He looks helplessly at her. He doesn’t know what to say.
She continues, in a rush, "I imagine that there is. I’ve always imagined that there is. Lots of wide open spaces. A wide sky and open spaces." She pauses only briefly. "My God, my God!"
David goes to her, embraces her. "I don’t know, Anne. It wasn’t . . . " He pauses. "I don’t remember," he lies. "I just don’t remember."
She pushes away from him, looks into his eyes, and he can tell that she knows he’s lying.
TEN
In Anne’s house, Jackson found his way to the third floor, where the martins were; he didn’t see them at first. But the martins saw him. After several minutes, one of the martins dive-bombed him, taking him by surprise. Jackson reared back and lashed out leadenly with one large paw. He couldn’t do much with it. His erstwhile owners had had him declawed early in his kittenhood, but the instinct was still very much alive. Indeed, Jackson spent much of his time kneading the carpets or the edges of doorways in Anne’s house, blissfully unaware that his claws were gone.
It was dusk when Jackson padded up to the third floor; this made him very cautious because, unlike most cats, his night vision was all but nonexistent. The night frightened him. Since he had come here, the night had brought him dim recollections of the room at the house of his former owner; there had been a bright nightlight in the room, and it had soothed him into sleep.
He squinted up at the martins. They were on a curtain rod high above him, at the top of a very tall window. They watched him squinting at them and, after a moment, the one that had dive-bombed him dive-bombed him again, again catching him by surprise, even though Jackson’s eyes had been trained on them all the while.
The martins had decided, in their canny, bird way, that Jackson was different from other cats they had tangled with. He was slower. There was not the aura of death about him that hung so heavily around most other cats. So, they had decided that Jackson could be a source of fun.
Jackson, in his dim way, knew that the birds were not afraid of him. But this was all right, because night was falling rapidly, and as it fell, his fear rose. There were no nightlights in this house (he had looked), so the next best thing was a spot in a clothes closet where the walls on two sides of him and his awareness of the all but closed door in front of him gave reassurance that he was well hidden. Because of his night blindness, Jackson was an agoraphobic after dusk. He needed the comfort of walls and closeness. In daylight, it was very different. In daylight there were possibilities; there was movement, there were boundaries, there was color.
Jackson turned and trotted from the room where the martins were tormenting him. He went to the top of the stairs and looked down, toward the second floor, but he saw very little, only rectangular blacks and grays.
Something raked along his back. He whirled. He saw a swiftly moving shadow flit away, toward the room he had just left. He gave the shadow a confused, gurgling meow, then, because the light was failing quickly now, made his way to the closet on the second floor, where he would spend the night. The martins followed him.
~ * ~
For David, it was not, now, a matter of sliding up through the tunnel, as if he were sliding down it on a stream of water. Now it was a struggle, a chore, and he felt a tug from behind; a rope might as well have been holding him, its strength not quite the match of his own. So he made progress, though in a slow and agonizing and dreamlike way.
Like a single bright star in the black fabric of the night, there was the mouth of the tunnel.
"Anne," he said, because it was the only name for him to rightfully say now.
"Anne."
He didn’t hear his words so much as believe that he said them. But there was reassurance in that. Proof of himself. Proof of where he was and what he was and that he was.
Somewhere beyond his sight or caring a body lay still. Something random, deep in its bioelectronics, had made it stir occasionally, and had made it mutter words, names. But none of it made any more real sense than did the scratchings of chickens which might form letters in the dust.
He was not aware of the movements of his body as he made his way toward the mouth of the tunnel. He told himself that it was up, that he was climbing to it, but this was no more true than it would have been to say that the future was above him. It was beyond him and telling himself that it was up, that it was above him, merely gave him parameters. Because he knew what the tug from behind was. It was the earth. Mortality. It was the body in the bed.
Just as he told himself, too, that he was wearing corduroy pants, white shirt, shoes. He was wearing nothing; nor was he naked. He formed for himself the image of his hands as he moved, the right and left inward curves of his shoes as he moved. He conjured up the sounds of his feet trudging over hard earth. But there was no sound except the whispers of his past.
He might have been floating, immersed. But that would have had temperature, and he would have felt a sense of motion, of being inside, as if in a womb.
He could only approach, will himself closer, be closer, higher, and, so, closer to that mouth. That opening. Into. Out of—
The earth. The body in the bed.
Past blindness into sight.
It could have been days or no time at all that he had been here. Only the body in the bed counted such things and it was beyond counting. It breathed. It perspired. It evacuated for its own sake. It had taken over its own care. It counted nothing. It was the moment that it lived. The moment. The inhale and the exhale but not the counting of it—the memory of it, and, so, the naming of it.
The body in the bed named nothing. It had no awareness of names; a wave does not call itself a wave, nor did the body in the bed have a name for itself.
It was the body in the bed that was, at this moment, an exhale, and, at this moment, an inhale.
~ * ~
Christian Grieg looked through the Plexiglas at the body of his friend. It was lying very still.
