Oona Out of Order Page 4

  3.  Avoid publicity. This applies to every leap. You’re a philanthropist, but the last thing you need is people sniffing around, so don’t draw too much attention to yourself (or your money). Kenzie helps you find good causes and can show you how to make donations while keeping a low profile.

  4.  Try to avoid having your picture taken, so you won’t know what you look like year to year (again, no spoilers). Easier said than done these days, but do your best. If you can’t avoid it, don’t keep any photos taken after 1982. The one in your study from Dale’s party is an exception.

  Oona’s stop was announced before she could read the rest. She stuffed the letter back in her pocket and hurried out of the station. As she walked, she refused to button her coat against the brutal wind, refused to acknowledge that this was really her coat. That this was really her life. With each step, threads of confusion wove into a thick coil of determination.

  As soon as I find Dale, we’ll make sense of this together.

  This Bensonhurst wasn’t too different from the version she remembered. Some new storefronts—a bagel shop, a Laundromat, a nail salon—but as she turned off Bay Parkway, the sand- and earth-colored brick apartment buildings and two-family houses looked the same. She was infused with desperate optimism as she hurried up Dale’s street.

  It was the same house. Mostly.

  Same house, different trimmings. The tiny front yard, once bearing rosebushes, had been replaced with a single blocky hedge. The black wrought-iron stair railings now looked as if they were made of silver pipe. And the front door, formerly crimson, had been painted brown.

  No lights on inside, but Oona still rang the bell, lightly at first, then with more insistence.

  The door swung open.

  A short Asian man with rumpled gray hair squinted at her. “Who are you? Why are you here?”

  Oona’s legs grew wobbly and she put a hand on the front of the house for support. “I’m looking for Dale D’Amico.”

  “Nobody here by that name. You have the wrong house.”

  She pressed her palm into the brick’s sharp grain, took in staccato breaths. “Do you know when the D’Amicos moved out? Where I could find them?”

  “I’ve never heard of them. I’ve been living here ten years. Please go away now.” He closed the door in her face.

  An ambulance wailed in the distance as Oona collapsed on the top step, wheezing. Shallow breaths wouldn’t satisfy her hungry lungs. The wind picked up, rattled through skeletal branches of nearby trees, yet she still couldn’t take in enough air.

  Finish reading the letter.

  5.  Trust Kenzie. He may be a stranger to you now, but I’ve known him for years. He’s more than your personal assistant, he’s a loyal confidante. Younger than you, but wiser in many ways, and just plain fun to be around. He’ll help more than you can imagine.

  6.  Don’t trust technology. Think of it as your fair-weather friend. Learn to use computers, smartphones, and tablets (Kenzie will teach you). You can find a vast amount of information on the Internet about anything, anyone. It’s awesome, but don’t get carried away. Also, try to avoid social media. Don’t get too attached to these modern conveniences, because next year you might have to live without them.

  Those are the main things you need to know for now except … Dale.

  This is the hardest part. Even after all these years, it hurts to think about. Dale had a stroke, young. He’s … I’m so sorry, but he’s gone. Please don’t look up his obituary. In fact, it’s better if you don’t look up information on anyone you know.

  But you still have Mom. You’ll see her tomorrow. She’s fine, healthy. Has lots of boyfriends, takes lots of vacations. Hard to keep up with sometimes. She’s living her best life. That’s all she wants for you, too.

  I’ll stop here. Take some time to grieve and process but don’t drown in the depression. You’ll get through this. Trust me, it’s me. Just take it one year at a time.

  Love,

  Me

  P.S. You’re probably wondering about the tattoo. All in good time …

  Oona’s fingers cramped from holding the letter so tightly. She wanted to tear it up and throw the pieces into the wind. Maybe that would make it less real. Instead, she refolded the letter and returned it to the envelope.

  None of this is happening.

  A youngish couple laughed as they climbed the steps to the house next door. “Happy New Year,” they called out to her before going inside.

  Fuck the New Year.

  Fuck everything.

  A black sedan pulled up and its driver gave two short taps on the horn. Kenzie.

