Strange but True

by John Searles

  Gail doesn’t know what she was expecting to find, but it certainly wasn’t this. As she stands beneath the shadowy yellow light above the workbench, a few stray rays of winter sunshine casting upon her face through the tiny cellar window, she stares at the pills behind the plastic and wonders what in the world they’re doing here. Without her glasses, it’s difficult to make out the letters on the face of each one. But this much she can tell: they do not say Benadryl or Tylenol or any of the other names she might recognize. In the blur of her vision, she sees an H and an E.

  Even though there must be a perfectly logical explanation as to what these pills are and why they are sealed away in a flashlight in the corner of the basement, Gail doesn’t like the feeling she is getting. She doesn’t like it at all. The moment reminds her too much of all those times in her past when she caught the men in her life up to no good. She can still see herself, the way most of us can, in the vivid distortion of life’s most painful memories. She is a twenty-seven-year-old woman married to a man she met at a local pub in her hometown of Lake Falls, Ohio. She is opening the glove compartment in his pickup with the simple goal of replacing the expired Allstate insurance card with the new one that came in the mail. She pulls out the old card and an envelope falls to the floor. When she picks it up and looks inside, there is a MasterCard bill in her husband’s name with his work address beneath. As she stares down at the long list of motel charges, tears spring to her eyes. A year later, she is a divorced woman with all of her belongings packed inside her Volkswagen Rabbit, telling herself she will start over again, that one day in the not too distant future, she will be okay.

  For Gail Erwin, who hasn’t had the easiest of lives, there are more of those sorts of memories than she’d care to count. And now all of them press down upon her, coalescing in a solid, deadening feeling of dread. It is a feeling she thought was behind her. A feeling she thought was one of the trappings of that woman she used to be.

  She shakes her head and tells herself to relax.

  It has been eight years since she first saw Bill standing in front of her desk with that steaming cup of coffee, seven since they got married in a civil ceremony in Philadelphia, five since he was asked to leave his job at the station, and she chose to go right along with him. Despite the uncertain circumstances of his retirement, Bill has never once behaved in any way that is suspicious to her. And when he arrives home from the hardware store, she will casually tell him about her search for the sock, which led to her search for the flashlight, which led to her finding these strange pills. Then he will offer up a perfectly plausible explanation as to what they are and why they’re hidden down here. As she backs slowly away from his workbench, carrying the foil pack with her toward the stairs, Gail can already hear his low, crackling voice offering up an explanation.

  Oh, those. They’re just pills I took for an allergy once. I tucked them inside the flashlight on a fishing trip so they wouldn’t get wet…

  Or perhaps, That old flashlight? I bought it at a tag sale and could never get the lousy top off because it was screwed on so tight. It’s good to know my wife is stronger than I am…

  Just the thought of those imagined explanations helps corral Gail’s feelings of dread as she weaves through those support columns and up the stairs. Inside the living room, the fire in the gray stone fireplace has died, leaving the drafty room in a chill. Gail has never been very good at reigniting the blaze once it has gone out. But she spends a few minutes futilely stabbing at the coals with the poker and tossing wad after wad of crinkled newspaper inside, only to watch it rise up in a sudden flame and quickly burn out. They have lived with this fireplace for five winters, and still she can’t master the art of it—a fact Bill loves to tease her about. At last she gives up and leans the poker against the stone.

  That’s when she turns her attention back to the pills. Gail lifts the foil pack to the light of the picture window and plays a sort of Hangman game with the letters, trying to fill in the blanks. This time, she sees an O and an H. Finally, she decides to get it over with and hunt down her glasses. It takes her a few minutes, and she begins to wonder if the glasses have gone missing as well, but then she spots her gold wire-rims on the back of the toilet, where she put them before her shower this morning. Once they are on, she can see that there are five letters: R-O-C-H-E. With a small encircled number 2 beneath and two lines on the back. Other than the occasional Benadryl or Tylenol, the only pills Gail and Bill take are Lipitor for her cholesterol and Zyrtec for his sinuses. She has never heard or seen anything with this name before. So for a long time, she stays just like that, transfixed by those letters until finally Gail can’t stand staring dumbly at them any longer.

