The Chalk Artist

by Allegra Goodman

  —

  All afternoon, Diana felt uneasy. She took Henry to Hancock Park with a net bag of pails and shovels dangling from the stroller. She helped the toddler into the sandbox and tried to keep his sun hat on his head, and the whole time she was thinking, “You don’t have to tell me anything.” Was that supposed to reassure her? Or was it some kind of threat? Did Aidan plan to find the BoX himself?

  She told Henry, “People as bald as you are should wear hats, or they’ll get cancer.”

  “No,” said Henry. It was one of his best words, along with “my.”

  “He’ll never find it,” she told Henry.

  “No.”

  “He can’t find it.”

  “No.” Henry took off his hat.

  “Yes.” She put his hat back on again.

  He smiled, showing his two teeth, and took off the hat.

  Stop panicking, she thought. He can’t find it, because I don’t have it. “He can look and look,” she told Henry, as she pushed the stroller back to Antrim Street, “but I won’t tell, and you won’t tell.”

  Henry laughed because the ride was bumpy. He loved the jolts where the sidewalk buckled over tree roots.

  —

  “It’s the little things, right?” Diana told Brynna that evening, as she laced her shoes. “Henry gets that.”

  “You like babies!”

  “I like money.”

  They ran together along the river. At first Brynna complained she couldn’t keep up, but six weeks into the summer she had lost what was left of her pregnancy weight. Diana burned—she was fair and freckled—but Brynna’s body loved the sun. She tanned and her thick hair flew out behind her, streaked with gold.

  “I think I might switch religions,” Diana said.

  “You can’t switch,” Brynna panted. “You’re Catholic.”

  “I know, but…not really.”

  “You go to church,” Brynna pointed out.

  “My mom goes.”

  “What would you switch to?”

  Diana glanced at the wind-ruffled river. “I’d be pagan.”

  Brynna snorted. “No, you wouldn’t.”

  “I already am.”

  “Last year you were Wiccan,” Brynna reminded her.

  “That was different. I was younger then!”

  They stopped at the light at the Eliot Bridge, and Brynna bent over, laughing. “Yeah, and now you’re almost seventeen.”

  “I hate you,” Diana said, although the opposite was true. When she was with Brynna, her uneasy feeling disappeared. When the light changed Diana took off again and her friend followed. Diana said, “I would be a pagan god.”

  Brynna didn’t have the breath to answer.

  “I’d be the god of secrecy,” Diana said. “No one could get anything out of me.”

  “How much farther?”

  “Just Fresh Pond.”

  “No way,” protested Brynna.

  Still, Diana pressed on, and Brynna followed.

  They cut away from the river and ran up Brattle Street, and then up Sparks to Huron Avenue, past fancy stores like Graymist, which sold Nantucket baskets, and Marimekko, which sold umbrellas covered with enormous poppies. “You got this far,” Diana encouraged her, but when they got to Formaggio Kitchen, Brynna sank down on the old-fashioned park bench out front.

  “Please!” Diana begged. “We’re almost there. I’ll let you take the bus home.”

  Diana knew her friend could run all the way, but Brynna didn’t. Brynna’s cheeks were scarlet, and her shirt clung to her, soaking wet. Diana had to coax her into the store for air-conditioning and water.

  “Wow.” Cool air prickled the hair on their arms as they stared at all the treats. Ripe apricots, pluots, and nectarines. Strange pears. Tart cherry scones. Marble tables displaying slabs of sheep cheese, goat cheese, runny cheese, unpasteurized cheese. Brynna said, “Isn’t that against the law?”

  There were boxes of Belgian chocolate and Italian nougat. Salted caramels from Seattle. Candied violets. Amaretto truffles. You could buy chocolate-covered grapefruit peel. “Oh, my God, look,” Brynna said. “Wild strawberries.”

  Tiny berries trailed over green pint-size containers. “This place is incredible,” Diana said, in a hushed voice.

  Brynna checked the price per pint. “And everything costs a bazillion dollars.”

  You couldn’t even buy regular water. You had to buy spring water untouched by man. They burst out laughing as they escaped with their single purchase.

