Lukewarm washrags on Conrad’s arms and chest and legs. A cooler one on his forehead if he was sweating. An extra blanket if he was shivering—but only a light one. You didn’t want to kill the fever, Florence had always said. The fever was your friend.
Probably the most important thing was sitting next to the person so they didn’t have to be alone. It didn’t matter if they were delirious and didn’t know you were there, or thought you were someone else. Sometimes just putting your hand over theirs made the sick person feel calmer. It was calming for Edgar, as well. He was afraid to be alone. Now more than ever.
When they’d first returned to the cabin after the horrible night in Ferryfield, Edgar had cried for two whole days. He’d run into the woods—not to escape, but to scream without disturbing Conrad. Jack sometimes followed the boy, and they howled together.
But then Conrad had gotten sick. After that, there’d been no time for tears.
The boy had gone through the medicine cabinets. There were some old prescriptions, but none of them seemed right. There was a bottle of Elavil with Conrad’s name on it, but Edgar knew from television commercials that such pills weren’t for infections or fever. Another bottle contained something called Ritalin—but that had Kevin’s name on it. Aspirin had been Edgar’s only option.
In the first-aid kit from the truck, he’d found half a tube of antibacterial cream and a pack of sterile bandages. Supplies had dwindled quickly, though—and when the bandages and surgical tape were gone, Edgar had had to use paper towels held down with Scotch tape. The flimsy tape had barely stuck to Conrad’s skin. Edgar ended up cutting an old sheet into strips, and then tying the strips around Conrad’s chest to keep the paper towels in place. It had been a complicated setup, reminding Edgar of a picture book from his old bedroom. Gulliver tied down by the Lilliputians.
One morning, toward the end of January, Edgar noticed a red line emanating from the wound. Each day the line grew a little longer, closer to Conrad’s heart. When it was nearly four inches long, and Conrad’s fever at its worst, Edgar had insisted that the man get up and go to a doctor. When he refused, the boy took action. He’d had no choice but to make the man suffer through something he himself had suffered through more than once during his own bouts of illness.
From the bottom of the kitchen pantry, he’d taken the little wire basket of garlic—and every day, for nearly two weeks, he’d chopped up a large clove and boiled it in a little water, which he then made Conrad drink. When the antibacterial cream had run out, Edgar mashed up more garlic and put the paste directly onto the wound. Florence had always mixed it with honey, but there was only sugar at the cabin. Edgar even wrapped two cloves of garlic in a bit of tissue, and then put them in the man’s ears while he was sleeping. Florence had done that, too.
Sometimes it seemed that Conrad wanted to be sick—or even worse. But why would a person want that, especially if it meant having to leave behind people you loved? It was a stupid idea—and Edgar wasn’t going to let Conrad be stupid. With lukewarm rags and aspirin, hot tea and garlic, he’d managed to save Conrad; the wound had closed, the fever had vanished.
It was intolerable to Edgar that Conrad was making himself sick a second time, by not eating. Sometimes Edgar wanted to slap him, to wake him up. A few months before, in a grove of yellow aspens, Conrad had told Edgar that he loved him, and Edgar had told Conrad that he wasn’t allowed to say that. Now, in winter, with snow padding the roof of the cabin, Edgar hoped Conrad would say it again.
But he barely spoke.
“I’m not angry anymore,” Edgar would tell him.
He had no time to be angry. It was a lot of work taking care of someone who was ill.
The hours passed quickly, though. And the work took your mind off other things—such as your own life. Edgar was pretty sure he never again wanted to think about the baby inside his mother, the one she’d made with the butcher. The baby that would grow up in Edgar’s old room and look at its face in Edgar’s mirror. The baby that, one day, would pull Gulliver’s Travels from Edgar’s bookshelf and think it was just some made-up story.
It was better to think about Conrad.
