by E H Davis
“How do I do that?” he asked.
“Suggest she keep her meds in the kitchen so she doesn’t forget to take them with meals, and you keep count — she has a month’s supply.”
“You want me to spy on her?”
“Naw,” the psychiatrist laughed, “just keep her honest. She must stay hydrated but no alcohol. If she misses a dose she should take it right away. But,” she said, her voice rising emphatically, “you definitely don’t want her to go off her meds.”
“What would happen then?”
“She might become suicidal.”
“This is more than I signed on for.”
“Don’t worry, she’s been doing just fine. I tell you the worst, just in case. Remember, routine is important. Anyway, you can expect her around noon.”
________
Teddy, camping out in the mudroom, was keeping watch for his mother.
“What time is it, Dad?”
Jens peeked inside, at the clock over the stove.
“Almost noon.”
“Shouldn’t she be here by now?”
“Have you tried calling her?”
“She doesn’t have a cell phone anymore.”
“Why don’t you come in and we’ll play a game of backgammon while we’re waiting.”
Teddy hesitated.
“C’mon. You’re not going to miss her if you’re inside. She knows how to knock on the door.”
“I just don’t want her to have to drag her luggage up all by herself.”
“Suit yourself. Want your tablet to listen to music meanwhile?”
“Sure.”
Teddy checked the time every half hour — much to Jens’ annoyance, as he tried to plow through Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, reading it again after twenty years to find the prose tiresome and repetitive, and the dialogue cute. But it didn’t make Vivian arrive any sooner. When it was three o’clock and she still hadn’t arrived, Jens got a little worried. Teddy was beside himself.
“Think we should call the shelter, Dad, and make sure Mom left this morning?”
Jens called and was able to get her doctor, even though it was Saturday.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, “I forgot to call and tell you that she planned to pick up some clothes and personal items at her house in Lee. She’ll be along, I’m sure.”
Not long after, Jens heard Teddy let out a cry from the mudroom, where he was still decamped.
“She’s here, Mom’s here!”
Jens heard the car door open, the excited exchange of voices, the trunk pop, and doors slam.
He looked around one last time to make sure everything was in place. In the next moment, Teddy entered, dragging a massive suitcase that was heavy, even for him.
Vivian, looking wan and road-weary, but better than when he’d seen her last, stepped into the cabin.
“Hi, Jens. How’re you?”
“I’m fine. Don’t just stand there, c’mon in.”
Surrendering his protection, he came out from behind the kitchen butcher block island.
She went toward him, taking in the cabin — its vaulted ceiling, its rose-hued walls of notched logs, its fieldstone fireplace, its glossy oak floors — and stopped. She looked down at her feet.
“I forgot to bring slippers. Can I borrow a pair of house shoes?”
This seemed funny to everyone but Vivian.
“Teddy, get Mom a pair of those padded socks from the mudroom, will you?”
“Soon as I get Mom’s bag upstairs,” he answered, lifting it up in front of him like a barbell, enjoying the strain as he clumped up the stairs.
Vivian kicked off her shoes and placed them neatly on the strip of carpet inside the door. Jens walked past nervously and returned with a pair of knitted wool socks with leather soles sewn onto the bottoms. He held them out to her. For some reason, she mistook his gesture as a welcome hug. When she stepped forward to meet his embrace, he recoiled behind the socks. She took them, her face red with embarrassment.
“Welcome,” he said awkwardly. “Let me show you to your room.”
As he mounted the stairs ahead of Vivian, he glanced up to see Teddy standing at the top of the stairs, a smug, judgmental look on his face. Apparently, he disapproved of Jens’ failure to welcome his mom with open arms.
Jens glared back as he passed him, led his ex-wife into the makeshift spare bedroom, and pointed out the amenities as though to a distant cousin whose visit would be dutifully tolerated if not exactly enjoyed.
________
As Thanksgiving Day neared, the household settled into an easy routine, with Teddy working on his vacation assignment from school weekday mornings, and Vivian sketching him while he worked. Afternoons, she and Teddy went for long walks in the woods with Bruzza. With Nola off to work in the morning and Vivian temporarily usurping his time with Teddy, Jens was left to entertain himself a good part of the day until dinner.
He was still waiting for Jean to finish reading his manuscript and report back, and he did not want to start another writing project until he knew the fate of his present one; though he felt Detective Honore Poulon chafing to re-enter the cone of light of his imagination.
Jens, talking to himself, placated his venerable fictional detective like an importunate child, with the promise of teaming him up with Cassie Melantree in the next book, should she survive his agent’s and editor’s respective judgment.
The ringing land phone offered momentary distraction, but was soon replaced by anxiety when he remembered all the pending concerns in his life, to which he was vulnerable via phone. As he reached for the receiver, he considered, in rapid order, the possibilities.
It could be Jean, calling with news of his literary life or death. Ferdie calling to report that Laurent had just been sighted in the vicinity of Jackson, and that they should clear out immediately and seek refuge at the police station. Or finally, it could be Nola, calling to check up on him, but really because she missed him.
“Corbin here,” he said tentatively.
“Ferdie here, your faithful Mountie.” She panted like Bruzza.
