by Susan Wilson
“We check IDs. Every now and then some freshman tries to get a high school girlfriend in, but we’re pretty diligent.” He asks if Adam knows whom Ariel might be visiting.
“No.” Courtney Bevin’s cousin’s friend. Adam thinks as hard as he can, trying to remember if Ariel has mentioned any specific names, boy or girl. What comes to him is the depth of her silence toward him. The lack of any insight he has into her life, despite his interrogations on her visiting days. He has asked, and Ariel has belittled his attempts at piercing the barrier she has built around herself as his daughter and as an adolescent.
The music is deafening; bodies are crammed together in the lounge. A black DJ is scratching records while a hip-hop tune plays for the predominantly white crowd. The ceiling fixture has been fitted out with a strobe light, and the dancers’ faces are frightening with a here-there-gone dizzy flicker. Adam strains to pick Ariel’s face out of the gyrating group, but the strobing lights make it impossible to fix on any one face.
The smell of vomit rises from the floor. In another room, a table is set up with plastic cups, which someone is filling from a keg. In another, there is an apparent contest to see who can swallow a twelve-ounce cup of beer the fastest. Three young men are already on the floor, and Adam can’t tell if they are even breathing. Should he call 911? A small room off to the left holds two men, who are silent over a chess table, oblivious to the racket in the house.
“Upstairs? She could be upstairs with someone.”
“I can’t let you go up there, man. Privacy.”
“This is my sixteen-year-old daughter we’re talking about. Anything happens, you and your brothers are up shit creek. Frats have been closed before.”
The frat-boy bouncer looks to his partner, who just shrugs. “Okay, but no knocking on closed doors. Open ones only, and I never took you up there.”
They wander the length of all the floors, checking into any room with a wide-open door. Most of these have students in them, and Adam’s presence startles several into hiding a hand behind a back, or slamming a door. A few are empty.
The hip-hop beat seeps into Adam’s bones and he feels as if all of this searching is being done to a rhythm, a weirdly choreographed dance in which he is the soloist and can’t remember the steps. “Ariel!” Adam cups his hands around his mouth at every floor and bellows her name.
Adam is back on the street. The boys have suggested a nearby dorm, and one after that. The magnitude of his search is daunting. He can’t possibly get to every dorm and frat house on this far-flung campus. He is searching for someone who doesn’t want to be found. Adam sinks down on the top step of the old brownstone frat house. He puts his head in his hands. He has to call Sterling, see if she has any ideas about whom Ariel might know here. Suffer her anger and take the well-deserved blame. He takes out his cell phone to call his ex-wife. The missed-call message is on the screen. He didn’t hear it ring when he was in the frat house, the hip-hop drowning out any other sound.
His pulse is in his ears as he presses the key to identify the caller. In the instant it takes to see who it is, Adam knows that he is praying, making deals with a God he has all but forgotten. A vestigial belief in a merciful God burns through his heart as he squeezes his eyes shut and waits for the call to connect.
Chapter Thirty-nine
The campus police station is on Vassar Street, not all that far from where Adam is. He can barely remember where he left his car, so he walks the distance, taking the time to reel in his emotions, catch his breath, straighten up. The streetlights dog him. There are only a few people on the streets now: stumbling coeds, arms linked together, giggling their way back to the safety of their dorm rooms; a lone bicyclist speeding down the center of the street, unthreatened by automotive traffic. A man walking a large dog comes out of the shadows. Adam thinks that he’s going to go home to a mess. Poor Chance, abandoned without a backward glance.
Recently, Adam has found himself talking to Chance as if he’s a sentient being. At first, he felt silly, embarrassed to think that he’d grown so used to the dog’s presence that he’d begun to feel like a pal. “Did you see that play? What was he thinking?” he’d ask. But he didn’t stop. It helped, this voicing out loud his train of thoughts, getting nothing more back than a sideways look or a big blocky head in his lap. Once in a while, the dog vocalized a little rroorr rroorr sound, agreeing that it was a boneheaded play or concurring with whatever Adam had said. He slipped his arm across the dog’s sturdy shoulders when he did that and was rewarded with a quick lick on the cheek. Then they’d both sit back, assured of their masculinity.
