“What did you do, Charlie?” she demanded.
Charlie stiffened, his expression both defiant and authoritative. “It doesn’t matter. He’s gone.” He turned away from her and back to Acheson.
He wasn’t going to tell her. Was Johnny really gone, or was he holed up somewhere, plotting revenge?
She stepped behind the counter and picked up the Burlington Free Press with shaking hands. Maybe Edson would tell her what had really happened. Maybe Johnny really was gone. She’d think about it later.
A headline proclaimed, “Wild Mountain Disaster Becomes Town Battle.” The article was about town meeting, and had been written by that young reporter, Jake Perez. There was a photo of Charlie with his finger in the air, looking like some old codger. She laughed. He was an old codger. But didn’t that imply that the whole town was some quaint relic, the old Vermont of yesteryear? Now she had her hackles up, and she scanned the article. Probably written in the condescending tone of some young punk from Burlington who thought he was way too cool for her little town. Surprisingly, though, the article was pretty good; Jake had just given the facts.
The door jangled open, and Charlie and Acheson moved aside for a young couple deep in conversation. They were both tall and dark-haired, and they brought a flurry of energy into the room. It was that reporter, Jake Perez. And the girl was Frank’s daughter. What was her name? Mary? Erin?
The girl’s face was animated and rosy. She smiled delightedly at Jake, who struck the pose of a young Jimmy Stewart, all charm and an aw-shucks smile.
Jake nodded to Charlie, Acheson, and Mona, and turned back to the girl. “It probably had the house to itself before your dad came up.”
“Yeah, but skunks don’t bother you if they live with you.”
Charlie and Acheson were smiling open-mouthed at the girl, who was wearing sparkles in her dark curls and a red cashmere sweater in an unusual design. Probably whatever this girl said would be received as brilliant by these men.
Jake, sensing the attention from the other men, puffed up his chest and moved closer to her.
This was Frank’s daughter, but where was Frank? Mona hadn’t seen him for two weeks, since the night of town meeting. And why hadn’t he called? She folded the paper and stashed it under the counter.
The girl chuckled and looked at her. “Hi, Mona.”
“Hi.”
“I’m Erica. We met at town meeting.”
“Yeah, I know. Frank’s daughter.”
With her curly hair and open face, Erica was the spitting image of Frank in younger female form, even down to the way she breezed into a roomful of people and took the floor. “And this is Jake Perez.”
Jake gave a little bow.
“Yes, we’ve met.” Mona reached out to shake his hand. “I was just reading your article about the bridge. Well done.”
“Thanks. I assume you’re on the restoration side of the issue?”
“Absolutely. And I have some of my pamphlets in now, if you want to see one.”
“Actually, I found one at the library. But I wanted to ask you some more about the history of the bridge.” He unzipped his leather bomber jacket, and took a notebook and pen out of an inside pocket while Erica drifted over to the new organic cooler.
Mona told him about her great-great grandfather, Luc Cavalier, who had worked on the bridge. He had come down from Québec with his family in the beginning of the 1800s, and bought a big farm at the base of Wild Mountain for sheep farming. The Cavaliers were sheep farmers for almost a hundred years, breeding the fine Merino strain that supplied the growing textile mills in Vermont and New Hampshire. But at the turn of the century, breeders in the western states could sell the wool cheaper, and sheep farming went bust in Vermont. That land was all grown over with trees now, she explained.
Acheson and Charlie had gathered round to listen. Acheson nodded in agreement. “Completely different landscape now.”
Jake was writing fast. “So, the bridge was built—”
“Right at the peak of sheep farming, 1875.”
A slim, white-haired woman in a powder-blue parka came in the door and walked past them. She was carrying a package wrapped in brown paper. Charlie looked at his watch.
“They needed a better way to get east,” Mona went on, “over to Route 100, the main route north, and west to the Connecticut River. With the covered bridge, they could take their wool to the mills up in Winooski, as well as by boat to Bellows Falls.”
“Excuse me.” The white-haired woman had come back to the counter. “Why isn’t the post office open?”
