by Sara Hanover
I turned around to face Mom. She’s short, curvy, and blonde; I’m like a weed, but at least I share the gaze and the attitude. We can both stop liars in their tracks. I eyed the bike and chariot Mom proudly introduced with a flourish, like a grand prize on a television quiz show. “What’s this?”
“This is a month’s rent.”
“You paid that much for it? And why?”
“Aunt April picked it up at a garage sale.” Mom beamed at the bicycle with cart and back at me. “I’ve signed you up for Meals by Wheels.”
“What? And whatever for?”
“Aunt April has dear friends nearby that use the service, and the regular driver is out for a few months with a broken ankle, so she hoped you could step in. She’s giving us a financial pass while you do. We could use the funds for the new gear you need for next season.”
“Or I can just get a part-time job, but I think the operative word here is: driver. As in, usually comes with a car.”
“We could really use the break on the rent, honey.” Mom didn’t look directly at me, just ran her fingers over the handlebar of the bike. She didn’t like asking any more than I liked hearing her do it. “Meals programs are important. You can always use community service on your resume. She’s hard to say no to. You’ll have killer legs, I promise.”
So family was not only responsible for renting haunted, rickety houses but committing your life to a program involving hungry old people. I opened my mouth to object, but the designer of this humiliation came out of the house, my great-aunt herself.
She smiled. She no longer had freckles but age spots, hidden slightly by a softly blushed powder, and her eyebrows had been drawn in brown over gray hairs, but she walked proud and confidently with the Andrews height, and put a hand on the contraption. I still remember the day when she only got one eyebrow drawn in and took us out to lunch, with me sitting across the booth and wondering if I should tell her about the missing brow. We loved her, but she could be vain, and silence is the better part of valor. I checked quickly to see if her make-up had gone lopsided again, but it hadn’t.
“What do you think, Tessa?”
She had appealing brown eyes that I could see Dad had inherited, though Aunt April walked as though she had a yardstick for a spine. Dad’s had disappeared, probably ripped out by a casino somewhere.
I eyed the bicycle dubiously. “This is a good idea?”
“A great idea. The regular on the route at this end of town can’t drive or deliver for two to three months. It’s only ten houses here that we couldn’t get covered, so I thought you would be perfect as a substitute. It shouldn’t interfere with classes or your hockey practice. You’ll love the ladies. I play cards with most of them.” She gave me a quick hug. Was it a rule that older women had to smell of lavender?
“Thanks, Aunt April. For thinking of me and—this—” Whatever it was. A bike and chariot? Bariot?
She shook a finger at me. “Don’t get in trouble with the professor. Your mother knows him. She needs all the allies she can get at the university!” With that she walked off, got in her car, and left.
I sighed at Mom, but we were now a team. We had each other’s backs and stuff. “Will you promise not to sign me up for anything else without asking first? If something just happens along?”
“Deal.” She stuck out her hand and we shook on it.
“Annnd I don’t have to ride this to campus.”
“Nope.”
I inhaled thankfully. “Now what about this professor?”
“Oh, that would be Dr. Brandard. He’s a smart and tough old codger. You’ll like him.”
One hoped.
I caved too fast, but it’s just the two of us against the world. While Mrs. Statler pitied me having lost my father, we knew we had the better end of that bargain. Except for my dog. I really missed Barney and his Golden Retriever goodness.
I ducked the auction for days, but Evelyn had me firmly fixed as her “handler.” This rather bizarre job title meant each of her prospective dates gave me the written invitation so I could vet the guy and his proposed evening. It’s vicarious, but something of a life.
