Hiding

by Henry Turner

  Chapter

  Seventeen

  I heard her walk up the hall and go in the kitchen. She put her book bag down on the table and sat on one of the stools.

  I could feel her under me. I could see her sitting there. I could see her staring at the living room door.

  After a few minutes she got up and walked back into the hall and turned onto the stairs.

  I got up quickly.

  I wondered whether she would be able to see me when she came into the room. I was uncertain about that, just as I was uncertain why I could see her as she walked through the house, because when I stopped trying to see her, I was just staring at the empty, quiet room.

  Still, it wasn’t right to just stand there watching her.

  I stepped over to where the curtains hung over the windows, beside a partition wall with corkboards on it where she’d pinned some notes and schoolwork stuff. I slipped behind a curtain, pulled it completely shut, and waited, standing very still.

  She came up the stairs, but she didn’t come into her room.

  She crossed the hall to her parents’ room and stood outside the door for five minutes.

  Then she went in.

  She went straight to her father’s bedside table, opened the drawer, picked up the gun, took the key from under the lip of the drawer, removed the trigger lock, and dropped it back into the drawer. She put the key back under the lip, closed the drawer, and stepped out into the hall with the gun in her hand.

  She came up the hall, opened the door to her room, and entered.

  I watched her through the veil of the curtain.

  She had on her school uniform: a white shirt, blue necktie, plaid skirt, and saddle shoes. I’d seen her in it before. The girls at her school have to wear all that stuff. They’ve worn the same sort of uniform for sixty years. Laura hated it.

  She shut the door silently and stepped to the center of the room. She gently put the gun on the bed.

  She stood still for a moment, her figure just a hazy shadow in the middle of the darkened room, until she sat on the bed, picked up the gun, and pressed the barrel to her left breast, over her heart.

  I said, Laura, stop.

  She stopped.

  At first she did nothing. She didn’t move. Her face was lowered and her hair had fallen around it.

  I stepped out from behind the curtain.

  I came forward a step, looking at her.

  She raised her face.

  Slowly.

  She looked at me.

  Through me.

  I now knew just how good I was at hiding.

  She couldn’t see me.

  I didn’t even know if she could hear me.

  You can’t do this, Laura, I said. Please. You can’t do this.

  I was lying. I knew she could.

  I saw her face. Her beautiful face covered in shadow: dark, fixed, decided.

  Ready to die.

  I didn’t know where to begin.

  I prayed not to say something stupid.

  I’d thought of great things to say to her—when I was behind the curtain I’d really thought of great, comforting things.

  She had to listen.

  But everything had just sort of vanished from my mind.

  I thought nothing.

  I said, I’m here with you, Laura. I didn’t mean to die.

  It was stupid to say that.

  I leaned closer.

  I died. But I didn’t mean to. They think I meant to, but they’re wrong. It wasn’t your fault like you think. You had nothing to do with it. I just can’t ride a skateboard, that’s all; I’m really lousy on a skateboard. I got run over by a bus. But it was an accident. Can you hear me? I didn’t do it because of you. My dad bought me a skateboard; my mom told him not to, but he did it anyways, and I got killed. That’s all.

  She stared at me, through me, across the dismal room, as if into a fog. She couldn’t see me at all.

  Maybe she never had.

  I had to make her see me, but I didn’t know how.

  I said, Laura, listen to me. Try to hear me. Try to see me. Don’t do this to yourself. It doesn’t matter what happened with gymnastics. Forget your mother. Forget your old friends. You can’t believe you are nothing. I don’t care if that sounds stupid. Believe me, I know things now. I’ve seen things. I know your life is bad. I know it hurts. But you can change it. It won’t always be this way. You have to believe me.

  She was small, lonely, and afraid. Her face was so full of pain that I couldn’t stand it.

  I wanted to touch her, but I knew she wouldn’t feel me. I wanted to scream, but I knew she wouldn’t hear. She didn’t hear me at all, and I knew it.

  I kept talking anyway. I’ve seen what’s in the box, Laura. I’m sorry I looked. I love your paintings; they were beautiful. I looked everywhere. I saw everything. I know it’s killing you. But it doesn’t matter. Not to me. I never loved you for those things, Laura. I love you, Laura. I don’t think you’re a failure. You were done performing your routine, that’s all. You’ll do other things. I wish I could tell you what you hope to find, but only you can find it. I hope it will be beautiful, but I just don’t know. All I know is that it’s your life. It doesn’t matter what other people think. To hell with them. It doesn’t matter if they don’t love you.

  She shivered, her eyes frozen with dismal misery, staring through me into the gloom.

  I looked at her.

  I tried to finally see who she was.

  All I could remember was the moment I’d met her.

  The moment she’d woken me to something I’d never imagined could be real.

  She’d woken me to love.

  And it was wonderful.

  But it had hurt me too.

  Falling in love doesn’t seem possible until it happens. I never believed I could love until I met her. She brought love out of me, and it was something hidden so deep I hadn’t even known it was there.

