A Thousand Voices Read online

  “You did all kinds of mean things to me,” Shasta corrected, returning to our table. “When I was in elementary school, my friends thought it was the coolest thing that my brother was a teenager. They all had these huge crushes on him, but he wouldn’t give us the time of day. At school, he’d walk right past us with the other football players, and he wouldn’t even talk to us.” She sneered at Jace. “You were such a turd.”

  Grinning, he shrugged. “I had a reputation to protect.”

  “Fart.” Shasta’s nose wrinkled like she’d caught a bad scent.

  “Baby,” he shot back.

  “Daddy, no calling names,” Willie scolded, and all three of us laughed. Around the room, the Reids began getting up from their places, stacking dirty plates and unused napkins and preparing to leave.

  Gathering our things, we rose and started toward the door with everyone else. Shasta stopped halfway and reminded me that we had parked out back, and her baby seat was in my car. “Let me tell Mama to wait on me a minute, and then I’ll go get my stuff out of your car.” She turned away, then turned back. “Or, if you want, I could show you around town real quick, then you can drop me at the festival grounds and I’ll point out where our booth is so you can find us later. You are going to come by, aren’t you?”

  I hadn’t even thought about how to spend the rest of the day. “I think so.”

  To Shasta, that was a definite yes. “Cool. You’ll like the festival. There’s the shopping, of course, but also the carnival, the Choctaw village where they tan hides and make arrowheads and stuff, the terrapin races, Indian dancers, the powwow, Choctaw stickball tournaments, horseshoes, softball, basketball, and then at night they have really big-time singers give concerts in the amphitheater.” Checking over her shoulder, she noticed that her mother was about to walk out the door, and Benjamin was headed back toward us. “Hang on a minute,” she said, then threaded her way through the lingering Reids, catching Benjamin’s hand and stopping to talk to her mother.

  Jace checked his watch as Willie and Autumn stacked up the place mats with Shasta’s impromptu artwork. “Guess I’d better head to the museum.” Grabbing a pencil and a paper coaster from the table, he jotted down a phone number and handed it to me. “Here’s my cell number, in case you get lost and need directions or anything. Cell service is a little inconsistent at the festival grounds, but it’ll probably pick up.”

  He handed me the paper, and I tucked it into my purse, then patted it, trying to look confident. “Thanks.”

  He leaned in, smiling. “See you at the museum at twelve thirty?”

  I felt warm in the pit of my stomach. “Sure. See you then.” We hesitated for a moment, bound by some invisible thread.

  Autumn broke the connection by handing her dad the jumble of artistic place mats. “Dad, Willie and me don’t have to go to the museum this morning, do we?”

  Tucking the papers under his arm, Jace shook his head. “No, you don’t. You two are with Neenee this morning. Nana Jo’s going to drop you by her house. Neenee and Pappy wanted to keep you two for the morning, and then we’ll do the festival this afternoon. We’ll go to the carnival a while, and then you can help Aunt Shasta and Nana Jo at the booth.” He checked his watch again, then looked at me, as if he hadn’t factored me into his plans. “But not right after lunch, because I have to help Dell with some things. Neenee can bring you guys over to the booth when Willie and Pappy get up from their afternoon naps.”

  Autumn threaded her arms around her father’s waist and sighed, studying the floor as if she were calculating the hours they would be apart. “Okay,” she muttered miserably.

  He ruffled her hair. “You’ll have fun with Neenee and Pappy. They’ll probably take you guys down to the creek to fish.”

  Willie brightened, clapping his hands and bouncing in place.

  “Okay,” Autumn muttered again. “But what if Pappy gets to feeling bad, and Neenee can’t bring us over to the festival?”

  “Then I’ll come to Neenee’s house and get you.”

  Autumn tightened her arms around him, her face turned downward. “What if you come to Neenee’s to get us and we’re down at the creek, and you don’t know where we are?”

  Jace frowned, his fingers absently smoothing his daughter’s silky hair. “Then I’ll come down to the creek and find you. Don’t worry, all right?”

  She nodded again. “Daddy, what time is it?”

  “About nine.”

