Joan pushed the mute button on the remote and sat back in the chair. She remembered James Shulz as the student had described him, a shy, very quiet kid. But she also remembered his incredible technical abilities. Liz had been very involved with the drama department and had talked about James. Like many of the department participants, Liz hadn’t known his last name, but she did know he was the one who routinely coaxed clear and consistent voices and music from aging microphones and an outdated audio system. He was the one who made everyone sound better than they actually did. All of the dramathletes, the moniker the head of the department had given her charges in an attempt at boosting their social status as well as enticing the booster club to contribute more money to her program, respected James. But none of them hung out with him between productions. He was exactly what so often is said about someone who does what he did—a loner.
The phone rang; it was Liz. When Joan answered the call, all she could hear on the other end was her daughter sobbing.
CHAPTER 3
This same morning, Ellie Fagen was sitting at her kitchen table, with her laptop open in front of her and a short stack of spreadsheets to the left of the computer. Today was the day to do something to rev up her bookkeeping business. Today was the day to find a new client. Today was the day to start making enough money so her husband, Chris, would stop talking about her getting another job—a real job is what he meant but didn’t say, a job that would handsomely supplement his gym teacher’s salary, a job that would help defray the cost of sending their younger son, Tim, to NYU. Ellie had been saying this to herself, giving herself a pep talk just about every day since Tim had packed all his belongings into his grandmother’s hand-me-down Passat wagon and driven into New York City to start his freshman year in college, two months ago. In fact, if she were going to be honest about it, Ellie had been talking to herself about this very topic since her older son, Brandon, had driven himself and all his stuff eleven hundred miles from Connecticut to Northern Michigan University two years ago.
She knew why she was, as Chris said, dragging her feet. And she was resolved to work on this troublesome aspect of her personality—this tendency to think and talk about what she wanted in life, only to do nothing about it, zero follow-up. And while it was natural to talk about change rather than take the soul stretching steps to accomplish it, Ellie was particularly adept at procrastination, especially when it came to self-promotion, which was exactly what she had to do to find new clients. Selling herself was not a part of her makeup, her DNA, as someone on a television show about cops or doctors would say. Ellie had confidence in her ability to accurately and efficiently manage financial accounts; she simply had trouble telling people this, thinking it boastful and distasteful to do so. Wouldn’t it be more convincing, more sincere to get promoted by others? Chris told her that no matter how good she was, her few clients had a multitude of things to think about rather than how they could help grow Ellie’s bookkeeping business. He had told her so this morning, while they were eating toast with peanut butter, while he was looking at her over the top of his reading glasses. It was a look she had seen before, a look that said: Are we really having this conversation? Again?
Ellie was often on the receiving end of this look, whether it emanated from her husband, her father, her mother, or any combination of her six older brothers. In her excuse-making moments, Ellie blamed her large family for her inability to take charge, to do whatever she needed to do, because her brothers had, growing up, made decisions for her. If she had hesitated when asked a question, one of them had answered for her. If she had approached one of them with a choice she was facing, that one had chosen for her. And while her mother had taught Ellie to “stand on her own two feet,” her brothers had, often without being asked, held her up by her elbows. Maybe this was why her today is the day resolutions often dissolved. Was she capable of changing her ways, of changing her life?
Ellie pushed back from the table and stood. She needed a walk to make sense of the jumble of thoughts and ideas in her head. She walked five miles a day, six days a week, often with her dog, but sometimes not. Today, she would go by herself, leaving the default two-mile loop with Buffy for Chris when he got home from school. She coated her lips for the second time that morning with the tube of balm she had in the pocket of her sweatpants and then strode to the back hall closet for sneakers, a windbreaker, and sunglasses. She paused at the mirror hanging on the wall next to the back door and saw her mother’s light green eyes looking back at her. Brigid Kilcullen hadn’t hesitated one moment in her entire life—except, she liked to say at family gatherings, for a full minute after Ellie’s father, Patrick, had asked her to marry him. Why couldn’t Ellie be more like her mother? She took a coated elastic from her pocket and used it to put her barely long enough, wavy blond hair into a ponytail. She had been growing it since Tim left the house in an effort, and a very small one at that, at embracing change.
