Livia Lone

18-THEN

Livia moved in with the Lones. She disliked them intensely-Mrs. Lone especially. She sensed Mrs. Lone, with her pinched face and expensive-looking necklaces, resented Livia’s presence in her house. Or that she just resented Livia.

Livia had never seen such grandeur, except on the village television. The house had two floors-four, if you included the basement and the attic-with common areas downstairs and bedrooms above. The property was enormous, surrounded by sloping grounds and perfectly manicured green grass. It had columns, with the flag for America waving from one of them alongside a massive front porch. Inside was really inside-no breeze from without, no humidity, no sounds. Livia couldn’t even tell if it was raining except by looking through the windows. Some of the floors were made of smooth stone; others were wood, covered with soft rugs. There were paintings on the walls. There were machines to make the air inside dry and cool-too cool for Livia, who needed extra blankets to be comfortable at night. There was no shared village spigot or privy; instead, the house had five separate rooms for toilet and cleaning. No one took dirty clothes to the river here, or hung them on a rope in the sun-instead, they used cleaning and drying machines. There was a giant refrigerator for keeping food cold, and even for making ice. The ice was the one thing about the house Livia liked. She was fascinated by how cold it was, and hard, and how she could make it melt by swirling it in her mouth. But she learned not to take it if Mrs. Lone was in the kitchen, because Mrs. Lone would watch her as though expecting her to steal something.

But despite the house’s size and luxury, Livia didn’t like it. It wasn’t just that everything about it was so unfamiliar. There was something… not real about the place, something uncomfortable. Life in the village had been so communal, with all the people living and working and even sleeping side by side. But the Lones seemed not to spend much time together. Maybe it had been different when their children-four sons, Livia understood-had lived in the house. But the sons were grown now, and gone, and the Lones seemed to live separate lives. Mr. Lone left for work early in the morning, before Mrs. Lone rose. Mrs. Lone dressed in nice clothes and was out for much of the day-for what Livia didn’t know, since the Lones had a maid and a gardener and even a cook, so it wasn’t as though there were any chores to do. For the most part, Livia ate her dinners alone in the cavernous kitchen. Sometimes when Mr. Lone came home from work he and Mrs. Lone would eat together, but Livia rarely heard them talking. Other times, Mrs. Lone spent evenings at something she called her “bridge club.”

On her very first morning in the strange house, Livia was greeted by Nanu, who explained that Mr. Lone had hired her to teach Livia English. Livia had to learn quickly, Nanu told her, because there were only two months left in the summer, and then Livia would have to go to the junior high school in Llewellyn, where as a thirteen-year-old she would be enrolled in eighth grade. Livia was terrified of going to school in this strange place, but recognized she had to do what Mr. Lone told her. If he decided he didn’t want to keep her in his house, she didn’t know where else she would go.

Besides, learning English wasn’t a bad thing. Not being able to communicate, not being able to make anyone understand her, had been a horrible experience, and the feeling of it lingered. Livia didn’t want to be dependent on translators, or anyone else. She wouldn’t be helpless. She was in America now, and as daunting a prospect as that presented, it was also good. Because being in America, and speaking English, was how she would find Nason.

Mr. Lone had explained through Nanu that “Labee” was a strange name for Americans, and that he and Mrs. Lone wanted instead to call her Livia, an American name-the same way people called Nanu Nancy. Would that be all right?

Livia didn’t think Mrs. Lone wanted to call her anything at all, as she never said Livia’s name and in fact barely spoke to her, preferring a grudging nod or forced smile on those occasions when simply ignoring Livia wasn’t feasible. But regardless, Livia welcomed the change. Labee was her name. But “Livia” felt like someone else, like a shield or disguise, something behind which she could conceal her real self.

So Labee became Livia, and sat with Nanu every day at the polished wooden table in the Lones’ dining room, uneasy in the strange, cushioned chair, glancing suspiciously at the giant light hanging above them, a thing with arms like an octopus made of hundreds of little pieces of cut glass, what Nanu called a “chandelier,” their voices echoing off the room’s cream-colored walls. A maid would bring them lunch at noon. Nanu told Livia they should try to use only English even during their break, but Livia sensed the woman missed her other language, and sometimes she would relent while they ate. She told Livia her mother had been trafficked from Thailand to America, just as Livia had been, and that Nanu had been born here and was therefore automatically a citizen. Her mother was put to work cleaning big American houses like this one, and Nanu had helped, until she managed to get a better job, translating part time for the Thai Embassy in Washington. But Mr. Lone had paid her even more than what she made at the embassy to come to Llewellyn and tutor Livia, for which she was grateful. Mr. Lone was a powerful man, Nanu told her, and Livia was lucky he had taken an interest in her welfare.

After lunch, more women would come to the house, all pasty white Americans, each a teacher from a local school, whom Mr. Lone was paying to spend some of the summer tutoring Livia in math, science, and social studies. As the sun moved westward in the sky and the dining room gradually filled with its golden light, Livia learned about algebraic equations, and the characteristics of unicellular and multicellular life, and the origins of the American Revolution and Civil War. Math was her favorite because she needed so little English to understand it. For the other subjects, Nanu translated. There was a lot to learn and none of it was easy, but the feeling of being able to control something, the possibility of mastering it, was galvanizing for Livia, and she studied diligently even through dinner, even in bed. Eventually, she would become too tired to focus, and feel herself slipping in and out of wakefulness while she practiced her English drills with a tape recorder.

