Frost

by Wendy Delsol

  “I don’t know what to do about the chairs,” I said, looking around.

  “The chairs,” Grim said, “can take care of themselves.”

  Right, and so can I. “Thank you, Fru Grimilla, as always, for your gentle guidance.”

  We locked eyes.

  “Meeting adjourned,” I said loudly and with a clap of my hands, knowing full well that Hulda always closed with a slight bow to her head and a soft “Peace be.” The clap at least made it seem like I was in command. In truth, I didn’t know what I was doing. Grim passed behind me with a loud huff. I didn’t have her fooled, either.

  “Kat. I could use some help in here,” my mom called from the kitchen.

  I had just gotten home from our first day back at school and was hoping to just chill for a while. Besides a backpack full of assignments, worries over Hulda tugged at my shoulders. I found my mom surrounded by pots and pans and two open cookbooks. She was squirting anchovy paste from a tube into a metal bowl.

  “Stanley and the visiting researcher will be here in an hour,” she said, brushing bangs from her face.

  Judging by the state of the kitchen, an hour wasn’t going to cut it. “What are you making?” I asked. “Besides a mess.”

  “Dressing for the Caesar salad right now. But I’ve got a bouillabaisse on the stove and all the ingredients for a crab dip appetizer ready to go.”

  “Uh, Mom,” I said, leaning over the bowl and sniffing at the inky black squirt of anchovy. “What if our guest doesn’t like fish?”

  My mom stopped, the wire whisk suspended midair. “It’s all fish, isn’t it?”

  “Pretty much.”

  She rested the whisk on the counter and brought her hand to her tummy. “I’ve been having the oddest cravings. Yesterday I ate a sardine sandwich. And when I chose the menu earlier today, it had sounded delicious.”

  “To a porpoise, maybe.”

  “And what about Jack?” my mom asked.

  “What about him?”

  “Does he eat fish?” She set back to work mixing the dressing. “He showed up at the lab after school, so Stanley’s bringing him along.”

  The evening was sounding better already.

  “I guess he’ll have to. What’s for dessert?” I asked.

  She lifted a brownie mix from the counter. “Funny you should ask.”

  I didn’t think it was.

  An hour later, we had the kitchen tidied, the crab dip and crackers set out, and my brownies cooling. Neither of us, however, had time to change. I was barefoot with rolled-up jeans and a black-and-white-striped long-sleeved T. That morning the prison-themed garb had seemed a good way to sum up my back-to-school mood. My mom wore old black stretchy pants over which a faded green sweater was stretched across her expanding midsection. It wasn’t her best look, but I knew she still wasn’t feeling too great and wasn’t really up to shopping for maternity wear or scaling our pile of laundry — what I liked to call Mount Ever-there. I made a mental note to run a load before bed that night.

  I heard the doorbell and then Stanley’s familiar “Yoo-hoo. Anybody home?”

  My mom smiled and wiped her hands on a dishcloth, and we both headed for the front door. A few steps into the foyer and I stopped, gobsmacked. Researcher? My foot. What stood in front of me was the most stunning, statuesque runway-type I’d ever seen in person, and I’d once spotted Claudia Schiffer at LAX. She was peeling from her rod-straight shoulders a full-length coat of pure-white fur. Her black leather boots shone like obsidian, her white woolen skirt hugged curvy hips, and her long ebony hair cascaded down her back in a plummet of silky ribbons. She was a mile taller than Stanley, and in those skyscraper heels even looked down on Jack.

  My mom and I both stood as rigid as plaster casts. Like me, she had obviously expected the researcher from Greenland to be male and backwoodsy, but there was something else about the woman that had my jaw clamped so tight my molars hurt. In our stupor, we forced Stanley to take her coat and bag.

  “Lilja, Kat, allow me to introduce Professor Brigid Fonnkona,” Stanley said, enunciating the hard g in Brigid.

  “Pleased to meet you,” my mom said, shaking Brigid’s hand. She was making a much quicker recovery. I was still staring openly. “Won’t you come in?” My mom directed our guest toward the family room with a sweep of her arm.

  I took the luxurious fur from Stanley. Jack hung back with me.