  Now all I knew was that I hoped I could do the same for her.

  I got on my knees in front of her.

  Listen to me, Laura. I know you’re in pain. But you’ll find other people. You’ll find other love. You found me. I loved you. And now that I’ve seen everything, I love you even more. I’ll always love you. You saw something in me that no one else ever saw; I hid it from everybody! You saw that little bit of value I have that lets me be myself. See it in yourself, Laura. But you have to hear me. I can’t stop you, and even if I could, it wouldn’t work. The time would only come again. You have to do it, Laura. Pull the gun away.

  Did she hear me? I didn’t know. Her eyes were wet. But she did not pull the gun away.

  It was hopeless.

  I knew her.

  I knew how hard and determined she could be.

  I had to tell her everything.

  Every reason in the world why she mustn’t do this.

  But there was nothing more to say.

  Every reason I thought of fell apart instantly.

  In the face of death, everything was trite and stupid.

  I told her she had to want to stop, and stop right now. I told her that she could tell somebody how she feels, a counselor at school or a doctor, and she had to get help, because she was wonderful and beautiful and worth it.

  I know. That was a mistake.

  I really didn’t mean to say it. I knew it was boring and redundant—my mom had told me—and I’d said it a million times before and it had never done any good.

  But I just couldn’t stop myself.

  I tried to think of other things to say.

  Really.

  I told Laura again that she had to stop and not do it and that everything would be all right and that if she found help she would believe that, because she herself was so much more than anything she could possibly ever do or be for anyone else.

  I told her that I knew I’d never been able to help her; that she’d looked to me for help but never found it because I’d never had the courage to really show myself t
o her, but she had to see me now.

  I closed my eyes because I was crying, and all I feared was that I’d hear a horrible noise, and I wanted to tear the thing from her hands, but I couldn’t—only she could do that.

  And so I just started to say it, even though I didn’t think it was even the right thing to say, though in my soul I knew it was the only thing to say: You’re wonderful, you’re beautiful; you’re wonderful, you’re beautiful.

  I think I said it ten thousand times—You’re wonderful, you’re beautiful—and I knew it was hopeless, even though I heard her starting to sob.

  I couldn’t stop her.

  I kept saying it over and over like a prayer.

  You’re wonderful, you’re beautiful.

  And I closed my eyes and waited for the sound I dreaded hearing, and I slid into a clump on the floor at her feet.

  I lay there for longer than I can remember. Until I knew I was alone.

  But I guess she heard me.

  Because when I opened my eyes, she was gone downstairs, and had left the gun lying on the bed.

  I had to go.

  My time was up.

  I had something else to do, somewhere else I needed to be.

  I don’t mean to sound strange. But I had the feeling that just after I died I had been somewhere I could not quite remember, and I’d met people who had explained things to me about how my new life would be. But then they sent me back, and they made me believe things were as they’d been before, when I was alive. They took away my memory of the new things I’d seen, so I could see Laura this one last time, to truly see her and say to her the things I knew were true, now, when they were most needed.

  I knew I could go there now, back where I had been, and when I got there I would see the people again and everything would again be clear to me.

  But first I went downstairs, and there she was.

  She was standing in the living room with her phone in her hand; she’d taken it from her book bag.

  She was thinking of who to call.

  I looked at her for a moment, hoping it was not the last time I would see her.

  I’m going now, I said.

  Her face was wet with tears. Her skin was red, her eyes puffy.

  She was afraid of what would happen when she told—I could see that—of what they would do to her, where they might put her and for how long. When she finally called her doctor and told him to come get her, she cried convulsively as she explained to him what she had almost done but stopped and not done—because she said she felt it was a voice in her soul that had stopped her.

  But after she hung up she stopped crying.

  Her eyes opened wider with a harder resolution than I had ever seen in them.

  In her eyes was strength.

  I saw it.

  It was a light, and it was small but growing brighter, and I knew that it could never be put out.

  I had finally seen her.

  I smiled.

  She smiled. Her eyes stayed hard, but she smiled, looking with wonder at what she’d never seen before.

  She was looking at her true self.

  Chapter

  Eighteen

  I could have left then, but I stayed.

  I mean I hung around the neighborhood awhile.

  I’d never really seen how beautiful it all was, all the houses and stuff, and all the trees everywhere.

  I guess I felt like seeing all the people again, just one last time, you know what I mean?

  I went down the big hill, and I went a bit farther until I got to York Road. I stood on the same corner awhile, right where I’d stood on the day of my funeral, just looking around. The funeral parlor was right across the street. That seemed incredibly appropriate. I mean convenient.

  And then, without really looking or even caring to look, I walked into the street. The cars passed through me.

  So this is where it had happened.

  It seemed incredible.

  How could anybody think I had done it on purpose?

  I went farther, right to where I had gotten hit. The bus was coming.

  I mean, come on.

  On purpose?

  No way.

  I was just a klutz on a skateboard, that’s all. Didn’t anybody get it?