  Dark strands of hair fell forward, hiding her face. “It’s a long way until after Willie’s nap.”

  Jace glanced at me, his expression filled with meaning. “Not so long. You’ll have a good time at Neenee’s. Come on, now. We’d better head out. Neenee’s probably waiting on the porch, wondering where we are.”

  Untangling herself obediently, Autumn retrieved Shasta’s pictures and clutched them against her chest. “I don’t like Neenee’s house.”

  “You like Neenee’s house.” Jace sat down on the edge of a chair so that he was face-to-face with her. “You guys always have a good time there.”

  “I don’t like some of the pictures.”

  Willie, who had been following the conversation back and forth like a volley at a Ping-Pong match, felt the need to interject, “I like Neenee’s pictures.”

  Taking his daughter’s hand, Jace smoothed her small fingers like knotted pieces of twine. “Sweetheart, Neenee loves those pictures because she loved your mommy.”

  “I know.” Autumn nodded glumly. “But it’s a long time till after Willie’s nap. I forgot my watch, and Neenee’s clock has hands. I can’t read it and I won’t know what time you’re gonna get us from Neenee.”

  “Here, take mine,” I said, unstrapping my wristwatch, a black plastic digital I’d bought in Ukraine. “You can borrow it for the day.”

  Autumn’s face lit up. “I can keep it all day? Really?”

  “Sure. Here, hold out your arm, and I’ll put it on.”

  “’Kay.”

  I buckled the watch into place, then stood over Autumn’s shoulder while she looked at it.

  “Thanks,” she said, touching the readout in awe, then pushing the button to turn on the backlight. “It’s so cool. It’s even got a light in it.”

  “And a stopwatch, and lots of other things I have no idea how to use,” I pointed out. “But the coolest thing is that all the little words are written in Russian.”

  Latching onto her arm, Willie stood on his tiptoes to look. Autumn pulled away petulantly. “Just a minute, Willie. You’re interrupting.” She sounded like a little girl playing the part of Mommy in a game of house. “It’s not for little kids.”

  Taking her hand, I lowered her arm so Willie could see. “Here. Let’s let Willie have a look. I’m sure he’ll be careful.”

  Behind us, Jace craned to see the watch as well.

  “Ooohhhh,” Willie muttered in amazement, his eyes wide around the dark centers. “I like it.” He tipped his chin upward with a meaningful look. “A lot.”

  Autumn pulled away, tracing a finger around the edge of the crystal, squinting at the tiny Russian characters. “Where’d you get it from?”

  “I bought it in Ukraine.” Autumn frowned at my explanation, her brows knotting. “That’s a country near Russia, way on the other side of the world. I worked in an orphans’ mission there last year, and sometimes we’d go into town and buy things from people who sell stuff on the street corners. They carry their merchandise in funny little wooden cases, and when they flip the latch, they have a little store, right there on the street.”

  “Wow,” Autumn breathed, regarding both the timepiece and me with equal amazement.

  Willie climbed onto a chair so he could see the watch again.

  “No, sir,” Jace said, guiding him back to the floor.

  “I wanna wear it,” Willie whined.

  Clamping her arm against her chest, Autumn covered the watch with her hand. “Uh-uh. It’s not for little kids, Willie. You’ll break it.” Her
voice rose in volume, causing Nana Jo, Shasta, and some of the aunts to turn our way.

  “I will not.” Willie stretched onto his tiptoes, his chin jutting up and out. “I’m not a baby.”

  Autumn leaned down, so that her face was close to his. “You are too.”

  Jace gave a tired sigh. “All right, you two. That’s enough.” Taking one child in each hand, he separated them, and I had a feeling he was about to use the parental tactic that Aunt Kate often deployed on her kids. Because they were fighting over the item, he was going to take it away, and then Autumn would once again be upset about spending the day at her grandmother’s house.

  “Tell you what,” I said, bracing my hands on my knees and leaning down, so that I was eye to eye with Willie and Autumn. “Let’s let Autumn wear the watch for today, but only if she uses the stopwatch to time some things for you—like, how fast you can run across the yard, or how long it takes you to catch a fish. Maybe you two can even keep a chart, and then later today, we can look at how fast you were.”