After a sixty-eight-minute walk, Ellie pushed through the back door. She filled a glass with water and returned to her computer. It was now close to nine. She told herself she would not get out of the chair again until she had a firm plan in place. But before she started in earnest, she decided to check the news. And as soon as she clicked on the bookmarked page for the local newspaper, she saw the headline about the shooting at the high school.
Southwood—High school students, teachers, and administrators are reeling from the shooting at William Chester this morning that took the life of two seniors. The shooter, James Shulz, a barely known sound technician for the drama department, walked into a classroom during first period and shot Emmanuel Sanchez, a scholarly athlete, in the chest, and then turned the gun on himself. Physics teacher Bill Sanders said he led the students into the hall before returning to the classroom to check the condition of the boys.
“Both of them were dead—I think instantly,” Sanders said. “There was no opportunity for CPR or other life-saving measures. This is a horrible, horrible situation that took all of us by surprise.”
Principal Sean Greeley used the same word: surprise. “There has been no violence at the school in his twenty-year tenure,” he said. In fact, he and other administrators had recently made the decision against installing metal detectors at the main entrance or ramping up security, in spite of shooting events elsewhere in the country, and in spite of what happened in Newtown. Greeley said that, “until today, danger dwelled elsewhere. We never saw this coming. We never thought this could happen in our small, coastal town in Connecticut.” Greeley canceled classes for the remainder of the day—and potentially the rest of the week—and indicated counselors would be available to students upon their return.
Several students interviewed who knew James Shulz were less surprised. They called him a “technical genius,” but an “absolutely introverted outsider.” One student described Shulz in the way other young men who commit violent acts are described: “He was always alone.” Nanette Benoit, Emmanuel Sanchez’s girlfriend, who was sitting next to him in class at the time of the incident, declined an interview but did say, “I don’t know why he did this. James was not a bad person.”
Principal Greeley, who said he was “heartbroken” over this incident, indicated he would send an e-mail to parents before the end of the day with more information.
Ellie got out of her chair and ran up the stairs to her bedroom for her cell phone, which was charging on the table next to her bed. There was a missed call from Chris and then a text message that he was on his way home. Phone in hand, Ellie ran back down the stairs and into the kitchen, just as Chris was coming through the back door. “Do you know?” he said, his face bearing the creased, pained expression of someone who is digesting sadness and shock.
“Yes,” she said, walking to him, tears forming in her eyes. He wrapped his long arms around her and held her tightly.
CHAPTER 4
Alice pulled her green Subaru Forester into the high school parking lot only to find it full. She drove up and down
the rows hoping to find a space that another driver hadn’t seen, even though she already knew the futility of this exercise at an event of such magnitude. If she hadn’t spent ten minutes posting pictures of her latest batch of chocolate chocolate-chip cookies to her Facebook account, she would be parked and walking toward the football field, where the candlelight vigil for Emmanuel Sanchez had just started. She drove her car back out onto the main road, where vehicles lined both sides, and managed to squeeze in between two others. After she shimmied herself out of the driver’s side door, hemmed in by a large rock, she jogged toward the back of the school, now thinking it was probably too late to find a seat in the bleachers.
The field was ablaze with lights. As Alice got closer, she could hear Principal Sean Greeley’s voice over the public address system. “. . . Senseless tragedy. Our presence here tonight cannot right the wrong. It cannot bring back Emmanuel Sanchez. But we can honor and cherish his memory. Our senior class has been handing out candles. If you don’t yet have one, look for a student in a lime green T-shirt. These students will also light your candles. . . .” Breathing hard from running, Alice slowed her pace when she reached the fence surrounding the field. She now had visual confirmation that the bleachers, like the parking lot, were full to capacity, meaning her best option would be to stand in the end zone with the other latecomers. As soon as she settled into a space, she was handed a candle by a girl who had been crying, her tears having smeared the letters E and S grease painted onto her cheeks. Alice closed her eyes in an effort to calm her heart and mind, both racing from what had been a hectic yet unfulfilling day of errand running and domestic chores, and to focus on the ceremony. She had not taken the time that day to register its import. Just as she opened her eyes, the overhead lights were cut off, leaving the assemblage in candlelit darkness.
