by James Sperl
The slosh of water and the clank of dishes from the kitchen filled what would have otherwise been crushing silence. All eyes were on Andrew, who was well aware of the fact that he had become the unwanted center of attention. He panned around the room and met the gaze of each person who stared at him. With hands on hips, he retreated to looking at the tops of his shoes.
“It's been a long day,” he said. “Going to be another long one tomorrow. We should probably get some sleep.”
Without another word, he peeled away and slipped through the kitchen screen door outside. Jon waited until he left, then he joined Clarissa and Kaplinsky in the living room.
“What was that all about?”
“Oh, that was just me opening my big mouth and trying to be reassuring,” she said. “One day I'll learn.”
Jon gave an empathetic wince. “Didn't go so well, huh?”
“To say the least. Pretty sure I just worked myself onto Andrew's least favorite person list.”
“Nonsense,” Kaplinsky said. He paused to admire a toe. “You can't be expected to navigate other people's minefields of emotional eggshells. If your intent was pure, then that's all you need to concern yourself with.”
“Maybe. I still should have known better than to shake my pom-pom's at him, though. He's just not ready for it yet. Even after all this time.”
“Or maybe it's exactly what he needed to hear. As I pointed out, he had a reason he kept coming to your diner. And it wasn't because your cook put the body of Christ in the hash browns. He was filling a social hole, however small it may have been.” Kaplinsky wiggled his painted toes and grunted approval.
“Don't be fooled by his anger. You heard him say it. His decision to hide up in the mountains was a direct result of tragedy. In other words, his hand was forced. He's not only angry, he's resentful, and not just because his wife is gone. His whole take on life was thrown on its ear. He and I may have arrived at the same destination, but I assure you, we took very different roads. Don't give up on him.”
Clarissa nodded gratefully. She was thankful for the insight, particularly from someone who could provide a neutral perspective.
“Now then,” Kaplinsky continued, finding Jon, “before I begin decorating my other foot, what say you show me the route you've plotted for tomorrow. I may be able to point you in safer directions based on my gathered intelligence.”
“That would be great,” Jon said. He held out his hand and hoisted Kaplinsky to his feet. Jon glanced at Kaplinsky's freshly painted toes. “That's a great color. Plum?”
“Vineyard Grape, though the name implies more purple than what's here.”
Clarissa enjoyed a quiet laugh while Jon led Kaplinsky into the kitchen. She had only known him less than a day and already she knew she was going to miss him. Part of her wanted to invite him to join their little group, but she didn't think he would come. Despite being alone—and occasionally lonely—he had found peace here. His ramshackle home was a place where he could be himself free from scrutiny and scorn. That same freedom would be harder to enjoy on the road, which was to say nothing of how it would suffer should they run afoul of people less inclined to accept unconventional life choices.
She looked over at Valentina, Rachel, and Evan. All were engaged in a low-key discussion over what appeared to be conflicting opinions relating to a Cosmopolitan quiz. Valentina found Clarissa staring at her and smiled. Clarissa returned it.
She prepared to push herself off the sofa to see if either Cesare or Elenora needed any help in the kitchen when something caught her eye: a wallet sat on the cushion beside her. It didn't take Sherlock Holmes-like detective work to realize it belonged to Andrew. Even so, she opened it and took a peek inside.
As expected, she found no money, credit cards, or club memberships (what good were they now?). Instead, Andrew had filled each card slot with photographs of him and Olivia, but mostly of Olivia. He had cut the computer-printed pictures to fit the pockets.
Clarissa pulled out some of the shots. The miniature scenes were a near carbon copy of the ones that had hung on the walls of Andrew's home: Andrew and Olivia camping; Olivia at the beach; Andrew and Olivia sharing a bottle of wine over a white wicker table in front of a glorious sunset; Olivia reading a book on a porch, seemingly oblivious to the fact that someone photographed her.
