The Second Home

by Christina Clancy

  Jason paid him in cash; no background checks, no requests to furnish proof of who he was, no taxes to file, no way for Connie or Ed to figure out where he’d gone, not that they were looking. When Michael wasn’t plowing driveways or checking on his clients’ empty houses, he was studying.

  When summer came around he asked Jason not to have him work in Wellfleet, convinced that Connie or Ed would spy him pruning a hedge or edging a lawn. Come September, once he knew the Gordons were back in Milwaukee, he’d slip away and spend a secret night in their Wellfleet house listening to Ed’s LPs. Ed loved Dylan and the Eagles and all the stuff you’d expect a middle-aged, guitar-playing, sandal-wearing guy like Ed to listen to, but he also had a thing for blues and jazz. It was through Ed that Michael learned about heavy-hitters like Charles Mingus, Art Blakey, and Coleman Hawkins, but he also had albums by obscure musicians like Roswell Rudd, Jeanne Lee, and Alan Shorter. Michael didn’t always love Ed’s music, but he gave it a try, just like he’d read whatever books Connie had read. He studied the lines she’d underlined and paid attention to the notes she wrote in the margins. He wished he could talk to them, but getting that close to them, listening to their music, reading their books—that was as close as he could get to having a sort of conversation.

  His overnight visits eventually stopped, like a childhood habit he’d outgrown. Still, he looked after the house whenever he could, the way he was watching over it that cold February afternoon.

  He often worked in the barn, where he could use what Ed called his “medieval torture devices,” an amazing collection of the kinds of rusty tools that had been passed down to him: a miter vise, a creeper, a Stanley plane—even a special hacksaw used to dehorn goats and calves.

  The barn was where Michael found the die-cutting tools he needed to make what was, at first, just a toy for Avery. Later, it became a prototype that would help him launch Anibitz, his new side business based on that old game he’d played with Ann and Poppy, where they’d combine two, three, four parts of animals. A centipede, catfish, and crow: the “centifishow.” A hyena, shark, and gerbil: the “hyarkbil.” The thin wooden pieces snapped together like jigsaw-puzzle pieces, and the game was to try to guess and name the creations, and to find creations that represented who you were—your “spirit Anibitz.” The concept had become so successful that he could hardly say it was a side business anymore, and sales had recently surged thanks to a few magazine articles and some active Anibitz fan sites. He could barely keep up with the orders on his own anymore, and soon he might need to cash out his share in the landscaping company to raise funds to invest in expansion.

  His distributor was a freelance rep from Los Angeles named Sandi. She was so into Anibitz that he swore she played with the toys herself when she wasn’t talking to him about social media and the youth market. She had a million ideas for his product: a clothing line, coloring books, plastic figures that snapped together, an educational line for science teachers, and a bunch of other stuff Michael tuned out because she always called him at the most inopportune time, like when he was fixing an overflowing toilet for Shelby, or firing an employee with a heroin habit.

  Sandi had called him earlier that week, excited. “The kids in Japan are going apeshit for them,” she said.

  “Great.” Michael must have sounded unimpressed.

  “Michael! Did you hear me? Japan! The kids are combobulating like crazy.”

  “Combobulating” was the process of selecting the animal segments that customers could choose from to make their own Anibitz creation. You could pick up to three, although Sandi was already imagining how they might expand to four, maybe even five, if they could find a plastics manufacturer that could come up with a decent prototype.

  There was even talk of opening an Anibitz showroom somewhere. The past two years, during the low season, this was what Michael had been focused on. He’d always believed in his idea, although he’d rather work outside than deal with the business that needed to be done on his computer.

  A truck rumbled down Route 6. It was easy to spend time at the Gordons’ undetected. The neighbors on either side of the Gordons’ house didn’t notice Michael’s presence. They were gone for the winter, and even if they’d been there, their houses faced the cove—they reminded Michael of chairs with their backs set away from each other. Michael drove a landscaping truck, and landscapers were hired to routinely check on houses during the winter—nothing suspicious about that. The police wouldn’t care much, either. The force was thin after the budget cuts, and the few officers who remained were busy with bigger problems, the kind you wouldn’t think you’d find on the Cape: thefts, drug abuse—stuff that kept Michael up at night worried over trouble that could befall Avery when she got older.

