No Good Asking

by Fran Kimmel

  She spent several minutes digging through her rock box for Grandpa Walter. She and her mother had collected these from that day at the beach. She chose one small enough to fit in his pocket beside his others, pink tinged and shiny smooth, like it had been baked in an oven.

  Daniel was the hardest. She decided on her angel on the chain, the one she kept in her jewellery box. When she was younger, she wore it all the time. It made her feel safe having an angel next to her heart. Until it didn’t anymore. She didn’t expect Daniel to wear it, but she hoped it would keep him safe, even if it stayed in a drawer and he had no idea where the feeling came from.

  She looked over the possessions she’d scattered across her bed, feeling small and unworthy. She’d tried so hard to be on her best behaviour since she got to their house, but she’d made so many stupid mistakes. Not answering the phone when they were building the snowman. Having a fit at breakfast. Another at supper. Crying like a baby over spilled water. Talking too much, too little, too loud, too quiet.

  When she was little, she had made pacts with God. I’ll always be good if you bring her back to me. I’ll never make a peep if you make him nice again. She used her favourites as bargaining chips: ice cream, her singing voice. It didn’t work then and it probably wouldn’t work now.

  She found an empty box in her closet and placed the gifts inside. Before she turned to go back downstairs, she reached for the small pillow she kept tucked under her covers. The fairy pillow her mother had made her, I Love You Most embroidered across the top. She would keep this close, whatever bed she ended up in.

  Hannah looked around the room one last time. There was nothing more to take with her. It might be a silly pile of stuff, but it was everything she had.

  —

  For the sixth time that afternoon, Daniel snapped closed the lid of the velvet box. A charm with no bracelet was probably too dumb a present to give, but it was Christmas tomorrow, and then she’d be gone. The charm was a straight-across exchange for Melissa’s locket, which didn’t seem like such a hot deal since it was as small as his thumbnail and minus the chain. But Dr. Dave had said it was their most expensive line, that girls held on to these for years, generations even, adding charm after charm until their bracelets were heavy as silver bricks.

  It was called the Birdbox—a tiny little bird sat on the detailed roof of a square birdhouse with a heart-shaped hole, its head raised up, beak opened wide.

  “What kinda bird is this?” he’d asked Dr. Dave, who held it in front of his nose, peering down from the bottom half of his glasses.

  “If I had to guess, I’d go with robin. Or some kind of thrush.”

  “Robins sing, right? Like in the morning. They have good singing voices?”

  “It’s called dawn song,” Dr. Dave said. “They’re famous for it. First birds to sing in the morning. They like to tell everyone within hearing distance that they were strong and healthy enough to survive the night. They’re quite territorial—”

  “I’ll take it. And the velvet box too.”

  Dr. Dave started a slow explanation about how the box went with the locket, not the charm, but then he glanced at the growing lineup at the pharmacy counter and shook his head and said, “All right then, you can have the box.”

  And just in time too, since Daniel’s mom reared up behind him like a madwoman the second he had shoved it in his pocket.

  Now that he’d had time to think, Hannah didn’t seem like the kind of girl to go in for collecting stuff, much less charms. When he’d gone into her bedroom to grab her things, it was bare and neat, like a cleaning lady had just swept through. No extra anything lying around. Either she liked it that way or she didn’t have a choice.

  All he knew was that he liked being a brother more with her in the house. Sammy had been the focus for as long as he could remember, overriding everything else going on. It seemed easier with Hannah beside him. She’d taught Sammy a clapping game that morning, his busy hands pounding out the music alongside hers, laughing and hooting like a regular kid.

  He couldn’t make a big deal of it. He would pass Hannah the gift like it was a package of Kleenex; her expression would tell him if he’d made the right choice.

  Part Six

  Those Words Could Mean Anything

  Wednesday, December 25

  Thirteen

  Hannah felt a scream rising in her throat. He’d somehow found her, crept out of her dreams and to the side of her bed, clammy fingers pressing down on her mouth, hot breath wheezing in her ear. She tried to lunge forward, get away from what came next, but she hit a mesh of warm fur, a wet nose nuzzling her cheek.

