Castle Juliet

by Brandon Berntson

  “Jack?”

  “Yes, Alice?” Jack said.

  “It’s okay. I don’t mind. I’m glad you scored higher than me. It was bound to happen at some time, don’t you think?”

  “I don’t like it,” Jack said, sticking out his bottom lip. “I don’t like it one bit. I want my money back! I’ll give that fuddy-duddy a piece of my mind. What do you think of that, dear Alice? Have you ever heard anything so ridiculous?”

  “Not heard,” Alice said. “But I’ve seen ridiculous, and that’s all that matters, Jack. Something ridiculous about what I’m seeing at the moment, but I don’t think it makes any difference.”

  Jack frowned and looked steadily at Alice. “Are you conspiring against me, Alice? Are you and Mrs. Dermott doing this to make me feel better, because if you are—”

  “Jack?” Alice said.

  “Yes, dear Alice?”

  “You’re impossible, you know that?”

  “Hmmm,” Jack said, contemplating the fact. He turned back to his paper, and looked over the marks Mrs. Dermott had made.

  Alice was happy for Jack. He was in a world all his own, and since he’d never had confidence in his schoolwork, it was good to see him taking pride in his efforts, and—most of all—believing in himself.

  Tork McGuckin had temporarily returned to school, but was still quiet and virtually invisible. Lance Holcolm was the new crowned bully of Storyville Elementary. Kids steered, parted, and gave him a wide berth as he walked the hallways. Lance spent more and more time in the principal’s office for picking on other children, stealing their lunch money, playing pranks, and various obnoxious things of that nature. The police stopped by his house once a week, or so it was said. Lance had been breaking into various houses around town. The boy had a reputation, and Tork McGuckin and the Randy Band of Rebel Survivors had been officially dismantled. Pooper and Lonny were hanging out by themselves again.

  The leaves budded in the trees during mid-April. The grass began to turn. Even the sky was a wholesome, vibrant blue. Spring had arrived, and the snow was forgotten. Flowers began to appear in various yards, tilled gardens. People were ready to plant every vegetable imaginable. Birds sang and flew. Life buzzed. From bleak and cold, to colorfully vibrant, Storyville was coming to life.

  At the Skylar house, they were sketching out plans for the stable and corral. Fred, Gerald, and Phillip sat around the table, mapping it out. They ate sandwiches while Jack watched scary movies on television. Alice beamed with excitement at the prospect of Sue having more room to roam. She put her hands on her father’s shoulder, lifting herself up to see what the men were putting together.

  “This is, like, a whole ’nother Christmas present,” she said.

  “We’ll call it a birthday present, how’s that?” Gerald said.

  “I’m totally okay with that,” Alice said.

  Gerald and Jane raised their eyebrows and looked at each other.

  “Mark that one down,” Gerald said. “You heard her.”

  “With Sue,” Alice said. “I’m not sure another present is needed for a long time. For a little while anyway.”

  Fred looked at her and smiled.

  “Oh, man, did you see what he did!” Jack exclaimed from the living room. He was watching the remake of The Thing, a vintage John Carpenter classic. No computer animation in this film. All the make-up was for real. “That was awesome! It took his hands right off!”

  “Jack you’re going to have nightmares,” Jane said, frowning.

  “Trust me, Jane,” Phillip assured her. “Jack sleeps better with thoughts of monsters in his head.”

  “Holy cow!” Jack said, not pulling his eyes from the set. “I can’t believe you guys aren’t watching this!”

  “Maybe later, Jacky-boy,” Phillip said. “We’re planning the stable for Sue. She’s gonna have a new home.”

  “Well, that’s cool, I suppose,” Jack said. “But this is a classic!”

  “How did you get Jack into scary movies, Phillip?” Gerald said.

  “It wasn’t me,” Phillip said. “It was during Halloween a couple of years ago. They were showing creature features all day on t.v., along with Twilight Zone episodes. Jack thought he’d watch it for a second, and that turned into the rest of the day. I had to pry him from the television to go trick-or-treating. He didn’t want to stop watching. Ever since, he’s been a horror junky.”

  “I heard that!” Jack said.

  Everyone looked at one another and laughed.