“Ferdie, you young dog. Good to hear your bark.”
“Woof, woof,” she answered.
Her trilling laughter reminded him of her feminine side. He pictured her, a modern-day heroine, cruising the state highways and byways, eyes vigilant, protecting the citizenry of New Hampshire. In so many ways, she reminded him of his fictional heroine Cassie.
“Where are you?”
“I’m driving down from Canaan, on the Canadian border.”
“Any luck nabbing Laurent?”
Jens could hear the crackle of Ferdie’s police radio in the background.
“False alarm. I’m going to check in Berlin, like you suggested. It’s on the way.”
“I’d love for you to drop by.”
“Why’s that?”
Jens glanced at Vivian who was working furiously on a sketch at the kitchen table. Teddy, he knew from the sound coming from the water heater, was taking one of his interminable showers after working out.
“Why, then you could say hello to Vivian.”
Vivian glanced up; continued working like one possessed.
“She turned up? How? When? Where?”
Speaking sotto voce, Jens brought her up to speed on his ex-wife’s reappearance, apologizing profusely for forgetting to update her.
“Hey,” Ferdie complained, after reaming him for not telling her to cancel the missing person report. “Information’s a two-way street, you know. You leave me out, I leave you out.”
“I’m sorry, really. Does that mean you won’t come for Thanksgiving?”
The crackling on Ferdie’s police band rose.
“Sorry, Jens, I gotta take this. Call you right back.”
________
Ten minutes passed before she rang back. In the meantime, Vivian kept working on her sketch, glancing up at him occasionally.
“Yes, Ferdie,” Jens said without preamble.
> “First, I want to know what you think you’re doing playing nursemaid to your ex-wife after what she did to you.”
Jens found her concern touching.
“There’s a story there, but it will have to keep until another time.”
There was a pause on the other end of the line.
“I take it you’re not alone.”
“Correct.”
“Okay. Now, don’t get your hopes up too soon, we’re still running tests, but we think we may have turned up Laurent.”
“Where? Around here? In Conway?” blurted Jens, unable to suppress his anxiety.
“Fished out of the Piscataqua — off Peirce Island, near downtown Portsmouth.”
“No!”
“Looks like suicide — cut his own throat. We’re waiting on the DNA report and his dental records to come down from Concord. But we think we’ve got our man.”
Glancing at Vivian, Jens lowered his voice.
“What makes you think it’s him?”
“One, he fits the physical description. Two, the body’s tattoos match his on record. Three, the clothes on the corpse are from a local Army Navy store favored by ex-cons. Four, and best of all — you remember I told you that we recovered Warren Flynn’s truck, the one Laurent used to run you off the bridge?”
Jens grunted affirmatively, feeling a glimmer of relief but not ready to let go his long-standing angst, like a post-traumatic stress victim unable to let go.
”It’s got Laurent’s prints all over it,” enthused Ferdie, apparently feeling the need to reassure Jens that it was over.
“What about Flynn?”
“Given his resources extorted from Vivian, the money she took from you, he’s likely down in the Caribbean, island-hopping in style. I don’t think we’ll be hearing from him for a long time.”
“Okay,” said Jens uncertainly.
He dropped his voice to a whisper.
“But what would make a man like Laurent want to kill himself?”
Ferdie said she didn’t know, could be a lot of things, starting with Vivian’s rejection.
“And there’s a high rate of suicide among ex-cons, especially after serving long terms.”
Jens let the idea of Laurent’s death sink in.
Ferdie, after promising to come for Thanksgiving, ended the call by telling Jens that she didn’t want to know how his book was doing, for which Jens thanked her, not wanting to go into it anyway.
Ferdie promised to let him know as soon as they had a positive ID on Laurent. After they hung up, Jens realized that there was something he’d meant to tell her, but he’d lost it in the excitement over her news.
________
He found Vivian staring at him. He wondered how much she’d heard, and how much she’d put together.
“That was Ferdie,” he began, deciding not to share the news about Laurent until it was confirmed. He had no idea how she would deal with it. He would tell her once he had a definitive answer.
“She says hi.”
She looked at him suspiciously.
“Jens, I’m not a fool, you know.”
“I know.”
She waited for him to go on. When he didn’t, she went back to her sketching. She was furious. It was a rift he’d have to live with for the time being.
________
They spent the rest of the day steering clear of one another. Teddy stayed up in the loft with Vivian, playing backgammon like they used to back in Lee, during the long hours when Jens had labored at his writing up in the attic. When he called up to ask if anyone was hungry, Teddy answered him curtly with a “what’s it to you?”
Jens took Bruzza for a walk, all the way to the stream at the foot of the mountain, and stayed there all afternoon, watching him cavort at the water’s edge, dipping his paws gingerly into the frigid waters, pawing after winter trout. Jens did not feel like going home and cooking dinner. That night or any other. The tiff with Vivian had brought up all his old, complicated frustration and anger about their marriage. He felt trapped.
Finally, night falling, he put Bruzza on his leash and started back up the road heading home. Soon he heard the familiar whine of Nola’s Beetle pitching through its gears. She pulled up alongside him.
“Hop in,” she said through her open window.
