Waking Anastasia (2 page)

THREE DAYS LATER
, outside the dark Ipatiev House, Captain Martin Powell folded his camera, stowed it in its leather case, took a much-needed swig from his canteen, and wiped the back of his tanned hand across his narrow moustache. He was one of forty drab-olive-and-dust-uniformed soldiers, many of whom stood at ease, smoking and batting idle conversation around in the warm sun. Except for a small Russian escort in their midst, the armed men were members of the Canadian Siberian Expeditionary Force, there to reinforce the anti-Bolshevik forces. They’d secured the area and were nearly done investigating, having not found the royal family they’d come to liberate but instead discovering evidence of unknown sinister acts committed in a small, cramped room in the basement. The blood had been hastily washed away, but uncountable bullet holes remained.

The voice of Powell’s commander cut through the chatter to his right.

“That’s it, lads! We have a train to catch. Load up and move out! Powell, retrieve the team in the basement!”

“Yessir!” Powell snapped off a sharp salute and jogged to the back door of the manor house. The milling soldiers double-timed back to their waiting trucks, still alert for attack, while their Russian escort boarded their own vehicle. Powell leaned inside the dark stairwell and relayed the order. “Basement detail! Move out! Double time!!”

A half-dozen soldiers trotted up the stairs and out into the bright sunlight, carrying battery-operated lanterns and flashlights. To give them room, Powell stepped into the shrubs flanking the doorway. His heel trod on something neither shrub nor soil and he turned to inspect the unexpected.

Casually lost in the soil between the shrub and the wall was a book—small, cloth-bound, simple. Around an estate so utterly stripped of any personal belongings, this one little, torn, and stained item spoke clearly to him of something dark and wrong in this place of revolution. Before he had an opportunity to examine the book closer, a barked command reminded him of duties best not forgotten. He dropped the curious little volume into his satchel with his camera and hurriedly joined his Expeditionary Force fellows on a truck just as the group of vehicles chugged off after their wary Russian hosts.

EVENTUALLY, OVER IMMEASURABLE
time, the pain and terror sloughed off and away and an arm’s-length-distant warmth surrounded Anastasia. She felt . . . cradled, in a place of safety. But she was restless, too, because somehow it was all wrong and she shouldn’t be here, in this place, this formless darkness. In spite of the coziness, fear trickled back in.

There was faint, unfamiliar music and laughter, growing, moving near, and she thought that a special moment, an
important
moment, had at last arrived. Then the music and laughter faded, leaving her with just the arm’s-length benevolence. No, that wasn’t entirely true, because there was, just beyond the cocoon of warmth, a deeper darkness, a chasm just waiting for her to step away from wherever she was. She steadied herself and waited.

Inside the chasm, the darkness waited, too.

@TheTaoOfJerr: “It’s no good pretending that a relationship has a future if your record collections disagree violently . . .”

~Bruce Hornsby

Present Day

WITH ONLY THREE
and a half weeks until Christmas, an unseasonably early deep-freeze slammed Southwestern Ontario and started icing over the Thames River that bisected the dozing town of St. Marys, twenty minutes down-river from Stratford. Jeremy Powell—twenty-four, determined, and stubborn—was bundled tightly against the knife-edged cold in his much-worn, fire-engine-red, Eddie Bauer parka. Refusing to give in to the cold, he snapped another photo of the short icefall forming where the river flowed over the low dam a hundred yards from Queen Street, the town’s main thoroughfare. Jerry moved his tripod-mounted Canon to capture another angle, marvelling at how the subtle pastels of the ice-reflected evening light changed the images ever so gently.

He was so bundled against the cold that when his cell phone rang, the theme from
Mission: Impossible
was too muffled for him to be sure he’d heard it at all. He stopped and listened and the second ring seemed clearer. Hurriedly, he yanked his gloves off, stuffed them under his arm, and frantically searched the large pockets of his bulky jacket, trying to find the phone before it went to voice mail. On the final ring, he found it and snapped it open.

“Jerry here.”

“Jerr, it’s Manny Werinick, out on Vancouver Island.” The Aussie accent was thick and the deep voice full of joy.

