David couldn’t even begin to formulate a sensible reply.
“Saw ya in the garden today,” Bill went on after a long hoist. “With her. With that girl.”
It took David a few seconds to realize that Bill meant Clair. The episode with Janice and Genevieve had pushed all thought of the morning’s encounter with her out of his head. “Yeah?” he said aloud.
“What’d she say to ya?” Bill’s eyes were as bright as his reddened forehead, and the reflected light from the TV made him appear slightly demented.
David gulped some more beer, attempting to sort through all that Clair had said. “I asked her why she knew so much. How she knew so much. She didn’t answer. Big surprise. Why?”
Bill leaned further toward him. David got a thick whiff of his breath, and it wasn’t good: fermented halitosis with an undercoating of decay. “When she took your hand. What’d she say to ya then? Was too soft for me to hear.”
“Mmm.” David tried not to dwell on the weirdness of Bill down on his knees, eavesdropping through a crack in the wooden fence as a first grade girl took hold of David’s hand to whisper bizarre prognostications into his ears. “Something about me knowing myself. That I would do so. Some day. Soon.”
Bill continued to gawk at him, his intense gaze turning by slow degrees more and more befuddled. “What?” he asked, a detonation of spittle going along for the ride. “What’s that s’posed to mean?”
David shrugged. “I don’t know. It was strange, even for Clair. But that was what she said: that I’d know myself.”
“Bah!” Bill’s hand flew up to bat at the air. “Bah! I jus’ think she’s crazy!” He sat back in his chair again, and David began to breathe once more with relief.
The can he had brought Bill was emptied, crushed, and discarded. The volume of the game was turned up. Bill’s eyes became glazed as he focused on the TV again, and David realized that he didn’t want to be here anymore.
He stood, and Johnson leapt up as well. “I gotta go call Genevieve,” he announced. “You want me to grab you another one before I head out?”
A grunt and a nodded head were his answer.
“All right.” David got Bill a fresh one, thumped his shoulder twice, and then turned toward him one last time before leaving. “You want anything else? A sandwich, maybe? I can bring one over for you; I haven’t made dinner yet, anyway.”
Bill didn’t even look at him. “Nah,” he uttered as he popped open the new can.
“Take care, Bill. Hope you get some sleep.” David stepped outside, and quietly closed the door behind him. And then he and Johnson walked through the darkened courtyard before returning to apartment 1F for the remainder of the evening.
Chapter Nineteen
It was Monday morning, normally the time for clear-eyed organization and planning for the coming week. This Monday morning, however, David was in a fog. He’d woken up late, and thus had had to take Johnson on his walk before breakfast. He hadn’t gone shopping for almost a week, so his first meal of the day was dry cereal with no milk or fruit. And Johnson wasn’t coming to Culpepper Mills with him today, because David worried that Detective Ormsby’s visit regarding his alibi for the previous Wednesday had ruffled more than a few feathers. The last thing he needed to do was to waltz in yet again with his dog, pester the staff with his usual arcane questions, and then discover that Johnson had shat on the already pissed off CEO’s carpet while David was away from his desk for a few minutes.
At least Genevieve’s animosity had downgraded from boil to simmer. David had finally texted her a bit after ten the night before, asking if they could have dinner again on Monday. At 11:45 his phone had lit up on the pillow beside him: “Fine. 7:00. You make the reservation.” It hadn’t woken him up; he had been unable to fall asleep until nearly two.
Johnson lay sulkily on the old couch after David told him he wouldn’t be coming. It was incredible how animals could act just like humans in their petty reactions to circumstances they didn’t like! But business was business, and David intuitively understood that he needed to toe the company line for the moment.
He closed and locked the apartment door behind him, and then rushed to catch the trolley that would hit Piston and Third in a few minutes. To walk to Culpepper Mills would only be fifteen minutes more, but he wanted to be inside the front doors before ten.
