Gwendy looks forward to the trip all summer long. She starts saving her money as soon as the school year ends, stashing away the quarters she makes from helping her father clean the garage and dusting the house from top to bottom for her mother. By the time she packs her own suitcase and climbs into the back seat for the seven-hour drive, she’s managed to save almost fifteen dollars in loose change. Her plan is to hold onto most of the money until the final two days of the trip, and then splurge on herself. Candy, comics, ice cream, maybe even a pocket transistor radio with an earphone if she has enough left over.
But it doesn’t work out that way.
Within minutes of their arrival, Mr. and Mrs. Peterson disappear into the cabin for a “grand tour” and Gwendy finds herself standing by the car surrounded by a group of local kids, including the cousin’s three children, who are all spending the summer at the lake. The boys are shirtless and tan and look wild with their messy hair and sugar-spiked eyes. The girls are long-legged and aloof and mostly older.
Nervous and not knowing what else to say, Gwendy eventually unzips her suitcase and shows the kids her plastic marble bag filled with quarters. Most of them are indifferent, and a few even laugh at her. But one of the older boys doesn’t laugh; he seems interested, and maybe even impressed. He waits until the other kids all run off, whooping and hollering into the back yard, and then he approaches Gwendy.
“Hey, kid,” he says, looking around. “I got something you might be interested in.”
“What?” Gwendy asks, even more nervous now that she’s alone with a boy—a cute, older boy.
He reaches into the back pocket of his cut-off jean shorts and when his hand swims back into view, it’s holding something small and fluffy and white.
“A feather?” Gwendy asks, confused.
A look of disgust comes onto the older boy’s face. “Not just any old feather. It’s a magic feather.”
Gwendy feels her heart flutter. “Magic?”
“That’s right. It once belonged to an Indian chief who used to live around here. He was also a medicine man, a very powerful one.”
Gwendy swallows. “What does it do?”
“It does … magic stuff,” he says. “You know, like bringing you good luck and making you smarter. Stuff like that.”
“Can I hold it?” Gwendy asks almost breathlessly.
“Sure, but I’m getting kinda tired of taking care of it. I’ve had it for a few years now. You interested in taking it off my hands?”
“You want to give it to me?”
“Not give,” he says. “Sell.”
Gwendy doesn’t miss a beat. “How much?”
The boy lifts a dirty finger to his lips, thinking. “I guess ten dollars is a fair enough price.”
Gwendy’s shoulders sag a little. “I don’t know … that’s a lot of money.”
“Not for a magic feather it ain’t.” He starts to put the feather back in his pocket. “No biggie, I’ll just sell it to someone else.”
“Wait,” Gwendy blurts. “I didn’t say no.”
He looks down his nose at her. “You didn’t say yes either.”
Gwendy glances at the plastic bag filled with quarters and then looks at the feather again.
“Tell you what,” the boy says. “You’re new around here, so I’ll cut you a deal. How’s nine dollars sound?”
Gwendy feels as if she’s just won the grand prize at the spinning wheel booth at the Castle Rock Fourth of July carnival. “Deal,” she says at once, and starts counting out nine dollars in quarters.
48
DRIVING HOME LATER THAT Christmas night, Gwendy thinks about her father’s words from earlier: “We all poked fun at you about that feather, Gwen, but you didn’t care. You believed. That’s what mattered then, and that’s what matters now: you’ve always been a believer. That beautiful heart of yours has led you down some unexpected roads, but your faith—in yourself, in others, in the world around you—has always guided you. That’s what that magic feather of yours stands for.”
49
UNFORTUNATELY, EVEN AFTER THE surprise appearance of her long-lost magic feather, Gwendy’s good mood doesn’t last, and by nine o’clock, she’s slumped in front of the television, missing her husband terribly. A hollow ache has crept into her heart, and no amount of meditation or happy-sappy positive thinking can ease it. She stares at her cellphone, willing it to ring, but it remains silent on the sofa beside her.
