A Sudden Light

by Garth Stein

  “I wanted to know if we were really soul mates, Harry. I wanted to climb a tree, and I wanted to climb it with you.”

  The inky woods around us were peppered with flashing animal eyes. Ben scuttled the fire until it was embers breathing at us.

  “Why don’t you tell him you won’t go?” I asked. “Why don’t you refuse? Is it because of your inheritance?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I hope you don’t think me so base as that.”

  “Why, then?”

  “So I can right the wrongs of my father and others like him,” he said. “So I can undo some of the damage he’s done. If I were to run from his wealth and power for my own preservation, it would be an incredibly selfish act, Harry, you see that, don’t you? A man has a moral responsibility to correct an injustice, not to run and hide from it and pretend it doesn’t exist. Who else could guide my father’s companies in the proper direction but me? I can change the world, Harry. Not just for me, or for you and me and people I know, but for all people. It’s my duty. My obligation. Some things simply must be done, no matter the personal sacrifice.”

  I considered the difficulty of his position, how much easier it would be for him to abdicate, and yet how he had resolved to take the more difficult road.

  “When will you leave?” I asked.

  “I can get you on a team up north, if you’d like to come along.”

  “I don’t want to go,” I said, thinking of my life in the past few days, the past many weeks. I felt like I had found something, my place. My soul mate. “And I don’t want you to go, either.”

  Ben laughed.

  “That’s very thoughtful of you, but I don’t know what I have to do with it.”

  “You have everything to do with it,” I said.

  Ben was silent for a moment as he examined the inside of his enamel mug.

  “I can put my father off for a while,” he said. “It will make him very angry; people don’t say no to Elijah Riddell.”

  “What would Thoreau tell you to do?” I asked, baiting him with his own ideas, for I knew what Thoreau would tell him to do, having been in the same position, the heir to a fortune made from pencils.

  “You’re very clever, Harry,” Ben said with a laugh.

  “But am I clever enough?” I asked, and I could feel my heart pumping. I felt excited by the nature of our conversation because it seemed to veer closer to what I had desired for months but was afraid to pursue.

  “Clever enough for what?”

  “For you,” I said boldly, for I felt like I was climbing a tree without gaffs and a flip line now. I was high up in a tree, and, while I knew the danger, I felt safe enough to continue. I looked up at Ben, whose face glowed orange in the flame, and I was touched in some strange way, compelled by an overpowering feeling in my chest, one that I had never known, having never before fallen in love. I was confused, because I had been told that God punished those who defiled their nature, that love like I felt for Ben was an abomination; they told me this in church when my mother used to take me and when my father and I were on the road and went to services so we could attend the picnic afterward and help ourselves to the free food. I went to Ben and pushed my face against his chest; he didn’t withdraw. I took his head in my hands and began to kiss him, but he pulled away.

  “Am I an abomination in your eyes?” I asked.

  “You don’t have to believe what others told you,” Ben said.

  “But they said—”

  “One’s nature comes from within, not from without. The abomination occurs in subverting one’s instinct in favor of a rigid code written by others. Trying to force yourself into a role that confounds your spirit will always break you.”

  I took hold of his head and kissed him again, and this time he accepted the kiss and I held it, though it was rough and tasted of salt, because it felt good and I was afraid to let go; finally, I pulled away and stepped back, ashamed, for what if he didn’t want that at all? What if I had misjudged him entirely?

  “The trees don’t judge us, Harry,” he said. “Out here, we can do whatever we want.”

  “What do you want?” I asked harshly, suddenly challenging him. “Make it clear.”

  Ben hesitated for a moment, and then he reached out, grabbed my jacket, and pulled me to him; he kissed me hard, so that our teeth smashed together with a sharp click.

  “That,” Ben said, “and more.”

  “Then do it,” I goaded him. “Do it, then!”