As for the hungry old people, the job did have perks. They appreciated company more than the food. I’d already been given a hand-knit winter sweater (and it’s only spring!) and two bottles of toilette water: one rosewater, and the other my Mom tells me is lilac. They are marvelously oblivious to the Internet and have heard far more scandalous gossip in their lives than my father up and leaving. Everyone seemed happy to see me except for that grumpy old professor who lived a block over and two blocks down, the last delivery on my little route. He could have been the first, but I made him the last. It’s difficult to explain why except to say that my day was almost done when I got to the professor’s, so I could put up with just about anything when I got there. He had a bristly mustache under his nose and out of each of his ears, of the salt and pepper color variation. He did not look like Albert Einstein, although he was probably just as intelligent and eccentric. I don’t say that because my mom also taught and had a professional connection with him, so I had to be on my good behavior regardless of his temperament. Her position in academia was tough enough without my complicating it further. I’d been told that Brandard could be a good influence, although he showed no inclination to be one.
* * *
• • •
The first time I dropped off the professor’s dinner, he came to the screen door and blustered at me in a semi-British accent about my trying to poison him in the manner of the Mycenaeans. He exhaled gustily. “Where’s the regular driver?”
“I’m the substitute,” I said, and proceeded to tell him if he didn’t want it, I wouldn’t come back, but since the Bronze Age of Greece was long gone, taking the Mycenaeans with it, I was more likely to poison him in the medieval tradition of Lucrezia Borgia, her being a woman after my own heart. That put a sparkle in his eye.
“You know your history.”
“A little bit.” I loved history, fostered by my mom’s interest, but I wasn’t about to encourage him to go on about it. I had things to do, and I’d already discovered that lonely old people could talk your ears off. I left the covered dinner on his front step, took my insulated envelope, which smelled, slightly fermented, of boiled cabbage, and bicycled home. The Meals by Wheels in this area is a Monday-Wednesday-Friday deal, as the funding didn’t allow it to offer a full week of meals. When I returned, the door was closed and stayed that way. I didn’t see him for at least two weeks, when he deigned to show himself in person again.
* * *
• • •
My meals had already been dropped off and stood stacked on our front porch like a convention of wayward pizzas, each in their own special insulated envelope. It wasn’t pizza though, which I suspected would have a greater reception on my delivery route just for the variety. It smelled like something with cooked cabbage again by its potent odor. Maybe meatloaf. Regardless of what it was, my job was to get them delivered still warm and by five o’clock because old people dine insanely early before watching TV and going to bed.
He sat waiting on the stoop for me. He wore a tweed waistcoat like Mole from The Wind in the Willows. I knew the book well, having read it after it pitched itself off after me, at least twice, from Aunt April’s highest shelf. He stood up as I put the kickstand down on my bike. Waving his pipe, he said, “Follow me. If I must eat, I intend to do so in style,” and he led me around to his backyard. We passed the economical but serviceable Corolla sitting on his driveway. Spiderwebs hung about the sagging tires, and the car looked as if it hadn’t moved in a good three years. I took note that it may be available if I asked nicely. The city bus was not all it could be.
The houses in this part of town tended to all be frame and a little bit of stucco or brick, with spindly wooden garages at the rear. His had two canopied windows in front,
looking out like benevolent eyes onto the street. Spacious yards lined the back of the houses in the neighborhood, most of which had gone wild. The professor’s ran more to a cultivated ruin, meaning someone mowed and edged it once in a while. We passed an herb garden, a few fruit trees with green fruit waiting to ripen in the summer sun, and through a maze that spanned the rear, where he ducked under an arbor and trellis. He pointed his pipe stem at it as he went. “Crafted of redwood. All but impervious to rot, pests, and fire. Remember that if you ever need to secret and protect anything. Redwood is a good guardian.”
Which made absolutely no sense to me, but he had a table and three chairs under the arbor in the shade as he sat down, waiting for me to deposit his dinner. So I did. Redwood is not common to Virginia—we use a lot of pine—and it looked perfectly ordinary despite the professor’s endorsement. Two of the chairs were people-sized, normal that is, but the third looked as if something gargantuan could, and did, sit in it, as it showed wear. Dinner proved to be a chicken fillet with potatoes au gratin and a leafy spinach salad with a little plastic tub of vinaigrette dressing. No cabbage. I thought maybe the aroma was ingrained into the delivery envelopes. He sniffed at each portion, nodded his approval and said, “You’ll stay.”
