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  SCISSORS, PAPER, STONE

  SCISSORS, PAPER, STONE

  a novel by

  Martha K. Davis

  Winner

  Quill

  Prose Award

  Red Hen Press | Pasadena, CA

  Scissors, Paper, Stone

  Copyright © 2018 by Martha K. Davis

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the prior written permission of both the publisher and the copyright owner.

  Book design by Selena Trager

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Davis, Martha K, 1961–author.

  Title: Scissors, paper, stone: a novel by Martha K. Davis.

  Description: Pasadena, CA: Red Hen Press, [2018]

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017051800 | ISBN 9781597090469 (tradepaper) | ISBN 9781597092487 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Brothers and sisters—Fiction. | Families—Fiction. | Domestic fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3604.A97256 S35 2018 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017051800

  The National Endowment for the Arts, the Los Angeles County Arts Commission, the Ahmanson Foundation, the Dwight Stuart Youth Fund, the Max Factor Family Foundation, the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Foundation, the Pasadena Arts & Culture Commission and the City of Pasadena Cultural Affairs Division, the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, the Audrey & Sydney Irmas Charitable Foundation, the Kinder Morgan Foundation, the Allergan Foundation, the Riordan Foundation, and the Amazon Literary Partnership partially support Red Hen Press.

  First Edition

  Published by Red Hen Press

  www.redhen.org

  For Pat, without whom . . .

  And in memory of

  Edward S. Davis, Jr.

  1963–1990

  CONTENTS

  Part One 1964–1982

  Chapter 1 Catherine Spring 1964

  Chapter 2 Catherine Summer 1968

  Chapter 3 Laura Fall 1973

  Chapter 4 Laura Winter 1976

  Chapter 5 Min Summer 1979

  Chapter 6 Min Spring 1982

  Part Two 1985

  Chapter 7 Min Summer 1985

  Chapter 8 Catherine Summer 1985

  Chapter 9 Laura Summer 1985

  Chapter 10 Min Fall 1985

  Chapter 11 Catherine Fall 1985

  Chapter 12 Laura Winter 1985

  Acknowledgments

  Biographical Note

  PART ONE

  1964–1982

  Listen, whatever it is you try

  to do with your life, nothing will ever dazzle you

  like the dreams of your body.

  —MARY OLIVER

  CHAPTER 1

  Catherine

  Spring 1964

  I HAD NEVER WANTED MY own family. The older I grew, the less I could tolerate the one I came from. Once when I was fourteen and my brother Andy was ten, we followed the stream at the bottom of our hill, climbing over low stone walls and balancing on trees fallen into the water before jumping to the opposite bank. We wanted to find out how far we could go before we encountered a barn, a road, someone’s house. It was all woods, occasionally a pasture with a few horses flicking their tails. As we walked, we imagined that we were ten years older, exploring a part of the world where no one had ever been. I decided I would carry a jackknife, a compass, and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which my mother had bought me the day before when it finally arrived in the bookstore. Andy said he would bring matches to light campfires and a can of bug spray. It would be possible to survive by eating the plants, drinking the stream’s clear water. We had been walking for over an hour before I realized I was actually running away, or at least investigating how it could be done.

  As if he knew what I was thinking, Andy said, “Let’s go home, Cathy. I’m tired.”

  Straddling two stones in the middle of the stream, I looked back at him. His hair was plastered to his forehead by sweat; his PF Flyers were soaked. We had been having fun splashing in the water and guessing what we would find up ahead. He jumped to a flat rock, leapt to solid ground, and started walking back, his head down. I saw then that when I left home for real, I would have to go further than downstream, and I could take nothing with me, not even Andy.

  Twelve years later, I had escaped to the other coast. I lived with my husband and my new daughter in a house that Jonathan and I had built ourselves, and I was surprised to discover I had never been happier in my life.

  Jonathan and I had been married four years before we felt ready to consider becoming parents. In the first years of our marriage, he had dedicated most of his waking hours to writing for the San Francisco Chronicle, working his way up to junior reporter for the City Desk, and we had both become involved in the civil rights movement, which in the Bay Area mostly meant marching to end job discrimination and raising money for voter registration in the South. When Jonathan rolled over in bed one morning and said, “Cath, let’s adopt our child from Korea,” I knew immediately it was the right thing to do. During the Korean War I had been in my early teens; I remembered listening to radio newscasts reporting on the Korean children who were orphaned and later those who were abandoned because their fathers were American soldiers. At school one of my teachers brought in newspaper clippings, and our class put together packages of toothbrushes and socks to send to those children overseas. I had seen their faces, read their stories. They had been real to me, like faraway younger cousins.

  We waited until the adoption process was set in motion to inform my family and Jonathan’s. Then I was glad that we lived three thousand miles away. Over the phone, my mother accused me of depriving her of her own grandchild, a direct descendent. When I pointed out that Robert and his wife Nora had already given her three, she told me I was being contrary and started to cry. My father blamed me for upsetting her, adding, “There’s no use in trying to talk sense into you.”

