A Shiver of Wonder

by Daniel Kelley

  “And that is when she said it,” David murmured, knowing that it was so.

  Carol nodded. “Yes. Exactly. She had even drawn me a picture of what it would look like: a pale yellow moon rising over the hills above town, the sky a light purple, with stars blinking everywhere.”

  “And did it happen? Did you see it?”

  Another nod. “A week later, on a Thursday night. Thank goodness the next day was a teacher in-service day. I don’t think I could have come in if the students had been here. But I stepped outside around eight fifteen, looked up, and there it was. My husband and I live on Maple, just below downtown, and I’d wondered how she knew that I could see the hills, but… Oh, David. My heart just about stopped.”

  David inhaled, slowly, trying to take all of this in. “How did she… How did you know that the purple skies Clair mentioned were connected with your daughter?”

  Mrs. Jenkins smiled, as simultaneously it appeared as if she were about to crumble. Her voice was little more than a whisper. “That was the other thing she said, when she was holding my hand. ‘She’s all right,’ she told me. ‘She’s really all right.’ And as I stood there, gazing into that beautiful, beautiful night sky, exactly as Clair had drawn it, I was truly and finally able to let go of all the pain I had held onto for six years. I began to cry, and it began to flow out of me, into the heavens, onto the grass. I fell to my knees, and the more I cried, the better I felt. She was really all right, and I knew it, I knew it! The burden was lifted off of me. And even if my husband couldn’t understand me or what had just happened to me, that night was the first night’s sleep I’d had in years when I didn’t wake up and want to just die in the morning, or just crawl back into bed and stay there until kingdom come.”

  Carol reached for another tissue, and David looked away from her, toward the windows that overlooked the playground. He couldn’t see much more than the continuous bobbing of heads, but the muted cacophony from outside had been a constant since he’d entered Room 126.

  “On Monday, when the children came back,” she continued, “the first thing she did was smile at me. Just that. But I could tell that she knew it had happened.” Carol blew her nose into the tissue, and David once again turned toward the desk. “She’s a special girl,” she added. “A very special girl.”

  The second tissue was tossed as well. She wiped her eyes, and then folded her hands about her lunch as she cautiously met his gaze. “She worries, you know. I believe she worries about her… gift.”

  David blinked. “How do you know?”

  She glanced toward the ceiling. “It was a week and a half ago, I guess. Our discussion was about morals. Fables, and characters in the stories that face a choice. It’s usually clear which choice is the correct one, but sometimes a little more effort has to be made. Especially when the children are this age. Clair… well, Clair raised her hand and asked how a person knows if they are good or bad.”

  “A fantastic question,” David said.

  “I agree. But this is the first time since she arrived in my class that she’s willingly raised a hand, or spoken up without being asked something directly. ‘What do you mean, Clair?’ I asked her, trying not to give away the fact that my heart had begun to pound. She merely repeated herself: ‘How can someone tell if they’re a good person or a bad person?’ ”

  “The crux of every fable,” said David. “How the characters react to a situation relays to the reader whether their choices are good or bad.”

  “Exactly. A wise choice indicates that the character is good. A poor choice signals the opposite. Though obviously in some cases, the characters learn from their mistakes, and become good by the conclusion.”

  “So what did you tell her?”

  Carol shrugged, exhibiting a wry expression. “I made a complete hash of it. A fifth grade class would have eaten me alive, but first graders? They’re far more forgiving, fortunately. I tried to answer her question in regards to the fable we’d just been reading, The Ant and the Dove. But the whole time, as I kept looking at her, I just kept wondering how she’d known the things she had told me. After rambling on for a bit, I could tell that I’d lost the entire class, including Clair. But you can’t ever let on to that. I wrapped it up, tied a bow on it, and then asked if everyone understood what I’d been saying.”

  “Twenty nodding heads?”

  “Eighteen. The nineteenth was Clair, who looked disappointed in me.”

