The 14th Day

by K. C. Frederick

  How could she possibly have explained to Vaniok how things have turned out between her and Jory, how could she explain it to herself? Not so long ago the two of them stood together in this garden, a dazzle of spring blossoms around them: pink, white, coral and lavender, and she read aloud to him from the tags that identified trees and shrubs from distant places. She and Jory were as mysterious to each other then as those plants were. She acknowledges it to herself: what was mysterious between them has become habitual. That’s a hard way to put it but she’s determined to be honest. What was it that brought them together? Was it just curiosity on her part, the challenge of interesting a stranger from the capital? “You’re always experimenting,” Stipa told her once. “I hope you realize that that dooms you to a good deal of failure.” Yes, she told him, she knew that; but simply accepting what she was given also doomed her to failure. He laughed softly and smiled his crooked smile. “I hope your guinea pigs feel the same way,” he said.

  What’s happened between her and Jory is nobody’s fault, it’s just that they’re two different people. From the moment she saw him, his intensity, his steadfastness, intrigued and challenged her. Before they’d ever touched she sensed something hard, coiled inside him: even in the moments of relaxation he permitted himself she was aware of a compass needle pointing steadily in one direction, which was so unlike her own way of operating. How could she help being attracted by that fixity? Maybe for a time she let herself be pulled in that direction, more likely she believed she’d make the needle point elsewhere. It’s possible that both of them willingly accepted certain illusions. She remembers talking to Vaniok about him shortly after he’d arrived. Didn’t she compare him to the farmer in the seashell in the old story? In the end she has to admit she wasn’t able to pull Jory out of the depths into which he’s always been able to retreat.

  Or is it only that each of us was greedy for the story of the other’s life and now we have as much as the other will give?

  Ila strides along the garden paths quickly, not stopping to look. She knows another change is already happening, one that has nothing to do with Jory. She’s started to feel restless again. When she talked to him about the desert recently she was surprised by how much the idea moved her: the clear, dry air, open spaces—it was what she’d glimpsed in the corner of the picture Zita had shown her of her sister’s house. When she told him what she’d heard about how dry and smooth your fingers became so that it felt as if you had no fingerprints, he said it sounded like a good place for criminals. Yes, she’d thought, excited, criminals and fugitives. Maybe I can’t be anything else but a fugitive. When I was under the hay I heard their voices calling to each other, I heard the sound of their boots approaching. The hay tickled my nose, the voices were louder, the boots struck the floor close by. They stopped for a moment and I could hear one of the men breathing. I was certain I’d be dead in seconds. And when I was allowed to live, what else could I be but a fugitive? The day she arrived in this town she knew she couldn’t stay here forever. She was waiting for things to happen.

  And things are happening. Just a few days ago when Zita phoned, Ila was thinking about Miss Lorraine, she was feeling the same kind of restlessness that had driven her to the woman’s door—it was one of those wonderful connections. From her friend’s first words she knew it was no coincidence she’d called to tell her about the real estate course that’s beginning soon. Zita was enthusiastic: her sister was planning to expand her business, she said, she’d talked to Zita about joining her. Why didn’t Ila take the course with her, and maybe think about moving west? She wouldn’t have to make any commitment right away. Just think about it, Zita said. And though she realizes now that she’d already made her decision, Ila has thought about it, she’s decided she’s going to take the course, as she told Vaniok, and now that she’s spoken to him about it, she knows she wants to go west.

  She isn’t worried about how she’ll survive after Jory and she now feels surprisingly confident about Vaniok’s capacity to deal with whatever happens to him. But what her cousin told her about Jory and his fellow worker disturbs her. She remembers seeing him after the riot with the cut on his head: her first thought was that he’d done the same thing he did in the cold country. From the beginning one of the things she found attractive about him was the air of danger he brought with him. Quiet and reserved as he is, he seems to seek it out as if it’s his due—he never would have shown up here if he hadn’t got into trouble somewhere else. But she’s afraid of what might happen if he persists in his quarrel at work.

  She’s going to have to tell Jory about that real estate course soon, about her plans for the future. And then it will be over between them. Years from now, looking back, Jory will see that this was the inevitable conclusion of their time together; very likely he already senses as much now. Still, there’s no need for Ila to tell him anything just yet, no need to rush things. After all, she hasn’t even made her commitment to Zita, there’s still time. What’s important is to make the most of what time they have left.

