by Bryan Davis
Looking the casing over, he checked the meters. The film had advanced, and the flash indicator showed a charge. Everything seemed fine. He draped the strap around his neck and let the camera dangle at his chest. Taking a picture of the mirror wasn’t a great idea.
Echoes of laughter filtered through the hall, male and female, then a shushing sound. Grabbing his shirt and throwing it on, he tiptoed to the bedroom door and paused there, fastening his buttons under the swaying camera. A light knock sounded from the other side, then a whispered call. “Nathan!”
Kelly’s voice! He turned the knob and cracked the door open. “What’s up?”
“Shhh! … Are you decent?”
“Yeah, I —”
She pushed the door and squeezed through. “Good.” Dressed in a long bathrobe and wool socks, she glanced around the room, her voice barely audible. “Who else is in here?”
“Who else?” he whispered back. “What are you talking about?”
“I was on my way to the bathroom. I heard voices.”
He peeked out the door. “I heard a woman laughing. Could that be it?”
“No.” She pushed the door closed with her back and held the knob. “That’s my dad. He’s … uh … playing cards, I think.”
“Oh … Cards.” Nathan furrowed his brow. He finally realized what Kelly’s father was up to. “Is he playing solitaire?”
She tilted her head downward and shook it slowly. “He’s not really playing cards at all.” After a few seconds, she lifted her head again and gazed at him. Her brown eyes glistened. “I guess your dad never did stuff like that, did he?”
“No.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “He had a lot of old-fashioned ideas.”
Kelly’s lips curled downward. She spun to the side and bit one of her knuckles.
Nathan’s heart sank. How could he be such a pig? What her father was doing was breaking her heart. He reached for her shoulder, but pulled back. “I’m sorry. I … I didn’t really mean it that way.”
Her voice cracked. “Yes, you did, and I deserved it.”
He reached again. This time he let his hand settle gently on her shoulder. She flinched, but only for a second. “How long has your mother been gone?”
“Maybe three months, but they’ve been sleeping apart for years.” Wiping her eyes, she shrugged and forced a trembling smile. “She just found another guy and took off, like trading in an old car for a new model.”
He pulled his hand away. “And you got left in the backseat?”
“Yeah. Something like that. She said I was more like a son than a daughter, so I’d be better off with Daddy.”
Nathan winced. “Oh, man! That’s gotta hurt!”
“Don’t worry,” she said with a sigh. “I’m used to it.” Shaking her hair out of her eyes, she turned toward him again, wiping a tear. Her voice still trembled. “Anyway, I heard other voices. They came from your room.”
“There’s no one else here.” He gestured toward the mirror. “Just me and my reflection.”
“I know what I heard, and it wasn’t your voice. Someone said, ‘Buckingham is as opulent as I imagined,’ but I couldn’t make out the rest.”
“Buckingham? Like Buckingham Palace?”
“I guess so. I’m not the one who said it.”
“Well, I didn’t say anything about Buckingham Palace.” He turned toward the mirror — still normal. “But lots of weird stuff has been going on.”
She slid her finger behind the camera strap. “Like taking pictures of your room at midnight?”
“That’s part of it.” He held the camera up for her to see. “This is … I mean, was, my dad’s camera. It was in the trunk.”
Her eyes lit up. “The trunk? How’d you get it open?”
He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “That’s kind of hard to explain.”
“Was anything else in there?”
“Yeah.” He pointed at the violin on the floor. “That was my mom’s.”
She scooted to the trunk and knelt, squinting at its weathered wood. “I still don’t see any seam.”
Nathan squatted next to her, picked up the violin, and nervously plucked a string.
She rose and sat on the trunk. “Did you say something?”
“I don’t think so.” He laid the violin back down. “Maybe I was thinking out loud.”
“About what?”
“I’m trying to figure out if I should tell you how I got into the trunk.”
Two lines dug into her brow. “Why wouldn’t you tell me?”
“Because it was so weird. You’ll think I’m crazy.”