  My sister Susie never returned the phone messages we left with other girls in her dorm. Weeks later she insisted she had never received them. I called Andy at his college too. On the phone he didn’t say much. He seemed distracted, and although he congratulated Jonathan and me, I felt disappointed hanging up, wanting more. Robert and Nora, on the other hand, told us we were being absurd. Why would we adopt a child when we could have one of our own? It wasn’t natural. Robert dismissed all the reasons we gave him, calling us bleeding-heart liberals. Finally Jonathan told Robert that it wasn’t any of their business; if they didn’t want to support us, we wouldn’t talk about it with them anymore.

  By then I could no longer be rational about the subject. After a certain point I could give no more logical reasons, no considered answers. Day after interminable day, we waited for the home study, then for approval by the agency, then to hear when our daughter would come to us. I became incapable of smiling at the children I saw downtown waiting with their mothers at the bus depot to go into the city or spinning a yo-yo on its string as they climbed a steep street on their way home after school. None of those children were mine. In the supermarket, the sight of a woman with a child in the seat of her grocery cart could reduce me to tears. I wanted to be a mother, and I wanted my daughter to be the scrunch-faced newborn whose picture we had picked out at the adoption agency. If someone had told me even a year before that I would feel so covetous, so obsessed, I would have laughed outright.

  The night Jonathan and I waited for the plane carrying Min from Korea, there were five other couples at the gate looking equally as anxious as we felt. We all clustered in front of the big window, squinting up at the dark sky. We were trying to see past the spotlights to
the airplane where our children were—where the children who were soon to be ours were. One woman had knitted baby booties and a little sweater for the child she was waiting for. She clung to them as if holding them tighter might hurry the plane’s arrival, bring it down safely. Other couples carried baby blankets, bottles, dolls. I tried to be casual as I looked over their provisions, the offerings they had brought to welcome their children into their lives. I couldn’t help comparing my blanket to theirs, trying to assess my worthiness as a mother. I had waited so long for this day, wanted this child so badly. I couldn’t believe, after the months of interviews and endless waiting, that the moment had finally come.

  Harriet, our social worker from the agency, patted my shoulder and wandered down the corridor in search of a water fountain. Jonathan looked at his watch again for what seemed like the fiftieth time. The plane was over an hour late, delayed by bad weather and lengthy stopovers. He shuffled through the papers he carried in his hand, some of them written in English, some of them in Korean: the visa, the adoption agency’s home study certifying us suitable parents, the interim adoption court order, the official documents from the orphanage in Korea, other documents that Harriet had told us we’d need. One of them slipped from Jonathan’s grasp and wafted down to the floor. He stooped and picked it up hurriedly, then went through the order of the papers, inserting the errant document in its place, counting the total number one more time. He looked up at me and gave me a wan smile. I couldn’t smile back. I felt as brittle as glass. I had never been as nervous as I was that night.

  Suddenly I felt a surge of fear and had to sit down in one of the padded chairs. I didn’t know what I had gotten myself into. I was damp with sweat and my heart was thudding against my chest. Who was I to think I could be a mother? Especially to a child who, three months before, had been born to another woman, a complete stranger, in a country utterly unknown to me. I looked up at Jonathan, relieved that Harriet wasn’t there. I was afraid that if she saw my terror, she would rescind her decision to allow us to be parents to Min.

  Jonathan was looking out the window, past the other couples crowded against the glass. “The plane’s here,” he said in a curiously neutral tone. Then he looked down and saw my face. He moved nearer and put his arm around my shoulder, hugging me close against him. This was it. I had never been so aware of change at the exact moment it became real. For all three of us, there was no turning back. I couldn’t remember wanting anything this much. I leaned my head against Jonathan’s stomach. I started to cry. My tears soaked into his flannel shirt.

  “I love you, Catherine,” Jonathan told me, squeezing my shoulder.

  It only made me cry harder.

  Andy came to visit us three months later, during his spring vacation. It was his senior year; in the fall he would study law at Vanderbilt. I was proud of him for having been accepted but baffled as to why he had chosen law school. I’d always imagined he would have a career as a marine biologist or a forest ranger, some kind of hands-on research job that would feed his incessant curiosity and his natural restlessness.

  We spent Andy’s first day with us in San Francisco, showing him the tourist sites. The day was warm after the fog burned off. Jonathan and I traded carrying Min as we climbed the steep steps from the Embarcadero up to Coit Tower, passing terraced gardens and rows of colorful Victorians on our way. Inside the building, Andy went up to the windy tower to see the views, while Jonathan and I stayed downstairs to show Min the historical murals of the area painted on the walls, pointing out to her the political and cultural references. She slept through most of it, but we were enjoying ourselves too much to care.

  On the long way down the spiraling road, I took Min from Jonathan while Andy walked faster and faster ahead of us until he was running and shouting, “I can’t stop! The brakes are gone!” I laughed, feeling Min settle her head against me and watching my brother disappear around a corner, his loafers slapping the road. Jonathan said something under his breath. I knew Jonathan thought Andy was immature, but he had only seen him with me. Andy and I slipped back into the memory of our shared childhood when we were around each other; it was one of the pleasures of being sister and brother.