Ariel is waiting for her father in a hard-backed chair across from the duty officer who made the call to Adam. She stands up at the sight of him coming through the door. Old tears already blotch her face, and the scent of vomit clings to her. A thin streak mars the perfection of her lambskin jacket. Her panty hose are torn above her boots, as if she’d stumbled and fallen down on her knees. Her hair is tangled. Her expensive purse is gone.
“Mr. March, your daughter is a very lucky girl. She was mugged but not assaulted. We found her alone on the street, although she says she was with friends.”
“Ariel?”
“Daddy.” It has been years since she’s called him that.
“What happened?”
“I’m all right.”
“Where are your friends?”
“I don’t know.”
“What happened?”
Ariel wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. Her nails are chipped and the palms abraded. “I fell down.”
“Did someone push you?”
“No. We were going to another party, and I was a little behind everyone because they were moving so fast. Then I tripped. I don’t think they knew I was down, because they kept going. They didn’t hear me. Then this guy, this guy out of nowhere, was standing over me. I thought he was going to help me up, but he didn’t. He swiped my bag. I was so scared, afraid that he’d hurt me, that I just let him. When I got up, I got sick. And then I was alone on the street with no phone and no money and I didn’t know what to do.”
“How did you end up here?”
“A cop found me. Brought me here and called you.”
“And you were drinking?” He can see that she would like to deny that she was, but the evidence is obvious.
“Yes.”
“Like the officer says, you were very lucky. You have no idea—”
“I do. You don’t have to tell me. Lesson learned.” Her tone is sardonic, as if the only lesson she’s learned is to expect a lecture from a worry-fraught father.
Her face is tear-streaked and dirty, but she is dry-eyed now. She walks out ahead of him into the predawn darkness. Adam knows that there is more to this story, details that he’ll never hear. This is a mishap that she has survived and that will become part of her life story. And maybe someday, when her own child does something equally rebellious, she’ll suddenly understand how he feels right now. The panic may have subsided, but the memory of it will last forever.
The gray light of day has faded the long night as they reach Adam’s building. The newsagent’s door is propped open as he retrieves the bundles of newspapers dropped on the sidewalk. Adam thinks of all the sleepless nights he’s spent, waiting for that door to open, those lights to come on. He is nostalgic, although grateful that he no longer awakens in the dark.
Beside him, Ariel is dozing. She’s unhurt, except for her scraped knees and bruised ego. For this, he remembers his deal with God and breathes a prayer of thanks. The old words by the grace of God, come to mind as he looks at his sleeping daughter. He’ll let her keep her nightmare night to herself, as he will. She doesn’t need to know the anguish he experienced as he hunted for her. As long as he knows that it was only an injury to her pride and not something more dire that led to her being hauled off to the campus police station, he’s satisfied. A lesson learned. Don’t hang out with friends who will abandon you to puke in the bushes alone
and leave you vulnerable to purse snatching, and be glad it wasn’t anything more dire.
Adam wonders if Veronica ever learned her lesson.
Adam rejects the idea that his father could not race after his sister because of him. He could have taken Adam with him, or dropped him with a neighbor—they lived on a street with three family homes; surely some woman would have been willing to watch a little boy while a frantic father chased after a rebellious daughter. Adam knows that he would never have given up looking for Ariel like his father had given up on Veronica, and then on him.
Ariel stirs as Adam shuts off the engine. The short nap has already faded the nightmare result of her defiance toward him. She looks at him with embarrassed contempt. Gone is the “Daddy” of her rescue. He is, once again, the Nameless One.
“I want to go home.”
“You’re going to bed. I’ll take you home when I’m ready to.”