  Oona took leaden steps down to the car. Her bones felt like struck tuning forks. How was it possible to feel so heavy, yet so hollow?

  “Thank god,” he said once she was in the passenger seat. “You must be frozen solid. No hat, no gloves, coat all unbuttoned.” He turned up the heat.

  “I’m not cold at all,” Oona said.

  “What’s that? I can’t hear you over your chattering teeth.”

  As Kenzie drove, he kept looking over at her but said nothing. Not until he parked the car. “Are you all right? Dumb question. Of course you’re not all right. What can I do?”

  “Teach me about the Internet. And social media.” Fuck 2014 Oona, too.

  “Now?” Kenzie’s hands fluttered like small panicked birds. “It’s late and—”

  “Right now. Please.”

  4

  “You sure you don’t want to start this in the morning?” Kenzie punched in the code to disable the security alarm.

  “Yeah. I’m sorry to make you work so late, and on a holiday.” Warm lily-scented air greeted Oona as she crossed the threshold.

  “No sorries necessary. This isn’t a nine-to-five gig. I’m around whenever you need me. It’s not about that, more that this is a lot—”

  “I live in this huge house all by myself?” Her boots clicked against black-and-white-checked marble as she circled the foyer in a daze.

  “Um … right now, yeah. I mean, I’m here a lot—you have a sweet home office setup—and you fixed up one of the guest bedrooms for me to stay over whenever—you’re a cool boss like that—but I have my own place in Cobble Hill.” He followed her as she wandered down the hall toward the kitchen. “It’s only a couple miles away, so if you wanted to take the rest of the night to, you know, absorb everything, I could come back first thing, bring you a soy latte…”

  “No thanks. Whatever that is, it sounds gross. Maybe some coffee, though? If people still drink coffee in … wow.” She entered the kitchen, which managed to be both lavish and cozy. Mint-green cabinets were complemented by chrome appliances and monochromatic granite counters. A breakfast bar and butcher-block island sectioned off the kitchen from the dining area.

  “I know, right? Martha Stewart would cut a bitch for a kitchen like this … which is a compliment. Let me make the coffee.”

  “We had coffee makers back in the eighties, you know. It’s this one, right?”

  “Right, but—”

  “Kenzie, I didn’t grow up in the Middle Ages. If you could just show me where the coffee and filters are…” The annoyance in her voice faded as she scrutinized the sleek appliance’s unfamiliar buttons. “And where they go…”

  “It doesn’t take filters, it takes K-Cups. They’re like individual coffee pods.” At her bewildered stare, he offered a calm smile. “It’s easy, but how about you let me do it tonight so we can focus on Internet stuff? Coffee 101 can wait.”

  “Sure.” Shrugging, she dropped her bag on a counter and sat at the kitchen island, concentrating on the granite’s speckled pattern to avoid the blurred jumble of her thoughts.

  After he made them coffee, Kenzie laid out three slim rectangular devices before her. “Phone. Tablet. Laptop.”

  Pointing at the phone, she said, “Well, at least I know what that is. Though it’s a lot different from the ones I used.”

  “It’s also a
computer. They’re all computers. You ever use one of those?”

  She shook her head.

  “Let’s focus on the laptop for now.” He flipped open the MacBook and began to type.

  “How can it work if it isn’t plugged in?”

  “Wireless technology. It’s a beautiful thing.” With a flourish, he turned the computer toward Oona. On the screen was a video of a tabby cat in a blue satin shirt playing the keyboard. “Behold, the Internet…”

  After a quick and dirty primer on the World Wide Web, he let her browse, but she kept accidentally closing out of windows and clicking on random hyperlinks. Frustration mounted on both sides.

  “For now, I think it’s gonna be easier if you just tell me what you’re looking for and let me search for you,” Kenzie said.

  “Let’s start with Dale. I want to know when he died. And how.” Staccato clicks as Oona drummed her nails against granite.

  “Didn’t your letter mention that?”

  “The how, yeah, but I don’t believe it. Young people don’t die of strokes.”