  To get Jonathan to smile, I reached out my hand and took his, swinging our arms between us. “He used to do that when we went skiing. We’d all gather at the top of the chairlift and set off, practicing our snowplows and stem christies to zigzag carefully down the mountain. Then Andy would come barreling past us, straight down, shouting, ‘The brakes are gone!’ My father called him a damn fool, but he never wiped out.” It didn’t sound particularly amusing once I explained it. “I guess you had to be there,” I told Jonathan. But he smiled and swung our hands higher, until they reached the zenith of their arc and broke apart.

  We took a ride on the Hyde Street cable car, but the clanging of the bell made Min cry, so we jumped off and walked to North Beach for lunch at Caffe Trieste. We were having dessert, Min in my lap, when I heard a voice ask, “Is she yours?”

  I looked up from feeding Min a small spoonful of strawberry gelato. An older couple stood in front of our table, gaping at my daughter. I nodded but didn’t answer. I was already tired of other people’s reactions.

  The woman smiled slightly. “How marvelous of you. Imagine what her life would have been like. She’s a very lucky girl.”

  “Actually, we think we’re the lucky ones,” I said and went back to feeding Min. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the woman’s husband nudge her. They moved away and left the restaurant.

  “Arrogant bastards,” Jonathan said. I looked up at him. He was staring angrily after the couple. Andy was looking out the window.

  I realized that Jonathan had rarely been in public with Min before. This was apparently the first time he had been subjected to other people’s unsolicited opinions of what we had done. “You’ll get used to it,” I told him, conscious of how completely I had adapted to the changes Min had brought into my life.

  I glanced at Andy again, who had turned his attention to the unlit votive candle in its glass cup on the table. He pressed his finger down against the wax, leaving a shallow impression. As soon as the subject had turned to Min, he had removed himself from the conversation. I felt hurt, realizing he hadn’t shown much interest in my daughter ever since I had introduced her to him the day before. He had been polite, peering into her face and commenting on how small she was. I knew he liked the idea of eventually becoming a father himself, but I also knew he was uncomfortable around actual babies, so I hadn’t tried to make him hold her. I had thought he just needed to get used to being around a small child. But it was a full day later, and still he practically ignored her, as if she weren’t almost always attached to me, riding my hip or sleeping on my shoulder or giggling in my arms. Maybe he felt left out somehow, though he must have known the entire week was planned around him. Watching my brother inspect the candle, I wrote it off as insecurity, simple lack of experience. Being around Min would be good for him, I decided. He would see how Jonathan and I interacted with her, and he would start to love her as we did.

  I leaned forward, holding Min securely, and pressed my index finger in the candle wax too, leaving my print beside his. “Do you want another ice cream?” I asked my brother, knowing he would never turn down a second dessert. And I had to admit I enjoyed watching him eat it. I had always taken pride in my ability to make him happy.

  During the week, while Jonathan was in the city, I drove Andy to the redwood forest of Muir Woods, the beaches and trails of Point Reyes, the vineyards of Napa Valley. I strapped Min into her car chair in the back seat, where she seemed happy enough as long as we didn’t ignore her for too long. One afternoon Andy and Min and I took a long walk at Tennessee Valley. We hiked up into the headlands, past stands of eucalyptus trees, following a narrow trail through the tall grasses. The sage plants gave off their tangy scent as we brushed past. At the top we turned onto the coast trail toward Muir Beach. Andy stopped every few minutes to look
out to sea, following the flights of gulls as they dipped and soared. The wind carried the scent of a wood fire from the north. Eventually we sat on a large boulder, sharing a Hershey’s chocolate bar. I took the Hike-A-Poose off my back and held Min for a while, who was getting fussy from staring at the landscape behind me for too long.

  Before we turned around, Andy walked down and stood at the edge of the cliffs. Far below him, waves smashed against the rocks, sending up a spray of foam. I hung back, afraid of erosion and the unpredictable winds. The ocean air sharpened my senses. I was aware of everything at once: the rumble of water rushing back into the sea; Andy standing in his windbreaker the way our father stood, with his legs apart and his hands in the pockets of his khaki pants; the solid weight of Min’s small body as I held her against me; my own sense of completeness at that moment. The three people I loved most in the world were with me in my daily life. I wanted to hold on to that feeling, make it last. Andy could surely find work as an attorney in San Francisco. It was easy to imagine the future: Andy and I sitting back in deep canvas chairs on the deck of his ocean-front house while Min and Jonathan took a walk down the beach; later, after making us hamburgers on the grill, Andy telling Min the story of his first visit to us, back when he was still in college and she wasn’t even crawling yet.

  In front of me, Andy lowered his head and kicked a small stone over the edge of the cliff with his topsider. Then he turned and walked toward us, jutting his chin out briefly to draw my attention to Min. Perhaps it was the salty breeze or the luxury of stillness after being jounced by my walking that had pacified Min. Her head rested on my shoulder, her mouth open and drooling onto my sweater as she slept. I put my hand up and stroked her dark thatch of hair, awed all over again by her utter vulnerability. When I looked up, Andy was walking back down the path.