Permafrost

by Peter Robertson

  When I woke, sunlight enveloped the room. A large window stood open, and ivory lace curtains billowed in the slight breeze. The room stood empty except for the bed, a pale wood dresser, and a matching bedside table, on which dried sunflowers stood in a tall vase. Were the flowers chosen as dried, or else long abandoned?

  I turned to the bedside table, picked up my wristwatch, and looked hard at it. It was just before six. Early. I put the watch gently down and sat up, blinking in the brightness.

  I hadn’t really noticed the elevation of Sandy Weller’s house during the drive up, but now, as I looked out the window, I saw that it stood on the highest point for several miles around. All of Paddle Lake lay visible beneath a light dusting of morning mist that swept across the water like soft gauze, which the sun would strip off as the day progressed.

  I remembered the forecasted heat and rain and I thought that the latter seemed unlikely, as the morning sky was a perfect, cloudless blue.

  Inside my bag, I found a pale gray T-shirt, underwear, baggy blue shorts, and Adidas cross-trainers. I put everything on but the shoes and went downstairs gingerly, feeling with my toes for loose floorboards, trying to be as silent as humanly possible.

  There was a note on the kitchen table. There was a cup beside a coffeemaker. The carafe was half full, and a plate of blueberry muffins sat beside a toaster.

  The coffee and the note were, I suspected, already a half-hour old.

  She had gone for a run.

  I should pull the door shut behind me if I went out.

  French toast and sausage would be served at nine.

  Drink the damn coffee because I made it especially for you.

  Love and kisses, Sandy.

  P.S. Last night was fun. I hope I haven’t spoiled you for other women.

  I found skim milk in the refrigerator and drank a half cup of coffee standing at the screen door and gazed without thought over the backyard wilderness of uncut grass and scrub that gave way to the thicker woodland, which effectively shut out the world.

  I had planned to run but instead walked the four miles back to the Handle. When I came at the houses from the other direction, they produced an effect oddly symmetrical to my arrival yesterday. The road still curved, the houses were similar, and the very first house, like the Taits’ on the other end, had a wide-open garage door that flaunted the family machinery stored inside.

  A large and prominent sign proclaimed the identity of the inhabitants, in this case Calvin and Joan Mitchell, who were, if the wording was to be believed, “retired and lovin’ it.”

  Calvin was pushing open his screen door as I passed the house.

  “Fine morning.” He bellowed at me. He was wearing short running shorts and a local college sweatshirt. He was clearly preparing for a jog. He looked fit enough. He also looked close to seventy.

  “It sure is.” I shouted back.

  “You staying up there with Sandy?”

  “Yup.”

  “She’s a pistol, that one.”

  “That she is.”

  “Heart of gold though. This a business trip?”

  “I’m looking for a house ‘round here.”

  “That so? Four for sale right here in town.”

  “I know. Tell me, have you lived here long?”

  “Close to five years. Place has changed some even in that short a time.”

  “All for the good?”

  He shook his head. “I wouldn’t exactly say that.”

  “How do you mean?”

  His eyes grew colder. “Oh. I don’t know.” He tried to smile. “Just me talking foolish talk.” Then he turned away. “Good talkin’ to you.” I wasn’t sure if he meant it. He grinned at me. “You give that Sandy one for me.”

  With that he took off across a well-tended front lawn at a respectable speed for a man half his age. I decided there and then I didn’t care much for the happily retired Calvin Mitchell.

  The parking lot beside the beach was empty. At the tennis court, a listless male youth of indeterminate age hit balls against the practice wall with a fluid style and very little enthusiasm.

  He favored topspin forehands, which he hit with an expensive Wilson oversized graphite racquet. He had two more racquets leaning against the fence. He was very good. He looked bored to tears.

  “Would you like a partner?” I asked.

  He shrugged in that universal teenspeak for gushing enthusiasm.

