The gray light of dawn woke Ron Hubbell after a few minutes of sleep. He lay in his bed thinking about the night that had just passed. Not a single hour had gone by that Ron had not seen marked on his bedside digital alarm clock. Sometimes he would doze in between, but he had noted every hour. He looked around the hotel room in the Endicott where his father-in-law had put him up. It was a comfortable room, decorated in blues and grays. Jake had insisted that he stay there, and made sure that he had every convenience that the hotel could offer at his disposal. He took his meals in the dining room, had the odd drink at the bar. It was like living in some genteel men’s club in the nineteenth century. Jake had treated him as if he were his own son. No one could have been kinder or more thoughtful.
Ron got out of bed and walked into his bathroom. He had to pee, so he did that. As for the rest, he had to think about it. Wash his face, shave, comb his hair? It didn’t really seem necessary. Brush his teeth? No, that certainly wasn’t necessary. He stared into the mirror on the old-fashioned medicine cabinet for a moment. It was a good mirror, not the kind you found these days. It had a clarity to the reflection, a depth somehow that you didn’t get in one of those prefab bathroom cabinets from Home Depot. Ron stared at the face he saw. The mirror spared no detail. The skin was yellowish, with gray patches in the hollows of his cheeks and under the eyes. His beard, which was growing in gray, was a stubble. His eyes were already lifeless.
Ron opened the cabinet, and took out the little orange plastic vial with the white plastic lid and a label on it. Two each night, the label read, to sleep. The doctor had only given him a two-week supply, and then he wanted to see him again. Ron knew why, of course. It was to prevent this very thing. It hadn’t been easy to resist these pills some nights, when he was in that pit of sleepless, torturous grief. But he had managed. He had hoarded every last one. The thought of how it was going to be scared him a little bit. But, after so many nights and days wracked by sleeplessness, there was undeniably a part of him that looked forward to sinking into it, to those first few moments when it would feel like falling asleep.
Ron took the vial in his hand and left the bathroom. A newspaper came sliding under his door, and he jumped as he saw it out of the corner of his eye. Then he recognized it. All part of the many kindnesses of the Endicott. He thought about bending down to pick it up, but then he thought, why? What did it matter to him what went on in the world yesterday? He didn’t even care anymore if there was news about Jennifer’s murder from the police. When he found Jennifer, she would tell him everything.
Leaving the paper lying in the little hallway off the bathroom, he returned to his bed, and sat down on the side. He placed the pills beside the clock and picked up the etched glass carafe of water with its matching tumbler. He poured out a few inches of the stale water, and the splash in the glass sounded loud in the silent room. He set the tumbler down, reached for the vial, and poured the pills out into his palm.
He had never seen himself as the kind of person who would do this. A quitter, or a person who was self-destructive. It was just too hard to continue. His mother had finally insisted that he go no further on the house until he was less distraught. He had agreed, just to get her to leave. To go home to his dad. He thought of his parents and he worried briefly about how they would feel. They had each other, though, and his younger brother in Hawaii, and their grandchildren. Maybe they would move there to be closer to them. That would be best. Ron thought briefly of his father-in-law, Jake Smith, who was kind, although they didn’t know each other all that well. He knew Jake would be upset, but he would understand. He, of all people, would understand.
Ron glanced again at the clock. It was early. Not even six o’clock. Most of the world was still asleep. A good time to leave. He didn’t want to disturb anybody. He’d spent most of last night trying to compose a note, but then he had decided, what for? It was self-explanatory. The only one he would have written to was gone. Ron took a deep breath, felt the fear, and willed it back. He willed it back by looking ahead. His life stretched out before him, empty and dim. He reached for the glass.
His phone rang, startling him so that he knocked the tumbler onto the floor and the pills scattered in his sheets. The ringing seemed infernally loud in the silent room. Ron picked up the phone and barked into it, ‘Hello.’
‘Ron. It’s Skip.’
Skip. Ron felt exasperated and fond at once.
