House Arrest

by Mary Morris

  Then she rolled over, and rested her chin on her hands. She smelled of suntan lotion and the zest of oranges. Her nipples dipped into the sand. “My parents—not Dr. Calderón, but my real father and mother—used to come to this beach,” she said. “Not with me, they never brought me, but she told me they came here. Once, to prove what it looked like, my father brought me a jar of black sand. He called me Negrita, I suppose after the battle of Playa Negrita, which was the only one he had decisively won. And because I was a dark one like this beach. Sometimes they came back with fish, because he also liked to fish here. But mainly they went to get away because no one knew about Playa Negrita for years. I still have that little jar of black sand. It is the only gift he ever gave me.

  “My mother would pack them a picnic—bread, cheese, wine, some fruit—and she’d pat me on the head as I watched them leave. I’d stand at the window, my face pressed to the glass. My mother would come back late in the evening, her face burned, flecks of black sand in her hair that sparkled like the night sky. When she bathed afterward, the tub would be lined with this fine, black sand. Then she would move around the house in her nightgown, distracted and miserable, for days. I have never seen anything like it before or since.” Isabel paused, rubbing cream into her legs. “But my mother was in love. It was as simple as that.”

  Now she looked at me, stared at me hard. “Have you ever been in love?” That look of sadness I had first noticed at the hotel came over her face, the kind that has no bottom.

  “Yes, I have. Of course I have …” I loved Todd, but I wondered if that was the proper answer to her question.

  “Well, I have. I didn’t understand when I was a girl. But I understand now. I lost everything.” I reached across and touched her hand. “You can’t imagine what it is like for me. I have no work; I have nothing I can do. Except for my daughter, I have no one. I am always being followed. Even as we sit here, I feel as if they are watching me.”

  Tears came to her eyes and I kept my hand on hers. “Isn’t there something you can do? Can’t someone help you?”

  “No.” She shook her head. Here on this beautiful beach she looked pathetic. “There really isn’t anything. Even my own mother says there is nothing to be done.”

  “But there must be something …”

  Shaking her head, she smiled at me with the wry smile I’d seen so many times now. As if to tell me that I do not know anything. That I am naive and could not possibly understand. She seemed to find me mildly amusing. Then she tapped me on the arm. “Come on,” she said, rising, “let’s swim.”

  I felt tired, lethargic in the sun and the heat and dispirited from her story, as if she had let some of that sadness out and I wasn’t sure I wanted to know any more about it. “I’ll follow you,” I said, thinking I would take a nap.

  She raced, diving into the waves. Then her head appeared like a cork, bobbing several yards out to sea, beyond the breakers. She swam in smooth, even strokes, perpendicular to the shore, and I was surprised at what a good swimmer she was. Gray clouds were mounting on the horizon, making long shadows across the water. A breeze picked up and there was a chill. It was as if darkness had descended all at once and I could barely make her out anymore.

  Then I saw the fin. It was gray like the clouds and cut a path through the water, not moving swiftly, but slowly, the way the day had been, and it was heading straight for Isabel. I began to wave, to cup my hands and yell from the shore.

  I jumped to my feet, rushed to the water’s edge, shouting for her to turn around, but she continued her swim out and the big gray fish swam straight toward her. I was screaming madly now, racing into the waves, my feet burning on the sharp bits of coral beneath them. I pounded the water, thinking perhaps if I made a big disturbance the fish would be distracted and swim toward me. Instead it rose in a smooth arch and the sound of its splashing drowned out my voice so that even I could not hear it.

  It seemed as if the fish were coming in for a strike, but then Isabel rose and descended and the fish rose again right after her. He was big and gray and they leaped together, then came down hard. When they did this again, rising up and coming down hard, I saw that they were playing, and that the fish was a dolphin, not a shark. I stood in knee-deep water, feeling somewhat stupid and thinking I should go in and join them. But it almost seemed as if this were a prearranged meeting. Something they’d planned. A rendezvous for just the two of them, and I could only stand on the shore and watch.

  When Isabel came out of the water, she was flushed and smiling as I had not seen her smile before. She shook water over me like a dog. “I don’t know what it is,” she said, reaching for a towel, “but they always come to me.”