As the trolley slid north, David closed his eyes and attempted to compartmentalize the many rivers of silt muddying his thoughts. Clair, Janice and Genevieve, the primary branches. Bill, Heck and Ormsby, the tributaries dumping effluent into the system. Jess, Mrs. Rushen and Abby Lowell, bystanders on the banks whose roles were unclear, if roles they played at all in the drama.
And what about Todd, that perpetually invisible elephant in the room within David’s relationship with Genevieve? Didn’t he provide his own oozing, gurgling stream of negativity, weaving himself into so many conversations and wordless glances and recriminations?
But of course, the recriminations were mostly in David’s head, and knowing this fact only caused him to brew up even more recriminations regarding his utter lack of self-control.
He opened his eyes as Birch Avenue slid by. Should he go talk to Abby again? But what good could that do? She would merely repeat what she’d already told him, that he needed to give it more time, and allow Genevieve to work through her issues at her own speed, and in her own way.
Besides, David could already anticipate Abby’s disappointment in him if he broached the same subjects again. Especially if the two of them had discussed him on Sunday when Genevieve had visited.
Which, of course, they had.
So why couldn’t he navigate the course of his relationship with Genevieve without help? And why were the people from whom he sought aid always her friends?
But David knew the answer to the latter question: he had no friends of his own. And as for the former? He shook his head in resignation. He had no confidence in his ability to sustain a relationship, so why should he be surprised when one was unable to be sustained?
The trolley’s bell rang twice as it crossed Larch, and David stood, ready to exit at Willow. He could talk to Lydia, but that idea still bumped solidly into the fact that she worked for Genevieve, their friendship aside. As well, he couldn’t help but acknowledge to himself that not-so-ignorable truth that Lydia’s outrageous flirting catered mightily to his ego. Whether her attentions were in seriousness or not was quite another matter.
As he hopped onto the sidewalk and began taking brisk strides toward Fourth Street, his thoughts turned yet again to Clair. Clair of the shiny saddle shoes, and the strangely worded phrases, and the seeming inability to answer a single question with a straight answer. What was he to make of Clair?
The mullioned-glass doors of the Culpepper Mills offices loomed. It was time for David to get to work.
~*~*~*~*~
Two and a half hours later, David had slipped product details onto a score of web pages, built two more templates, and learned more about the inner workings of a warehousing floor operation than he’d ever desired to know. The knowledge did have some application to his chore, as he was the architect in charge of how orders would now be translated from consumer to company, but the long-winded manager with whom he’d met had been a virtual fountain of useless, rambling information.
David had discovered that the search for Hector Vance’s murderers was intensifying. John “Deke” Decatur and Lewis Allan Thickman were now considered prime suspects, according to the newspaper one of Culpepper Mills’ vice presidents had brought in to show him, she being the unfortunate corroborator Detective Ormsby had found to question about David’s whereabouts on the day in question.
“Poor Janice,” he had muttered to himself as he’d skimmed the article before returning to his tasks. The suspected killers were thought to be hiding out somewhere in Greenville, and it had turned out that the ‘sister-in-law’ with whom Heck stayed while there was in reality another girlfriend, who’d been en
tirely unaware of the existence of Janice Templeton.
David backed up his morning’s work, and then headed outside. There wasn’t any point in visiting Gâteaupia, since it was closed, so he bought a sandwich and an orange juice, and then strolled south on Fourth Street as he ate his lunch. He’d work from home for the rest of the day, and hopefully Johnson would forgive him by the time the two of them took their afternoon walk.
While at Culpepper Mills, David had managed to keep his thoughts away from all that had occupied him before. But as he left the Shady Grove business district behind, the various conundrums began to descend once again. Genevieve, Clair, Janice, Ormsby.
But Ormsby was probably off chasing bad guys in Greenville. And Janice could take care of herself, was probably already shrugging off, in fact, Heck’s latest duplicity as something else she expected the men in her life to do naturally.
Which left Genevieve and Clair.
He crossed Gum, and briefly entertained the idea of turning onto Birch to drop by Genevieve’s house for a few minutes.