But no matter how tired she was, she never went to sleep without first kneeling in front of the window so she was facing the world outside, and whispering in Lahu as though Nason could actually hear her, “I love you, little bird. I will never forget. I will never stop looking. And one day I will find you.”

Every evening, when he returned to the house, Mr. Lone would stop by the dining room, his tie loosened and a drink in hand, and ask about Livia’s progress. Livia could tell from the smell that it was an alcohol drink, something she didn’t like because Skull Face and the other men had liked alcohol drinks, too. Nanu issued glowing reports, and in a matter of weeks, Livia was able to answer Mr. Lone’s questions directly. And every day, she asked him a question of her own: “Please, Mr. Lone, have you learned anything about my sister Nason?”

“I haven’t, Livia, but I promise I’m trying. And please, feel free to call me Fred.”

When he was gone, Livia asked Nanu to explain the phrase “feel free.” It seemed that while on the one hand, Mr. Lone was giving Livia the choice of what to call him, on the other he was also letting her know his own preferences. It also seemed that in America, using the first name implied familiarity, while the last name was generally more respectful but also more distant. Livia decided that as long as she had a choice, she would use Mr. Lone’s last name. She hadn’t liked him from the beginning. And she sometimes didn’t like the way she thought he was looking at her. It reminded her of Skull Face.

Livia welcomed the constant studying. The more she learned, the more in control she would be. And studying was the only thing that could put Nason out of her mind. Studying and sleeping-when she wasn’t doing one or the other, anxiety plagued her like an illness.

The only break in the routine came on Sunday mornings, when the Lones took Livia to church. For these occasions, she had a closet full of dresses they had provided, dresses she found ugly and hard to move in. But she did her best not to reveal her discomfort-not just with the clothes, but with the whole experience. She knew about Christianity-half the rich Yao tribe were Christians, having been converted by missionaries-but Lahu beliefs were less distinct, and more flexible. Livia understood there were spirits inhabiting the trees and rocks and rivers, and this made sense because trees and rocks and rivers were real. But an invisible being that was at once everywhere and yet nowhere? That seemed silly to her, and she was amazed people could believe it. When Mr. Lone asked, as he invariably did, whether she had been moved by the service or the sermon, she would tell him, oh yes, it was so beautiful, so profound-a word Nanu had taught her-even though in fact she could only understand snatches. The truth was, she resented that these people seemed to want her to share in their silly beliefs. Why did they even care?

On weekends, the Lones had visitors, sometimes many of them. Everyone wore nice clothes, and an extra maid and cook would hand out drinks and bite-sized food on trays. Mr. Lone would call Livia in and introduce her to people, telling them how smart Livia was, how fast she was learning English and adapting to her new life. Livia could understand only part of these conversations, but she didn’t need words to know these people were all afraid of Mr. Lone, or wanted something from him, or both, and that’s why they came to his house, not because they liked him or wanted to be real friends.

One of the people Mr. Lone introduced her to was named Garry Emmanuel, the chief of Llewellyn’s police department. “Chief Emmanuel knows about Nason,” Mr. Lone said. “He’s doing everything he can to find her.”

Nanu had told Livia that in America it was considered impolite not to look in someone’s eyes. For Lahu, it was different-looking in the eyes felt like staring, or aggression. So she looked at Chief Emmanuel. She didn’t like what she saw. Hair cut close and the color of metal; jowly cheeks and a white mustache; cold blue eyes and a smile she knew he thought would fool a dumb little girl like the one looking up at him and having trouble meeting his eyes.

“That’s right,” Chief Emmanuel said. “I’m making sure Llewellyn PD is using all our contacts and resources. We’ll find your sister, don’t you worry.”

Livia didn’t like his promise. Because how could he really know? She would have been more reassured if he had just said he would try.

But maybe she was being too suspicious. This place… everything was so different from her people and the village. Maybe she just didn’t understand. And what choice did she have but to try to be patient, and helpful, and to hope?

So she merely thanked Chief Emmanuel for his kindness and told him how important it was to her to find Nason.

The other visitors would make sorrowful faces and tell Livia she was so “brave” to have suffered her “ordeal,” how “blessed” she was that Mr. Lone had decided to raise her in his own house. Livia wanted to take their pity and fling it back in their faces. But she knew the role Mr. Lone wanted her to play, and she needed to please him. So she smiled politely and thanked the visitors for their concern, and told them, oh yes, she certainly was lucky, and the Lones were so generous, and Llewellyn was the most beautiful place she had ever seen.

But Llewellyn wasn’t beautiful. It was alien. And there was something… rotten about it, something she could sense in the way people watched Mr. Lone and interacted with him, something dark and somehow even shameful. It reminded her of a smell-the one that would come from under the hut when a small animal had tunneled into a hole there and died. Everything would look fine, but until the animal’s carcass was found and removed, there would be that smell.