The Ice Queen

Eliza unhooked the IV right before it happened. There was a click, and then quiet. You wouldn’t think there could be so many butterflies in the world. You wouldn’t think everything could change in an instant. But there are, and it does.

There were whirling clouds above us, brought in from the cold ocean air. Nimbus. Fast moving. Flying. Good to lift your spirit. Good for everything. Good for him.

II

Nina named their daughter Mariposa. She was born in January on a day when there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I noticed. I was keeping track of such things. I was there with Mariposa when she was born; I was the coach who said, Breathe and Push and Oh my God, there has never been anything so beautiful. I was watching over her from the beginning, so I was made her godmother, which meant I had to watch over her forever more. It turned out to be something I was good at. Something I was meant to be. I stayed on for several months, babysitting, helping out, nearly learning to cook, until Nina was ready to go back to work, ready to have her daughter go to the day care center at the university while she taught her classes. I left Giselle with them. It just made sense. She was a Florida cat now. She’d have howled if she’d been made to put a paw into snow and ice. Besides, I’d never thought she was mine, so I wasn’t really giving anything away.

A godmother’s role is to send gifts, and I do that — too much, probably. Every year on Mariposa’s birthday, I go for a visit. I don’t despair over that time of the year anymore. It’s my favorite month, just as it used to be. I’ve given Mariposa a dozen volumes of fairy tales. Her favorites are the Andrew Lang books, with all those pretty covers, filled with stories that feel illogical and true at the very same time. She and I are both partial to the Red Book.

Once I read Mari her father’s favorite, “Godfather Death.” “That’s not funny,” she said to me.

“No, it’s not,” I agreed. “But your father liked that story. He was a scientist like the doctor.”

“They don’t all have to be funny,” she said after thinking it over. “But tell me the one about a girl who climbs a mountain that no one has ever climbed before.”

“I don’t know that one. I only know the one about the girl who was turned into ice.”

“Make it up.” Mariposa had a solemn face that reminded me of Ned. Ned, who was a good secret-keeper. Ned, who never believed in perfect logic. Ned, in the ever after.

It was difficult for me to say no to Mariposa. I wanted her to have everything. So I made up the story for her. It turned out to be a good one. Better than the story I used to tell myself. It was the same girl, in the same icy land, but this time she thought to climb over the mountain instead of standing in place and freezing. She was smarter now, less likely to give in. As soon as she got to the place on the other side of the mountain, she started to melt; she left a blue river behind her, one that is always cold, always pure, always true.

The last time I visited Orlon, I took Mariposa out to the orange grove. I was babysitting. Nina was at class, and Mariposa had turned six. That’s the way it happened. Time kept moving forward. We sang songs as we drove, ones I thought I would have forgotten by now. Mariposa made me remember things. She liked my horrible voice and applauded. Everything she did was a treasure in my eyes. I was the godmother, after all. She belonged to me, too.

When we got to the orchard I pulled into the driveway, parked, and took Mari for a walk. She wore her hair in a pixie cut. Nina had told me she refused to let her hair grow; she hated to have it brushed and braided and fooled with.

“Smart girl,” I said. I told her that a lot.

“It smells good here,” Mari said as we walked in the grove.

She was right about that, too. The land had been sold at auction, and all the trees were in bloom. We walked down the road and waved to some of the workers.

“Hello!” Mariposa called to one of them who was pruning the branches. “Do you live in a tree?”

I have thought of Lazarus Jones, but he’s like a story I heard long ago. A story where I turned the pages even though I knew how it would end. Some things are like that, chaos theory aside. Turn left or turn right, you come to the same conclusions about certain things, the very same results. A young man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, who wasn’t afraid of death, who, when he got a chance to be someone else, had to take it.

By now the hole in the ground had been filled in with stone and rock. I suppose the new owner hoped to cover it with fertilizer and sod, maybe reclaim the soil. All the old trees had been cut down. I thought I saw a red orange on one of the trees, but it was just the slant of sunlight, turning a piece of orange fruit crimson.