“Thank you, Ash,” Mrs. Espinosa beamed at the boy, “That was nice of you.”
“It’s nothing,” Ash blushed, hiding behind his sketchpad.
“Are you ready to go home, mijo?” Mrs. Espinosa asked Danny when he stopped crying, “I have Mr. Harrison and your Explorer here, you can lay down in the back and keep your ankle up.”
“Can we take Ash to his car, Tia?” Danny asked her, “He’s parked at the resort.”
“Of course, mijo! Anything you want.”
With Mrs. Espinosa there to escort Danny home, the doctors and nurses came clustering around, all trying so hard to be helpful that they were getting in each other’s way; they lifted him into a wheelchair and trolleyed him out to Danny’s big black SUV, settling him into the back with blankets and pillows and boxes of juice. Danny was a little embarrassed by the attention, but he was gracious to everyone who helped him, thanking people by name and making eye contact and shaking hands all around.
Mrs. Espinosa sat in the back with him and had Ash sit in the front with Mr. Harrison, the family chauffeur; she held his head and stroked his hair, singing Spanish lullabies; Mr. Harrison tried to have a conversation with Ash, but the boy was so shy that he replied in terse monosyllables.
“Which car is yours, sir?” Harrison asked Ash when they pulled in to the parking lot of the Lake Augusta Hotel at the end of Dam Road, which led to the resort over the dam that created Lake Augusta from the eastern end of town.
“You can let me out here,” Ash said nervously.
“I am happy to take you to your car, sir,” Harrison protested, slowing to a crawl in the driveway.
“It’s not necessary,” Ash insisted.
“As you wish, sir,” the chauffeur stopped the car and popped the locks from his control panel so Ash could get out.
“Ash?” Danny called out from the back seat, as he stepped out of the car, “Will you come over tomorrow afternoon? If you’re not busy?”
“If you want,” the boy paused, looking at him over the back of the seat.
“Do you know how to get there?” Danny asked, smiling up at him.
“I think so,” Ash answered, though still nervously.
“Just follow the Lake Road to the end. Mrs. Espinosa will expect you.”
“OK,” Ash paused and looked at Danny wonderingly, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Thank you so much, Ash, for all your help today.”
“It was nothing,” the boy said again, blushing, then scuttled out of the car and around the side of the hotel in the direction of the staff parking lot.
“I wonder why he wouldn’t let us take him to his car?” Danny asked Mrs. Espinosa as the car started up again and pulled back onto the Dam Road to drive around the southern shore of the lake.
“Maybe he’s embarrassed by it, mijo,” the housekeeper said reasonably, “maybe it’s not as nice as your car.”
“That’s silly,” Danny frowned, “I don’t care about such things.”
“I know you don’t, sweet boy, but Ash doesn’t know you as well as we do.”
“I can change that, though, can’t I?” Danny smiled at Mrs. Espinosa and kissed her hand.
7
When Ash arrived the next afternoon, Danny was propped up in bed, his ankle elevated on a pile of pillows, working on the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle. He was wearing gray fleece lounge pants and a forest green scoop-neck t-shirt, his uninjured foot in a fleece-lined slipper, the foot of his injured ankle and its brace swaddled in what looked like a hand-knitted Christmas stocking. He was surrounded by books, mostly schoolbooks but also several volumes of epic poetry open face-down, to be dipped into at leisure.
“Ash! Thank God you’ve come!” Danny cried gladly when the boy crept quietly into the room, dressed in baggy blacks and blues again, carrying a tray with two glasses and a bowl filled with ice and bottled sodas, “I am dying of boredom.”
“This house is so confusing, I actually got lost,” Ash said with a tone of wonder, looking around the large bright room for a place to set down the tray.
“Oh, here, put that down,” Danny cleared the books off his night-table, “I’d get up, but Tia won’t let me. The doctor told her I was to stay off my feet for three days at least, and she has taken that to mean that I am simply not allowed to stand up or walk around for any reason. I think she’s got my floor rigged with sensors, when I got up to go pee a while ago, she came roaring in here and practically carried me back to the bed.”
