SIX

THE VERY THING I’VE BEEN LOOKING FOR

No different from all the other folders. Nothing to explain the electricity that shoots up my arms. Except that the name under the purple F sticker on the corner is FOX, SHERRY.

Sherry.

I say it out loud. “Sherry.”

It’s pretty. Soft.

Is this my mother? Sherry Fox.

WHAT’S IN THE FILE

I hurry through the pages, trying to figure it all out. Sherry Fox’s pregnancy is here in my hands! What parts matter the most? There’s no time to puzzle out these illegible scribbles, abbreviations, initials. Notes, I guess, from her visits each month. What I want is how to find her, not how much she weighed on a particular date.

Here! An intake sheet that Sherry Fox filled out when she first became a patient. Her handwriting is round and careful, like script written by one of the Littles.

NAME: Sherry Fox

BIRTH DATE: October 5, 1921

WEIGHT: 126 lbs.

Wow, so long ago! So, doing the math…she was twenty-eight when she had me. If she were still alive, she’d be forty-three years old.

ADDRESS: Lot 9, Salt Dock Road

That’s all I need. I put that page aside and look at the next one.

ROBERT R. MACINTYRE, M.D.
ST. JOSEPH'S HOSPITAL, PARRY SOUND, ONT.

A.B. cases:

Judith anderson
R. connor
Sherry Fox
P. Golia

Deborah Munro

Patty Nelson

Harriet Thomas

WHAT I TAKE WITH ME, FOLDED INTO MY UNDERPANTS

The page with Sherry Fox’s own writing, showing her age and weight and address.

The typewritten list of names that includes Sherry Fox.

On the main floor, I go out through the door and stand there getting drizzled on for one hundred seconds. I have about three minutes left of my break. I let my legs take me, running, along the sidewalk beside the hospital. I’m cuckoo. Where am I going? And what if the papers fall out of my undies? I turn around and race back, all of me wet and shivery. Not from cold, but from having the astounding new knowledge of my mother’s name. I race to the change room and zip the precious papers into my sweater pocket. I use a sleeve to dry off my arms and face. I race to my cart, wondering if everyone can see on my face that I am now in possession of the beginnings of an identity. For the rest of my shift I am the most vigorous cleaner that ever wielded a mop on the floor of St. Joseph’s Hospital.

THE LIST

After work, I wear my sweater out of the hospital, feeling as if the left pocket is pulsating or sending out flares. How much trouble would I be in if anyone knew that I’d stolen the papers?

The rain has stopped, leaving polka-dot puddles. I walk, stomping almost, away from St. Joe’s and Church Street, toward the harbor. I turn onto James Street and see an enormous iron bridge way overhead, with water bubbling through a dam below. The bridge is for trains, I realize, spying the rails from underneath. The water beyond is calm, divided by long jetties where dozens of boats are anchored, their tall masts like a forest of birch trees. The water gleams dark green below the clouded sky. I wonder if there are rules about looking at the boats, so I keep my distance. People can act funny when coloreds get too close, I’m finding out. A couple of seagulls dive for something just beyond the nearest dock, coming up empty time after time.

I glance around before I sit on a bench, but nobody seems to notice me. No finger-waving Mrs. Kowalski or angry policeman. I take the papers out of my pocket and smooth them flat over my leg to examine the typewritten list. It tells me nothing, except that Sherry Fox is among the names.

The other page has the name of the hospital, St. Joseph’s, at the top. An old-timey picture of the building makes it look grander than it really is.

I skip straight to the address and keep my finger there, repeating it in a murmur. “Lot 9, Salt Dock Road.”

Salt Dock Road. I pull out the map that Linette gave me. My hands are trembling. I press them against the slats of the bench for a second. Can it be this simple? I unfold the map. I find where I am—Turtle Cove Marina at the end of Bay Street. I look at the street names listed on one side, but I don’t find Salt Dock Road. Not simple after all. Maybe the stupid street isn’t even in this town. But it must be. Sherry Fox has written on the address line P.S. for Parry Sound.

“Excuse me?” I speak to a man sitting on the dock not far from where I am. His battered hat is decorated with fish-shaped pins. He’s slowly winding a spool of nearly invisible string, which I’m guessing is something to do with fishing.

“Eh?” he says.

“Have you heard of Salt Dock Road?” I move closer, holding out the map.