Ariel stomps off to shower and Adam snaps the leash on his dog. They pound down the stairs and Adam feels every tense muscle in his spine and legs revolt. Chance has contained himself and hasn’t greeted Adam with anything but gratitude. Adam walks him as far as the empty lot, but he doesn’t let him off the leash. He’s had enough of runaways already.
“Are you going to tell Mom?”
“Do you want me to?”
“Duh, no.” Ariel isn’t looking at him; she’s looking out her window as the verge along the highway speeds by, guardrail posts spooling out the miles as they head to Sylvan Fields. “Besides, she’ll blame you anyway. Save yourself the trouble.”
“I can’t say you’re wrong about that. So, let me get this straight. I protect your butt from your mother, and I benefit somehow. And you’ve learned … what? Not to mix vodka with wine?”
“She’s dating, you know.”
“She has that right.”
“He’s a creep. He’s younger than she is and she only likes him because he’s got a really big …”
“What?”
“Portfolio.” The corner of Ariel’s mouth twitches into a little smile.
The resemblance to Veronica is so vivid that Adam pulls off the road at the next rest stop. “You have an aunt. Her name is Veronica. When she was your age, she disappeared. Ran away. I never saw her again and I have no idea what happened to her. She was just like you. Beautiful and headstrong.”
“I’m not running away.”
“You did run away.”
“That was just to go to a party. I wasn’t going to vanish forever.”
“Maybe that’s what Veronica thought, too.”
Adam puts the car into gear and gets back onto the highway.
Chapter Forty
They didn’t even have the common decency to call him and tell him over the phone. A fucking e-mail. “Sorry to have to cancel with you, but we’ve decided that we need to change consultants.” Blah, blah, blah. New focus. Different direction. “We really can’t take a chance on you. You should have told us….”
His clients have bailed on him. A check will arrive in the mail. Time spent. Maybe two hundred bucks. They’ve seen his CORI. They’ve discovered his error. Just like Gina. His criminal offender record information sheet will list A&B—assault and battery. They won’t care that he’s been sentenced to community service. The lone woman in the group has probably kicked up a fuss. Who would want a consultant like him? A man who has been accused of being a danger to women.
Adam opens up the first draft of the business plan, stares at it, admires how he would have brought the dream to those spineless neophytes, and then deletes the document.
“Mornin’, Artie.”
“Mornin’, Adam.” As has become his habit, Artie wordlessly slides a dog biscuit across the counter, never looking at the dog or at Adam, keeping his eyes on his puzzle. The cookie disappears into Chance’s satchel mouth.
“He says thank you.”
“If I had one like him, I wouldn’t need you know what.” Artie waggles his bushy eyebrows, intimating that he has illegal weaponry stowed out of sight.
“Where were you when I was trying to find him a home?”
“I like my freedom. No pets.”
Adam and Artie have had this conversation before. In the year or so that Adam has walked through that door seven days a week, Artie has always been on his stool behind the counter, cigar clenched between his teeth, newsprint streaked on his forehead and crossword puzzle under his hand. Adam seriously doubts the man has any freedom at all. If Artie thinks he’s unencumbered, it’s his delusion.
Adam fills his travel mug, snags a couple of packets of cheese crackers, a Globe.
“That’s four and a quarter.”
Adam hands Artie his last ten, pockets his change, and wonders how soon he’ll get his kiss-off money from the skateboarders.
A second dog biscuit comes across the counter. “That’s for later.”
Gina is unlocking her door as they walk out.
“Morning, Gina.” Adam nods to her, is rewarded with one of her smiles. Which he knows is for the dog.
“Hi, Adam. How’s it going?”
“Could be better.” He just doesn’t have the energy to play at civilities with his unpredictable neighbor.
“You look a little ragged. What happened?”
Such small courtesies, a short lifeline tossed in his direction. Although he’s certain that she’ll snap it back, Adam decides to grab it anyway. “You want a coffee? It’s a long story.”