  We played one set. He served aces followed by double faults. His forehand was ferocious, but he hit long, faulting as often as he landed the reluctant ball inside the lines. I served and volleyed like the old timer he obviously had me pegged for and wore him down with consistently mediocre tennis. I’m a decent enough player. He would soon be a great one.

  I won six games to four.

  “You kicked my ass,” he said sullenly.

  “Don’t worry. In a couple of years you’ll be far out of my class.”

  He shrugged, but didn’t actually deny it. “Maybe,” he said. “Depends on a lot of things. Like scholarships and stuff. They’re a bitch to get.”

  “How old are you?” I asked.

  “Sixteen.”

  “Do you need a scholarship?”

  He looked at me. “Are you for real? My grades suck.”

  I held out my hand and told him my name. He obviously found the concept droll but he consented to shake my hand limply. His name, he told me, was Greg Tait.

  I told him I was looking ‘round the Handle for a place to live. I’d seen his house. I’d seen the Corvette in the garage. Was that his? I hit a vein there.

  “That’s my brother Chip’s ‘vette,” he said, the jealousy oozing from every pore, “at least it is until Dad takes it away from him for flunking out of college, like he said he would. I don’t get to drive yet. Dad wants better grades before he’ll spring for lessons. If I get the grades and pass the test he’ll let me drive the Mustang.” This was clearly an effective motivational tool.

  “Does your mother drive the Mustang?”

  He laughed. “When her nerves aren’t totally fucked up, she drives a piece of shit Plymouth Horizon.” He sneered. “And only a total doofus would drive that.”

  He clearly liked cars. “What do you drive?” He asked me suddenly.

  I told him.

  He was plainly skeptical. “Bullshit,” he said.

  I showed him the keys.

  He shook his head. “Any asswipe can have keys.”

  Did all the inhabitants of the Handle have such graceful vocabularies?

  I said, “We can walk up to Sandy Weller’s house and you can take a look.”

  “That’s miles,” he protested.

  “I’ll let you drive it back.”

  He was incredulous for a moment. “Are you shitting me? Without a license?”

  I threw him the keys and he started to walk very fast.

  Greg Tait gunned the poor Mercedes mercilessly for the four miles, made me put the top down, and found a radio station playing Van Halen. He turned the volume way up. He was clearly very happy.

  Outside his house he sat in the driver’s seat and squirmed luxuriously in the soft leather. When Eddie Van Halen had finished his solo he turned to me.

  “You’re not real old.”

  “Thank you very much,” I replied.

  “How’d you get the money for this?” He stroked the dashboard affectionately.

  “Mostly luck,” I replied. It was an answer he could understand. It wasn’t especially inaccurate. He nodded sagely.

  As we sat like old friends his mother came out. This was Sylvie Tait, the high-strung driver of the piece-of-shit Plymouth. She opened the driver’s side door.

  “Come inside Greg. Oh, please come now.” She spoke softly, nervous and tired at the same time.

&
nbsp; Sylvie Tait was attractive and close to forty. She wore a denim skirt and brown leather sandals, a black shirt with no sleeves and a high neck. There was a wet stain on the side of her skirt. Her hair was mid-length and very dark with a few gray hairs carelessly noticeable. Her eyes were deep-set and slightly puffy, hidden deep in a face that either turned away when she spoke or else sought safety in a far distance. I took these both to be habitual gestures.

  Her breath smelled very faintly of bourbon.

  “This guy kicked my ass six games to four.” Greg spoke loudly.

  “That’s good, Greg.” She addressed this to the beach beyond the roof of the car, through tightly pressed lips, as she shepherded her son toward the house.

  “Thanks for bringing Greg home. He has to get ready for school now.” She was almost running away from me.

  “You’re very welcome,” I said after her. “Greg wanted to see my car. I’m staying up at Sandy Weller’s for a few days.”

  She stopped and turned and looked at me with an odd, unreadable expression that turned to disbelief. “What for?” She forgot her shyness for a moment.