  The bus came closer. Nobody was at the stop. I stood there and it went right through me, a big ringing metal box. I saw the seats inside, all the handrails, people sitting and standing around reading the paper. It was crazy.

  When the bus was past I turned and watched it.

  The day it happened, it was that lady cop who found me. She came up first, I mean. She tried, but there was nothing she could do. She cried. She tried to hide it, but she cried, you know?

  I sort of liked her after that. I mean, I couldn’t actually remember what had happened yet, at least not back then, but I suddenly thought she was pretty nice, and I always wanted to thank her—I mean for just being around and looking out for everybody, because it really proved she wasn’t the mean lady cop some of my friends said she was.

  So I did. That day in the grocery. Now I knew why she had looked at me so strangely and hadn’t said anything.

  She couldn’t see me.

  But she’d smiled. I guess she’d heard something.

  The bus was going to the city, downtown. The other way it went up into the county where all the malls are. We went to the movies there, once, Laura and me. We rode the same damn bus.

  I couldn’t even remember seeing them at my funeral.

  I mean all the people who had come.

  At the time it was like I couldn’t see anybody but Laura; she really sort of absorbed all my attention. I mean, she really had a way of doing that.

  But I do now. I can remember all the people who had come now.

  It was really quite an event. Lots of neighbors, kids from school, parents, you name it. My fourth grade teacher who’d never, ever called on me even once, and that must be some kind of record. Suzie was there and she cried. And her mom, looking rather large and stoic. Carol brought his mom, looking sexy, of course. Even Mr. Miller, my next-door neighbor, and I must admit that he’s really the last person I’d ever expect to have shown up, but he did. I guess my dad invited him.

  I talk a lot about hiding, but from the size of the crowd, it seemed like maybe they’d seen me all along.

  It occurred to me, something funny—that veil Laura wore. Maybe she wished we’d been married. I guess we had the same wish.

  I’ll tell you, they really do a great job when they want to fool you. I mean, I don’t know if you were fooled, but I sure was. I mean, come on. They fake you out like a simulator ride, only better, a whole lot better, just to make it all seem real. I never was hungry—they just put that there. I guess they wanted to see how I’d react, you know, and get their little private satisfactions. I didn’t even really ever have to pee; they just threw that in because somebody has a great sense of humor. I still can’t decide whether Dobey saw me or not. I guess I still have a lot to learn. Maybe dogs have a sense for this sort of thing. And walking around with the tablecloth over me? Had that tablecloth even been real? I felt like an idiot.

  I was given this task for reasons I can’t understand.

  I won’t say I saved her. She had to save herself.

  But I put an idea in her mind.

  I felt good about that. I mean, I don’t want to sound funny, but I felt I’d finally accomplished something pretty important.

  Maybe I asked to do it.

  I mean, I needed to have something to do, right? Anything was better than just hanging around my house. I’d spent a whole summer cooped up with my dad, listening to him talk to himself, bemoaning his fate, and even though I sympathized with him and everything, it really had become a little tiresome.

  I was a ghost, for god sakes, just wandering. I had no idea what was going on.

  Still, one thing puzzles me.

  Maybe I was sort of dead my whole life, because I’d been hiding, and being real
ly dead barely mattered, so I didn’t even notice until after the end.

  Maybe I never even was hiding. Maybe I just thought I was, but really I was just reacting to never feeling like I was truly being seen.

  But maybe this is not about hiding.

  Maybe what this is really about is how I don’t think life is horrible and meaningless, even if it sometimes seems to be.

  I know I said that big things never happened to me.

  Well, that’s still true.

  Because this happens to everyone.

  And you know, you can’t say something’s really big if it happens to everyone.

  It’ll happen to you too.

  At the right time.

  Because like my mom said, there’s a right time for everything.

  I mean, sure, she said that when I was complaining about sex, but doesn’t the same advice apply to everything?

  You have to show yourself.

  You have to let people know you are there.

  You can’t play hide-and-seek with your life, no matter how safe it may seem. You’ll get too good at it after a while, just like I did and Laura did, and you won’t be able to tell anybody where you are or how to find you.

  You know, I never told you my name.

  I was Danny Preston.

  Don’t ever hide.

  Acknowledgments

  A number of wonderful and beautiful people helped me write this book. I want to thank my wife, Alma, for her suggestions, encouragement, and support—but mostly for her love. I want to thank my son, Hugo, for his love and encouragement, and for proving every day that a boy can be his own perfect self without ever having to hide. Alma and Hugo, you are forever the most wonderful and beautiful people in my life.

  I want to thank my agent, Dan Lazar of Writers House, for his constant support, and for bringing my work to Clarion Books, and to my editor, the fabulous Anne Hoppe. Anne, your encouragement and faith in my writing led me to look deep enough into myself to find this story, and your sensitive comments and suggestions—through all the various drafts—helped put in my hand a light I could shine on Danny and Laura, to bring them out of hiding and into the brilliancy of their true selves.

  Chapter One