  “Wow,” I whispered. “She’s gorgeous.”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “I hadn’t noticed.”

  If I’d had a gold star to stick on his forehead, I would have. He’d just have to make do with the happy face I flashed him. My attention turned to the bulky coat I was holding. Not that I was some kind of expert furrier, but this pure-white pelt was definitely real and of an animal that required a heavy-duty self-heating system. Was it legal to sell — or wear, for that matter — polar bear coats? And no way was this thing bought at Saks. No label, no tags of any kind, expertly hand-sewn, and lined with a material that even I couldn’t place. I hung it in the hall closet — seriously doubting that the wire hanger was up to the task — and followed Jack into the family room, where my mom was pouring glasses of white wine. Brigid smiled at Jack and patted the open spot next to her like he was some kind of tail-thumping pooch. He sat down, and she crossed one long leg over the other, sliding her body an inch or two in his direction. Stanley was seated in one of the leather chairs across from them. I sat on the floor at one end of the coffee table, helping myself to a cracker full of crab dip and keeping a sharp eye on the newcomer.

  “You are old enough to drink aren’t you?” my mom tittered nervously.

  “Of course,” Brigid said, accepting the offered glass.

  Funny my mom should ask that. In the hallway, I’d been certain she was about the age of my mom and Stanley. Now, next to Jack on the couch, she seemed much younger. Only a few years older than us. And her striking features were hard to classify. Exotic for sure, but I couldn’t decide if she was Asian, or Hispanic, or Middle Eastern, or even Pacific Islander.

  “Should we call you Professor Fonnkona?” my mom asked, taking a seat on the arm of Stanley’s club chair.

  My mom was a professor, too, but I’d never heard her use the title with her peers before.

  “Please. Call me Brigid.”

  Her accent was difficult to pinpoint as well; it definitely had a guttural Scandinavian or Germanic crispness to it.

  At the front door, I heard two knocks, a pause, and then three more quick raps. There was only one person I knew who had a signature knock.

  “That’s Dad,” I said, bounding from my spot on the floor.

  I found him peeking his head around the front door. “It’s just me. I brought your phone charger.”

  My mom joined us in the small hallway. “Oh. Greg. It’s you,” she said, looking at the cord in my hand.

  My dad must have heard voices from the family room. “Did I interrupt something?”

  “He can come in, can’t he, Mom? Maybe stay for dinner?” She didn’t move — stuck to the spot I’d put her on.

  Luckily, Stanley joined us in the foyer. “Greg. Nice to see you again.” They shook hands. “Come on in. Meet our guest.”

  My mom shot me a glare before we joined the group in the family room.

  My dad was already seated in the other club chair and leaning forward to accept the glass of wine being delivered by Stanley.

  “Greenland, huh?” my dad said. “Are you actually from there?”

  “My studies have taken me all over the world,” Brigid replied.

  Not necessarily an answer to the question.

  “Exactly what is it you two are studying?” my dad asked.

  He was being polite. Anytime my mom tried to explain mathematical theorems to him, he said, in a fairly good robot voice, “Does not compute.”

  “Variations to the global-warming phenomenon,” Brigid said. “This area’s micro-climate of cooling trends is intriguing. If we c
an explain this anomaly, seek to re-create its properties, we can apply these findings to other regions whose ecosystems are in danger.”

  What the —? My dad was inching forward in his chair and gobbling up every word Brigid said. This from the guy who claimed PBS stood for the Prattle, Babble, and Sedation channel.

  “Fascinating,” my dad said. And I could tell he meant it.

  I looked around the room. Was it me? Or was everyone hanging on her every word? Jack, who would not get another happy face from me anytime soon, was just as transfixed as the rest of them. I knew it wasn’t purely her discourse that had them all — weirdly, even my mom — so riveted. Brigid’s eyes were wide, long-lashed, and had a decidedly feline upturn to them; her lips were very full and garnet-red; and her teeth were a brilliant white. It was so not fair that she was intelligent, too.

  “Have you eaten?” Stanley asked my dad.

  “No, as a matter of fact. And something smells good.”

  “I’ll set another place,” my mom said with a small sigh of resignation.

