A Keeper's Truth

by Dee Willson

  “Abby, baby, what are you wearing?” I’m having trouble breathing.

  “Daddy’s pajamas.”

  Meyer was a die-hard Maple Leafs fan. Game days were pajama days. Always.

  I fall to one knee beside Abby and pull her into my arms. I kiss her face. Grams has both hands over her mouth.

  Abby weasels out of my grip and stands back, tapping her wings on the floor. “So Daddy can find me,” she says. “He likes candy.”

  “He . . . does,” I whisper, gently working out the creases in the jersey with trembling hands.

  Grams rises from the couch and heads for the door. A bowl of candy waits beside the pumpkin we carved before dinner, and Grams picks it up, visibly relieved to find Gramps hasn’t made it to the door yet. Her eyes are red.

  I take Abby by the hand and open the door. “Let’s go get some junk.”

  The moon casts an eerie glow onto the street sparsely dotted with kids fluttering about in their costumes. Most of the families out this early have young children in tow, making their way from house to house. I park Abby’s wagon so no one trips over it, waiting at the end of a long driveway while she runs to the door. She skips, humming some muddled tune that sounds dubiously related to the theme song for The Addams Family. I find this amusing. Abby’s never heard of The Addams Family and I’ve never watched it, not even as a kid. The show scared the bejesus out of me. And goodness knows my imagination didn’t need any assistance on the horror front.

  A muffled growl assaults me from the left and the cricket orchestra pauses in fear. I hold my breath, suddenly tense, cursing the city for placing the streetlights so far apart. Something snarls, and I search the trees where shadows come to life, spinning gruesome scenarios through my mind. A figure jumps to my right, roaring, and I tumble over the wagon.

  “What the hell?” I scream as the man steadies me.

  “Gotcha,” he says. His laugh is a garbled mess under the rubber zombie mask.

  Backing up, I twist the wagon between us. I can’t see his eyes, but his smile can’t hide behind the gaping mouth hole.

  “Thomas?”

  He raises gnarly rubber gloves. “How’d you know it was me?”

  “You’ve got teeth straight out of a dental advertisement. And the hoodie and shorts kinda blow the look.” Thomas removes the mask and runs a hand through his hair, throwing reckless curls into absolute mayhem. I run the wagon into his shins. “You scared the shit out of me!”

  Thomas grins, shrugs. “Mission accomplished.”

  “You know it’s October, right?” I point to the shorts then gather my sweater for warmth.

  “Broken thermostat.” He watches Sofia lock hands with Abby as they cut across the yard to the next house.

  I study him, wondering, thanks to Karen, if he’s holding out for something other than idle friendship.

  “What’s new with you?” he says.

  Losing my mind, seeing things. “Nothing much.”

  Thomas pushes the sleeves of his hoodie up, mindlessly fingering a nasty scar that runs from elbow to thumb. I’ve seen the scar before but have never thought to ask about it. We never talk about anything personal.

  “What’s that from?” I ask before thinking.

  Thomas tugs his sleeves down. “Boating accident.”

  He’s lying. I have this way of knowing the truth about someone, a sixth sense you could say. He’s hiding something, but I’m not about to pry. I glance at him sideways, curious. It’s the first time I’ve noticed the color of his eyes, a bluish gray that matches the shade of his sweater.

  We follow the road, the wagon looking like a miniature toy behind Thomas’s towering stature. I hide my hands in my pockets. I’ve been brooding over my ring lately. Should I take it off? Are you no longer Mrs., no longer married, once you’re a widow?

  Till death do you part.

  “How long did you wear your wedding ring after you and your wife . . .?” I immediately regret asking. Other than assuming Sofia had a mother at some point, I don’t know a thing about Thomas’s past. I think Karen once mentioned he’s divorced, but I wasn’t really paying attention to the conversation.

  Thomas looks away, and for a moment I think he’s not going to answer me, but he changes his mind. “I hadn’t even thought of it until I ran into a friend a few months after . . . the divorce. He and his wife split the year before and he donated his ring to charity. Mine went by burial at sea.”

  “Boat or toilet?”

  Thomas looks amused but doesn’t answer.