  She goes to the kitchen and picks up the telephone. She dials Janet Pornack’s number. Grumpy old Janet is Gail’s one friend left from those years at the station, since she was the only other person who stuck by Bill when it got so terribly ugly in his final days. Gail’s reason for calling Janet is simple: the woman takes buckets of medicines for her various ailments, from arthritis to bursitis to high blood pressure to diabetes to an unpronounceable fungal disease that sounds vaguely like the name of a noodle to Gail: Aspergillili or something like that anyway. She figures that if any-one might know what these pills are for, it’s Janet. As the phone begins to ring, Gail stretches the coiled wire back to the living room and looks out the picture window at the swath of white over their front yard, then at the driveway to make sure Bill has not pulled up in his red pickup yet. All she sees out there is Melissa Moody’s Toyota parked by the side of the road, covered with snow. The phone is on its third ring when Gail realizes she better come up with a story that will keep Janet from getting suspicious. She decides to tell her that she found an odd pill mixed in with her usual prescription. Gail runs the lie through her mind, silently practicing the words like a script: the darndest thing just happened. I was about to take my Lipitor when I found a funny-looking pill mixed in with the others. It says R-O-C-H-E 2 on the front. Do you have any idea what it’s for?

  Unfortunately, a machine picks up, so Gail puts down the phone without getting a chance to ask that question. For lack of a better option, she returns to the living room and holds the foil pack to the light a second time. She is standing there, telling herself that she is wasting time, that this sort of behavior is nothing but residual superstition left over from the many disappointments of her past, when a door slams outside. Amid the chilly, clock-ticking quiet of the living room, the sudden noise sends a nervous jolt through Gail’s small body, causing her insides to seize up. She lets out a gasp and flinches, dropping the pills. Before bending down to pick them up, she stares out the window. The driveway is still empty, but Melissa Moody has just stepped out of her cottage and is walking across the snowy lawn toward her car. Even on such a bitterly cold day, she is wearing nothing but an Indian-print shirt and army green cargo pants. Gail has never had any children of her own, but she can’t help but open the door and call out something motherly to the girl.

  “Honey, shouldn’t you put a coat on? It’s freezing out there.”

  Melissa looks up and shakes her head. “I’m all right.”

  No matter how many times Gail sees Melissa’s face, she is always troubled by those horrible scars. They look especially bad in the dying light of this winter afternoon. Imprinted on her left cheek is that grisly patchwork of lines. Above her right eye is that mangled patch of skin, which looks as though a rabid animal clawed her there, leaving her with only half an eyebrow. When Melissa speaks, there is that black void at the front of her mouth. Over the years, they’ve had so many intimate conversations about her accident, about that boy who died in the wreck and left her heart broken, but never once has Gail pushed Melissa on the sad topic of her appearance. Still, she wonders why the girl doesn’t go to a doctor or a dentist to see about having those things fixed. Surely, there is something they could do. “Where are you off to?” she asks as Melissa scrapes a patch of snow and ice from the windo
w of her car, concentrating on the area directly in front of the driver’s seat and nothing more.

  “I have an appointment in Philadelphia with that woman, Chantrel. I told Mr. Erwin about her the other day.”

  That’s right, Gail thinks. Bill had said something about another one of Melissa’s visits to a psychic when he came back from bringing her a bundle of wood the other morning. “Well, do you really think you should be driving like this?” By “like this,” Gail is referring to both her pregnant state and the weather.

  “I’ll be fine,” Melissa tells her and smiles a wan, close-lipped smile.

  “Okay,” she says. As concerned as Gail feels, Bill is forever reminding her that Melissa is not their daughter. He can bring her wood, Gail can bring her food, they can dole out subtle bits of advice and let her slide on the rent, but they cannot run her life. “Just go slow. And be careful.”

  Melissa says she will, but after she gets in her car and starts the engine, a puff of white smoke spews from the muffler and she does a U-turn, driving away far too quickly, considering the state of the roads.

