by Melody Clark
He shook his head to redirect his focus. “But that still doesn’t explain why it says Thomas’ room?”
Thomas smiled gently. “Because Thomas was your name at birth. Didn’t you know that?”
He had heard the words, but they still lay fallow in his mind. “It was?”
“Yes, Thomas Edward Croftdon, Junior,” Thomas said. “I’m sorry, somehow I thought you had been told. When the adoption transpired, Jennifer Bakunin wisely determined to preserve some of your heritage, so they switched the names around. You were born Thomas Edward. You became Edward Thomas.”
Eddie swallowed hard. His voice tenuous, he spoke again, “And the room has always –”
“Has always been your room. Yes. You didn’t know that?”
“No. I – didn’t. I’m sorry. If you’ll give me a moment – ” Edward said, his voice finally breaking. He stood up slowly, considering all the people before him, before walking around the table and out of the room toward the back of the house.
Both Tad and Andrew rose to follow, but Thomas held up his hand. “No, boys, this one is my calling.”
Thomas found him standing in the deep hollows of the twin trees, their old spindly arms twined together at the tips. In the right light, they cast a long shadow across Edward’s windows. Faith, as she was dying, would sometimes sit in the room and think about her lost one far away, the images of the trees becoming too great a burden to behold. She had them cut back severely, to minimize the import. Since her death, the arms had grown back to full length.
What was there to say to someone – so near to him and still so far?
“I’m sorry, Eddie, I honestly thought you knew,” Thomas said.
“No, I don’t know, for some reason, it never even occurred to me,” Eddie said, shutting his eyes at another realization. “That’s why my baby book was in the room.”
“Yes, that’s why.”
Edward covered his face with his hands, as if for a moment of inner privacy. “You have to understand,” he murmured, shaking his head, “everything in my life up to this point has been conditional. Wendell used to say we have no inherent right to anything. That we have to regularly meet our quota, fit the standard, live up to his expectations.”
“I wish I could say I’m surprised,” Thomas said.
“I know it seems like such a simple thing. But in Wendell’s world, there is no grace. Mercy is weakness. There are no special exceptions. No benefit of the doubt.” Edward blinked away what he would never have admitted to. “To know I actually always had a room here. In the house of my ancestors.”
“Then I’m very sorry I didn’t tell you before now,” Thomas said softly. “You mean that all this time, you thought you were just staying in a guest room?”
“Yes. I honestly did.” Edward, with a second thought, walked back to Thomas again. “Listen, about the funding, I did it before –”
“Never mind, we can deal with it later,” Thomas said.
“No,” Eddie said firmly, “I want to explain. I set up the funding as a package with the original estate funds. I obviously didn’t think it through from your perspective. I never meant it as an insult. It was just my way of trying to help. It’s the only thing I thought I could offer. But I should have realized it would be offensive. Context is something I sometimes sorely need. Okay, frequently need.”
Thomas laughed a little. “And perhaps I’m a bit too fast to judge.”
Eddie nodded. “I apologize for the drama. I guess we should go back in.”
“I can have the boys put up your dinner. Take some time if you need it.”
Edward stood back for a moment, his face reflecting an inner process of thought. Finally, he looked up with an air of new resolve. “No, Dad, your rules are your rules. I’ll respect them. I’m ready to go back in now.”
Thomas’ small smile grew into a big one. “Thank you, son.”
Eddie chuckled. “Well, I’m a slow learner, but I get there eventually.”
It only took a moment to realize that the focus of the evening had changed. Edward saw Tad hovering over their grandfather, listening to his heart through the stethoscope he had evidently just pulled quickly from his upended bag of medical tricks. The old man seemed pale and on the verge of panic. The other boys had gathered around.
“What’s wrong?” Thomas asked quickly, moving up beside them.
Tad shook his head. “I think we’re copacetic for the moment. I just gave him some sublingual nitro. We’ll see how that goes. I believe it is just very bad angina.”
“It’s the beginning of the end for me,” John Croftdon said weakly.
“You don’t know that, Granddad,” Tad said, stowing away his stethoscope.
“In fact, I do, young man.”
“Is that your medical opinion?” Tad asked gently.
“It’s my opinion based on living more than eighty years in this body,” the old man replied. “Like an old clock, I am winding down. My era is at last at an end.”
“Oh, I think we can stretch it out a bit more,” Tad replied.
“In either case, I want to meet the moment in my own room,” John said. “James, Wilse, will you assist me to my bed?”
As the younger boys assisted the old man down the hall, Thomas turned fully toward Tad. “What is it really?”
“Hard to tell,” Tad replied. “At his age, every traffic circle is a potential five car pile-up. But for the moment, he’s stable.”
“I had best look in on him. Excuse me, boys,” Thomas said, turning to follow his father.
