Segment 11.10

Hallucinating again. The medication used to make her ears ring and sometimes caused the room to spin. There were other effects she was too modest to mention, even to her doctor. Now she thought she was hearing Lyndsey call to her from somewhere far away as she lay in her bed, as if he was trapped behind something.

She raised her head and listened for him. He was speaking as if to himself but Lyndsey never carried on that way. He was so quiet and thoughtful. The wicked medication made her think she heard him say, “How can I do this? Polly…I need to talk to you about something…no…I want you to know…that’s ridiculous. It sounds so phony…”

Polly lowered her head, certain she was in the grip of unreality. Lyndsey had never been unsure of himself at any time. His hand was always steady as he balanced his equations. Watching him in the classroom took her breath away. Because she understood little of what he wrote on the white board, she saw only elaborate designs and arcane symbols, flowing together in a complex abstract pattern, a dazzling Kandinsky swirling out of her husband’s talented hand.

“I can’t do this to her,” the phantasm sighed.

The bedroom door seemed to creak. More fantasy. The bed sank in around her as some weight seemed to depress its edges. The feeling of fingertips brushing her face intruded in a manner so realistic that she nearly opened her eyes in response.

“I’m glad you’re asleep,” the voice murmured. “I’m not ready for this conversation.”

The warmth of a body close at hand spread up and down her limbs. A hand closed across her cold fingers. Humid breath skimmed across her ear. Now it was too delicious not to risk a peek.

Polly opened her eyes. Lyndsey’s face was buried so deeply against her that she could barely glimpse him in the corner of her eye.

“Lyndsey,” she said. “You’re here. You’re safe. Don’t tell me what happened to you. I don’t need to know.”

“I think you should.”

“I disagree. Let me carry on in dignified ignorance until I fade away. If you really love me, you’ll do that for me. You’ll let me steep myself in memories of you as my handsome, noble prince and die a blissfully happy death.”

“After you do that…after you fade away…what do you expect me to…?”

Polly rubbed his hand. “It won’t matter a bit since I will be gone. I would hope you could find happiness but I would no longer be part of the story. It’s all up to you to keep writing it.”

“It can’t be. I don’t know how to spin a story. I have no lines without you. For all I know, I’m a figment of your imagination.”

Polly laughed and laid a kiss on his head. “My imagination could never be that colorful.”

“Thank you for dreaming me up anyway.”

Segment 11.9

The door fell open on one twist of the knob, unlocked. Monique pocketed her lock kit and swallowed her disappointment. She almost turned back, disgusted at being able to enter without a challenge. The home itself repulsed her. Someone had recreated the pages of a department store sale flyer. All about were cheaply made pressed board furnishings, generic paintings and posters, and lower-end electronic equipment from oddball companies. The air smelled of disinfectant. She was not surprised to find her fingertips could locate no dust.

A note on the dining room table informed her that “dinner is in the fridge” and the author did not intend to come home. In case the intended reader did not understand the seriousness, several exclamation points were there to advise.

Monique imagined the food that must await the reader. She drifted to the fridge, thinking of macaroni and cheese from a boxed mix with a side of meatloaf, green beans baked right in. The foil-topped platter, however, revealed a savory smelling salmon. A modest wine of local vintage chilled beside it. Such finery should not be wasted on the loose ends that plagued her employer’s empire.

She pulled the salmon and wine out and devoured them without ceremony or utensils, plucking at the fish with her fingers, gulping the wine from the bottle. She enjoyed her feast without fear or shame and finished by tossing the remains into the tidy garbage can with a bank-shot that made the bottle echo. She washed her hands and rubbed them with sanitizer.

A heavy car door slammed in the driveway. The footsteps that followed bored into the ground like hammers. The front door flew open, rattling the chintzy photos that lined the walls. A throaty voice howled, “Sugar!”

Monique shot a puzzled look at the sugar jar.

A metal crash resounded from the laundry and pantry area near the rear of the unit. The shouter continued, “This is it! I’m going to do what I should have done long ago!”

The front door whiffed back into place, put to final rest with another shove or kick.

“This time, I plan to kill you, woman!…What’s this?”

Monique leaned back against the sink, eyeing the fine selection of kitchen knives. A man charged past her and seized the note on the table. The rending of paper was punctuated by the flight of a chair that brought down the flimsy entertainment center with a mighty groan and crackle. Monique considered the tenderizing mallet. Poetic but slow. Less predictable than the butcher knife.

The man stomped over to the phone and ripped it away from the wall, hurling it towards the garage access door. It impacted the tiles at the threshold, showering bits of plastic and circuit board. Panting, he heaved himself into the doorway of the kitchen. His eyes went wide in the moment before a precise blow to his face threw him back into the dining room and out of his frenzy and all touch with perception.