  “I don’t think 2014 You would’ve lied about that.” His fingers edged closer to hers, but she pulled back her hand.

  “I want to know for sure. And I want the exact date of his death.” The tone was meant to be stern, but her voice cracked with the threat of tears.

  “Okay. I’ll look him up. But even if I find the obituary, it may not mention the cause of death.”

  It didn’t, but it did have his date of death: February 27, 1984.

  “He was only twenty,” Oona whispered, an ache in her throat. “He would’ve been someone great, but he never got to be … anything.” She wiped at her wet face.

  Kenzie exhaled audibly and slid over a box of Kleenex. “I’m so sorry. This is why you weren’t supposed to—”

  “I don’t care what I’m supposed to do. 2014 Oona doesn’t rule my life, I do. And I want to know what happened to everyone. All my friends.”

  “Then let me make us more coffee.”

  Once they were armed with refills, Kenzie took his place at the computer with a resigned hunch. “Who’s next?”

  “Pamela Lipscombe.”

  Her childhood best friend went on to Harvard Law School, worked as an assistant district attorney in New York, and ended up a federal judge.

  “I always knew Pam would make it big. Look at this—she was even short-listed for the Supreme Court in 2010. And her daughter’s an overachiever, too, ranked one of the top twenty chess players in the world.” Somewhat bolstered by her friend’s success, Oona nodded at the screen. “Let’s look up Wayne Sumpter.”

  The former Early Dawning bassist now lived in Baltimore, owned a private security company, was married to a petite redhead, and had two grown sons.

  “How is all this personal stuff so easy to find?” she asked.

  “Believe it or not, people post a lot of it themselves. Social media is … complicated. It’s like people live their private lives in public now.”

  Oona tilted her head at the Facebook photo of Wayne on the beach with his family. “So ordinary people act like they’re famous?”

  “And many of them actually become famous for nothing. Don’t get me started on celebrity culture. Who’s next?”

  “Corey Balcerak.”

  Early Dawning’s former drummer was twice divorced (no kids), ended up in real estate, and was in the middle of serving an eight-year sentence in a federal prison for embezzlement.

  “Oh my god.” Horrified, she leaned in to get a closer look at the screen. “That can’t be him.” But the orange jumpsuit he wore in the news photo was eerily similar to the one she’d just seen him in at the party. And even with smoothed-back hair and the addition of wire-rimmed glasses and a grooved forehead, the resemblance to his younger self was undeniable. “But he was a good guy. A sweet dork, even if he was kinda dumb. I can’t imagine him being a criminal.”

  “Considering he got caught, he’s obviously not a very smart one.”

  “I can’t even picture him working in an office. He was all about having crazy hair and playing the drums.” She saw a flash of his quirky grin, his sweat-drenched face after rehearsal. “Does that mean nothing came of the band? Look up Early Dawning opening up for Factory Twelve.”

  While the latter went on to massive success, there was nothing about the 1983 tour mentioning the former, nothing in any other search results.

  Does that mean I chose London? Did the band break up because of me?

  Oona rubbed her bleary eyes.

  “Maybe that’s enough for tonight,” Kenzie said.

  “No way. I might as well know about everyone else.”

  Eventually it all became a blur of careers, marriages, divorces, children, grandchildren, diseases, and, in a few more cases, early death. These people were supposed to be extraordinary, yet most ended up with mundane, marginally successful, or flat-out tragic lives. Aside from Pam, none of the others had accomplished anything truly great.

  “What about me?”

  Pages of results filled the screen; websites, blogs, and social media profiles from around the world. Melbourne’s Oona Lockhart was a tattooed vegan with three kids. Cleveland’s Oona Lockhart was in college and collected antique board games. Oslo’s Oona was biracial and photographed reindeer.

  “None of those are me,” she said. “I didn’t think my name was so common.”

  “It isn’t. I pay for special services to create fake Oona pages to flood the Internet. Makes it tougher to find the real you and easier to bury any info we can’t erase. We’re careful about you keeping a low profile. Sometimes you use aliases.”