Tad looked toward his older brother. “So have you recovered from your latest trauma drama, Brother Septic?”
“I’m sorry,” Eddie replied. “Did I do something to you?”
“Only the usual. You see, I find most people to be too encumbering,” Tad said. “In your case, it’s the utter lack of your imposition that frustrates me. But that makes it very easy to remain detached, doesn’t it?”
“Wait,” Edward said, “I was just at a family meeting where the consensus was I imposed myself too much.”
“So long as you can control the game, of course,” Tad said, stuffing everything back into his bag.
“Look who’s talking,” Eddie replied.
Tad stayed silent for a long moment. “And that stealthy move put me right into check. You’re right, of course. I’m sorry. Bad day. See you in the morning.”
Chapter Four
He vaguely remembered dreaming, but he didn’t stay with the memory long enough to later recall what he had dreamed. It wasn’t until he was dressed for the day that he awoke enough to hear voices in the distance. Young voices outside; older, more measured voices nearby and within.
A gaggle of strange voices in a home in which he had only recently become somewhat comfortable did not sound welcome. But then a glance out his window reminded him – Wilse’s birthday party. Guests had already started collecting in the yard. Most of them were young – Wilse’s friends. That was a group from which he might hide.
He slipped silently into the hall to make a break for the kitchen where he had hoped to partake of Andrew’s morning coffee. He saw the gathering of great room people, some standing, some sitting, all of them chatting, with Thomas at the center. Edward turned to look back at his room door – at a symbol of certainty and solitude. Before he could return, the great room voices in unison hushed.
“It’s him!” someone said.
He stepped back to peer around the door, only to find everyone in the great room staring toward him.
One woman stepped up, looking like someone staring at a head of state, or a royal, or a celebrity. As if she couldn’t believe who stood before her.
The first shining-eyed blonde woman, who could have passed for his mother’s twin, reached out to squeeze his hand. “It is you – isn’t it?”
“I’m Edward,” he said, hoping that might answ
er her question.
“Of course it’s him,” said the shorter woman, on the verge of tears herself. She looked like his mother, too, except shorter and less fair. She quickly collected herself. “He’s a perfect cross between his parents.”
One of his aunts walked tentatively forward, embracing him at first carefully, as if he might break, and then as if she couldn’t let go. The other one encircled him from behind. Together, he was surrounded. Edward had never been an easy hugger. He just stood there being awkwardly compressed by strangers for several seconds. He never knew what to say in such occasions – he definitely didn’t know what to say at that particular moment.
The taller woman stood away, smiling as if in apology. She enshrined his face with her hands a moment, thumbing away her lipstick from his face.
“I’m sorry. This must be awkward for you. We knew you existed. You have no idea who we are,” she said, straightening his collar. “I’m your Aunt Charity. This is your Aunt Hope. We’re your mother’s sisters. And it seems like such a miracle to have you here.” She pointed to the taciturn looking man who, while hiking his chin, seemed to jostle a chip on his shoulder. The man beside the other fellow was smiling kindly, looking a little dewy-eyed. “This is my husband, your Uncle Stephen. And this is your Uncle Herbert, Hope’s husband.”
Herbert. The one his father had warned him about.
Both men nodded at him, one, the one with the invisible chip burden on his shoulder, looking far less receptive than the other. Thankfully, Thomas smiled sympathetically and beckoned him toward the circle. “Eddie, why don’t you come and join us over here, son?”
Edward sat down in the chair beside his father, which quickly became encircled by his tribesmen. He felt distinctly like the new Bonobo at the primate cage exhibit. His Aunt Charity sat right beside him, holding his hand like a found kitten.
“It’s very nice to meet you all,” Edward said, hoping that filled up one awkward moment, with a million more of them still to go.
“We’re so very, very happy you’re here,” Charity said.
“Thank you,” Edward said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
One of the men stepped forward to join the conversation, perhaps, Edward thought, out of sympathy for his mother’s sisters.
“So, you’re a computer person like your brother, Andrew,” the man identified as Uncle Stephen said. “Must run in the family.”
“I suppose it must,” Edward said, fumbling for something else to say.
Stephen nodded. “I remember your mother very well. She stood up at our wedding, you know.”
Edward smiled. “I’d like to hear all about that someday,” he said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Everybody seemed to be glancing tensely toward the one called Herbert.
He cleared his throat and spoke in the voice of an orator, “So, Edward, what might your politics be? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“I mind your asking, Herb,” Thomas said. “This is Wilse’s birthday party, and Eddie’s first celebration with the entire family. This is our home, not Hyde Park. Edward is here as my son, not as the target of your political sentiments.”
“It’s a simple question,” Herbert said, “not an attack.”
“It’s always the beginning of one with you,” Thomas said.
