Torey Hayden - The Sunflower Forest

Mama considered that. She waited a moment longer in case I was going to change my mind. Finally, satisfied that I wasn’t, she turned and left.

I could hear them preparing downstairs, fixing a picnic of fruit and soft drinks. Mama was talking in Hungarian, her voice full and undulant. Megan was beside herself with excitement, and her glee floated up the stairs in squeally, high-pitched syllables.

From my window I watched them leave together. They had the little knapsack with them. Bulky in Dad’s brown sweater, Mama strode off down the street, moving purposefully, like one of Odin’s Valkyries. Megan flitted around her like a small, dark wraith.

‘Where’s your mama?’ my father asked when he returned from work mid-afternoon.

‘She and Megs went to see the farmers putting in the sunflowers,’ I replied. He had come upstairs, still carrying a bag of groceries in one arm. He was in his blue work coveralls and had his cap on. He set the bag down on my bed. Taking off his cap, he ran his fingers through his hair. It stood straight up.

‘Mama asked me to go,’ I said, ‘but I have this test on Monday to study for.’

‘That’s an awful long way,’ he said.

‘That’s what I told her. I said you’d probably take her out in the car, if she’d only wait till you got back. But you know how Mama is. She wanted it right then.’

He wandered over to the window and pulled back the curtain. ‘It’s been such a long time since she’s been out,’ he said, more to himself than to me. Then he turned in my direction. ‘Did she say where she was going?’

‘No.’

I knew what he was thinking, even though he didn’t say it. He was thinking I should have asked her specifically, that I had been irresponsible to let my mother wander off with Megan without finding out at least which way they planned to go. It had not occurred to me until just that moment that Mama might have had no idea of where she was going. That was the problem with Mama. Like the time she had dismantled the refrigerator because it wasn’t working. Mama would set her mind to do something and she’d do it, not caring whatsoever that she had no clue about how to go about it. The sheer pleasure of action was enough for her, even when her willingness to tackle something far outweighed her actual knowledge of what was involved. Suddenly the simple Saturday afternoon walk seemed fraught with every kind of possible disaster.

‘Maybe I should take the car and go look for them,’ Dad said thoughtfully.

‘I don’t think you need to do that,’ I said. ‘If they get lost, they can call. Megan’d know to do that.’

‘Do they have any money with them?’

Again, I realized I hadn’t checked. ‘Well, they could go to a farmhouse and use the phone there.’

‘How long have they been gone?’

‘Since about one.’

My father sighed. ‘She’s been inside all winter. She should have waited.’ Letting the curtain fall back into place, he went over and picked up the bag of groceries from the bed. ‘Well, I’ll give them until five. If they’re not back by then, I’ll take the car out and look for them.’

There was no need to worry. At 4.30 the storm door slammed, and I heard the sound of Mama’s voice calling for my father. When I came downstairs, I found them embracing, involved in one of those chaste but terribly long, complete-with-droning-bees-sound-effects kisses that they got into. Dad never said anything to her about being gone without telling him. Instead, he told her that Mr Hughson from the garage had paid him double overtime for working Saturday afternoon and that he’d bought us steaks for supper.

When it became obvious that I’d get stuck helping with the meal if I stayed downstairs, I returned to my room to study. Megan had gone thundering up the stairs past me when I’d first come down, so on my way back to my room, I stopped at her door. It was shut.

‘Can I come in, Megs?’ I asked and opened the door without waiting for an answer. ‘How was it? Did you and Mama find any sunflowers being planted?’

Megan was crying. She was sitting on the edge of her bed and had her stuffed tiger cat shoved against her mouth to block the noise.

‘Whatever’s wrong with you?’ I asked in surprise.

‘Nothing,’ she said and furiously mopped her face. I came over and sat down on the bed beside her. That immediately caused her to throw the stuffed animal down and get up. She crossed to the window. Reaching for a rubber band on the window ledge, she lifted her hair up and put the band around it. I remained on the bed.

‘Megs?’

Another prolonged effort to stop the tears. I waited.

‘Lesley, who’s Klaus?’ She turned to look at me.

‘Klaus who?’

Tears flooded her eyes again. ‘That’s what I’m asking you , dummy.’

We stared at one another in silence. She had snot running over her upper lip.

‘What are you talking about, Megan?’

‘Well, you know we went out? We were walking on this road by the creek. By those fields where you and me got the fireflies last summer, remember? Anyway, there was this little boy there. He was playing in the underbrush.’

Megan paused. She came over to the bed and picked up the tiger cat again. Taking its two forelegs, one in each of her hands, she held it out in front of her and gazed at it. ‘All of a sudden,’ she said pensively to the cat, ‘Mama looks at this kid and she says to me in this really excited voice, “There’s Klaus!” You could just tell from the way she said it, she was super excited.’ Megan looked above the stuffed animal’s head to me. ‘I mean, really, really super excited, Les. She shouted, “Klaus, Klaus, come here!” And this little kid looks up and he sees her and of course, ’cause he hears this lady yelling at him, he gets this scared look and he takes off down into the underbrush. And Mama’s hollering “Klaus! Klaus!” after him.’

‘What did he look like? Did you know him?’

The tears reappeared and Megan paused a moment to quell them. Pressing the tiger cat to her chest, she sat down on the bed beside me. ‘He was just some little kid. I don’t know who. He was just little. Maybe five or something. He was wearing overalls and one of those brown jackets that’s got the flannel lining inside. And he had this really white hair.’

‘What did Mama do then?’ I asked. ‘After he ran away?’

‘We were on the road. So she ran down the road a little way, and I ran after her. Then she turned to me and said, “Maybe he doesn’t understand German.” See, she had shouted at him in German. So then she shouts at this kid in English. Same thing. “Klaus, come back here.” But the little boy was on the other side of the fence by then and he was still running. She stopped when she got to the fence. But she kept yelling for him to come back.’

I shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t worry about it, Megs. Really, I wouldn’t. It’s not worth getting so upset about. It’s probably just one of Mama’s funny things.’

‘But she kept saying to me, “He must not speak German. They must have raised him here.”’

‘Look, don’t worry about it. You know how Mama is sometimes.’

‘But who is Klaus?’

‘I don’t know, kiddo.’

‘Where would Mama know him from?’

‘Like I said, it’s probably nothing at all. Just a funny idea of hers. Maybe somebody she remembers from before. You know. From Germany or somewhere. I wouldn’t get all upset about it.’

‘You weren’t there. You don’t know what it was like.’

‘Just the same, I wouldn’t worry about it.’

‘But who is he?’

‘Megan, I said I don’t know. I don’t. I’ve never even heard of anyone around here named Klaus. So don’t cry about it anymore, OK? It’s probably nothing.’