  Thirteen

  WE ARE TRYING to move forward with your case,” Major Lorenzo tells me as we speed back to the hotel, “but there are still some technicalities. The process is taking longer than we had imagined.” It is midafternoon and I am tired. I also have not eaten and think that perhaps they have not either because they also look tired. Though Major Lorenzo did leave the room once while I was being questioned and was gone for quite a while, I don’t think he went to have lunch. On the sides of their faces I can see their afternoon shadows starting to grow.

  As Major Lorenzo speaks, I cannot see his face, only the movements of his jaw, because he is sitting with his back to me, staring straight ahead. My heart is beating faster. Why would this be taking longer? What could be wrong? “Well,” I say, “can’t we clear this matter up? I am anxious to get home …”

  Now Major Lorenzo glances back at me, his face darkened. “Of course you are, but we don’t think the matter will be cleared up so easily now, so soon …” He fumbles for words. “You should have been more forthcoming,” he says hesitantly. “You should have told him what he wanted to know.” I am silent when he says this, and it is as if we are both keeping a big secret and we can’t even say it to each other. “You will probably have to stay in the hotel until we resolve what needs to be resolved.”

  “Yes, of course, I understand.” Though I am not sure what needs to be resolved or how long this will take.

  He reaches for something in the glove compartment and I am afraid that there is some paper that pertains to my case, but instead he takes out a candy bar. My mouth begins to salivate and I am surprised at how hungry I am. He offers some to his aide, who declines, and then he offers some to me. “Yes, I’ll just have a little piece.” The candy is dry with the flavor of fruit, but the sugar feels good on my tongue.

  “And then,” he goes on, “there is the problem of the return flight …”

  “Because there’s no flight until next week.”

  Major Lorenzo smiles. “Yes, that’s the other problem.”

  I ponder this for a moment. It seems to me that I should leave as soon as I can. It’s this nagging feeling at the back of my brain, but I know that sooner would be better than later. “Major Lorenzo,” I say, “I was just wondering …”

  “Yes,” he says, smiling.

  “I was wondering, do I have to go back to where I came from? I mean, couldn’t you deport me to Cancún or Jamaica? You have flights that go there all the time and I am sure my company would pay for it.” Montego Bay suddenly appeals to me. Or Negril. I’ll call Todd and have him fly down with Jessica and meet me. We’ll snorkel off Sunrise Cove, eating jerk beef and garlic shrimp at Papa Joe’s, shoot pool with the Rastamen at Zulu’s. This seems like the thing to do.

  Major Lorenzo looks perplexed because it is not up to him if I am to stay or to go. He really is only carrying out orders. The two men exchange glances. “It is not so simple,” Major Lorenzo says. The guard with the reflector shades is young and good-looking, and he grins at me in his rearview mirror, but this is not a come-on; it is a complicit smile. Because I have come up with a clever solution to this problem. “There is a possibility …,” the Major says. “Let me look into it.”

  “Cancún,” I tell him. “Montego Bay.” Or anywhere. If they are going to depor
t me, I have this feeling that they had better do it soon.

  Major Lorenzo nods, but his face is solemn and I feel he knows something he is not telling me. He looks as if he is the deliverer of terrible news, and I think to myself as long as no one mentions Isabel, as long as her name never leaves my lips, I’ll get out of here soon.

  “All right,” Major Lorenzo says as we pull up in front of my hotel, “I’ll see what I can do.” This time he does not get out of the car when the aide opens my door. He stays inside and gives me a short wave. But I know he is watching me as I walk into the hotel.

  When I get upstairs to my room, there is a man literally tapping my phone. He has the phone turned upside down in his hand and he holds a small pencil with which he taps the back of the phone. “Is everything all right?” I ask.

  “Oh, yes,” he replies. “Just a little static.” He taps again, grins at me, then a few moments later he is gone. What is this dime-store novel I’m trapped in? Cheap thrills, low-level espionage. What’s next? Laser guns, poison-pen notes, secret missions?

