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The After House

Page 6

by Michael Phillip Cash


  “Like floating orbs,” Remy thought, but she chose not to mention them. It had to be a trick of light.

  Remy and her daughter stared at the messy floor. Flour was spilled on the counter. A planter had been overturned, the dirt sprayed across the floor.

  “Boys.” Olivia’s mouth pursed into a disapproving line.

  “What?” Remy turned to her.

  “The only one who could have done this is a boy. The question is, Mommy, which boy wants us to notice him?”

  Remy locked the door, then swept up the kitchen first so she could feed her daughter. She walked from room to room, turning on every lamp in the small house.

  “Why are you putting on all the lights?” Olivia stayed close to her.

  “It’s much nicer when it’s bright, right, Livie?”

  They ate soup and tuna sandwiches in silence. Olivia propped her head on her hand, looking irate. Her rosebud mouth was pursed, her brows wrinkled over her serious eyes.

  “It’s nothing, honey. Just a prankster or something.”

  “What’s a prankster?”

  “Someone who likes to joke,” Remy said.

  Olivia’s little face was glum. “Well, I don’t think this is very funny.” She pushed away her plate. “I’m done.”

  “No, you’re not. Livie, finish your food.”

  Her daughter showed her a decidedly mutinous pout. Remy could see an epic meltdown heading their way. She had seen it coming for a few days now, with the move, the new school, going to her father’s. Olivia kept things to herself and had a mostly amiable demeanor, but she had a formidable temper that lurked below the surface. “It must have come from Scott’s side of the family,” Remy thought with chagrin.

  Remy looked directly at her and told her sternly, “You’re asking for a time-out, Olivia.”

  Olivia shook her head. Her lips thinned. Tears brimmed in her eyes. Her bottom lip quivered ominously.

  Remy sighed loudly, her chest tight with anxiety. It was all going to fall on her own shoulders now. She was a single mom. Would Olivia stumble into the cracks with other kids who were trouble? Not enough parental guidance. No more good cop, bad cop. Her tag team of discipline was gone—not that it functioned really well in the past year. That’s when the whole thing fell apart.

  She watched her daughter war with her feelings and consider the half-eaten sandwich. Finally she pulled her plate back to give her mother the victory.

  “Good choices. I love it when you make good choices, Olivia. I’m very proud of you.”

  Remy changed the subject to the upcoming winter concert in school. She took down the extra bedding she kept for guests, and redressed the mussed beds. She tucked Olivia in after her two stories and a bedtime song.

  With a broom and a mop, she spent the next forty minutes cleaning the mess in her parlor. When she entered her study, she found her new television hanging from its arm, the glass shattered.

  “Why, Scott?” she asked the empty room, knowing he was the only one who could possibly do such a thing. But why would he want her to notice him?

  Eli watched the woman clean the mess, feeling his face tighten with shame. He hadn’t meant to be so destructive. He didn’t know what had come over him. He wanted to scare them a bit, just enough to make them leave. Having them here made him uncomfortable, brought back strange feelings. The child stared at the spot where he levitated as she climbed the steps to her room. Her eyes narrowed with anger, filling him with dread. She unnerved him, she did.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Olivia didn’t know what woke her, but her eyes opened to scan the darkness of the room. Protectively, she tucked the great blue whale she slept with under her arm. She petted his furry head attentively. Olivia sat up, then slid out of the pink confection of a bed. Her toes sank into the raspberry shag carpet as she approached the wall.

  * * *

  Eli sat on the top of her dresser, watching the girl’s movements as she walked around the room. His eyes glittered in the dark.

  “Wait for it. Wait for it,” he told himself. He planned on putting her in her place. It was time to take back his territory. He opened his mouth to roar.

  Olivia’s little fingers grazed the walls as she circled slowly in his direction. He had filled himself up with air, ready to unleash a blast of icy wind, when her chubby but determined fingers settled on his calf, squeezing his skin until he howled like a little girl.

  “Ow. . .ow. . .ow. . .”