  I watched as my dad escorted Brigid into the dining room, pulled her chair out for her, and seated himself at her right elbow. She was the toast of the table, regaling us with stories of her travels. She’d been everywhere, places even my smart mom had never heard of. It all left me feeling vaguely uncomfortable, though I couldn’t precisely state why. Maybe it was because she was the kind of star who didn’t just dwarf those who surrounded her — she sucked ’em into some kind of dazzled orbit. It was also possible that the princess in me wasn’t used to sharing my dad’s attention and affection. Whatever the reason, the evening was not going well. I was the party pooper at the table, the turd in the tub.

  “Kat, why don’t you help me with dessert?” my mom said.

  “I’ll help clear,” Jack said, pushing back his chair and gathering plates. He had either been trained well, or was seriously angling for brownie points with my mom. I had to inwardly chuckle; he might not get a badge to sew on his good-deeds sash, but brownies were on the menu.

  My mom started a pot of decaf while I got out dessert plates, forks, and a spatula.

  Jack returned with a second round of dirty plates; an empty-handed Brigid followed him.

  “Anything else?” Jack asked.

  “See if you can find the mint-chip ice cream,” I said. “It’s my dad’s favorite.”

  Jack bent down to the pull-out freezer drawer and began rummaging through our wide assortment of CPK pizzas, Stouffer’s mac and cheese, and, my personal favorite, Amy’s black bean burritos. Lately, with my mom feeling worn down with her pregnancy, dinner meant something zapped.

  “Can I do something?” Brigid asked.

  With the coffee burbling, my mom leaned back against the counter. “No. No. You’re the guest.”

  “I don’t mind,” Brigid said, fiddling with a long, jagged crystal pendant.

  “What an unusual necklace,” my mom said.

  I hadn’t noticed it, or the cleavage it nestled into. My attention was now drawn to both. The stone was clear as glass and chiseled into a stalactite-like formation of long, pointy rock.

  “Is that a real diamond?” I asked, the words escaping my mouth.

  My mom gave me a look, but, honestly, she was the one to mention it.

  “This trinket?” Brigid zippered it back and forth along its silver chain. “A family piece.”

  Which didn’t really answer the question — only made me more curious — about her family, for starters.

  “It’s beautiful,” my mom said. “And looks one-of-a-kind, and very old. Is it an antique?” It was, I knew, a more subtle dig for information than my previous “Is it real?”

  Brigid brought her hands behind her neck and expertly unclasped the chain. She held it out for us to see. “It was mined not far from where I grew up.”

  Again, not necessarily an answer to the question.

  “Got it,” Jack said, pulling his head from the freezer. He stood, holding a carton of ice cream. As he thrust it out to show me, his hand somehow collided with the pendant Brigid was still holding up. Things happened so fast my eyes, and certainly my brain, had a hard time working it all out. Brigid dropped the necklace. It shattered. Both she and Jack dove to the floor in reaction. And then Jack cried out, “Ouch!” and shook his left thumb, which now had a pinprick of blood at its tip.

  “You’ve been cut,” Brigid said, shuddering as if one drop of blood was a gruesome sight.

  Still crouched on his knees, Jack rubbed the blood away with his thumb.

  “It’s just a tiny jab,” he said, scrambling to a stand. “But, boy, that sucker hurt.”

  “Your necklace,” I said, realizing the extent of the damage.

  Brigid picked up the chain and swung it back and forth. Only a short jagged piece of crystal remained; the other two inches of the stone were glassy shards. “It was an accident,” she said. “Do not worry too much about it. It was old, had some sentimental value, but I promise you, it wasn’t valuable.”

  Whether it was watching the pendulum-like motion of the remaining shard or empathizing with Jack, who continued to cradle his thumb, I wasn’t sure, but my stomach took a rough-seas roll.

  My dad, having heard the commotion, joined us in the kitchen. “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing a broom can’t fix,” Brigid said, accepting my dad’s assistance standing up.

  From a drawer, I found a Band-Aid for Jack, and then swept up the bits of Brigid’s stone or crystal or diamond or whatever the heck the glittery fragments were. The ice cream hadn’t even been mint chocolate chip, but rocky road. It took me all of three seconds to locate the correct carton myself. Apparently Jack, like my dad, didn’t have what my mom called the “finding gene.” Her theory was that it required two X chromosomes, as did table manners.