  Diana took a long swig and handed the bottle to Brynna. “This water bubbled up through natural aquifers in a volcano.”

  Brynna splashed water on her own face. “How does that work?”

  “Come on.” Diana pulled her by the hand. “This is the best part of the day. See? The sun is going down.”

  “Next time.” Brynna untied and retied her hair. “I have to take care of Angela.”

  “Please.”

  “Come back with me,” Brynna offered.

  Diana shook her head.

  —

  Alone, Diana ran up Huron Avenue to Fresh Pond, the reservoir, hidden in trees. There was a good trail there all around the pond, and a water fountain where you could splash yourself and dunk your head. Older ladies strolled along, deep in conversation, and every once in a while one of them would look at the water and say, It’s so beautiful—look how still the water is. It’s like glass; it’s like a mirror. Look at the mist! And for a split second they would stop and look, and then they’d go right on talking. Joggers brought their terriers, and big black Labs and goldens, and Irish setters straining at the leash. But if you knew where to go, you didn’t run into people so much. There was another pond, a smaller one, all choked with water lilies. The big pond was fenced, but at Little Fresh Pond, you could run right to the edge.

  Diana knew a fallen tree, an oak that looked like it had taken its own life, keeling over and trailing its branches in the water. She ran to this tree, pulled off her shoes without unlacing them, and peeled off her sweaty socks. Broken bottles lay scattered on the ground. Frowning, she collected a few of the big shards, but the shore was littered with little jagged pieces. She gave up and climbed the toppled trunk to dangle her legs and soak her feet.

  The sun had set. The first stars began to show themselves, but it wasn’t dark. The evening was bright, and the trees stood black against the sky. Diana stretched herself out the length of the tree trunk, her back against the bark. It was good to rest; it was good to be alone, to test the edge of your own loneliness. When she looked up at the night sky she saw how impersonal it was, how big, how changeable. Everything was moving, trees, moon, stars. You tried to keep up, but you couldn’t run fast enough.

  A scuffling, growling sound.

  She started up and then held still as possible, as she saw two pit bulls, racing through the trees off-leash. Their master called to them, but they scented her immediately and ran for her, barking, red-eyed.

  “Anton!” she screamed when the dogs’ master appeared. “Get your fucking dogs away!”

  He ordered them to stay and then to sit. He clipped leashes to his dogs’ collars, but they never took their eyes off her, and they growled deep in their throats, even as they obeyed. Anton didn’t speak, but he stared as she scrambled off the tree trunk and retrieved her shoes and socks. His eyes traveled down her shoulders, and over her breasts, down the front of her wet shirt to the waistband of her shorts, then lightly over her bare legs to her feet.

  “I didn’t recognize you,” he said.

  “I’m the same,” she told him flatly.

  “No, you’re not.”

  “You wouldn’t know.” Probably she should have been afraid of him, but she felt a confused kind of power.

  “Did you run here?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “I’ll drive you back.”

  “Yeah, right,” Diana said. “Is that what you told Brynna last year?”

  —

  “
What happened to you?” Aidan asked when she got home. She was dirt-streaked, blistered, carrying her shoes.

  “Are you playing?” Diana demanded. Aidan was sitting just where she’d left him, with the open biology textbook, but she saw that he’d got ahold of their mother’s clunky old desktop computer.

  “No,” Aidan said. “Why’re you in such a bad mood?”

  How to answer? My feet are bleeding. I had to fight off wild dogs. I’m scared for you.

  She limped upstairs and saw that he had searched her room. Her piles on the floor had toppled. The clean clothes on her chair had shifted. Her closet door was ever so slightly askew. “Aidan!” she screamed. She wanted to run downstairs and knock the chair out from under him, but her legs were so sore that she couldn’t move. “Aidan.”

  No answer.

  She threw herself onto her bed and opened her phone.

  WTF, she texted him.

  ?? he replied, as if anybody else would have searched her room.

  You know what u did dont deny it. what is wrong with you??

  calm down, he wrote.

