The Waning Age

by S. E. Grove

  There were no pews, only rough wooden benches. By silent agreement, Joey and I lay down on one of these, head to head, staring up at the ceiling. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been in a place this quiet—probably on one of the trips to Point Reyes with Mom and Cal. It was arresting. As I watched the clouds move by in horizontal stripes, I let myself think about the future with Cal. Maybe we didn’t belong in Oakland. Maybe we belonged someplace like this—not with the Puritans, but with the dry grass and blue sky. Maybe once Cal was out we should disappear for real. Convince Joey and Cass and Tabby to come with us and head to Alaska. Or Greenland. Or Tierra del Fuego. I didn’t know how we’d make money, but at the moment that seemed secondary.

  “I don’t like this place,” Joey said, his voice floating up from the bench over my head.

  “You just hate peace, don’t you?”

  “I hate the way this seems to belittle my life. Like the only thing that matters is the big outdoor world. And it’s obvious. And free. And I’ve been too dumb to see it.”

  I thought about this. “Yeah. I know what you mean. The deep space phenomenon. Nothing matters in the grandeur of the universe and you are a meaningless speck and so on.”

  “It’s not much, but mattering does help for wanting to stay alive.”

  Joey is the only person I can talk to about stuff like this. “I think because of Cal even when I am certain of being a meaningless speck, I know I am the meaningless speck Cal counts on.”

  He was quiet for a little while. I didn’t know exactly where his mind was going, but I had a general sense that it was floating around me and him and Cal and how we all fit together. When he spoke his voice was quiet, but the silence on the hilltop made it linger in the air over our heads. “It’s not just Cal who counts on you. You are eminently count-on-able. Even when things are very bad. Especially when things are very bad.”

  There’s something different about knowing someone from before you both faded. Joey and I have been friends since we were four, and we were different as children. Not just because we felt things. We were different people. I was like a jellyfish—soft and squishy and quick to sting. It’s hard to imagine, but Joey was the tough one. He used to block the door to the girls’ room so I could pee without being teased. He would stand next to me at lunch while I was reading, pretending to read his own book and glaring at anyone who thought about making fun of me. He was my childhood defender. Even though we both changed completely after we faded, there is a part of us that is cumulative; every time I talk to him I see the kid who guarded the bathroom door, who held my hand when I cried even though it was covered with snot, and who made it seem like nothing I ever did was stupid. I’m sure when Joey looks at me he can still see the scared, morose little creature he looked after.

  Even though he wasn’t saying so, I knew that by “very bad” he was thinking of when my mom died. That night, I could tell that Joey was seeing me but picturing the little girl. It was a long night, with police and endless questions and Cal almost going crazy. Joey did not budge from my side for fourteen hours, and then only because I finally fell asleep. When I woke up he was on the tweed sofa, snoring with his head at a weird angle and his mouth open. He had cleaned the room while I slept.

  That’s one of the things I would want to ask Hugh Glout, if he were not my semi-mortal enemy. It’s something all the explanations I’ve ever heard or read can’t explain. Even in the absence of feelings, we put meaning into our actions. Those meanings are heavy the way emotions are heavy. They make significance. And so the past creates an accumulated weight of significant moments, and that accumulation determines what we will and won’t do, what we can and cannot fathom, whom we cannot stand and whom we cannot live without. How does it do that?

  I reached up over my head and Joey did the same until our hands met. There was nothing to say, so we just watched the sky for a while longer and I considered that I had never really thanked Joey for the night my mom died. I would have to tell him sometime.

  * * *

  —

  The sun started setting on Mordecai’s Hill, and Reverend Hoffman had still not returned. We had partaken of lemonade and olives and bread and Point Reyes blue and more lemonade, and our wizened host had unapologetically remarked more than once that the minister was out late that day. Finally Cass put the question to her directly, asking when we would be certain to find him, and Cressens told us we were welcome to attend services the next morning. Cass and Tabby were so fed up they didn’t even balk at the idea of sitting through a Puritan sermon. They agreed and promised to return the next day at eleven.

