by E. F. Jacks
Chapter Twenty-One
Pauline
After I have lunch with Mom, I set out to call information for the phone numbers of the Denise Hayes’ I found. I hope to match the real woman with a phone number and an address if possible. I don’t want to visit any of the addresses I found until I’m certain I’m going to the right house.
Mom doesn’t know the whole story about Ellis other than he was my guide on the trip. I promised myself I’ll be honest with her from now on, but it seems too risky to share this secret even with her.
I sit at my desk and open my spreadsheet for this project, which will be a minor project because I won’t put too much time into it. Yeah, right. I’m dying to find out about Ellis. I can’t get him off my mind. Even reapplying to college programs isn’t enough of a distraction for me.
From the phone information service, I get a few numbers for a Denise Hayes in Appleton and enter them in a section of the spreadsheet below the addresses. No matter how pleasant or desperate sounding I make my voice, the operator won’t help me match the numbers with the addresses I have because it’s against their policy. In total, I have ten phone numbers.
No one answers at the first number, and when I call the third number, the man on the other end hangs up on me. The fifth person, a woman, makes it clear upfront that she isn’t who I’m looking for. She proceeds to talk my ear off for ten minutes anyway. I have to hang up on her mid sentence, or else there’s no way I’m going to get through all these numbers.
By the ninth call I’m ready to give up.
The phone rings four times before a woman with a soft, welcoming voice picks up. “Hello?”
In my gut there’s the instinct that I’ve finally found the right woman. Then I’m at a loss for words.
The friendly tone in her voice doesn’t change. “Hello? Anyone there?”
“Um. Yes. May I speak with Denise Hayes?”
“That’s me.”
“You don’t know me, but…”
The pitch in her voice rises and she sounds a little alarmed. “Who is this?”
“My name is Pauline Choice. Are you the same Denise Hayes who’s looking for her brother Shane?”
Her silence hangs in the air and stays there for a while. “Did you read that in the papers?” From her voice, it seems this has happened before—people calling her after seeing the story in the newspapers, perhaps with false leads.
I pause. How can I put this to her? What if she becomes hysterical? “Yes, but I’m for real. I mean, there’s no other way to put it. I’m pretty sure. No, I’m positive. I’m positive I’ve met your brother recently.”
There’s a soft noise on her end, and it takes me a moment to fathom that she’s sobbing.
“Are you all right?” I ask.
“How can this be, what you said about Shane? Miss, where is he? Where is he?” I can hear her hysteria through her voice. There’s a thud on the other end and then she’s gone.
“Hello?” I say.
She comes back on. “Sorry, I dropped my phone. Oh, God, my hands are shaking so much. Are you for real? What you said—it’s true?”
I exhale. “The guy in the newspaper photo is the same guy I’ve seen. Talked with. Slept with.” This is starting to sound as though I picked him up in a bar somewhere. “I live near Boston. Is there any way we can talk?”
Her voice lifts with hope. “Shane’s in Boston?”
“No. I met him when I was visiting Canada, actually.”
Disappointment colors her voice. “Oh. Do you want to talk in person? I guess you sound pretty normal. My husband’s at work and my kids are here. I work from home. If I give you my address, can you stop by today?”
“Sure,” I say.
She reads off her address.
“Do you want me to come by now?” I ask.
“Oh, yes, you have to if you can. I need to hear about Shane. I need to know where he is.”
“I’ll leave my house in a couple of minutes and should be at your place in less than an hour.”
“We’re the first house on the right. The outside’s painted light blue.”
I want to make a good first impression and also let Denise Hayes know upfront, at least visually, that I’m not indeed a lunatic looking for my fifteen minutes of fame, so I change into work slacks and a dressy summer top.
I tackle two steps at a time as I race downstairs, armed with my purse and directions to Denise’s house.
Mom stops me at the front door before I can sneak outside unnoticed. “What are you up to, sweetheart? Are you going out to see a friend?”
There’s so much hope in her voice that I don’t know how to break it to her that I don’t exactly have any friends left outside of this house. I try my best to fill my voice with enthusiasm. “No, I’m just visiting someone about that guide who was with me during the trip. I’m going on a quick visit to Appleton.”
“Appleton? Is this guide the one you haven’t heard from and were wondering what happened?”
That’s about all I told her. There’s a sparkle in her eyes. Does she think…How can she know how I feel about him? “But all I told you about him was that he was my guide, my rock, and then he wasn’t.”
“Honey, mothers always know. Good luck. Be safe. You have your phone with you?”
I nod.
“Call me when you get there,” Mom says.
She cares about me, but as long as I’m living under her roof, she’ll think of me as a kid. It’s time for me to create a life for myself again outside of my family’s house and return to school. Will there be a place for Ellis in that life?
I close the door and head outside into the sun filled afternoon.
The day stays warm, and I have the car top down, with the radio on low. I never thought I’d get this involved in Ellis’s life. In Shane’s life. But despite what he’s done, he’s also served his country, and I want his family to know he’s safe and for him to know who he is again. While doing this won’t bring him back to me, it might return him to his family.