Andrew's wallet was a portable tribute to his wife's memory. It probably meant more to him than anything else in the world. When he had cooled down, Clarissa vowed to return it to him. As she fitted the photos back into their respective places, a folded piece of paper tucked behind a picture of Olivia eating from a carton of Häagen-Dazs with a devilish, caught-in-the-act grin, drew her attention. Clarissa pulled out the thin paper and unfolded it.
Her hand rose absently to her mouth in sad surprise.
The ultrasound screen grab showed a fetus perhaps two months along, the characteristically monochrome image faithfully portraying every unborn child Clarissa had ever seen. A pronounced white crease divided the picture down the middle, the worn line no doubt a result of the countless times Andrew had viewed it. Clarissa couldn't tell if the baby was a boy or girl.
Hastily—but carefully—she reinserted the paper back into its pocket cradle, closed the wallet, then held it firmly on her lap with both hands. For now, she thought it a good idea just to sit there. Anything other than that might cause her to cry.
CHAPTER 40
Ashland, Massachusetts.
After months of aimless wandering, the group had finally stumbled upon legitimate information from what appeared to be a reliable source. They were heading to Ashland, a town that, at the time of the last census, boasted a population just north of 16,000 people. Just how much the Sound had reduced the population over the past few months was anybody's guess.
No one held any illusions. Just because Kaplinsky had pointed them in a direction didn't mean it was the direction. For all they knew, the address he provided could turn out to be a grocery store. Even if that turned out to be the case, it was better to have a goal than none at all, and simply having something in their sites raised everybody's morale tenfold.
Everybody, that was, except Andrew.
He had driven in relative silence since they departed Kaplinsky's home early that morning. He wasn't grumpy or mad, just distant. It was as if the conversation from the previous evening had settled over him like a thin film of existential residue, coating him in self-reflection and regret. That, or he just missed his wife.
Clarissa had waited for an opportune moment the previous evening to return his wallet to him after she discovered it. She knew Andrew would have preferred to get it back sooner than later, but no time seemed optimal. After the one-sided, testy conversation, she thought it wise to keep her distance. He needed some alone time, and she was more than happy to let him have it.
The morning turned out to be no good either. With Kaplinsky finger-pointing the way to Rosenstein, the group flew high with adrenaline. Everyone flitted about like butterflies in a spring garden, working together to gather belongings and pack the vehicles. They weren't in a hurry. They were just eager. Everyone wanted to get the ball rolling so they could arrive at the destination and learn once and for all if the hope they had carried with them over the past few months had been for naught.
Wind whistled through Rachel's cracked window. It was the only sound in the truck's cab and had been for the better part of twenty minutes. No one spoke. Clarissa figured it was as good a time as any to give Andrew some much-needed positivity.
“Hey, Andrew?”
His eyes darted from the road to her and back. “Yeah.”
“I found something of yours yesterday. Something I think you might like back.”
Clarissa held out the wallet to him. Andrew glanced at it, but it took a good two seconds for what his eyes saw to register in his brain. He took the wallet and turned it over in his hand, flipping it open and fingering the pictures inside. He gaped at Clarissa with an expression both confounded
and heartbreaking.
“Where did you get this?”
“On the sofa,” Clarissa said. “It must've fallen out of your pocket.”
Andrew checked the contents of the wallet again as if he couldn't believe it had been out of his care.
“And you waited until just now to give it back to me?”
Clarissa let her shoulders drop. “You didn't seem like you wanted to be bothered last night,” she replied, her voice tinged with irritation. “And this morning was so hectic, I just thought it was better to hold on to it until things calmed so I could explain how I came by it. But you're welcome.”
She crossed her arms and looked out the window. She could see Andrew from her peripheral vision. He was formulating a follow-up comment, his head swiveling from the road to her with the same loaded intent a parent would show a child after learning she had skipped school. But whatever words had queued in his throat, he swallowed them back. Instead, Andrew pocketed the wallet, gripped the steering wheel with both hands, and said, “Thank you.” Clarissa wouldn't qualify it as a breakthrough, but she would take it just the same.