Segment 11.8

The flash and thump of the heart monitor put Caleb’s mortality and fragility on the forefront every few seconds. The weight of this knowledge had become almost too much for Rebecca Issacson to bear. She longed to get away from that sound and yet found herself mesmerized. Her feet tapped with the rhythm.

Beside her, Imelda took in a gossipy magazine purporting to share some starlet’s supposedly simple secret for losing an unlikely number of pounds in an impossible timeframe. She twirled a strand of hair around one finger as she took in the strangely similar ‘before’ and ‘after’ photos. Becca wondered how her older sister could be so cool about their father wavering between life and death but stopped herself from asking, certain her sister would say something superior-toned and refuse to talk to her after that. Becca needed a listening ear more than she needed to make Immy pay for her attitude.

A nurse trotted into the room and unlocked the wheels on their father’s bed. Becca rose, arms crossed, and bleated, “Where is he going?”

“Surgery, child,” the nurse told her. An orderly stepped in to take charge of all the monitors and tubes that would go along, while the nurse removed some of the connections.

Immy dragged herself to her feet and said, “Come on, Becca. We’ll sit in the waiting room.”

“I want to be here when he comes back.”

“It’ll be a long time, honey,” the nurse advised. “Why don’t you go on down to the gift shop and get a change of scenery? Ask the charge nurse for a beeper so we can call you when the time is right. You can wander anywhere you want on the hospital grounds or even go for a walk in the neighborhood. I’m sure you won’t get out of range on foot.”

“I don’t want to go.”

Despite applying the strength of her will, Becca could not hold back against Immy’s guiding tug. It might have been the pinch her sister landed on her waist, causing her to yelp and lose her focus. She found herself walking down the hall with Immy pulling on her arm.

“Hey,” Becca asked. “Where’s Shauna Rae? She’s been gone forever.”

“She was on foot. Like the nurse said, you’re not going too far off the grounds like that, especially if you’re Shauna Rae. Her legs ache when she has to walk down the hall at home.”

“Little brat. It’s just like her to make us have to find her. She never thinks of anyone but herself.”

“She’s a kid. That’s what kids do.”

“I wish she’d never been born.”

Immy growled. “You don’t say stuff like that.”

“Like you haven’t thought it too.”

They stopped at the nurse’s desk to claim the beeper. “Hey,” Becca said. “Maybe since she’s our half-sister, we only have to look for her halfway.”

It had sounded so clever in her head, but nobody laughed.

Segment 11.7

One after the other, every pencil in the room scraped across its respective desk along the length of a t-square.

“Darn,” someone snarled.

Bobbi drifted to the side of the snarling student. His eyes remained trained on the paper where he shifted the head of the square around to bring it flush to the side for another try at the assignment.

“Don’t hold the T down so hard,” Bobbi advised. “That skews your rule.”

“Why do we have to do this?” the student asked, eyes still cast downward. “Nowadays, computers can do all this stuff for you. No one has to know how to draw a straight line.”

“Done right, design engages your hands and all your senses, especially your awareness of space. That’s what this lesson is about.”

“Ms. Kamil?” a voice called from the front of the room.

Bobbi faced the one who called her. The dean of arts leaned against an empty desk near the door. The dean called Bobbi again. “Ms. Kamil. I need a word with you.”

The walk to the dean’s office gave Bobbi ample opportunity to imagine the conversation to come. Perhaps the financial problems of the time meant a paring away of some staff. Maybe Polly had finally admitted her leave of absence was going to be permanent and it was time to discuss who could be the chair in her stead. Possibly someone had gotten wind of Lyndsey’s arrest and now the dean wished to wring information out in order to gauge the potential embarrassment to the school.

The dean’s hyper small talk did nothing to soothe Bobbi’s fears. She could hear the strain in the dean’s voice, sense the desperation involved in dredging up morsels of information to share. The false laugh that punctuated the rambling monologue only underlined the emptiness of the gesture.

“Here we are,” the dean announced, throwing the office door open.

As soon as they were enfolded inside with the door closed, the dean’s shoulders relaxed. “I have some news for you, Ms. Kamil. You’ve been chosen Wycliff Fellow for the coming school year.”

“What does that mean?”

“You get a stipend to pursue a creative project that will have a public product of some kind at its end. You must, of course, follow all the rules of the award. You will need to conduct periodic check-ins with the fellowship board of overseers. There are a few other directives outlined in the fine print.”

Bobbi accepted the thick packet notifying the school of her award. “How did I come to be considered for this? I never even applied for it.”