  We climbed back into the coupe, took the dusty road out of the hills, and drove home to a spectacular sunset in the western sky: an orange fire that waned to violet, not so much ceding to the darkness as consenting to its company. I fell asleep in the back of the car, my head on Joey’s shoulder. It reminded me of old times.

  24

  NATALIA

  OCTOBER 13—EVENING

  I made it just in time for my training with Gao at 8:30. The night had turned cool. I wore black leggings and a racerback tank under a sweatshirt, and I brought spare shirts knowing I’d be soaked with sweat by the end of the session and wouldn’t want to jog home dripping. Gao refused to hear the update on my tale of woe unless I reported while running eight-minute miles on the treadmill, so he got a somewhat abridged version. After two miles he stopped me. “You need to get back in shape before we do much else,” he said. He’d had his arms crossed the entire time I was running, and he watched my heavy breathing with an expression of dour unamazement. I wanted to tell him that my cleaning schedule didn’t leave time for Olympic-level training, but the panting made it tough to say anything at all.

  Gao, much like the Nancy Drew novels, favors judo. Although, I doubt even George would be able to keep up with Gao’s techniques, because I can barely keep up and I’ve been practicing them for years. Gao did not break a sweat in the hour he spent making origami with my limbs. For most of that time I was becoming intimately acquainted with the mat, getting to my feet a bit more slowly each time. Hey, we all need to practice safe falling. Finally Gao reached a hand out and helped me up—the worst possible sign. During training, Gao only helps the helpless.

  “Guess I need a little more practice,” I said, eyeing him.

  “You were the best in your class when you graduated high school,” he said.

  I winced. I wasn’t sure if he meant it as a measure of how much I’d deteriorated or as evidence that I could achieve a thing or two when I put my mind to it. I decided to pretend it was the latter. “I’ll be here three times a week like I promised. I appreciate your taking the time,” I added. “I know you have other things to spend it on.”

  He pulled a sweatshirt on over his tee. “Combative orphans are a good use of time.”

  I smiled. He wasn’t giving up on me. “They can be very loyal,” I agreed.

  I changed out of my wet shirt in the locker room and came out feeling dry, my muscles like pounded meat. Gao was waiting for me. There were still a few cops working out late and he waved to them on the way out. “Let me see your screen decal,” he said as we neared the door.

  I fished De rerum out of my bag and gave it to him. He tapped a few things into it and then showed me. “I don’t give this number to a lot of people,” he said, pointing to his name, newly added to my address book, “and it’s only for emergencies. I hope you don’t need it. But if you do, don’t hesitate. Running for—”

  “Running for cover is smart when you’re fast and calling for help is smart when you’re stuck.” I took De rerum back with a smile. “I haven’t forgotten.”

  * * *

  —

  The walk home was good for my tired muscles, but by the time I arrived I felt like soup in a body-shaped bag.

  It was not a good time to see Troy Philbrick on my doorstep.

  He sat
there looking tense, and by my estimate it wasn’t just the neighborhood. “Hi,” he said, standing up as I approached.

  I was surprised he recognized me wearing sweats and looking, I have no doubt, like I’d just spent an hour being pummeled into a floor mat. “Hi,” I replied.

  “I’m sorry about the hour,” he said. “And for perhaps being creepy getting your address from Crystal Cleaners.”

  I was going to tell him that it was nothing compared to Charlie-level creepiness, but I bit my tongue and decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. “It looks urgent,” I said.

  “Kind of, yes.”

  I lifted my chin at the building. “Come on in.”

  He didn’t comment on the psychedelic carpet my landlord had installed in an effort to “cheer up” the corridor or on the table of goodies where tenants left items they were giving away. At the moment there was an Our Lady of Guadalupe votive candle, a box of macaroni and cheese, and two self-help books. They made a distressing group portrait.