“Maybe I will.” A wide grin crossed her face. “Maybe I already do.”
Nathan plopped onto the bed, making the mattress coils squeak. He gazed at the mirror for a moment, hoping it would try some of its tricks so Kelly wouldn’t be tempted to haul him away in a straightjacket, but its images and shadows reflected the room with perfect precision.
She leaned forward, her red socks tickling the flat, beige carpet as she cupped her hands around her mouth. “Earth to Nathan. This is mission control. I’m waiting for transmission.” She stretched her arms and yawned. “Report your extra-terrestrial findings, please, before I fall asleep.”
“I’ll do better than that.” He lifted the camera to his eye and took Kelly’s picture. “I’ll transmit a photo of a female Martian to go along with my report.”
4
ECHOES FROM THE PAST
Nathan paid for the photo pack and stuffed it into his jacket without opening it, keeping his promise to Kelly not to peek until he got home. The jacket, a leather one borrowed from Tony, complete with a soft inner lining and a Newton High School “Cardinals” logo, was a bit warm for the late summer morning, but the extra protection seemed appropriate, considering his mode of transportation. Besides, it looked great.
Alternately running and jogging, he hurried out to the Wal-Mart parking lot where he had left the motorcycle. Finding the store hadn’t been too hard — near the interstate, just as Kelly had said. She had wanted to come along, but since her allergies were acting up, he set out on his own.
Tony had left before dawn on this early autumn Saturday, taking the only car, so Nathan borrowed Kelly’s motorcycle right after breakfast. Snapping three quick photographs of her in front of the house, he had finished the roll, anxious to reveal the secrets that lay hidden in his father’s camera.
Now, after sliding his helmet over his head, he started the engine and wheeled around toward the parking lot exit, riding in the shopping center’s outer perimeter road, a two-lane access that ran parallel to the storefront on his right and the highway on his left.
When he reached the intersection with the entrance lanes, he stopped and waited for a long line of incoming cars, giving him a moment to gaze at the miles of pavement on the main road. Although he couldn’t see them from here, he remembered the endless stretch of pregnant cornfields begging to be harvested. It had been a pleasant ride to the only one-hour film-developing lab around, a good chance to get away and think — about Mom, about Dad, and about mornings just like this one: Saturday breakfasts at a pancake restaurant and playing cards on a long flight from who-knows-where to some other nameless place across the ocean.
He flipped down the helmet’s glass shield. Yes, the ride home should be just as pleasant, another chance to reminisce in private. Through the visor, nobody could see him crying.
One of the cars in the line, a blue Mustang convertible, turned right on the perimeter road and drove slowly past, then stopped suddenly, while the cars behind him all turned left or headed straight into the store’s central parking lane.
Nathan gulped. It was Mictar’s gunman from Chicago. The car was a little different — royal blue and not a scratch on it — yet there was no disguising the gray-bearded man behind the wheel. But how did he get out of jail? And how could he have known to come all the way out here?
As he waited for the last car to pass, Natha
n angled his face away. Would the helmet be enough to keep this guy from recognizing him?
The Mustang backed up and stopped again. Pulling off a pair of sunglasses, the driver stared at Nathan. “Hey, kid! What’s your name?”
Nathan squeezed the bike’s handlebars and lowered his voice. “Who wants to know?”
“Don’t get smart with me. I’m looking for my nephew, a boy about your age. He’s a runaway from my brother’s home, so I’m helping him search around town. His name’s Nathan. Seen any strangers lately?”
“What’s he look like?”
The man squinted, apparently trying to get a closer look at Nathan’s face. “About five-foot-nine, short blonde hair, a square jaw, kind of like you, only shorter.”
Nathan sat up straight and crossed his arms, more confident now that the gunman hadn’t recognized him. “Well, I haven’t seen anyone who looks like me.”
