Deep Down True

by Juliette Fay

  No kidding, she thought. I know who you are, for Pete’s sake. His discomfort soothed her. It sounded so much like her own. This made it a little easier to dial his cell phone for the second time that day.

  “Hi,” he said tentatively, and before she could respond, he added, “I really didn’t . . .”

  “I know,” she said. “Let’s just talk about Grady.”

  Afterward, Dana took her lunch to the kitchenette, where Tony sat with his half-eaten sub and a bottle of iced tea. She knew she would tell him about Grady—he already knew part of the story. But she surprised herself by also recounting her first conversation with Kenneth’s girlfriend.

  “Sounds young,” Tony said.

  “She just turned thirty last week.”

  “Even younger than that,” he said, raising his eyebrows. And he was right, she realized, smiling at the suggestion of Tina’s immaturity. Tony smiled back, gave a little shrug, and added, “But hey—that’s his problem.”

  CHAPTER 24

  DANA HAD JUST RIPPED OPEN A PACKET OF SPLENDA and was dusting the steaming surface of her tea with it when Morgan came in. “I thought you were going to Kimmi’s,” she said, surprised.

  “Yeah, um, I was . . .” Morgan’s hands were tucked up into the cuffs of her fleece jacket, and her shoulders were hunched as if the afternoon chill had followed her into the house. “I just wanted to get in a little cello. I’m way behind on that piece for the concert.”

  The holiday strings concert was six weeks away, and Dana was tempted to point that out, but Morgan was already moving toward the stairs. Soon a melodic humming punctuated by random moments of silence drifted down.

  She’s nervous about something, Dana realized. Morgan was not a very good musician, and she regularly complained about pieces being boring or too hard. In fact, she’d told her parents last fall she was quitting. But then Kenneth had moved out after New Year’s, and the cello had stayed.

  The mudroom door opened and slammed, and Grady came loping into the kitchen without even taking off his backpack. “Can I go?” he asked. “To Dad and Tina’s?”

  “Dad and I talked about it, and he’ll pick you up at four-thirty,” she said, removing the backpack from his shoulders. “He’ll bring you back in the morning. Why don’t you put your skeleton costume by the door so you don’t forget it.”

  “I’m doing the ninja costume from last year. That skeleton one’s stupid.” He shrugged off his jacket and let it slip to the floor as he crossed the kitchen toward the cabinet with the snacks.

  “What? Two weeks ago you were begging me for it. You thought it was the coolest thing ever.” Dana picked up the jacket and draped it over the back of a chair. Grady started to climb onto the counter, but she nudged him down and reached into the cabinet for the Cheez-Its.

  He plunged his hand into the box, then tilted his face upward and released about half the handful into his mouth. “Skeletons are for babies,” he said as he crunched. “They would’ve made fun of me.”

  “No they wouldn’t. Lots of kids do skeletons. Besides, that costume was expensive, and I can’t return it now.”

  “Well, they already did make fun of me,” said Grady, jamming the rest of the crackers into his mouth. “A lot.”

  Dana studied him. “What did they say?”

  He didn’t answer her for a second; then he blurted out, “They said I was already a skeleton, but I was like a skeleton without bones! And then they pretended they couldn’t see me for the rest of recess!” He slammed the Cheez-Its box onto the table. It tipped over, and little orange squares splayed out across the tabletop.

  “Oh, Grady.” She reached for him, and he buried his face against her stomach. “That was a mean thing to say. You are definitely not a skeleton without bones.”

  “Can we move?” he begged, his voice muffled against her sweater. “I hate it here.”

  “Is that why you don’t want to trick-or-treat with Travis and Farruk?”

  “No, they’re just jerks! My whole school is full of jerks, and it bugs me, that’s all!”

  Fighting with friends, Grady’s teacher had said. He was sour and irritable from missing his dad, and his friends weren’t putting up with it.

  “You know what I think?” she said.

  “What?”

  “I think you need something to get your mind off this,” she coaxed. “And I can’t wait one more minute to find out what happens in Rowan of Rin.”