  He finished his repair work, climbed down his tall ladder, and loaded it back in his pickup, which he’d parked on the service drive under the trees so nobody would know he was there. He figured he’d check to make sure the pipes hadn’t burst. Ed and Connie emptied all the water, but sometimes they did a shit job, like three years ago, when they’d neglected to drain the water heater and Michael caught it just in time, before the heating element cracked.

  As much as Ed and Connie loved their house, and as much as Ed liked to tinker, they weren’t really house people, not the way Michael was. That was why Michael figured they probably hadn’t ever noticed his small repair jobs. But he couldn’t help leaving little messages behind, like the dried leaves he inserted between the pages of some of Connie’s books, a shiny penny dropped head-up on the floor because Poppy used to be superstitious about pennies, or a jar of grilling spices he thought Connie might like tucked in the back of the kitchen cabinet. Last fall he’d set a pretty slipper shell under the pillow of Poppy’s bed. When she was young, she told him the shells were cribs for babies. He noticed when he lifted the pillow up that her bed was covered in dust; he figured it hadn’t been slept in for years.

  But Michael never left a secret message for Ann. He didn’t know how to communicate with her, not even in the smallest and most subtle way.

  Anthony Shaw, on the other hand … for years, Michael had planned to someday send him a message loud and clear. Back when Avery was born and he and Shelby sorted through all their financials, Michael finally checked on “his” bank account and discovered that Anthony, who’d cosigned and had equal access to the account, had withdrawn so much that there was barely enough to keep the account open. That was money that was supposed to go to Ann. Michael knew Ann was getting screwed over, and even though she’d sold him upstream, he couldn’t stand the thought of her struggling. He was so upset that he’d finally told Shelby the full story about the Gordons.

  He didn’t have much money then, not after he’d used the other check Anthony had given him to buy his partnership in Jason’s business, but he suffered from lingering feelings of guilt for accepting Anthony’s payoff in the first place. Michael worked it out with the bank and scraped together some of his own money to send to Ann, a little here, a little there, always in odd amounts that probably confused her since she’d been used to getting the same amount every month. Shelby was generally supportive, but during the financial crisis, when they were really struggling to get by, she told him that it was time to wash his hands of Ann and her “situation.” After all, Shelby said, Ann was the one who’d fallen in love with a jerk, and she was the one who’d come up with the stupid plan in the first place.

  Enough was enough.

  Michael took off his heavy gloves and scooped the house key out of the bulb digger. The heavy, old key to the Gordon house slid into the lock. He heard the familiar click and opened the door, inhaling the familiar, musty odor. But this time something was different. Someone had been there. He spied a Starbucks cup with lipstick on the kitchen table. He picked it up and pulled off the lid. The little bit of coffee left inside had frozen solid. “Hello?” he said, although he could sense that he was alone.

  The rooms were just as they’d been the last time he’d
been there, the beds and all the furniture covered in sheets. He felt as if he were in the middle of a morgue. Then he saw something he also hadn’t seen before: a business card with a photo of the ocean as the background. He picked it up: Carol Hargrove. Her photo was off to one side. She wasn’t even smiling. She didn’t look like any Realtor he’d ever met. She looked like she belonged outdoors, like she worked on his landscaping crew.

  Perplexed, Michael stuffed the business card in his wallet and sat down on the sofa. That was when he felt something hard and heard a sharp crack. He lifted up the sheet and saw the photo of himself with Ann and Poppy that had always remained on the mantel. That photo meant everything to him, because, after what had happened, Ed and Connie had kept it on display when they could have stuffed it in a drawer.

  Why, now, was it hidden under the sheet? The crack ran right down the middle, right through him.

  How did it get there? He set the photo back on the mantel as it was. He felt spooked enough to drive back to the shop and pull the Shaws’ house key from the pegboard. Jason still had the Shaws’ key, and it dangled teasingly all these years.

