she was sure she had mowed every strand. She saw her at two, in the picture on the change-of-address postcard that Laura sent out. Tilly in a red, pink, and orange wool cap kissing Mark as the snow coming down over them looked like magic dust. She saw her in backward time, when she was just born, swaddled in pink in her hospital bassinet, before the years could bruise her, hurt her—cut her.

  Chapter Three

  SO FELL EXCALIBUR

  Tilda’s reaction to the death of Excalibur, the rescue dog euthanized in Spain for fear he might transmit the Ebola virus, took her by surprise. She was undone. Alone in her office, she read the news online, sinking her head into her hands. With long, racking sobs she could not control, her rational self told her this response was beyond all reasonable proportion. I know, she replied to the rational voice, but it’s overwhelming, such unnecessary death and cruelty. But for Tilda, the Ebola crisis, with its horrific and terrible deaths and the irresponsible and fear-mongering reporting, all seemed to be mixed up with the fate of this poor animal. She allowed herself this vulnerability. It was all right, she reasoned, to give in to this. I’m crying for the dog, yes, and for the victims of this horror, but also, I must admit, for Harold and for me.

  She had steadfastly refused to give in to her most wrenching sadness, choosing instead to “stay busy,” so this relenting was unusual. When Laura and friends inquired after her, she answered with, “I manage to stay busy.” And she did, volunteering at the food pantry, reading, walking on the beach, keeping up with her family, even the occasional lunch date with friends. Crying and grief were so painful to her she tried to avoid them. The nights were the worst. She had given up trying to sleep, and her night prowling—walking around the house aimlessly, eating, trying to read or watch late-night TV—was beginning to feel ghoulish, like the goings-on of the undead. Lately Tylenol PM was doing the trick, but for how long? She had declined when Dr. Willis offered to help soon after Harold died. “I can prescribe something to help with sleep,” he had said. “Nothing too strong, just to help you relax, so you can get your rest.” But she had said no.

  Her eyes fell on a photograph on the far end of her desk, almost hidden behind the green-and-blue ceramic bowl Tilly had made in the third grade. The photo was of Tilda, Harold, and Bully, their exuberant black Lab named after Theodore Roosevelt, taken at the beach almost ten years ago now. They asked a passing stranger to snap the shot. Taken in winter, when dogs are allowed at the Water Haven beach, fresh white snow is mingling with gray sand. Tilda and Harold are sitting on a bench, Bully on the ground between them with a big smile on his face. It was definitely a smile, Harold always said. “You can just see how happy he is.” And Tilda had to admit, Bully always seemed to be smiling.

  Bully, a rescue, loved being off-leash, running with the other dogs in and out of the frigid water. But his favorite thing was playing Frisbee with Harold. Bully never missed, jumping so high onlookers at the beach often gasped. Strangers called him Frisbee, and, indeed, at home, that was his nickname, that and TR. Tilda and Harold, usually reserved in company about the special attributes of their dog, were shameless at home, calling him “genius dog” because he seemed to understand their every word. If one of them said, “We’re not going out right now,” Bully would lower his ears and walk back into the bedroom and curl up on his bed. If either asked, “Do you want to eat dinner?” Bully would circle them excitedly and rush into the kitchen, skidding to a halt right in front of his bowl, sitting, waiting for the pleasure beyond all, mealtime.

  But Bully’s most endearing quality, Tilda and Harold both agreed, was his appreciation for having been rescued. They bestowed upon him their belief that he had this special knowledge—that he had been saved by two senior citizens who were committed to making this lost and forsaken mature black dog the center of their lives. And aside from Tilly, he was.

  For a while it appeared the three of them were growing old together, but then Bully outpaced Tilda and Harold. In his geriatric years, Tilda “seniorized” the house for him, putting down pads for accidents and multiple beds for his ever-increasing naps. She cooked rice and boiled chicken as his digestion grew more delicate, finally pureeing his food. Bully, ever the good-natured fellow, died quietly one morning several hours after not getting up for breakfast. Tilda and Harold, realizing a missed meal was significant, had stayed by his side all morning, petting him and telling stories about his wondrous deeds and good, sweet nature. When he took his last breath, they sat longer, cried and consoled one another, and told more stories before calling the vet about what to do.

  Tilda and Harold buried his urn in the backyard near Tilda’s roses. Tilda later added a little marble marker that read, Bully, An amiable dog, born c. 1997. Died August 13, 2010. So of course she cried when she heard news of Excalibur’s death. When Bully died, Harold had been there to console her. Who was going to console her now, to soften the blows of an often cruel and senseless world?

  It had been several weeks since the Fucking Mall Misadventure, as Tilda referred to it to no one but herself. In the meantime, she held her breath, hoping there would be no further cutting incidents. Maybe Tilly was over this particular type of adolescent malaise. Maybe the cutting had been a one-off kind of thing, experimentation, done and over. The other possibility was not as reassuri
ng, that Tilda was no longer a part of the family inner circle, no longer to be consulted on this or other growing pains, by Laura or by Tilly, who had been ignoring her grandmother since that awful afternoon. Tilda was hurt by this, but she was trying to be patient, knowing as she did about teenage mood swings, having seen more than one of Tilly’s in the past.

  To fill in the gap, Tilda began following Tilly’s every move on Instagram. She had become a follower several years ago, when Tilly first started posting. At that time Tilly was happy to have as many followers as possible, even her grandmother. At first Tilda joined in the fun, “liking” this or that post—even occasionally commenting. As time went on, though, her involvement lessened. She began to observe but not participate, wanting to get the uncensored straight scoop, hoping that Tilly would forget she was even there. That seemed to work, and so Tilda would dip in once or twice a month to see what her granddaughter was up to.

  But since the mall incident, Tilda had become what could only be described as an online stalker. If she was online paying bills, answering emails, or googling the title of a new book, she’d first go to Instagram, seeing what Tilly was posting—and Tilda was doing this once or twice a day. She was compelled to peek, telling herself it was all right to snoop in this way. She couldn’t help but be worried; it was her granddaughter, after all.

  Fortunately, on this fall afternoon, her worries seemed misplaced. Tilly’s latest posts were selfies with smiles, shots of friends at dance-team practice, and photos of Tilly with friends at the movies. Feeling relieved, she closed her laptop at the same time the doorbell rang. She rose from her chair and went to the front door. Leaning in to look through the peephole, she saw Darren Esmond, Amanda’s husband, glancing over his shoulder toward his house and straightening the collar of his rather wrinkled plaid shirt. Tilda opened the door.