  David chuckled. And then his demeanor turned serious. “There was a murder in our building a few days after that.”

  “I know. She told me, and then it was all over the Courier.”

  “I…” But suddenly, David realized that he couldn’t relay his suspicions regarding Clair, Janice and Heck to Mrs. Jenkins. “I was glad that she talked to you about it. That she was able to. Mrs. Rushen – the woman who takes care of her – I don’t sometimes know if she’s…” He foundered for a few seconds while searching for the right words. “…able to see all that Clair sees.”

  “I’ve met Mrs. Rushen,” said Carol, “and I’m pretty sure that she can’t see what Clair sees.”

  “Her first name is…” began David.

  “Patricia. She’s quiet, but she’s gotten Clair to school on time every day, and she’s waiting for her each afternoon at three. That’s more than I can say for some of my actual parents.”

  “So she’s not Clair’s mother?”

  Carol smiled. “No. But you already knew that. What you didn’t know was her first name, and I probably shouldn’t have told you. But it slipped out before I could stop myself.”

  “Sorry,” David grinned. “May I ask one more silly question?”

  “This is certainly a good place for them.”

  “Is Clair’s last name Rushen?”

  Her head shook. “No. It’s not.”

  “And I can’t ask what it is?”

  Another shake. “You can ask, but I’ve probably broken half the rules in the school code today, so I’m not going to go there.”

  “It’s a game we play. Clair and I. She wants to know my girlfriend’s last name, I always ask if she’ll tell me hers.”

  An amused glimmer appeared in Carol’s eyes. “Something tells me she’s won that game, and a long time ago, too.”

  “Yeah.” David nodded. “Yeah, I’ve had that feeling.”

  “May I ask what it was that she said to you? That brought you here to see me?”

  Again, David understood that a simple response was undoubtedly the best response. “She told me yesterday that I would know myself. One day, soon. But what Clair says to people is anything but cut and dried. I’m not sure what to expect, but I’m hoping for something that’s not… frightening, I suppose.”

  “You should expect to know yourself, David. And maybe it will be as simple as that,” Carol said with a smile.

  David stood, and placed his chair back where it had originally been. “I’ve taken up your entire lunch break,” he said, “but thank you. Thank you for telling me so much, for talking with me.”

  She rose as well, and moved toward him. “Give me a hug,” she ordered.

  David complied, and was stunned by the strength with which she enfolded him. It was over almost as soon as it began, though, and she was again back by her desk. “It was good to meet you,” she said. “I can see why Clair enjoys talking with you. Your girlfriend is a fortunate woman.”

  Embarrassed, David nodded goodbye to her, and then turned and strode out into the hallway.

  ~*~*~*~*~

  Three-quarters of the way back to the school’s lobby, a door opened on David’s left. It was Clair, heading inside from the playground.

  Nobody was with her. The pair was alone in the hallway.

  “She’s nice, isn’t she?” Clair said as she halted before him. David noted that her saddle shoes looked entirely appropriate in this venue.

  The door clicked shut behind her, but David discovered that he had no ability to reply. All he wanted to do was to as
k yet again how she KNEW so many things that she shouldn’t know, and to engage in a normal back-and-forth conversation seemed ridiculous.

  “I knew you would like her,” Clair added with a smile. Her right foot tapped once, twice, the sound echoing down the lonely corridor.

  “How did… What are…” he managed to get out, but suddenly she was inches away, and her hand was gripping his once more. The heat that flowed from her was astounding!

  “Four things that you love, you will lose,” she said in that ordinary tone of voice that was so terrifying for its normality. “But one of them could be yours again. And I hope for that, David, I do.”

  And then a bell began to scream, and all around them, doors started slamming open as the hallway filled with children, practically pummeling each other as they scrambled toward their classrooms.

  Clair and David were their own island in the center of this, all else flowing around them. And then the bell ceased, and she took one step backwards. Her smile returned, hesitant and frangible. “Goodbye, David,” she said as she entered the stream. But it had been spoken so softly he hadn’t been able to discern the actual words.

