Through the open door of the bedroom, I can hear Caitlyn singing to herself down the hall as she unpacks.
My unpacking is relatively easy. I hang my clothes in the closet and I tuck away the rest in the dresser. I’m not much of an interior designer, so the walls are going to remain bare. The only ‘decoration’ is a photo on the mantel over the fireplace of Nicole and I on our wedding day. Now, I’m sitting on the corner of the bed with the last thing that needs to be put away: a small cardboard box. I stare at it for a moment, then flip open the lid to reveal the small, snub-nosed pistol resting inside. I purchased it at a pawn shop a few months earlier, during what was my lowest point after Nicole’s death. It was an impulse buy that I immediately regretted, but I can’t bring myself to get rid of it. I keep the bullets in the drawer below the top drawer in a pretense of safety. Nicole would be furious if she knew I had a gun in the house.
“But Nicole’s not here, is she?” I mumble to myself and instantly feel ashamed.
I close the lid, go to the dresser, tuck the box into the back of the top drawer, bury it behind pairs and pairs of socks, and push the drawer closed.
The wind blasts across the top of the chimney, filling the room with a soft wail.
I take in my new bedroom.
It feels cold; like the room doesn’t want me here. The shadows on the walls don’t seem to match what’s around me.
It’s a ridiculous thought, of course. The room feels unwelcoming because this isn’t the same room as before. I was supposed to share this room with Nicole and now, she’s not here. That’s all. I’ll get used to it. I really don’t have a choice, do I?
The wind gusts again, causing a louder wail than before.
But not right now, I think, and head out the door.
*
A gust of wind rattles the window above the sink.
“Bowl,” Caitlyn announces.
She hands me the bowl and I place it on the shelf in the cabinet.
She takes another paper-enclosed item out of the box marked ‘kitchen’ and unwraps it.
“Little bowl,” she declares.
“Thank you,” I reply and place it next to the stack of other bowls in the cabinet.
After unpacking our rooms, Caitlyn wanted to help with the rest of the house. I wasn’t going to say no and figured that the kitchen would be the room with the most objects she could help with. At first, she delighted in unwrapping the items, like she was unwrapping Christmas presents. She would take them out of the box, tear away the paper, declare what they were, and hand them to me to put away in the cabinets she can’t reach. However, that was an hour ago and for her, it’s no longer like Christmas.
She lifts another item out of the box and unwraps it.
“Bowl,” she sighs, disappointed.
“Thank you,” I say, repeating our process.
“We have a lot of bowls,” she says.
“Well … maybe.”
I guess we do have a lot of bowls but the real problem is that she’s getting restless. The novelty has worn off.
Caitlyn looks at her hands and claps them together.
“Gloves,” she says.
“What’s that, pumpkin?”
“I need gloves. The movers had gloves. I should wear gloves.”
She abruptly turns and walks away into the dining room, out of sight.
“Caitlyn?”
“Be right back!” she calls out, her voice heading upstairs.
I lightly laugh, bend down, take another object out of the box, and remove the heavy wrapping paper.
A bowl.
Caitlyn may have a point.
Another gust of wind rattles the window, drawing my attention, and I glance out across the lawn towards the lake.
Nicole is standing by the shore.
She’s staring right at me, unmoving, with a fearful, anxious expression. The wind whips her hair about her face.
The window continues trembling in the frame.
Behind her, the surface of the lake ripples from the wind.
She looks so worried, so scared. It’s as th—
“Okay! I’m ready.”
I drop the bowl. It crashes to the floor and shatters into countless shards of sharp, ceramic pieces.
Caitlyn is standing just inside the kitchen doorway, wearing her big, bulky, red snow gloves. She looks just as startled as I am.
“Pumpkin, you scared me.” I exhale, clutching my chest. “I’m sorry.”
We stare at the broken pieces.
“It’s okay, Dad. We have a lot of bowls.” She stares at the pieces a moment longer and then has an idea. “I’ll go find the broom!” she proclaims, like she’s going on a new adventure, and stomps away.
I turn back to the window.
Nicole is gone.
*
A few hours later, I’m in the living room, working on that most essential of projects: the entertainment center. Caitlyn is reading a book on the couch. I’ve already hooked up the television. It’s resting on the floor while broadcasting a Cubs game. They’ve brought in their “ace” relief pitcher who has promptly blown a two-run lead.