“More of a track.” The man points to a line on the edge of the town. “They never paved that part—it’s still dirt out that way toward the reservation.”

“The reservation.”

He peers at me. “Where you Native folks live,” he says. “Visiting, are you?”

“Yes,” I say. You Native folks? Does he think I’m an Indian? “Thank you.” I tuck the map back into my sweater pocket and return to the bench. I close my eyes, listening to the slap slap of water against the sides of the boats. It’s like a cat purring or leaves rustling, repetitive and soothing. Maybe I even doze for a minute, because suddenly my mouth is hanging open. I think, What if I start walking? What if I just go take a look right now at where Sherry Fox used to live?

Why not?

I get up and shake my foot for a few seconds because it has fallen asleep. It feels like a sploodgey blob of numb for the first several steps. I wave to the man on the jetty, as if he cares, and head the way he showed me, out of town along a trail that runs near the water.

HALF AN HOUR LATER, AFTER A WHOLE LOT MORE TREES

The path I’m on veers from the water’s edge and widens into a dirt road, but only two cars go past. They both slow down and the drivers take a good look at me but keep going. Nosey parkers. Just like on the way to town from the Benevolent Home—always someone watching.

Every so often there’s a rutted driveway going off between the trees, marked by mailboxes nailed to posts, painted with names and numbers. ROGERS #6, Martyn Family #6, and then BILL ‘N’ BARB A LOTTA FUN LOT 7.

It finally sinks in that the driveways lead to lots. Meaning that I’m nearly there. I tell myself not to bother getting excited, because what will I find? Whoever lives on Lot 9 now might not even know who Sherry Fox was. The house could have had two or three or seven owners since she died. I’m trotting though. My feet trying to get there ahead of my common sense.

What will be worse? Meeting a blank-faced someone who has no information? Or meeting a stranger who knows more than I do about my own self?

LOT 9

There are three mailboxes beside the driveway that leads to Lot 9. One of them says McPhee Clan, and the second is marked R.K. #9. And the last one says Fox.

Off the main road, the trees meet overhead, turning the air cool and dim. I pass a cabin that is shuttered tight, as if summer hasn’t begun here yet. Farther along, the drive divides. An arrow-shaped sign points right, painted with the name R. Kehler. On a stake in the ground at the top of the left fork is a wooden cutout in a fox shape.

I can see most of the house from where I am, though house is an exaggeration. It’s a trailer in the middle of a sun-dappled clearing. I’ve never seen a trailer before, but I know that’s what it is, sort of a blue cubicle on wheels, with a white stripe along the side and windows that reflect the sun in occasional bright flashes.

THE NEXT CONVERSATION WILL CHANGE MY LIFE

It occurs to me that I should make an effort at poise and posture, since I’m skulking in the shadows outside somebody’s front door.

Then the door opens and a boy steps out.

“Hey,” he calls. “Are you looking for someone?”

I nearly laugh. Am I looking for someone?

He hops down from the little platform in front of the door and walks toward me. He’s not scary the way Luke was, but my brain is going clickety-click, wondering if he’s going to yell because I’m trespassing on his property.

“Hey.” He’s close enough to say it quietly this time.

“Hey,” I say.

He’s skinny and taller than I am but not by much, right about my age. His hair is straight and black and glossy, the opposite of mine. He’s got cheekbones that stick out and a bony nose. His eyes are smiling through wire-rimmed glasses. It’s a nice face. But the main thing is that it’s a brown face. A warm brown, like maple fudge. The second colored boy I’ve met this week! Except he’s not a Negro or a Mexican, like Frankie. Maybe an Indian?

“Are you lost?” he says. “Nobody comes this way except if we know them.”

“I…I’m looking for someone named Sherry Fox,” I say. “I think she used to live here…and I was wondering if maybe…”

He looks over his shoulder toward the trailer house.

“My mom,” he says, tilting his head toward the open door. “She’s Sherry. What do you want her for?”

“Your mom?”

She’s supposed to be my mom.

But she’s also supposed to be dead.

“She’s alive?”

He laughs. “Last time I looked. A minute ago.”

“How old are you?” I say.

“Just turned sixteen,” he says and grins. “Three weeks ago.”

I stare at him, dizzy as heck, hoping that I look normal. How could we be born the same week and have the same mom? Are we twins?

I look at the trailer door. Sherry Fox is alive?