  Within half a minute, the hallway was clear. David strode a bit unsteadily toward the street.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Shit,” David muttered to himself. “Shit! Seriously?”

  Detective Ormsby was in front of the Rainbow Arms, leaning nonchalantly against what was clearly his unmarked police car. He was working a toothpick around his mouth with fastidious pedantry, but pushed himself off the vehicle and tossed the toothpick onto the grass as David approached.

  “Mr. Wilcott. You made it back.”

  “Excuse me?” David was still reeling from his encounter with Clair at the school. “What could you possibly need from me now?”

  The detective smiled. The brightness of his teeth terrified David. “Just wrapping up a few details. Tying a ribbon around the box, as it were.”

  David halted a few feet away from him. “I read in the paper that you’ve got your murderers, and it’s just a matter of time before you catch them. Shouldn’t you be in Greenville? Shouldn’t you be chasing some real criminals instead of pestering citizens who had nothing to do with it?”

  Ormsby’s smile only widened. He had obviously anticipated David’s reaction to seeing him, and was ready to milk the antipathy until the well ran dry. “The newspapers are spewing trash, printing crap! It’s how they stay in business, you know.” He edged a step closer. “Let’s go through some of my questions again.”

  David closed his eyes, wondering if the whole afternoon was going to be a nightmare. It had been bad enough walking home from the school, trying to keep his head from swimming after the emotional encounter with Mrs. Jenkins and the latest pronouncement from Clair. Now, he was being baited by a puffed-up authority figure who clearly had a rather large ax to grind with him, for whatever reasons.

  “By the way, that is your dog making all that noise in there,” Detective Ormsby said. David opened his eyes to discover that his wish for the sidewalk to be cleared in front of him had not been granted. And indeed, he could hear the muted sounds of Johnson going more than a bit crazy inside apartment 1F. “I knocked. Several times,” he added. “But I knew you’d be back soon if Mr. Johnson was left home all alone.”

  “Johnson,” David automatically corrected him. “Just Johnson. Can I at least get him so he doesn’t tear the door down?”

  Ormsby’s eyebrows rose. “If you feel you need him here with you.”

  And as his face tightened, David berated himself for even asking; he understood as unmistakably as the detective had that Johnson would only have been a crutch for him. “Ask your questions,” he said aloud, his voice thick. “Let’s get this over with.”

  Again, a smile. Ormsby was reading him like a book. “You know, I looked you up online,” the detective said, his voice sickeningly pleasant as David’s heart began to sink. “Quite a few hits for ‘David Wilcott.’ Not many folks out there with that name. There were images, too. A lot of them.”

  David licked his lips, wondering how far this humiliation would go.

  “You were on quite a different career path then, weren’t you?” Ormsby’s head appeared to be growing larger. David could almost see the bristles sprouting from his nose and ears, the reddening of his eyes as they grew bulbous and malevolent.

  “It was a long time ago,” David replied, astonished at how calm he sounded. “It didn’t work out. I moved here.”

  “It wasn’t that long ago,” the detective countered. “I’d heard about it, of course. It was part of every late show monologue for weeks! But to have a superstar like David Wilcott come to my little burg of Shady Grove, and no one seems to know about it? Shameful, shameful. There’s something the Shady Grove Courier should have covered. Not this tripe about Greenville, and alleged squabbles between lowlife drug dealers.”

  David breathed in, breathed out. Breathed in, breathed out. No response was a good response.

  “Was that how you got Mr. Johnson? Oh! And my apologies,” Ormsby offered with a gallant wave of his hand. “Johnson, I mean. I recognized him in a few of the pictures as well. And speaking of which, what a girlfriend you had!” He shook his head while puckering his lips as though he was sampling a delectable wine. “Quite a looker, if I do say so myself. Not exactly who I would have imagined you with, but still… Amber, right?”

  “Camber,” David corrected, knowing full well that the detective was purposely muffing the names so that he would respond.

