IMPERFECT ORB

by K. Lorel Reid

  “So what are you doing home so early?”

  “I just came to pick up a few papers. I was just on my way to car, ready to head back to work, when I saw you walking away. Where were you going?”

  Michael’s heart leapt into his throat and lodged there. He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. He closed his mouth again. It didn’t matter. He was out of excuses. The stress and the heat and the general feeling of being interrogated were waring him down.

  “Mikey,” his mother pressed impatiently.

  Quickly Mike composed himself and blurted out something about losing something in the woods. Before his mother had a chance to ask him exactly what that something was he pushed past her, insisting that he had to go to the washroom this instant. That one wasn’t a lie, it was the bald truth and suddenly it constituted an emergency.

  Stepping into the powder room on the main level Mike locked the door behind him and waited for the slumping green car to start. The sound of its engine was distinct: it sounded as lazy as the car looked. When finally that familiar purr grudgingly alighted on Mike’s ears, Mike quickly flushed the toilet and washed his hands before throwing open the bathroom door and running into the kitchen. On his way out of the bathroom he caught sight of his face in the mirror. Despite the dirt and grime it looked familiar to him; more familiar than it had in a long while. He couldn’t say exactly what the difference was. He had, after all, just glanced his reflection for a fraction of a second; and anyway he didn’t have time for aesthetics. Not only was he in the middle of a complete and utter emotional meltdown, his frayed nerves demanded confirmation that his mother was really and truly gone.

  Sure enough, from the small, perfect square of a window in the kitchen he saw his mother’s forest green car roll slowly up the road before disappearing onto a side street.

  That had been a total and complete catastrophe and although he wasn’t out of the woods yet, Mike felt he was safe for now.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  David stood looking up at they grey brick house. It was the house he had called home all his life and after such a long time it was hard to imagine gaining comfort from any other house the way he did from his. There was a time when he’d harboured an irrational dislike for the light blue trims and wanted his own room painted a deep navy blue. That had all passed and he, again, became content with his grey brick home — trimmings and all. The house always seemed to have a peaceful appearance to it which David found to be exceptionally comforting.

  David’s mother would be up by now. He couldn’t say for sure but he suspected it was about two o’clock. She liked to catch up with her soaps on her days off from work and in the afternoons, guaranteed, his mother could be found watching one soap or another. David also liked the daily soap operas but tried to keep away from them. To get addicted to a daytime soap in the summer was the worst thing a person could do. He knew this because a few years ago he had succumbed to the glitzy charm of the serial dramas. It had gone from bad to worse and by the time school was ready to begin in the fall David found himself in deep trouble. For months he had hounded his mother for detailed summaries of what he had missed, even though her descriptions were never quite enough from him. He always felt as though she were leaving something out. But today would be different. Today he’d watch whatever it was his mother was watching, chiefly because he felt the need to be engrossed in something other than the turmoil of his current thoughts.

  David pushed open the front door, painted light blue to match the shutters, and stepped into the cool hallway. The air conditioning was on and he couldn’t help but feel a sense of relief to have the cool air blowing over his skin.

  “Mom,” he called, walking further into the house, “I’m home.”

  His mother was in the den just as David had suspected. She sat on the floor directly in front of the television. She only glanced up to “shh” David then returned her attention to the screen. David took a seat on the large, overstuffed chair that dominated one corner of the den. He’d chosen that particular chair because it was one of those that you automatically fell asleep in. A dreamless sleep was what was needed to put his mind at ease. Problems just did not seem as insurmountable after a good nap. If sleep did come he would not fight it.

  As David made himself comfortable in the chair, the music from the television picked up and he turned his attention that way. On the screen there was a man dressed in black scurrying across what appeared to be a darkened living room. The camera then zoomed in on a brass door knob that was slowly being turned, presumably from the other side of the door. The music suddenly stopped and the picture didn’t fade out but was snatched away and replaced with a man in a white lab coat. This smart looking figure stood in front of a large line graph and David instantly recognized it as a well-played commercial for toothpaste.

  “What was happening there?” David asked, knowing that only during commercials was it safe to talk.

  “That was Rick, he was inside the Kenningway mansion. He was looking for some papers to prove they stole the baby.”

  “What baby?”

  “Julia had a baby…. Or more accurately she said she was pregnant. I think it’s part of her plan to inherit the entire Kenningway fortune. Annette also had a baby, but for some reason the hospital has no record of it. They couldn’t even find the baby. So naturally she has now been committed to an insane asylum. Rick thinks that somehow Julia’s involved — so do I.”

  David sat back, eyelids threatening to fall closed, and waited for the show to resume. This was very interesting. Last time he’d watched this show Julia and Rick had presumably run off together. He hadn’t believed it then and he didn’t believe it now.

  The show returned and the two watched in silence. Rick’s scene was replaced by another equally, if not more, intriguing. When the commercials returned David again broke the silence.

  “Mom,” he asked, “Do you know of any kind of a glass toy or contraption, shaped kind of like a sphere, that can fly?”