The button box sits on the coffee table next to her Grisham book, the small white feather, and a cup of hot tea. Normally, Gwendy would be worried about spilling her drink and getting it on the box. Tonight she doesn’t give a damn.
Once she got back to the condo, Gwendy called Sheriff Ridgewick to wish him a Merry Christmas and ask about Caroline Hoffman. He picked up on the first ring and assured her that Mrs. Hoffman was doing just fine. Some stitches and a concussion—and one doozy of a hangover. The hospital kept her overnight and released her earlier this afternoon. Her husband was waiting to drive her home.
The phone call started the shift in Gwendy’s mood—she could still picture the dark angry gash on the woman’s forehead; the glassy, excited stares of the partygoers gathered around her—and then when she stumbled upon the tattered deck of playing cards Ryan left behind, the downward spiral began in earnest.
On their second official date, many years ago in downtown Portland, Ryan confided in her that he’d always wanted to be a magician. Gwendy was charmed by the thought and implored him to show her a magic trick. After dinner, and much convincing on Gwendy’s part, they stopped at a drug store and picked up a pack of Bicycle playing cards. The two then sat on a bench in the park and Ryan demonstrated three or four different tricks, each one more elaborate than the last. Gwendy was impressed with his skills, but it was much more than that. It was deeper than that. This childlike wonder was a part of Ryan she’d never known existed when they were just friends, a part of his true self. That was the first time Gwendy thought: I might be falling in love with this guy.
Twenty minutes earlier, when Gwendy bent over to pick up her bookmark and discovered the old pack of cards sitting in a nest of dust bunnies underneath the corner of the sofa, her first reaction was one of calm gratitude: Hey, I’m glad I found you, Ryan will be looking for you when he gets home.
And then those four words exploded inside her head: WHEN HE GETS HOME!
Oh my God, he forgot his damn cards, she thought, her stomach roiling. He never went anywhere without taking them with him. He says they’re his good luck charm. He says they remind him of home and keep him safe.
Gwendy picks up her book from the coffee table, and then immediately puts it down again. She can’t focus. She glances at the television screen, jiggling her foot with nervous tension. “If he’s not going to call, at least let there be something on the news. Anything. Please.” She knows she talks to herself too much, but she doesn’t care. No one is around to hear her.
She turns her head and stares at the button box. “What are you looking at?”
Leaning forward, she runs her finger along the rounded edge of the wooden box, keeping a fair distance from the buttons. “You made me hurt that woman last night, didn’t you?”
She feels something then, a slight vibration in her fingertip, and pulls her hand back. Before she realizes what she’s saying: “What’s that? You can help me get Ryan home?”
Sure, she thinks hazily. Find out from the news where the rebel forces are located in Timor. Once you’ve pinpointed their location, push the red button. Once they’re gone, the uprising’s over, and Ryan comes home again. Simple.
Gwendy shakes her head. Blinks her eyes. The room feels like it’s swaying, ever so slightly, like she’s riding on a ship in uneasy seas.
And, hey, while you’re at it, why not do something about that jerk-off president of yours, too?
Is she thinking these thoughts or listening to them? It’s suddenly hard to tell. “Destroy North Korea?” she asks dimly.<
br />
You need to be careful there. You do that and someone will most likely assume the U.S. military’s responsible. Someone like China, let’s say, and they’ll want to retaliate, won’t they?
“Then what are you proposing?” Her voice sounds very distant.
Not proposing anything, dear woman, just food for thought is all. But what if that president of yours were to up and disappear? Now that’s not such a bad idea, huh? And just think, it’s only a red button away.
Gwendy leans forward again, her eyes fixed on something far away. “Murder in the name of peace?”
You could certainly call it that, couldn’t you? Personally, I rather think of it along the lines of that age-old question: if it were possible, would you travel back in time and assassinate Hitler?