Stay and what? But I sat down cautiously on the edge of the picnic chair. He must have noticed the quizzical look and added, “To make sure this doesn’t poison me.”
I quirked an eyebrow and decided silence was my best response. Halfway through his chicken fillet, the professor commented that I had a smart mouth.
“I hope you mean educated.”
“Precisely.” He sliced his meat neatly into small cubes, easily chewed and swallowed. I wondered if it was OCD or if it had become a habit of his age. He waved his knife. “What brings you to bring my meals?”
“Charity work looks good on scholarship applications. There’s always another semester to pay for.”
I must have had an edge to my voice. He looked up. “And you have something against that?”
“Oh, no. I’m all for scholarships, but I had intended to work this summer. Aunt April signed me up for this freebie, so I’m stuck with it for a while.”
“Ah. Until she forgets about its importance.”
“Actually, until your regular’s leg heals enough that she can drive again.” I toed a clump of grass.
He speared a limp spinach leaf. “You look familiar.”
I doubted my face had changed much from the local newspaper photos about the disappearance, asking for local help, and I knew it hadn’t from the Internet gossip that kept circulating because someone had updated it. I didn’t know who it was, but when I caught them . . . I smiled instead. “Probably do.”
“I have it. You’re the unfortunate young woman whose father went missing.”
I nodded. “Him and the family dog.” I shifted in my chair.
“Your father and I had a brief business deal. It did not end well.” He eyed another bit of spinach. “I should probably discuss that with your mother, however.”
“There’s probably nothing she can do. He’s brought us a lot of grief.”
He nodded sympathetically. “If only grief were a finite thing.”
I stood up, sliding the meal carrier under my elbow. “Enjoy your dinner, Professor Brandard,” and left.
It was a little trickier getting out of the arbor than it had been getting in. Who knew? I felt as though I’d hacked my way out of a jungle by the time I emerged. The sun threatened to settle low in the sky. I scurried off and flung a look back at the redwood arbor, arched innocently over a third of the professor’s yard, and wondered. I could see no sign of him or the picnic set buried in its depths. I stood on tiptoe. I knew he was there but could not see him.
The following week, he greeted me warmly and left me with a saying about a man’s home being his castle and the threshold as the moat against all evil. Running water the same. I had no idea what he meant by that, except the turkey hash that I carried on his dinner tray looked menacing, and I passed it over to him with misgivings. He seemed terribly grateful for it though. Dark circles bruised the wrinkled skin under his eyes and one hand shook a bit as he balanced the tray.
I took a step away, and then back toward him. “Are you all right?”
“All right? All right? By all the gods in all their heavens, I am fit! Fit as any man who thinks and walks on two feet, and never think I’m not!” His mustache vibrated with indignity.
I hurried away as those words and more boomed after me, as though I had insulted every bone, all 200 and some, in his body.
He’d been afraid. Of what? Aging? Although I had no idea of the professor’s age, I knew that he was older than anyone else on my route, but still capable. I had studied Aunt April enough to know that incapability could be a worry. I decided to apologize next time I saw him, although in a roundabout way. I didn’t want to face that thundering anger again.
More days passed and the meals had been taken, but I didn’t see him. I gathered my nerve to ring the doorbell and apologize face-to-face next time.
My offering didn’t smell auspicious when my deliveries were dropped off. Maybe cooked cabbage was a generational thing and older people loved it more than I did, but it certainly seemed to be a staple. I peeked into a tray. Aha. Brussels sprouts. Fake, miniature cabbage. I felt only a tiny bit better as I went about my route and deliveries.
Mrs. Romero, she of the lilac water, had a baggie of oatmeal raisin cookies waiting for me. I took one and thanked her, but left the rest. “All that bicycling won’t do me any good if I’m munching on delicious cookies,” I told her. She dimpled as she smiled and took the goodie bag back. Even her hands had dimples.
