The Probable Future

Stella rubbed a larger circle in the glass, then took the wool sweater she had tied around her waist and cleaned the rest of the case, not caring if her sweater turned black from the dirt. She saw the arrowheads set in rows, just as they were in the little house she’d been sent as a gift. The only real difference was that here the tenth arrowhead was missing. But at some point it had clearly been in place; time had edged its shape onto the satin where it had once been.

A silver circle, an old compass, was in the north corner of the case. A tarnished bell, much like the one on Stella’s bracelet, was displayed in the south. It may have been the rising dust that caused Stella’s eyes to burn, but most likely it was the sight of Rebecca Sparrow’s hair, the single black plait tied with a frayed strand of ribbon. Now she understood why these relics were kept behind glass. She understood why her mother had run away from Unity, as fast as she could. Jenny couldn’t bear to know what had happened; she’d do anything to stay clear of their family history. But Stella was nothing like her mother. For years, Jenny had watched her mother from behind her bedroom window without making a move herself. Stella, on the other hand, went directly to the garden, where her grandmother was raking mulch into a tall pile.

“Tell me about Rebecca Sparrow,” she said.

Elinor didn’t even glance up. “Out of the question. I can’t do that.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

Elinor was exhausted from raking and worn out from the constraints of a houseguest. All the responsibilities of family life she’d given up so long ago had arrived on her doorstep along with Stella; she had to get groceries from the market, and make certain there were clean towels and sheets; she was forced to converse when all she wanted was peace and quiet—all the niceties she’d never paid attention to when Jenny was a girl. Naturally, Jenny had no faith in Elinor’s caretaking abilities and had therefore mailed out a written list of instructions denoting Stella’s care: no sugar, no TV during the week, no newspapers until the mess with Will was settled, no late nights, no fried food, and absolutely, positively, no Rebecca Sparrow.

“I can’t tell you because your mother asked me not to.”

Elinor took the opportunity to sit on the bench Brock Stewart had given her, earlier that month. Why, she hadn’t even thought there was anyone on earth who knew when her birthday was, and then the bench had been delivered on the day itself. She’d been ungrateful; she’d told Brock the bench was an unnecessary luxury. Why, she never stopped working once she walked through the garden gate. But, lately, she’d come to realize it was a fine bench, beechwood, with a delicately carved back. Lately, she’d found she needed to rest.

“My mother,” Stella scoffed. “My mother was four years older than I am now when she ran away to get married, but she treats me like a baby. I want to know the family history. Maybe she was afraid to find out the truth, but I’m not.”

“Don’t you have history at school? Isn’t that enough?”

“The Colonial period. Today we made a time line charting the journey of the Mayflower. Not what I had in mind. I want to know about Rebecca.” Stella sat down across from her grandmother, balancing on one of the tumbled-down stone walls. “Just tell me a little bit. Tell me what her gift was.”

Elinor looked into her granddaughter’s sweet face. She wasn’t about to lie to the girl, despite Jenny’s instructions. “The worst one there is. She couldn’t feel pain. And don’t you dare let on to your mother that I told you.”

“Isn’t not feeling pain a good thing?”

Dusk had begun to fall in waves, first gray, then green, then inky blue. Today, in earth science, the teacher had noted that the sky began at the earth’s surface, but no one ever thought about it that way. It was just plain old air to most folks. They never noticed they were walking through the sky, just as they never recognized the lakes above them, formed out of vapor. Here, in the garden, the air was especially fragrant and damp. Rose petals that were doused tended to mold, leaves watered directly became mildewed, and so Elinor had rigged up an elaborate irrigation system, one that slowly leaked lake water into the soil. It was lake water, Elinor believed, that made the difference in her garden, the nutrients of all that muck: the frog waste, the insect larvae, the murky water from the depths, so cold the roses shuddered on the hottest days of August and gave off clouds of scent.

“Every gift comes with a price. Haven’t you found that to be true?”

Stella nodded. “Mine’s a burden.”