  He looked up at her finally, chin resting against her stomach, his eyelashes sparkling with dampness. “I don’t want to read,” he said, groaning.

  “How about if I read and you just listen?”

  He wiped his nose on the sleeve of his shirt and considered her offer. “That could work,” he conceded. “When’s Dad coming again?”

  “Four-thirty. Go get the book.”

  By ten of five, Grady had been picked up by Kenneth, and Dana had driven Morgan to Kimmi’s house. Alder called to say that she and Jet had plans to see the Rocky Horror Picture Show at the Goodwin Street Cinema in East Hartford. “What are you doing?” she asked.

  Dana explained the whereabouts of Grady and Morgan. “So I’ll be here, handing out candy.”

  “By yourself.”

  “With my book, which I haven’t had a chance to read in weeks.” She tried to put a good spin on it. “It’ll be nice to have a little time to myself.”

  “I could come back and hang with you. I really don’t mind.”

  “No, sweetie, go have fun. I’ll be happy as a clam here with my book.” But then Dana had a thought: Was Alder looking for an out? Was this code for “Make me come home”? She murmured quickly, “Unless you want me to tell you to stay in. You can blame it on me if it helps.”

  “Oh, that’s so sweet,” Alder said, in that way she had of making Dana feel like an adorable toddler. “But actually, I think I’m better off distracted. I had a really good Halloween last year, and if I think about it too much, I’ll get all . . . you know.”

  At five-fifteen, with the last rays of light simmering at the edges of the treetops, the doorbell rang for the first time. Two ballerinas, a firefighter, and a raccoon. The raccoon costume was beautiful, clearly made by a seamstress who knew how to tackle fake fur. “Quite a costume,” Dana remarked, catching the young mother’s eye as she doled out 3 Musketeers bars to the children.

  “My mother-in-law,” muttered the woman with a quick eye roll. “It’s dry-clean-only.”

  Dana offered a sympathetic laugh and said, “Oh, for Pete’s sake.” The woman smiled back—relieved, it seemed, to be understood at last.

  Probably got into a snit with her husband about it, Dana thought as the children chimed out their prompted thank-yous and took off for the next house. She returned to the kitchen to read her book, wishing her husband-related snits were as simple as an interfering mother-in-law.

  But apparently the book did not want to be read. She usually loved science-fiction romances, loved imagining herself in a place and time so disconnected from her own. There were always riddles to be solved and antagonists to be outsmarted. But though the odds were stacked against them, the lovers always discovered the one scenario that would unite them in the end. And the love scenes were quite satisfying in their level of detail. Just enough to make you feel as if you yourself were being made love to by a powerful yet kind intergalactic warrior, Dana often thought, but not so much that you were forced to visualize his “throbbing member.”

  Handsome warrior or no, however, Dana couldn’t make herself attend to the story. Her thoughts drifted to Grady. A skeleton with no bones—what was that supposed to mean? And how had he gotten to a point with his friends that they were calling him names and pretending he wasn’t there? Her own father had never coached her basketball team, or even gone to a game, but it hadn’t made her angry or inclined to fight with her friends. To the contrary, it was even more important to stay on good terms, despite the ebb and flow of petty disagreements and betrayals.

&nbs
p; Connie, though—she bounced in and out of friendships as if it were a contact sport. Everyone was eventually determined to be stupid or annoying, though she did seem to put up with the ones who were entertaining a while longer than most. Dana assumed this was also the case with Alder’s father, but, having no idea who that was, she couldn’t be sure.

  After quitting art school, Connie had waited tables at Durgin Park in Boston, a restaurant known for its surly staff, where her snide remarks were appreciated as part of the “experience.” Her scrupulously stashed tips had funded an extended trip to Europe.

  Dana had almost lost touch with her then. Connie called occasionally (though never on holidays and birthdays, when you wanted her to call). Soon after she left, Dana had gotten married and immersed herself in creating a home life that conformed to her ideals of wedded happiness. It was easier to have Connie out of the picture—she had a way of letting you know your ideals were crap. “So how’s it going over there in White-Picket-Fenceville?” she asked during one of her infrequent international calls. “Has it all fallen to shit yet?”