  Ben kissed me again, almost violently, and he didn’t let go until I jerked free and laughed defiantly. “Like that,” Ben said, clenching his fists. “Do it, then!” I taunted. And Ben rushed at me so quickly, hooked under my arm in a wrestling move, and threw me to the ground next to the smoldering fire. We struggled wordlessly, a dangerous fight; we pulled at each other’s clothes and looked for an advantage, twisted each other’s arms in locks and holds until the other winced in pain. A thigh slipped between legs, leverage gained, opponent flipped, pressed down, face forced hard into the forest floor, tasting dirt and laughing, panting breath in an ear, hearts flailing in effort, hands aching, muscles straining until exhaustion approached, and then, like wolves fighting for a pack, a neck offered to gleaming teeth, eyes locked with eyes, sweat and sinewy muscles entangled, the greater beast dominated and the conquered showed his supplication, and mercy was granted; the grip was released and the greater man embraced the vanquished.

  Ben stoked the fire back to life, added fuel, rolled out a blanket near enough so the warmth would be a comfort, but not so near that it would be too hot. He gently coaxed me onto the bedroll. I was exhausted, and he lay down next to me and covered us both with a woolen blanket that scratched our naked skin, but not enough for us to do anything about, because the discomfort in some way acknowledged our nakedness and our boldness and effort. And the trees, which had witnessed everything, said nothing.

  “The estate my father is building is in the most beautiful place on earth, I promise you,” he said, his voice deep and hypnotic. “The forest is so thick and green, and a bluff drops two hundred feet to the water, and the west-facing view with the mountains and the sunset is so magnificent it will make you cry. Harry, it will be our place. The deal I’ve made with my father means he can ask me no questions about how I manage the estate. He thinks it will be for my future family, but it will be for us. It will be our haven.”

  “It sounds beautiful, but I want to stay here a little bit longer,” I said, staring lazily into the flames, the fire hot.

  “I’ll stay, too,” Ben agreed, nodding to himself. “I think I’ll stay a bit more, too. And then, maybe I can convince you to join me at The North Estate.”

  – 21 –

  NIGHT DANCING

  I suppose if I had been at school or with my friends or something, I would have felt more self-conscious about my gay great-granduncle and his affair with Harry. Of course, people aren’t allowed to use homosexuality as an insult anymore. Professional athletes get fined for it, politicians are forced to apologize publicly. The difference between 1990 and the present day is quite remarkable in this regard. When I was growing up, it was commonplace to toss around tags like “gay” or “fag” to put down one’s friends and enemies. Kids who weren’t good at sports were accused of being gay. Kids who studied too much were faggots. It was a universal depiction of unmanly behavior, and nothing was more insulting to an adolescent boy than having his manhood challenged. So considering the school yard culture of 1990 and my tender age of fourteen, I’m a little surprised I didn’t balk at reading a diary entry depicting gay sex. But I didn’t. For some reason—maybe because of the isolation of Riddell House?—having a gay great-granduncle didn’t bother me at all. In fact, I felt protective of Ben and Harry. I still do.

  I went to sleep that night feeling close to Ben and Harry and to the trees they climbed and the wild forest by the coast where they lived, though I had never been there myself. I felt caught up in their relationship, their love, t
heir plight; it was as if they were still alive, grappling with their issues in a timeless state, and I was there with them.

  A sound in the darkness woke me out of my sleep. I opened my eyes but didn’t stir. I could hear music. I slipped out of bed and opened my door without a creak. I trod softly down the hall until I reached the back stairs, and then I went down instead of up. When I reached the ground floor, I opened the door a crack and saw what I thought I’d see: Grandpa Samuel at the kitchen table with a glass of medicine. Isobel always came to dance when he couldn’t sleep. Or vice versa.

  I snuck upstairs to the third floor, which was more creaky, so my work was more difficult; it demanded patience. The transfer of weight was the key, as was a belief in weightlessness. It was to have no momentum. It was to be a tree, to grow without notice, but to grow. It was to be still, but always moving. I crept down the hall with the music playing, the footsteps dancing. It took me days. Weeks. I felt as if it took me years to move the fifty feet from the servants’ stairway to the doors to the ballroom, but I did it without disturbing a breath of air; the house had grown around me.