  I trudged up to the second story, opened my door, and turned on some lights. “The living room is this way,” I said, because he was lingering in the doorway, maybe wanting a more direct invitation. “I have some . . . uh, water if you’d like.”

  He stood awkwardly next to the tweed sofa. “Water would be great.”

  “Or tea,” I said belatedly, as I went to the kitchen.

  “Either one,” he called after me.

  I brought us both glasses of water and he spared me the offensive false compliments about my apartment. I had seen his home. I had a pretty good idea what he would think of mine.

  “Thanks.” He took a sip of water for the sake of politeness or maybe to show he wasn’t afraid of being poisoned and then carefully put the glass on a coaster on the table.

  He had changed out of the riding outfit, and now he wore a summer suit over a white linen shirt. His hair was combed and an undone tie in a lilac print hung over his shoulders. Running a hand through his hair, he looked down at the table, then up at me, and then down at the table again. I waited.

  “I was with my mom this afternoon,” he finally said. “You met her at the Landmark.”

  I leaned back in the rickety rocking chair. “I remember.”

  “It came up that I’d be seeing you tomorrow. She remembered you, too.” Troy paused and rubbed a thumb on the side of the glass, clearing away some invisible stain. Or maybe visible. We don’t have a dishwasher.

  “Okay,” I said.

  “She said something that unsettled me. She asked me how you were doing.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “I’m touched.”

  “No, not like that.” Troy ran a hand through his hair again, took a deep breath. Something was chewing away at him, a mean tick burrowing deep. “She asked in this way that was like she’d scored.” He looked at me anxiously. “You don’t understand my mom. She goes after people. Did you say something to her at the Landmark?”

  Pieces began falling into place. I was right. Frances Peters was the start of my troubles. “I might have,” I sniffed. “I didn’t like how she treated you, and I said so.”

  A spasm of fear flashed across his brows, and then his face melted. “You’re so sweet,” he said sadly, his gaze equal parts fondness and penitence. “I’m really sorry,” he went on. “But it’s going to cost you. I’ve seen her do it before. It’s like a project, upending people’s lives when they piss her off. She will just find whatever angle she can. I really don’t want to pry, but you have to think about what that might be. Debt? A rap sheet? A crazy uncle? She’s going to find whatever weak spot she can and just go after it.”

  I made a decision. I leaned forward in the rocking chair and rested my elbows on my knees, looking straight at him. “I think she already has.”

  His eyes widened. “What’s happened?”

  “My brother, Calvino. He’s ten, and he’s a late waner. He was taken by RealCorp for testing two days ago and they won’t give him back.”

  “Oh, God. No.” He dropped his head abruptly into his hands and held it tightly, as though at any moment his skull might burst into pieces.

  I risked adding a few more combustible sentences. “I think some guy named Dr. Glout has him at the moment. But honestly I’m not even sure where they’ve got him. I’m trying to figure out an angle to get him back.”

  Troy lifted his head. “How are they keeping him? I mean legally.”

  “Adoption. Not Glout—your father.” I saw the question in his eyes. “Cal’s biological father is MIA. Our mom is dead.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said, with a solemnity that managed to overcome the threadbare phrase. But he was still puzzled. “Why didn’t you adopt him? Or did she die a long time ago?”

  “I’m not of age.” I grimaced. “Believe it or not, given the manifest maturity of my ways. My mom’s friends, Cass and Tabby, fostered us so I could adopt Cal when I turn eighteen. She died last year,” I added. I pointed to the floor beside my chair. “Right there.”

  He stared at me. “What happened?”

  I don’t tell a lot of people about Mom, but on the occasions when I do, surprisingly few people ask that. They’re all curious, and yet they treat the question as off-limits. I shrugged. “I can tell you how it ended, but I can’t tell you why. I never understood what she was thinking. Especially the last year. She was out of her mind.”

  “She was taking synaffs?”

  “The cheapest, nastiest dirt you could find. Not nice stuff like you’re used to.”

  His eyes shifted. He sat back, his body tense. “My doses are not always nice. As you’ve seen.”