“Oh, you jerk!” I say as the runner crosses the plate.
Caitlyn raises her head to look at me, but goes back to reading.
The wind has died a little bit, but short gusts will occasionally rake across the house.
I’ve gotten over the shock of seeing Nicole. Honestly, it’s nothing new.
I’ve been having dreams about her. They started the day after the accident. Sometimes, they’re nightmares. Other times, they’re wonderful visions where we’re living our lives, like nothing had happened. I’ll wake up right in the middle of the dream and try to fall back asleep as quickly as possible, in the hopes that I can pick up right where I left off, but whenever I fall back asleep, we have really big heads and are watching sumo wrestling fish or something equally bizarre.
I’ll admit that this was different. It was the first time I’ve seen her while I was awake, but I’m not too bothered by that. After she died, I used to feel like she was around all the time at the apartment, and today of all days, when I was missing her more than I thought possible, of course I would see her in my mind’s eye. I’ve come to grips with the idea that the next few weeks and months are going to be tough with moving into a new house without Nicole. I don’t know how I’m going to react, but I’m just going to have to roll with the punches.
There’s a knock at the door.
“Hello?” a sing-song voice rings from the porch.
I stand up and walk to the door.
I open it to find a woman in her early sixties with short, dyed hair that remains almost motionless against the wind. Her cheeks are creased in laugh-lines. Her eyes sparkle, as does her jewelry. In one hand she has a plate of cookies. In the other, she’s holding a bottle of scotch. She is clearly in a class by herself.
“Are you my new neighbors?” She smiles.
“I believe so,” I reply. “Come on in.”
“Thank you.” She steps inside and I close the door behind her. “I’m Mildred Johnson. I live next door.”
“Hello, Mildred Johnson. I’m Daniel Price and this is my daughter, Caitlyn.”
Caitlyn gets off the couch and joins us.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Mildred says with, of all things, a curtsey to Caitlyn.
Caitlyn loves it and tries to return the gesture. “Nice to meet you, Mrs. Johnson.”
“Oh, you can call me Mildred. I wanted to welcome you two to the neighborhood.” She offers the plate of cookies to Caitlyn. “These are my legendary ‘Twice-Spanked Cookies’. The trick is, just as they start to rise when you’re baking them, you spank them down with a spatula.”
Caitlyn takes the plate. “Thank you, Mrs. Johns— I mean, thank you, Mildred.”
“You are so welcome. And this is for you,” she says, extending the bottle of scotch in my direction but stops. “You’re not on the wagon, are you?”
I laugh. “Nope.”
“Oh, thank God,” she sighs, and hands it to me.
I don’t recognize the label, but I do notice that the bottle has been opened and some of the liquid is gone.
Mildred reads my mind.
“I had to know if it was any good,” she offers without a hint of shame.
“And now, it’s my turn. Care to join me?”
*
We spend a little while talking in the kitchen while Caitlyn enjoys one of Mildred’s ‘twice-spanked’ cookies. The wind has finally died down to a gentle breeze and we head outside.
Mildred and I sit on the back porch, sipping our scotch, enjoying the sunshine, and watching Caitlyn stand knee-deep in the water and attempt to skip rocks. Occasionally the wind will kick back up for a second, grab hold of one of the flat stones Caitlyn just threw, and send it sailing to the left.
“So, Daniel Price. What do you do for a living?”
“I’m an author.”
She raises an impressed eyebrow. “Really? What do you write?”
“Novels.”
“Anything I would know?”
“Maybe. In the Shadows of Justice? It’s a political thriller.”
She shakes her head. “Nah. I only read the steamy stuff. If I’m not going to blush, I want nothing to do with it.”
I chuckle and take another sip. It is good scotch.
“Is there a Mrs. Price?” she asks, hesitantly.
“There was. She passed away eight months ago.”
“Oh … that sucks.”
“Yes, it does.”
She contemplates her scotch and shrugs. “Still. A sexy, single, successful author? The women of this town will eat you alive.”
She catches me mid-sip and I erupt in a fit of laughter and coughing.
I’ve found that there’s a ritual to disclosing Nicole’s death. I’ll be having a pleasant conversation with someone. They’ll ask. I’ll tell them. There’s a moment of awkward shock. They’ll offer their condolences and then a shadow hangs over the rest of the conversation. It’s refreshing for someone to take it in their stride and I’m oddly thankful for it. Besides, I knew Nicole’s sense of humor, and she would have found it hilarious.