“She gave me this and just told me to go to the top of the stairs and turn right,” Ash laughed as he laid the tray on the table, then started peeling off his outer layers of clothes, laying his messenger bag, coat, hoodie, and knit cap on the small desk-chair, “but she didn’t tell me to go forward to the hallway and then right. I ended up in a linen closet first try.”
“I’m sorry,” Danny smiled up at him ruefully, “Sunday is the maids’ day off, only the live-ins are here. It’s their day off, too, but Tia always comes back from mass and spends the day concocting in the kitchen. We’re all usually over at The Aspens for Family Sunday, so she has the freedom to experiment.”
“What are The Aspens?” Ash was looking around for a place to sit, having already filled the one chair in the room with his outerwear.
“It’s my Uncle Charles’s place, a few miles west of town. Do you like ginger ale?” Danny asked, prying open two of the bottles and putting ice in the glasses, “Since he’s the head of the family, we’re all supposed to go to his house on Sundays after church and spend the afternoon. Of course, none of us goes to church anymore, except on holidays, but the tradition stands. Oh, hey, there’s an armchair in the next bedroom down the hall, why don’t you drag it in here so you can sit comfortably? I’m sorry I didn’t think of it before you came, I don’t have visitors up here much.”
“That’s OK,” Ash assured him, “I don’t mind. How many doors down the hall? I don’t want to get lost again.”
“Two doors… no, wait, three doors, there’s a utility room between my bathroom and the empty bedroom. Just open doors on the right and you’ll find it.”
A few minutes later, Ash came back dragging a heavy Mission-style oak armchair that probably weighed more than he did; Danny was impressed by his strength, though he felt horribly guilty for not getting up and helping. But Ash managed quite well on his own, putting the chair into position, getting settled into it, and taking a few gulps from his glass of ginger ale.
“Is this really your room?” Ash wondered, gazing around with curiosity.
“Of course,” Danny looked at him questioningly, “Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Well, it’s so bare. It’s not what I expected at all.”
“What were you expecting?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Ash hesitated, not sure if he should continue in this vein, “Big-screen TV, video games, monster stereo, posters. Rich-kid stuff. This looks like a guest room, bigger than the one down the hall but not much different.”
“My brothers’ rooms down on the second floor are like you say,” Danny looked around his room trying to see it with a newcomer’s eye, “But nobody ever gives me those kinds of things. I didn’t really want them. I do have a stereo, it’s in that cabinet over there, I usually keep it closed so it doesn’t get dusty. And I have my laptop, and all the books want… though I must admit, a big-screen TV would be nice. I’ll remember to ask Santa.”
“You don’t feel like you belong here, do you?” Ash blurted an observation that had been brewing since he entered the Spartan room.
“No, I guess I don’t,” Danny answered slowly, letting the idea sink in, seeing for the first time the transient look of his bedroom, a room that for most people was a reflection of their true selves, “I guess I should decorate it more. There are paintings in storage I could use, and souvenirs and things I could set out instead of keeping them in boxes. But I just don’t spend that much time up here. I’m outside most of the time, or at the Aunt
Ems’.”
“Who are the Aunt Ems?” he laughed at the strange name, which gave Danny the opportunity to entertain him with stories about his great-aunts, their personalities and his special relationship with them, telling him about the lessons he received there and the room he’d been given (though it occurred to him that his room in the Pine Street house was no more personal than the one at the Lake House, being more of a museum display than a private room).
“I hope you’re hungry,” Mrs. Esposito came into the room backwards, carrying two bed-trays piled high with food, stacked one on top of the other, “I made tapas today, and I got carried away with the different recipes I’ve found.”
“But, Tia, it’s your day off!” Danny protested, though he was grateful for the food, “you shouldn’t be waiting on us.”
“What, I should honor the Lord’s Day by letting you two sit up here and starve?” the housekeeper gave Danny a sidelong look as she set both trays over Danny’s lap and then carried the topmost tray over to Ash, “You’re doing me a favor, eating up all this extra food. You boys tell me what you think when you’re done, OK?”