“Alice?”
Alice looked to her right and saw Joan Howard, Liz’s mom, a fellow drama parent. Liz and Alice’s daughter Linda had been in three productions together. And Alice and Joan had helped with fundraising, set construction, and pasta dinners before performances. “Hi, Joan,” said Alice in a whisper, and then she asked the rote question that shouldn’t be asked on days like this one. “How are you?”
“I’ve been better,” said Joan, keeping her voice volume low as well. “Can you believe this? Can you believe this has really happened, and we are all standing on the artificial turf that Emmanuel should be running on this weekend?”
Alice shook her head. “No,” she said. “I’m in shock, actually. I’m having trouble processing this entire situation.”
“A moment of silence please.” It was Sean Greeley again, holding his candle aloft and bowing his head. Alice mimicked his stance for a moment and then opened her eyes and glanced over at Joan, who was rubbing her temple with the index and middle fingers of her left hand. Alice moved closer and put her arm around Joan’s shoulder. Aside from Joan’s quick intake of air, the stadium and its occupants were still; no one coughed, sneezed, spoke, moved. Alice conjured up an image of Emmanuel in her mind: a magazine cover, good looking boy, whose family had moved from Florida two or three years ago. Her daughter Linda had thought he was dreamy. And now he was dead. Alice didn’t blame James Shulz as much as she blamed his mother, Kelly. What kind of parent doesn’t lock up her guns?
Several minutes later the vigil was over. Principal Greeley asked that they all leave the field in a respectful manner and keep the Sanchez family in their prayers. Alice and Joan slowly made their way with the crowd back to the main parking lot. They stopped at Joan’s car, parked in the final space in the last row.
“Putting all this aside for a moment, how are you really?” asked Alice. “How is Liz?”
Joan flashed a quick smile. “I’m good. And Liz seems to like Williams. Her roommate is from New York City, which Liz thinks is the coolest thing ever. I’m not sure she realized that some people actually grow up in Manhattan. How about Linda? Does she like UConn?”
“Loves it,” said Alice. “My cell phone is uncharacteristically quiet. When she does call me, it’s usually when she’s walking to class and has six minutes to talk.”
“Clever girl,” said Joan.
“Hey, Alice. Hi, Joan.” It was Ellie Fagen, Tim’s mother. Tim had also been in the drama club and was friendly with Liz and Linda. Ellie, like Alice and Joan, had pitched in, with cast dinners and mural painting. Tim had played Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady and was now at NYU studying music and theater. The head of the Chester drama department, along with anyone who had ever heard Tim sing, thought he was bound for stardom. Ellie’s Honda Fit was parked two cars away from Joan’s car. Ellie walked past it to join Alice and Joan.
“Hi, Ellie,” said Alice. “Tough night.”
“Yeah,” said Ellie. “Nice attendance though. Sean was good.”
“He was,” said Joan. “He can be such a blabbermouth.”
Ellie smiled. “Not tonight.”
“Thank God,” said Alice. “How’s Tim doing?”
“Great,” she said. “He absolutely loves New York.”
“Good,” said Joan, “because he’ll be living there when he’s appearing on Broadway.”
“Well . . .”
“Well nothing, Ellie,” said Alice. “Your kid is talented.”
“Thank you.”
Joan opened her car door. “I’m going to run,” she said. “What are you two up to tomorrow?”
“The usual,” said Alice. “Nothing. I’m still trying to figure out this empty nest thing.”
“I’ve got to balance some accounts in the morning,” said Ellie. “And then I’m free.”