  While Jack was in his own world, everybody sat around the table making plans and writing down items they’d need for Sue’s stable. Fred knew more about what they needed and how to put it all together. The three men would shop around town and see what they could find. Still, they’d planned to wait until the weather warmed. Alice was more excited than any of them. They sipped coffee around the table, jotted things down, and soon, Sue’s stable was in preparation.

  Spring continued to press its warm, yellow rays across Storyville. School moved on, and Jack and Alice grew increasingly involved as the days passed. The weather turned warmer with another noticeable shift in the air.

  Flowers sprang up here and there under windows and porches. Spring was a slow process, but it grew increasingly bright and colorful as the season waned. Even the clouds, when they rolled in, were brighter, puffier, rolling ships against a vivid, solid blue. Jack liked to imagine jumping up and down on them like a trampoline.

  The bright yellow sun dried out the last of the damp ground, the remnants of a frozen winter. The air, too, was cleaner. Spring had arrived.

  *

  “I think this one looks best,” Jack said. He turned to Alice and put the spectacles on. He wore a bowler hat, a black suit—much too big for him—and long pants. If ever clothes swallowed a boy, these clothes were swallowing Jack now. He’d stenciled a thin, pompous mustache above his upper lip. He was looking for a gold watch on a chain, which would complete the outfit, but he couldn’t find one among all the clothes and items in the attic. Jack was a shortened version of Hercule Poirot, an undersized penguin trying to appear human, a clown a long way from home.

  He and Alice were in the attic of Phillip’s house, Jack doing nothing more than rummaging around when he’d found the clothes in the cedar chests. Jack had been up here seldom, except to retrieve the boxes to build the walls of snow last winter. This time, he’d made a discovery. Where had these old clothes come from? Were they his fathers, what he’d worn on his wedding day? And why were there so many different kinds? He remembered his mother once mentioning how she’d been an actor and loved being on stage. Could the clothes be from various performances and plays? Jack liked the idea of his mother and father playing so many different roles and characters. Why hadn’t his dad said anything to him? Phillip could’ve used these outfits for Halloween instead of being a simple lumberjack. Jack decided he’d ask Phillip about it later.

  The attic was musty, dusty, dirty, and dark. It smelled of weathered boards, dry heat, and old clothes. Jack liked the feel and the musty aroma of the clothes, being up here in the attic with a treasure chest of countless items and surprises. Even more vintage clocks, layered in years of dust, sat idle and scattered about. Mirrors, picture frames, rocking chairs, props, and a dozen other forgotten antiques occupied the attic. A small box held a red rubber ball, a clown nose, a red wig, similar to what Alice’s father had worn on Halloween. Jack even found a pair of angel wings and a chicken outfit.

  Alice had come by on Saturday during the first week of May. Everybody else was at Alice’s house, digging postholes and roping off where the stable was going to be. Fred mentioned to Alice it would be good to take Sue out for a ride because of all the banging and hammering, so Alice took Sue to Jack’s house, and here they were in the attic. Jack wanted to show Alice all the clothes he’d found. This was the perfect outlet for his imagination. The attic was no exception, either. Jack seemed right at home. He didn’t always need a change in setting. He could go off
on the grandest adventure whenever he pleased. He’d told Alice he’d discovered a sunken treasure. Discovering the clothes had been an adventure itself. Every imaginable costume was here, it seemed. Hats with huge feathers, dresses, even risqué outfits for seedier characters. Jack thought it funny, because here he was wanting to be Mr. Hyde every year, and right above his head was every costume imaginable. Clothes from the twenties, leather jackets from the fifties, slick, polished black dress shoes, his father’s size. Jack even found a headband with rabbit ears.

  They’d been trying on these clothes for the last hour. Jack had found the chicken outfit particularly funny, but was now in the mood for a 1920’s detective. He’d made a guess on the bowler hat and mustache, though he wasn’t sure what a detective might wear back then. He even had an eyeglass in one eye, a chain dangling from the side. He’d found a make-up kit and stenciled the mustache on him earlier. Jack was looking for a magnifying glass, and was surprised when he’d found one. With his big, baggy clothes on, his hat, and eyeglass, he moved around the floor, making footprints in the dust, and leaned over with the magnifying glass toward the ground. Jack was trying to solve a murder.