As soon as I was out of sight, I spit out the rest of the cookie. Good lord, had she put in a handful of salt instead of a teaspoon? I was still sucking down my water bottle when I arrived at Mrs. Sherman’s, she of the rosewater cologne, eight deliveries later. Mrs. Sherman was next to last, and she felt her dinner tray carefully to make certain it was still warm enough. She smiled thinly. “That’ll do.”
“Good! Because between you and me, I don’t know how these things will stay warm in the winter.” I eyed the old Pontiac sitting in her driveway, lightly driven and all but abandoned, like the professor’s car. Maybe I could arrange a payment plan. Not that I intended to keep working the meals program, but Aunt April hadn’t told me yet if I could bail from deliveries.
Her yarn and knitting needles fell off the small corner table and we both bent to retrieve them.
“Oh, be careful! Those needles are quite sharp. Antique, you know,” she told me. “Made from bone.”
“Really?”
“Oh yes. Bone and, if you had money in those days, even ivory. I must say, I’m glad ivory isn’t used for such things today. Let me put these away.” She hurried to the kitchen and then to her craft room by the front bedroom. She made another trip to the kitchen and brought something back with her. She pressed a wax paper package into my hand. “Homemade fudge.”
“Oh, you shouldn’t have!” Not after Mrs. Romero, she really shouldn’t have.
“It’s a family recipe,” she said. Mrs. Sherman had red hair. Texas red, my mom called it fondly, and bright blue eyes. “Trust me.”
I took a wary nibble. Milk chocolate melted on my tongue, the first thing that could take away the memory of that block of salt. “Oh, my.”
“See? Just a few pieces. Wouldn’t want to add too many curves to that figure of yours, Tessa.”
I licked my lips. “Thanks, Mrs. Sherman!” I waved and trotted back to my cruiser. You win some and you lose some.
At the professor’s house, his Corolla had gone missing, leaving big tire ruts in his grass and stone driveway as though it had been dragged away reluctantly. I parked my bike thoughtfully as another car stood at the curb. He had visitors. I’d learned that s
ome of the seniors I served were very keen not to let their friends and relatives know they were on a food program. Professor Brandard might be embarrassed as well, so I went to the side kitchen door framed by an arch with wisteria vine in purple bloom. I balanced in hesitation, not quite able to trespass. He hadn’t looked well, he needed good nutrition, and, well, I had signed on for this gig. Or my aunt had, but we both had good intentions. The moment of heaviness keeping me not quite in, not quite out passed. Quietly as I could, I went inside, deposited his meal in the oven, and put it on low to keep it warm. I’d telephone back and let him know. It was NOT my fault that I then overheard the voices.
I froze in place.
“Mortimer, good chap, I’m having a terrible day. They came and took my car today. What are you doing sitting on my steps?” Brisk and almost British, my Professor.
“They’ve hauled my wife away.” Mortimer had a low, rusty voice that rumbled in that heavy, heart-pounding bass range which people roll their car windows down for, thinking everyone should appreciate it.
“Really? What good fortune. Not like my car. Neighbors reported it derelict and now I have to get it back. Wish I had luck like you do, but you always did fall in the muck and come out smelling like roses! Now that you’re in, tell me all about it and have a spot of something bracing while you do.” The floor creaked dreadfully and I realized they must be standing just inside the foyer. I had barely missed running into them. The professor sounded incredibly cheerful despite his terrible day. “However did you manage something so clever as to have her done away with?”
“I didn’t, they did, and she won’t like it. She’ll be wanting me to come get her.” Mortimer sounded far less cheerful about his missing wife than the professor.
“Ah. Umm. Awkward. Do you think you can manage it?”
“Not without your help.” An Eeyore of a man, whoever he was.
Another hmmm sound. “Called her name three times?”