  Olivia twisted again, causing Eli to rear up in pain, wondering how in the world she was able not only to find him but to touch him. Making a fist, she punched hard, this time slamming him in his groin, reminding him of a long-forgotten part of his body. He curled into a ball and rolled onto the floor.

  “Olivia, you OK?” Her mom’s muffled call floated up the staircase.

  “I’m fine, Mom,” she shouted, taking her petite foot and kicking him in the bread basket. “That’s for making a mess,” she hissed.

  Eli groaned, holding himself, then croaked, “Who told you to hit a person there?”

  “My poppi. Who are you?” Her amber eyes peered down at him intently, her little brow furrowed with anger. Eli might have laughed if it didn’t hurt so much. She was a miniature of the woman downstairs, but a termagant if he’d ever seen one.

  “You’re going to make some guy’s life a living hell one day, princess.” He crawled to be nose to nose with her. “Aren’t you afraid of me?”

  Olivia mutely shook her head. “Are you the captain? Do you know Stella’s mom?” Olivia peered closely at his face.

  “Who’s Stella?” he asked, watching her just as closely. Maybe the couple in the shiny clothes could scare her, but he sure as hell wasn’t doing much. “How did you know I was a captain?”

  “The painting in the living room. Do you live here too?” She kept up her rapid-fire questions. “Are you doing this because you like my mother?”

  “Like your mother?” Eli asked incredulously.

  “Are you trying to get her attention?” Olivia thought for a minute. “You know, you are not making good choices.”

  “Good choices?”

  “You’re asking for a time-out,” Olivia said as she climbed back into her frilly bed.

  “Time-out?” Eli wondered what she was talking about but found himself following her.

  “I’m tired. You have to do something else, because she was really mad about the mess.”

  “Mess?” Eli asked, bending over the bed.

  “Yes, the mess. As if you didn’t know,” she muttered. Olivia reached for the covers. “I can’t get them. Can you hand them to me?”

  Eli stood open mouthed, his hands slack at his sides.

  “The covers, please?” Olivia said.

  Without knowing why, Eli found himself tucking her in, a memory tickling at the back recesses of his mind. He watched her eyes drift shut. They widened as the little girl fought sleep. “I forgot to ask What’s your name?”

  He thought for a minute, reaching for the information. It had been so long, he wasn’t quite sure he could even say it. But he did. “Eli, Captain Eli Gaspar.” He bent low, close to her face.

  “Captain Eli. That’s a funny name.” Olivia patted his cheek. “Did you catch the whale?”

  This was crazy, the world was upside down. He had to think of something to get the upper hand. After all, who was in command of this ship? He was going to have to pull out all the stops and show this halfling who was in charge. Using all his energy, he turned transparent, his skin sliding off, leaving him a skeleton, his eye sockets empty but for worms. It was no use. The imp of Satan was snoring softly.

  Eli sat down on the carpet, humiliated. He had lost his touch. Too many years of comfortable existence with Pat. He was rusty, couldn’t scare a six-year-old. What was happening to him? He stared at her red-gold hair fanned out across the pillow. Taking a curl between his fingers, he caressed it. It was baby soft, like down.

  The room clouded, and distant cries
of seagulls filled the air. The ocean pounded against the shore, and the room faded into sepia-toned hues spangled with gold.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  1838

  “Wake up, Princess Charlotte.” Eli Gaspar nuzzled the petal softness of his daughter’s cheek. “Wake up, my sweet girl.”

  “Eli. Eli, is she up?” a musical voice called from downstairs. “Really, Eli, we’ll be late for church.”

  They could hear the distant bells of Saint John’s in the distance, calling parishioners to the Sunday services.

  Charlotte stretched widely and opened sleepy blue eyes.

  “Papa!” She jumped up and threw herself at Eli, who caught her deftly.

  He stood to his full height, his dark head grazing the low beams of the whitewashed ceiling. “Wisht, you little powder monkey.” He pulled off the sleeping cap that covered her bouncing curls. “You must have grown a foot,” he groaned, swaying as if she were too heavy to carry.

  “I mithed you!” Charlotte revealed a gap-toothed smile that sent Eli into whoops of laughter.