“The hours,” Charlie proclaimed, “are nine to eleven-thirty and one to four-thirty. Posted on the wall.”
The woman looked at her watch. “Not open in the middle of the day?” Her voice was high, shrill. “I never heard of such a thing. A post office closed for an hour and a half!”
“Well, you’re in Vermont now,” Charlie said.
The woman walked out the door in a huff.
“Flatlander,” Charlie scoffed.
Jake smiled indulgently, as if he wasn’t a flatlander himself, and Erica stepped over to the counter carrying a carton of eggs, two containers of yogurt, a quart of organic mango juice, and a container of tofu. Erica sure had different eating habits than her father. “I didn’t know you had these organic eggs here, too,” she said, placing everything on the counter.
“Yes, from the Allingworth Farm.”
“Allingworth—the woman who’s chair of the select board?” asked Jake.
“That’s right. Roz.” Mona started to ring up the purchases, and Erica placed them gingerly in her “green” bag.
“I hear she’s been fighting for the gay marriage bill,” Jake said. Apparently, he hadn’t seen the petition yet, which was a good thing. The less publicity that nasty tract got, the better.
Acheson and Charlie exchanged a glance, and Acheson straightened up to his full six-foot-three height. “I saw a petition about her over at the hotel.”
Jake’s eyes widened. “A petition about Roz Allingworth? What for?”
“To kick her off the select board.”
“Oh. Mmm.” Jake looked puzzled. “Why?”
“Because of the gay marriage thing,” said Mona.
Charlie, uncharacteristically silent, was watching intently.
“But that’s terrible!” cried Erica. “Because she’s fighting for justice, they want to kick her out? What is this town? Mississippi in the sixties?”
“Well,” Acheson said, “it’s not only because she’s gay—”
“Oh, and she’s gay!” Erica exclaimed. “That’s even worse!”
“No, what I’m trying to say is, it’s not only because of the gay thing. A lot of people think she manipulated that bridge issue, as well, and stacked the deck against any dissent.”
Charlie pursed his lips and nodded.
“They think,” Acheson went on, “that she’s going to take us down the tax-and-spend road, like the rest of the Democrats in this country, and then life will be harder than it already is for those of us who don’t have lots of money.”
Jake, looking puzzled, studied Acheson, with his thinning wisps of blond hair, pointy face, form-fitting spandex jacket and running pants, and fashionable running shoes. “It sounds like you want her out, too.”
“I do. I signed the petition.”
Charlie gave a thumbs-up.
Erica clutched her green bag and stared from Charlie to Acheson while Mona and Leo stood quietly. Everyone, it seemed, was expecting Erica to explode, but instead, she rolled her eyes and said, “God.”
Jake smiled, wrote on his notepad, and homed in on Acheson. “What was your name, again?”
18
FRANK PARKED THE CAR AND STEPPED UP ONTO THE PORCH, shivering in the April air that felt bitter compared with the balmy spring mood at the rest area in Massachusetts. In New York, daffodils and tulips were blooming, but up here, the land was still bleak, and the cold felt like a sudden flashba
ck into winter.
Erica’s blue Mini Cooper and an old red Saab were parked in the driveway. He turned the doorknob and heard a squeal and muffled rustlings, and the bedroom door shut abruptly.
Oh, God. Erica. Frank walked inside, put down his duffel, and sank into the couch. This cabin was his hideout, his sanctuary. This was his quiet place. But now, there were rustlings and squeakings and muffled voices and emotions raging behind his bedroom door. He opened the stove and poked the fire with the tongs. Almost out. And only one twig of kindling in the basket. He sighed. Erica had never learned to tend the fire properly. He got up to go out to the woodpile.
“Dad!” Erica burst out of the bedroom, looking flushed and angry. “You were supposed to be in New York!”
