Unending Nora

Chapter 5

Julie Shigekuni 41 Chapter 5 Practical considerations kept Nora from returning to her apartment for three days following Caroline’s wedding. She blamed the sweet coconut frosting for turning a tooth bad, which led to a root canal. And as if the expense were not a big enough worry, the pain in her mouth was excruciating. It was her mother, however, who convinced her to stay. Yukari said it would be more convenient that way because she’d be the one having to drive Nora to the dentist’s office; she knew Nora wouldn’t argue, but she couldn’t have known how frightening Nora’s visit would prove to be. The room she grew up in had been changed into her father’s study and bore no trace of her ever having lived there. Her father’s huge oak desk occupied the space where her bed had been; from across the room on the fold away couch, it reminded her of a tombstone. A terrible thing, she woke up thinking, not even to be dead. Yukari had not consulted her before giving away bedroom furniture—white wicker dresser, hutch, bookcase, and headboard —which she still remembered fondly. She imagined her things decorating the room of some pretty little girl and wondered if the secret drawer where she had hidden away her most personal belongings had ever been discovered. There was the Mickey watch stolen from Diana Plunket in the first grade, an assortment of baseball cards from John Stalinger, a black rock, a red plastic hair band, a fake gold ring, a retainer, a pair of gym socks—nothing Unending Nora 42 of tremendous value to its owner, though worthy of being missed by another and coveted by her. The Mickey watch was the first item she ever stole. She remembered the day Diana came to school wearing it, so proud of Mickey’s moving hands even though in the first grade she still could not tell time. She didn’t deserve it, yet there she was at recess with her friends around her admiring it. Of course no one had noticed Nora’s new Mickey watch when she’d worn it several months before Diana got hers, the day after her birthday. That day she’d made sure to raise her left arm—the one with the watch—in class, and she’d walked with her arms outstretched pretending she had wings. After school on her walk home, she’d taken it off and smashed it with the heel of her shoe, taking the flimsy Mickey from the wreckage of sharp glass and shiny sprockets , and pulling apart his paper ears, his smiling face, his too big feet and hands. The morning Diana appeared at school wearing in fact what should have been hers, bragging and showing it off, there was nothing to be done but to endure her humiliation because Diana did not take the watch off even once. But the next week, when the class was given a painting assignment and Diana had red in her hair and green and blue up to her elbows, she took the watch off her wrist and placed it in her desk, giving Nora the only opportunity she needed. A twang of pity shot through her when Diana screamed and cried, along with a thrill. The teacher suspected Derek Swanson. Not Nora. That night, when she put the watch on in her room, she felt deeply satisfied that what had been Diana’s favorite possession belonged once again to her. The next day she wore the watch to school beneath a long-sleeve blouse. She wore it the next day and the day and week after that feeling privileged all the while, and then occasionally, in the years to come, she stole other things. Stealing fostered her sense of justice, though she noticed as the years followed each small victory how nothing kept its value for long. Nora did not need to join her parents for dinner or wander through the house to hear the familiar sounds of home, her father’s Julie Shigekuni 43 after dinner belch, chairs scooting back from the table, and plates clattering in the sink. When her father entered his study, he did so without knocking. Perhaps he believed she was asleep, or else he’d forgotten she was there. As she lay across the room watching him from behind, she could see...