Plus, there was a lot to do at the cabin—and only one person strong enough to do it. Cleaning and cooking and laundry, and of course he was responsible for Jack. The fish, too. Twice a day he made a fire. The snow had not let up—six storms since the blizzard in December—and Edgar often needed to clear a path to the woodpile. By evening he was exhausted and would fall into a sleep so deep that his unhappy dreams stayed in the underworld, and had little effect on his waking life.
* * *
When he carried the tray into the bedroom, Conrad turned away. His eyes were red.
“I’ll drive you back soon,” he mumbled—and then he said something that sounded like mistake.
Edgar set the tray on the bedside table. “I have crackers.”
“No, thank you, Edgar.” Conrad was very polite lately, as if he and Edgar had just met. It made the boy sad.
He held out the glass of water.
But the man shook his head and pointed weakly to the left. “In the desk. I want you to get something.”
“Just have a little,” persisted Edgar.
Conrad pulled the boy’s hand to his mouth.
Edgar shifted nervously. “A cracker would be better.”
He didn’t mean it to be funny, but Conrad smiled. The light from the parted curtains fell like a plank across the bed. Conrad was so skinny he looked unreal, like a cartoon.
Edgar could smell the peanut butter, the strawberry jam. He felt hungry.
It wasn’t right, though, to take Conrad’s food—and besides, Edgar was trying not to eat too much. Not that he ever did—but lately he’d been trying to eat even less, since there wasn’t a great deal left. For several weeks now, there’d been no fresh fruit or vegetables. In the pantry was still some canned stuff; cookies and crackers; two boxes of cereal—cornflakes that, without milk, tasted like sawdust. There was peanut butter and sugar cubes, a half jar of fish flakes, a week’s worth of kibble for Jack.
Edgar reached for the bottle of aspirin and shook one out.
Conrad waved it away. “I want to give you something,” he said, pointing toward the desk. “Top drawer.”
Edgar got up and opened it. The first thing he saw was the cell phone.
“I don’t need it,” he said quickly, his voice rising in anger.
Conrad gestured impatiently. “Under the notebook.”
Edgar looked, and saw the key.
“Everything you need,” Conrad mumbled, closing his eyes. “Won’t be long.”
* * *
It was the key to the shed.
Edgar had never been inside. The only thing he knew about the little building beside the woodpile was that it was where Conrad had taken the deer after he’d killed it.
Edgar looked out his bedroom window. Maybe he should have taken the phone, too.
But all that was over, wasn’t it? He lived in the Pinelands now; it was no longer Mars. He knelt on the floor, and from the rot-hole in the corner he retrieved the diamond. He laid it on his bed, beside the key. He added the Virgin’s head—and then the photo of his father, the one he’d brought with him when he’d first come away with Conrad.
The key was worn in spots, and shiny—not so different from the color of the floating rectangle he sometimes dreamed about. Maybe the rectangle had something to do with his father. Edgar placed Frank’s photo on the nightstand as he slipped under the covers. It seemed that one’s own life could be a secret. There was a plan beyond what you could understand.
Maybe that’s why the future was important. To figure things out.
Edgar was sad beyond measure, and frightened—but, unlike Conrad, he would not let go. He was bound to this world by a chain of wonder, each link an unanswered question that surely only a long life would be able to undo. Always one had to ask: What happens next?
Maybe the answer would come
in a dream. Mr. Levinson had once said something about Einstein figuring out relativity after dreaming about cows.
Was it cows?
Or was it a snake?
Edgar drifted off, feeling very confused.
March
56
Expecting
The Gospel Shoppe looked from the outside as if it sold fudge. A canvas awning of blue and white stripes fluttered over a large window on which the store’s name was painted in golden curlicues. Hanging from the door, below a lace valence, was a heart that chimed as Lucy entered.
The proprietress, dressed like an usher, looked shocked to have a customer. When Lucy asked for a Saint Christopher medal, the woman presented six options, including one rimmed with tiny misshapen diamonds, like a margarita glass dipped in salt. Lucy made a show of examining it before choosing one costing $6.99, made of nickel. Then, feeling guilty, she grabbed a small bag of Communion wafers from a rack beside the register. “I’ll take these, too.”