“Well, I came back.” He stepped to the door and went outside. He had no desire to see Erica’s boyfriend emerge from his bedroom. Maybe Erica was an adult, as she kept reminding him, but that didn’t mean he had to feel any better about her having sex with some character he didn’t even know. As he trudged across the yard, a fat woodchuck toddled away into the hemlock grove. The sky was gunmetal gray, and Wild Mountain was no longer visible across the valley—but now there was a wet, tangy feel to the air, and a smell of pine, composted leaves, and wood smoke from the cabin. The breath of Vermont, he thought, like a quickening. A quickening had something to do with birth, he remembered. The moist air around his cabin felt like new breath, like he was being given life again. Would it be a new life here in Wild Mountain? Of course, he’d been thinking about nothing else, but really hadn’t believed he would actually move here. Not so easy to change a life. But standing here now, breathing this air, that new life felt more real than anything else.
Frank stepped over the bumpy yard to the woodpile. His woodpile, he had to admit, was very neat and tidy, and he stopped to admire the alternating north- and south-facing logs arranged in a pleasing log-cabin design. Though reluctant to spoil it, he started to pick some logs off the top.
Behind him, the cabin door was flung open. “Dad! Come and see Jake!” Erica’s voice was like a song, rich and lilting. Her moods could change abruptly, and, like him, she never stayed down for long.
Frank loaded his arms with wood, walked back up the steps, and stepped inside as Erica held the door. Wearing white leggings and a tight pink sweatshirt, Erica darted around the kitchen, while Jake, dressed in skintight black jeans and a black T-shirt, stood behind the counter. Frank recognized him now from the town meeting. Jake’s hair, like Erica’s, was black and curly. They could be brother and sister, Frank thought, not pleased with the idea. He went to the woodstove, opened it, and placed two logs inside, then stood in the doorway to take off his boots.
“Dad,” Erica said, glowing, “Jake wants to talk to you.”
Jake stepped forward and extended his hand with a crooked grin and no shame. These kids were a far cry from his generation, when at least you had the decency to hang your head and stutter when a girl’s parents caught you in bed with her. Jake had a dark complexion and light-colored eyes that seemed to change from brown to green as Frank shook his hand. “Pleased to see you again, sir,” Jake said. Sir. What game is this guy playing?
“And you.” What else could I do? he asked Patsy inwardly. Erica was an adult, after all, and neither Patsy nor Frank could control her life anymore.
When Erica was fourteen, she had come to New York for her Christmas vacation. By that time, she was already living in New Mexico with Patsy. Just before the trip, Patsy had phoned. “Erica needs a lot of supervision,” she said. “She’s sneaked out a couple of times, and gone to parties where she drank alcohol and smoked pot.”
“Well, it’s not like you never did that,” he replied.
“I know, but not when I was fourteen. And I’m pretty sure some of these kids had cocaine, too. I’m telling you, you have to watch her every minute. She’s started lying to me about where she’s going and who she’s with.”
“Okay,” he said, conceding; but underneath, he’d believed that Erica was forced to lie because Patsy was so overprotective and suspicious. He, on the other hand, had a relationship of trust with his daughter, and intended to treat her more like the adult she wanted to be. When she’d arrived at his apartment and begged to go out “exploring” the morning that he had to work, they talked about where she would go, who to talk to and who not, and when she’d be back. He gave her the key, and they were both satisfied, adult-to-adult, about the arrangement.
But when he got home at six, she wasn’t there. She was supposed to be home by five. Well, she probably got sidetracked, doing her Christmas shopping in some of the Village shops, he thought. An hour later, she still wasn’t home. The night was dark, and it was snowing, with a big storm predicted. After three hours, he went out on the streets looking for her. A drunk was sleeping in a doorway, a junkie leaned over offering sex to passersby, and five young men in a pack sauntered by, looking furtive and cocky. Suddenly, he saw how treacherous his neighborhood could be. And he heard Patsy’s voice from when Erica was five and they’d lost her in a department store. “Frank, you idiot! Pay attention!”
