Resurgence: Book 2 of the Second Chances Trilogy

by M. M. Mayle

  “I go other job now,” the bartender explains when Hoop lingers. “Go Newark. After hours joint. Two night jobs buy papers bring ode father Taiwan USA. No nursing home, I take care, I good son,” he brags like he’s the only person in the world respectful of elders.

  The brag doesn’t drive Hoop away, though. For some reason he hangs around till the bus shows up. After the bus wheezes off with the Chink bartender on board, the bartender’s words linger like they’re part of the bus exhaust—like they’re something Hoop ought to write down in his notebook and maybe even underline, along with the fact that the bus had a bike rack on the front.

  Hoop weaves the rest of the way back to his lodgings, the repeating voice in his head bleeped out by this new stuff to think about.

  FORTY-FOUR

  Early morning, August 14, 1987

  The empty space in the bed next to her is still warm. Colin can’t have been gone long. But why? And where?

  Laurel opens one eye, squints at the clock. Too early for Simon to be screeching for someone to fix him; even too early for Anthony to be plotting mischief. She sits up a little, groggy from deep contented sleep, sees that she must have forgotten to pull the drapes across the southeast-facing oriel window last night. She sits up a little more, fixes on a patch of sky large enough to indicate her wedding day is dawning without blemish.

  But this is England; that could change in an hour, she’s reminded by sounds that register as intermittent gusts of wind. She sinks back into the pillows, pulls the covers over her head to block out these ominous sounds. Then, when the puffing noises infiltrate the bedcovers and begin to sound less like a storm brewing than the exhalations of a dragon, she springs out of bed, hurries to the oriel window to see what’s going on.

  She’s not the only one wondering. Colin is visible on the terrace, along with Sam Earle and several of the groundskeepers. Anthony and Simon, in pajamas and wellies, are dancing excitement at the edge of the group, and they’re all staring upward at an unbelievable array of hot-air balloons. There must be one hovering above every open stretch of land on the estate.

  “Oh . . . my . . . god,” Laurel gasps as she dashes to the dressing room for whatever clothing her hands grab first.

  Barefooted, in yesterday’s shorts and still fumbling closed the buttons of a clean shirt, she runs the distance of the central corridor and down two flights of stairs against house rules and better judgment. When she reaches the terrace, those assembled there are as breathless as she is.

  “Will you just look? Did you ever?” Laurel exclaims, drawing spontaneous applause when it’s assumed she’s responsible for the stunning visual display—a display that will also keep airborne paparazzi at a distance, if she’s any judge of things.

  “Brilliant, you are!” Colin grabs her in a quick bear hug, lets go just as quickly to gawk again at the colorful spectacle. “But how did you pull it off without any of us involved?” he says.

  “Me? I didn’t arrange for this . . . Good lord, didn’t you?”

  Colin professes innocence. So do the groundskeepers, who are the logical conspirators.

  “Can we go up in one, Dad? Please? Dad! Can we? Can we? Can we?” Anthony shrieks. Simon takes up the cry without knowing precisely what he’s yowling for, and Sam Earle, suddenly appearing the most culpable, separates himself from the group.

  “Someone would need full knowledge of the open meadows and utility tracks to bring this off,” Colin shouts at the retreating estate manager. “And he’d have to be possessed of the authority to admit strangers bearing balloons to the property, wouldn’t he then?” Colin shouts even louder.

  Sam halts, turns to face Colin. “Indeed he would,” Sam says.

  “He’d also need funding. He’d need the resources of a Nate Isaacs to pay for it all,” Colin says.

  “Not to mention the bollocks,” Sam says with a wink and continues on his way.

  The rest of the group, now increased by members of the household staff, remain mesmerized by the sight until Anthony’s wheedling prompts Laurel to suggest that they go see if a ride might be possible.

  “You go ahead,” Colin says, looking like the thundercloud she feared earlier. “I want no part of it.”