Without much traffic this time of day, after lunchtime and before the rush hour, I make it to Appleton in under thirty minutes.
I pull up in front of a large, pale blue saltbox house that’s exactly as Denise Hayes described and park in the street so I don’t block the car in the driveway. I call Mom to let her know I’m okay. I think about calling Denise, too, to tell her I’m outside her house.
I decide against it, step out of my car and walk up the low stone step to ring the doorbell. Children call to each other from within the house. An attractive, dark-haired woman whom I recognize from the newspaper photo peeks out of the oval glass piece cut into the front door. The knob rattles and the door swings open.
Her smile, with her lips pressed together and tightened, reveals her uncertainty about my intentions, and her voice is thick with anticipation for news of her brother. “Pauline?”
“It’s good to meet you, Ms. Hayes.” I shake her hand.
She waves off my formality. “Please, call me Denise.” She waits a few moments to let her guard down and invite me inside, as though she’s still deciding something about me before I enter her home.
I offer up a little more about myself, and finally she says, “Come on in.”
Once I’m inside, I see she’s taller than me by a foot. Maybe not quite. But almost. Impressive heights must run in their family. What would it be like to be a part of Ellis’s family? I’ll never get to find out.
Denise shuts the door behind me. A little boy and girl wait in the hallway. They have dark hair and blue eyes like her. “These are my children, Andy and Erica. They have off from school today.”
The girl looks older than the boy. The kids wave to me and then chase each other away. Their giggles are like small bursts of a pleasant song echoing through the hall.
The living room Denise escorts me to is decked out with overstuffed brocade furnishings, and is comfortably cool. It’s neat despite the children’s toys spread over
the polished wood floors. Through the French doors, I spot the kids sitting on a new-looking leather couch watching TV. The dishwasher is churning in the kitchen.
Denise shows me to an armchair near the fireplace and I sit down. She settles on a chair across from me.
“Sorry about not letting you in right away back there. I just had to see for myself that you aren’t crazy. With the story in the newspapers, once in a while I get a few people contacting me with all sorts of wacky ideas about Shane.”
“I understand,” I say.
“Would you like something to drink? Coffee perhaps?” She rises from her seat.
“No, thanks. I’m okay.” I think back to when Ellis and I made coffee over the campfire.
Denise sits down again. “How do you know him?” She scoots closer to me in her seat and peers across at me in anticipation.
My lips part to answer. There’s a commotion coming from the TV room and then Denise excuses herself to check on her kids. I look around the tidy living room and think about how much I should tell her.
After a minute, she returns and reseats herself. “How do you know Shane?” Her face brightens when she shows me a photo on her phone of her with a slightly younger version of a guy I recognize as Ellis.
“That’s him.” I tell her about Ellis working as a guide and how I met him. I leave out the darker parts of the story and call him Shane not Ellis. It’s up to him to tell her more than the basic facts. “When I saw your social media posts on him and recognized him from the photo, I knew I had to reach out to you.”
Denise nods and seems to believe my story. “Where is he? Where’s Shane?”
“I’ll admit I’m not sure. The last I saw him he was working outside Vancouver.”
Astonishment raises her voice. “He made it all the way to Canada?”
“Yes, that’s where I left him, in Canada.” Or rather where he left me. My ears are hot with anger at his abandonment. “May I ask, I read in one of the articles that you’re orphans...”
Denise stares at her hands folded in her lap. She places her hands on the armrests, squeezes, and then leans back with her eyes shut. She opens her eyes and speaks in a hushed tone so as not to let her kids hear from the adjacent room.
“I didn’t want Shane enlisting in the Marines because I felt something bad would happen to him, and I guess it kind of did.” Her smile is sad, and there’s a distant glaze in her bright blue eyes. “We lost touch after he left, and I lost track of him. We pretty much only had each other for a while and I always felt Shane and I would be close for our whole lives. Our parents died in a house fire after our older brother Joshua killed himself in college.”
“I’m so sorry.” I hold back telling her about Sam. It must be hard enough for Denise to confide in me without me unloading my life on her also.
“And I took care of Shane after our parents passed on. Of course, I wasn’t much older than him. I was a teenager. I always wondered if our parents had intentionally hurt themselves while he and I were out shopping for their anniversary present that day, because they couldn’t bear to go on without Josh in their lives. He was the star of everything—school, our family. They left a little insurance money, but it went fast, and I had to leave school early and go to work. Seems like a long ago memory now that I’m married and have my own kids. My husband—he’s a good man. I moved on. Shane couldn’t.”
Her story about Josh reminds me of Sam.
“Shane thought our mom and dad loved Josh more than us. But the fire might have been an accident.” From her voice, it appears she’s making an effort to reassure herself with her statement. “I think he left home to escape Josh and our parents’ deaths. Did you know his girlfriend got married to another guy not long after he left to serve? She always wanted a big wedding. Couldn’t wait for Shane to share it with her, though. Her name’s Linda. She still lives back near Albany.”
“Maybe she didn’t know he was still alive,” I say quietly.