“Good,” said Joan. “Let’s meet for lunch at noon at High Tide.”
“I’m in,” said Alice, backing away from Joan’s car.
“Me too,” said Ellie.
“See you then,” said Joan. She sat down in the driver’s seat and started the car. Before any of them had time to wonder about the invitation, discussed among women whose only social interactions had occurred when helping with drama productions, Joan shut the car door, pulled out of the parking space, and drove away.
CHAPTER 5
High Tide sat on the Southwood River estuary and routinely flooded when the full moon and Long Island Sound joined forces. The previous summer, however, new owners had raised the restaurant up out of the ground and set it on a sturdy looking system of stilts, some twenty feet above sea level, as well as gutted the aged interior. They replaced the crumbling stone retention wall that had done a poor job of holding back the water with a mass of reinforced concrete, resulting in a nearly dry parking lot, no matter what the lunar or tidal activity. And when it had reopened just after Labor Day, it was so popular that no one could get in without a reservation or an hour long wait. A month later, the initial buzz had diminished somewhat, but Joan still called to make a reservation, knowing the dining room would be filled with local business people and women’s groups happy to have somewhere else to eat lunch.
Southwood had its fair share of restaurants for a town of ten thousand. But many of them served mediocre food, catering to the tourists who congested the streets in the summertime with minivans packed with family members headed to the nearby beaches or with Corvette-driving gamblers eager to try their luck at the casino just north of town. The less popular restaurants were simply worn out, with water stained wallpaper in their dining rooms and out-of-date bathrooms with rusting fixtures and loud overhead fans; and their faded menus featured dishes out of the 1970s: shepherd’s pie, fried haddock and chips, mild chili. High Tide, with its roomy booths, martini bar, small plate offerings, and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the harbor, was everyone’s new first choice.
Joan parked her Range Rover, a present from her husband for her fiftieth birthday, at the far end of the parking lot. Parking close to the front door was one of Stephen’s pet peeves—and this included at shopping malls, airports, even people’s houses. When you’re eighty, he had told Joan more than once, yo
u can park up front. But until then, park away from everyone else’s car doors and fenders. Joan often scoffed at her husband’s peccadilloes, but this one made sense to her. For the last two years, she had parked a distance from whatever building she was entering. She was proud of herself for making this gesture, even in bad weather. Her Range Rover had no dents or scratches, which Joan knew was not, she hadn’t yet admitted to Stephen, merely an indication of luck. She hadn’t asked for or even wanted the car—she had driven a Honda for years, much to the chagrin of the Howard family, who all drove either luxury cars or SUVs—but had grown fond of its sporty styling and automatic transmission.
This was another good weather day. Like the day before, the sun shone and the warm temperature made sweaters optional. Joan slid out of the driver’s seat, locked the car, and strode toward the restaurant. Glancing at her watch, she was pleased to be five minutes early, which would give her a chance to check out the menu before Alice and Ellie arrived. Joan had skipped breakfast, a new dieting scheme that had not lowered her weight one ounce in the last forty-eight hours, and knew she wanted something with cheese. Starving her digestive system in the past had always increased her appetite. And this diet, touted by her mother-in-law, who put nothing in her mouth save coffee and seltzer water before noon and weighed what she had weighed in high school, was so far yielding the same result.
Escorted to a seat next to the large wall of windows, Joan couldn’t help looking out at the water, with its colorful sailboats and inviting wooden docks. Stephen had talked about getting a boat to give them something to do, give them something in common, now that both girls were out of the house. Joan liked the idea of a boat, but not the commitment level it would demand. She enjoyed having in-laws with boats, her ticket to three hours of pleasure cruising that cost nothing more than sandwiches from the downtown deli and a six-pack of cold beer. Joan shifted her attention to the menu and was in the process of deciding between a chicken quesadilla and a BLT with Swiss cheese when Alice approached the table. She sat down, dropped her blue leather satchel to the floor, looked at Joan, and slowly shook her head. “Bad morning?” asked Joan, reaching for her water glass.
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