“Someone did. Frankly, I wouldn’t have thought you worthy but then it wasn’t my call, was it? Congratulations. I hope you can do us proud.”

Bobbi looked at the cover letter repeatedly on her way back to the studio. One look at her students slaving over their t-squares, though, persuaded her to tuck the packet away in her satchel and get back to work.

Segment 11.6

The lunch call had gone out minutes ago and had been repeated. Now the steaming bowls graced the table and there had been time for PePé to settle in his seat, say grace twice, and cross himself. Angel watched from across the table, his chin resting against his interlaced fingers.

“Shall I go call her again?” PePé asked.

Angel shook his head. Upstairs, the bathroom door slammed again. He raised himself to his feet and trudged to the base of the stairs.

“Saffron?” he called. “Are you coming?”

The bathroom door slammed. Saffron called to him, “Start without me. I’m not quite ready.”

“We did start. We want to know if you’re coming.”

“I’ll come…at some point. Just start eating. You have to get back to school.”

Angel started back to the kitchen. He spun on his heels and returned to the stairs. “Are you okay, Saffron?”

Silence and then, “Yes, yes. Of course.”

Angel returned to the kitchen and began scooping food onto his plate. PePé tucked a napkin in the collar of his shirt and asked, “Is Florecita coming after all or not?”

“She says to go ahead without her.”

Saffron pulled the bathroom door shut and turned off the light. The corner of the tub, the innermost point of the house, felt safest. She wedged herself into that space and crossed her arms. A few minutes more should make her strong enough to go out into the exposed space of the kitchen, past the patio doors, right in view of the spot where the strange man had gripped her and had sworn her to secrecy on the life of her family. After all, he wasn’t there anymore and her husband and his father were there to protect her. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. Only a few seconds passed before she scrambled out of the tub and burst out of the bathroom, slamming the door behind her. This time was the one.

Angel consulted his watch. “I’ll help you wash the dishes, Papa. I have time.”

The bathroom door slammed again.

“What about Florecita?” PePé asked, taking his second helping of the savory but all too familiar leftovers.

Angel sighed. “We need to let her be the way she needs to be. You know how this works. You and Mamma had many children between you. A woman about to have a baby has a great burden to master.”

“You are right, hijo. I have a great deal of experience this way. So, heed my advice. Your Saffron carries more than the usual burden. She needs more than the usual help.”

“How do I know you are not just saying this because in your heart you never really liked my wife, because she is not enough like us?”

The bathroom door slammed. PePé pointed upwards and said, “Because of that, Angel…the evidence of your own ears and eyes…and the knowing from your heart.”

Angel nodded and turned towards the stairs once again.

Segment 11.5

It all smelled so appetizing…sizzling ground beef stewing in a tortilla, softening shreds of cheddar and soaking in chunky salsa. The burrito could barely fit in two hands.

“You want one,” Sam predicted.

“No,” Dinah grumbled, turning her attention to the opposite side of the squad car. “My stomach is blitzed. You took my appetite away with all that gobbling and slurping.”

“How about some baking soda?”

“That’s not funny.”

“Quit sulking, partner. You didn’t know. You did the right thing arresting that guy.”

“Who carries baking soda around in their pockets? Who? And who sneaks around with it like it’s high-grade snort?”

“And then goes running down the street like a wild man and won’t stop for an officer…good question. Maybe we keep an eye on the good professor.”

Dinah straightened and turned her widening eyes back to her partner. Sam pulled the mangled burrito away from his mouth and settled it back on the bag from the street vendor.

“What?” Sam asked, wiping his hands on the back of his pants.

“Of course. Who do we know who bakes all the time? Mrs. Garland. She kept pushing her caramelized cookies on us. And what makes a cookie fail to rise?”

“Lack of baking powder?”

“Don’t be silly.”

“Trust me. I know my food.”

“You know your eating, yes, but leave the deduction to me. There’s more than meets the eye about that old woman.”

“Speaking of food, I have to say, her fridge looks grim. She needs to hire that guy who delivers groceries out there, the one whose flyers are all up and down the street.”

“I want to talk to him. You need a permit for those things.”

Seeing that his partner had fallen into a brooding silence, Sam busied himself with wolfing down the remains of the burrito. He didn’t see her squint to keep up with Lyndsey Templeton as he jogged towards his home and didn’t hear her mutter, “And, yes, I’m watching you too.”

Segment 11.4

The smile just fought its way back onto her face. Even when she tamped it down, her eyes lit up. “Guess what?” Sugar squeaked. “I got a job.”

Bertie answered her with a hearty burp, excused himself, and said, “On the way to the ladies’ room? How much of a genius are you? Way to go.”

