Dead Silence Read online

  Jessie and Billy had considered making it a master suite but had taken the smaller room at the head of the stairs instead, adjacent to their two older children. Petty had chosen the light-drenched turret room with the bay window seat. Chip had wanted the room with the “treasure cave”—a panel in the back wall of his closet that lifted off to access the ancient tub plumbing in the adjacent bathroom.

  Chip had been six then, Petty going on five. Now he’s got two more semesters at the University of Vermont; she has two years left at Northeastern. Jessie suspects that neither will ever be coming home again for a significant length of time.

  Thank goodness they have Theodore. He’d been seven years old when he came to them; eight when they’d nearly given up on him; nine when they realized they couldn’t let him go. Though hardly the only needy child who’d ever tugged at their heartstrings, Theodore is the only one they were meant to adopt.

  His bedroom door is ajar, but that’s not necessarily intentional. In this house, doors occasionally swing open and closed of their own accord. “Not haunted,” Si had told her years ago. “Just old and off-kilter. Kind of like me.”

  She peeks in and sees her son sitting at his desk, typing on his computer. “Theodore? I need to talk to you.”

  “I’m doing my English homework. This is a stupid poem.” He doesn’t break the clacking rhythm. An open textbook sits to the left of the keyboard and a spiral notebook to the right, with three sharpened pencils aligned parallel to each other and the page.

  “You’re writing a poem?”

  “No. Some lady did, and I have to analyze it.”

  “What is it? Who wrote it?”

  “I told you, a lady.”

  “Does she have a name?”

  “Everyone has a name.”

  She gives him a look, and he glances down at the book. “Her name is Emily Dickinson. The poem is about hope.”

  Jessie smiles. “Is it ‘“Hope” is the thing with feathers’?”

  “You know this stupid poem?”

  “I happen to love that stupid poem.” She crosses the threshold into the only unfailingly orderly room in the house. Theodore’s twin bed is made, his dirty clothes tucked into the hamper, clean ones organized in his drawers and closet. None of his shirts have buttons. Theodore hates buttons.

  “Why do you love it? It doesn’t make any sense. How can hope have feathers? And it isn’t a thing, and things have feathers—like Petty’s fancy bed, and Espinoza.” Named after Theodore’s favorite jockey, Espinoza is his pet rooster, and the root of her son’s latest troubles.

  “It isn’t a tangible thing that you can see and touch. But the poem is a metaphor, Theodore. Do you want me to help you with it?”

  She knows the answer before it comes, decisive as always.

  “No. I can do it.”

  “What about French?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did you study for your French test tomorrow?” Foreign language is by far his worst subject.

  “Not yet.”

  “Do you want me to—”

  “No.”

  “Any other tests tomorrow?”

  “Health ed. But I don’t have to study. I’m great in that class.”

  Lightning flashes beyond the window.

  “Better save your work, in case we lose power again.”

  Old house, old city, old trees, old wires. The electricity goes out a lot around here.

  “The Wi-Fi isn’t working.”

  “From last night’s storm, or this one?”

  “Don’t know. I’m connected to the internet on my cell phone’s Bluetooth hotspot. Can you call the repairman?”

  “Yes, as soon as I get a chance.”

  Standing behind him, she resists the urge to smooth the tuft of hair sticking up on the back of his head. She learned early on that you don’t touch him without warning or permission. And that sometimes, when you do touch him, he craves a squeeze so fierce that anyone else would scream. For him, it brings comfort.

  “Theodore, I need you to stop typing for a minute and turn around so that I can tell you something.”

  She sees him clench and hesitate before he swivels in his chair.

  He’d been an adorably roly-poly, round-faced little boy, but the extra pounds padding his frame now create an awkward bulk. His chin and jawline have all but disappeared, and his tee shirt clings to the rolls around his midsection. Angry red pimples spray his cheeks and forehead around the rims of his glasses, and a sparse slash of dark hairs lines his upper lip. His hair, once a sleek, golden cap, puffs out like a dandelion gone to seed. He balks about getting it cut, about shaving, washing his face, wearing new clothes that fit . . .

