Wintertide: A Novel (10 page)

I walked down the hall to the
bathroom, stripped off my clothes and stepped into a hot shower. The chill that
had been with me for hours slowly melted away.

I ran a razor across my cheeks and
along my chin and neck. My tired eyes stared back at me, slightly skittish. The
fresh smell of soap filled my nostrils chasing away all traces of cigarette
smoke and sweat.

Back in my bedroom, I threw on a
fisherman's sweater and khakis and grabbed my coat which was still on the floor.
I left the house before Mom and Dad woke up, leaving a note saying I would be
home early. I also wanted to let them know that I had actually come home last
night. I stopped at a Dunkin Donuts, sat at the empty counter and ordered a
large coffee. The hot liquid scalded my tongue and throat as it slipped down.

Having spent most of my childhood
reclining on the sofa, my eyes glued to the television set, I've often found
myself wishing real life was like TV. When I was nine years old, I wanted to be
Spiderman. I caught spiders in the yard, allowing them to crawl on my skin,
hoping their bite would transform me into a superhero. Then I could climb
buildings and catch bullies in the web that came spewing forth from my wrists. I’d
dreamt of saving a beautiful girl caught in the clutches of an evil criminal. I
would insert whatever girl I happened to have a crush on at the time into the
role. As a kid, I’d wanted more than anything to be a superhero. But the
opportunity had never presented itself, until maybe last night. But I wasn’t a
hero at all. I was the cowardly friend who did nothing but try to save himself.

As I finished my coffee, I thought it
was possible for me to go to work, go home, and not come in contact with
neither Seth nor Eddie again. The bright sun reflected off the thin covering of
snow. Christmas decorations adorned houses and buildings. At the Dunkin Donuts,
a red jingle bell hung on the wall surrounded by silver tinsel. The horrors of
last night seemed unreal. Other than a strong undercurrent of apprehension and
anxiety, my initial panic was giving way to something else. With a strong dose
of caffeine working on me, I attempted to rationalize the situation. I knew I
should have at least tried to stop Eddie, but on the other hand, I was also
pretty sure that I couldn't have. Other than being utterly stupid, I committed no
crime worse than trespassing last night. Right?

I paid the completely disinterested
woman who worked there, wishing her blank, heavily powdered face a happy holiday,
and I walked back out to the car.

Professor Sheffield welcomed me
inside his warm house with a bright smile. There was a station wagon parked in
the driveway next to his car. I assumed his niece had arrived early for the
holidays. I was right.

"Come in, Mr. Hiller. False
alarm on that snow storm, thankfully. I'm afraid my house is a bit of a zoo
this morning. My niece, Barbara, has just arrived. They’ve come to visit me a
day early. With two little children running around, you won't get much done. Why
don't you just take the day off?"

"I could try working and if
I'm too distracted, I'll let you know." The thought of going back home was
too depressing.

"That's dedication for you.” He
clapped me on the back. "You're going to be successful in whatever you do.
You have drive. Even more than talent. Drive, that's the key."

Toys, Barbie dolls, miniature cars
and stuffed animals littered the living room floor. The professor's supply of
peppermints was scattered about, looking significantly depleted. I was glad
that I had piled all the notebooks onto a high shelf next to the desk. A young
girl, about four or five came running out of the kitchen, her long blond curls
bouncing around her head, a piece of toast held tightly in her chubby hand. A
boy, maybe six or seven years old, came dashing out behind her, a wooden spoon
held high above his head. He seemed to be pretending to joust with it.

Professor Sheffield eyed them
affectionately. "This is Rachel and Tommy," he said.

His niece, a heavy, tall blond
woman emerged from the kitchen. "Stop running you two. Rachel, I mean it!”
   

Rachel froze in place about three
feet away from me. She suddenly took notice of my presence, peering up at me
with big brown eyes. I smiled. It was a reflex. Her lower lip began to quiver
and her eyes grew glassy. A moment later she began bawling loudly.

"Oh, Rachel," her mother
said and came over to scoop her up. "I'm sorry," she said to me. "She's
scared of strangers."

"Barbara," Professor
Sheffield said, "this is my assistant, Mr. Hiller."