“Are you an Indian?” I know it sounds dumb. How would I like it? How’d you get so dark? Something Luke might say.

This boy makes a noise in his throat like, Huh? Or maybe, None of your business. But he nods. “Anishinaabe.”

Huh? “What’s your name?” I ask.

He narrows his eyes at me, finally getting suspicious. “Not to be rude,” he says, which is what Toni always says just before she’s really rude, “but who are you? And what are all these questions for? Why don’t you just come in and meet my mom, since you’re supposedly here looking for her?”

“Okay.”

Not feeling okay at all, I follow him into the trailer.

It’s cute inside, small and tidy. Like I just swallowed a shrinking pill and stepped into a dollhouse. Sherry Fox is sitting at the table. Her skin is the same color as her son’s, maybe a bit lighter. She doesn’t look right at me, more at my left shoulder. She shows no sign that she might know who I am.

Of course she doesn’t. I am not her child—the boy is. Why would she keep one baby and give the other one away? This boy and I are not twins. Plus, I have frizzy hair. Hers is straight, pulled back into a long braid, her face as still and blank as a cupboard door.

“Hello,” I say. “My name is Malou Gillis.”

Not Fox after all.

Sherry nods at me.

“This is my mom,” says the boy. “Sherry Fox, like you asked for. I’m Jimmy. Do you want something to drink? Lemonade? Or I could make tea, if you want something hot.”

His mother still hasn’t moved or said anything. She’s just watching.

“Lemonade, please.”

I had lemonade one other time, last year during the Canada Day picnic at the fairgrounds. All the orphans went. One of the booths had a huge glass urn filled with ice cubes and slices of lemon and sweet, tart juice. You turned a spigot and filled your cup for five cents.

“Sit down.” Jimmy doesn’t seem to think his mother’s silence is odd. He opens a tiny refrigerator set under the counter.

I squeeze onto the bench to face Sherry Fox at the table and smile at her, willing warmth into her eyes. I unzip my pocket, take out the bracelet and put it on the table. Her eyes leave my face to look at the bracelet, finally showing something: surprise. She picks it up, squints at the lettering and looks back at me.

“What’s that?” Jimmy puts my glass down.

His mother hands him the bracelet. I wrap my fingers around the cool glass. Every second feels five seconds long. I lift the glass and take a sip. I hadn’t noticed how dry my mouth was until the lemonade pours in like water around a thirsty plant.

Jimmy reads, “Baby Fox?” He looks at me. “Where did you get this?”

His mother’s face is asking the same question.

“Aren’t I Baby Fox?” he says.

His mother nods. Is she mute or something? Why hasn’t she said a single word?

“The only Baby Fox?” Jimmy asks what I most want to know.

Now she smiles, what I instantly know is a mother’s smile.

“The only one I ever met,” she says. Her voice is soft and low, like you’d expect from a person who doesn’t use it often. She makes room for her son to sit next to her. Both pairs of eyes turn my way, waiting for me to explain.

I TELL THEM MOST OF THE STORY

I start with the fire and the church ladies and the charity clothes. I explain about the Seven and how the Home was going to close anyway, about Mrs. Hazelton being ill and how she gave us all money and clues to where we came from. How the bracelet was my clue and it led me here. How Mrs. H. hoped that each of us would discover something about ourselves to propel us onward. But…but…

“My only clue turns out to be a mistake.” I better not cry. “Already the trail has fizzled to nothing.”

“Huh,” says Jimmy. “Mysterious.”

Sherry Fox had stopped looking at me a while ago. She is turning the bracelet over and over between her fingers.

“This is Jimmy’s,” she says. “It was lost in the hospital. It was around his little ankle and then it wasn’t. No one cared. They all knew who he was. The Indian baby.”

She glances back at me, eyes narrowed. She goes still for a second, as if something has occurred to her.

“Mom?” says Jimmy.

Sherry closes her eyes and shakes her head.

WHAT I LEAVE OUT

The part about stealing documents from the hospital, and the list of names and how I got her address. Luckily, nobody asks.

WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?

“We can’t help you,” says Sherry. “You’ve come to the wrong place to find answers.”

She leans her shoulder against her son’s, sealing the space between them, his red T-shirt and brown arm glued to her green blouse.