Christian asked, "Would you say that he’s close to death?"
David’s doctor answered, "No, sir. He’s in a coma. It’s not deep. We expect that he’ll come out of it soon." The man spoke with a calm and practiced reassurance.
Karen Duffy asked, her eyes on David, though she turned her gaze to the doctor halfway through her question, "How long has he been like this?"
"Eighteen hours. Approximately eighteen hours," the doctor answered.
"But that’s a very long time, isn’t it?" Karen asked.
The doctor didn’t answer at once. He seemed to be weighing his response. After several moments, he said, "Under some circumstances, yes. But not in his case. As I pointed out, the coma is very light. He has, in fact, shifted out of it momentarily. He’s even spoken to us."
"Spoken?" Christian asked.
"A name," the doctor said. "His sister’s name, I believe."
"Anne?" Christian asked.
The doctor nodded. "Yes. Anne. That’s his sister? The one who was murdered recently?”
“Yes," Christian said. "Anne."
"A tragedy," said the doctor.
ELEVEN
It was easier now. The tug from behind was lighter, weaker, as if he were about to float.
And the mouth of the tunnel, the opening, was . . . nearer. In easy reach. He could reach for it, touch it.
He tried.
But the opening was no closer. It was at a distance. Above him, beyond him, as if it were a reflection in water. He reached for it again. He saw the image of his hand reaching and his hand was like white clay. Then there were veins on it, half moons, lines. It was a hand complete.
~ * ~
Christian Grieg said to Karen Duffy, "I always maintained that he was weak and this is proof of it."
David’s doctor had just waddled off and disappeared left down a corridor, and now there were soft bells announcing that visiting hours were at an end in the nearby intensive care maternity wing.
Karen said, "I don’t believe it; you resent him. I wouldn�
��t have thought that that was possible, Christian."
Christian shook his head. He scowled. "I don’t resent David. Why should I?"
Karen said, "I have no idea why, but it’s what I just saw in you."
Christian smiled. It was flat and resentful and there was no humor in his eyes; they were hard and accusing. "You’re psychic, Karen?" His smile vanished. "I didn’t know that."
Karen looked at him a moment without expression. She shook her head. "I’m sorry. Clearly I’ve touched a nerve—"
"That’s an accusation, Karen. What are you accusing me of?"
She shook her head. She was confused; this was so unlike him—baiting her. She said nothing.
Christian said, "But we’ll let it drop. I’m feeling magnanimous. My friend"—he nodded quickly to indicate the body in the bed—"is ill." He paused. "And I’m concerned."
~ * ~
It occurred to Detective Fred Collins that Anne Case had much the same effect on him that girls in high school—whom he had loved from afar and in vain—had once had; she intrigued him, she filled his mind and his senses. He imagined that he could smell her, not just in her house but around it, too, and then in his car as he drove off, and later, at his apartment, while he prepared for bed. As if she were lingering nearby, watching him, as if she found him intriguing and unapproachable.
It had been two weeks since her death and he had gone to her house three times, not including his initial visit, when he had seen her body, so many wounds in it, her face in peaceful repose. His logs noted each visit, and gave each visit a purpose—"Extension of on-scene investigation," one said—but he realized that his purpose was to know her from being where she had lived and died.
It was not the first time he had formed such an attachment, but it was the first time that it was so intense, and he fought it because it seemed morbid to him, and unproductive.
So he did not go into her house today. He looked at it from his car, looked at the white clapboards and green shutters, the red-tiled roof, the lawn that had grown tall. He looked past the yellow tape surrounding it; the tape read: POLICE LINE, DO NOT CROSS.
The house was sturdy and attractive; people would live in it, they would be told what had happened in it; at night they would pass through it from room to room, and they would imagine that there were shocking and remarkable things to see, if only they had the courage to look.
Fred Collins lingered with his gaze on the house for several minutes. His hand went to the car door handle once, and he gripped it as if he were ready to open it. But he stayed where he was. He was upset with himself, and confused; for being obsessed with a ghost; for creating for himself a woman to love out of the corpse of Anne Case and the leftovers of her life.
This house needs people in it, he thought, knowing that he was trying to distance himself from his purpose here.
At last, he drove off.
TWELVE
“Going to be a beautiful day," said the voice.
David looked back. He saw a shadow, man-shaped, and behind it the pines, which were in great abundance here, and beyond the pines, wedges of pale blue sky. And above . . .
Above.
"No rain today," said the voice. "No darkness today."
Above.
"Today there is blue sky," said the voice. "Today is a beautiful day. All day."
David reached for the shadow of the man. He had no real idea why; perhaps he wanted to test this place, find its reality. But his arm was unfamiliar to him, white and straight—a piece of wood. Then there were muscles in it, then the skin was pink, and he recognized it.
But his arm was still a good distance from the shadow of the man, and David’s outstretched fingers touched only air.
He felt a breeze tickle the hair on his arms.
In awe, he whispered, "This is the earth."