But that was a terrible idea. She’d only be irritated with him, and would probably cancel their dinner engagement to boot.
David traversed Birch, continuing south. He tossed the last bit of his sandwich into a trashcan, and drained his orange juice before dumping the cup in as well.
A pair of women walked by with kids in tow, and David nodded to them as they smiled at him. Up ahead, a group of parents was crossing Fourth at Marion Avenue, all holding the hands of what appeared to be kindergartners, probably being let out after a half day of school.
Shady Grove Elementary was on Marion, one block east at Fifth. Clair was there right now, David realized, most likely at lunch with all of the other first graders. Could he spot her on the playground if he walked by?
But before he could weigh whether or not this was a good idea, he had turned onto Marion. More parents passed by him, all offering greetings of some sort, no doubt thinking that David was on his way to the school to pick someone up himself.
The playground was a riot of children. Eating, playing, running, shouting. David looked for Clair, but quickly realized that it would be close to impossible to pick her out among the hordes of moppets streaking about the asphalt. A teacher blew a loud whistle three times, and all activity slowed for a few seconds while she admonished a boy who had just kicked another. But almost instantaneously, the frenetic whirlwind had resumed at full force.
Was this Mrs. Jenkins? The wise, empathetic teacher who Clair so clearly admired? David didn’t think so; this woman appeared to be in her early twenties, and her visage was already displaying the fine, harsh lines of the impatience that she felt for her youthful charges.
He entered the school’s lobby.
“Can I help you?” An older, tired-looking civil servant rose from behind a counter.
“Hi. I was wondering if…” If what? If he could talk to someone about the strange little girl who lived in his building? “… if Mrs. Jenkins might be around.”
“Are you a parent?” the woman asked.
“No,” David replied. “It’s a personal matter.”
She stared at him for about six seconds with her eyebrows raised, and then picked up a phone, still standing erect with her eyes glued to the visitor. “Carol?” she said. “You got a few minutes for someone to see you on a personal matter?”
David heard the murmur of a response emerge from the receiver.
The mouthpiece was covered. “Name?” she asked him brusquely.
“David Wilcott,” he answered, feeling even stupider than before.
This was repeated into the mouthpiece. And then a second later, the receiver was thunked down. “You know where her classroom is?”
“No. I know she teaches first grade, but I – ”
A finger rose to point down a hallway. “One twenty six. Third door on the right. Eighteen minutes till lunch is over.” Without anything further, the woman sat, returning her attention to whatever she’d been doing before.
David walked down the hall, smiling at the hundreds of art projects that lined the walls all the way up to the ceiling. None of them were of the quality he’d seen in Abby Lowell’s room, but they were uniformly cheery, splashed with brilliant colors and bold lines.
The door to Room 126 was propped open. David knocked, and then stepped inside.
Chapter Twenty
“You would have to be David Wilcott.” A woman sat at a colorful wooden desk at the front of the room, whiteboard behind her, classroom before her. The classroom itself was a mélange of brightly hued numbers, letters, animals, places, and elemental sentences.
“I am,” David replied. “I’m sorry for bothering you during your lunch.”
She smiled, a warm, engaging gesture that practically welcomed him to sit cross-legged on the plush red carpet that lay between the children’s desks and her own. “You’re too old to have been one of my students,” she said, “and I know you’re not one of my parents. No briefcase, so you’re not a lawyer. What can I help you with?”
David liked her, instantly. She was in her late thirties or early forties, cute with a touch of plumpness. Her demeanor was frank yet accessible, and the friendly smile had remained on her countenance even as she waited for David to explain his business.
“You have a student named Clair in your class,” he stated.
A hesitation, and then she nodded. “I do.”
“I live down on Piston, at the Rainbow Arms. Clair lives there, too.”
Her head tilted as her eyes grew more luminous. “I see. Mr. Wilcott, I have a feeling you might be here a few minutes. Why don’t you grab that chair over there and sit right here at the desk with me?”