  “Camber,” was repeated thoughtfully. “Camber D’Angelo. That was it. She’s engaged to the first baseman of the Mets now, isn’t she?”

  David met his eyes evenly. “I wouldn’t know. We haven’t been in contact. Do you want to ask your questions now? Perhaps something pertinent to your case? Or would you like to cover who I dated in junior high as well?”

  “Background information, Mr. Wilcott,” Ormsby said, his whimsical air evaporated. “Background information is everything. It leads us to understand character, which allows us to determine motive.”

  “Motive for what?” snapped David. He couldn’t stop himself from taking a step forward. “You know I didn’t kill Heck. And it’s great that you can quote a textbook from your junior college days to me, but what’s your motive? Alleviating the boredom brought on by writing parking tickets for most of the year?”

  “Oh ho! A touch of the famous Wilcott wit!” Ormsby looked happy; his eyes were practically dancing as David once again attempted to clamp down on his ire. “You were the darling of the Internet world with that silver tongue of yours! How have they survived without you? And how is the world a better place without Puppy Love ’n Friends? Dot com, that is. Was it you who came up with that asinine gem, social petworking? God, how I love that phrase!”

  Social petworking. Social petworking. God, how David hated that phrase. “It wasn’t me,” he intoned, hating himself as well for bothering to chase the bait. “I was the background guy. I built the website.”

  “You mean you were the architect of the website,” Ormsby taunted. “But you were hardly in the background when the money started rolling in.”

  Gobs of money, buckets of money. David exhaled heavily, and his eyes found the façade of the Rainbow Arms, its peeling stucco patches, the dingy lobby that was smaller than David’s shoe closet had been a couple years before.

  “You guys tore up the town. Facebook for dog owners, right? What a pack of animals you became. Probably a good thing it all came crashing down before you crashed any more fancy cars, eh?”

  David’s eyes moved slowly toward Ormsby again. The Maserati had been a rental for the one evening, thank God. But the image of an inebriated David doing a jig on the side of the road while his chocolate Labrador sat obediently nearby, the most exquisite quizzical expression on its face, had quickly gone viral. The background, the neatly wrecked, bright red GranTurismo, had been endlessly photoshopped to become a cliff o
n the Alps, the surface of the moon, an audience with Queen Elizabeth II, the deck of the Titanic with the iceberg looming.

  The metaphors had been apt. Doubts as to the long-term financial viability of Puppy Love ’n Friends had already begun to creep into the news. The partying and antics of its founders had first brought in the investors, and then frightened a few off. David’s unintentional foray into a telephone pole while driving drunk with his promotional puppy Johnson along for the ride had driven the final nail into the coffin of the venture.

  “I hope you managed to put a few pennies by,” Ormsby said as he pitilessly met David’s hollow stare. “It would suck if this was all you had.”

  Once more, David closed his eyes, blotting out the detective as well as his malicious gloat. This was all he had, Goddamn it, but it was enough, it truly was. What were all of his former friends to him now? Nothing! And, no doubt, he was nothing but an embarrassing memory to any of them. The money was gone, the attention, the incredible prospects, the egotistical heights… yet what had any of those brought him? Where could they have taken him that could offer a richer life than what he had right here in Shady Grove?

  “What the hell’re you doin’ back?”

  David’s eyes flew open. It was Bill, angrily mauling his unlit cigar as he stomped out of the Rainbow Arms’ lobby toward Ormsby.

  “Does nobody have respect for the law down here?” the detective asked as he turned. “I’m questioning a witness. Back off, Lo-pes!”

  Bill’s countenance became ugly. His fists balled, and David wondered if he were so hung over that he would actually do something as stupid as to hit Ormsby. He probably could have knocked him out more easily with the fumes coming out of his mouth.

  “It’s Lopes, you jackass,” Bill snarled. “And why don’t you take a flying leap off a really tall building?” He came to a stop, a foot away from the detective.