The shadow of the man said, "Going to be a beautiful day. No dark today. Beautiful day."
David’s arm dropped. He moved forward, closer to the shadow of the man. The man receded. The shadow receded. Its movement was attended by a low, flat rustling sound, like paper being crumpled. It was the sound of distance being established, David realized.
The shadow said aloud—louder, though still without urgency—"You can’t stay. How can you stay?"
Then there was again the sound of paper being crumpled, and the shadow moved very quickly, as if it were the shadow of something very small that was being withdrawn by something very, very large. And so, in a moment, stillness was in the forest again, in the dust hanging in the air, in the silence.
~ * ~
At the house, dust collected, settled, formed, dissipated, collected again.
In the fields surrounding the house, people were picking fruit that grew on plants which hung close to the ground. The fruit was sweet, pungent, and red, like strawberries, and one of the people gathering the fruit straightened in the white light, held a piece of the fruit between his fingers, and smiled. "We could have whipped cream with this," he said.
There were people around him, but they made no acknowledgment of him. And the man, having already forgotten what he had said, popped the fruit into his mouth, enjoyed the squish of it under his tongue, and continued picking.
~ * ~
Christian Grieg and Karen Duffy had stayed at a motel outside Syracuse for the night following their visit with David, and they had made love. It was their first time; it had been awkward, self-conscious, unsure, and now, over breakfast at the motel’s tiny restaurant, they were mutually embarrassed but did not want to show it.
Christian was thinking, as he and Karen talked, about the mistakes he had made in his life, the regrets he had fostered and sheltered now. This woman was one of those regrets, he had decided. He did not love her. How could he love her? She was like his sister, or his mother, so it would be wrong to love her in the way that he had.
"I’m sorry, Karen," he cut in.
She stopped talking. She had been talking about her work. "Sorry?" she said, not so he would repeat what he’d said, but because she simply hadn’t heard him.
"I said nothing." He pushed a bit of scrambled egg around his plate. "Go on," meaning that she should go on talking about her work.
Karen mentally played back the last half minute. "You’re sorry for last night, Christian? You needn’t be."
A family came into the tiny restaurant. They were a family of four—mother, father, girl, boy—and they were all very fat. The father said in a high, squeaking voice to the mother, "Over there, Alice," and indicated a booth just behind the booth that Karen and Christian were in.
Christian glanced around at the family; he grimaced a little as they sat down, the man with his back to Christian, so the seat Christian was in moved and shifted. Christian looked around again. He said to the back of the fat man’s head—which was covered with thin black hair—"Do you mind?"
The man did not respond.
Karen said, confused and embarrassed, "Christian?"
The fat man shifted in his seat, making room for his hefty wife. The wife said, "I don’t have no room, Earl."
The two kids were pushing at each other now, not because they had no room but because they often pushed at each other. They smiled chubbily as they pushed; it was a game.
The fat man leaned forward to stop them then, and, when the kids quieted down for the moment, he leaned back with a whump.
Christian said again, "Do you mind?"
The fat man craned his small round head around and smiled at Christian. "Sorry?"
Christian hissed, "You’re moving my seat, dammit!"
The fat man stopped smiling. His wife glanced critically at Christian, frowned, then looked at her children, who were again pushing at each other. As her husband had done, she reached across to separate them.
The fat man looked at his wife. "Let’s move, Alice," he said. Alice nodded, and in a moment the family had seated themselves at a booth on the opposite side of the small room.
Karen said to Christi
an, "That was rude, Christian."
Christian said, "They were people to be rude to. Unnatural people."
~ * ~
Jackson found the window through which he had come into Anne’s house and he stared confusedly at it from the floor. Finally, he leaped to the sill. He paused there, his four feet balancing him on the narrow sill, his big orange head bobbing, tail twitching. His tail twitched when he was in thought. For him, thought consisted of a series of almost random memories (pictures) that flitted through his brain. The memories were weighted plus and minus (though he did not consciously will this). One of the minus pictures which flashed through his head and vanished was of the night and the outdoors, and for Jackson that was blackness and noise and the touch of a thousand small creatures. The noise consisted of grunts, hoots, feet crunching the earth nearby. He had been outside at night only a few times, mostly as a kitten, and those times had formed for him a pulse of terror in the back of his cat brain, because although the hoots and the touch of a myriad of small creatures were disconcerting, the crunch of earth nearby told him that something very heavy was walking about, something his poor eyes could not see. And his only recourse was to run from the sound; run into blackness—into walls and trees, the tires of parked cars. So there really was no escape.
Except inside, into the light.
Which formed a plus memory. Being inside at night, his nightlight guiding him safely into sleep.
There were other pluses and other minuses, all having to do with danger, safety, hunger, contentment; and they were mixed together in his cat brain so that outside did not necessarily translate as danger, and inside did not necessarily translate as safety and contentment.
So he balanced on the sill in Anne Case’s house until, at last, some random pulse, like a spark, sent him leaping to the ground three feet below.
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