  “Very well.” Laurel scoops up Simon and beckons Anthony to come along. “We’ll discuss this later,” she says to Colin and hurries with the boys in the direction of the nearest balloon.

  They soon see that this balloon is tethered to the trailer hitch of a heavy-duty off-road vehicle that must have rumbled in with Sam Earle’s complicity sometime during the wee hours. As they near the rig, a man on an ATV closes in from the opposite direction. When they meet, the rider swings off the three-wheeler and steps forward to introduce himself as crew chief of the operation. He explains that the twenty-seven balloons are in service to deter overflights by unauthorized aircraft—just as Laurel surmised. But he sees no reason she and the boys can’t be wafted a ways up and down, as long as the weather remains dead calm and no others are clamoring for rides.

  Laurel is required to sign a release that gives pause, reminds that she hasn’t yet signed the documents that will legalize her claim on Anthony and Simon. The signing of those documents is scheduled for later, immediately following the signing of the marriage certificate, and has no bearing on the liability she just assumed. She’s presently responsible for the safety of these children, regardless of their relationship to her. Something to seriously contemplate as the crew chief radios the balloon pilot and calls for additional ground crew.

  She and the boys are directed to wait at a distance as the balloon is vented and coaxed back to earth. Then they’re cautioned to wait until all three members of the ground crew are in place before they approach the wicker gondola. The longer they wait, the more inclined Laurel is to call the whole thing off and suffer the double-barreled consequences of the children’s disappointment.

  Are these pre-wedding jitters she feels? Pre-adoption jitters? Has Nate’s extravagant gesture laid bare the Nate-generated concerns that are never very far from the surface?

  Given the all-clear, Anthony goes first, boosted into the gondola by the crew chief; Simon gets handed up next, fearless and trusting as his big brother. She accepts a leg up from the crew chief, hauls herself into the gondola wishing she’d brought her shoes and left her misgivings behind.

  They’re positioned for even weight distribution before liftoff; this puts Anthony out of her reach but well within range of the pilot. She locks Simon in a tight grip when—with a single chuff of the burner—they rise high enough to recall her arrival here by helicopter and the breathtaking views available from the roof.

  Although they’ve seen it all before, both boys whoop with excitement every time a familiar object is recognized from this novel perspective. The pilot interjects commentary on ballooning; explains everything he does and why; touches on the interdependent subject of meteorology, thereby providing excellent material for Anthony’s next science project, if the boy happens to be paying attention.

  Laurel’s attention drifts as the pilot’s lecture drags on with overly technical descriptions of the role played by the local topography in discouraging violent updrafts and downdrafts, buffering prevailing winds that might otherwise have prevented all manner of flight, and even curtailed development of the centuries-old vegetation dotting the meadows below. As if she hadn’t already figured that out. She’s only half listening as he avers that it would take a truly massive act of God to disturb any of those deep-rooted, long-established oases—another non-profundity. She’s hardly listening at all as the pilot explains that the cord he’s presently manipulating is attached to the parachute valve at the top of the envelope, and will release enough heated air to enable their gradual descent.

  “Dad’s really gonna be sorry he missed this,” Anthony says when their feet are back on the ground. “Why didn’t he come with us? He’s not afraid of high places.”

  “Indeed he’s not,” Laurel says. “Didn’t you see h
im watching from the roof?”

  Laurel is in no hurry to confront Colin’s displeasure at Nate’s presumed wedding gift. She’d rather confront the specimen copper beech tree that’s come to symbolize everything she once thought too good to be true.

  Although the boys must be getting hungry, they go along without complaint when she steers them toward the long open stretch surrounding the tree. At the halfway point to destination, where paved pathway becomes gravel track, she has to walk in the dewy grass to spare her shoeless feet.

  They pass two more captive hot-air balloons before they reach the tree, itself fully inflated with peak summer foliage and splendid in its isolation.