  She stops before a planting of cacti: spiked green tongues lying flat on a clearing of bare ground. In her mind she tries to erase the lush foliage around her, to set the cacti among empty spaces that extend to the horizon; but she can’t perform this mental trick. I’ll see what it’s really like, she tells herself. I’ll see.

  It’s Saturday morning and Vaniok is in the supermarket. He isn’t pushing a cart or carrying a basket as he strolls past counters where plump cakes and shiny hams behind the glass look like images of themselves in the shadowless light; he’s just enjoying the surroundings: bright colors, buzz of shoppers, carts turning purposefully down ordered aisles. He delights in the mounds of dusty brown potatoes and bright tapered yams that might have been hauled up only minutes ago from under the earth. Lingering near bins of pungent onions, red, yellow and white, he traces with his eyes the smooth curving shape of an eggplant. A few steps away in the fruit section he picks up a grapefruit and runs its rippled skin against his hand, then puts it down carefully. It pleases him to think he didn’t come here to buy anything but he could if he wanted to. Moments later he’s standing before glistening fish, open-eyed and solemn, lying on beds of white ice. There are pink curled fingers of shrimp as well as piles of crayfish, fresh and cooked, and blue-gray crabs with pincered arms extended. He’s drawn to the scene. Why? What is it? There’s some connection to the Deep Lakes. “Can I help you?” the smiling man behind the counter asks, a knife in his hand. Vaniok shakes his head and moves on.

  He awakened this morning from a dreamless sleep, full of energy and expectation. He washed the dishes, swept the kitchen floor, made his bed, even cleaned his bathroom, whistling as he pushed the vinegar-soaked newspaper across the cabinet mirror in squeaky circles. The day was sunny and bright and from time to time he looked out the window at the thinly wooded landscape of young pines dipping toward a shallow creek, then rising again towards the buildings of another apartment complex beside the road leading into town. A quarter mile away cars moved soundlessly along the curving white sweep of the highway that circles the village. He’s looked at this view countless times but today it occurred to him that what he saw had the orderliness of a fingerprint: he knew where the highway would take those cars, he knew where the road that ran under the highway led, he knew what he’d see if he walked in any direction. Yes, he thought, I’m not a stranger here.

  He’s buoyed by the memory as he walks away from the seafood section. No, he says to himself, I don’t want any fish. He hears himself saying it to Ila: “He asked me if I wanted anything but I didn’t come to buy, just to look. I was a tourist.” Ila would smile, shake her head. “Vaniok, Vaniok,” she’d say. But that’s the strange thing, he’d want to tell her, I felt like a tourist and at the same time I knew I belonged here.

  Still imagining a conversation with Ila, he recognizes again that she’ll very likely be leaving some day, possibly soon. He doesn’t like to contemplate that prospect. Ever since
she told him her plans he’s tried to resign himself to her departure but the thought still brings a quick spasm of sorrow. Ila gone. His instinct is to blame Jory though he knows his cousin better than that: she does what she wants to do. As his eyes pass over innumerable cuts of packaged meat, Vaniok reminds himself that Ila hasn’t left yet; there’s no point in dwelling on that sorrow until it happens. He’d rather think about Jory. Jory is no longer a threat, the shadow-stealer is going to have a hard enough time holding on to his own shadow. From the man’s own behavior, from what Ila has told Vaniok, it’s clear things aren’t going well between the two of them. God knows what will happen when she tells him about her plans for the future. Maybe she’s already let him know. Vaniok recognizes how unusual this is: he’s thinking about Jory and he isn’t depressed, he doesn’t feel threatened. I wouldn’t want to be that man, he thinks, remembering his creased trousers in their first meeting, the thickness that came into his voice as he closed the jar of soil from the homeland.

