Secret Lives

by Diane Chamberlain

  I was still carrying the lit lantern, out in bright daylight. “Just come with me!” I said.

  Kyle sighed like I was a terrible bother and started reeling in his line. “Let's go see what she wants,” he said to Matt.

  “No!” I said. “Matt can't come.”

  Kyle looked at me with his mouth hung open like he couldn't believe I could be that rude, but I didn't care.

  “Kyle,” I said in a voice too low for Matt to hear. “It's the cave.”

  Kyle turned to Matt who was pretending not to be interested in any of this. “I'll be back as soon as I can. You can use my pole too.”

  Matt nodded without looking at us—he is strange, but I have no time to write about that just now.

  I explained what I'd found on the way back to the cavern so he was prepared by the time we got to the little maze room. We each had a lantern now and I was shivering from the cold and my nerves. The tites and mites cast shadows everywhere that we moved as we walked through the maze.

  I expected the skeleton to be gone because by now I'd convinced myself it was only my imagination that I'd seen it at all, but there it was, laid out like its owner had died in his sleep.

  Kyle's face went white as he knelt down next to it. “God,” he said, looking from the skull to the toes and back again.

  “I screamed like a girl when I saw it,” I admitted.

  “You are a girl,” Kyle said, still staring at the bones. “And Matt's noticed that. He likes you.”

  “I don't like him,” I said.

  “Look how small this is.” Kyle stretched his six foot body down next to the skeleton. He was nearly twice as long as the bones. “It must of been a child.”

  That made me feel sad. “How did it get here?” I asked. “When did it get here?”

  Kyle shook his head. “We should tell someone about this,” he said as he stood up.

  “No! They'd come in my cave.”

  “Kate, this was a human being. We can't just act like we didn't find it.”

  “We're not telling,” I said. “It's my cavern and I say we don't tell.”

  November 20, 1943

  I named the skeleton Rosie. I haven't returned to the maze room to look at her and at first I was uncomfortable in the cave, knowing she was at the end of the tunnel. But now that I've given her a name I feel more comfortable in her company. I wonder sometimes what killed her. An accident? Murder? Disease? I guess I'll never know.

  I am more envious of Matt Riley than of Sara Jane. Kyle spends so much time with him. They are like brothers and at times they joke with each other in a way that leaves me out. When they see I don't get it, one of them explains the joke to me but by then it's no longer funny.

  Matt's grandmother died last week. He has been red-eyed since. He is a very soft boy and feels things over sensitively. He looks young and girlish compared to Kyle, who can pass as a man these days.

  Kyle is begging me to let Matt into the cavern. I've decided to let him, not because I want Matt there but because Kyle visits so infrequently these days and this is the only way I can think of to get his company back.

  –14–

  Eden needed to tell Ben about the skeleton. At least that's what she told herself when she called for an invitation up to his cabin. He'd sounded pleased as he gave her directions. “It's hard to find after the sun's down,” he said. “Do you want me to meet you somewhere instead?”

  She thought of their grisly date at Sugar Hill. “No, I'll find it.”

  The moment she hung up, Michael called. It had been only a few days since she'd last spoken to him, yet it seemed like months. Nina was upset about her, he said. She wanted to know what Eden thought of the script she'd sent.

  “Haven't looked at it yet,” Eden said.

  “She says she has a few more for you to see if you don't like that one. She wants to know if you ever plan to work again.”

  “Tell Nina to relax.”

  “She doesn't like having you three thousand miles away from her. Out of her control, you know?”

  Eden grinned into the phone. “Well, I like it.”

  Michael was silent. “You like being that far from me, too?”

  “I just needed a break from the whole scene. From L.A. I didn't even realize it till right now. Don't take it personally.”

  “You sound like you're getting a hillbilly accent or something.”

  Did she? “I'm getting in character early, I guess.” She glanced out the window at the dusky woods. She wanted to get to Ben's before dark. “I've got to run, Michael.”

  “Where are you going?” He sounded hurt.