  NO

  Its been 6 weeks

  Idc

  I have like one week of summer. By this he meant one week between the end of his summer course and the first day of school. He had seven days of freedom, and he wanted to spend it with his BoX. That would be Aidan’s vacation. A week of caves and red-eyed vampire bats. You promised you wont play, she typed.

  Instantly his answer appeared. I promised mom not you.

  In the last days of summer Aidan got his class assignments for senior year. Physics, calculus, Spanish, European history, American literature again because he’d plagiarized. He talked his mother into computer access too. Kerry had given him her ancient desktop—safe, she thought, because it was too primitive and slow for gaming. Aidan couldn’t play, but he scanned fan forums all day long, following the news. He couldn’t enter games, but he could dream about them. He stood in the center of his room and closed his eyes and he could see the leaden river, and the Gates, the dark caverns all around him. He clenched his fist and saw his arm changing to silver. He drew his sword—and yet no caverns rose up around him, no tunnels opened up. He had to live outside of UnderWorld.

  Official beta testing was beginning, but he had not been chosen. The BoX was to go on sale in the winter, but he couldn’t wait until December. The situation maddened him because he had a BoX, but couldn’t get his hands on it.

  He searched every room, every closet and cabinet. On Labor Day weekend Diana found him hunting in the basement. Carrying her laundry bag downstairs, she found him rummaging in dusty cartons labeled CHILDREN’S BOOKS; HUMIDIFIER; TENNIS; WINTER CLOTHES.

  “Just stop!” Diana said, acutely aware of the doll carriage in the boiler room.

  “Tell me where it is.”

  “No.”

  “I finished summer school,” he said.

  “So what?”

  “I did what I was supposed to do.”

  “You gave it to me,” Diana said. “You said keep this for me.”

  “Not forever.”

  She set down her laundry bag as if to stake her claim. “Yes! Forever. You gave it to me when you were getting sick.”

  “I wasn’t getting sick! I got sick later.”

  He was always correcting her on that, but in her mind, his illness and the black BoX went together. “You said I could have it, and now, guess what, Aidan? You don’t get it back again. It wasn’t like a long-term loan.”

  “I want it.”

  Diana snapped, “What makes you think I kept it?”

  He dipped into the tennis box and hurled a yellow ball at her.

  Shielding her face, she caught it. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  Aidan didn’t answer.

  —

  Just an hour later, Diana sneaked into the boiler room, retrieved the BoX, and stuffed it into her backpack. Then she ran across the street.

  For a moment she stood looking up at the third floor of Maia’s triple-decker. All she could see were the tomato plants in Sage’s window boxes. She had the key from babysitting, but she felt some trepidation as she slipped inside and climbed the stairs. Sage and Melissa had taken Henry to the Cape, and she felt like a trespasser.

  Stifling hot without AC, airless, dusty, deathly clean, Sage’s apartment scared Diana. No, that wasn’t true. She brought her anxiety with her, and she was afraid to touch anything, almost afraid to touch the floor.

  She set her backpack on the couch and took out the BoX, so heavy and compact. No lights, no buttons, no electric ports. Not even the words MADE IN CHINA. Just a perfect cube, smooth and mute. Diana felt it now, the strange desire to touch this thing, to open it. She opened the hall closet instead, rooted behind ice skates and hockey sticks, and heaved the BoX in.

  Done. She tried to leave, and yet she felt no relief. Hiding the thing was not enough. She took up her burden again, carrying the BoX out in her backpack. Slowly, she walked around the block. Once around, and she felt the BoX hard against her back. A second time, and she felt the weight between her shoulder blades. The third time around, she met Lois returning from the gym with her furled yoga mat. “Excited about senior year?” Lois asked.

  “Not really.” Diana was watching for her mother’s car.

  “It’s a transition,” Lois said, all teacherly.

  “Mom!” Diana saw her mother drive up. “Mom!” Diana sprinted across the street.

  “What’s wrong?” Kerry called through the open car window.

  “I have to give you something.”

  “Okay.” Kerry was drenched in sweat. Her car’s air-conditioning had broken long ago. “Just let me get inside.”

  “No. Not inside. Here.” Diana blocked her mother’s way. “This is Aidan’s.” She unzipped her backpack and unwrapped the BoX.