  I reached the threshold and peered around the edge of the door and saw the record player and someone dancing like a ghost in the shadows. A woman, her dark dress flowing around her as she spun so elegantly across the ballroom floor. I slipped inside the room silently. The waning moon offered some light, but I couldn’t make out details. The music played and she danced and I saw my grandmother Isobel. It was her. The house was haunted by more ghosts than I thought. Benjamin, I knew—the man with the hat. But now? She spun and leapt as if in a ballet. Her muted footsteps echoed through the house down to her beloved Samuel, two floors below. It was really her. I reached for the light button. I pushed it and it clicked; the lights did not light.

  She stopped, alerted by the click. She breezed toward me with fluttering hands. I was frightened by her sudden approach, and I turned away. When I turned back, she had vanished.

  I ran down the front stairs as quickly as I could. I didn’t worry about sound. I ran to my room and grabbed my flashlight. I sprinted back up the stairs to the ballroom and aimed my flashlight around the room. Nothing. The record player ticked at me, so I switched it off. I continued scanning the ballroom.

  Against one wall was a row of doors. I opened one. A storage closet filled with chairs and banquet tables. I opened another. More storage, boxes of things, glasses, maybe. I opened a third. It was nearly empty, but smelled of recently disturbed air. Against the back wall, I saw something—a flash of light through a small hole. I made my way to the back of the storage room and shone my light. A finger hole. I slipped my finger into it and pulled. It took effort, but a small hatch door pulled free and came off in my hands.

  On the backside of the hatch were two handles. I stuck my head into the newly discovered space. It was some kind of a shaft that plunged downward through the core of the house. It wasn’t big—three feet square, maybe. I could see ladder rungs attached to the wall opposite me. I shone my flashlight downward, but it couldn’t penetrate far into the darkness.

  I considered investigating, but I’d need equipment. A better flashlight, for sure, or a headlight would be better. Definitely some rope. And a wooden stake, some garlic, and a Bible. Because I had no idea what exactly I’d find down there, though I was determined to find it.

  – 22 –

  TELL ME ABOUT YOUR MOTHER

  I wanted to get the equipment for my investigation as soon as I woke up the next day, but I saw my father hacking and slashing at the blackberries across the orchard, and I knew he needed to work things out, so I didn’t bother him right away. I was pretty sure it was our one-week anniversary at Riddell House, but, to be honest, it was hard to track time there. The days were long, and they blended together into a soup of experience that took effort to sort out in my head. I had come to understand the feeling of isolation Serena and Grandpa Samuel had lived with for so long. My father felt it, too, I knew; it was a natural reaction to pick up a machete and start slashing.

  When it was close to lunchtime, I couldn’t wait any longer, so I walked down the hill and interrupted my father’s brutal battle with the vines.

  “I need to get some stuff at the store,” I said. “Can you take me to town?”

  “Ah, yes,” he said, wiping his sweaty brow with the disgusting T-shirt he had removed and tossed in the dead grass. He guzzled water. He was naked from the waist up, and his leathery, lean torso was sweaty and speckled with dirt. “A mission to replenish supplies. Running low on staples. Orange juice, fruit, Ritz crackers. We must restock the canteen. Let’s go.”

  We walked back up the hill to the house, and I waited in the kitchen while he got a fresh shirt. When he came back downstairs, I mentioned the ballroom light issue I had discovered the previous night.

  “Did you try the fuse box?” he asked.

  “Where is it?”

  He led me outside the kitchen door to the porte cochere. He lifted an old, hinged cover and revealed rows of glass cylinders and a tangle of brown, filthy wires going in all directions.

  “Why is the fuse box outside?” I asked. “Isn’t that dangerous? I mean, some ax murderer with night-vision goggles could turn off the power and then hunt you down in the dark and you couldn’t do anything to stop him.”

  “That’s the way they did it in the old days,” he said. “I guess no one foresaw the danger of night-vision goggles falling into the wrong hands. Or maybe no one foresaw the invention of night-vision goggles at all.”