  Let it go. Choose your battles.

  It’s just that the other kids wouldn’t tease him so mercilessly if he took better care of himself or allowed her to.

  Oh, come on, yes, they would. They always have.

  It isn’t about how he looks, though that doesn’t help matters.

  It’s about his inability to fit in socially due to obstacles that accompany his particular diagnosis.

  She’d had plenty of career experience with children on the spectrum before Theodore came along, but she’d never raised one. Compared to what she’s been through so far with him, getting Chip and Petty through adolescence was like cruise control on a deserted country straightaway. Their mood swings and boundary-pushing escapades were nothing she hadn’t expected, seen before, or done herself.

  But Theodore?

  Every day, it seems, he’s waging battles on new fronts, from communication frustrations to academic challenges to severe sensory overload that can leave him in a crumpled heap.

  Every day, she does for Theodore what she’s done for her other children: embrace him for who he is, celebrate his gifts, protect him, love him. Yet she’s also determined to show her son, and the world, that what some persist in referring to as his disability is a difference.

  “Everyone is different, and everyone has their struggles, no matter how cool they appear to be on the outside,” she frequently assures him.

  Like me. I act as though I have all the answers, because that’s what you need from me, and it’s what Diane did.

  When you’ve been raised by the most flawless woman in the world, after having been abandoned by a horribly flawed one, what kind of mother do you become? One who strives for perfection, ever aware of the gross imperfection inherent in your DNA.

  “What’s wrong?” Theodore asks, focusing on something over her shoulder as he often does when she’s about to tell him something he doesn’t want to hear.

  “Dad called a little while ago. He’s bringing someone home with him later.”

  Theodore stares fiercely at his bookshelves.

  The titles are sorted not in alphabetical order or according to genre, but by size and color. Novels flank textbooks and children’s picture books. Some had resided here long before Theodore had come along, when the majority of shelves had housed his siblings’ trophy collections. Theodore scours tag sales for tall, skinny books with orange spines, or short, thick books with purple spines . . . whatever he “needs” to add to the rows on his shelves. It doesn’t matter what’s between the covers; he’ll never open them. He just collects books the way other boys his age collect baseball cards.

  Or girlfriends. That had been Chip’s primary interest at fifteen. He hadn’t been particularly mature for his age, but his brother seems years younger. The opposite sex isn’t on Theodore’s radar yet. Nor does he care about sports, friends, cars, a part-time job.

  For Chip and Petty, those things had always come without a struggle. For Theodore, nothing ever will.

  Chip had excelled at sports from the first time Billy tossed him a ball in the backyard. Intent on keeping up with her big brother, Petty had been a soccer standout and champion swimmer.

  Theodore doesn’t play sports or even watch televised games with Billy, unless you count the horse racing. Billy does not.


  In August, they’d sat through hours of televised Saratoga races. When Theodore wasn’t complaining about race coverage that had been preempted by the Summer Olympics, he was providing ongoing running commentary. Mostly, he was reciting from memory the statistics he’s compiled in marble notebooks that occupy the entire top shelf in this room.

  “I just don’t get it,” Billy told her privately. “It’s not like the kid’s an equestrian or has even been to Saratoga. Why the fascination?”

  “It’s his thing. Just roll with it.”

  “You know, Jess, if our lives had a theme, it’s ‘just roll with it.’”

  “And that’s why I love you. Nobody rolls with anything—everything—in this crazy world the way you do, Billy.”

  Theodore’s eyes narrow as he processes what she told him, but they don’t make contact with her own as he asks, “Who is Dad bringing home with him?”

  She keeps her voice level and measures her words. “I know I told you we weren’t going to be having any more foster kids for a while, but—”

  “No!”

  “—this is an emergency.”