  “What happened to prompt a divorce?” The words are out before I think twice, and Thomas just stares at me from several feet away. I haven’t known him long enough to read his face, but I’m not blind. Several emotions flutter through those glazed eyes.

  “She left me.”

  I kick at a weed growing out the side of a clump of gravel and dirt. Abby comes running, almost tripping over the jersey, and shoves a handful of candy into the pillowcase stashed in the wagon. I wipe the chocolate off her chin, and she and Sofia head to the next house.

  “I’ll give you the pretty picture,” Thomas says when the kids are out of earshot. “My wife wasn’t sure she wanted children. We had Sofia, and I was the happiest man alive.” He beams, watching Sofia twist from side to side to keep a chubby poodle from swiping the licorice hanging from her coat pocket. “We fought about having another—and other things, of course. There are always other things—I wanted a son.”

  A son. A sibling for Abby. That’s what Meyer wanted. That’s what we both wanted.

  Thomas flinches as if slapped. “She got herself fixed.”

  Yikes. That’s as drastic as a concrete wall. And that final. I opt to change the subject to something less bleak. That was his pretty picture.

  “How’s everything at the farm? Last time I saw you there was a situation with a foal.”

  Thomas houses some forty-odd horses and a couple of dozen goats. He’s also got a donkey, a pig, and a flock of geese. Whenever I bring Abby by to play with Sofia, I have to wander about the farm to find them. Sofia is usually playing, Thomas close by working with the horses or tending to a repair. The guy wears the outdoors like a layer of skin, camouflaged by his surroundings.

  “Filly’s got her land legs now. She can even outrun her brother.”

  For the first time I notice Thomas has a slight American accent.

  “Have you always worked with horses? Where did you live before moving to Carlisle?”

  “Everywhere. Nowhere important. Chicago.”

  “The city?” I can’t imagine Thomas living in a city.

  “The one and only. I didn’t work with horses then.” He starts to look uncomfortable again. “I didn’t work with animals much at all.”

  “So what did you do in Chicago?”

  “Well,” he squeezes the bridge of his nose, “I was a teacher.”

  Really. Now that I hadn’t expected either.

  “What did you teach?”

  I pretend not to notice Thomas pulling himself together, picking at a hole in the seam of his shorts. He seems more tortured by this line of questioning than he did when talking about his wife. Maybe I should bite my tongue and avoid topics that don’t revolve around the weather or our kids.

  “I didn’t mean to—”

  “I’m a dad. Without a mother, Sofia needed me. And I needed her to know she was the most important thing in my life. I moved here, to Carlisle, to start fresh, to leave all that behind. Is it so hard to imagine needing a new life?”

  Is it hard to imagine? Shit no. I’m the poster child. This spurs all kinds of questions, questions about Thomas, but I lay them to rest. He’s his little girl’s hero. I leave it at that.

  The air has adopted a winter-like crispness, working its way under my sweater, and Abby’s fervor has dwindled. Her pint-size feet take three steps for every one of ours, and the Keds, meant to give my angel a running start to fly, seem to drag behind. We plan one last stop before calling it a nig
ht. We can’t miss Mrs. Maples on Halloween.

  At the very end of our street, huddled behind towering cedars and white pines, is an ancient farmhouse. Although the house saw the raising of a half-dozen gangly boys into strapping men, it now enjoys the quiet bliss of one, Mrs. Maples. Mrs. Maples goes all out for Halloween. For weeks prior you can find her frail, eighty-pound body dragging decorations from the barn. Cocky kids and curious adults come from who-knows-where to brave the walk beneath ominous trees with frightening ghouls to pocket one of Mrs. Maples’ renowned goodies. Even I’ll endure this nightmare set-up for one of her candy apples.

  We take slow, arduous steps toward the farmhouse porch, turning every so often in response to nail biting shrieks and piercing yellow eyes that assault us from the dark foreboding trees that line Mrs. Maples’ driveway. Orange lights flicker, illuminating ghosts hung from branches, goblins sneering from under fake grass hills, and tombstones claiming the dead. Horrified screams and animalistic howls seem to pour from the wood siding as we approach the house, and less than two feet from the stairs, the girls stop cold. I stand on one side of Abby and Sofia, Thomas on the other, both of us watching their faces. Abby seems torn between ringing the bell and bolting as fast as her runners will take her.