Chance is straining against his leash, trying to get closer to Gina. Adam steps forward, loosening the tension. Gina bends to stroke Chance’s head, runs her hand along his back, scratches his rump, and then stands up. “Sure. I’ve got time.”
Adam hands Gina the leash and his coffee, goes back into Artie’s to get another one for himself. He’s smiling and he doesn’t know why. His pulse is just a little stronger, as if he’s already downed sixteen ounces of dark roast.
The parrots squawk their greeting to Gina, who opens their cage and puts in a breakfast of seed and fruit, changes the water, feeds each one a tidbit by hand. She leaves the door to the cage open, eyeing Chance and wagging a finger at him. “Leave it.” Chance wrinkles his brow and flops down on the floor, heaving a great sigh, like a bellows emptying.
Gina sips from her coffee cup while moving from tank to tank, scooping debris, sprinkling in food, checking temperatures as Adam spins out his tale of Ariel and her Saturday-night adventure.
He won’t talk about his stillborn consulting job; it would force him to reveal too much about himself that she shouldn’t know. It is too shaming.
She says nothing, but her activity doesn’t suggest inattention. It’s easier to talk about Ariel’s attitude toward him, her defiance—her similarity to his sister in looks and attitude—without Gina looking at him. Adam finds himself telling Gina more than he should about his strained relationship with Ariel, and about his sister’s more permanent rebellion.
“So where is she now?” Gina’s done with the chores and now moves behind the counter.
“I took her home yesterday morning.” His coffee has gone tepid.
Gina sets the canister of fish food back on the shelf, hesitating a moment longer than the task should take. She turns to him. “I mean your sister. Whatever happened?”
“I have no idea. She walked out that door and that was it.” Adam clears his throat, sniffs a little to suggest that this fact no longer has the power to hurt him. “My father never went after her.”
“Well, you did the right thing, going after Ariel.”
“What else could I have done? Sat home waiting helplessly? As it was, I was helpless and I did wait helplessly, but at least I was near to hand when the cops called.”
“She knows you were looking for her. She knows how much you care.”
“I’m not so sure.”
One of the parrots has emerged from its cage and has worked its flightless way to where Gina leans against the counter. Cocking its head right and left
, it finally launches itself to her shoulder, where it begins to pull gently on her hair.
Adam remembers the packets of cheese crackers in his pocket and pulls one of them out. “Can Polly have a cracker?”
“His name is Fred, and yes. He loves that kind. Just break a piece off for him.”
Adam offers the orange-yellow cracker to the bird, who runs his beak against it, then gingerly takes the offering, keeping his tiny bird eye on Adam while he does this.
“Did you tell Ariel’s mother what she did?” Gina lifts the bird off her shoulder and onto her hand.
“Not yet. Sterling wasn’t home when I dropped Ariel off, not back from her weekend with her new paramour. The thing is, if I do, they’ll both hate me; if I don’t, who knows. Maybe Ariel will learn to appreciate my silence.”
“I’m sure she appreciates what you did, or tried to do. If not now, she will eventually.”
“I hope so.” Adam offers another piece of cracker to the parrot. “It’s been really hard lately to get the women in my life to cut me some slack.” Their eyes meet over the head of the cracker-crunching parrot. In Gina’s he sees a flicker of something, something she’s keeping back. As if she knows something about him. “What?”
“Nothing.” A slight flush touches the apples of her cheeks. He thinks of reaching out and laying a finger on those cheeks to see if they feel warm to the touch. The thought is so compelling that he raises his hand. Suddenly, Gina steps backward; the parrot flaps clipped wings to keep his balance.
“Are you all right?”
“Fine.” The warm flush is now scarlet. “Just fine.”
And then it hits him. Gina knows about Sophie, about his episode. She’s Googled him. There is no burying past sins anymore. Anything and everything is laid out there for public consumption. Newspaper articles and the infinite discussion on blogs all there for the mere typing of his name on a search engine. Potential employers, potential friends can find all the dirt on you. The most personal of stories writ large across the electronic concourse of the Internet.