  Today, within its sanctuary she’s more inclined to bow her head than focus upward at the silvery-limbed, dark-leaved canopy. Today she’s inclined to feel prayerful, superstitious even, and want to knock on wood to avoid tempting fate—knock on centuries-old living wood.

  To reach the hub of the tree, she picks her way across bare sun-starved ground strewn with twigs and nutshells, booby-trapped here and there with exposed roots. She raps sharply on the immense trunk, withdraws to see that both boys are watching her intently.

  “I just wanted to see if the Keebler Elves were awake,” she quips to cover for the bizarre behavior. But neither boy looks amused; they both look skeptical, which is quite a stretch for Simon.

  “I’m sorry,” she says, “you deserve better than that. It’s silly, I know—sillier than believing in elves and this tree’s not even hollow—but I was knocking on wood to ward off . . . to keep the rain away.”

  “We call it ‘touch wood’ and we do it to keep evil spirits away. Is that what you meant?” Anthony says.

  “Yes, darling. That’s exactly what I meant. Shall we go now? You both must be starving. I know I am.”

  At the house, Laurel pulls off the children’s boots and scoots them in the direction of the kitchen. She’ll follow as soon as she removes at least one layer of grass stain and mud from her feet.

  The catering tents set up next to the studio yesterday, house a full working kitchen and several prep stations. They undoubtedly have water, soap, and towels on hand and are more convenient than the nearest outdoor water spigot she can think of. But how would it appear for her to go to catering staff for what she needs? Well aware that she’s slated to be the star of today’s show, and even more aware of her disheveled state, she’d likely come across as some sort of Cinderella, and look as foolish as she felt when she was caught knocking wood—touching wood—a while ago.

  The water outlet she has in mind is at the far end of the arcade, in a recess adjoining the walled garden she thinks of as purely medieval for incorporating a weathered bronze armillary sphere, surrounded by unruly perennials and the ancient wisteria gone wild up the framework of the ramshackle iron stairs leading to the roof.

  The spigot is next to the sturdy openwork gate to this enclosure where a unicorn can be imagined feeling right at home. Before washing her feet, she checks that the gate is locked, a ritual observed anytime she’s in the vicinity, and reminds herself to again request that the stairs be removed, if only for her peace of mind—another ritual observed whenever she dares.

  Once her feet are relatively clean, she glances upward to see if Colin might still be monitoring activities from the roof; if he’s still up there he can’t be seen from this particular vantage point.

  In the kitchen, the boys are devouring special-occasion sugared cereal under Gemma Earle’s watchful eye. “Thank you,” Laurel says as she passes through, “I’ll be right back. I need to speak to Colin.”

  “No need to hurry, dear. It is your day, you know,” Gemma says with every indication she’ll be among the first to spill over at the ceremony.

  Laurel scours the ground and first floors in her search for Colin. On the second floor, after determining he hasn’t gone back to bed, she’s about to conclude he is still on the roof when she hears his voice booming from his office. She pauses outside the open doorway to listen.

  “Don’t tell me he’s not there,” Colin says at near fever pitch. He favors the Dorchester over all others and always registers under his own name. I-s-a-a-c-s. Do you hear me? Nate Isaacs, it is.”

  Laurel rushes unto the room, shaking her head. “No,” she mouths and moves to take the phone away from him. “No,” she repeats sotto voce and when that doesn’t work, lets him know full voice that Nate is not at the Dorchester or any other London hotel.

  “Then where the fuck is he?” Colin says to her without ending the call or covering the mouthpiece.

  Laurel makes good her grab for the instrument this time, breaks the connection and calmly explains that Nate is in New York and now—two-something a.m. in that part of the world— might not be the best time to demand of him that the hot-air balloons be removed.

  “How do you know that’s what I was gonna say?”

  “I don’t, but based on your earlier reaction, it’s a damn good guess.”

  “How do you know for dead certain he’s not in London?”

  “Amanda told me, and if she hadn’t, I would have been able to tell from the forlorn expression she’s worn all week.”