  And Mr. Jory had better be careful because it isn’t only love problems that are going to bother him. There’s Carl, too. Vaniok feels a rush of involuntary excitement at the thought of the danger awaiting his countryman from this quarter. Yet the satisfaction he allows himself to feel is immediately mixed with shame. No, he reminds himself: Carl is hunting Jory down on his own, I’m not his accomplice. Vaniok didn’t plant the dislike of Jory in Carl’s mind—the two were enemies from the moment they met and of course Jory has done little to make himself likable. I’m not guilty of anything, he protests, but just thinking about the conversation at the Barn makes him uneasy. He’s certain he didn’t actually say anything against Jory; still, just the act of listening to Carl might have been encouragement enough. Whatever the degree of his complicity, there’s the separate question of whether he ought to let Jory know what his fellow worker told him. After all, the man did say he might get someone to investigate Jory. Is Vaniok’s silence a sin of omission? But then, telling Jory about something that might have just been empty bragging could make things worse; it might give Carl’s story more weight than it deserves, it could even worsen the conflict between the two men. Vaniok shakes his head. Seconds after congratulating himself on being able to think about Jory calmly, he’s found himself snared once more in a moral tangle involving his countryman.

  Yet even in the midst of these speculations, he’s registering something else out of the corner of his eye: he knows the woman coming down the aisle pushing a loaded shopping cart, though he can’t say how he knows her. Pretending to be interested in the snacks before him, he steals a glance at the thin dark-haired woman in her thirties who’s wearing jeans and a purple tee-shirt, which is oddly smudged with dirt. He takes a bag of mixed nuts off the rack and examines it with great care while he tries to remember where he’s seen her before. At last it comes to him: she’s the woman who works in the Music Library, the one who gave him coffee. It’s her clothes that made her unfamiliar, but now that he’s made the connection, Vaniok is excited at the prospect of a meeting. Out of the corner of his eye he watches her—her arms seem poignantly thin as she loads the cart with potato chips and nachos—and he glimpses the shadowed eyes that confirm the identification. Why does she go shopping in dirty clothes, he wonders? Is she poor? He feels a wave of compassion for the woman. At the same time he remembers exactly what it felt like to be in the basement of the library with its smell of books, the uneven floor, the muted light; he remembers the volume on church music written in the language of the homeland. Quick, he urges himself, think of something to say, and he’s already turning toward her when a man carrying a couple of six packs of soda pop steps beside her—incredibly, it’s someone else Vaniok knows though he can’t place the stranger: he doesn’t work at the library, Vaniok is sure. The woman turns toward the youngish, wide, soft man who’s also clad in dirty jeans and a T-shirt and she laughs at something he says. Her husband, Vaniok thinks, noting all the snacks they’re buying. The man puts the soft drink in the cart and takes it from her.

  Vaniok turns back toward the counter full of brightly-packaged snacks and carefully replaces the bag of nuts. His breast is filled with rage toward this masculine intruder, he marvels at how quickly the rush of excitement has caved in on itself. He wants to get out of here; at the same time he’s curious about the man: where has he seen him? Still turned away from the couple, he tries to remember that face. In spite of his anger toward the newcomer Vaniok has a sense that in their previous encounter he found the man likable. He strains to make the connection but he isn’t successful. More immediately, though, he has to get out of here because the two of them are coming toward him, engaged in apparently hilarious conversation. Who is that man, Vaniok keeps asking himself, and how do I know him? He turns to leave the aisle before they can come abreast of him but he hasn’t taken two steps before he hears the man call after him, “Wait.” The voice too is familiar.

  Vaniok stiffens: though there’s no threat in the voice he feels accused. His impulse is to keep moving, pretend he didn’t hear the call, but he’s done nothing wrong, he reminds himself, he has a right to be here. He stops and slowly turns to see the couple advancing toward him. There’s a welcoming smile on the man’s face. The woman too seems to have recognized him with delighted surprise.

  “I’m sorry,” the stranger says, “I can’t remember your name. I’m Tom, Father Tom.” He gives a last name that Vaniok immediately forgets. “We met once before when I took a spill on my bike.”

  “Yes, yes,” Vaniok smiles back, absurdly enthusiastic, as if he’s just recognized the priest as an old friend. He’s nodding as if answering a dozen questions, bowing toward both of them, dancing in place. He tells the man his name, recalling with pleasure that encounter that seems to have taken place years ago. But what is the priest doing with this woman?

  “I’d like you to meet Ellen Bird,” the priest gestures toward the woman, who’s holding her elbows as if to protect them from the cold.