  “Cause he wants to. The Weller woman’s a babe.”

  “Shut up, Greg.”

  “I’m house-hunting around here,” I said pleasantly.

  “Why here?” She sounded appalled, almost amused at the idea.

  “It seems like a nice spot.”

  “Mom thinks it’s full of weirdos.” Greg said.

  Her voice grew soft again. “I would like you to go inside now Greg, please.”

  There was a blur of activity. A girl of twelve or so ran across the yard toward Greg. He grabbed her and they both fell to the ground laughing and fighting. A moment later Greg was sitting on her face. She mumbled something inaudible but he only laughed more and pressed down harder.

  “Get off Tammi’s face, Greg,” his mother said. He did. Tammi Tait got up. She was dressed much like her mother, but wore denim shorts rather than a skirt. She was paler, fleshier, and considerably less inhibited. She struck me as fearless.

  She scrunched up her pale face and spoke. “His ass smells gross,” she said with a solemn dignity.

  He cuffed her on the back of the head gently. “What do you expect you little mutant. It’s an ass.”

  “Stop it! Both of you!” Sylvie Tait was suddenly shrill. Then she anxiously tried to backpedal. “It was good to meet you. We have to go now. They have to . . .” Tammi swung her foot and a Doc Marten boot connected with Greg’s shin. He yelped, mostly for effect.

  “Stop it! For God’s sake!” Sylvie Tait shouted at her children. They laughed at her.

  She tried to smile at me. A kids-will-be-kids smile. But the warmth of the gesture never reached beyond her mouth. She steered her children toward the front door of the house.

  I watched them go.

  Sylvie Tait was an extremely nervous woman, even allowing for the sensory brutalizing of which two teenage children were quite easily capable.

  She was also the second person on my trip to react strangely when she first heard me speak.

  And I was curious about that.

  There was a noise, a masculine shout muffled. I looked back at the Tait house. The blinds were partly open as Sylvie Tait stood with her back toward the large front window. She raised her arm and slapped her son as hard as she could. His hands went up around his ears as he easily fended off his mother’s tightly clenched fists. To one side the younger girl watched, howling with laughter.

  Child abuse is of course a serious matter, but Greg Tait was much too big and strong for his mother to do any physical damage. He stood his ground as a succession of her feeble blows rained down on him, and when she had exhausted herself, he lowered his arms, and I saw that he too was laughing.

  Perhaps she saw me as she turned toward the window, in the split second before the blinds became tightly closed slits. Did her wet eyes gaze out toward me, and beyond me, out across the lake, to the island?

  I started the car and quickly silenced Bon Jovi.

  But as I began to pull away a movement caught my eye. Two houses past the Taits’ a man opened his screen door, strode across his lawn, and approached my car with an air of importance.

  I glanced at the number of the house, at the Harmony Realty sign sticking out of the grass and realized that this was Will Sanders, onetime special counsel to the faceless might of the Detroit auto industry.

  I turned off the engine and got out of the car.

  “Hi there,” I said pleasantly.

  Will Sanders stood close to the door, and stared hard at me for a long moment.

  “Can I ask you what you’re doing here?” His tone was even and restless.

  “I was just talking to Mrs. Tait. Passing the time of day. Is there some problem?”

  “Is this . . .” He hesitated a little. “Was this some sort of a business matter you were talking to her about?” He tried to make his question sound unimportant.

  “I actually don’t think it’s any of your business.” I smiled disarmingly at him.

  “You’re probably right.” He nodded his head then, and smiled at me, as if recognizing a social blunder. But he didn’t move away.

  “Was there something else?” I asked.

  “You still haven’t answered my question.”

  “Actually I did.”

  “None of my business?”

  “That’s right.”

  “It looked to me like you got Sylvie all upset back there. I was looking out the window just now.”

  “Well, that wasn’t my doing. She got herself all upset without my help.”

  He relented. “I guess that does sound like something Sylvie would do.” He looked at me. “I don’t know you, do I?”