The fist he extended across the table came in slow motion and stopped, hovering expectantly in the middle. Sugar touched one knuckle to his and drank in his warm smile. He wasn’t even trying, she could see. He thought nothing of words of encouragement and a fist that didn’t come full speed with intent to harm. For Sugar, they were strange and delicious.

A man in an apron brought a pen and paper. “Just hand it in on the way out. We’ll see you on Monday at 10:00 AM for training.”

The logo that marked everything in the restaurant appeared on the upper right corner of the paper beside the bolded words, “Application for Hire.” Sugar’s heart pounded when she saw the lines below. They wanted her address, phone number, and references. She sagged and set her chin against her hand.

“What is it?” Bertie asked.

“I can’t fill this out. I don’t have a home anymore.”

“What’s the job?”

“Just…cook’s helper.”

“Okay. We’ll put the address and phone of the first church we see in the phone book and then we’ll go there. We’ll keep going back for messages until we have a place to stay. Then you’ll change your address.”

Sugar’s doubt slid away when she saw the nod of his head. He was right. He knew what to do. She lifted the pen. Then again, here was another man telling her what to do and her following his instructions. She wrote an address in the blanks.

“What’s that?” Bertie asked.

“A friend’s address. An old lady who was kind to me.”

“That works.”

She skipped the phone number. They’d find that in the phonebook later. For “last name,” she wrote, “Daniels.” That was the truth and the old lady wouldn’t know her any other way. She’d be careful what she told her so Oscar wouldn’t come after her. For “first name,” she wrote, “India.”

“India,” Oscar repeated. “That for real?”

Sugar pulled out her driver’s license and held it up.

“Beats the heck out of ‘Sugar,’” Bertie declared. “Not to mention Jimmy.”

Sugar wrestled with the references. Maybe that Bobbi who lived next door with the old lady? Maybe the professor? He seemed like a decent guy. Maybe Angel, the school teacher across the way. He treated his wife so nicely, at least in public. Maybe it was only in public though.

“Jimmy’s my actual name,” Bertie said. “You’ve never asked me that, you know. I lost my driver’s license so I’ll have to deal with that later. I’m a wanted man anyway.”

“Jimmy,” Sugar muttered. “Sounds like a little boy’s name.”

“So it does. What do you think of ‘Albert?’”

Segment 11.3

Maybe it was the scent of the coconut oil or the glare of the sun, but more likely it was the sight of all that flesh barely contained by tiny strips of cloth going by the term “bathing suit” that caused Jamie to lose his focus. Petra restarted him from a dead stop several times on their search for Mr. Tobin.

“Save that for after your shift,” she snapped.

“But I’m always so tired. I get up at a ridiculous time in the morning just to go change a bunch of bed pans and spoon feed drooling old ladies.”

Jamie caught the look Petra slid down her nose at him. “Well, it’s not exactly glamorous…you have to admit,” he said.

“No. And you’re a trooper, Jamie, to put up with it when you could be working McBurger Monarch.”

“Got that right. I could be up to my armpits in fryer grease and dressed like the latest Disney sidekick. But no. I chose to work for you and I’m still here after most of the conscripts who came in with me went screaming down the street.”

Petra stalled and put her hands on her hips. She pointed at a little heap of ashes and rock lying at the foot of a modest cliff, away from the more crowded portion of the beach. A man knelt beside the fire pit, rocking his body and whimpering. Petra led Jamie to the man’s side.

“Mr. Tobin,” Petra said. “It’s time to go inside now.”

“They took it,” Mr. Tobin whined. “It’s gone.”

Jamie squatted and laid a hand on Mr. Tobin’s shoulder. “Maybe the tide took it out.”

Mr. Tobin shook his head. “It never reaches up here…My wedding ring.”

“Not yours,” Petra corrected. “A ring belonging to someone else, one of the patients in the basement ward. Remember being in the basement?”

“Of course. My wife gave me that ring for safe keeping, so I brought it here.”

“What did she have you bring today?” Jamie asked.

“Just asked me to check on the ring. Told me she’d be real good to me if I kept it safe.”

“Let’s go now, shall we?” Petra said. “Afternoon snack is coming. It’s pudding today.”

“I don’t want no pudding. I want my wife’s ring.”

Jamie slipped his hand under Mr. Tobin’s arm and pulled with no result. “Listen, I have a metal detector. I’ll come back after work and find it for you but you have to come back home with me and give a full description to the shift leader or she won’t let me go.”

Tobin stared at him. Jamie continued, “Really. I’m very good with that metal detector. I promise I’ll leave no stone unturned and I’ll give you a full report. I’ll even work with the police if I don’t find it. Let me take care of everything.”