  “A glass toy?”

  “Not a mirror type of glass, the window kind…” David thought a moment then added, “except you can’t see through it.” It was weird the way Mike’s contraption reflected colours. The types of colours that would be seen in a greasy pool of water. That was it. That’s what those colours reminded him of.

  Now it was his mother’s turn to think. The brown haired lady thought for a long time — almost too long. Nevertheless his mother’s response was exactly what David would have guessed it to be.

  “No,” she admitted, “I can’t say I have. But then there are so many high tech toys out there I couldn’t possibly know them all. But I must say, making a child’s toy out of glass doesn’t sound right to me. Are you sure it isn’t plastic?”

  David didn’t feel sure about anything at the moment. He supposed it could have been some kind of rigid plastic — plexiglass? He suspected Mike may have built that contraption himself, although for what purpose David couldn’t even begin to guess. David suspected it may very well be easier to work with plastic than glass. Regardless, the truth still remained that Mike was a genius at anything, so whatever material Mike may have been forced to work with, he would have found a way to persevere and get the job done.

  David tried to conjure up the image of that spinning ball shattered on the ground. He thought he remembered the scene well but the details of that memory were already beginning to fade. He couldn’t recall for certain whether or not he had seen any wires or microchips. There may have been. He definitely did not recall seeing a battery, although there could very well have been one — a small one — and he just hadn’t noticed it amongst the debris. Suddenly, as he surveyed the scene in his mind’s eye, he became convinced that clear plastic, even of the rigid variety, was a definite no-no… it was glass that had been broken.

  It wasn’t long before David became frustrated with his memory of the afternoon’s events. After the glass had shattered everything else that had t
aken place had happened quickly. There were a number of things that his other senses had picked up on while in the Drop, but which he had not seen directly. There were also things that he’d thought he’d seen but now suspected had been nothing but manifestations of his imagination. For example, he’d seen what had appeared to be a beautiful glass gadget turn menacing before his eyes. He wasn’t sure about this, but David got the feeling that maybe the ball had begun to change — as if it were some kind of living being that could go from one mood to another. But then, that may have been one of the things he thought he had seen but really hadn’t.

  David had heard things, though. He’d heard that geometric shape spewing a vitriolic tirade and then crying out, high pitched and strained. He couldn’t tell if it had been a cry of defeat or a cry of surprise. He wouldn’t have minded not knowing, it was the not being sure part that frightened him and— .

  Or maybe that was just something he thought he had heard. Just like he thought he had seen corresponding colours to the sounds he’d supposedly heard. They weren’t dark shades — that was the only thing that made him doubt it was his imagination. His imagination would have associated a bright red for trouble, the grey of thunder clouds for malice. That’s what was so surprising about the entire thing: what he thought he saw was a washed out, pale blue with a questioning tone. In the Drop that washed and pale blue had looked familiar, and once he’d made the steep climb back out to the surface, David recognized it as the sky. Now why he’d seen something like that, he just couldn’t say. Of course, that was only what David thought he had seen.

  David had also felt something. He was sure he had felt this because he had seen its effects on Mike as well. Mike had been standing in front of him with his back turned towards him. To see that blank back had been frightening and although he thought the sight of Mike’s face wouldn’t be as horrible as the one he’d conjured up in his mind’s eye, David didn’t want to see that either. Just because Mike’s back was facing David, however, didn’t mean that David hadn’t seen Mike reacting in much the same way that he had. When the wind had picked up suddenly and without warning the hands of both boys had gone up to brace themselves and protect their faces from the now airborne bits of twigs and leaves and dirt. David couldn’t say exactly how long the gale had lasted but the feeling of it pulling at his skin, trying to tear away the cloak that shielded his bones, was still on him. Had Mike felt it also? The menacing, vindictive nature of that wind? That was a question he wanted desperately answered. To find the answer to that question would go a long way towards clearing up exactly what had happened and what had not. Although he wasn’t sold on the idea, David felt that perhaps he’d imagined the wind also.

  “Hey David, you all right?” His mother was standing directly in front of him, looking at the deep lines that creased his forehead. The lines only added to the picture of worry that covered his face — not a usual look for him.

  It took David a moment to get his bearings but in time he pulled himself from within the Drop and back into the familiar den. He looked up at his mother, his face confused, his mouth agape.

  “David, what’s wrong?” She sounded genuinely concerned.

  “Nothing Mom, I was just thinking.”

  She frowned.

  “About what?” she asked, skeptically, all concern gone from her tone; like it was just so not plausible for him to be sitting on the couch deep in thought.

  “Nothing,” he replied, “just thinking.”

  She pursed her lips, as if to say, ‘I knew it. No thinking going on there. Daydreaming? Maybe. Thinking? Definitely not,’ but responded out loud with, “Well, I know what you should be thinking about.”

  “What?” He was afraid to ask because he already knew the answer.

  “Homework.”

  Now it was David’s turn to frown.