  Colin’s expression gives nothing away when he drops into his desk chair and motions her to take her usual place in the dilapidated roll-around chair. She complies, waits for the next development.

  “Do you have any idea what that must have cost?” he says, surprising her with a civil tone of voice. “It’s the tarted-up barrage balloons I’m talking about. He probably could’ve given us a work of art for less—I doubt a small Bonnard would have set him back as much.”

  “Oh but he did give us a work of art, sweetie. Maybe not in the conventional sense, but he did give us something we can keep forever. I know I’ll never forget my first sight of the . . . the sheer spectacle of it. I’m sure you won’t either.”

  “No, I won’t, but don’t forget the sheer spectacle shit is incidental. The dramatic appeal’s secondary to his twitting us for not thinking to look after our own—”

  “If you think he intended that display as a pointed reminder of previous carelessness, you’re wrong!” Her adamance propels the rickety chair out of the corner. “If anything, his gesture is a pointed reminder that he really has backed off,” she says and creaks the rest of the way across the space between them. “And truly has relaxed his vigilance to the extent he’d endorse and pay for the incursion of dozens of strangers onto your premises!”

  “He’s not that relaxed,” Colin says, waving a sheaf of papers at her. “According to the work orders coerced from Sam, every last one of the ballooners and every single member of the support teams was vetted and made to sign confidentiality agreements no different than the other temps working here today. If any of their lot sells an exclusive to one of the usual rags, there’ll be heavy forfeit. I can promise you that.”

  “I see. Do the work orders mention how they got onto the premises without disturbing anyone? You’d think that many vehicles coming in at once would have set the dogs to barking at the very least.”

  “I’m told the dogs did go half-mad with barking and we couldn’t hear them because they’d been removed to the outermost barns. And we didn’t hear the motor traffic roll in because Sam opened a distant place in the fence where there used to be a gate.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “Near the oasts. The hops gate it was called, and only ever used for bringing crops to the kilns. Was sealed off when I bought the place, but for connecting with the interior service road the logical place—”

  “Oh, I remember now. You mentioned it when we were trying to figure out what to do about guest parking.”

  “Yeh, during the session with Amanda when she came up with the better way, the carpooling idea.”

  “I wouldn’t exactly call it carpooling. More like mass transport, and I’m still a little worried about how the guests are going to feel about gathering at a municipal parking lot to be bussed here.”
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br />   “They’ll feel just fine, I’ll wager. They’ll make a party of it.” Colin sets aside the sizable stack of color-coded folders pertaining to every aspect of today’s event. “And they’re not gonna object to wearing ID bracelets. Amanda was dead right about that too.”

  “Are you sure?” You don’t think that’s a little insulting or—”

  “C’mon now. It’s not like we’re collecting fingerprints, and you did rather insist on that level of security, you know.”

  “I know, I know.” She eases back from the desk, as unwilling as he is to make direct reference to the hard-won agreement reached in Paris.

  “Anticipating your next question,” Colin says. “I have Sam’s word that the opening in the fence is manned even as we speak and will be welded shut immediately the balloons depart.”

  “That’s not what I was going to ask. I would like to know, though, how long the balloons will be in place.”

  “Again, according to Sam, and weather permitting, they’ll be released at half-seven and go up like the flock of doves you said you didn’t want for being too schmaltzy and contrived.”

  He smirks.

  She laughs.

  “They won’t interfere with the fireworks, if that’s another worry,” he says.

  “It’s not.”

  “What is, then?”

  “It’s not a worry, I should have said.”

  “You’re losing me.”

  “I’m not worried about the gate, the balloons, or the fireworks, and I’m going to stop worrying about the treatment of the wedding guests. There, is that clear?”

  “No, because you still have that look about you . . . the one that says you’re not quite finished.”

  “Very well. What were you going to say to Nate if you’d reached him at the Dorchester?”

  “Same thing I said to you when I thought you were responsible for the balloons—Brilliant . . . bloody brilliant. And maybe ask him to pop round later.”