David moved to fetch the adult-sized chair that she had indicated with a grin. How many children had received the same amiable invitation over the years Mrs. Jenkins had been teaching here? “Please, call me David,” he said aloud.
“Carol Jenkins,” she replied. They shook hands over her lunch of carrots, sliced peppers, and crackers with a hummus dip. Her hand was soft yet firm, her grip solid and comfortable. “So tell me, what brings a neighbor of Clair’s to Shady Grove Elementary School?”
David would have become flustered at having to yet again explain his curiosity regarding Clair, but there was something in Mrs. Jenkins’ eyes that made him feel as though she were already somewhat aware of what he might say. Her gaze was even but rapt, belying her straightforward words.
“I suppose I just want to talk about her,” he said. “With someone who knows her. Outside of our building, I mean. She can be a bit… unusual, for lack of a better word. The things she says, sometimes I find them haunting my thoughts. I know that things she’s said to other people have made a… a difference. In their lives. In the way things happen to them.” He shook his head. “Sorry! This is all coming out in a jumble.”
Mrs. Jenkins hadn’t shifted her gaze one jot. “What has she said to you?” she asked quietly.
His hands shot into the air. “Oh, lots of things! Starting from when I first met her. She knew my girlfriend’s name, the pronunciation of it, which is unusual. I’d never seen Clair before, and she’s never told me how she knew that. She never really answers any question I directly ask her.”
A knowing look melded with a touch of a smirk lit up the teacher’s face. “She never does, does she? Answer, I mean.”
“So she’s the same here?” David asked eagerly. “Does she say things to you or to others that seem… profound? And yet at the same time, they’re vague, and normal, and – ”
Carol’s hand had moved forward to gently touch one of his, breaking off his inquiry. “Let me tell you a story,” she said, her voice quiet and earnest. “It will help you understand my own feelings for Clair. It might help you understand more about who she is, too.”
David sat back in his chair. “Okay.”
“My daughter died six years ago.” And after uttering this, Carol closed her eyes and took a long,
deep breath. “A playground accident, right here at the school. Stupid, really. Nobody’s fault. She just… fell. And because she fell on her head, at exactly the wrong angle, she… died. Instantly, thank God.”
“I’m sorry,” David muttered into the silence that followed this. “Truly. That’s… terrible.”
She nodded. “It is. It was.” Her eyes fluttered open, and he could see beads of wetness in them. “I wasn’t on the playground. I was right here, at this desk. Eating my lunch, just as I’m doing today. Two of the other teachers, they ran to come get me, but she was already gone. Her body was lifeless, dead.” A tear began to roll down one cheek. “It was the worst day of my life. Ever. Nothing could… possibly be as bad as that day, as that day when I lost my angel, my sweet, sweet daughter.”
David remained immobile, afraid to comment again, uncomfortable with the idea of leaning forward to offer the pallid comfort of touch, considering that he had only just met her.
“No one talks about it anymore. None of the other children even know about it except for the few that might have heard from their parents or older siblings. But she knew. Clair knew. I could tell, from the first day she was in my classroom.”
Carol opened a drawer of her desk and pulled out a box of Kleenex. She wiped her eyes, blew her nose, and then placed the used tissue in a wastepaper basket in the desk’s kneehole.
“How did you know?” David asked in a low voice.
Her head shook. “I… I just did. The way she looked at me, it was as if… it was as if she could read everything there, see all of my thoughts.” Carol’s eyes met his. “I can’t explain it, even to myself, but I knew. And sure enough, a couple of weeks later, she talked to me about it.”
David found himself tensing, moving forward with a shiver of anticipation.
“She told me that the purple skies would bring relief. It was a few minutes after school had ended, and I was straightening up, putting things away. She had come back into the classroom without my even noticing, and I turned, and there she was. ‘Clair,’ I asked her, ‘what did you forget?’ But she just walked up to me and took my hand.”
A Shiver of Wonder Page 10