“I don’t mind answering,” Edward said, “Pro-science, pro-education, pro-humanity. I accept I don’t have any answers. I just try to follow my conscience.”
Pierce’s spine seemed to stiffen in response. Edward could almost see the chip forming on the older man’s shoulder. At this point, he was prepared for anything. “Well, that’s hardly the political objective of your sort over the last span of years. Especially with this computer weaponry of yours. I’m sorry, but I am on the board and I simply think –”
“Mr. Pierce –” Edward said.
“Uncle Herb, please,” the man replied.
Edward drew a deep breath of composure. Oh, good, he wanted to be rude and familial at the same time, Eddie thought. “That was a very complicated matter. It would take a lot of time and, frankly, reflection on events I’d just as soon forget.”
“Would we could all forget them,” Herbert said. “Certainly those poor people in South Africa cannot.”
“Herb, this is not the time or place,” Charity said.
“Well, it should be,” Herb said. “If someone had drawn the line with this madness some time ago –”
The front door opened and Stewart crept in quickly, only to see the gathered group. He immediately froze in place, a standing portrait of fear.
Thomas smiled at the happy interruption. “Come in, Stewart,” he said, standing. “You can meet everyone, too. Everyone, this is Tad’s son, my grandson, Stewart.”
“Don’t you look just like your father!” Hope said cheerfully, beckoning the boy with a smile.
“I – I just – thought –” Stewart whispered, “maybe Uncle Eddie and I could play catch –”
“You may do that later. It’s family time now,” Thomas said. “Come in and meet your great aunts and uncles.”
Edward took advantage of the moment to stand up quickly to take his leave. “If you’ll all excuse me, I’ll be outside,” he said, so brusquely he nearly felt rude in the face of a roomful of smiling strangers.
He left – he just left – and kept walking until he stood beyond the porch and the side yard, near the fence and the stand of trees that partly obscured the road. Edward had almost reached the near gate when he realized that his young nephew had followed him out.
“Stewart, you should go back in,” Edward said, “your grandfather told you to visit with the family.”
“Hey, I’m not going back in there!” Stewart said. “They were eating you alive! I wasn’t gonna stay in there if you left.”
Before Edward could answer, he heard the front door open. Thomas’ slow, deliberate steps followed in time. “Stewart, go inside now please,” Thomas said, in a soft measured voice. “I need to speak with your uncle.”
Eddie quickly came to the cold, queasy conclusion that he was about to confront another first name, middle name moment with Thomas. He didn’t like the feeling in the slightest. He hadn’t felt like this since he was 13 years old. That feeling of being fearful of Thomas, waxing and waning over the last few months, flourished again in a flash.
“Do I have to?” an obviously frightened Stewart asked in just above a whisper. “I’d rather stay out here.”
“Yes, you must,” Thomas said strongly. “Now do as I ask, please. The others are waiting for you. No one is going to harm you, for heaven’s sake.”
“Okay,” the boy whispered, sneaking a sympathetic look at Edward. The boy mouthed “See ya” and then walked inside with all the eagerness and energy of a condemned man.
“Am I really that terrifying?” Thomas asked Edward, as he glanced toward the house to make certain the boy had gone in. “My only grandson in the world at present constantly looks at me as if I am Godzilla and he is Tokyo. You were frightened of me, too.”
“It’s the accent, I think,” Eddie said. “It’s the voice of authority to our ears. I think that’s why most of the Hollywood bad guys are Brits.” Edward turned around fully toward Thomas. “I’m in trouble again, aren’t I?”
“Well, I do have some things I would like to address with you,” Thomas said.
“In other words, yes,” Edward said. “Very well, lob them at me.”
“For one thing, do not countermand my directives to Stewart. I’m his grandfather. In the absence of his father, he should listen to me. I realize you two have a lot in common, but we still have to keep the structure of the family intact. It may not be perfect, but it’s the way we’ve always done things.”
“I didn’t countermand you,” Edward said. “Stewart followed me out.”
“He followed your
lead, Eddie, just as we’ve spoken before,” Thomas replied.
“And I’m responsible for him following me out?” Eddie asked.
“If you had stayed and continued visiting with the family, Stewart would have followed suit. He took your departure as permission to do the same. He followed your example.”
“I did tell him he should go back inside as you directed.”
“Good. Thank you for that. Also, Stewart must spend more time with his father than he does with you. I recognize you two have a lot in common, but the division between them will not narrow until they become closer.”
“I have encouraged that, believe it or not,” Edward said, looking away.
“You must encourage it more. Now, since you’re a grown man, I can’t order you back inside. But I asked you to sit down with the family and visit with them. I cleared the visit with you beforehand. Your aunts have waited a very long time to meet you. It’s your duty as a member of this family to conduct yourself in a civil manner.”