  I plated the brownies while my mom scooped the ice cream. Jack sat at the island, suddenly quiet and brooding over his sore finger. I remembered that my mom also listed tolerance to pain as a girls-only genetic trait. My mom carried the coffee service into the dining room; my dad followed with a tray of brownies à la mode; Brigid went with them, casting a glance back at Jack as she left. I settled onto the stool next to him. His sulk was unusual, but I assumed the incident had him feeling guilty.

  “It’s really a shame about that necklace,” I said. “So weird the way it shattered like that. How’s your cut?”

  “It’s no big deal,” Jack said.

  “It wasn’t your fault.”

  “I said it’s no big deal.” He got up from his stool, leaving his dessert untouched, and followed the others into the family room.

  My head jerked back; it was the first time Jack had ever snapped at me. I sat staring at my dessert. Did Jack feel that guilty about the necklace? Despite Brigid’s denial, it had to be valuable. Did he worry that he’d ruined his chances of continuing as Stanley’s helper? Was the cut deeper than it looked? Or was I making something out of nothing? Laughter erupted from the family room, Jack’s throaty chuckle rising above the others; I got up to join them. Whatever the incident had been, it had clearly blown over. So why was I in no mood to laugh?

  “Can you believe she was on the second helicopter that flew over one of the uncontacted tribes of the rain forest?” Two days after the dinner party and Jack was still talking about Brigid. “She knows all about their customs.”

  I leaned back on the bleachers and stretched my legs, briefly admiring my bubblegum-pink knee socks paired with the kelly-green Converse high-tops. Below, Mr. Addomy, the P.E. instructor, demonstrated how to wield a lacrosse stick.

  “I thought her area of study was the polar regions,” I said.

  Mr. Addomy asked for a volunteer to pitch him a few balls. I sat on my hands.

  “That’s her concentration, sure, but she’s interested in any corner of the biosphere that is experiencing a sudden and potentially catastrophic mutation to its ecosystem. Deforestation of the tropics is disturbing everything from p
lant diversity to animal habitats to weather patterns.”

  “Snjosson,” Mr. Addomy called over the rows of bleachers, “Why don’t you show us all that flick of the wrist I was just demonstrating?”

  Busted. Normally I’d feel sorry for him. Even a bit guilty for being the other head in an unauthorized tête-à-tête. I was, however, so sick and tired of hearing about Brigid that I welcomed the interruption. Jack hangdogged his way down to Mr. Addomy, who tossed him a few easy balls. Frustrated and clearly embarrassed, Jack gave it several brow-scrunching attempts, but he never quite managed the “flick of the wrist” Mr. Addomy made look so easy. Jack, I could tell, wasn’t used to coming up short. With an iron clamp to his jaw, he handed the stick back.

  After that, the gym was divided, boys on one side and girls on the other, for our first crack at lacrosse. And I’d thought it was some nice upper-crust lawn game, like croquet or badminton. More like hockey on steroids — for the criminally insane.

  Upon exiting the locker room, I found Jack leaning against the wall and practicing the “flick” with an imaginary stick. Irritation chiseled his cheekbones. Man, the guy really didn’t like to fail. About as much as I didn’t like rough sports.

  “You’re limping,” Jack said, pushing off the wall.

  “Enjoyment of that game should be one of the criteria the FBI uses to profile serial killers.”

  “That bad, huh?”

  “Terry Andriks is deeply disturbed.”

  Jack laughed and took my book bag from me. “Let me lighten your load.”

  As ever, his mere presence did. By the time we reached the lunchtime school-newspaper meeting, I was considerably better.

  I took a seat at my usual desk between Jack and Penny in the circle.

  “Why don’t we take the first half of the lunch to work independently on our stories?” Jack said to the group before sitting down.

  Work independently meant we’d yak about anything and everything. It happened at least once a week. Sure, we were putting out a school paper, but that didn’t necessarily mean we were all hard-boiled reporter types. On the contrary, plenty of us — myself included — viewed being liberated from the whole lunch scene as equal to, if not greater than, exercising our freedom of speech.