  “What happened to your teeth, kitten?”

  “Marcus hit me in the fath and knocked out my tooth.”

  “I’ll keelhaul the little bastard.” His face darkened.

  “No, no, Papa. He didn’t do it on purposth. He did it ’cause he likth me,” she explained, as if he were an idiot.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Eli!” Sarah called from the bottom step. “Eli, I can’t make the steps today. Please don’t make me climb the steps.”

  Eli and Charlotte exchanged guilty glances. He dropped her on the feather bed. “Come on, shark bait. We better get moving before your mother gets upset and has the baby early.”

  Charlotte threw on her dress, and Eli deftly buttoned up the back. They clamored down the steps, Charlotte on his back, Eli leaping off the last step to his daughter’s delight.

  “Eli, the noise, please,” Sarah implored, her hand at her temple.

  He had just gotten home from a six-week trip. Both he and his father-in-law had met their investors in Connecticut. He had struggled so to get here, his first command. He had served as second mate for the past seven years. Because he was working hard, he had missed every milestone from his honeymoon to the birth of his daughter, Charlotte, over the past half-dozen years or so. It was a hard life, but he loved it and saw great potential in it.

  They had scrimped and saved, and with his father-in-law’s help, his dream had just become a reality. His profit, along with the money Sarah’s father invested, made up for half of the cost of the twenty-thousand-dollar Mattie McGee, a neat little hundred-foot bark. Eli was excited— his first command. He swung his daughter around to land in a ruffled mess on the floor.

  “Gertie, get Charlotte’s spencer ready. Go on,” said Sarah. “Get in the trap with Gertie, and I’ll meet you there.”

  Charlotte ran after their cook to get her outer clothing and leave. Sarah turned to place her small hand on Eli’s chest. She pressed her big belly against his side. Eli wrapped his arms around his wife. The amber earbobs he’d purchased on his last trip winked in the sunlight pouring in through the spotless windows.

  “Do you have to leave so soon?” she pleaded. “The baby is due in just a few weeks.”

  He kissed her gently on her soft mouth. “This won’t be a long trip.”

  She eyed him distrustfully. “You said that the last time, and it was four years.”

  “Come on, Sarah. I’ve been hugging the coast for the last few years, taking in small loads. That trip was years ago.”

  It was still a bone of contention between them, sorely testing their relationship. He had left soon after they married for a four-year trip, making them enough to start their life together and purchase this little cottage. In her defense, he shipped out not knowing she was pregnant. If not for her parents, who lived up the hill, she would have lost her mind.

  After he returned and saw how she had suffered in his absence, he selected local jobs that took him away for shorter periods, but he didn’t make as much. He missed the open sea and the opportunities of better fishing. Sarah hated the whaling. She despised the odor that clung to him, the danger he put himself into. With her mother dying earlier this year, Sarah became more unreasonable. She was weepy, difficult, but a man had to support his family.

  “We need the money. I have to do this for your father, Sarah. He’s put up eight thousand dollars. I owe it to him.”

  “What about me?” she demanded. “You just got back.” Sarah rested her head against his chest, and a tear slid down her face. Eli hated when she cried. It always started with delicate sniffles and grew into dramatic sobs. She was a wee bit spoiled. Her father spoiled her, Eli spoiled her. He couldn’t help it. Sarah was special. She wasn’t cut out to be a whaler’s wife. She had grown up with finer things. As the daughter of a prominent attorney, she was used to her comfort. She never missed a chance to let him know what she thought of his career choice. She wanted him to open a shop or work in one of the many mills.

  Eli loved the sea and all that went with it. There was nothing more exciting than chasing whales all over the world. He had a chance here to change their lives. He made it up to his wife by stretching his budget and hiring both a cook and a tweeny—a little servant girl to clean the fireplaces, do the slops. It reduced the portion for his own needs. He wore old boots and a secondhand coat, but Sarah had what she needed. He looked down at her rosy complexion, framed by golden curls. She had dark blue eyes, rimmed with black lashes that could capture his attention without a word being said. He kissed her upturned nose, the dewy skin making him wish his daughter would go to church with Gertie and give him a few precious hours with the love of his life. He knew she loved him just as fiercely, and she had thought she understood his life when they wed.

