I Went Down (NaNoWriMo Read-Along)

14 Emmy Jane

“Do you have brothers and sisters?” she asked Luessa.

“Five.” Luessa turned in front of the mirror, examining her hair. “Do you think it’s the same on both sides?”

Emmy Jane slid another bobby pin into Luessa’s hair.  “Do you miss them?”

“I’ll probably never see them again.” She spun around on the chair to face Emmy Jane. The pin curls framed her face beautifully. Other times she wore it long and straight, or piled on top of her head. Her hair was willing to transform into different shapes. Emmy Jane’s hair, despite a vast number of bobby pins and the application of a straightening iron, remained a stubborn cloud of curls around her head. “Are you missing your family?” Luessa asked.

“A little.” Ever since Russel Blake had turned up at Minnie’s, thoughts of Ibai—of home—had crowded into her mind. When she went into the kitchen, she wondered if her mother was missing her help in the farmhouse kitchen at home. When she helped Luessa pin up her hair, she thought about Elodie, her closest sister. “I was thinking about writing a letter to one of my sisters.”

“Would she tell your parents?”

“I don’t think so.” She and Elodie had shared many secrets in the bed they slept in together until two older sisters had married away and left a little free space in the house. “She didn’t give me away when I was planning to leave.” Just begged to come along. “I should have written to her before.”

“My father could never think of anything worse than the Mouth and my mother just goes along with what he says,” she said. “One of my brothers went to join a group trying to destroy the railroads and he’s a hero to them for fighting against the Pels. And here I am in the Mouth, singing and and dancing for Pels. My family will never speak to me again.”

Emmy Jane looked into her friend’s sad eyes. “Never is a long time, that’s what my mother always said.”

“Maybe, but you never met my father.” Luessa clasped her hands around Emmy Jane’s. “If you miss them and you can send a letter, then you should. You can tell them that you’re practically a leading lady, and there’s no reason for them to drag you home.”

Emmy Jane gave Luessa’s fingers a friendly squeeze. “They couldn’t drag me home,” she said. “I wouldn’t go. And they couldn’t afford to come and fetch me, anyway.”

“I have some paper,” Luessa said. “You can have it. I haven’t got anyone to write to.”

Emmy Jane took the paper to the parlor and sat at a small writing table in the corner. Contessa Marietta was at the piano again. She had been in better spirits lately and was actually playing a song rather than simply lying on the keys.

“What are you doing?” she asked when Emmy Jane had crumpled up a third sheet of paper.

“Writing a letter. Or trying to.”

“Don’t bother,” Marietta said. “He’s not worth it. None of them are.”

“It’s not to a he,” Emmy Jane said. “It’s to my sister.”

Contessa Marietta returned to her song and Emmy Jane bent her head over the paper again. A few minutes later Marietta lifted her hands from the keys and spoke again. “Is she coming here?”

“Passage downriver is expensive,” Emmy Jane said. She’d only just managed to buy the ticket with money she’d won singing at the county fair—money that should have been her dowry.

“You could send her money,” Marietta said. “There will be a place here soon; I’m leaving.”

“Where are you going?”

“To the Wave Theater. They’re going to open a new show. It’s called The Mermaid and the Seven Silver Spoons, and I’m going to be the mermaid’s sister.”

“Congratulations,” Emmy Jane said.

“Thank you.” Contessa Marietta began to play again and now the music seemed to be full of chord progressions that flowed like water from her fingers.

Emmy Jane began the letter to Elodie over again for the fifth time. There were only a few sheets of paper left; there wasn’t much room to change her mind again about what to say.

Dearest Elodie,

I’m sorry a hundred times that I didn’t write you before. But after the trip down the river, I didn’t want to write until I knew I was settled. And I am settled now.

On the boat, I met a Mrs. Gage who recommended a particular nightclub to me where her cousin had had a place in the band. Once I found it, they gave me a place in the chorus and now I sing every night for many people. Most of the chorus is from the Plains and most of the audience is from Pelago. I have hardly seen a single face from Ibai since I arrived here.

That’s not to say that I haven’t seen anyone familiar, though, because I met Lily Lilt! We were both buying perfume at the same shop and she was so very kind to me. Someday soon I will sing with her, but for now I am learning a lot at the nightclub. It’s not like singing at the fair.

The band is much better, and the songs we sing here are very different. I’ll teach them to you sometime.

Please don’t tell Mother and Father where I am, but if they are worrying, tell them that I am safe. I spent all the prize money to get here, but I am getting a salary for singing in the chorus and I will save up until I can send your portion back to you.

I am sending this letter to you with one of the only Ibaians I have met in Delta Mouth, a man by the name of Russell Blake. He recognized me from singing at the county fair and told me that his brother was sweet on Melina. If she comes home to visit, I hope you will find a way to ask her about the Blakes and what their place is and send me back word through the same messenger.

All my love,

Emmy Jane

When she had signed her name, Emmy Jane folded the letter neatly and collected the half-written sheets. “I hope you have a good run at the Wave,” she said to Marietta.