  Willie considered the idea, then nodded reluctantly. “I’m real fast.” Squinting one eye shut, he took on the look of a boy faced with a double-dog dare.

  “I’ll bet you are,” I said.

  “Not as fast as me.” Autumn gave me an impulsive hug. “Thanks, Aunt Dell.”

  “Yeah, thanks, Aunt Dell.” Willie joined in the hug, and the force of it knocked me into a chair.

  “All right, you two.” Jace chuckled, catching me and the chair in one hand. “Now that you’ve mugged her for her watch, let’s leave her in one piece. Time to go.”

  “’Kay.” Autumn wiggled out of the embrace and trotted happily across the room, holding up her new treasure. “Nana Jo, look what Aunt Dell let me borrow. It’s got Russian on it. Over there, they got guys on the street with boxes that they open the latch, and…”

  Willie remained sitting on my knees, toying with the choker the Spencers had given me before I left the orphanage—an old Soviet coin with a hole drilled in the middle and a leather thong passed through it. The sensation of Willie’s tiny fingers against my neck felt nice. It reminded me of my kids in Ukraine, lonely—sad, desperate to touch and be touched, to give and receive love. Despite his usual boundless energy, Willie seemed content to sit on my lap and investigate the coin.

  “You remind me of my kids in Ukraine,” I said, and he raised his eyes curiously. “I bet they would love to go fishing with you today. They live in a city, so there isn’t any place to fish. One time, we made fishing poles from dead branches, and we played a game where they got to fish for candy. It’s not as much fun as real fishing, but they liked it.”

  Willie blinked, surprised. Bracing his hands on my knees, he leaned back, so that he almost slid off, and I had to circle my arms around him to keep him from falling. “You like fishin’?”

  “I love fishing.”

  “Did the ’Crane kids catch any candy?”

  His pronunciation of the word made me chuckle. “The kids in Ukraine? Yes, they did.”

  He studied the ceiling. “How’d they get candy to bite the hook?”

  I chuckled. “The teachers have to put it on for them and tug their lines, so it feels like they caught a fish. It takes a little pretending. Sometimes I’d hang on for a minute, so they could fight the line like they had a great big daddy bass on there.”

  Willie nodded thoughtfully, imagining the game. “Maybe you can come fishin’ at my Neenee and Pappy’s.”

  “We’ll see,” I answered, uncomfortable with the assumption that I would be around long enough for that.

  “Autumn don’t like to fish anymore.”

  “That’s okay. Not everybody likes to fish.”

  “My mama liked to fish. I got a picture.” Stretching far against the circle of my arms, he arched backward like an acrobat attempting a walkover. “She looked like you look.”

  A hot flush burned into my cheeks, and I fumbled for something appropriate to say. In the silence, Willie dragged himself upright to look at me.

  Jace cleared his throat self-consciously. “We’d better get going, big guy.”

  “Okie doke,” Willie answered, unfettered by the invisible swell of adult emotion around him. Lingering a moment on my lap, he touched the coin necklace, met my gaze, and said, “That’s pretty,” then slipped away.

  Jace rubbed his thumb and forefinger across his dark brows, then held his hand there a moment. “Sorry about that. They have a hard time knowing what’s all right to say and what’s not.” He lowered his hand, his eyes meeting mine with a look of grief and concern that was like a tide, pulling me into an ocean of thoughts he kept to himself.

  “It’s all right. Really,” I said quietly. Shasta was headed our way, and from across the room Nana Jo watched the exchange between Jace and me with an expression somewhere between concern and disapproval. She eased a few steps closer, her walking stick making a hollow, almost impatient tap on the linoleum tile.

  Jace reconnoitered over his shoulder, as if the walking cane were an unspoken signal, and he knew what it meant. “Sounds like Nana Jo’s about to pound a hole in the floor.” He turned away, then back, regarding me from the corner of his eye. “See you in a little while.”

  “Sure,” I answered, and he smiled just before he turned away. I smiled back.