She smiled at me and brought the
whimpering Rachel back into the kitchen. Tommy jumped up onto the couch and waved
the wooden spoon dramatically above his head. "Do you surrender?" he
demanded.

The professor turned to me. "You
had better surrender or he will try to hit you with that spoon."

I put my hands up in the air. "I
surrender."

The boy jumped off the couch discouraged.
"Everyone always surrenders. What fun is that?"

Professor Sheffield took the boy's
tiny hand. "We'll get out of your way now. Oh, would you like some eggnog?
Barbara made it herself."

"Isn't it early for
eggnog?"

"It's never too early for
eggnog. You don't have to stand on ceremony here, Mr. Hiller. Just come into to
the kitchen if you'd like some."

"Thank you. Maybe later."

I sat down at the desk in hopes of
plunging into the notebooks and losing myself in the work. But the children
clanked, clattered, yelled and whooped in the kitchen. I worked as best I could.
It was slow going. I wanted to prolong the morning. I still didn’t know if my
mother was making a large dinner tonight or if my father would even be there
for it.

Today's notebook was number
fourteen. There was no number thirteen. Professor Sheffield was either
superstitious or that particular notebook was well camouflaged somewhere in the
house.

I turned on a small black portable
radio that sat on the desk, tuning it to an AM news station. I listened for any
word on that man or the house. The major story seemed to be about a whale that
had beached itself in Chatham, but nothing that occurred in South Seaport was
mentioned in the report. There were no break-ins, no beatings, no murders. I
worked for several hours, attempting to tune out the children that ran by
occasionally, giggling and yelling. The keys clicked softy beneath the pressure
of my fingers. The screen glowed in front of me. When my already sore neck
began to pull uncomfortably, I decided a glass of eggnog was just what I needed.
I headed into the kitchen.

Tommy and Rachel were just slipping
out of their chairs, running back into the living room, apparently needing to
expend all the pent up energy that had accrued while sitting for a whole five
minutes. Professor Sheffield and his niece were at the table, each with a cup
of eggnog. They looked up at me when I walked in.

"You've decided to take a
break," the professor said.

I went over to the bowl and ladled
the thick creamy liquid into a short glass. It tasted sweet. The faint hint of
alcohol was subtle.

"Why don’t you sit with us for
a while?"

"Oh thanks, but I'd better get
back to work."

He smiled at me. "Nonsense,
you can sit for a minute. Barbara was just commenting on how nice it must be to
live on the Cape. I told her that you grew up here."

I reluctantly sat at the end of the
table with my glass.

Barbara looked at me. Her face was
full and round, but her chin was distinct and strong. "Uncle Reggie says
you're from South Seaport?"

Uncle Reggie
? "Yes,
that's right."

"So how did you like growing
up there?"

I was going to lie, rendering a
polite answer, but I was in the mood to tell the truth today.

"Actually," I said,
"I didn't really like it at all."

Both Barbara and the professor
looked at me with surprise. "Why not? It's so pleasant here."

"I don't know. I guess it
always felt small to me. There’s nothing much here really."

They both studied me seeming not
quite sure how they should respond. "Well,” Barbara began, “it seems to me
that there’s quite a lot here. You’ve got the ocean and the beaches, great
restaurants, art galleries, and of course the Kennedys live here.”

I tried to keep my face
expressionless as I nodded politely at her, wondering if I really needed to
point out that the Kennedys were completely irrelevant to me. In the end, I
just smiled and responded to the rest of their questions with the expected
platitudes.

As I walked out of the kitchen with
my glass of eggnog, I heard Professor Sheffield talking. "Mr. Hiller wrote
a wonderful paper in one of my classes. That’s why I hired him. He compared a
photograph of a homeless man to the downfall of the Roman empire..."

Concentration was now impossible. Warmed
by the eggnog, I sat staring blankly at the screen, my fingers poised, frozen
over the keyboard. Just then, I heard a soft, wet sneeze. I looked to my right
and there was little Rachel standing beside me, the top of her curly head
barely reached the surface of the desk. She looked up at me as she wiped at her
nose with the back of her hand. Her brown, liquid eyes were intent on my own.