The driver’s icy stare chilled his heart. Had he guessed the truth? Nathan glanced around the parking lot. Only two escape routes were in sight. One was the main exit, where someone was waiting at the red light to get out. That wouldn’t work. The other lay straight behind him, the perimeter road that would eventually lead to the side entrance, but a Wal-Mart tractor-trailer approached from that way, taking up most of the access road.
“Gotta go!” Nathan restarted the engine and wheeled the bike around, yelling over the roar. “Sorry about your nephew!”
The man pulled a gun from under his seat. “Nathan!”
Nathan took off toward the oncoming Wal-Mart truck, hugging the left-hand side of the road. Cringing at the thought of a bullet in the back, he sped toward a gap between the truck and the curb, barely enough room for the bike but far from enough for the Mustang. Just as he roared past the front cab, he glanced back. The truck driver suddenly swerved to his left, cutting off Nathan’s pursuer. A horn squawked, followed by skidding tires. As Nathan whirled around and idled his engine, a loud string of obscenities burned in the air.
With the truck nearly jackknifed between him and the gray-bearded man, Nathan could only see the back of the truck driver’s head up in the cab. Seconds later, the Mustang took off out of the main parking lot exit, roaring its engine as it peeled away.
Nathan rolled up to the driver’s window. A burly man wearing a Chicago Bears cap stepped out of the cab and crossed his tree-trunk arms over his chest. “Everything all right?”
Nathan cut his engine and pulled off his helmet. “Yeah. What did you do to spook him? He had a gun.”
The driver nodded toward his truck. “I had a bigger one.”
“Good thing.” Nathan took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Thanks. I think you saved my life.”
The man waved toward his truck, his muscled forearms a stark contrast to his fifty-something face. “Want me to call the cops?”
Nathan shook his head. “I’d better just get home. I need to kind of stay under the radar for a while.”
He peeled off his cap and scratched through his graying hair. “Are you in a witness protection program or something?”
“I really shouldn’t be talking about it.” Nathan extended his hand. “Thanks again, Mister…”
“Stoneman.” He shook Nathan’s hand firmly. “Glad to be of help.” He pressed his cap back on and raised his eyebrows. “You got far to go?”
“A few miles. Not real far, why?”
“Just wondering.”
As the trucker shuffled back toward his truck, Nathan set his hand on his stomach. A sick feeling churned inside. The Mustang driver might be gone for a while, but he probably wouldn’t give up.
He revved the engine, squeezed between the truck and the curb, and cruised to the exit, looking every direction for any sign of the gunman, but he was nowhere to be found. Prickles stung the back of his neck. Somehow not knowing where the gray-bearded man lurked was worse than staring down the barrel of his gun.
A loud diesel engine sounded to his rear. The trucker pulled up behind him, flashing a thumbs up sign as Nathan glanced back. Obviously, Mr. Stoneman had the same concerns.
Nathan throttled up and cruised toward home. With the comforting sound of the Wal-Mart truck trailing him by a hundred feet or so, he savored the ride, wind whistling through his helmet and the musty aroma of damp earth filling his nostrils. He pressed his hand against his pocket, feeling the photo packet inside. Who could guess what might be on his father’s last roll of film? Maybe a keepsake photo of his mom that he could frame and hang above the desk in his new bedroom. A clue to why Dr. Simon stole the lives of his parents. Or, better yet, some kind of message his father had intentionally left behind, something that would add to the mystery.
As he neared the narrow road leading to his house, Nathan peered over his shoulder. Cresting the hill behind him, the truck sent up a plume of black smoke from its vertical exhaust pipe, its diesel engine making a loud racket as it downshifted to coast the hill. Nathan waved and turned onto the side road. A horn tooted in reply, and the engine roared louder as the big rig accelerated and sped away.
Nathan skidded to a stop at the farmhouse’s garage and closed the automatic door, watching the road through the gap as it lowered. Pulling off his helmet, he stopped at the inner door and poised his knuckles over it, ready to knock.