That pesky silence again.
“So, what do you think's waiting for us in Ashland?”
Andrew glimpsed her before replying. “I haven't the first clue. But like everyone else, I hope it's answers.”
“Yeah. Although...”
“Although what?”
“I don't know. It just seems weird.”
Rachel lurched forward into Clarissa's line of sight from the back seat.
“What seems weird?” she said.
“I'm not sure,” Clarissa said. “It's just...the more I think about the message Jon and I heard, the more something seems off.”
Andrew scrutinized her. “Off how?”
“Well, the man in the message said that they think they know what's going on and that anyone who could come to Ashland should.”
Rachel frowned. “Yeah. And?”
“What for? Why are they recruiting folks if they only think they know?”
“Maybe they found a cure and they're inoculating people,” Rachel said with a shrug. “You know, like a flu shot. But maybe they're not sure if it's totally effective. Could be the people at Rosenstein made something they just think will work, but they haven't had the chance to try it on enough test subjects yet to know for sure.”
“Test subjects?” Clarissa responded through a mild grimace. “That doesn't fill me with a whole lot of confidence.”
“Not only that,” Andrew added, “if even a fraction of what Kaplinsky told us about Rosenstein fudging with the space-time fabric and conscious planes of existence were true, I'd have a hard time accepting that it could be altered with a single shot. But what the hell do I know. This is uncharted waters for me.”
Clarissa looked past Rachel to Valentina in the back seat. She hadn't said a word since she crawled into the truck, and every time Clarissa sneaked a glance at her, Valentina only held herself and stared out the window, watching the passing scenery with wide, fluttering eyes. Her leg jackhammered a kick drum rhythm, and her fingers teased a reddened area of flesh on her arm.
Great, Clarissa thought, she's on something again.
“So, Val,” she said, “what do you think we're going to find?”
Valentina waited so long to acknowledge her, Clarissa thought she would have to repeat herself. But after a prolonged pause, Valentina snapped her head toward Clarissa suddenly.
“What? What's that?”
“I said, what do you think we're going to find once we reach Rosenstein? You think we'll finally get some answers?”
Valentina's face twitched and spasmed. She considered Clarissa's question with skittish awareness, and in that moment of hesitation, Clarissa realized just how taxed her friend looked. The area around her eyes had become dark circles of fatigue. Her once full face now appeared gaunt, the skin having taken on an unhealthy pallor. She hunched more now too, her posture a far cry from the shamelessly confident person who used to stride into a room and own it, chin up, chest out, as if everything and everyone were there for her.
Granted, no one looked the way they did three months ago. Clarissa had watched her appearance suffer a decline as a result of fewer showers, no makeup, and a lack of skin-enriching moisturizers. But those were cosmetic wants, not survivalist needs. She still ate regularly and well and had probably drunk more water in the past few months than she had over the entire previous year. Though she may not reflect it on the outside, all things considered, she felt pretty good.
How Valentina looked, on the other hand, was a direct result of what she actively did to herself. More than her physical depletion, Clarissa worried what toll her mind paid. Had the onslaught of chemicals she pumped into her body mentally corrupted her? Was her erratic behavior temporary, or had she inflicted so much damage that she had reached the point of no return? Clarissa shuddered when she considered the possible ramifications.
“Rosenstein?” Valentina said finally, the corners of her mouth fluttering nervously. “I...I don't know. What does it matter?”
“What does it matter? It matters a lot, don't you think? To hopefully learn what's been happening? To see if someone's figured out how to deal with the disappearances, to avoid becoming one of them? Now that we may have learned where the place is, we could be entering a turning point.”
Valentina fluctuated between tenuous smiles and uncontrollable tics. She didn't seem to know what to do with herself; her body appeared out of sync with her mind.
Clarissa turned nearly sideways to look at her friend.