  When he leaves, I want to call home, but I hesitate. What have they done to my phone? What would I say? It is three o’clock and I wonder what Todd and Jessica are doing right now. When I am away, he picks her up after school. He is probably getting her a snack—cookies with milk, a slice of pizza.

  I phone the operator and ask her to place the call, but she tells me all the circuits to the States are busy. Try back in an hour or so, she says. I plead with her. “Please,” I say, “it is very important.” I feel desperate to get through, as if my life depends on it, though, of course, I don’t think it does.

  “I am sorry,” she tells me, “but I have no line.”

  I sit on the edge of the bed, staring at the phone. If I close my eyes, I think I will weep. I can see Todd making a butter-and-sugar sandwich. Jessica has her dolls lined up on the counter. There’s Ernestine, Bangor, and Rudy. We don’t know where the names come from but Jessica gave them those names as soon as she got the dolls. Ernestine is a black Raggedy Ann that I bought her in Jamaica and that some of our friends think is a voodoo doll. Bangor is a fragile, white thing, the closest in resemblance to Jessica herself. Rudy is a disorderly little boy who gets into trouble for no reason at all.

  When it is just the two of them, Todd and Jessica get along fine. They like to make a mess in the kitchen, then soak in a leisurely bath. They like to curl up in pajamas and tell stories.

  Domesticity bores me. It’s not that being Jessica’s mother or being married to Todd bores me. It’s the repetition of things. The making of beds, folding clothes. Dusting. Dust, my mother, the nurse, told me once as I watched her do the chores, is 80 percent human skin. I don’t like the details of running the house. The things you forgot to get at the store, the missing socks, a bill you didn’t pay. The valentines have just come down when the Easter bunny goes up. I never have enough juicers in the house.

  There’s always something going wrong, something that has to be repaired. I can never just sit and stare out at the oak tree, the way you can in a country inn or a bed-and-breakfast or even an interstate motel, where you can close the door when you leave and someone else will take care of what you’ve left behind.

  I didn’t want to buy our house. It was Todd who said we should. He wanted a sound investment, something that was his. Never mind that we couldn’t afford anything. Todd said we should pioneer. We bought a handyman’s special in a neighborhood that was on the brink of some change that never occurred. We have friends who live in a twelve-room Victorian around the corner and they’ve been trying to get out for years. Despite the drive-by shootings at the bodega down the street, the “Rest in Peace, Joey” graffiti on the abandoned building on the corner, Todd has done wonders with what we have—knocking down walls, bringing in the light. He’s managed to put in new fixtures that look just like the old ones we took out.

  Before we bought this house, I dreamed it was on a golf course and filled with flying fish. People kept shouting “fore” as fish splattered against the walls. I’m not sure why I dreamed about a golf course since I haven’t played in years, though it was the only thing, along with billiards, that my father ever really taught me. Not that I play either well or even like the game, but I can whack a ball down the fairway with a nice, smooth stroke. Even now, my father’s coaching remains emblazoned in my mind. Bend your knees, head down. Eyes on the ball.

  When I told Todd I didn’t want to buy, he said, “Don’t be silly, Maggie, it’s just a house.” Todd can spend an entire weekend ripping out a bathroom, designing new shelves. I’ve never seen a man so happy stripping paint. Todd’s great invention is what he calls “invisible storage.” Cubbyholes, secret compartments, hidden drawers tucked under beds and tables. It is perfect, I suppose, for urban living, but I can never find the things I’ve put away.

  I swore I’d never have a conversation with, let alone be married to, a man who said he wanted a propane gauge on his barbecue. We can talk endlessly about our adjustable mortgage and when to lock in. Once conversion meant to me a religious experience. Now it means thirty-years fixed.

  Perhaps that is why I go on these junkets. Perhaps that is how I got here.

  Actually, I had to go on this trip. That is, I had to get away. I had to get away because something is wrong and I can’t quite put my finger on it, though I’ve searched my house for clues. Clear indicators. A letter, a message, a bill from a hotel. Evidence of Todd’s betrayal. Proof that he is drifting away. I want something concrete, something I can sink my teeth into.