  “No! No more foster kids!”

  “Theodore, I know it’s not what you want, but this little boy won’t be here for long. He doesn’t have anywhere else to go. He needs help.”

  “There are a lot of other places to go for help. He can go to the hospital. They help people. He can go to the police station. They help people. He can go to school. They help people. He can go to—”

  “Theodore. He’s coming here. He needs our help.”

  “I can’t help him. I have to do my homework.”

  “And you can do your homework. This isn’t going to change that. Everything will be”—she stops herself short of claiming things will be the same—“fine,” she says instead. “Everything will be fine. You’ll be fine.”

  “I have to do my homework,” he repeats. “And I have to sleep in my bed. And then I have to make my bed, and eat my breakfast, and—”

  “You can do all the things you have to do, Theodore. This little boy won’t bother you.”

  She hopes he won’t, anyway. She knows nothing about him, other than what Billy told her in their brief conversation.

  It’s not great timing. Not with Theodore’s situation. But if Billy wants to shelter a child in need, there’s no way she’s going to say no. Not after all the yeses she’s wheedled out of him over the years. Not after all the . . . rolling with it.

  Theodore shifts his gaze to the ceiling, rocking in his seat, and for a moment, she thinks he’s focused on the hard rain pattering overhead. Then he asks, “What about Espinoza?”

  “What about him, sweetie?”

  “I don’t want the boy to see him or touch him.”

  “Don’t worry. He’ll be fine, too. Everything will be fine.”

  “You already said that.”

  “I know.” She sighs. “Go back to your homework. I just wanted to let you know so that you won’t be surprised if someone is here when you wake up in the morning.”

  “I have to make my bed. I have to eat my breakfast . . .”

  “I know, sweetheart.” She smiles at him. He doesn’t smile back. Not this time, but once in a while he surprises her. Unlike Theodore, she likes surprises.

  Surprises . . .

  She heads back downstairs and puts away the groceries, thinking of Mimi.

  Of course, her friend wants to believe that a new client showed up with the prized possession she’d lost back in 1987, but seriously, what are the odds? This Lily Tucker might be trying to take advantage of her. Nobody knows better than Jessie that when you desperately want to believe in something, find something—someone—all rationale flies out the window.

  She drags a chair over to the old brown cabinets and climbs up to cram four boxes of cereal onto a crowded shelf. She closes the door. It swings back open again. She rearranges the cereal, trying to get the cupboard to stay closed, but it refuses until she removes two of them. Old house, old cabinets, old everything—including a landline phone that rarely rings anymore unless it’s a robocaller.

  I should just call Mimi right now.

  She drags the chair to the refrigerator, shoves the cereal boxes on top, climbs down, and picks up the receiver. No dial tone.

  Oh. Right. Theodore had mentioned the Wi-Fi is out. It must have impacted the landline as well.

  She finds her cell phone and dials her friend’s number. After a moment, the call is declined with an automated message: “Can’t talk right now—I’ll call you later.”

  Jessie hopes that for now, Mimi has forgotten all about the ring.

  I get it. I understand how badly you want to know who you are . . .

  So do I. But maybe you’re better off not knowing.

  Rain streams down the windows, thunder booms, and the lights flicker. Jessie heads for the basement. She has way too much to do before the new foster child arrives, and electricity is necessary for all of it.

  Why, she wonders as she moves wet, clean sheets from the washing machine to the dryer, do she and her husband seem to attract so many lost souls? Maybe it’s because they’ve both been there themselves, one way or another.

  She’d grown up well aware that her parents were Good Samaritans who’d adopted her after she’d been found alone in the gorge on a frigid January night. They’d loved her. Because they were—are—wonderful people: supportive parents, welcoming in-laws, doting grandparents, not to mention successful Ivy League professors and ideal next-door neighbors.

  “I’ll babysit the kids while you plant your annuals,” Diane would offer in July—as if planting annuals had even occurred to Jessie, while Diane’s petunias had been blooming across the hedgerow since Mother’s Day.