“They’re not consecrated,” the woman said.
“Good to know,” said Lucy.
She hung the tiny medal from her rearview mirror, to replace the one she’d lost outside Slaphappy’s, the night she’d been attacked in the parking lot. The same night she’d ended up in the butcher’s bathtub and had let his sperm enter her body.
As she drove, she was annoyed by the preponderance of green lights—the signals utterly indifferent to the trepidation she felt about her destination. She looked at Saint Christopher, an old man bent over a walking stick who somehow managed to carry that child on his back. She touched the medal, set it swinging. Ever since she’d slapped the psychic’s face, Lucy had felt a little less frightened; often had the odd sense that she was working in collaboration with Florence.
On the earthly plain, she still had the support of the butcher. He was doing a lot—though sometimes he had funny ideas about what Lucy might need. Now and then he’d bring home some ridiculous book or DVD. The latest offering was a three-part series entitled Fireheart: Overcoming Emotional Trauma. It came with a workbook in which Lucy was supposed to write down her thoughts and feelings. Do you remember the first time you experienced fury as a child? What caused you to feel that way? After these questions, the workbook offered a single blank page. As if that would be enough room! Lucy could write a fucking novel.
She left the page blank. Rather than write about things, she preferred to deal with her problems head-on.
That’s what she felt she was doing now, as she parked the car outside her father’s house. Somehow, this place where she’d been hurt as a child seemed inseparable from what was happening with Edgar.
Ms. Mann and the police had come up with nothing, after nearly six months. Just a few weeks ago, three missing boys had been found in Mississippi, all in the same house—all alive. Lucy asked Mann if the police might be encouraged to search the house again, reminding the detective that Edgar was tiny and had a habit of jamming himself into tight spaces. Ms. Mann didn’t rise to the occasion, though—claiming blandly that the authorities in Mississippi had surely done a thorough job.
A boy who’d been bullying Edgar had finally been identified. He’d cried through most of his interview, claiming that he, in turn, had been roughed up by a man he assumed was Edgar’s father. When Ms. Mann asked Lucy if she was sure Frank was dead, Lucy said she was no longer sure of anything. Ultimately, it was the detective’s opinion that the man who’d assisted Edgar was just an overzealous Good Samaritan. Neither he nor the bully was deemed worthy of further investigation.
Back in December, the break-in at 21 Cressida Drive and the discovery of the shotgun shell had seemed promising. Especially in light of the fact that the shell was found in the same parking lot where Edgar’s clothes had been discovered right after he’d disappeared. Plus, there were two sets of partial fingerprints on the cartridge—one of them small enough to be a child’s. Unfortunately the prints, compromised by weather, were deemed illegible. The shell itself was of a generic type that could be used in any number of 20-gauge shotguns—and since the shell was unfired, there were no markings capable of connecting it to any specific gun.
Still, Lucy couldn’t understand why every person in New Jersey with a 20-gauge shotgun wasn’t being investigated. Mann replied, again blandly, as if she were losing interest, that it was a pretty standard hunting firearm—the list would be a mile long.
But a mile didn’t seem very long to Lucy. “Where do people hunt?” she’d asked the butcher. He’d told her that, as a kid, his father had taken him up to the Kittatinnies or the Catskills. But he had cousins who hunted up at Ramapo, and an uncle who liked to go south to the Pine Barrens or around Fort Dix. When Lucy started to write down the locations in her notebook, the butcher gently stopped her pen, explaining that those were only a few of the hundreds of places folks hunted in New Jersey—and there were hundreds more where people hunted illegally.
Her father had been a hunter. Though it wasn’t animals he’d been after. He’d preferred his wife or daughter. As Lucy sat in the car, munching nervously on Communion wafers, she wondered if he’d already be drunk. It was nearly lunchtime. They tasted like shit, the wafers, like glue. She opened the door and spit a mouthful beside the curb.
As she walked down the flagstone path, she buttoned up Florence’s coat—a gnarly bear of a thing with tremendous faux-fur lapels. It had become a sort of armor, useful as much for protecting herself as for intimidating others.