Denise lowers her eyes and doesn’t answer me. Apart from a similar hair color, her eyes are different than Ellis’s, and I wonder what their brother Josh looked like.
She looks across at me. “I am just so relieved to hear Shane’s okay. I hope you can find him again.”
You can find him. From her comment, it almost seems as if I don’t have a choice. Reconnecting her with her brother is my obligation.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ellis/Shane
The spray of the hotel shower blasts at my face. Steam engulfs the bathroom. Even with the fan on the shower fog is so thick I can only just see through the glass door. I’ve been in here for an hour trying to get my mind off Pauline. Even during my strong headaches I can’t stop thinking about her. And when the ringing in my ears is as loud and persistent as a timer going off in my head, I can fight through it by thinking about Pauline.
Ever since I left her at the sheriff’s office in that little town, I can’t not think about her. But, after we tied up her ex and his brother, I promised myself I’d get Pauline into town and out of harm’s way and then leave. I wouldn’t stay behind to hear that she hated me when I told her I love her. I couldn’t bear knowing in my gut she’d choose not to have me in her life.
A few hours ago I arrived in Boston and checked into my hotel. Getting a five star hotel wasn’t a problem. I wasn’t lying when I said I made some money. Getting Pauline back will be harder. Still, I’ve come here to see her. Since she said she’s been living with her parents, I’ve gotten their address through a computer search I did at the library. I refrained from looking up Pauline’s film. Although I’m not the jealous type like her ex, knowing her like I do, I wouldn’t feel comfortable viewing her without her consent.
I’d been paid anonymously and had no idea what I was getting into with the rafting trip. What those two assholes did and wanted to do to Pauline gutted me. I quit the business for good once and for all because of the experience. I have no idea what’s in store for me next, although I know it will be a normal occupation and an honest life.
I could do research online about my past to find out more of my story. I do remember I have a sister somewhere out there, only I’m afraid those who I discover might not like who I’ve become.
No matter how hot I turn up the water, I can’t wash away the memories of Pauline. She’s the first person to change me and to make me change myself.
I shut off the water, step onto the plush shower mat and dry myself off. I planned to grab dinner at the Italian restaurant downstairs in the hotel lobby and then head out to Pauline’s parents’ place. Now I don’t know if I can face her in person, or even talk to her on the phone to let her know I’ve arrived.
If I’m going to make contact with her I want to do it the right way, and that’s face to face. I can’t stop seeing her face. How her lower lip sticks out whenever she’s worried. And how every time I saw that, I wanted to lean down and kiss her troubles away.
I also want to do what’s best for her, and I don’t want to complicate her life, or worse, risk upsetting her by showing up unannounced.
The balcony in my room overlooks the city center. After I leave the bathroom and get dressed, I stand outside and take in the magnificent view. The night air is warm, and seasoned with the smells of food and the noises of people’s lives.
Somewhere out not far beyond these shining buildings is the girl I’ve come to love. Does she think about me the way I do about her? Maybe she’s decided to forget me, or maybe I don’t mean as much to her as I thought and she didn’t have to put much effort into making the memories we shared fade.
Sometimes the whole rafting trip seems like both a dream and a nightmare. A dream because I met Pauline. A nightmare because of what almost happened to her. What I almost let happen. The experience snapped me out of the desperate, miserable stupor that had begun to encircle my soul when from afar I watched Linda step into the limo before her groom after their church wedding.
I care for Pauline in a way I couldn’t love
Linda. There’s a sadness way down inside Pauline that matches mine. Our backgrounds are somewhat similar but at the same time different. Yet for some mythical reason it works and we work as a pair.
I need another day to decide. Either I will go see Pauline tomorrow by the afternoon, or I’ll leave the hotel and Boston without her knowing I was here, which might be best for her.
I square my shoulders and shut the balcony door behind me, set out for a solitary, unfulfilled night of eating room service and watching television in an air-conditioned hotel room. A night without Pauline.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Pauline
The next afternoon’s warmer than the previous one, and I’m reading out in the backyard while swinging in a hammock tied between the shade of two oak trees. The leaves above me tremble in the breeze. Since having to abandon my Kindle in Canada, I’ve gotten a new one. The loan company hasn’t returned my call yet, and I’m considering going to the police in case Seth’s family is trying to bribe me.
Mom opens the sliding glass door behind me. I look up from my reading and peek over my shoulder at her.
“Someone’s here to see you,” she says from the patio.
I’ve been so engrossed in the story and the glorious weather that I didn’t hear a car pull up. “Who is it?” Frank’s at work, so it can’t be him. And Seth’s jailed in Canada. Nick’s out on bail.
Mom shrugs. “They say they’re a friend of yours, sweetheart.”
After the trip, I don’t like surprises anymore. But Mom looks composed. I roll onto my side in the hammock, swing my legs around and hop down. My bare feet touch the cool, dry lawn and swish through the grass as I walk toward the patio. Mom takes my Kindle from me. I walk ahead of her into the house through the sliding glass door and then around to the hallway.