  “Well, my mom didn’t have a choice.”

  He looked wounded. “You think I do?”

  That was interesting. “Are you saying you don’t?”

  He backed off at once, cheeks suddenly flushed, eyes guarded. “You’re right, of course. We all have a choice.”

  “Some have more choices than others. I’m guessing you’ve never taken fear mixed with gasoline and chalk sold by a predatory multiple offender who also peddles underage kids to the very depraved.”

  “No,” he said softly. “I haven’t.”

  “Once the synaffs are adulterated they do all kinds of crazy things to you. Half the time she wouldn’t even feel anything; she would just pass out from whatever poison she’d swallowed. The other times she’d be backed into a corner, crying and screaming and terrified of nothing. When I was around I could talk her through it, but I wasn’t around that time.” I looked at the top drawer of my dresser, the only place in the apartment with a lock on it. No jewelry in there. Just some photos, a box of trinkets, an old shirt, and a piece of evidence. “It was fourteen months ago. She shot herself right by the window. Calvino and I found her. He was only nine.”

  “God,” he said. “Poor kid. What did you do?”

  I studied the spot on the floor where Mom had been. Sure, she was out of her mind, but that hadn’t stopped me trying to figure out what she’d been thinking. It wasn’t about consolation. It was about getting a reason. I wanted her ghost to sit at the witness stand and account for her actions. I wanted to interrogate her, to ask her what kind of calculation made the self-indulgence of a few minutes’ thrill more valuable than a lifetime with two children, both of whom relied upon her and one of whom loved her to distraction. I wanted to question her into a corner, so I could prove that she hadn’t been thinking at all, that her brain was faulty, that her reasons were worse than stupid, they were not even reasons. Nothing could justify what she had done.

  I was bringing Cal home from school, and he walked into the apartment first. I saw him stop. I walked up behind him and saw what he was looking at. He lunged forward, and I caught him reflexively, holding him back.

  Her eyes were closed, her body relaxed. The gun, which I had never seen before, was still in her grasp.
The blood was pooled on the floor, bright in the sunlight that came through the open window. It had stained the edge of the carpet. The gun wound was elaborate, looking more like the impact of a baseball bat than a bullet. But the casement window was open, and the breeze blew in, ruffling her hair, giving the illusion of life through movement. Around her head on the wooden floor, the blood was textured with pieces of brain, white and gray amid the red. I realized as I observed these things and wondered where the gun had come from that Cal was screaming.

  I adjusted; my task was to stop the screaming. But I didn’t know how. Cal was feeling something—immense, impenetrable, and new—and I didn’t understand it. I crouched down and held him by the shoulders, putting myself at eye level, because that’s what I often did when he was upset. But he just kept screaming. Every inch of his face broadcast terror: eyes wide, pupils tiny, the muscles around his jaw straining with the scream. He probably shouldn’t keep looking at this, I thought. I tried ineffectually to block his view. “Cal?” I said. He was having difficulty breathing. What was I supposed to do? Pick him up? Get him to the window for some fresh air? “Cal?” I said again. “Tell me what I can do.” His eyes suddenly met mine. He stopped screaming and his expression shifted. I didn’t recognize what he was feeling. His eyes were still wide; his mouth hung open; his breathing was shaky, irregular. I knew it had to do with me, but what was it? For several seconds we both stared. Cal, feeling something. Me, trying to figure out what. It was hopeless. I might as well have been reading omens in entrails.

  Abruptly Cal turned and ran from the room, and I followed him into the bedroom that he shared with Mom. His small bed was neatly made against the wall, and Mom’s bed was a mess of blankets and pillows. He climbed up into her bed, nearly muffling himself in the blankets, and started wailing. No, Mom. No, Mom. No. No. No. No. No. I stood at the edge of the bed, incompetent.

  “I called the police,” I said to Troy, waving my hand around the room. “I tried to comfort Cal, but the damage was already done. Or I guess you could say the damage had already started. Because it goes on.”