“Mr. Werinick . . . hi.”

“It’s ‘Manny’, mate. Nothing but.”

“Manny, then.” Jerry smiled. Manny seemed to ooze glee and even standing in the freezing cold a couple thousand kilometres away, Jerry felt the glow. “Did you get the email I sent, with the audio files?”

“I did, Jerr.”

“Great! Have you had a chance to listen—”

“With a voice like yours, Jerr, you could woo the joey from a wallaby’s pouch. Your résumé kicks ass, too. The job’s yours if you want it, mate.”

Jerry’s breath caught. “Really? Wow. I didn’t expect your decision quite so soon. I haven’t even told my girlfriend or my family that I applied for it. When do you need my answer by?”

“Monday’ll be soon enough, mate. Just think on it over the weekend and get back to me.”

“Thanks, Manny. I guess I’ll talk to you Monday.”

“Looking forward to it, young fella. Have a great weekend, and enjoy the bloody cold one last time, cuz it’s never like that here in Victoria.”

“One more reason to aim for the West Coast, then.”

“One of many, Jerr, one of many. Monday. Gotta run, mate. Cheers.”

“Cheers.” The call ended, Jerry stared at his phone, now oblivious to the cold, damp air freezing his bare hand. “Sonofabitch. I got it! ‘Jerry Powell, Station Manager’. Damn, I like the sound of that!”

TWO HOURS LATER
, Jerry sat in the cozy, warm Riverside Diner on the limestone- and heritage-lined main drag of St. Marys, wiping rib sauce off his fingers. It was the kind of retro diner the locals cherished and the tourists expected, with a dozen Formica-topped, steel-trimmed tables and four green-vinyl-wrapped booths. The Riverside was only a third full with the usual post-dinner coffee crowd, mostly due to the cold, but also because the local minor hockey team—the Lincolns—were still beating up the visiting rival London Nationals in the second period. This left Jerry to share the last booth, the one in the shadows at the back, with Haley Simmons, his on-again-off-again, nearly-divorced, live-in girlfriend of the last two years.

The long photo shoot in the cold and a belly full of Riverside ribs had Jerry wanting to be ensconced in the warm comfort of their own apartment, slippers on his feet and Netflix on the big screen. “I don’t know why we couldn’t have had dinner at home, Haley. There are a couple things I wanted to talk to you about.”

“Sorry, Jerry, but there’s something I want to tell you and I really don’t want to do it at the apartment.”

“Oh-kay. That’s a little odd, but what’s up?”

Keeping her eyes downcast, she took a sip from her steaming mug followed by a slow, deep, nervous breath. When she finally looked up and spoke, her voice was soft and the words came quickly. “I won’t be going back to the apartment, Jerry. Steve and I . . .”

Jerry had a good idea where this was headed—where it had been headed for a month or so now—so he shut up and mentally crossed his fingers.

“. . . and for the sake of the girls, I’m moving back and we’re going to give our marriage one more try. You know I love you, but the girls need me.”

“You’re sure this time? Steve’s sure?”

“Yeah. I . . . I need them, too.”

“Haley, I’ve always said that I’d respect your decision if you went back to Steve and the girls, and I do.”

She took his hands in hers and kissed them, grateful. “Thank you, Sweetie. We’ll still be friends. Steve and the girls like you, so maybe you can come over for Sunday dinner every so often.”

Jerry forced a half smile. “Sure.” He was surprised how much actually hearing her say the words hurt.

“You’re not mad?”

“Why would I be mad, Haley? Disappointed, yes. Mad? What would be the point?” He shook his head sadly. “You’ve made your decision. And now I’ve made mine.” He dropped a handful of fives on the table to take care of the bill, then stood up with his heavy coat in hand. “Take care, Haley.”

She reached out to stop him from leaving. “Jerry . . .”

“Have a good life, Haley. No regrets. Call me when you want to come get your stuff.” He turned to leave but only got two steps before her quiet whisper stopped him.

“I love you, Jerry.”

“Yeah, me too.” He placed a folded ten-dollar bill on the counter in front of their waitress as he passed by. “Thanks, Tanya. G’night.”