Lucy paused before ringing the bell, thinking, He’ll have time to prepare, time to hide things—though as to what these things might be she had only a vague sense. All she knew was that she needed to think strategically.
She moved her ungloved hand from the bell to the doorknob. It was cold as she turned it. The door opened easily, as if in a dream.
Everything as she remembered it—but so exactly the same that the preservation seemed malicious. There was the little egg-shaped lamp on the foyer table. There was the green plank studded with yellow plastic coat hooks. The water stain on the ceiling like the outline of a cloud. And here—she was standing on it now—the pale blue entrance rug with its border of smashed daisies.
She passed through the hallway into the main part of the house. Again, its spiteful accordance with her memory made her freeze—each piece of furniture like a dog commanded to sic her.
When she took a deep breath to dispel her fear, she began to hear the clocks. There had always been too many of them in this house—the brief silence of one always filled by the tick of another nearby. A constant, overlapping argument about time—pointless because, sooner or later, all the clocks would arrive at the same conclusion. For those under their spell, as Lucy had been for the first seventeen years of her life, it was only a matter of waiting as, second by second, the little machines brought you closer to the things you dreaded most.
Finally, as if each sense wanted its own moment of tyranny, the experience of the house was suddenly its smell. Her mother in the kitchen, frying potatoes, boiling cabbage. A kind of nauseating hope filled Lucy.
Voices. A television from upstairs.
He was sitting in a chair in his bedroom, his back to the door. She could see the pill bottles and the framed photographs on the bureau. There was one of Edgar—but something wasn’t right about it.
“What is that?” she said to announce herself.
Walter Bubko, who could not see behind him, gasped and reached for his cane. He fell back into his chair as he tried to stand. It took him nearly thirty seconds to get up and turn sufficiently to see who was there.
He said his daughter’s name quietly.
He looked awful. When Lucy had seen him at Florence’s wake, it was after not seeing him for nearly fifteen years—and, though older, shakier, he’d looked essentially the same that day, with his greased-back black hair and his powerful little body stuffed into a brown suit. Now, several months later, half the stuffing it seemed had been knocked out of him; his skin looked singed. The
re were distressing black patches on his cheeks and on his forearms. His hair, without pomade, was thin and weeded with gray. Even his smell was different. Lucy could detect no alcohol, but rather a deeper, more pungent scent, swampy and rotten. He was clearly ill.
“Is everything okay?” he asked.
She responded to his absurd question by walking over to the bureau and picking up the strange photo of Edgar. She could see now that it wasn’t a real photograph—only the boy’s face cut from one of the flyers she’d put up around town. The black ink that described Edgar’s features had faded a bit.
“I meant to get in touch,” said her father.
She put down the framed photocopy. “These are meant to be outside—for people to see.”
The old man coughed for a bit—and then grunted, as if to silence the animals in his lungs. “You did a good job with the posters,” he said. “I saw them everywhere.”
He attempted to smile. Lucy watched his lips carefully. He’d always been a man of easy smiles, ferociously mean. He could have killed her as a child if she’d been weaker. She should have taught Edgar how to fight. Why hadn’t she?
For the boy’s whole life, she’d kept him away from this man. She’d told Edgar that her parents were dead, had made up stories about them. Just as she’d made up stories about Frank. A shell game, but it had worked. Her lies had protected the boy. She’d managed to keep the men out of his life.
Lucy glanced at the pill bottles. It made her sick that she wanted to ask her father if he was ill. She turned, looked around the room to see if she could spot the real bottle, the proof that nothing had changed.
“What are you looking for?”
She went to the closet where he used to keep them.
“What are you doing in there? Lucille—whatta you need? Come downstairs, I’ll make us some coffee.”
With her foot, she pushed aside some boxes at the back of the closet. She finally found it in the bottom drawer of the nightstand. Bourbon. Half a fifth. She poured the stuff into an empty glass and brought it to him.
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