  She’s not our daughter, Bill’s voice echoes in her wake.

  When Gail closes the front door and bends to pick up that foil pack off the braided rug, a dull yellow glow shines up at her from the basement stairs. She left the light on down there, and she thinks of the laundry basket on the cold cement floor by the machines, of those balled-up socks in a neat pile. All but one anyway. A big part of her wants nothing more than to forget this nonsense and go back to what she was doing. But as she walks across the soft, incessantly creaking floor toward the stairs to the basement, an idea comes to her. There is a very simple way to find out what these pills are. She goes to kitchen, picks up her Lipitor container, and dials the number on the front.

  A young woman answers. “CVS Pharmacy.”

  “Uh, hello. This is Gail Erwin calling. I was wondering if I could please speak with the head pharmacist.”

  “David’s not available at the moment,” the woman says, sounding harried. “Can I help you with something?”

  “I was just wondering—”

  She cuts Gail off. “Hold on a second.”

  As the woman muffles the phone to speak with someone else, Gail feels grateful for the interruption. Lying always seems so easy when she considers the prospect in her mind, but the execution never fails to make her nervous—even when it comes to a small lie like this one. She needs a moment to gather her thoughts. And when the young woman comes back on the line and tells her to go ahead, Gail swallows and says, “I get my cholesterol pills from your pharmacy, and I have a question about my recent refill.”

  “And what’s that?”

  Gail can tell she is impatient for her to get on with it. She hears another phone ringing in the background, and she can picture the line in front of the counter that’s almost always there. “I picked up my Lipitor last week. And I was about to take one just now when I found a pill inside the container that doesn’t match the others. Instead of the tiny oblong things with the number ten, this one is white and round and has the letters R-O-C-H-E on the front with an encircled number two beneath and two lines on the back. I’m not sure if I’m supposed to take it.”

  “Well, I definitely wouldn’t take it if it doesn’t match the others. But I will give David the message, and he’ll call you back as soon as he can.” She asks Gail to repeat exactly what’s on the pill, then for her phone number. After writing it down, she rushes Gail off before there is time to say anything more.

  According to the clock on the stove, it is ten to five. Gail wonders what is taking Bill so long, though she knows better, since the man can make a day out of a simple trip to Home Depot. Considering the eternal lines, too-high shelves, and crowds of people, she can’t understand why he likes that place so much. Gail much prefers Leonard’s Hardware, where they’d gone for years before Home Depot opened. There is never a line, and the owner knows both Bill and her by name. So what if he doesn’t have every screwdriver ever made in stock?

  Gail stares at their backyard through the paned window in the kitchen door. The wind gusts, sending a spray of snow from the bare tree branches into the air. For a moment, the yard turns as white as a shaken snow globe, then the wind dies down and the flakes drift to the ground. Those large black birds, the ones that are forever perching in one place or another around Monk’s Hill Road, are gathered on the floor of the woods back there, pecking at the frozen earth. Just beyond is the rundown cottage, yet to be winterized because they ran out of money. When Gail and Bill first bought this property, their plan had been to fix up all three houses, live in this one and rent the others for income. But still, that eyesore sits back there with its sagging roof, smashed windows, graffiti-splattered walls, and caved-in floor—a daily reminder of their failed plan. At the very least, Bill finally got around to cleaning up the squashed beer cans and other trash left behind by the teenagers who used to party back there years ago. Now Gail watches as another gust of wind rises up, causing the plastic he taped over the vacant windows to flap violently, making that snap-snap-snap sound she hears from their bed late at night when she cannot sleep.

  Without warning, those large black birds spread their wings and take to the air, disappearing into the twisted branches of the trees. Something about their sudden flight breaks the trance of the previous moment, and Gail forces herself to stop staring out the window. She turns and pulls open the junk drawer by the sink, where she wishes she had looked in the first place. Inside is the sleek black policeman’s flashlight that she lifted from the station when she packed up her desk in a hurry that last day. She takes it out and slides the button to the On position.