  I shook my head. “I’m staying here for a few days with Sandy Weller.”

  He looked curious. “Can I ask why?”

  “I’m looking at some property.”

  “Oh. I see.” Now he affected a sheepish look. “Well. My place is for sale.”

  “I know that.”

  I really didn’t like Will Sanders much, and I was pleased to think of how little a chance there was of me actually buying his house.

  He looked around at the sign in his yard.

  “Of course you must have noticed.”

  “No. I spoke to the realtor Tom Younger in Harmony yesterday.”

  “Ah. Tom. Yes, of course. Look,” he said, making a visible show of brightening up, “what if we try and start this conversation all over again? I’m sorry if I was rude. Sylvie’s kinda high-strung as you probably noticed. Excitable by nature. She brings out some kind of possessiveness and I try to look out for her. She worries a lot about her kids.”

  “They don’t seem especially fragile.”

  He tried to laugh. “No. I guess they’re not. Sylvie can sometimes imagine things. She manufactures her fears out of the ether.”

  “What kind of fears?” I asked.

  “Stupid fears,” he replied. “Fantasy fears. Dangerous fears. Fears that tend to leave her exposed. But she’s a harmless thing. A little bird. She just cares way too much.”

  I said nothing.

  “But this,” he enthused, “this is a hell of a fine spot. Real nice folks ‘round here.” He was beginning to sound a little like Tom Younger.

  “So why are you leaving?”

  He smiled without warmth. “Maybe it’s my turn to be coy. I have my own reasons.”

  “Which are none of my business.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Is Sylvie Tait a part of it?” I asked. ”You seem very protective toward her.”

  Something very unpleasant flashed behind Will Sanders’ eyes and he punched me in the face very hard. Or at least he tried to. I took a step back and grabbed his fist as it slid off my f
orehead. I squeezed his hand hard and he clamped his mouth shut to stop from screaming out. Then I pulled him toward me. He stumbled over his own feet, and as his head dropped low I kicked him in the face and pulled my shoe quickly away as blood exploded out of his nose.

  He felt tired as I let him go.

  He spluttered, “Get the fuck away from me.”

  I turned away, leaving him to hold his wet but unbroken nose with his good hand.

  He shouted bravely at my back. “You hear me? Leave Sylvie alone! Buy your house somewhere the fuck away from here, and leave her alone!” Another of the silver-tongued Handle residents.

  “And if you come near me again, I’ll sue you!”

  Will Sanders was a lawyer to the end.

  I wiped a stray drop of his blood from my shoe and started the car. I was late for breakfast, and very hungry.

  I was also determined to talk with Sylvie Tait again very soon.

  TEN

  “There’s a lot more toast.”

  “Mmmm.” My mouth was too full to say much else.

  We sat in her kitchen.

  I had been late, but Sandy had waited for me. Coffee had been brewed and she had carved fresh wheat bread into huge geometric chunks. French toast and sausage links had been fried in a large black skillet.

  “What do you normally eat for breakfast?” She asked me.

  “A low-fat muffin. Or yogurt. Something like that,” I answered back.

  She smiled. “Me too,” she said.

  “Do you get many guests?” I managed to ask her between bites.

  “No. Not many. You’re the first in a while. I’m a well-kept secret. I haven’t even decided what I’m going to charge you yet.”

  “I see. Do I get some sort of discount for last night?”

  She laughed. “Are you nuts? I should charge you extra.”

  I decided to change the subject. “You look fine.”

  She tossed her hair. “Yup. Just showered after a good long run. Got that all-over fresh-fucked feeling this bright sunny morning. I was very close to giving you up.”

  A radio was playing and I was surprised to find myself listening to public radio. I said as much. “We get very few stations in clear this far north, and I sure as fuck don’t want to listen to ‘Stairway to Heaven’ all the livelong day,” she cheerfully explained to me as Bela Bartok flooded the warm sunny room.