  “I need to see a friend of Kyle's.”

  “Call me when you get back?”

  “I'm not sure what time that'll be.”

  “Doesn't matter. I'm not going out. Parties aren't the same if I'm not getting high. Or if you're not there. Aren't you proud of me? Three weeks straight.”

  She had told him that one reason she could not consider a serious relationship with him was his cocaine use. “That's great, Michael.”

  “Have you found out anything about Matthew Riley?”

  “My mother writes in her journal that he's overly sensitive and girlish.”

  “Whoa! If you want me in that role, you'd better bend the truth a little.”

  “We'll see. Gotta go now.”

  “Eden? Don't forget I'm here, okay? I love you.”

  She cringed. “‘Bye, Michael. Thanks for calling.”

  She took pains with dressing, finally deciding on khaki pants and a plain white shirt. She let her hair down and actually sneaked out of the house. Kyle and Lou knew where she was going, but she didn't want them to see how she looked. Her appearance would give her away tonight: they would be able to see in her face that this evening meant something to her.

  She drove first to Coolbrook to pick up fried chicken and biscuits and then headed back past Lynch Hollow and into the hills. Ben's cabin was about seven miles above Lynch Hollow. There was no address, only landmarks to guide her. The car filled with the smell of fried chicken as she passed the big oak, the farm by the creek. She pressed the gas pedal harder.

  What was she doing? She'd been cold, practically rude, to the man she'd been seeing for months because she was anxious to see a man she barely knew. A man who rescued lobsters from seafood restaurants. Well, she needed to tell him about the skeleton. Ha! If she had not read about the skeleton in the journal she would have had to invent a reason to see him tonight. She hadn't seen him in two days. She'd spent all of yesterday at the archives in Winchester and most of this morning in Richmond, giving a pep talk to the Children's Fund volunteers. Then she'd had lunch with Fred Jenkins, the dynamic blind director of the Virginia Children's Fund. By this afternoon she could no longer remember the shape of Ben's hands or whether his eyes were blue or gray, and that mattered to her in a way that nothing had mattered in a long time.

  She almost missed the cabin. It was tiny, tucked so thoroughly into the trees that all she could see from the road was the amber light of the two small front windows.

  “I like it,” he called from the open front door before she had even gotten out of her car. “Your hair down.”

  “Thanks.” She handed him the bag of chicken. “You got a haircut. Looks good.”

  “What's that?” He pointed to the notebook in her hand.

  “Part of the journal. There's something I want you to see in it.”

  He pushed the door open for her. He wore jeans and a T-shirt that had once been red or purple but had faded to a mauvey pink that looked good against his tanned arms. “Sorry it's so hot in here.”

  It was hot. The cabin was the size of her bedroom in Santa Monica and purely functional. The floor was bare wood. The tiny kitchen in one corner held a small refrigerator, a two burner stove, and a sink. A sofa and chair, both upholstered in an industrial-strength brown plaid, sat in a second corner next to a wood-burning stove. Newspapers and books littered the heavy wood-plank coffee
table, and a fan in the window above the stove blew hot air across the room. The third corner housed a small closet or, more likely, a bathroom. Ben's bed was in the fourth corner, in front of one of the two front windows. The bed was somewhere between twin size and full, with no head- or footboard. It was covered by a blue-and-white quilt which stood out in the room for its handmade beauty. In the center of the room stood a round table with spindly legs and four wooden straight-backed chairs.

  “Sorry this place is so small.” Ben looked around him as if he'd just noticed the size of his cabin. “And primitive.”

  “It's rustic,” she said, her tone complimentary. She looked at Ben. Despite his rugged demeanor he did not belong in this bare little mountain cabin.

  “It's a little cooler outside,” he said. “Why don't we move the table out there to eat?”

  They set the table and two of the wooden chairs in the small clearing in front of the cabin.

  “You're really isolated up here,” she said. “It must be scary at night.”