  It was only the dog, not Nigel. She lay there blinking in the darkness, waiting for the ugly shape to disappear, for her heart to stop thumping.

  “It’s okay, Thorn.” She threw her arms around the dog while he slurped her face. “You’re a good boy.”

  The clock beside her bed read ten after three. Christmas morning. It would be hours until the others would wake; hours before she could reach under her bed for the gifts she would give them. She’d used the brown paper from the roll beside her window, different coloured ribbon for each one, and glitter stars for Sammy.

  “It’s not time yet,” she told the dog. “Be quiet. It’s still night.”

  She tried to make Thorn lie down beside her, but he refused to be still. He whined and yipped and jumped down from her bed and back up, then down again, which must have hurt because then he paced in circles on three legs instead of four.

  “You have to go to the bathroom?”

  She’d never seen him this crazy, not even when he helped build the snowman. A gale beat against the window like a living thing.

  She looked closely at Thorn as he limped back and forth. “All right then, I’ll take you outside.” She lifted the covers and let her toes touch the cold floor. She could dress in layers, cover every inch of skin, and be as quiet as a mouse so as not to wake the others. She threw her jeans on top of her pajama bottoms, and added two pairs of socks and her heaviest sweater. She would lead Thorn to the front door, help him with the stairs as she’d seen Ellie do.

  “Come on then, silly dog,” she whispered, stepping into the hallway of doors, all closed except for Grandpa Walter’s. She patted her thigh encouragingly as she tiptoed backward toward the kitchen. But Thorn would not be coaxed into coming with her. He went the other way, through Grandpa’s open doorway and back out again. In and out he went, while she stayed in her spot, praying all his clicking and clacking wouldn’t wake the whole house.

  She had not dared go into Grandpa Walter’s room—their rooms are their homes, Hannah, you would not just walk off the street into someone’s home. She could poke her head in, check on Grandpa, and back away with the dog by grabbing his collar.

  Except Grandpa Walter was gone. She snuck up to the side of his bed, that Sunnybrook smell filling her nose. She patted her palm against the tangle of covers, lifting pillows and sheets. Thorn sat on his haunches and stared, head tilted to one side, as if he expected more from her than just this. She could hear nothing but the wind, the crackling of branches as they fought with the storm.

  She ran then, as fast as her legs would take her, flicking lights along the way. She spun in circles in the big room, his usual places flashing in front of her. His favourite chair with the sunken seat, the half-done puzzle, his place at the table. She ran to the window, trying to look through the trees for a shape in the snow, but all she could see was her face staring back.

  Thorn sat with his nose pressed to the front door. Panic tore through her, a prickling at the back of her neck that moved to her chest. Grandpa Walter was out there somewhere. Alone. The wind would lift him up and swallow him whole.

  She bolted toward Ellie and Eric’s room and threw open their door. She found them pushed together, close to the edge of the bed.

  “Wake up. Please, wake up.
”

  There was shuffling and an untwisting of arms. They weren’t moving fast enough, so she ran to the bed and pounded the covers. Eric lunged forward, flinging his arm, nearly hitting her. She didn’t jump back, just lifted her heels to make herself taller.

  Ellie propped herself on an elbow, blinking into the yellow light spilling in from the hallway. “It’s okay, honey,” she whispered groggily. “It’s just a bad dream.”

  “He’s run away.” She tried not to cry.

  Eric flung off the blanket and swung his legs to the floor, while Ellie reached out and pulled Hannah close to her.

  “It was just a bad dream,” Ellie said again, holding her close, her breath in her ear.

  Hannah wanted to stay like that, next to Ellie, but she could not waste more precious time. She broke free, took a deep breath, and spoke slowly, enunciating each word. “He’s not in his room. Not anywhere. He’s disappeared. Thorn . . .”

  As if he heard his name, Thorn barked from his post at the door. Ellie, sitting and wide awake now, held Hannah away from her, gripping her shoulders to get a closer look at her face. “Sammy?”

  “Walter.” Eric cursed. He’d wrestled into his jeans and yanked a sweater over his head. “She means Walter.”

  “Oh God.” Ellie pushed Hannah to the side and jumped to her feet. “He can’t have gone out there!” The wind crashed in waves against the side of the house.