  The front door creaks open with an artificial screeching sound that must be from some sort of battery-operated device because no door really sounds like that, and there stands Mrs. Maples, all four and a half feet of the eighty-nine-year-old. A black wig matted into a once-chic sixties hairdo hangs to her knees in clumps. Ash colored net-like material clings to her body, chin to toes. A bodice covered with glimmering sequins flattens her chest, wrapping around her waist and over her legs, pooling into a black-feathered fish tail.

  We all laugh.

  “You’re one nasty looking mermaid,” I say.

  Mrs. Maples snickers. “If Walt can take liberties, so can I.”

  She’s referring to Walt Disney. We’ve talked about this before, how ancient myths change over time, becoming twisted with every generation of storytellers.

  Mrs. Maples swings her cane, motioning us to step inside while she holds the door. The smell of death permeates her skin, and gelatinous make-up blots her hands and face. Abby and Sofia leap into her arms, giggling, and Mrs. Maples plants a wet one on each cheek before stepping back to consider Abby’s hockey jersey.

  We exchange looks but neither of us comment.

  “Vindictive oafs,” Mrs. Maples huffs, waving a hand at the life-size mermaid statue that resides in an alcove off the foyer.

  Mrs. Maples has a love-hate thing for mermaid folklore. Apparently mermaids were once people, legs and all, who deserved to be thrown from their land during the great deluge. Those who didn’t drown adapted to life amid the waves. Many became bitter, angry. They’d lost everything that mattered to them: land, riches, power. They blamed others for their demise and in retribution lured innocents to their deaths for centuries. Misery loves company. Tonight the three-thousand-year-old bronze mermaid unearthed by archaeologists in the Middle East dons a dusty pirate hat.

  “Fitting,” Mrs. Maples says, eyeing the hat.

  Mrs. Maples is eccentric. And slightly off her rocker.

  She winks at me then disappears into the kitchen. Thomas stretches to investigate a wall of sepia photos and almost topples the table of tribal masks balancing precariously on metal stands. He steadies one then yanks his hand as if bitten.

  “For my young ladies,” Mrs. Maples says, tail swishing. She blows Thomas a kiss. “Candy apples, green ones, just how you like ’em.” She pokes the end of her cane at a basket of apples. “One for each, your Grams and Gramps included.” She points a bony forefinger at me. “One special, to bring sleep.”

  Man, how bad do I look if she can tell I’m not sleeping?

  “Nightmares are getting worse,” I say. We’d talked about them a bit the last time she stopped by the house for tea. I kept the café delusion to myself. Forgetting about it altogether would help me sleep. “How can an apple—”

  “In times of stress, the mind opens. Some call it the third eye. It allows us to see things as they really are, keeping us mindful of our inner strength. Some are stronger than others. I say it’s a gift.”

  “I say it’s time to go,” mumbles Thomas.

  Mrs. Maples grabs a fist full of Thomas’s sweater and pulls him down to her level, patting him on the side of the face. “’Tis our soul coming to the rescue.” She shakes her head and a cloud of make-up dust billows from her wig.

  “Sure it is.” Thomas gently grabs Sofia by the shoulder.

  “Do not fret,” Mrs. Maples says, waving a hand in my direction, “the body will know.”

  “Know what?” asks Abby, taking my hand.

  The doorbell shrieks.

  “Thanks not necessary.” Mrs. Maples opens the door, driving us out with her cane. I fumble onto the porch, trying to figure out what an apple has to do with an eye and why nightmares are gifts. A devil and his father step past us into the foyer.

  “Enjoy that party!” Mrs. Maples calls out, slamming the door.

  I wheel around, staring at solid wood, my breath swirling in the porch light. When I last had tea with Mrs. Maples I didn’t mention Halloween. How does she know I’m going to a party?

  “What party?” asks Thomas.

  I step down the stairs, pausing for a second peek at the door. If Mrs. Maples heard there was a party tonight, I guess she’d assume I’ve been invited.

  Thomas steps in front of me. “What party?”