  Shasta watched Jace go, then turned to me, crossing her arms with a deliberateness that surprised me. Normally, she flitted around like a little girl trapped in a woman’s body. “He’s too old for you, you know.” Her words were astonishingly blunt. “That’s why Nana Jo’s giving you two the hawk eye.”

  My mouth dropped open, and I snapped to my feet, a rapid pulse racing in my neck. Last night’s biting commentary about Lana flashed through my mind. Did Shasta think I was being nice to Autumn and Willie because I was scheming after her brother? I barely knew Jace, and besides, I’d seen Shasta’s bad side, and I definitely didn’t want to be on it. “I…I didn’t…I’m not…”

  Shasta giggled like a teenage girl passing dirty notes in class. “Relax, will you? I’m just telling you what the old folks are saying.” We moved to the back door, and she pulled it open, then blinked against the light. “Just watch out. They’re kind of protective about Jace and his kids since Deanne died. Personally, I think it’s kind of cool to see him act, like, interested in someone again. Believe me, Lana’s been trying for months, and he doesn’t look at her the way he was just looking at you. I mean, it’s sad about Deanne, but it’s not like they were still married. They got married straight out of high school, and they just shouldn’t of, that’s all.”

  In my mind, Grandma Rose was grousing, Well, that’s the pot calling the kettle black, now isn’t it? I didn’t say it, of course. Instead, I checked the rapidly emptying room behind us and tried to change the subject. “Where’s Benjamin?”

  “Oh, he’s with Mama. She’s got an extra baby seat in her car, so they went on and left.” With a vague wave over her shoulder, she ushered me through the kitchen door. Aunt Maemae had disappeared into the freezer again. “Mama’s about to have a conniption because I’m not headed right over to the booth to help immediately this morning. I told her I had to show you around town, and it’d be easier if she took Benji with her. She wasn’t too happy, but she’ll get over it.”

  We slipped through the rear exit together, and Shasta turned to push the door shut with both hands, then swung around, flinging her hair over her shoulder. The movement caused her to lose her balance, and she wobbled sideways like an off-center Weeble, bumped into me, and caught my arm.

  “Geez.” Slapping a hand to her chest, she caught her breath, then circled her stomach with the other arm. “I forget sometimes. Sorry.”

  I hovered beside her as we started toward the car. How could anyone forget the weight of a nearly full-term pregnancy? “It’s the flip-flops,” I joked.

  “You sound like Lana.” Shasta sneered sideways, unconcerned by her near fall. She circled the car and waited for the door
s to unlock. “I’ll show you all the places you need to know, and if you’ve got a map, I can tell you how to get to the county courthouse. A girl where I worked was looking for her birth parents once, and the first place she started was the courthouse. I never did find out what happened. I got pregnant and had to quit the job.” She paused long enough to open the passenger side. “I wish I didn’t have to work the booth today. I’d go with you.”

  “It probably won’t be all that exciting.” I wasn’t sure if I was trying to console her or prepare myself.

  Bouncing into the passenger seat, Shasta tossed her hair cheerfully. “Oh, I don’t know. I’m sure the ladies at the courthouse can help you at least get your birth records, and that’s the first step—anyway that’s what the girl at my work told me. Who knows? When I was down at the courthouse paying Cody’s speeding ticket, those girls in the office nearly talked my ear off. My stepcousin works there, and Lord knows, she could talk the hair off a horse. If she’s there, you might get lucky and find out all kinds of stuff.”

  CHAPTER 14

  Touring the small town of Clayton with Shasta turned out to be an exercise in patience. Shasta wanted to show me the local landmarks, everything from the drive-in to the grocery store. Everywhere she went, she knew people, and people knew her, and we stopped to talk. Half of the people in town were related to Shasta, and the other half had either taught her in school, coached her in softball, had her in Sunday school years ago, gone to high school with her, or knew her because of the murals she’d painted on several buildings in the area.

  “We did those back in high school as a community service project,” she said with a backhanded wave toward a mural on an old brick building downtown. “They so totally stink. One of these days I’m going to come down here with a sandblaster and blow them away.”