  Well, what do you know? Gail thinks when a beam of light shines up at her. The batteries work after all.

  She carries it, along with the foil pack of pills, back down the stairs and through the maze of makeshift support columns to Bill’s work area. As Gail stares at the neat spool of twine, the nails gathered in their proper box, the sorted and separated screwdrivers, she considers messing everything up again so Bill will never know she’s been here. But just then, the front door opens. Gail cocks her head up at the slats of wood above her and hears the unmistakable squeak of hinges, the slow scrape of the door’s bottom brushing across the braided rug, followed by the solid thud of Bill’s workboots against the rotting floor, which they don’t have money to fix either. He is whistling one of his usual songs until coming to an abrupt stop. In his deep, crackling voice, he calls out, “Gail?”

  Gail puts the top back on the empty plastic flashlight and buries it beneath those metal tools again. Then she reaches over and yanks the wire, killing the dull yellow bulb over his workbench. The only illumination comes from the sleek black policeman’s flashlight, the small window near the ceiling, and the humming fluorescent tube by the washer and dryer. “Down here,” she says and walks toward the laundry basket.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Laundry.”

  “Still? You were doing it when I left.”

  “Yeah, well, we had a casualty again.”

  “Another mouse in one of the traps?”

  “No,” she calls up. “Another one of your socks is missing in action.”

  Bill laughs. The hardy, familiar sound comforts Gail. It makes her realize how ridiculous she has been acting, giving in to those feelings of dread and suspicion. From the top of the stairs, he asks, “Well, are you going to join the land of the living or stay down there forever?”

  Gail puts the flashlight on the floor by the dryer, then tucks the foil pack into the pocket of her sweater. When she turns and looks up at his large frame in the doorway, all she can see is his silhouette—a paper cutout of a six-foot-tall, barrel-chested man with broad shoulders and thick limbs. “On my way, dear,” she tells him as she picks up the basket and carries it upstairs.

  In the living room, Bill unloads a bright orange bag from Home Depot. He pulls out a brand-new screwdriver, of all
things, and sets in on the wagon-wheel coffee table in front of the couch. More junk, Gail thinks, just as I predicted. Somehow, though, his predictability brings comfort instead of frustration. Looking at him, in his worn-out John Deere cap and oldest flannel shirt, with missing buttons and a tear in the sleeve, along with his faded Dickies, he looks to her like a farmer who has just returned from the fields—overworked, exhausted, underappreciated. And as she gazes at the familiar wrinkles in his wide forehead, the drooping lines beneath his dark eyes, she feels a momentary stab of pity, thinking of all the trouble he’s been through. “Good news,” Gail tells him. “Your shirts are clean, so you can stop wearing that raggedy old thing.”

  Bill smiles, flashing his large yellow teeth. He pinches the material by his chest and looks down. “It’s not like I’m out to impress anyone at Home Depot.”

  “I don’t know about that. I’ve seen the way those cashiers flirt with you,” she tells him as he pulls a new hammer from the bag. Seeing it in his hand, along with the screwdriver on the table, causes Gail’s pity to fade away. She can’t help but take a new tone with him. “I thought you went to get a shovel.”

  “I did. I left them outside by the front door.”

  “Them?”

  “The store had a two-for-one special, so I got a garden shovel for the spring too.”

  More money we don’t have, Gail thinks as she sits in the cushioned rocker by the bookshelf, which is loaded with those books of unusual trivia and real-life oddities that Bill loves so much. He has every volume of The Darwin Awards, an annual anthology of truly bizarre deaths, along with every volume of Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader, a compendium of quirky facts, and Weird News from Around the World, which is exactly what the title says. There are also baskets of old Field & Stream magazines, as well as Gail’s dated copies of Good Housekeeping, Redbook, Family Circle, and Ladies’ Home Journal. Gail runs a finger along the shelf that contains her collection of Mary Higgins Clark novels, to check for dust. There is none. When she turns back to Bill, a voice inside her head—maybe it is the voice of that woman she used to be—rises up in her mind and says, Tell him what you found. Ask him what they are and why they were hidden in the basement.