The Jodi Picoult Collection Read online

  “Isn’t that nice, Pearl,” I say. “An early present.”

  “And it truly is,” Ernie says. “This meal’s on me.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Barb.” Rebecca picks up her fork and Ernie tells her to make a wish—which she does, blowing the candle onto a napkin and starting a small fire that Ernie douses with tomato juice.

  Throughout the meal Ernie discusses his job: how he got it (an uncle in corporate); how he likes it (he does); how he’s been rewarded (HOT DOG! Publicity Award, 1986 and 1987). Finally he asks us where we’re from (Arizona) and where we’re headed (my sister Greta’s in Salt Lake City). Rebecca kicks me under the table every time I lie, but she doesn’t know any better. Oliver can be a very smart man.

  This is what Ernie eats: a stack of raspberry pancakes, three eggs, with sausage, a side order of hash browns, four slices of toast, an English muffin, two blintzes, two grapefruit halves, smoked mackerel. It is only during his mushroom omelette that he says he feels stuffed. In the kitchen, Annabelle drops something that breaks.

  In the end, Ernie doesn’t even pay for the meal; Annabelle insists it’s on the house. She stands at the doorway as we walk back to Ernie’s hot-dog car. “Ladies,” he says, “a pleasure.” He gives me his card, which has no home address, only the number for his car phone.

  Rebecca and I stand in front of the diner, watching the fabricated hot dog disappear at a point on the horizon. We stand just far enough apart to not be able to touch each other.

  “It was too red to look real,” Rebecca says, turning. “Did you notice?”

  21 JANE

  Rebecca is looking out the window at the flat field of white. It’s mesmerizing. “Do you think this is what Heaven is like?” Rebecca asks.

  “I hope not,” I say. “I like a little color.”

  It would be easy to be fooled into believing the Great Salt Plains are covered with snow, if it weren’t for the ninety-five-degree temperatures and the gusts of hot wind that hit my face like someone’s breath. Salt Lake City, dwarfed by the huge Mormon Church, is not a place where I feel comfortable. In fact, I feel like I am sinking deeper into this different religion, this different climate, this different architecture. My clothes stick to me. I want to get Joley’s letter and leave.

  But the postmaster, a thin middle-aged man with a sagging moustache, insists there is no letter for a Jane Jones. Or a Rebecca Jones. No Joneses at all, he says.

  “Look again. Please.” Rebecca is sitting on the front steps of the post office when I come out. I could swear I see heat waving up from the pavement. “We’re in trouble,” I say, sitting beside her. Rebecca’s shirt is stuck to her back, too, and there are circles of sweat under her arms. “Joley’s letter isn’t here.”

  “So let’s call him.”

  She doesn’t understand the pull of Joley’s words like I do. It’s not his directions I need, it’s his voice. I don’t care what he says, just that he says it. “There are two branch post offices. I’m going to try there.”

  But the two branch offices have no mail for me either. I think about throwing a tantrum but that won’t do anyone any good. Instead, I pace the anteroom of the post office, then I walk out onto the blazing sidewalk, where Rebecca stands, accusatory.

  “Well,” Rebecca says.

  “It should have been here.” I look up at the sun, which seems to have exploded in the past minute. “Joley wouldn’t do this to me.” I feel like crying and I am weighing the consequences when I look at the sun again and, hissing, it comes hurtling down at me and my world turns black.

  • • •

  “She’s coming around,” someone says, and there are hands; hands with cool water pressing against my neck and my forehead, my wrists. This face, too big, looms into view.

  Oliver? I try to say but I can’t remember where my voice is.

  “Mom. Mom.” It’s Rebecca, I can smell her. I open my eyes wide and see my daughter leaning over me, the ends of her hair grazing my chin like silk. “You fainted.”

  “You hit your head, Mrs. Jones,” says the displaced voice I heard before. “It’s just a cut, no stitches needed.”

  “Where am I?”

  “You’re in the post office,” that other voice says, and then a man squats in front of me. He smiles. He is handsome. “Are you feeling all right?”

  “Okay.” I turn my head. Three young women with washcloths are on my right. One of them says, “Now don’t sit up too fast.”

  Rebecca squeezes my hand. “Eric was nearby when you collapsed. He helped me carry you in here, and his wives helped you cool off.” She looks frightened, I don’t blame her.

  “Wives. Oh.”

  One of the women gives Rebecca a little jar and tells her to hang onto it in case this happens again. “The heat is dry here,” Eric tells me. “This happens to visitors a lot.”

  “We’re not visiting, we’re just passing through,” I say, as if it matters. “What did I do to my head?”

  “You fell on it,” Rebecca says, matter-of-fact.

  “Maybe I should go to the hospital.”

  “I think you’ll be fine,” says the middle wife. She has long black hair woven into a French braid. “I’m a nurse, and Eric’s a doctor. A pediatrician, but he knows about fainting.”

  “You picked a lucky bunch to fall in front of,” Eric says, and the women laugh.

  I try to stand up and I realize my knees aren’t up to it. Eric grabs me quickly and loops my arm around his neck. The sky is spinning. “Sit her down,” Eric commands. “Listen,” he turns to Rebecca. “Let us take you to the lake. We’re on our way anyway, and it might do your mother some good to cool off.”

  “Is that okay, Mom?” Rebecca says. “Did you hear?” She is shouting.

  “I’m not deaf. Fine. Great.” I am lifted to my feet by Rebecca, Eric and two wives. The third carries my purse.

  In the back of Eric’s minivan are rubber floats and towels that get pushed out of the way for Rebecca and me. Eric positions me lying down, with my feet propped up on an inner tube. From time to time I take sips of cold water from a thermos. I have no idea where this lake is and I’m too tired to find out.

  But when we stop at the shores of the Great Salt Lake I am impressed. You can see across it for miles; it might as well have been an ocean. Eric carries me to the lake down a steep embankment, surprising for someone who is relatively slight. There are many people swimming here. I sit on the sandy bottom of the lake, in a shallow spot that wets my shorts and half my T-shirt. I beg not to go in farther than this; I don’t like to swim, or to feel that my feet cannot reach the bottom.

  I am wondering how my clothes will ever dry, when it occurs to me I keep floating up to the surface. I have to bury my arms in the sand to keep sitting. This takes all the energy I have. Eric and two wives paddle past me on a raft. “How do you feel?” he says.

  “Better,” I lie, but I am beginning to cool off. My skin no longer feels like it is raw and splitting. I duck my head under the water to wet my scalp.

  Rebecca runs past me, splashing. “Isn’t this excellent!” She dives and surfaces like an otter. I’ve forgotten how much she loves to swim, since I hardly ever take her to the water.

  Rebecca moves a little farther out and says, “Hey Mom, no hands.” She sticks her arms and legs into the air, buoyant on her back.

  “It’s the salt,” Eric tells me, gently helping me to my feet. “You float better than you do in an ocean. Not bad, for a landlocked state.”

  Rebecca tells me to lie on my back. “I’ll swim you out. I’m a lifeguard, remember?” She wraps her arm across my chest and vigorously scissor-kicks. Because I am in her arms, her care, I don’t try to protest. Also because I am still feeling fairly sick.

  After a second, when I have the courage to open my eyes, I see the clouds passing by, lazy and liquid. I listen to the way my daughter breathes. I concentrate on being weightless.

  “Look, Mom,” Rebecca says, dancing in front of me. “You’re doing it by y