  “Let me string your Christmas lights,” Al would say around mid-December, when his had already been twinkling on the shrubs next door for two cheery weeks and Jessie hadn’t gotten around to tossing the Thanksgiving leftovers.

  “How can you resent them? They’re trying to help,” Billy had said in the beginning. But as time went on, he, too, had become awed—and agitated—by their flawlessness.

  “How is your father’s lawn not covered in leaves?” he’d asked the first October in the new house.

  “He rakes.”

  “Me, too, but ours is always covered again right after.” He’d gestured at their own yard, buried under foliage, and then at the unblemished green expanse next door. “Does your dad have magical powers?”

  “My mom does. She just whipped up homemade peanut butter cups for her trick-or-treaters.”

  “Too bad she didn’t make them for ours, too.”

  “She offered. I told her we’re capable of buying our own Halloween candy.” She’d held up a container—not a ceramic pumpkin-faced platter like her mother’s, but a dishwasher-warped plastic Tony the Tiger cereal bowl. But it was clean. And orange, dammit.

  Billy had peered at the individually wrapped disks. “Are those . . . breath mints?”

  “The store was out of candy by the time I got there.”

  “So the kids get to go from homemade chocolates to Certs? Man. It’s not easy living next door to perfectionists.”

  “Try being raised by them.”

  Imperfect Jessie had been secretly—and guiltily—relieved when her parents had retired and sold their home to a young couple with children Chip and Petty’s ages. For years, a happy brigade of kids and pets had worn a path between the border hedges and traipsed muddy footprints throughout both houses.

  These days, all is quiet. A little too quiet for her taste.

  Not for long, though, with a little lost boy on the way, and Theodore protesting.

  He’ll adapt, though, and sometimes you just have to look to the greater good. Anyway, it may be good for him to have another child under this roof. And in a perfect world, they’ll have an ID on the boy any second now, and his parents will show up, Jessie tells herself, wishing that darned thing with feathers wo
uld flutter just a little.

  The Angler had taken a circuitous route back to Ottawa. Instead of continuing northeast on Interstate 81 at Syracuse, he’d jumped on the New York State Thruway westbound toward Buffalo. It would be a good five or six hours out of the way, but he couldn’t risk running into this morning’s border patrol agent on the return trip. Not without having attended the Toronto-Boston baseball game, and without a striped bass, and without the boy.

  Just past Rochester, he’d stopped for gas at a rest area, venturing inside to use the restroom and get something to eat. He’d left in a hurry when he’d spotted two uniformed sheriff’s deputies standing at the fast-food counter. They were more likely to be waiting for cheeseburgers than for him, but what if the boy’s body had already been found?

  Rattled, he got back into the car and continued on, sticking to the speed limit, though his foot itched to gun it toward the border. After a brief, perfunctory interaction with the border patrol agent, he’d crossed the Peace Bridge at Niagara Falls.

  Even back in Canada, he’d been clenched and paranoid, watching the rearview mirror for a whirl of red as Niagara Falls faded behind him.

  He’d visited once, as a child. A school trip. He remembers standing at the brink, watching the water rush past and into oblivion, remembers Ralphie Michaels coming up behind him, nudging him in the ribs. He’d started, and all the kids laughed, with Father Hercule scolding him.

  “This is not a place for monkey business! If you fall, you will die! Do you want to die?”

  “Yes,” he’d shot back, defiant as always. “I want to die.”

  But he hadn’t. Not really. Not in that moment. He’d wanted Father Hercule to die, and Ralphie Michaels, and the other kids, and his father—always, his father.

  If you fall, you will die . . .

  If the tower falls, you lose . . .

  So precarious, this life he’s built for himself.

  The town house is dark when he pulls into the driveway. Cecile and the children will have been in bed for hours. Good. He isn’t in the mood to interact with them after everything that’s gone on today.