  “I know these tracks lead somewhere, Alice, but where?”

  “I don’t know, Jack,” Alice said. “Where do you suppose all this stuff came from?”

  “I don’t know,” Jack said. “But I’m gonna find out. As soon, as I discover who the murderer is, the rest will piece itself together. There won’t be a criminal, a convict, a thief, or rogue in the next hundred miles who will get away from me, who will be safe!” Here, Jack straightened and pointed, as if an idea had just occurred to him. “Mark my words, Alice!”

  “Oh, I’m marking them all right,” Alice said.

  Jack continued to bend over and follow the footprints on the floor, which were, of course, his own. Technically, all he did was move in circles and stop, pointing an accusing finger at Alice: “You! You’re the murderer! The girl in the wedding dress!”

  “Oh, please, detective!” Alice said. “You’re standing in your own footprints. Which makes you the murderer!”

  “What a fascinating turn of events,” Jack said, curling the end of his moustache.

  Jack watched Alice, who was putting the wedding dress on, arms first. She was, of course, still wearing pants and a shirt. Jack pretended to twist his handlebar mustache, even though the stenciled mustache was much shorter.

  “What?” Alice asked.

  “It’s been a long time since I asked you to kiss me, Alice.”

  “And it’s gonna be an even longer time before I actually kiss you, Jack. So just watch it, Mister-Man.”

  “Tee-hee,” Jack said, and then turned to look at himself in the full-length mirror, an old-fashioned thing on a swivel. He reverted to his English accent. “I say, my dear Alice, a jolly-good show!”

  Alice finished putting on the dress, which had a long train and a veil, and much like Jack’s outfit, seemed to swallow her. Jack thought the dress looked ghostly, because only Alice’s hands and face were visible.

  “I say, dear Alice,” Jack said. “You look jolly-good. Jolly-good, I say. Jolly good-show!”

  “I think ‘jolly-good’ is the only English expression you know, Jack.”

  “Bugger,” Jack said.

  “You sound ridiculous, Jack,” Alice said, adjusting the train behind her.

  “Oh, thank you, Alice!” Jack said. “Splendid to have you say so! Bloody-good! Jolly, and splendid, my dear!”

  Alice giggled because he sounded ridiculous. “You’re blushing, Jack!”

  “Never seen you in a wedding dress, except on Halloween. That was more princess-like, and there was blood on it, and there’s no blood on this one, Alice, so the whole atmosphere is changed.”

  “Just the same, Jack,” Alice said. “How do I look? Here. Move over, so I can see myself in the mirror. This attic just isn’t big enough for the both of us. Why look at me! I’m so charming.”

  “Strange to see it with the cowboy hat on,” Jack said.

  “I’m never taking this cowboy hat off, Jack Bristol. I sleep with it.”

  “Hey, I’m just saying. Boots, pink lasers. It’s just as much your world as it is mine, Alice.”

  “Don’t you forget it, Buster Brown. And are you still going off on pink lasers? That was, like, almost a year ago.”

  “But it did paint a pretty picture, Alice. You were right. Sometimes I see these pink lasers shooting across the galaxy in my mind, and it really does look pretty cool.”

  “See,” Alice said. “You should listen to me once in a while. Why do you have to be so stubborn?”

  “Something else you’ve taught me, Alice.”

  “Hardy-har-har.”

  Jack looked at her and nodded. “Smashing, Alice.”

  “These pearls make me look freckled and speckled.”

  Alice, of course, wasn’t wearing a pearl necklace.

  “You are freckled and speckled,” Jack said.

  “You take that back this instant Jack Bristol.”

  “I didn’t say there was anything wrong with it, Alice—”

  “Take it back or no cheesecake for you!”

  “You don’t have any cheesecake!”

  “Mom does.”

  “You’re starting to sound like me. Only I’m allowed random, nonsensical talk. You take that back right now.’

  “Poo on you,” Alice said, and stuck her tongue out at Jack.

  “It does smell funny in here, doesn’t it?”

  “Oh, Jack, that’s disgusting!”

  “Hee-hee,” Jack said, giggling behind his hand, acting more immature than he actually was. He winked at himself in the mirror, cocked an eyebrow, and tipped his hat.