  His mother went on as though she hadn’t noticed, “I’ve figured out the problem, David. You should be doing your homework right after school, while all that great knowledge is still fresh in your mind.”

  “I don’t have any homework tonight.”

  “Well… well then you can study. The final exam is coming up quickly; remember you have one month instead of five.”

  That was great. He couldn’t even pretend to do homework right now. He’d left all his books at school. How was David going to explain the fact that he didn’t have his books? There wasn’t any way around it, his mother would get it out of him eventually, so David decided to just tell her, knowing that it would inevitably lead up to the Responsibility Talk.

  Of course David was right. Not only that, he received the extended version. The Talk had brought them into the kitchen where David started fixing something to eat. Dinner would be a while. The only one who did any serious cooking in the household was Mr. Ryan and by the time he got home and put something together it would be well passed seven o’clock.

  “Mom, I’ll bring home my books tomorrow and every single day after that.” It was a few of the small handful of words David had offered throughout the entire conversation.

  “You should have brought them home today, you have to learn — “

  “Mom, do you know how the Drop came to be?”

  It was a drastic change in the discussion and cut Mrs. Ryan off in mid-sentence.

  “Why would you ask that?”

  “Just wondering,” David said, shrugging and taking a bite out of his sandwich.

  “Well, I couldn’t say for sure, but I suspect it was put there just like Harold’s Knoll.”

  David understood this perfectly, as did most of residents of Ceedon’s Valley. Harold’s Knoll was a great, cresting, forested hill that stood at the base of the steep mountainous terrain to the north. Whereas the mountains were too treacherous for any kind of recreation, Harold’s Knoll, on the other hand, was perfect for hiking during the summer and skiing during the winter. It offered breath taking views of Ceedon’s Valley and its waterways from almost every angle. Harold’s Knoll was widely rumoured to be a man-made artifice, from a reclaimed garbage dump no less.

  So it made sense (in Ceedon’s Valley, anyways) that the Drop — something that was absolutely beautiful to view from every angle — may have been one of those man-made creations that had sprung up over the course of a few months instead of being crafted by nature over the course of a few hundred years.

  “Is there any way we’d be able to know for sure?”

  “Nobody knows for sure,” David’s mother replied, “it’s just there looking picturesque, that’s why no one complains. There must be something about it down at the city hall or in the library archives — buried deep so the tourists can’t find it.”

  “Do you know what’s inside the Drop?” David asked, trying to sound casual.

  His mother’s face took on a odd look that brought here eyebrows together over her eyes. (Now who was thinking too hard?)

  “Inside the Drop?” she repeated questioningly.

  “That’s right. Inside the Drop.”

  “David, I can’t imagine that there is anything inside the Drop except for trees. You can tell. Just stand a good distance away and you’ll be able to see a full canopy of leaves.”

  David didn’t say anything, he only thought a moment. What his mother said made perfect sense. That was, after all, what he had thought until that day. It was really fascinating, and he could’t help but wonder what he’d see if he went back down there again. He could always track down the moustache-man and ask him. Ceedon’s Valley was ‘small town’ in every sense of the phrase and the chances of David running into moustache-man at a plaza or finding someone who knew how to contact him was far from nil.

  “Why all the questions about the Drop?” his mother wanted to know.

  “Just wondering. Today, on my way to school, there were a bunch of men gathered around there. They said they were going in.”

  “What for?”

  “I couldn’t say for sure, but they stopped me a
nd asked if I had seen these kids.”

  “Kids?” His mother sounded wary. David could tell that she knew where this conversation was going. “What kids?” she asked, as if David really had to explain.

  “Well, the men didn’t say much but I got the impression that some kids were missing.”

  “Really? I haven’t heard anything about it.”

  “They were probably just discovered gone this morning. If they’re not found soon we’ll have another search party.”

  His mother understood. Every year-round resident of Ceedon’s Valley understood. At least a few times a summer one or more of the campers would go missing and the townspeople would have to mobilize a search party — an effort at which they had become quite adept. The missing person was usually found or would somehow find their way back into town of their own volition. Often that person was dehydrated and exhausted, either due to exposure to the elements or exposure to whatever party their journey had taken them to, but otherwise they were okay. Sometimes, though, campers simply vanished. Dogs often tracked them to a point not far from their camp site and then it was as if — poof! — they had simply disappeared into thin air, leaving behind their belongings, their vehicles, their families. These cases, which occurred more frequently than any resident of Ceedon’s Valley cared to admit, were almost never talked about, and David knew why. The campers were everything to their small economy. Nobody wanted Ceedon’s Valley to get that kind of reputation. David could only assume that law enforcement continued the search for those truly missing with quiet determination. For the families.… David knew of several who continued to annually plaster Ceedon’s Valley and it’s surrounding towns with posters of missing loved ones.

  Again the question came back to David. What would he see upon returning to the Drop? There was one very simple way to find out. All he had to do was go back there and look. He’d be able to locate the entrance fairly easily, he was confident of that. The only thing David was unsure of was what he’d do once inside. Just look, he suspected. He’d look to see….