He laughed at himself. This was his home now. He could just walk right in. After passing through the laundry room, he found Kelly sitting on a stool at the kitchen bar, leaning over an open notebook, pen in hand.
He pulled the photo pack from his jacket. “I’m back!”
Kelly slapped her notebook shut and patted the space on the bar. “Let’s have a look.”
He opened the envelope and laid out the photos, following the indexed thumbnail guide to make sure they stayed in chronological order. “Okay,” he said, pointing at the photo of his mother’s violin, “here’s my first picture, so all of these before the violin are my dad’s, and all the ones after are…” He squinted at the photos, picking up the one he had placed after the violin. “This should have been the mirror.” He brought it close to his eyes, then handed it to Kelly. “What do you make of it?’
She held one corner and angled it toward the light. “Looks like two people in heavy fog. Almost like a pair of ghosts.”
“What are those red things behind them? Brake lights, maybe?”
She held it with both hands, altering the angle several times as she studied it. “I see a dark form around them, a human form, maybe a young girl. Her eyes reflect the light, like a cat’s eyes.”
“I’ve never seen a cat with red eyes. An alligator, maybe, but not a cat.” He pointed at the next photo. “And this one was supposed to be of you. Remember? The female Martian?”
“Yeah.” She bent forward and studied the image, a girl sitting on the trunk, but she couldn’t have been older than ten or eleven. “It’s certainly not me.” She slid it closer to Nathan. “Anyone you recognize?”
“She looks kind of familiar, but I don’t think I know her.” He tapped the countertop next to the last three photos. “And look at these. They’re supposed to be of you in front of the house this morning.”
She held the first of the final trio by its edges. “That’s definitely our house,” she said, hovering her finger over it. “Look. There’s our cottonwood tree, but it’s smaller, and the leaves are green like in summertime. And that’s not me in front of it. She looks like…” She picked up the “Martian” photo and held the two side by side. “Like this girl. And she’s holding a violin.”
“A violin?” Nathan snatched the photo and studied the little black-haired girl. “I think I know who she looks like.”
“Who?”
“My mother.” His hands trembled slightly as he gave the photo back. “I haven’t seen many pictures of her when she was little, but this could definitely be her.”
Kelly held the pair of photos together again. “You’re scaring me, Nathan.”
“Yeah. Me, too.”
She laid both down and pointed at the last two. “And these buildings aren’t anything like my house at all. They’re enormous.” She looked up at him. “Do you recognize them?”
“Yeah.” Trying to keep his hand from shaking, he pointed at them in order. “That’s the Taj Mahal, and that’s Buckingham Palace.”
Holding his mother’s violin in his lap, Nathan sat on the trunk and stared at the mirror. Two faces stared back at him—his own, darkened by his somber countenance and the closed drapes, and Kelly’s, wide-eyed and expectant. They had spent their Saturday taking pictures, a few action shots of birds flitting around the cottonwood tree, several portraits of Kelly standing in front of the house, and, with Kelly as photographer, three animated poses of Nathan trying to stand on his head with his body leaning against the wall while playing his violin. Now, with the evening advancing toward the hour of the previous night’s reflective miracles, he hoped for a repeat performance, this time with a witness present.
Kelly, wearing loose-fitting jeans and a navy sweatshirt, fidgeted, first leaning on one hand, then on the other. “Nothing weird yet.”
“Nope. Can’t get much more normal.”
She glanced around the room. “Are you sure everything’s the same?”
He stood up, pointing out objects as he did a slow, three-sixty turn. “The desk lamp’s on, the curtains are closed, and my bed covers are pulled back.”
“Dad’ll be back soon with the new pics, and Clara should be here any minute.”
“Maybe she’ll have some news that’ll help.”
“Maybe.” She pushed a curtain to the side and peeked out the window. “I’d better put the coffee on. It could be a long night.”
“Think we should let your father in on what’s going on?”
Kelly waved both hands. “No way! Bad idea! Only you, me, and Clara should look at the photos. If what you’re saying is true, my dad’ll go nuts!”