  “The Halloween party at the Vandemere estate.”

  Thomas runs a hand through his hair. “That’s fishing the deep end of the pool, that guy is bad news.”

  “Aren’t you going?”

  “No. And neither should you.”

  Abby calls from halfway down the driveway. She’s tired and wants to go home.

  I allow doubt and confusion to slip from my mind and hurry to catch up, waving goodnight to Thomas and Sofia.

  The night suddenly feels claustrophobic. The hairs on my arms stand on end. Fiendish cries echo through the trees and illusory claws paw at me from the dark. Fumbling, I try to shake the sensation of being watched, studied . . . stalked.

  I scoop Abby up, placing her in the wagon, and hightail it home.

  The Keds are just not fast enough.

  At home, Abby sprints to the kitchen to sort candy with Grams, and I head upstairs to calm my nerves and dress for the party. Gramps is parked by the open door with a huge bowl of lollipops on his lap, waiting for the next round of kids. I’m at the door to my bedroom when he calls out to Abby, urging her to hurry to see what’s coming up the driveway. The patter of Abby’s feet rumbles through the floors as I wiggle out of my jeans and sweater, throwing them onto the bed.

  I step closer to the mirror and glide my hands over my belly as I turn, the side view taunting me. If Meyer were alive, maybe I’d be pregnant. I’d thought I was—hoped I was. I’d missed a period after the funeral and dreamed, for a brief time, we’d created the family we so dearly wanted. But it wasn’t meant to be.

  I arch my back, filling my insides with air, pretending.

  The air rushes out in a great whoosh, heat flushing my cheeks. Thanks to Meyer losing control of his car, that dream is lost. Now I’ll never know the feel of another child moving inside me, the sound of a suckling newborn holding tight to my breast, the scent of creation. Abby will never be a big sister.

  Damn you, Meyer, for leaving us, for leaving me. You promised I’d never be alone. Damn you for making me think we could be a family, for giving me hope. And while we’re at it, damn that transport truck, and the drivers on the road that day. Damn you all!

  I glance at the bed . . . at the Halloween costume. Adrenaline has me high.

  I’m a widow. No longer half of two, but single?

  To hell with that!

  I scroll through songs on my cell looking for something to spur my mood then crank the volume,
Pink drowning out sounds from downstairs.

  “I got a brand new attitude and I’m gonna wear it tonight.” I dance around the room, naked, singing at the top of my lungs. “I’m gonna get in trouble, I wanna start a fight!”

  I spin in circles then fall to the bed. I haven’t had this much energy in a long time. I almost feel like my old self, the girl who laughed, challenged all authority, and kicked up a fight just to get the blood pumping. The girl who took destiny by the balls.

  “Tonight,” I declare to the woman in the mirror, “I’m going to have a good time in spite of my status.”

  I’m gonna dress to kill and act the part.

  White Knight

  I arrive just after nine, wondering if I’m early since there are only a half-dozen cars parked in the drive. Even in the dark of night the estate is magnificent. Its entire façade is clad in ivory limestone and massive windows line several stories. Three soaring arches announce sets of oversized mahogany doors and every ornate post is lit with a wrought iron lamp. Scaffolding and equipment sits to the left, the place obviously under renovation. No one has lived here in years. Before Bryce, that is.

  What the hell am I doing here? I shouldn’t be at a party. I should be home, grieving, tucking Abby into bed. The bravado I had getting ready has evaporated on the walk over, and my stomach is considering giving back the peas. Beaming faces come to mind. Grams, pleased to see me going out, Gramps holding me tight. They’d be disappointed if I returned home now, tail between my legs.

  Among the living. Karen’s words taunt me.

  A few minutes later I’m in the same spot, second-guessing my outfit. A taxi pulls up and the back door swings open an inch from my hip. Curvaceous legs and navy heels swing from the back seat. “You came,” squeals Karen. She comes to stand beside me, squinting to see my face in the glow of the lamps. “Oh no you don’t,” she says, hauling me up the stairs. She knocks on the middle set of doors, holding my arm in a death-grip.

  A man opens the door in a butler costume and a nervous laugh escapes me. “Good one,” I say, pointing at his outfit.