“Well, thanks anyway.” I leave the Baby Fox bracelet in Sherry’s hands and bang my way out the door, tripping off the little step. My eyes are hot with welling tears, but I manage to wait until I’m out of sight around the bend in the drive. I pause next to a prickly bush, letting myself cry and make noise, wishing I didn’t have such a long walk back to the place under my pillow.

“Wait!”

Jimmy is calling me.

I don’t want to turn around because my face is wet and puffy. He must have heard me snuffling like one of the Littles.

Footsteps and then a hand on my shoulder.

“Wait,” he says, softly like his mother.

I keep my head ducked, blinking.

“You left so fast.” He holds out the bracelet.

“You keep it,” I say. “It’s yours.”

“I don’t get what’s going on.” He hops from foot to foot as if it’s cold, but maybe he’s just nervous.

“Me neither,” I mumble. “I’m sorry. You’ve been really nice. I’m just…I’m just…”

Again the world slows. A bird flits onto a branch overhead, sending a leaf to the ground.

“You thought you might find your mother today,” he says. “Or something that would lead to her. Right?”

He has spoken the truth so exactly that I nod, still struggling to swallow my disappointment. We both go so quiet that I’m sure I can hear squirrels chewing.

“You want to sit down?” he says. “Or keep moving?”

“It just doesn’t make sense.” I start to walk, and he sticks right by me. “Where did that bracelet come from? Mrs. Hazelton—she was the matron at the Home—she’s the one who held on to our histories. She had that bracelet for sixteen years, from when I was born.”

“From when I was born,” says Jimmy.

“It’s weird, all right.”

We walk along, quiet for a bit, but it’s not awkward or scary. It’s like we’re friends already, because he understands what I’m looking for.

“Where’s your dad?” As soon as I say it, I know it’s the wrong thing to ask.

“Not here,” says Jimmy.

Shoot, I’ve stuck a thorn in.

“It’s okay.” He taps my arm, a sudden connection. “He left a long time ago. There’s not enough room in that trailer for all of us anyhow.”

He sounds…is it embarrassed? Maybe he’s been teased his whole life for living outside the town in a tin can, the way we were teased for our orphan smocks. Anything that makes a person a fraction odd, I think. Like being the only brown face.

“Your trailer is like the modern-day version of a woodsman’s hut,” I say. “You know? From a fairy tale? There’s always a kindly woodsman to help the frightened damsel.”

He looks at me sideways. “You don’t seem like much of a damsel,” he says. “No offense. But you’re more the hero on horseback, galloping over mountains to pursue your quest.”

“Ha. Really? I wouldn’t even know how to put on the saddle.”

We walk along some more. I’m hungry, thinking about maybe ordering another grilled cheese sandwich for supper. We come to the part of the road where we can see the water. The sun is softer now, not making the water sparkle like before.

“Do you know how to swim?” I ask him.

“Sure,” he says. “Don’t you? The water’s still cold enough to freeze your—” He stops. “Cold,” he says. “But in another week or two, by the end of school, it’s usually ready.”

The bay looks deep and chilly, like there could be a sea monster in there.

“You don’t have to come all the way,” I say. “Your mom will wonder.”

“Nah.” But he looks over his shoulder.

“Thing is,” he says, “if we’re logical, somebody really wanted you to think that you were Baby Fox, enough to steal an ID bracelet from a newborn kid. You see that?”

“Or maybe,” I say, “it was more like it didn’t matter whose bracelet I got, as long as it wasn’t really mine. To stop me from ever knowing who I was. Who I am.” I unzip my pocket. “There’s something else.”

I pull out the list of names and hand it over. He reads it in three seconds.

“What is this? What’s my mom’s name doing on here?”

“I found it.” I tell him where. I tell him more than what I told inside the trailer.

“I know one of these names,” he says. “Aside from my mother’s.”

My heart jumps. “Really?”

He points. “Deborah Munro. She’s the mother of a kid in my class. Pete Munro. She has two kids, actually. Twins.”

WE MAKE A PLAN FOR TOMORROW

Jimmy tells me where to find the high school on Isabella Street, only a couple of blocks from St. Joe’s. My shift ends at two thirty, so there’s plenty of time for me to walk over and meet his friends, Pete and Lucy Munro.

He offers to come all the way back to town, but I need to breathe alone.

“I’m fine.” Actually, I am more confused than ever.

He lets me go. I wave until he’s a blur on the road.