“She’s really nice,” Ash said when Mrs. Esposito had left, picking over the pile of unfamiliar bite-sized morsels on his plate.
“She’s wonderful,” Danny agreed, digging into the food, “She’s a mother to me.”
“But you have a mother,” Ash pointed out.
“Yes, but Mother doesn’t like me. She still resents me for almost killing her when I was born.”
“That’s not your fault!” the boy was aghast.
“Yes, well,” Danny shrugged, not wanting to go into it, “Tell me about your parents.”
“They’re divorced,” Ash sniffed suspiciously at a roll of salmon and cress wrapped in transparent rice-paper, “My Dad is an accountant, he lives in Maine, I don’t see him much. My mom’s a veterinarian, she works for County Animal Control.”
“Oh!” Danny looked up in surprise, “I’ve met her! Andrea Phillips, isn’t it? She came out to The Aspens for the annual deer hunt in August. She’s absolutely delightful.”
“You hunt deer?” Ash frowned at him, unable to puzzle that piece of information into the general picture of Danny that he was forming.
“I have,” Danny admitted, “I don’t anymore, it always made me so sad. Deer are such beautiful creatures. I know they have to be culled, it’s for their own good, and I do love venison… but to destroy a living creature, bring that wonderful gracefulness to an end, convert it into hides and meat… I just don’t have it in me. Nevertheless, I have to go to the Hunt Breakfast, it’s a family occasion. That’s when I met your Mom, she was seated on my left and told me the most wonderful stories about family dogs forming attachments with wild animals. You used to live in Boulder, didn’t you?”
“Yeah,” Ash said simply, amazed that Danny would not only remember meeting his mother and the exact topic of their conversation, but even remember on which side she sat.
“I’ve been there, very briefly, on a trip with the cross-country team. It’s really breathtaking.”
“The winters are way too cold,” Ash told him, “But yeah, it was nice. It’s a lot like here, but with more people.”
Over the next two hours, the boys got to know each other, asking each other questions and revealing things about themselves that surprised and delighted the other. It turned out that Ash was the same age as Danny, and like Danny had skipped freshman year because he was too smart; they both liked opera, though Ash wasn’t as educated on the art-form as Danny and only knew a few Puccini standards and a fairly obscure French opera that he’d bought when an aria from it had been featured in one of his favorite films; they neither of them seemed to understand other kids their age, and enjoyed socializing with adults, though Ash never quite knew what to say to strangers and so knew no adults in Vandervere except his mother’s boyfriend, a forest ranger who Danny could tell Ash didn’t like but endured for his mother’s sake.
Before too long, Ash had his drawing pad out again and was scribbling dozens of little character-sketches, trying to capture Danny’s facial expressions, his different kinds of smiles, his little pouts of distaste, his way of playing with his hair when he was thinking; but this didn’t interrupt the flow of their conversation, it just gave Ash something to do with his hands.
Mrs. Espinosa came back at 3:30 with another meal, a high tea with fried-egg sandwiches and chocolate cake, and quizzed them on the tapas, taking note of the things they liked and the things that were “too challenging to the palate” (as Danny phrased it), then left them again to their own company.
They kept on talking for another two hours, but were eventually interrupted when Danny heard his parents return from The Aspens; through the open window overlooking the entrance front of the house, he could hear his father’s voice complaining about something.
Ash noticed Danny tense up at the sound of the voices, and fell silent, joining into the listening… the sound of tires on gravel, a segmented automatic garage door opening, car doors opening and closing, and a querulous male voice, too far away to make out the words but close enough to hear the irritation, answered by a quieter female voice.
“I hope I didn’t park wrong,” Ash said when the voices disappeared and Danny visibly relaxed, as if the string that was holding him on point had been cut, “I tried to get as close to the edge of the gravel as possible.”
“Unless you left your car horizontally across the driveway, you’re fine,” Danny assured him, “He’s just complaining because he wasn’t expecting a car in the drive, and anything he’s not expecting is cause for alarm.”