“Say, who are you, kid?”

“Stand up and I’ll tell you.”

Tobin creaked into an upright position. “Well?”

“Just call me Saint Anthony.”

Segment 11.2

Something about the idea of those tattooed hands digging through the pockets of an expensive designer suit gave pause but it was too late. She had his jacket gripped in her colorful paws and her hand out with the ticket. Atticus froze, afraid to give up a chance to return the suit to his loving care but even more afraid to confess to the clerk his reason for not trusting her. Her eyes narrowed to mean little slits. He was bigger and could probably best her…but then she didn’t look like she’d fight fair. Atticus took the ticket and tucked it into his wallet.

“When did you say you’d be done?” he asked.

“Check back in two days. We’re a bit backed up. The vintage clothing store sent a bunch of things over and the boss says they’re a priority.”

Atticus lost her at “Check back.” It wasn’t only her uninspired, barely audible mumble. The sweep of her hand at a pile of swag introduced him to a man’s coat made of rich, glossy fur in a warm, attractive hue. The paisley lining and pewter chain-link buttons perfected the eccentric and striking presentation of the garment. No coat had ever sparked his imagination so completely.

“That mangy thing,” the clerk sighed. “They want some crazy amount for it like a thousand dollars. You couldn’t pay me that much to wear it.”

A face passed by the coat, floating through the window on the way to the door. Atticus stowed his wallet, completing the gesture just in time to confront the face head-on.

“Peter,” he said.

Peter let no expression cross his polished, lawyerly visage. He bowed in response and turned to the clerk. “I’m Peter Goodkind.” He offered a card emblazoned with his name. “Madame Sackett has asked me to come make myself familiar with this property, as she would like my assistance negotiating with her neighbors.”

“Negotiating?” the clerk scoffed. “Madame never negotiated anything in her life. If you haven’t figured this out yet, let me clue you in. The way it works with Madame is she tells you and you do it.”

“As you say, then. That makes us both her servants. Please allow me to have a look.” He pulled a stapled document filled with photos and diagrams from his briefcase.

“Nice seeing you again, Peter,” Atticus said.

“Likewise.”

“True that you plan to move into the Court?”

“Perhaps.” Peter excused himself for the staff area behind the counter, barging in through a door.

The clerk chuckled. “If he goes to live in the Court, he’ll be under Madame’s thumb 24/7. Glad it’s not me.”

Segment 11.1

No numbers appeared on the machine, even though it had been fed multiple quarters. Shauna Rae loosed a whining gasp and stamped her foot. The thoughtless machine deprived her of the only thing that would make her feel better, a package of her favorite chocolate cookies. She turned to appeal to the clerk at the snack bar and caught the snap of the clerk’s head, a willful act of avoidance.

Shauna Rae fought back tears. There had been enough crying. There had been that embarrassing scene in which she had thrown herself across her Dad’s body, tugging at the tubes and wires. That nasty nurse shouted at her and demanded her half-sisters remove her. Becca seemed all too happy to grab her in response, digging her nails into her arm. Immy had told Shauna Rae she had to “be brave for Dad.”

Looking at the sagging face of Candy Grenholm, Shauna Rae had known those were her words and it stung to think everything was shifted. That special place in Candy’s favor that made Shauna Rae better than Immy and Becca no longer belonged to her. No one corrected Shauna Rae when she wailed that it was “all my fault.” They just stared at her.

Maybe they actually did think it was her fault. Maybe it actually was. She wasn’t there when Dad got in the car for work. She wasn’t with Candy on the other end of the phone hearing the crunch of the metal. She didn’t sneak off with the car like Becca did but, then, she knew about it and never told. Maybe Dad wouldn’t have been hurt and Becca would be grounded like she deserved if Shauna Rae had done the right thing.

Shauna Rae considered the candy machine and rejected giving it another chance to ruin what was left of her day. She turned and drifted towards the gift shop and the display of candy she’d noticed there. Of all things to think about on her way to see her Dad on the edge of death. Maybe she was a bad person after all and that was the problem. Maybe her overall badness just made bad things happen.

The snick of the front door opening for a family group caught Shauna Rae’s attention. Their faces were all turned to the hall before them as if they could see down into the hospital, to where their loved one lay. Their eyes never moved as they spoke. Outside, in their wake, a man stopped after waving them on and pulled out a cigarette, squinting in the sun. Shauna Rae felt just as left behind as he seemed to be, banished to the outside. She veered out the door and down along the sidewalk. The faster she moved, the more certain she felt that this was best for everyone. She had to move her badness away to where it couldn’t hurt Dad anymore.