"Hello," I said.

She stood there silently. Her nose
was red and runny.

“Do you have a cold?” I asked.

She didn’t respond.

"Is there something you want,
Rachel?"

At the sound of her name she
blinked and bit her bottom lip. "Why?" she asked softly in a high
voice. She appeared close to tears again.

"Why what?" I asked.

"Why did you do it?"

I blinked at her, my thoughts
veering off in an unwelcomed direction. "What did I do?” I finally managed
to ask.

She pointed down at the leg of my
chair as a solitary, fat teardrop ran down her cheek. I followed her finger,
leaning over to glance under my seat, and then I saw it. I tried not to laugh. When
I sat back down and pushed my chair in toward the desk, the back leg had
inadvertently impaled Barbie. Her rubber face was completely squashed. A fan of
yellow hair surrounded the flattened head. I quickly stood and moved the chair.
Rachel kneeled to the floor, grabbed her doll and ran away.

I sat down again slowly. The
symbolism of Barbie’s fate was not lost on me. Suddenly, I wanted to go home.

I said good-bye to Barbara and her
children. Rachel was hiding behind her mother the entire time. The professor
handed me my check and insisted on walking me to the door. I stood in the open
doorway, my coat on, the cool air drifting into the house. "Have a happy holiday,
Professor Sheffield."

"Yes, you, too. I'd like to
ask you a question. This book is going to be an ongoing process. Would you like
to continue working for me during the next semester? I'll have the computer
moved to my office on campus."

I already had two jobs lined up,
but I’d never before turned down work. "Yes, that would be great,” I
replied. “Thank you."

"Very good then. Have a Merry Christmas
with your family."

Right about then, Professor
Sheffield, with his white beard and ready smile was looking a lot like Santa
Claus to me.

I stopped off at the bank and
deposited almost the entire amount of the check into my savings account. I took
the rest and went to a linen store where I purchased a new pillow and
pillowcase. I was so thrilled by the professor's offer I actually forgot my
anxiety for almost an hour, until I returned home.

"Seth called twice," my
mother said. She was sitting at the kitchen table dressed in a white housecoat
covered with bright yellow daisies. “He said you weren’t answering your cell
phone. So he tried the house.”

I grabbed my phone in my pocket and
sure enough, I had two missed calls. "I'll call him back later," I
said moving past her attempting to hide the shopping bag that contained my new
pillow. I wasn’t ready to talk to him yet.

"What's in the bag, Daniel?” She
was tilting her head to the side, trying to catch a glimpse of it.

"It's a new pillow.” I could have
explained it, clearly she was asking for an explanation, which was that mine
smelled terrible, like this entire house. But I lied. "I'm used to a
fuller pillow at school. I couldn't sleep with the one in my room.”

"Well you should have said
something. I’ve got plenty of pillows in the attic you could have tried."

I shrugged. "Oh well, too late
now.” I started to head upstairs, but then turned back. "Are you cooking a
big dinner tonight?"

She looked put out by the question.
"Of course. Why would this year be any different? I cook it every
Christmas eve. Don't you want me to? Is that why Seth called? Are you two going
out together?"

"No, not at all. I just
thought, well I.....I mean is Dad going to be here?"

She stood and walked over to the
refrigerator. She peered inside for a moment, but closed the door without
taking anything out. "I don't know. But there will be enough food either
way."

I picked up the shopping bag. I was
exhausted and my head was starting to pound. "I'm going to bring this up
to my room.” I bounded up the stairs and down the hallway. What the hell was
wrong with them? She didn't know if he was coming home for dinner again? On
Christmas Eve? I dropped the bag onto my floor and walked to my parents bedroom
at the other end of the hallway. Mom always kept a bottle of aspirin in the top
drawer of her night stand. I didn't wander into their bedroom often. It was
decorated in brown and gold, with a coffee brown rug, yellow curtains and a
shiny gold bedspread. The heavy dressers and night stands were dark wood with
black circular knots.

Basically, no one can imagine their
parents actually having sex. However, here I was looking a lot like my mom,
proof that they had done it at least once. But how anyone who wasn't blind
could actually become turned on in this horrible bedroom was beyond me.