I nodded. “She’s getting ready for a show in Washington, D.C.”
“Lucky her. I’ve never been there. “Sissy frowned and tossed a stone at a seagull. It missed, and the bird hopped a few feet farther away. “I’ve never been anywhere. Just here—boring Sycamore Lake, boring Webster’s Cove, boring Maine.”
“But Maine’s beautiful. People come from all over to see the ocean and the boats and the lighthouses—”
“They must be really stupid.” Sissy threw another stone, harder this time. She missed again, but the gull squawked and flew away. “I’d give anything to leave here and travel all over the world.”
“Maybe when you grow up—”
“You know what? You’re stupid, too.”
I stared at her, but she was too busy building a little driftwood fence around her castle to look at me. “Why are you so mad all the time?” I asked her.
“What makes you think I’m mad?” She stuck a seagull’s feather into the top of her castle and sat back to study the effect. “How about your mother? Is she an artist, too?”
“No.”
“Why doesn’t she like the lake?”
“Like Emma said, she’s scared of water.” I paused. Even though I didn’t trust Sissy’s sly eyes and mean mouth, she’d lived around here all her life. Maybe she’d heard people talk about the cottage. Unlike Erin, she wouldn’t change the subject to spare my feelings.
Sissy stared at me, waiting for me to go on. Taking a deep breath, I said, “I think something happened the last summer Mom and Dulcie came to the cottage—something they don’t want to talk about. Maybe something…” I hesitated and dropped my voice to a whisper. “Maybe something bad.”
“You’re right,” she said. “Something bad happened, and lots of people know just what it was.”
I drew in my breath and let it out slowly. “Do you know?”
Sissy tugged her bathing suit strap into place again and got to her feet. “That’s for me to know and you to find out,” she said with a smirk.
I jumped up and faced her. “You don’t know anything, and neither does anyone else. You’re making up stories, that’s all.”
“Think what you want. See if I care.” Sissy turned her back on me and ran down the beach toward the Cove.
I watched her until I couldn’t see her anymore. Brat. Did she really know something? Or was she lying? With one kick I demolished her castle and then splashed home through the water, sending the minnows racing for cover. The next time I saw her, I’d tell her to stay away from Emma and me.
Emma was perched on the boathouse steps, waiting for me. In the studio, Dulcie had Wagner turned up loud. I could see her through the door, painting another canvas with dark shades of purple and gray. A stormy day at the lake, I guessed.
“Where have you been?” Emma asked.
“For a walk.”
“Did you see Sissy?”
I watched a gull land on one of the dock’s pilings. “No,” I lied.
“I wonder where she is.” Emma gazed up and down the shore, as if hoping to spot Sissy.
“Oh, she’ll turn up one of these days,” I said, sure it was true. No matter how much I wished she’d go away, Sissy would keep coming back. She probably didn’t have any other friends. Who’d want to play with someone like her?
“She’d better. Next to you, she’s my best friend.” Emma followed me up to the cottage, looking back every now and then, still hoping.
“Let’s play a game,” I said, thinking I might get her mind off Sissy. “How about Candy Land?”
“Okay.” Although she didn’t sound very enthusiastic, Emma watched me pull the box down from a shelf stacked with checkers, dominoes, Chinese checkers, Clue, Parcheesi, Chutes and Ladders—everything you could possibly want to play.
I laid the board on the floor between us. While Emma picked out four green playing pieces, I noticed that Mom and Dulcie had written their names in two corners of the board. The handwriting was loopy and childish, and I imagined my mom with a crayon in her hand, laboriously printing “Claire.”
“What’s that say?” Emma pointed to the names.
“Dulcie and Claire. I guess this was their game.”
“How about this?” Emma pointed at a scribbled-over place on the third corner. “What’s it say?”
Under a dark smear of black crayon, I made out the letters T-e-r-e-s-a. “Teresa,” I whispered. “It says Teresa.”
I stared at the board. A little prickle as sharp as a razor raced up my spine and tickled my scalp. Teresa. T for Teresa. The girl torn from the photograph, the girl I dreamed about—was her name Teresa?
“Why did somebody scribble on her name?” Emma asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. But I’d find out.
“Maybe Mommy didn’t like her,” Emma said.
“Maybe not.” Suddenly uneasy, I picked up the dice. It was weird how the cottage changed when evening shadows gathered in its corners. “Do you want to go first?”
We played three rounds, but it was hard for me to keep my mind on the silly game. My eyes returned again and again to Teresa’s name. Who was she? Why was her name almost hidden by layers of black crayon? Why had she been ripped out of that photograph? I had to find out.
At the dinner table, Dulcie asked us what we’d done all afternoon. “We played Candy Land,” Emma said. “I won two games, and Ali won one. She says I’m a champ.” She held up her arms and flexed her muscles.
Dulcie laughed. “You’ve always been a champ.”
Emma paused, her fork halfway to her mouth. “Who was Teresa, Mommy?”
“Teresa?” Dulcie stared at Emma, her body tense. “I don’t know anyone named Teresa. Why?” She quickly got to her feet and began to gather the plates. The knives and forks rattled, the glasses clinked.
“She wrote her name on your Candy Land game.” Emma followed Dulcie to the kitchen. “But somebody scribbled all over it with black crayon.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Dulcie scraped leftovers into the trash, her face hidden.
“I’ll show you.” Emma ran to the living room and came back with the Candy Land board. “See? Here’s your name and Aunt Claire’s name, and right there is Teresa’s name.”
Dulcie glanced at the board and shrugged. “Our mom used to buy stuff at church rummage sales. Some girl named Teresa probably owned the game before us, so we wrote our names and scribbled hers out.”
It was a good explanation, but I didn’t quite believe it. Something about that name upset Dulcie. She was tense, anxious.
“Remember that photo I told you about?” I asked her. “The one where the girl had been torn out? Well, her name started with T and I was wondering—”
“Will you please stop talking about it? How often do I have to tell you? I don’t know Teresa, I don’t know why her name is on that stupid game board, and I don’t know who the girl in the picture was! She could have been named Tillie or Trudy or Toni.”