‘I just had the worst nightmare about you, man. I woke up crying and I can’t get it out of my mind. Laura said never mind the time, that I should call. That I wouldn’t have a moment’s peace unless I called.’
Ron didn’t say anything. He felt somewhat amazed by what his old friend said. Was there really such a thing as ESP?
‘I woke you up, didn’t I?’ Skip said. He sounded anxious and apologetic.
Ron said, ‘No. I was up.’
‘Are you … you’re not all right, are you?’ Skip demanded.
Ron held the phone to his face, but he couldn’t think of what to say. ‘Talk to me, Ron. I woke up thinking … Are you all right?’
A little voice inside him, a voice he would later swear was Jennifer’s, said, ‘Tell him.’
Ron remained silent.
‘I can hear you crying, man,’ said Skip.
Ron was surprised. He hadn’t realized he was crying. But sure enough, tears were splashing onto his pajamas. In the background, at Skip’s end, Ron could hear Laura’s voice saying, ‘Tell him we’re coming. Tell him we’re on our way there. We’re going to bring him home.’
‘Did you hear that, buddy? We’re going to come down there and get you. Nobody’s going to stop us this time. You hang in there. Laura’s already getting dressed. Do I need to call Jake Smith? Can I trust you to wait for me?’
Ron nodded.
‘Ron?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
Dena had not slept well, though the cabin had been quiet, and the bed reasonably comfortable. Despite the fact that she was tired when she went to bed, she had not fallen asleep easily. She pretended to be sleeping when Peter finally came into the room. She had heard him stop as he entered the room, but she couldn’t say if he was looking at her or not. Then, he had quietly climbed into the other bed. She felt as if she had been awake much of the night, listening to the hooting of owls and the rustling of pine trees outside the window. Her baby had been still, making no movement, but she felt a shift in her belly, as if the baby were suddenly weighing more heavily on her than it had before, making it difficult to breathe. She didn’t know when she had fallen asleep, but when she awoke in the morning, the room was empty, Peter’s bed neatly made. She saw through the window that the day was gloomy, not warm, as the children had hoped. She pulled her clothes on without much thought to her appearance and went out into the main room.
The two girls were sitting at the table. Tory was coloring in a coloring book, and Megan was crooning a soft, disjointed tune to a baby doll.
‘Ah,’ said Peter glancing at his watch. ‘I was just about to wake you. I have to go and see about trading the car.’
‘Right,’ said Dena. ‘I’m sorry I overslept. I didn’t sleep well last night.’
‘Oh, really,’ said Peter. ‘You seemed to be fast asleep when I came to bed.’
‘Well, I slept on and off. You know how that is.’ Even as she said it, she wondered why she felt the need to make an excuse. Somehow, she didn’t want to tell him that she was awake when he went to bed. In any case, he didn’t seem to notice. He was busily collecting his papers and his keys in preparation for leaving.
‘The girls have eaten,’ he reported. ‘Help yourself to what’s here. I don’t know how long this will take. I may have to try a few places. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
‘We’ll be fine,’ said Dena.
‘Goodbye girls,’ he said.
Both children jumped up and ran to embrace him at the door, hanging on him as if he were leaving forever. ‘You stay here at the cabin. Do what Dena tells you.’
‘We will,’ said Tory. She was the first to resume her activity. Megan, as usual, clung desperately to her father, and Dena had to help to extricate her from him. As he started the car and pulled away, Megan pressed herself up against the screen door and began to sob.
Tory regarded her sister with a long-suffering expression. ‘I don’t know how she’s ever going to go to first grade,’ she said to Dena. ‘She always does this.’
Sometimes Dena wondered the same thing. She and Peter had discussed it a little.
She knew that he blamed the preschool teacher in Monroe for Megan’s poor adjustment to preschool, but the child was undeniably more tense and frightened than other children her age that Dena had seen. Of course, she had lost her mother in infancy. That could account for much of it. Well, Dena thought, a little positive reinforcement can’t hurt.