“Val, what's going on? Are you all right? Talk to me. Is something wrong? I'm really starting to worry about you.”
Valentina giggled deliriously, exposing teeth that hadn't met a toothbrush in quite awhile.
“Is something wrong? Is something...?” She tittered some more but left her sentence hanging. She returned to gazing out the window and said nothing more on the subject.
Instead of speaking to her, Clarissa needed only exchange worrisome glances with Rachel. The writing was on the wall: Valentina was on a downward spiral, and it was one from which she may never recover. Unless something shifted drastically, unless they could learn some truths at Rosenstein that tipped the scales in favor of humanity, Clarissa feared she might lose her longtime friend forever.
CHAPTER 41
Kaplinsky couldn't decide between the sunburst yellow apron dress or the fiesta paisley jumper. Both were airy and comfortable, the colors for each a perfect match for his upswing mood.
He hadn't been able to stop thinking about the past twenty-four hours and what a delight it had been to interact with people again. He'd forgotten how great it felt to strike up a conversation and engage in topics that had nothing to do with survival or the Sound. Sure, his initial interaction with Clarissa, Andrew, et al., had started off with hostility and no small amount of suspicion, but once the first vestiges of trust seeped into their relationship, the floodgates opened.
For a brief moment of lunacy, he had considered asking if he could join them. Good company was not only hard to find, it was damn near impossible. But joining up with Clarissa and her friends would have never worked out. Though they seemed accepting, he feared his quirks and idiosyncrasies would have eventually gotten on everyone's nerves.
Besides, he had already established a space for himself. A place where he could be free to do as he pleased unencumbered by the threat of ridicule or violence. He could not so easily attain that same independence were he to hit the open road, which had become a playground of intolerance and cruelty. Folks like him didn't fare too well when decency and compassion no longer held meaning.
Which is why he chose to stay.
The apron dress. Definitely the apron dress.
Yellow was the right choice. Fall was just around the corner. Temperatures had already begun to dip into the fifties at night, which meant there weren't many days left to enjoy above-the-knee garments comfortably. He
needed to make the remaining warm-weather days count.
Slipping the paisley top back onto its hanger, he noticed a rolled sleeping bag beside a door in the hallway. He hung the garment in the closet then picked up the bag, which was orange and cloud soft. He recalled Evan had toted around something similar the previous evening.
“Must've forgotten it in all the activity this morning,” he said aloud. Talking to himself had become standard operating procedure over the past year, but even he recognized how cavernous his voice sounded now that the house was empty again.
As if on cue, engines rumbled in the distance and got louder.
Kaplinsky searched the air then smiled. “Well, that didn't take long.”
The group had departed only a half hour ago, so at least they hadn't lost much time coming back to reclaim their misplaced item. Kaplinsky reasoned that someone must have done inventory en route and discovered the bag was missing.
He started down the stairs.
“Better you guys found out now rather than two hours down the road,” he said aloud. “Otherwise, Evan would've been up shit creek.”
He reached the bottom and made his way to the front door, traversing the room he had dressed to appear ransacked. He kicked a crushed can gleefully out of the way. The visit would be brief, but he'd be lying if he said seeing everyone again didn't lift his spirits. With any luck, he'd be able to persuade the group to stay for a shot of coffee and a slice of bread and honey. He didn't know anyone who turned down an offer of free food these days.
He glimpsed the first vehicle through the window, as it emerged out of the forest. Smiling to himself, he threw open the door, stepped onto the porch, and held the sleeping bag aloft, as if to say, Did you forget something?
But his enthusiastic smile waned when he realized that not only was the vehicle approaching his house not one of the two driven by his new friends, it was the first in a line of three others. The lead vehicle, a black SUV of some sort, was followed by a Range Rover, a Silverado, and a Jeep, whose roll cage had a machine gun mounted atop it. A scowling man in aviator goggles glared at him from over the top of the barrel.