Gwendy reaches out with both hands and picks up the button box. “Richard Hamlin’s a lot of things, most of them bad, but he’s no Adolf Hitler.”
Not yet, anyway.
She places the box in her lap and leans back into the sofa cushion. “Tempting, but who’s to say the vice president will be any better. Guy’s a certified fruitcake.”
Then why not get rid of the lot of them? Start over fresh.
Staring at the rows of colored buttons. “I don’t know … that’s a lot to think about.”
Okay then. Perhaps it would be easier to start with something … less far-reaching. A bitch-cow of a woman named Caroline Hoffman? How about a certain ill-mannered congressman from the state of Mississippi?
“Maybe …” Gwendy slowly reaches out with her right hand—
And that’s when the phone rings.
50
GWENDY SHOVES THE BUTTON box off her lap and onto the sofa. Snatches up her cellphone. “Hello? Ryan? Hello?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Peterson,” a quiet voice says. “It’s Bea. Bea Whiteley.”
“Bea?” she says absently. It feels like the room swims back into focus, although she can’t for the life of her remember it appearing out of focus in the first place. “Is everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine. I just wanted to … first, I want to apologize for calling so late on Christmas. I didn’t even think about the three-hour time difference until the phone started ringing.”
“No need to apologize, Bea. I’m wide awake.”
“It sounds like Ryan didn’t make it home.”
Gwendy settles back into the sofa. She glances at the button box and then quickly looks away. “No, he didn’t. I’m hoping to hear from him soon, though.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” She can hear laughter in the background. “Sounds like your grandchildren are having a Merry Christmas.”
“Running around here like a bunch of wild animals.”
Gwendy laughs.
“Mrs. Peterson, I called to thank you.”
“For?”
“The beautiful notes you wrote inside your books to my children. Nobody’s ever said those kinds of things about me before, except for maybe my own family. I just wanted to tell you how much it meant to me.”
“It was my pleasure, Bea. I meant every word.”
“It was such a surprise,” Bea says, sniffling. “I swear I’ve never seen my daughter look at me the way she did today. Like she was so proud of me.”
“She has every right to be proud,” Gwendy says, smiling. “Her mother’s an amazing woman.”
“Well, thank you again so much. I …” She hesitates.
“Is there something else?”
When Bea Whiteley speaks again, her voice sounds odd and tentative. “I was wondering … is everything else there okay, Mrs. Peterson?”
“Everything’s fine,” she says, sitting up and glancing at the button box again. “Why do you ask?”
“I feel silly saying it out loud, but … just before I called, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong … that you were in some kind of trouble.”
A shiver passes through Gwendy. “Nope, everything’s fine. I’ve just been sitting here watching television.”
“Okay … good.” She sounds genuinely relieved. “I’ll let you be now. Merry Christmas, Mrs. Peterson, and thank you again.”
“Merry Christmas, Bea. I’ll see you in a couple of weeks.”
51
GWENDY WAKES UP EARLY the next morning with what feels like a mild hangover, despite having not touched a drop of alcohol the night before. She downs a bottle of water and knocks out a hundred sit-ups and fifty push-ups on the bedroom floor, hoping to get her blood pumping and chase away the headache. She’d slept restlessly, with unremembered dreams lurking just below her consciousness—but even without the details, she senses they were unpleasant and frightening.
The snow stopped falling a short time before daylight, leaving behind four or five inches in Castle County and most of western Maine. The traffic man on Channel Five warns travelers looking for a post-Christmas getaway to adjust their schedules for delays. Gwendy calls her father and informs him that she’s coming over to shovel the driveway and sidewalk, and she’s not taking no for an answer. Surprisingly, he agrees without an argument and tells her he’ll have hot coffee and leftover sausage-and-egg casserole from yesterday’s brunch waiting for her on the table when she arrives.