  “And I’ve lost touch with all of them? All my friends?” She stared down at the laptop’s keyboard, the letters swimming before her. “I must be so lonely.”

  There was a loaded pause before Kenzie replied. “You form other friendships over the years. And you’ve gotten a lot closer with your mom. For what it’s worth, I’m here, too.”

  Right then it wasn’t worth much, but it was better than nothing. “Thank you for…” Her hand wove through the air, unable to pluck out the right words. “Just thank you. I think that’s enough for tonight. You can stay over if you want.” There was a tremor in her voice.

  “Of course. I’ll show you your room. We should try to get some rest.”

  “Yeah.” Though how could she sleep? The new information coursed through her head like cars on a busy freeway.

  But when Kenzie led her to a bedroom dominated by a chrome four-poster bed piled high with pillows, she slid beneath the covers, curled up into a ball, and dropped right off. It would’ve been a small solace to dream of Dale, her friends, that mirrored basement, to return to 1982 for even a little while—before she knew how the story ended for all of them—but her sleep was a deep inky void.

  * * *

  Oona woke up after a few hours, oddly rested. Early morning’s pale yellow light illuminated the room. She blinked at the celling.

  I need to tell NYU if I’m going to London.

  I need to tell the band if I’m going on tour.

  I need to decide—

  Except it was the wrong room. Instead of the popcorn ceiling of her teenage bedroom or the tangled wires suspended over Dale’s bed, above her was an ornate tin ceiling.

  Shit.

  There was nothing to decide. She was in 2015.

  Oona got out of bed, still in last night’s skirt and sweater, eager for a fresh set of clothes.

  Is this really my room?

  She took cautious steps around the bedroom, like a guest snooping in someone else’s house. Too nervous to touch anything—the nightstands resembling aluminum cubes; the glass shelves lined with silver vases, each containing a single violet calla lily; the iridescent lavender walls. A small display case in one corner of the room bore the only personal traces. It was filled with colorful knickknacks: a pyramid inside a snow globe, a porcelain Venetian mask, a model car made of crimson crystal, a Fabergé egg,
a glass igloo, dozens of other items. Gifts? Souvenirs? Above the display case was the anniversary wristwatch from Dale, mounted and framed.

  Why is it behind glass? I should be wearing it.

  A desire to break the glass rose within her, only to be extinguished as the answer came:

  It’s too precious.

  She turned away and refocused on finding a change of clothing, only there were no dressers or wardrobes in the minimalist room. There were three doors, though. One opened to a hallway and the rest of the house. The second revealed a bathroom done in creamy marble and mother-of-pearl. The third led to a humongous walk-in closet. It housed a wardrobe of classic styles in neutral colors for a range of body types, which made it easy to find something to fit her current size. At the far end was a rack containing more colorful pieces like vinyl catsuits, crinoline skirts, bustiers in metallic fabrics, and dresses made of improbable materials (Christmas lights, duct tape, plastic shingles…).

  Are these leftover Halloween costumes?

  As she changed into black jeans and a gray turtleneck, there was a knock on the bedroom door.

  “Be right there,” she called out.

  When she opened the door, her mouth fell open. Her mother stood before her, smiling a crooked, expectant smile. Oona had anticipated wrinkles, frailty, gray hair, a stooped posture, but instead found a woman in leather pants and a low-cut sweater, brimming with bawdy vitality.

  “How’s my little time traveler?” Madeleine hugged her, enveloping her in a cloud of dark curly hair, periwinkle mohair, and Chanel No. 5, the same perfume she’d worn her entire life.

  A stunned silence gripped Oona as she gawked at a woman who’d surely been trapped in amber. True, the decades had left some fingerprints on Madeleine: they added a plumpness to her petite form, framed the mouth and eyes with lines, made her neck tendons more prominent. But her face was pulled tight, copper-green eyes still bright, even if tilted at a new feline angle, eyebrows higher by a few degrees, lips fuller. And where Oona covered up her older body, Madeleine showed off ample cleavage, the loose skin of her bustline only faintly discernible.