  But soon thereafter Connie had come home pregnant. And strangely sad. And even more strangely quiet.

  “She’s all inside herself,” their mother had said. “For once.”

  Connie had moved back into the house in Watertown, Massachusetts, where they’d grown up. Their father was gone, and it was good for their mother to have a baby to care for. Dana took every opportunity to visit. It was unanimously agreed that Alder was a miracle of a child. Smart and funny, with an uncanny knack for making each of them feel uniquely adored.

  And now that beatific child had shoe-polish-black hair (though it did seem to be growing out a little) and had to be distracted from remembering the good Halloween she’d had last year.

  The doorbell rang throughout the evening as Dana tried unsuccessfully to read her book. Each time, she made enthusiastic comments about costumes, doled out candy, and checked to see if anyone was lurking around with rolls of toilet paper, eyeing her trees. No one ever was.

  The doorbell rang again when she was in the bathroom, and she had to wash her hands quickly and call out, “Coming! Be right there!” as it chimed several times more. She grabbed the plastic witch’s cauldron of candy and yanked open the door. Expecting to look down into the faces of little treat beggars, she was taken aback when the only face on her porch towered above her.

  “Trick or treat, beautiful,” said Jack Roburtin. A set of red velvet devil horns stood erect from his sandy blond crew cut.

  “Jack!” she said with astonishment that bordered on horror.

  “I know.” He grinned. “I’m a little early, but I couldn’t wait.” He stepped into the mudroom and closed the door behind him. “I was so psyched you didn’t call,” he added.

  “I didn’t . . . call?”

  His right arm, which had been tucked behind his back, now brought forth a Whitman’s Sampler of chocolates. “Bet I’m the only trick-or-treater who brought his own treat,” he said.

  “Oh, that is so . . .” she said appreciatively as she took the small box. “But did we . . . ? I don’t remember talking about—”

  “No,” he said. “The phone message. I called your cell last night, because I’m trying to be discreet and everything.” Dana had been at Keeney’s with Nora, and she’d shut off the ring. “But you didn’t answer, so I figured the best thing was to leave a message on your voice mail at home. Don’t worry, though, I was planning to hang up if one of the kids answered.”

  She’d forgotten to check the messages when she got home. “I have to admit I never did get the message, Jack. What’d it say?”

  “That I’d plan to come over around nine unless I heard from you. I figured your ex would have the kids.” He scanned her for confirmation. “Oh, wait—does he? Did I mess up?”

  “No, it’s fine,” she said. “As it turns out, none of them are home right now.”

  “Excellent!” he said. “Then you won’t mind if I give you a little . . .” He leaned over and kissed her cheek. It was tender and soft, and when he finished, he whispered into her ear, “Your skin is the best.” His arm circled her waist and drew her to him so that her stomach rested against his. He wanted to kiss her lips, she knew that. She tilted her face up to his.

  There was a thumping sound, and for a second she thought it was his heart hammering against her chest. In the next moment, the thumping was louder—footsteps coming up her porch steps. The doorbell rang.

  “Don’t answer it,” Jack whispered.

  “I have to,” she murmured apologetically, tugging herself out of his grasp. “It’s Halloween.”

  She shooed him into the main part of the house, out of sight of the costumed throng. The group was bigger, older, and their costumes were more haphazard. Most of them simply wore their sports uniforms. A few were hoboes. One was Tinker Bell, but she was clearly only in it for the way the outfit showed off her shape. “Happy Halloween !” called a boy’s voice from the back. “If you’re sick of answering the door, we can just take the rest of the candy off your hands.” The group guffawed their approval.

  “ That’s very thoughtful of you,” Dana said with a knowing smile as she tossed pieces of candy into their pillowcases, “but I don’t want the next group of kids to go away disappointed.”

  “There’s no one out anymore!”

  “Just in case,” she said and closed the door.