  “You look more like Charlie Chaplin?” Alice said.

  “Who’s he?”

  Alice raised her eyebrows, shook her head, and looked at herself in the mirror after shoving Jack aside. He thought Alice was acting this way for effect, as if the dress were not as big as it was, and she was modeling it, convincing herself it was the perfect fit.

  “Something wrong, Alice?” Jack said. “Need me to zip you up?”

  “Hands off, Jacky-boy!”

  “Boy, ever since Fred gave you that horse, Alice, you’ve been kinda snobby.”

  Alice gave Jack a penetrating glare, like steel. It scared Jack, and he stumbled over his next words:

  “But…uh…it’s charming, too, Alice. Sorta pretty, even. If ever a snobby, moody smug could be attractive, that snobby, moody smug would be you. Yes, you have certainly mastered it.”

  Alice tilted her head and smiled at Jack with a hint of condescension. Jack, still flustered, pointed out the window. He’d opened it earlier. Now, instead of it being musty and dark with the smell of old clothes, a fresh, breeze had been coming through for the last half hour. The rectangular pillar of light caught filaments of dust suspended in the air. Jack reverted to his accent with a slight tinge of pomp.

  “I say,” Jack said. “You look absolutely ravishing and smashing and tea-cup-like in all your fine white wear, dear Alice. That dress makes me want to take a vampire bite out of you.”

  “Grrrr,” Alice replied, making the sound of a tiger.

  Jack peeked over Alice’s shoulder and looked at himself in the mirror.

  “Do you think I should curl my hair, Jack?”

  “Well, that depends on how you want to look. Seeing as how it’s already curly, I’m not sure what to say, unless of course, you want it more curly. Do you want more curls, Alice? Or are you content with the curls you have?”

  “They’re just curls,” Alice said, taking a strand of hair and looking at it. But I would like to see them curlier.”

  “Ah!” Jack said. “Those ravishing copper curls, my dear! Curls fit for only Queen Juliet! I say, it is a miraculous sight to behold, this wondrous edifice, this stargazing, glowing coal of midnight! Ah! You see how it moves through the darkness, Juliet! It catches fire, radiates, b
linding the ever-mighty sun, I dare say! Glory be your copper curls, Alice! No other fire burns so bright!”

  “That’s quite an array of starshine you’ve created, Jack. How did you manage it?”

  “Look in the mirror, Alice! The reason is right before you! Poetry comes easy when you’re around, my dear. It flows like spaceships.”

  “Jack!” Alice said, theatrically throwing her hand to her heart. “You are all talk and nonsense! You’re making me blush!”

  “It matches your fiery curls, Alice! It makes your eyes greener!”

  “Jack, you’re all talk, you know that?”

  “Well, in all my years—” Jack began. “I never—”

  Alice giggled.

  Away from the subject, Alice suddenly asked again: “Why do your think your father has all this stuff, Jack?”

  “I don’t know, Alice. I’ll ask him, though, when I see him. How’s that?”

  “Well,” Alice said. “I should probably take the dress off. I’d hate to ruin it.”

  “Maybe it was Mom’s,” Jack said.

  Suddenly, Alice paled as if she’d committed a crime. She quickly took the dress off. “Oh, Jack, I didn’t even think about that! Why didn’t you say something?”

  “It only just now occurred to me. Anyway, I didn’t think Dad would mind, as long as we didn’t ruin it. I think he would be flattered. I’m sorry…I didn’t mean…”

  “No, Jack,” Alice said. “It’s okay. I just didn’t think…I didn’t realize…”

  “You don’t think…?” Jack said.

  “What, Jack?”

  “Well, I don’t know. It would be kind of cool if this was some old theme on their wedding day. That dress is very old-fashioned, and what I’m wearing is very old-fashioned, like from the twenties or something. Dad sometimes watches those old silent movies, so maybe he has a thing for that time period, you know? Kinda weird, don’t you think?”

  “That would be cool,” Alice said. “But I never meant…”

  Almost reverently, Alice took off the dress, folded it up, and put it back in the chest where she’d found it.

  “I’m sure it’s okay, Alice. You’re worried for no reason. It was just an accident. I’ll ask Dad. I bet he tells us some fabulous story.”