  That was the lot of a whaler’s wife. It wasn’t easy, but it was the best opportunity for a poor boy from Long Island. His parents owned only enough land to help their older son, his brother Jacob. There was nothing left for Eli, not that it mattered. He had no head for farming, never had. He fished the harbor for years, selling oysters and clams to the Milleridge Inn. He got his first job at sixteen on a fishing boat. He made it to first mate by the time he married Sarah, shipping out on that long trip weeks after they married. It was one of the first to depart out of Cold Spring, but he made good money and was able to buy the small house for his little family without the help of her father.

  When Charlotte was born while he was at sea, he decided to change ships, taking quick runs instead, learning the waters of the North Atlantic, where they picked up blackfish and small pilot whales. They were easy to catch, yielding profitable quantities of oil, and hunting them trained him for the bigger prey in deeper waters. He flexed the muscles of his forearm. It was hard work, filthy, but it had the potential to make him a good life. They saved and saved, enabling him to buy in as a partner on the bark with his father-in-law and a couple of big shots from Connecticut.

  He was a merchant now and didn’t have to rely on his brawn. Soon he’d have a fleet of ships, he assured his wife. They would move to one of the bigger houses on the hill and have lots of servants. Couldn’t she see this time as an investment in their future? He and Sarah had both grown up in the town. She was educated at home, and he had attended West Side School, established in 1790. George Washington himself had set the rafters in that school. While he had gotten a fair education, a clerk job was not for him. His son would go to that school and maybe become a lawyer like his grandfather.

  Eli was an important part of the community now, not just another tar on a whaleboat. He was a captain, a businessman like Fred Allen, who ran the paper mill, or Josiah Banks, who owned the flour mill. He lived in a town that was being noticed because of whaling. The natural harbor made it important. He loved the little village, now bustling with excitement caused by the Jones brothers. They had invested in a whole fleet and were on their way to putting Cold Spring on the map. Th
ere was a need for whale products, and they lived in the center of the world right now. They had to take a chance.

  “Don’t you see, Sarah?” He held her away at arm’s length, looking at her piquant, heart-shaped face. “We finally caught the great wave. The Joneses understand what a perfect gift our little harbor is. They are buying a fleet, Sarah! A fleet of whaling ships all leaving from here. Already people are moving in—barrel makers, sailors, merchants, chandlers—all to feed this new industry.”

  “We don’t need it,” Sarah replied petulantly. “The Hewlett-Jones grist mill provides plenty of work. What do you need to kill all those poor whales for?” She stuck out her lower lip. “I don’t care if I live in a root cellar if it means you’ll stay home. Eli, I miss you dreadfully.” Her face turned blotchy, and he knew tears simmered beneath the surface of her smoldering blue eyes. He hated when she cried. It twisted him all up, staying with him long after he went to sea.

  Trying to distract her, Eli spun her around to a lamp hanging in the corner of the parlor. “Poor whales? Like reading late into the evening? Whale oil is progress, Sarah mine. Whale oil lets us work into the evenings, get more things done. It helps us grow.” Eli’s dark eyes gleamed with excitement. “The oil lubricates the machines that made the cotton for your dress.” He picked up a dainty parasol resting on the table, opening it with a snap. “Why, the spokes for your little umbrella are made from whale-bone. The city of New Bedford is already being called the ‘City That Lights the World.’ No part of the beast is wasted. The spermaceti from the whale’s head is used to make smokeless candles. Don’t you want to be part of this new age, Sarah? I don’t want to haul sacks of flour until my back breaks.” His dark eyes implored her. “Sarah, if I don’t do it, someone else will. Sweeting, I want you to live in luxury.”

  “No, you want to go chasing after your adventures whilst I stay here and give birth to your son!” She rested her hand on her bulging belly. “Charlotte hardly knows you.” The threatened tears spilled. She was not a pretty crier. The color traveled down to her neck until everything from hairline to bodice was beet red.

 

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