“I should probably go,” Ash said, sensing that the spell had been broken by the arrival of Danny’s parents; for though Danny was no longer listening intently, he seemed a little more distant and guarded than he had been before.
“Wouldn’t you like to stay for dinner?” Danny offered, “We usually just forage among the leftovers on Sunday, but I suspect Tia has more experiments to dispose of.”
“No, thanks,” Ash got up and started gathering his things, “My Mom will be expecting me pretty soon, we usually eat around seven and I didn’t tell her I’d be gone this afternoon. Would you like me to pick up your homework for you tomorrow?”
“Oh, that’s so sweet of you!” Danny was touched by the offer, “You don’t have to go to all that trouble.”
“It’s no trouble,” Ash said simply, tucking his long hair behind his ear and looking at Danny with both eyes.
“You’re very kind,” Danny assented quietly, aware that this gesture meant more than it seemed on the surface… he knew it meant that they were now friends, and that Ash trusted him.
“I’ll see you tomorrow then,” Ash shifted uncomfortably, apparently unsure if he should shake hands or hug or just wave.
“Tomorrow,” Danny put out his hand, thinking that would be the easiest form; Ash had a strong grip but his hand was small and delicate — it was like holding a live bird. The other boy smiled and scuttled out of the room with his bag and jacket dragging after him.
When Mrs. Espinosa came up with Danny’s dinner, she helped him into the bathroom to eliminate and wash up before eating, and promised to come back before bedtime to bathe him.
“Tia! I’m too old for you to be giving me a bath,” Danny was slightly shocked by the suggestion.
“You think you can get in and out of the tub with your foot like that, and not get it wet?” she challenged him.
“It’s not a cast, Tia. It’s made of steel, I’m pretty sure it can take a little water. Or else I can just take it off.”
“No you won’t take it off, the doctor didn’t say you could,” Mrs. Espinosa scolded him, “I’ll draw your bath and go get a bath-stool so you can keep it elevated. You can do the rest, Mister Grown-up.”
“Thank you, Tia,” Danny reached out and grabbed her hand, pressing it to his cheek, “Thank you for taking care of me today, I really appreciate it.”
&
nbsp; “Anything for you, my sweet boy,” she leaned down and kissed him on the forehead, “Now you eat that up and I’ll be back in an hour to help you with your bath.”
8
The next day was unseasonably warm, and Danny’s attic room was roasting hot by midday, so he asked Mr. Espinosa to help him onto the sleeping porch outside his room; it was essentially outdoors, open on three sides to catch the breezes coming off the lake, with transparent cotton mesh screens to keep the insects out. The handyman not only made up Danny’s cot into a comfortable daybed with pillows and quilts, but he even brought up some wicker lawn furniture, chairs for visitors and tables to put his books and stereo and computer on, to turn the empty space into a nice little room.
Danny was happily ensconced on the porch near the rail, shirtless in gray-and-white flowered board shorts, looking out over the lake, sipping a lemonade and reading Persuasion; he heard someone enter his bedroom, and thinking it was Ash, called out, “I’m out here, come join me!”
“Good afternoon, Mr. Vandervere,” Officer Pete Kelly stepped through the French door onto the porch, his peaked hat in his hand.
“Oh! Officer Kelly! I wasn’t expecting you,” Danny smiled graciously through his surprise, “May I offer you some lemonade?”
“No, thank you. How’s the ankle?” the man seated himself in an armchair facing Danny.
“Much better, thank you; but Mrs. Espinosa thinks I need to keep it elevated at all times and has kept me bedridden since I came home Saturday. I’m thinking about bribing my doctor to tell her to let me get up.”
“Have you given any more thought to the questions I asked you earlier? About your relationship with Mr. Janacek?”
“I want to tell you something,” Danny hesitated, staring into his glass, “But I don’t want it to get me into trouble, and I don’t want it to prejudice you against Mr. Janacek.”
“You were having an affair with him,” Officer Kelly guessed what Danny wanted to say.
“How did you find out?” the boy was wide-eyed with shock.
The Math Teacher Is Dead Page 7