  “Not scary. Just lonely.” He had brought a bottle of wine from the cabin and he poured it into plastic glasses. “Sorry about the plastic cups.”

  “If you apologize for one more thing I'm leaving.” She took the wine he offered, hoping it would loosen his tongue a little. She thought of Kyle drunkenly asking Kate for her help in his plight with Sara Jane and began to laugh.

  “What's so funny?”

  “I'm learning more about Kyle than I ever wanted to know. Do you know the bakery on Main Street?”

  “The Millers'?”

  “Yes. Do you know Sara Jane Miller?”

  “Is she the heavyset woman?”

  That he would be so kind in his description of Sara Jane said a lot about Ben, she thought. “Yes. Well, she was Kyle's first.”

  “First…?” He looked confused for a moment. Then his face broke into a warming smile. “Oh, you mean his first.”

  She nodded.

  Ben set down his glass and laughed. “You really shouldn't tell me things like that. Does Lou know?”

  Eden told him how Lou had manipulated her meeting with Sara Jane.

  “I should have guessed,” Ben said. “Lou and Kyle don't have many secrets between them.”

  Just one, Eden thought.

  “Lou's one of a kind,” Ben continued. “She inspires me. When I'm wallowing in self-pity, I think of what she's accomplished with her positive attitude. She's never let her handicap hold her back.”

  “No, she hasn't.” Eden thought of changing the subject, but she wondered how much Ben knew. “Did she tell you how it happened?”

  “Car accident. You were with her, right?”

  She amazed herself by considering the truth, but settled for the lie. “Yes.”

  “She said she was going too fast and a station wagon plowed into her.”

  “She makes it sound like it was her fault.”

  “She drives like a maniac,” Ben said. “You were lucky you weren't hurt.”

  Eden sipped her wine. “She likes you very much,” she said.

  “Lou and Kyle have been wonderful to me. They've gone way beyond the call of duty.”

  She picked the fried crust off her chicken. “What stuns me is that Kyle hasn't censored the journal in any way. If I were him I would have wanted to pull out a few pages here and there.”

  “Maybe he did want to, but he's an archaeologist. He'd never tamper with an artifact. Besides, he said your mother wanted you to have it, right? She knew what was in it.”

  “Yeah, but the truth is my mom was a little kooky. She wouldn't care what I learned about her.” She leaned forward and rested her elbows on the table. “Tell me about you, Ben. I'm not sure what to ask you because I get the feeling some questions aren't safe to ask.”

  “Some aren't.” He smiled. His eyes were gray, a true gray, pale as mist. “I was born in Maryland. Bethesda. Thirty-eight years ago. I have a brother, Sam, who's a psychiatrist and rich and successful. My father was a doctor, my mother a nurse. They died a few years ago within a couple of months of each other.”

  “Oh, I'm sorry.”

  Ben took a bite of chicken before he answered. “Well, it was lousy for Sam and me,” he said, “but really best for them in a way. I couldn't imagine one of them living without the other.”

  “Did you always want to be an archaeologist?”

  “Since I was a teenager. I like examining the past. It's safer than the future. Not too many surprises.”

  “Do you miss teaching?” She plowed ahead. He was still talking, still comfortable.

  “Yes, I guess I do.” He tossed a shred of his biscuit to a squirrel at the edge of the clearing. “I liked standing up in front of people, trying to make what I had to say entertaining enough so they'd get something out of it. I liked working with really bright students who showed a lot of promise.” He shrugged. “But, you know, it's nice to be in the field, too.”

  “Do you miss…what was your wife's name?” More dangerous ground, but he didn't seem put off by the question.

  “Sharon? I miss the life we used to have. We had so many plans, and we'd done a lot together that's hard to just forget, you know?”

  She nodded, thinking of her own marriage. She and Wayne had done amazingly little together over the fifteen years they'd been married. Cassie had been their only common thread.

