KATE
Kate steps back from the imposing front door, one that most certainly belongs to Helena Ross, given the tiny angry sign above the doorbell, one that proclaims DO NOT RING! in angry handwritten font. If the tiny note wasn’t enough of a tell, there is also the laminated list, taped to the center of the door. It is a list of rules, designed for anyone who dares to step on this property. Through Kate’s worry, she is amused to note that this list is just as long and ridiculous as the one Helena once gave to Kate.
To read the list, you’d think a monster lives in the house, one who feasts on small children and gives stern looks when afforded a joke. You’d never dream that the same skinny fingers who typed these lines also created Eva and Mike, the couple who flies through the air when not falling madly in love. There is a sense of humor and wonder inside Helena, it just chooses to come out in her novels and not in her human interactions. Kate has spent many nights sipping wine and envisioning Helena’s life, wondering whether her rules are in place everywhere or just in her interactions with Kate. She has pictured Helena with a big home, bookworm babies, and her adorable husband, one who tickles her while she writes, then pulls her into the bedroom to make love. Surely that is the type of world that creates the stories that Helena Ross writes. And why wouldn’t she have those things? She isn’t an unattractive person, almost cute in a sort of owlish way. And she is funny, with a bone-dry, off-beat sense of humor. You can’t read a novel of hers without recognizing that. She manages to slip humor into the darkest of situations, adding just enough life to keep a reader’s heart from stopping.
Her knock unanswered, she steps off the porch and looks at the house. The large home stretches into the overcast sky, two stories squatting on the top of a hill and peering down on the surrounding homes. It dominates the end of the cul-de-sac, the neighboring lots vacant and overgrown, their tall grass snug against the neat and perfect property line that is 112 Hilltop Way. Dark grass, stiff and short, blankets the front yard, its edge sharp and precise when it meets the bleached driveway. The stones that lead to the front step are also painfully white, set carefully in black mulch that matches the dark grey brick of the home. There is no color anywhere, everything varying shades of somber grey, and set off by the white blooms in the window boxes. The curtains are drawn at each window, no chance of peeking in, their edges stick straight and pinned in some fashion. It must be pitch black inside, with none of the warm sunlight that is starting to play across Kate’s arms. This house isn’t the world of Kate’s wine-fueled musings. This house is a much starker, sadder reality, one that matches the darker, harder side of Helena. The side that creates rules and snaps at agents, the side that she fears. She peers up at the security cameras that point down at her from the porch eves. Lifting a hesitant hand, she waves.
Maybe Helena’s husband is home. Simon, that was his name. He’d be a good one to talk to, could give her some insight into Helena’s retirement. She’d met him once, a decade ago, at Helena’s first and only attempt at a book signing. He’d been a great guy, super helpful, and seemingly immune to Helena’s quirks. She waved again, then gave up.
This is silly. Helena isn’t the sort to be okay with a pop-in. She should leave, get back into her rented Camry and drive the three hours back to the city, pretend this terrible idea never happened. Yet… she pauses. There are times in an agent’s life when she needs to be there for her authors. And Helena’s proclamation of early retirement certainly qualifies as one of those times.
She moves down the steps, stopping beside her car, and risks a final glance at the two-story Victorian.
Sad, that house. She can almost hear it crying, its yearn for a life not its own.
She opens the car door and stops short, catching sight of death itself.
The woman is almost skeletal, her sharp bones tied together with skin, her dark eyes sunken, her lips chapped and pale. She walks carefully, struggling up the inclined drive, her hair stringy and damp, her mouth pinched in a grimace of anger. No—not anger. Pain. Kate recognizes it in the hunch of her shoulders, the furrow of her brow, the halting stop. Behind her, a large bush hides a mailbox, the envelopes in Helena’s hands a hint as to her origin.
“What are you doing here?” From the haughty tone, Helena’s words clear and enunciated, you’d have never guessed at the condition of her body. In those words, she recognizes the author, even if her appearance has changed so drastically.
Seven years since they’ve last seen each other. Other clients would have hugged her. Or smiled. Yet, for Helena, the greeting is almost warm.
“I wanted to speak to you,” Kate says, forcing her shoulders back, her posture into place. “About your retirement.”
“Has seeing me answered that question?” Helena asks dryly.
It hadn’t, until that question, that terribly simple clue that clicks all of the puzzle pieces into place. In the brief moment it takes Kate’s heart to seize, she understands.
Helena Ross isn’t retiring. She’s dying.
It’s interesting to see the reaction when it hits, the pale flush that covers Kate’s generous cheeks, the widening of eyes, the stiffening of her chin, as if she’s expecting a blow. I watch the action as an observer, the author part of my brain carefully cataloging the indicators for some future book that I’ll never write. It’s an automatic action and I stop myself before the pain of reality hits. It comes anyway. I will never write another book again.
Kate swallows, and she’s aged in the last seven years. There are more sags in the skin of her face, more wrinkles on the edges of her red-stained lips. She’s gained a little weight, her black pants suit a little tight in the thighs, her neck fleshier than I remember. She mentioned once, in an email several years ago, that she was getting divorced. Maybe her relationship was like mine—a careful chess match of secrets and power plays. Maybe her ex is responsible for that deep line in her forehead, for the extra pouches of skin under her eyes.
He probably isn’t responsible for the wet dew of those eyes, the open inhale of that mouth, the spill of tears that suddenly leak out. My agent—the woman who is supposed to spearhead my career, fight for my novels, and stand toe-to-toe with New York’s nastiest publishers, is crying. My opinion of her deflates, and I watch her wet her lips, and take a cautious step toward me.
“What’s happened to you, Helena?”
What’s happened to me? I have a story that I don’t have time to tell. I have an empty house that reeks of death. I have no friends, no family, and no one to ask for help. I’m dying, and it’s the best thing that has happened to me in a long time.
I shrug. “I’ve got a tumor. It’s spread just about everywhere. The doctors gave me three months.”
She sways, and I hope she doesn’t faint, because I can barely make my own way into the house, much less cart her also. I sigh. “Would you like to come inside?”
She nods, and brushes a quick finger along her bottom line of lashes. “Yes. I’d like that very much.”
I sit at the round kitchen table, one of the rare items that stayed in the house after that day. I don’t have the energy to offer Kate a drink, and she doesn’t ask for one, perching on the other chair, her gigantic purse on her knees, her eyes moving everywhere but to me.