  “He’ll be heading for the barn,” Eric said. “I’ll get him.” Then he was pounding down the hall like an army of men, Thorn barking furiously. The commotion had woken Sammy, who called for his mother. “I’ll help,” Hannah said, not wanting to go, not able to stand still. She could feel the cold bite her toes, bite the old man’s skin. Did he remember gloves? A scarf?

  “You will do no such thing!” Ellie flung on her housecoat and then stripped it off again. Sammy’s calls were getting louder. “I’m not going to lose you too.”

  Hannah kept her eyes on the floor while Ellie tore off her nightie and threw legs into sweatpants, arms into Eric’s huge sweater. I’m not going to lose you too. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Those words could mean anything. She pulled at the rug’s scruffy fringes with her pointed toe. She was just a girl to keep track of until she could be delivered somewhere else.

  Now Sammy could be heard sobbing in his room, a feverish calling that could crack the moon.

  “I have to calm Sammy down,” Ellie said, an edge of panic in her voice as she headed toward the door. “You go get Danny. His father might need him.” Then Ellie came back and bent down in front of her, grabbing her shoulders. “You don’t go out there, Hannah. You don’t know your way around, and it’s too easy to get lost. Promise me you won’t go out there.”

  Hannah winced under the pressure of Ellie’s fingers. “I promise,” she whispered.

  Then she flew too, down the hall, down the stairs, down the length of the cold concrete floor. Hannah hadn’t been in Daniel’s room; she hadn’t been in any boy’s room before this. She flicked on the light. There was crap everywhere—covering the walls, the floor. She hopped over piles of clothes, pulled back his blanket, and shook his bare shoulder.

  “Wake up!” she yelled, panting. “Grandpa Walter is lost.”

  Daniel was dead weight, unmoving except for the up and down of his chest. She dragged his blankets to the floor—he wore only shorts—and shook harder. “Daniel! Get up! Right now!”

  He stretched out his hand, eyes squeezed shut, grabbing for something to fight against the cold. “What? What’s going on?” His voice cracked with sleep.

  “Wake up. It’s Grandpa Walter. He’s lost in the storm.”

  Daniel bolted up, rearing out of sleep, and saw Hannah standing right there beside his bed, looking down at him.

  “Grandpa got out?” he yelled, grabbing his pillow to cover his nakedness. “Holy shit. What time is it?”

  “Hurry. Get dressed. You have to come now.”

  She didn’t know where to look as he pulled on pants, a sweater.

  “Go tell my dad,” he said.

  “He’s already out there.”

  They tore up the stairs. Hannah watched at the front door as Daniel threw on boots, jacket, hat, gloves, and scarf. Thorn whined and yelped, getting tangled in their feet. They could hear Sammy behind his closed door, Ellie’s muffled shushing.

  “Aren’t you coming?” Daniel asked, breathless under his scarf. Thorn pushed his nose through his legs. “Not you, old boy. You have to stay here.”

  “Ellie says no.” Hannah watched as he reached for a flashlight from the boot box in the closet. “Your dad’s heading for the barn.”

  “I know,” Daniel said. “That’s where Grandpa goes.” Hannah held tight to Thorn’s collar as Daniel opened the door and was eaten by the night, the whistling cold striking her before she pushed the door closed.

  She paced up and down the entryway, Thorn pacing with her, favouring his hind leg. She counted the steps she imagined would get Daniel to the barn and back with Grandpa beside him. Hypothermia could kill. The first aid teacher said so. If a body’s temperature drops too low, a person starts shivering at first, then confusion sets in and they can’t remember who they are and they stumble around, and then they turn blue and their heart pumps slower and slower until it doesn’t work at all. Especially an old heart, already worn out.

  Sammy had stopped crying. Hannah strained to hear Ellie in the stillness of the house. She wanted to go to her, to sit beside Sammy on his bed and let Ellie’s voice wash over her, but she was stuck on what the teacher said about treating a hypothermia victim. Get him inside, of course. Then she supposed a warm bath or hot tea or a pile of blankets. Eric would know what to do. Except they weren’t back—none of them. Years had passed since Thorn butted her awake, since they set off in search of him. It shouldn’t take this long to sweep the barn, to help an old man make his way home.