She walked over, knelt down beside her, and rubbed the miserable toddler on her back. ‘It’ll be OK,’ Dena said kindly. Megan stiffened, and stopped crying, but kept her face pressed to the screen.
Dena could feel that Megan was frozen beneath her massaging palm. Best not to draw attention to it, Dena thought. ‘What’s that you’re drawing, Tory?’ she asked.
Tory sighed and looked at her picture. ‘Santa and his reindeer,’ she said.
‘That’s good. You’re getting a little jump on the season,’ Dena observed. She continued to rub Megan’s back, but the child’s stiffened spine did not relax.
‘I don’t know why I’m doing this,’ said Tory. ‘I hate Christmas.’
‘You hate Christmas!’ Dena protested. ‘I thought all children loved Christmas.’
‘Not me,’ said Tory. She closed the book on her picture and sat back clutching her knees to her chest. She gazed out at the bleak sky. ‘It didn’t turn out to be a nice day,’ she said.
‘Not too nice,’ Dena admitted. ‘But we can still go for a walk. We can throw pebbles in the water. Would that be fun, Megan?’
Megan said nothing, but shook her head. Tory stood up and paced restlessly around the room. Dena watched her sympathetically. It had to be hard on these kids, moving around, no mother to help them get organized in a new place. Of course, Peter did everything he could to make it easier for them. But still. She wondered just how much they enjoyed the ‘adventure’ of moving.
‘Do you wonder about your new home?’ Dena asked. ‘What it will be like?’
Tory folded her arms on the windowsill and put her chin on her hands. ‘No. Not really,’ she said. ‘Oh no, it’s starting to rain. Now we can’t even go outside.’
Dena glanced at the window and saw the raindrops begin to bead on the glass. ‘You’re right,’ she said. She thought for a minute and then she said, ‘Why don’t we play a game?’
‘How about Candyland?’
‘OK,’ said Dena. ‘Can you go get it?’
‘Megan, come on,’ Tory cried. She scampered to her room, followed by Megan, as Dena got up and went over to the table. The children returned in a few moments with a dejected air. ‘It’s in the car,’ Tory said. ‘It’s in that box in the back.’
Dena pretended to share her disappointment. In fact, she was disappointed, for their sake. Then she had an idea. Yesterday, at a gas station, she had picked up a deck of cards for them to play games on the road. ‘I’ve got a pack of cards. Do you know how to play hearts?’
Tory’s eyes lit up again. ‘I know how to play gin.’
‘Gin rummy?’
‘Yeah. Where are the cards? I’ll go get them.’
‘OK. Great. They’re in my pocketbook.’
The child vanished into Dena’s room and came back, triumphantly holding the cards aloft. ‘Got ’em,’ she said. In spite of herself, Megan lifted her head and looked at them curiously. She sidled toward the table and climbed up on a chair.
Dena offered to open the new deck but Tory insisted on doing it. Then, to Dena’s surprise, Tory divided the stiff new cards in two, and began to shuffle them with an inexpert, but deliberate technique.
‘Hey,’ said Dena playfully. ‘Where’d you learn to shuffle like that? Did your dad teach you that?’
‘No,’ said the child gravely. ‘He doesn’t know I can shuffle. Miss Kay taught me. She taught me to play gin, too.’
‘Miss Kay?’ Dena asked absently, picking up the cards that Tory dealt.
‘Our old baby-sitter. Mrs Kelly.’
The name hit Dena like a jolt of electricity. At the same moment, Megan let out a wail. ‘Miss Kay,’ she shrieked.
Tory covered her ears. ‘Stop that.’ She looked at Dena. ‘We always called her Miss Kay because Megan couldn’t say Mrs Kelly.’
‘Miss Kay,’ Megan sobbed, and Dena reached for her and scooped her up, cradling the stiff, shrieking child in her arms.
Miss Kay, Dena thought. She remembered now. The flyers and charity appeals that would accumulate on the hall table in the duplex. She started to shiver. Mrs Kelly. Mrs Brenda Kelly.