  Kerry flinched. “What is that?” she asked reflexively, but she knew. She seized the BoX, even before Diana finished explaining.

  “Don’t bring it in,” Diana pleaded, as Kerry marched up the steps. “Don’t let him see.”

  Kerry took the BoX into the kitchen and set it on the table. “Throw it away! Get that thing out of here,” Diana begged her mother. She was afraid to see it in the open.

  Kerry was rummaging in the broom closet, but Diana hovered over the black BoX. She had done the thing she’d sworn she’d never do. She had betrayed her twin, and her younger self as well—the girl who’d promised, chanting along with Aidan, We won’t tell no matter what.

  “What are you doing?” Diana cried out when her mother returned with a hammer in her hand. “Wait, not in the house.”

  Kerry didn’t hesitate. She took her hammer and she struck again and then again. She hit so hard the salt and pepper shakers jumped. She struck a third time and a jagged hole opened in the smooth black cube.

  A cloud of aeroflakes flew up to the ceiling, shrouding the light fixture, clouding the air. Kerry didn’t even look. Harder and harder, she kept hammering down blows. This was for UnderWorld. This was for Arkadia. This was for night shifts. For lack of time. For lack of money. For unanswered prayers.

  Kerry smashed the BoX to pieces, even as Aidan ran downstairs. He watched in silence as the walls of the black BoX shattered. Disoriented, unfocused, the little motes faded, faint as watermarks on the kitchen walls.

  “Stop,” Diana said, as Kerry hammered pieces into powder.

  With a long, shuddering sigh, Kerry set down her hammer and sank into a chair. Diana was the one who sponged the plastic shards into the trash.

  —

  All that afternoon, Aidan kept himself locked upstairs. Diana heard him pacing. She heard him moving furniture. His desk? His bed?

  She knew better than to knock. She texted him just once. I hadto.

  He did not respond.

  Her mother tried to comfort her. She sat with Diana on the couch and she kept murmuring, “You did the right thing.”

  “Yeah, I can tell,”
said Diana, “because I feel like shit.”

  “Don’t punish yourself like that.”

  Diana buried her head in the cushions. “Just get away from me, okay? The only one punishing me is you.”

  In the heat of the evening, the afterburn of the long summer day, Diana ran all the way down Magazine Street to Cambridgeport to bang on Brynna’s door. “No!” Brynna protested. “My feet still hurt. I can’t.”

  “Please, please, please,” Diana begged, and even as she asked, she kept moving, jogging in place, hopping from one foot to another. “I need you.”

  “What happened?” Brynna asked.

  “Nothing, if you’ll come with me,” Diana said. Her face was tearstained, her body eager, strong.

  Together, they ran along the river. Diana charged ahead, and the sullen breeze riffled her dark hair. Brynna followed, protesting, “Wait up. You’re way too fast.”

  Diana was too upset to wait. She was still too close to home; she had to get away. All she wanted was to run faster, to outstrip the setting sun and plunge into darkness. She wanted to feel nothing, remember nothing, be nothing.

  But even she couldn’t keep up this furious pace. Gradually the girls found their rhythm, running up Huron Avenue. Diana wiped the tears from her eyes, and Brynna stopped complaining, gathering her strength, saving her breath until they reached Fresh Pond, the reservoir, fringed with trees.

  “Rest,” Diana said.

  They stopped at the fountain near the water treatment plant and splashed their faces.

  Brynna sighed. “That feels so good.”

  “Wait. I’ll show you something better,” Diana said.

  She led Brynna to Little Fresh Pond and showed her the half-drowned tree. “Watch out. There’s glass.” Together they picked their way around the broken bottles, and climbed up on the fallen trunk. They pulled off their running shoes, peeled off their sweaty socks.

  Night fell, sky and water deepening. Barefoot, Diana walked along the fallen tree to the point where the trunk dipped into the pond. She sat there trailing her legs in the waterlogged branches. She reached for Brynna, who hesitated. “No one’s here.” Diana stretched out her white arms. She was persuasive, confident. Even her voice seemed lower, whispering. She was a different creature in the dark.