  She found Jack sitting in the living room, one arm stretched out along the back of the couch. It was clear that he meant for her to sit next to him, beneath the shelter of that arm. As she did so, something in her resisted. It was the devil horns. They made him look silly. Like an overgrown boy, she thought. She reached up, tugged them off, and tossed them onto the coffee table.

  “Hey,” he said, feigning anger. “My costume!”

  “You’re too handsome to be a devil.” This was true. He certainly was attractive, with those smoky blue eyes. “And who wants to kiss the Prince of Darkness?” She smiled. “Not me.”

  He smiled back, puffed up a little from the compliment. “Now, where were we . . . ?” he murmured as his arm behind her began to pull her in for a kiss. It was a good kiss. He was a good kisser. But all Dana could think was, “Now, where were we”? Who says stuff like that anymore? She found herself drawing back, and as she did, something across the room caught her eye. She turned to look and realized that it wasn’t actually in the room—it was out the window. A white ball of some kind was being thrown in her yard. Toilet paper.

  “They’re doing it!” she said. “They’re throwing—”

  Jack followed her gaze, and in the next moment he was up off the couch and dashing out of the room. “Son of a—” she heard him mutter.

  Then he was in the front yard. Through the window she could see him cutting off the escape route of one of the boys as the others ran from the property. Without actually touching him, Jack was using his intimidating size to corral the boy, shaking a finger at him and pointing to the trees. “. . . NO RESPECT . . .” she could hear him say, and then he was pointing to the house and yelling, “. . . ALL ALONE . . .” and “. . . IF I EVER . . .”

  He stood there, arms crossed over his expansive chest, and supervised the boy’s removal of the toilet paper from the crabapple tree. Dana was astonished. And enormously thankful.

  The phone rang. “Yeah?” she answered, still watching Jack and the boy.

  “Mom?”

  “Oh, Morgan,” she said. “Are you done trick-or-treating?”

  “Whoa, that was weird. You never say ‘Yeah’ when you answer the phone.”

  “Well, I . . . Where are you?”

  “At Kimmi’s,” she said. “Can I sleep over? Also, can we just quick go over to Devynne’s? She lives up the street.”

  “Sure, sweetie. Do you need me to drop off some pajamas?” Jack was pointing to pieces of toilet paper on the lawn now.

  “Kimmi’ll lend me some. I don’t have to go to Devynne’s if
you don’t want me to. I can just stay here and listen to Kimmi’s iPod.”

  The boy was holding out the flimsy pieces of paper to Jack. Jack was waving him off, gesturing to him to put them in his own pocket. “Is Kimmi’s mother okay with you two going?”

  “Um, well . . . yeah.”

  “Then I’m fine with it. But don’t stay too late, okay?”

  “No,” Morgan said quickly. “Kimmi promised we’d only go for a few minutes.”

  “Sounds good.” The boy was leaving now, and Jack was walking back toward the house. “I’ll pick you up in the morning, then. Love you, Morgan.”

  “Bye, Mom.”

  When Jack walked into the living room, his cheeks were pink with cold. Dana reached out to put her hands on them. “That was amazing,” she said.

  Jack reached up to her wrists. He pulled one hand down to his mouth and kissed her palm. “Hey,” he said with a proud little grin, “no one TPs my girl’s house.”

  And then she was up on her tiptoes to kiss him, pressing herself against him, wanting to be claimed by him. His thick, powerful arms drew her in tight, his hands running up and down her back. She kneaded her fingers into the rope of muscle across his shoulders. He kissed her harder, and his teeth clacked against hers, a momentary snag in the silky feel of wanting him.

  He unbuttoned her blouse; she responded in kind, untucking his polo shirt and pulling it off. He had a handsome face, yes, but this was nothing in comparison to the masterpiece that was his chest. Smooth, unmarked skin, chiseled pectorals, and a navel anchored like a perfect little boat among the gentle swells of his abdominal muscles. Dana’s fingers traced across the magnificent chest. A gratified growl rumbled from his throat, and she knew she had delivered a signal, and the signal had been received and decoded, and that sex would happen in the very near future. And that was fine with her.