With Bruzza perched on the back seat, Jens folded himself stiffly in front.
“You look cold and tired.” She observed him through her concerned smile. “Are you okay?”
Her sympathy was enough to open the flood gates. He told her what had happened earlier with Vivian, and how Teddy had reacted.
“Are you surprised? You saw how protective he was at dinner the other night.”
“I know, but this is between his mother and me. It doesn’t really concern him.”
“She’ll always be his mother, but you’re forgetting she’s no longer your wife.”
Jens shook his head. “Not the point.”
“Jens,” she said, shaking her head. “She’s very fragile.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’ll behave myself, I promise.”
“Good! I’ll help you fix dinner. We’ll patch things up.”
“Oh! Almost forgot! Ferdie called — they think they fished Laurent out of the Piscataqua — a suicide.”
Nola’s mouth dropped.
“You mean I don’t have to sleep with one eye open anymore?”
“She’s going to confirm it with us once the lab results are in.”
“Does Vivian know?”
Jens shook his head.
“Not explicitly — she suspects.”
________
Nola made dinner tolerable, providing the social graces that permitted them all to be together. Jens found Teddy distant and cold, but didn’t know how to break through. Vivian was reserved but not unfriendly, at least not to Nola. She retired early, taking her pill without being prompted. After kissing his mother good night, Teddy left the table without excusing himself. Moments later, the sound of his Xbox powering up could be heard coming from the basement.
Teddy felt no remorse for lying to his father about Daniel’s gun, believing the Glock to be his due, like Daniel’s watch. Spoils of conquest. Hadn’t they defeated the bear and saved Daniel’s life? His father’s stubborn anti-gun stance was an aberration, especially up here in the woods. While he loved his father, he did not respect him enough, thinking him weak, damaged. His love for his mother was without reserve. He would do anything to protect her, including kill, were it called for.
Chapter Sixty-Five
In the morning thaw, wrapped in blankets, their breath steaming, Jens sat with Nola on the back porch sipping his cooling coffee. Teddy and Vivian weren’t up yet, so they could talk freely.
“I just don’t want Teddy to go through life regretting his actions.”
“Then you’ve got nothing to worry about. Accidents don’t count as sins.”
He’d told her about Nils.
“Don’t they? I don’t think the heart knows the difference.”
“Jens, isn’t it time you forgave yourself for your brother’s death?”
He brightened with an idea.
“Know what? We could have a little ceremony for Daniel up on Black Mountain, scatter his ashes.”
Nola had told him that the hospital had been obliged to preserve Daniel’s ashes for at least ninety days in the event a family member turned up to claim them. That time had passed. His remains would soon be interred in a communal pauper’s grave, compliments of the township of Jackson, New Hampshire.
“You’re a sweet man.” She kissed him.
He shook his head. “I’m the lucky one.”
“That deserves another kiss.” She kissed him again.
They exchanged shy smiles. The sky was overcast, grey and unrelieved. Jens sniffed the air.
“I smell snow.”
“No you don’t. That’s a fishwife’s tale.”
“Really?” He held out his hand; small, hard flakes began
to collect in his palm. “Here it comes.”
Snow began to fall steadily.
“You can be a pain in the ass, Mr. Know-it-all.”
They went inside, observing the silence signifying mother and son were still in bed. Nola poured out the remains of their coffee, rinsed and set the cups to dry.
“Want to take Bruzza out for a walk with me?” asked Jens, taking the blanket off Nola’s shoulders, folding it, and putting it in the chest behind the sofa with his.
Jens scratched behind the dog’s ears, evoking grunts of pleasure from him.
“Sure, just give me a minute to brush my teeth.”
She slid across the floor in her socks while Jens went to the mudroom, Bruzza trailing.
“Might want to change into foul weather gear,” he said a few minutes later, as he pulled on his insulated rubber boots and LL Bean sweater.
He handed her her parka with the faux fur collar. She put it on and tugged on her boots.
“After all, heavy snow is predicted,” she teased. “Weatherman says so.”
“I never said how heavy it will be.”
He buckled Bruzza’s collar and attached the leash. The dog pulled him out the door and into the yard.
“Should I lock the door?” called Nola, trailing him out.
He thought about it, acknowledging that he wasn’t ready to let his guard down.
“Why not? No point in leaving Teddy and Vivian unprotected.”
“Hey, wait for me.”
She put on her gloves and ran after him, slipping on the thin layer of crystalline flakes dusting the drive. She managed to scoop up enough for a snowball as she ran.
________
Jens and Nola trudged blithely along the switchbacks through the woods, snow crunching underfoot, the tall pine branches overhead scintillating like Christmas trees in a crèche, though it was Thanksgiving, observed Jens. They walked arm in arm, comfortable with the way their hips and flanks fit, affirming the fact that they were, officially, now a couple. And they were happy together.
So caught up in their talk — about the menu for tomorrow’s dinner, about Jens’ idea for his next book, about Nola’s screenplay revision, about plans to go skiing, both were avid skiers — that they failed to notice that Bruzza had disappeared around a bend in the trail. Jens had decided it was safe to let him off the leash, as long as he stayed within earshot.