  He put down his chicken and leaned forward. “I designed the house we lived in. That had always been a goal of mine, and we did a lot of the building ourselves. Would you like to see a picture of it?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  He wiped his fingers on his napkin and went into the cabin. When he returned he showed her a snapshot of a beautiful cedar contemporary that she had no trouble at all picturing him in.

  “It's wonderful,” she said.

  “It was on a wooded lot that backed to the water. Not huge—we couldn't afford huge—but it was really nice. Lots of glass. We were in it eight years and I never stopped marveling at what we'd done.”

  He looked up at her. She saw the glimmer of pride in his eyes and felt his loss.

  “Is Sharon still in it?” she asked.

  He nodded. “With her new husband. She remarried a couple of months ago, probably about the same time Wayne and his schoolteacher tied the knot.” His voice was quiet, his pain almost tangible as it hung above the wobbly table.

  “Something is terribly wrong,” she said.

  He looked up, alarmed.

  “No, not here. I mean, you've been gypped somehow.”

  His laugh was bitter. “No kidding.”

  “You had a special house, a good job. I don't care how vicious a divorce is, people don't lose everything unless they've done something outrageous or…”

  He shook his head, touched her hand. “You said there was something in the journal you wanted me to see.”

  She shoved her plate aside and leaned toward him, arms on the table. “Ben, do you understand that I know exactly how it feels to lose a marriage? To have the person you love marry someone else?”

  “Shhh. I just need a change of topic, okay?” He pushed his chair back from the table. “Where's the journal?”

  It was getting too dark to read outside, so they carried the table and chairs into the cabin. She sat on the plaid sofa; he sat in the matching chair.

  “My mother found a human skeleton in the cave,” she said.

  Ben's eyebrows shot up. “What did she do with it?”

  “Nothing, as far as I've read. She was only sixteen when she found it. She wasn't interested in archaeology yet.”

  “Did you ask Kyle about it? Is it still there?”

  “I didn't mention it to him.” When she'd told Kyle she was having dinner with Ben tonight he'd shaken his head at her. “You need to be very careful, honey,” he said, and she was so bothered by his words that she didn't ask him anything else.

  She opened the notebook to the entry from November 16 and read it to him. Ben laughed when she ha
d finished. “Your mother was a pip,” he said. “Who's this Matt guy?”

  “My father.” She smiled. “This is my introduction to him.”

  “Your mother seems very fond of him.” Ben snickered.

  “It's only 1943 and I wasn't born until 1955. I think it's going to be fun to see how her feelings for him change. I want her to have one great passionate love affair. Can't you picture it in the movie? The way their relationship will grow as they mature into adults? Great sensual tension. Michael Carey's going to play Matt. How young a character do you think he could get away with?”

  “In terms of looks, maybe twenty-one or -two with a little makeup. In terms of behavior, fifteen or so.”

  She laughed. “You don't like him much, huh?”

  “I'm jealous.”

  “You don't need to be.”

  He sighed and set the notebook on the coffee table. “I'll ask Kyle tomorrow about the skeleton, but probably it's nothing or he would have told me. If it were any older than a couple hundred years it would increase Lynch Hollow's value as an archaeological site, so surely he would have done something about it if that were the case. Skeletons don't last more than a few hundred years anyhow. Unless it was really dry in that part of the cave. Your mother did say the tunnel was on an incline, huh? It's possible.”

  Eden was no longer listening. She had spotted a photograph of a little girl on the mirror above his dresser. She walked over to the dresser and plucked it from between the glass and the frame.

  “Is this your daughter?”

  “Yes.”

  She carried the picture back to the sofa and sat down again. The girl had long, straight platinum-blond hair with deep bangs above wide gray eyes. “She's adorable. She has your eyes.

  “Yes.”

  “What's her name?”

  “Bliss.”

  “Bliss?” Eden smiled.

  “Yeah. We had two girls' names picked out and hadn't decided between them by the time she was born. When I saw her in the nursery at the hospital the name Bliss just popped into my mind. I was thinking that someone with that name could never be unhappy.” He rubbed his palms on his thighs. “A little naive of me, I guess.”