  Michael parked his truck down the street and walked quietly down the long driveway toward the brown house, careful to make sure nobody was watching him. The sun was going down, and he admired the slit of light on the horizon over the bay. There, in that eerie afternoon light, was the bluestone patio he’d once laid, visible in the gullies where the wind had lifted the snow. There were the rosebushes, although nobody had bothered to cover them with burlap. The key slid into the lock, and the door creaked when he opened it. He walked back into the place and felt as if he’d been body-slammed against the massive white walls. This was where his youth had died. It took him a moment to collect himself. What was it about houses, the power they had? The houses he’d once inhabited now inhabited him. They were witnesses to who he once was, to the people he’d loved—and hated. He could practically hear the fall of Anthony’s footsteps, the jingle of Maureen’s bracelets, the bored lamentations of the boys. And Ann, Ann, Ann. He could practically reach out and touch her ponytail, her bare feet, her smile.

  Everything that had seemed modern and new now looked old and worn. The sheet on the couch was rumpled, the vase at the center of the dining room table was empty. He had to leave.

  But first, he had a mission to accomplish, just a flick of a switch. Only Anthony might appreciate how a single gesture could cause such great destruction.

  TWENTY

  Ann

  Ann pounded along the Salt and Pepper Bridge and made her way from the Back Bay to the MIT campus. She loved the view of the Boston skyline. She and Noah had moved here when Noah was eleven, almost five years ago. Yet she still felt like a newcomer in the city, still in awe of the old brick buildings, bay windows, turrets, and history, still proud she was able to insert herself, a single mom, into the bustle and flow of the intimidating Northeast, proud she’d found a life here. She could have easily never left Milwaukee, but Boston had always been part of her “Ann with a Plan” vision; it was where she’d always imagined her adult life taking shape. The city had seemed almost mythical to her, especially after her plans to study there had changed so abruptly. It was a city she’d always wanted to live in, near the Cape she loved. She was close, yes, but she always came up with excuses to not make the drive. Now she wished she could have refused to let that single memory of Anthony prevent her from spending more time with her parents.

  Instead, she worked. As soon as she finished her MBA at Marquette, she secured a job at BNN, a strategic consulting firm in the Back Bay. Now she was in management, in charge of “top of funnel” channel messaging for an online housewares site. Lately, she was on youth and nursery, one of the “life stages.” She analyzed search data—“industrial chic” was out, “boho” was in, and “glam” was on the rise. She selected pregnant celebrities who were social media influencers to promote their products, reaching out to offer them exclusive contracts and other product-for-publicity arrangements. Her work made her long to have another baby herself and participate in all the shallow consumer excitement that went along with it. When she had Noah, her parents hauled her own crib up from the basement, a crib that would be recalled for a thousand reasons today.

  She was good at her job, and had a particularly shrewd eye for data analysis, but all of the management changes her coworkers whispered about had her feeling nervous. As a single mom, the prospect of losing her job terrified her. That evening, she tried to leave her concerns about conversion rates and job security at the office. She didn’t think about her pace or the distance she’d gone, which was unusual, because Ann liked to measure things. She wore a GPS heart rate monitor on her wrist that was as big as a blood pressure cuff. She could upload data from her workouts to her computer and keep track of every step, interval, and heartbeat. Instead of a journal, she kept a training log and tracked it religiously, desperate to see improvement in her speed and endurance. She believed she could always improve.

  It was getting dark. She’d meant to head back to the Cape and tackle the list of chores the Realtor had told her she’d need to take care of, but her assistant had screwed up a spreadsheet, her manager called to ask her to update a presentation, and then … Screw it. She hardly ever went back to Wellfleet, because returning meant remembering.

  Don’t, she thought. Don’t think about Anthony. That was her mantra. She could have tattooed the words across her wrist as a reminder. When she thought of Anthony, she thought of how hollow his words were that everything would work out if she just followed his plans. She was so stupid back then, so overwhelmed. And look what happened: Anthony sent her some money, and her parents believed it was from Michael, happy that he’d at least managed to support her. Except after only a few years, the money, once a reliable thousand dollars a month, trickled to odd amounts, a little here, a little there, until it stopped completely.

