Page 64 of The Seekers of Deer Creek

“But China Garden never does.”

Finally, they pushed the last of the food away and leaned back on the rattan bench. It was coming apart, snakes of brown cording falling off the underside of the seat, a symptom of the house’s chronic disrepair.Tu?nhadn’t maintained any of it. There were likely black mold and trapped animals in walls, in addition to the many cosmetic updates needed to make the place enticing to buyers. Vivi thought Scotty was wrong; they would lose money on this old property once taxes were paid and repairs were made. Better to demolish it than put it on the market.

And yet, as she looked out on the setting sun with its zebra stripes of scarlet and smoke, she felt a pang. Her childhood could be counted in horizons. Snuffed-out golds fighting through the batting of clouds in winter. A sidling of orange in the spring, a shade that would always remind her of peeled clementines. Over the years, she’d sat on the bench with Calla, bickering about nothing at all as they doodled in the margins of their books. Sometimes she’d sat with Wayland, crossing and uncrossing her legs like a demented crane, sure that her heart would beat right out of her chest if he looked at her a second longer.

Their childhood wasn’t idyllic. But the land could—did—tell stories.It held the promise of change yet managed to cling to a certain reassurance of stability. The players might switch in and out, but the sunset would always come. The trees, taller each season, would continue to provide hiding places for children whose imaginations often overtook their reality. Vivi had a brief thought that, despite it all, the yellow farmhouse might be a good place to raise kids.

A sandstorm of russet and umber went barreling through their yard, yapping the whole way.

“Baxter,” Calla supplied. “He’s a brindled mutt. Ugly thing; but sweet as hell. He and his owner, Robin, live next door, in the blue colonial. I’ll never be able to think of it as anything but Wayland’s place. When I glance over, I half expect him to come racing, trying to get you to go on some adventure with him.”

“I expect to see Dad coming out the side door, scowling about something or other.”

“Or Mom with her scissors, trying to chase us down for one of her terrible haircuts.”

The sisters sat with the old ghosts, giving them their due. Their mother was dead. Their mother had been trying to return to them. These were numbing thoughts. The impact of these revelations would hit in unexpected ways for the rest of their lives and that too was their cross to bear.

Both had wept after Vivi set down the letter. They clung to each other, burying their faces in one another’s necks. Minutes? Hours? The tears eventually dried, insufficient. Their mother’s disappearance had already wormed a hole inside of them; now, with her death, that hole was being filled with something different, a viscous regret that neither wanted to touch.

Vivi swung her feet against the bench legs. “It’s strange. Trying to rearrange everything we knew about them. What if she hadn’t left that night and just stayed with us? Would she still be alive?”

“I’ve been asking myself the same thing.”

“Maybe he wouldn’t have been so bad if she’d returned. Maybe he’d have gotten sober sooner with her here.”

Calla shrugged. “What I know about addiction is that it finds you eventually. Sometimes you win the battle; most of the time, you lose. But it’s a song in your blood, you know? If it wasn’t Mom leaving, it would have been something else. You can’t love a person into sobriety.”

“Do you think they wanted to be strangers with us? Or was it just... I don’t know. Immigrating? Language barriers?”

“I think parents are always strangers to their children. May andTu?njust took it to extremes.”

“It runs in our family. Extremes.”

Calla’s lips quirked and Vivi thought for a second that she was going to snap back. Instead, she flung up a shoulder in a self-deprecating manner. “At least we come by the dramatics honestly. Tell me what you know about the offering. Don’t leave a thing out.”

As twilight began to spread, a fist slowly unsplaying, Vivi shared all she knew aboutTâm’s connection to their family. About LongXuyênand how, with the address from their father’s unsent letter, they finally knew where to look. The house by the ravine. Calla had suspected some familial connection toTâmafter reading their father’s last letter, but she didn’t know exactly how the pieces fell together. She hadn’t understood thatLýwas a woman. Now, she bounced in her seat, newly alert.

“She’s our great-grandmother. K. P.Lýis our great-grandmother.” Calla clutched at Vivi’s wrist.

“No wonder Dad was obsessed with her.”

“Wait. Do you think they’d met each other?”

It was Vivi’s turn to shrug. “It seems unlikely. But our uncle would know for sure.”

“Our uncleKi`êu,” Calla marveled. “In LongXuyên. Did you know he was alive?”

“Not until just a few hours ago. I assumed—”

“We both assumed.”

“We could write him.”

“We could goseehim.”

The midges were coming out. “No-see-ums,” as the kids used to say. They couldn’t make out the specks in the darkening twilight but felt their sting anyway. Vivi slapped at a midge that’d dug itself into her neck.

“We could go see him,” she agreed. “Should we? Go toVi?tNam?”