Maybe Patsy had been right, he thought that night in the Village, and he was an idiot. He imagined his daughter lured into some den of rapist-kidnappers, halfway to Morocco by now. But then he passed a bookstore, and through the window, glimpsed her long hair, wild and curly, her head bowed over a book. He rushed in, and she looked up, her eyes red and pupils dilated. Behind her lounged an emaciated red-haired man about Frank’s age, who looked alarmed when he saw Frank, and then seemed to fade into the woodwork.
“Dad!” Erica said, looking outraged and glancing around as the guy disappeared behind a bookrack. She showed no contrition about being late, only anger with him for humiliating her and scaring away her new friend. But when they left the bookstore and started walking on the sidewalk through the dirty snow and the crowd of people rushing along, she kept looking behind and to the sides.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
She burst into tears. “He was stalking me.”
Frank put his arm around her. He would protect his little girl, come what may.
But she had been fourteen then. What could he do now? He glanced at the door where Jake stood, putting on his shoes and looking as graceful as a dancer. Could you trust a kid who balanced on one foot while he tied his other shoe?
Erica, at the kitchen counter, spread goat cheese on slices of bread. She opened a jar of dried tomatoes in olive oil and picked some out, placing them on top of the cheese, and directed her gaze at Frank. “We’re going to Montpelier.”
“Research on the bridge?”
“No, a Freedom to Marry rally. Want to come?”
“A rally? I used to love rallies.” He looked around the room and saw the table stacked with the files for the Feral Journeys project he’d been planning to work on today. He supposed that could wait. “Well, why not?” He took his jacket from the hook, sat on a chair, and tugged on his hiking boots over his socks.
He checked the woodstove again, and the fire was burning hot and steady. This was not some half-assed fire. This was a fire that would last.
Frank stepped out onto the porch, where Jake was zipping up his leather bomber jacket and contemplating the view of Wild Mountain, now rising softly like a pillow out of the overcast sky. They stood side by side in silence for a few moments until Erica came out, the old canvas lunch bag they used to take hiking slung over her shoulder. “I’ll drive,” she said.
The front yard, uneven and pocked with ruts and bumps, was even more of an obstacle course today, with pockets of mud between the little hillocks topped with grass, and they had to pick their way over to the Mini Cooper.
Frank sat in the back seat. His ankle was just about healed now, but he put his foot up on the seat, just in case standing at the rally became tiring. In addition to his work project, he had planned to do some of his own research on the bridge and some more campaigning for Mona, but thi
s was a good cause. And, he admitted to himself, he needed to check out this character Erica was with. He adjusted his leg on the seat. But was he going a bit too far? He didn’t want to spy on her, but after that incident in New York when she was fourteen, Patsy had been furious with him. He could just hear what she would say now: Frank, pay attention! Find out who this Jake is.
The car bounced down the driveway through the avenue of pines, and when they turned onto River Road, he watched the swollen river beside them surging toward town. Would Mona be at the rally? No, of course not; she had the store to tend.
From the front seat, the voices of Erica and Jake rose and fell, intense, insistent.
“So, what do you think?” Jake asked, turning around and looking at Frank, his chameleon eyes curious.
“Oh, about what?”
“About the gay marriage bill, Dad,” Erica said, exasperation in her voice. “Do you think it will pass?”
“Oh, God, I don’t think so,” he said. “It’s too radical, even for Vermont.”
“I heard there’s a group of ultra-conservative church types from Idaho or somewhere coming to demonstrate against it,” she said.
“Kansas,” said Jake. “The Westboro Baptist Church, headed by the infamous Fred Phelps. They travel all over the country demonstrating against gay marriage. Their motto is God Hates Fags.”
Erica shuddered. “And they call themselves Christian?”
“Pretty scary.” Frank agreed. “It reminds me of the eighties, when we were demonstrating against apartheid in South Africa.”
“Oh, yeah?” Jake looked more interested. “Where did you do that?”
“Washington, D.C. The South African embassy.”
“And were church groups opposed to ending apartheid?”
“No. Not in this country. In South Africa, though, they believed apartheid was ordained by God.”
Jake looked at him with approval. “Just like these hate groups think heterosexuality is ordained by God.”
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