  It’s not exactly that anything happened, but it feels as if something has. When I ask Todd about it, he says, “Maggie, it’s all in your head.” It’s true that our life is as it always has been. But it feels different. What is it you call this in astronomy, these imperceptible tugs? Perambulations? A force that is not seen, but exists because of the impact it has on the things around it.

  There is a woman in Todd’s office, a designer, named Sarah, and sometimes I believe he has fallen in love with her. Not an affair, not some lusty hotel room when he’s supposed to be working. But really in love. The way I know he once was with me and I was with him. That blend of danger and excitement. I see it in his eyes when he talks to her on the phone. But when I say to him, even as a tease, “You’re in love with Sarah, aren’t you?” Todd replies, “Maggie, get a grip on yourself.”

  It hasn’t been that easy. A few weeks before I left on this trip, we had a break-in. I was in my office, working on the ground floor, when I heard a noise. Doors banging, footsteps. The dog began barking, racing up and down the stairs.

  I usually don’t hear any noise when I work at home. Todd had converted an old storage closet for me on the ground floor, and on days when I don’t have to go into the office (about three days a week), I am set up there in my little insulated windowless space, complete with fax-modem and a hookup to the office. Though he has no children of his own, Kurt encourages this kind of flexible working arrangement. I never thought I could be happy in a windowless room, but actually I am. I don’t know what time it is or what the weather is outside. There’s a clock on the fax, but I only look at it when I think it may be time to get Jessica from school. I am amazed at how much I can enjoy this solitude. Some days I don’t even go outside. Todd jokes that I’m like someone with twentieth-century disease—that illness when you are allergic to your environment, its fumes, its toxic waste—who can’t cope with synthetic fibers or cleaning fluids. He likes to kid me that nine out of ten people with this illness are women.

  I argue that I just like to be free of the chaos of the house—the dishes that aren’t done, the clothes that need to be put away. I can spend hours checking my E-mail, faxing freelancers all over the world who are gathering information for me when I need the name of a hotel in Eboli, ecotourist information on the birds of Madagascar, where you can get the best brik-à-l’oeuf in Tunis.

  I can go on for days like this in my little cell because, of cours
e, unlike here, I know I can leave. I always resist going away, but then once I really go, I am gone. It always amazes me when I travel somewhere how easy it is to leave your other life behind. As if it has ceased to exist; as if it has vanished in thin air.

  I was in my own world when I heard the banging upstairs. At first I didn’t believe that someone was in the house, but the dog kept growling, running up and down the stairs. He’s a small dog, built close to the ground, and I never thought he’d be that fierce, but somehow he chased the person out. When I heard the hatch door slam the second time, I called Todd. He told me to leave the house while he called 911.

  We live in a neighborhood where drug dealers have their turf one block from ours, and we rarely go out at night. Some of our neighbors have bullet-proof front doors, but so far we had resisted such precautions. But Todd said it was time to put in an alarm system.

  Lyle Nashe, the Home Security Alarm salesman who arrived, wore a shiny blue suit and carried a small suitcase. First he admired our house—the banisters Todd had stripped, the marble mantel that had once been covered in blue paint. He said, “You’ve done wonders with this place,” winning Todd over, but not me. He liked the country kitchen, the primitive art on the walls that I bring back from wherever I go. “I like it,” Lyle Nashe said. “It’s eclectic. You have a lot you must want to protect here.”

  “Actually,” I told him, “our possessions don’t amount to much. We just want to feel safe.”

  “Well, I think I have the right system for you.” He put his suitcase on the table. It had two doors that opened like an advent calendar, revealing a miniature house, complete with a pot on the stove, crib in the nursery, dog on the stairs who Jessica thought resembled Sandy, which is our dog’s name, like Little Orphan Annie’s.

  Then Lyle Nashe produced a tiny masked man carrying a burglar bag whom he moved from a window, onto the roof, and then down the back stairs. The movable burglar had a mustache and wore a black cap. He was dark-complected, but not black. Racially diverse, I categorized him. “These are your vulnerable spots,” Lyle Nashe told us, “your potential danger situations. This is where trouble begins.”