  “We’ve already met,” she says with a smile, leaning a little in his direction. “Vaniok helped us out at the library when we had a flooding problem.” It pleases him that she says his name.

  “Sounds like just the kind of man we could use on our project,” the priest says. He motions toward the cart filled with snacks and drinks. “We’re part of a group that builds houses for people who can’t afford houses of their own.” He laughs. “That’s why we look like we’ve just climbed out of a ditch.” He gestures toward the woman. “Ellen is a real carpenter but I think they sent us out to get snacks to keep me from hammering my thumb too many times.”

  The woman shakes her head and gives Vaniok a look. “Don’t believe half of what he says. Tom’s a real workhorse.” In the library, though she was friendly, she seemed reserved and efficient; here, gesturing with her thin arms, she’s more lively, even playful. Vaniok smiles in appreciation.

  The priest shrugs off the compliment and once again Vaniok remembers something from their previous encounter: the sense that under his comic banter the man is capable of being serious, someone you can trust. “I grew up as a Catholic,” he finds himself volunteering, “but I haven’t been to church in a while.”

  The priest laughs. “I won’t tell.” Then he says more quietly, “Nobody’s keeping score. Anyway, I’ll bet you know how to use tools.”

  Vaniok shrugs but the woman nods for him.

  “You ought to come by the Center,” the priest says. “We could use you. Couldn’t we, Ellen?”

  “For sure,” she says encouragingly.

  Again Vaniok is nodding. He’s actually been asked to join their project; the future seems rich, boundless. He smiles at his new friends. He can’t explain what prompted him to volunteer that information about his religious past—this isn’t a confessional, after all, but a supermarket. He isn’t sorry he said it, though. He knows he wanted to make a connection with these two. He’s convinced too that Ellen Bird with her thin arms and shadowed eyes likes him. “Ye
s,” he says emphatically, “I would be interested.”

  “You could come by the Music Library too,” Father Tom says. “Ellen can give you the details.” He and the woman exchange a mysterious look though by now Vaniok has come to feel that the priest is on his side. Already he’s decided to get in touch with him early next week. And certainly he’ll drop by the library.

  “We’ve got to be getting back,” the priest says, “or they’ll think we’ve absconded with the funds. But I really hope we’ll be seeing you.” Ellen Bird nods her agreement.

  “Yes,” he says. “You will.”

  After they leave he stays in the snack aisle for a moment, allowing them to make their way to the cashier—he doesn’t want to overstay his welcome. Abstractly he takes a bag of potato chips from the counter and runs his hands along the smooth cellophane wrapping, then bunches it up and listens to the crinkling sounds it makes. He feels connected, he’s part of this place, he knows people here.

  Holding the bag of potato chips, he has a sudden thought of Jory, who’s going to lose Ila and is possibly being hunted by Carl. I wouldn’t want to be him, Vaniok thinks again. This time, though, he feels sympathy for the man’s misfortune. The thought strikes him that the priest might be able to help his countryman. His friend, the priest.

  Outside the supermarket he breathes in the already warm mid-morning air. The blue sky is clear and sharp with only a few flat, pale clouds pasted on the horizon, though he can foresee the growing heat, the haze, the thickening clouds and evening thunderstorms that have become familiar to him. Soon the long, hot days will be upon the town. He starts out toward his apartment by way of an old neighborhood set among thick, heavy trees, already darkly green with the ripeness of summer. The small, low houses with metal roofs and a few feet of shady porch were built in the last century for the mill workers, and some of them are hardly bigger than trailers. Still, all of them are marked by signs of individual lives: porch furniture of every variety, toys on the lawn, plaster figures of smiling animals and angels, plants in brightly colored pots and even a painting on cloth give each of them a distinctness. As he passes one of the houses an old black man sitting in a chair on his porch lifts his head. In spite of the warmth he’s wearing an overcoat and a red woolen hat, his face seems to be covered by a fine dusting of flour. Vaniok nods to him and the man is still for a moment, then returns the greeting, lifting his hand slowly as if summoning a figure in his dream. Vaniok is warmed by the gesture. Is the man dreaming of home, he wonders, and if so, where am I in that dream?