  Then it came to her. All those muddled repetitions at the puzzle table, more insistent each time. Grandpa Walter had said he needed to change the spark plugs. He needed to fix the carburetor. He needed to get down to PoPow’s and get his truck back. PoPow’s was in Neesley. If Grandpa Walter got that much straight, he was headed toward the road, not the barn.

  Hannah ran to Sammy’s room and pushed open the door, but Ellie held up her hand, warning her to stay back. Ellie was on the bed next to Sammy, who was rocking wildly back and forth.

  Ellie mouthed the word Go, waving her away. Hannah closed the door and paced the hallway, waiting for Sammy to get right again. The thought hit her like a stone hurled at her chest. She knew how to get to the road. It wouldn’t be that hard. She would find Walter herself, take his hand, and lead him home. And once Walter was back where he belonged, safe and warm, wouldn’t she be more special in Ellie’s eyes, in all their eyes—someone worth hanging on to?

  She ran back to the front closet and grabbed an old down-filled jacket with a tear in one sleeve and a striped toque too big for her head. There was one flashlight left in the boot box and when she pressed its sticky black button, a feeble beam danced along the wall. She buried it in the jacket’s pocket beside an old package of gum. The tattered butterfly quilt—the one from her bedroom she’d come wrapped in—lay folded in the closet corner. She scooped it up and whispered to Thorn, “You have to stay here. I’ll bring him back.”

  She opened the door, struggling to keep a grip on the metal handle, the gale ripping it from her grasp before she could push it closed again using the weight of her whole body. Despite her two pairs of socks and heaviest sweater and the too-big jacket, the cold shocked her senseless. She hoisted the blanket under one arm and clung to the railing as she stumbled blindly down the steps. The porch light was no help, its beam too weak against the driving snow.

  She tripped over a solid and unexpected mound at the bottom step and heard Thorn’s yip. He was beside her, had
somehow slunk through the door and laid himself down for her to stumble over out there in the storm.

  “You have to go back,” she cried, her voice devoured by the deafening wind, tornadoes of white rising all around. “Thorn, please.” She grabbed his collar and tried to lead him up the stairs, but he backed away, pulling in the opposite direction.

  “Eric! Danny!” she yelled, although she’d already given up trying to see or be heard. The world had shrunk to the two feet in front of her. The barn, the van, their snowman—it was as if they never were. Thorn pulled her along, head close to the ground, as she clung dizzily to his collar, bits of ice stinging her cheeks. She didn’t dare let go or he’d disappear too, and she’d be alone.

  She looked back as often as she could manage in the driving wind, trying to keep the porch light in view, but it was becoming more a pinprick, a distant star. She could still make out the blur of gauzy light through the kitchen window, but they were moving farther and farther from it, slogging toward the open road, though she couldn’t be sure with nothing real or solid to focus on but the razor-sharp swirls. Thorn forged ahead, his bad leg working again, shoulders hunched low like he was pulling a heavy cart up a steep hill, muzzle white with crusted snow.

  She placed one foot in front of the other. Her fingers had numbed inside the heavy gloves, no longer willing to do what she wanted. As they slipped out from under Thorn’s collar, she lunged forward to grab onto his neck, but all that she found was a piece of the wind. He’d moved on already, left her behind.

  “Thorn,” she screamed, dropping the weighty blanket in the snow. She turned to get her bearings, to measure the distance from here to the house, but the lights behind the window had been swallowed without a trace. The house was gone.

  She swung her head in all directions, desperate to see past the thick wall of lifting snow. What if she’d gotten turned around? What if she’d been traipsing round and round in circles, the house ahead not behind? Which way was which? She shook uncontrollably, waterfalls streaming down her cheeks, under her nose, teeth clattering behind tight lips. She was no hero. She’d done the exact opposite of what she’d promised Ellie, the person in this world she wanted most to please. She’d lost everything and everyone, including herself. She couldn’t find her nose much less Grandpa Walter—or Thorn either, who was probably buried under a mountain of snow by now, his old legs buckling beneath him.