  He poked around the fuses. A diagram explained which fuse controlled which circuit, but it was hardly legible.

  “Ah, this must be it,” he said, screwing in one of the glass fuses. “It was loose. Probably lost the connection.”

  “Probably,” I agreed, but the wheels in my head were spinning. Why would the fuse be loose?

  We didn’t really go into town. Not into Seattle, at least. We drove to a strip mall shopping complex a few minutes away from The North Estate. The complex was anchored by a supermarket and an old Sears department store that looked like it had been there for a hundred years. A Chinese-Thai combo restaurant was sandwiched between a Radio Shack and a Laundromat, and my father suggested we get lunch before we went shopping, so we went in. Almost everything in Seattle—at least the narrow slice I had seen of it—was weird, and the Chinese-Thai restaurant was no exception. It was a shell of a place with no redeeming aesthetic qualities: old Formica tables and plasticky chairs and bright fluorescent lighting. A page of the menu said: Vietnamese Specialty Soups. The people who seemed to own the restaurant didn’t really speak English; they just hung out at the empty tables like it was a living room—there were aunts and uncles and little kids—and a TV was playing a VHS tape of old news in an Asian language. The only word I could understand was George Bush, which, apparently, has no translation. So even though my father and I were in a suburban Seattle strip mall, it didn’t feel like it. We ordered off the Vietnamese side of the menu, even though Vietnamese food wasn’t advertised on the neon sign outside. We only spoke with one guy, and the only thing we said to him was “Two number fourteens,” and a few minutes later the guy shuffled out with bowls of soup. I tentatively sipped the broth and found that it was amazingly good: the smell and the steam and the taste. It took all five senses to taste it completely, and part of why it tasted so good, I thought, was that we were eating it in this strange place.

  “All this stuff is new,” my father said, waving his soup spoon at the parking lot outside the window. “The Sears was here, but none of the other stores. There used to be an Ernst Hardware and a Pay ’n Pak over there . . . But I guess I haven’t been here in a while.”

  I added garlic chili sauce to my soup. I added jalapeños and Thai basil. I added lime. I added bean sprouts. I wanted to add everything I could.

  “I feel like I hardly see you anymore,” my father said as we ate.

  “Same here,” I agreed.

  “What have
you been up to? Seeking the truth?”

  “Always. I spend my life in the relentless pursuit of truth. Speaking of which . . .”

  “Yes?”

  “Why did you start building boats? You’ve never told me. Was it because the boatbuilding place was near the school? That’s what Mom said.”

  “Because it was there? That’s why she said I did it?”

  “More or less,” I said.

  “Hmm,” he said. “No. I went and found it. It wasn’t so close that I tripped and fell through the front door. I searched for it and I found it. I wanted to do something with wood that was constructive, you know? I wanted to build something. When I was a kid and Grandpa Abe was still alive, all he talked about was destroy, destroy, cut down, clear-cut, sell off, develop, make money, money, money. At some point, my mother took me aside and said, ‘You don’t like that kind of talk, do you?’ I said no. And she said, ‘You are your own person. You can create your own future. You don’t have to live for him. He’s already made a mess of his life; he doesn’t get to make a mess of yours.’ ”

  My father worked on his soup for a minute.

  “So I thought if I could build something beautiful out of wood,” he said, “something useful and also beautiful—I thought somehow that would equalize things. I don’t know. I guess it’s karma. But that’s my mother’s talk. I don’t really believe in that.”

  I shrugged, but I didn’t believe him. I thought he did believe in it. All of it.

  “I still don’t understand why Grandpa Samuel sent you away to school after your mom died,” I said, leaning over the bowl to meet a chopsticks-load of noodles. Relentless pursuit.

  “Things were hard for Grandpa. He had Serena to take care of.”

  “Serena said you were taking care of her.”

  My father shrugged again as he picked at his soup.

  “If you were sixteen or whatever,” I pressed, “and you were taking care of Serena, why would Grandpa send you away? Wouldn’t it make more sense for him to keep you around? It would be less work for him.”