  Don’t think about Anthony! Now, when she thought of Anthony, she thought of all that blood.

  Ann realized her hands had clenched into angry fists. Her nails left half-moon-shaped marks in her palms. Relax, relax, she told herself. She was wound up so tight with worry and dread that she hardly had the slightest inkling what relaxation even felt like.

  She’d been tense and distracted ever since Poppy told her she was finally heading back to Milwaukee, six months after their parents had died. Exotic Poppy, the great surfing, adventuring Robinson Crusoe. But damn, Ann missed her, even if she didn’t understand the choices Poppy had made and she couldn’t forgive her sister for leaving when she’d needed her most.

  “What’s Poppy like?” Noah would ask, the same way he’d ask about relatives that were long dead, and Ann would pull out old photos of the two of them from Cape Cod, or show him Poppy’s pictures in their high school yearbook. “She’s pretty,” he would say, and Ann would have to agree. To everyone else, Poppy was charming, mellow, and impossibly cool. Ann had always admired Poppy, even when they were girls, although she hadn’t liked to admit it. Like Noah, Poppy never tried to be like anyone else, never cared what people thought of her. She was her own person—so why was she the one trying to find herself?

  Ann thought of the postcards and packages Poppy had sent to Noah over the years. They were wrapped in thin brown paper and decorated in unusual stamps from all the far-off places she’d stayed. She’d sent handmade wooden yo-yos, painted kazoos, knotted bracelets, strange currency, pretty stones from the beach. All those packages and scenic postcards—was Poppy trying to make Ann feel as if her own life was small and unlived?

  Dear Noah, hello from Honduras! I hope you learn to speak Spanish while you are young, when it’s easier to pick it up. There are parrots everywhere. Their eyes are black as stones, and they are so smart! They even know who I am. One of them, a green one named Mango, greets me every time I come home from work. Hello Poppy! I could swear he waits for me there all day long. He talks, but he doesn’t say much I can understand. I’ll try to teach
him to say your name. I feed him beans and rice and bananas. He especially loves coconut Johnny cakes. I hope you are doing well in school. I’ll bet you are smart like your mom. Give her a hug for me.

  —Yours, Aunt Poppy

  Dear Noah, a stray cat has moved in with me. I’m trying to think of a name for her. I’m calling her Little Mama for now. She’s got a white star on her forehead. Any ideas for a better name?

  —Yours, Aunt Poppy

  Dear Noah, the surf here is very rough. Mother moon is full and the tide is so high that it washed out the dirt road to this side of the island. We can’t surf or swim because the shore is rocky. It rains almost every day but it’s warm. I love listening to the red howler monkeys scampering around in the mangroves at night. That’s why I’m sending this monkey hand puppet. Have fun with it!

  Dear Noah,

  I hope you are learning to practice gratitude. I hope you are thankful for your beautiful face and your healthy body and your mother and grandparents and all the people who love you so much, like me. I can’t wait to see you and connect. Hopefully soon!

  May our spirits mingle,

  Aunt Poppy

  Now, at last, Poppy was coming home, and Ann worried about the ways in which their spirits would mingle. Ann couldn’t quite forgive her for being gone so long, and Ann was especially hurt when she couldn’t reach Poppy after their parents had died. She’d never felt more alone in her life than she’d felt that horrible week, trying to stay strong for Noah while making arrangements with the crematorium, dealing with insurance, searching for the will, meeting with lawyers, sending notices to their creditors and banks, writing “DECEASED” on the mail that arrived and popping it back in the mailbox, unread. She was about to turn thirty-five and felt too young to lose both of her parents, too young to go to bed alone every night. She’d broken up with her only long-term boyfriend, Kevin, an investment analyst she’d met through friends. He was perfectly nice. Too nice. The kind of guy who wears tennis shoes with suit pants. Noah didn’t like him. “He calls me ‘pal,’” he’d said. “He gets excited about eating leftovers. He calls them ‘LOs.’” Kevin was eating leftovers with a new wife now and living in Newton, with twins on the way. Ann’s lack of jealousy confirmed that she’d made a good decision, although sometimes she wondered if she was getting too old to expect more from a romantic partner.