Gwendy throws on warm clothes and laces up her boots, then heads downstairs to clean off her car. Once she’s finished scraping the windows and brushing off the roof, she climbs inside the Subaru and immediately turns down the heat. She’s already sweating.
On her way down the hill, she spots a group of children having a snowball fight at the Castle View Rec Park. She can hear their excited shouts and squeals of delight even with the windows up. She smiles and tries to remember how long it’s been since she’s plunked someone with a snowball. Too long, she decides.
Ten minutes later, she turns onto Carbine Street and spots the flashing red and yellow lights of an ambulance in the distance. Her first pang of concern is for Mrs. Goff—she suffers from occasional bouts of vertigo and has fallen before. Last spring, she’d spent two weeks in the hospital nursing a broken hip. As she gets closer, Gwendy realizes the ambulance is parked in her parents’ driveway and someone on a stretcher is being loaded into the back. She stomps on the brakes and fishtails to the curb.
Her father stumbles out the front door of the house, carrying Mrs. Peterson’s purse in one hand and a jacket in the other. His face is drawn and pale.
“Dad!” Gwendy shouts, jumping out of the car and meeting him on the snow-covered sidewalk. “What happened? Is Mom okay?”
They both turn and watch as the ambulance pulls away, disappearing down the street.
“I don’t know,” he says weakly. “She started having cramps shortly after I talked to you. At first, she thought it was because she ate too much last night, but then the pain got worse. She was curled up in a ball on the bed, crying. I was about to call you when she started vomiting blood. That’s when I called the ambulance. I didn’t know what else to do.”
Gwendy takes her father by the arm. “You did the right thing. Are they taking her to Castle County General?”
He nods, his eyes big and ready to fill with tears.
“Come on,” she says, guiding him toward the curb. “I’ll drive you.”
52
THERE ARE ONLY A handful of other people sitting on the bright orange, plastic-molded seats outside of the emergency room at 10:00 AM. An older bald man nursing a sore neck from a fender-bender earlier that morning, a teenage boy with a deep cut on his lip and another under his swollen and darkening right eye from a sledding mishap, and a young Asian couple holding a pair of fussing, pink-faced twins on their laps.
When Mr. Peterson sees his wife’s oncologist, Doctor Celano, emerge via the swinging doors marked NO ENTRANCE, he immediately gets to his feet and meets him in the middle of the waiting room. Gwendy scrambles to catch up.
“How is she, Doc?” he asks.
“We gave her some pain medication, so she’s
resting comfortably. There’s been no more vomiting since the ambulance.”
“Do you know what’s wrong?” Gwendy asks.
“I’m afraid her tumor markers are up again,” the doctor says, a solemn expression coming over his face.
“Oh, Jesus,” Mr. Peterson says, sagging into his daughter’s shoulder.
“I know it’s difficult, but try not to get too alarmed, Mr. Peterson. Her blood tests from Wednesday’s appointment just came back this morning. I pulled them up on the computer when I heard the ambulance call, and they’re showing an uncomfortable increase—”
“An uncomfortable increase?” Mr. Peterson says. “What does that mean?”
“It means that most likely the cancer has returned. To what extent, we don’t know yet. We’re going to admit her today and run a series of tests.”
“What kind of tests?” Gwendy asks.
“We’ve already drawn more blood this morning. Once she’s settled into a room, we’ll schedule abdominal and chest scans.”
“Tonight?” Mr. Peterson asks.
He shakes his head. “Not on a Sunday, no. We’ll let her get some rest and wheel her over to Imaging in the morning.”
Mr. Peterson looks past the doctor to the swinging doors. “Can we see her?”
“Soon,” Doctor Celano says. “They’re transporting her to the second floor anytime now. Once she’s in her room, I’ll come back down and get you myself.”
“Does she know yet?” Gwendy asks.
The doctor nods. “She asked me to be honest with her. I believe her exact words were: ‘Do not blow sunshine up my rear. Give it to me straight.’ ”
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