Both relieved and sad that Haley had finally made up her mind, Jerry stepped firmly out into the night. Once outside, bundled up against the cold, he shook off unexpected tears. Then he steadied himself and headed off up the Queen Street hill, now fervently wishing he’d driven instead of walking the half-mile from the apartment. The throb of a familiar headache was already starting.

He was only a block from home when the mild throb transformed into a full-blown migraine within the space of a heartbeat, causing Jerry to stumble on the freshly plowed sidewalk. His boots scuffed awkward marks in the light dusting of snow as he slammed his eyes shut and jammed his gloved hands against his temples with the hope that just this once he could squeeze out the pain. The movement only seemed to sharpen and define the agony, and he wobbled a few more steps before dropping to his knees into the nearest fluffy snowdrift. The pain of his bruised heart forgotten, he ripped off his woollen toque and slammed two generous handfuls of snow to his temples, crushing them hard to his aching skull.

“Oh God oh God oh God.” Unsuccessfully willing away the spikes of torturous current, he groaned and whimpered and tried not to puke.

The vice tightened on his skull, and he was sure his head was going to explode like a grape. Then the worst of the wave passed and he was able to roll over into a sitting position and look around. His vision was blurry as hell but he could see that he was still very much alone beneath the streetlight, in the softly tumbling snowfall. He suspected that everyone else in St. Marys was either inside, barred against the cold, or at the hockey game, screaming encouragement at their team. Not a single car passed by in the five minutes Jerry took to eventually stagger to his feet and start stumbling his way through the final leg of what had just become a marathon journey home. By the time he reached the walk leading up to the scruffy, ninety-year-old former Victorian manor, he felt the beast of a second storm of pain stalking him, close on his heels.

In through the shared entrance, up the Everest of the bending, scream-squeaking, wooden stairs, he fumbled with the key, dropped it once, snatched it up, and gently, deliberately, slipped it into the lock. The entire time, the Riverside ribs threatened to come back up and stain the faded old wallpaper with barbeque sauce. With his weight against the door when he turned the key and the knob, it slammed open, pulling him into the darkness. He managed to stay on his feet just long enough to shoulder the door closed behind him before he succumbed to gravity and crumpled.

Almost blind from the pain, Jerry let instinct guide him. He crawled down the long, semi-dark hallway to the cluttered coffee table in the living room where a distant memory told him that somewhere on the table, amongst the variety of half-read photography magazines and a D. B. Jackson novel, was a huge bottle of some extra-strength painkiller. A quick grope found the bottle, and after a brief struggle to open it, he popped four of the chalky white tablets into his mouth and chewed. With a swallow from a warm, half-empty can of Pepsi on the end table beside him, he washed down the crushed relief, crawled onto the couch, and curled up in a fetal ball, smushing a cushion over his eyes to block out the light he didn’t have the energy to turn off. He rocked back and forth, groaning, wanting to puke but not daring to for the further torture it would inflict. Soon tears came, but for the pain, not for Haley or the pseudo life they’d had. It took almost half an hour, but he finally fell asleep, not giving a damn that he was still wearing his snow-wet coat and boots.

JERRY WOKE ONCE
during the night, long enough to remove his outdoor clothes, stumble into the bathroom to relieve his bladder of the previous evening’s coffee, and then back to the couch. The bedroom was still too far away. By the time the sun came up, he was finally sleeping peacefully and soundly under the old afghan blanket he’d had since he was a kid.

NOON FOUND HIM
sitting up, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, and draining the rest of the Pepsi with a disgusted grimace. He swallowed the warm, syrupy sweetness, and found himself staring at Sushi, his Siamese fighting fish that watched him from the little tank on his desk.

“Ladies and gentlemen, pain has left the building. A couple more skull-crushers like that and I’ll have them amputate my damned head, Soosh.” He yawned, levered his stiff body up off the long couch, and stretched out the kinks he always got from sleeping there. He was twisting his neck left and right to pop the tendons and get the blood flowing again when there was a rapid, insistent, small-fisted knock at the apartment door.