“What about you, Mildred Johnson?” I ask, after the coughing subsides. “Is there a Mr. Johnson?”
“Yep. That’s how I bought that thirty years ago,” she says with a wave towards her house, which is about a hundred yards down the shore. She then looks back at the Nightingale House. “You’ll love this place.”
“Did you know the people who lived here before us?”
“The Thompsons. Wonderful people. They were getting older and the house was getting to be too much for them. They moved to some God-awful place in Florida. But if you ask me, all of Florida is God-awful.”
We watch as Caitlyn tries to sidearm another rock. She gets two skips before the rock disappears below the surface.
“How is she handling it? Her mom and all?” Mildred asks.
“It’s rough. We were all in the car together. T-boned by a drunk driver. My wife died instantly. Caitlyn was out for a few days.”
“… That really sucks,” she says, eyes still on Caitlyn.
“Yes, it does.”
“And the drunk driver?”
“He died at the scene.”
“That’s too bad.” Mildred looks down into her scotch and then adds, “They should have kept him alive so you could finish him off.”
“… I’d be lying if I said that thought never crossed my mind.”
Mildred nods, as if I passed some kind of test. “Well, let me know whenever you need someone to look after her. I’ll spoil her rotten.”
“Mildred Johnson, you are my kind of woman.”
We clink glasses.
*
Our inaugural dinner for our first night in the Nightingale House is pizza.
While I pay the delivery guy, Caitlyn sets the table. I know it’s pizza but I feel that we should observe some sort of ceremony and actually eat at the table. As I carry the pizza towards the kitchen, I see that Caitlyn is setting out three plates on the dining-room table.
“Who’s the extra plate for?” I ask, suddenly worried that she’s setting a place for Nicole, like she’s forgotten that she’s not here.
“The pirate,” Caitlyn responds.
“I’m sorry—the pirate?”
“Yeah. I met him outside when I was throwing rocks. You didn’t see him. You and Mrs. Johnson were talking.”
Honestly, I’m a little relieved.
“Is he joining us for dinner?”
“He said he might stop by,” she replies, completely unfazed.
“Do pirates even like pizza?”
“Everyone likes pizza, Dad.”
I suppose she’s right. I’m weary of the story, though.
Since Nicole’s death, Caitlyn’s lying has become much worse. She would tell me things about her friends at school that alarmed me, but a little investigation would show that she had made it up. I tried to get her to stop. Each time, she said that she understood that it was wrong and promised to stop, but she kept doing it. Finally, I took her to a child psychologist. He said her fantasies were a normal coping mechanism for Nicole’s death. Caitlyn’s reality had been shattered and her active imagination had been providing an escape. He added that I should only worry if she started believing the stories she was making up. As it stood, she never insisted they were true if I questioned her about them.
I know I’m not supposed to let her get away with these little stories but it’s been a long day, we’re starving, and if I’m going to allow myself some room to process things and not freak out, I should probably do the same for Caitlyn.
*
After dinner, we both get ready for bed and crash on the couch to watch a Disney movie we’ve seen a hundred times before. By the end, Caitlyn is already fast asleep in her nightgown, drooling on my shoulder. I’m not too far behind.
The movie ends. I reach over, pick up the remote, and hit the power button. The screen goes dark.
There’s a man standing next to the television.
I throw a hand over Caitlyn, and quickly turn on the lamp on the end table, nearly knocking it over in the process.
The shadows are obliterated.
“Dad?” Caitlyn mumbles, rubbing her eyes. “What’s going on?”
I’m still shaking. I glance around the room. Caitlyn and I are alone.
“It’s okay, pumpkin. Sorry. Daddy was having a bad dream.”
She sits up, more asleep than awake. “About what?”
I finally take a deep breath and settle myself.
“Nothing. Come on; time for bed.”
Instead of getting up, she leans over and falls back asleep on my arm.
I smile. “That’s the way it’s gonna be, huh?”
She doesn’t argue as I gently lift her up. She only wraps her arms around my neck and rests her face against my shoulder.
I carry her to the foot of the stairs. I can’t help but look back one more time to the spot where I had seen the figure.
There’s no one there.