Shadows Gray

Chapter Four



I bring my blanket from my bed and wrap myself in the recliner. I spend the rest of the night next to the couch where Dad sleeps, snoring blissfully away the way he always does. I am freezing cold, shivering and trembling, chilled almost to the bone, teeth chattering, my fingers and toes alternating between a state of numbness and bone-chilling pain. It’s not the temperature of the room, it’s the way my body reacts to fear. It was the same when I was a little girl scared by a dream or a thunder storm. I’d cocoon myself in quilts and shake like a leaf until the fear subsided.

To be frank, I am not one of those girls you read about in mystery novels. If something goes bump in the night, you can be sure I won’t be the type to head down into a dark basement to investigate. I’m not going to traipse off into the spooky attic, looking for mysterious answers. I’m not going to calmly take a shower if I hear a serial killer is on the loose in my neighborhood. I’m more the “yell for help and hide under the covers” type. I’m not particularly brave, and what happened in my bedroom frightened me. I want nothing more than to reach out to someone, anyone, but knowing Prue would probably beat me with the bat she keeps by her bed just for such purposes, I curl my legs up in the chair and try to fall back asleep. Whatever happened had to have been a strange nightmare; a nightmare that caused such anxiety that I scratched my own palm and wrist. The dried scrapes looked like the leftovers of a cat fight. Dark red and jagged, they run from the first line of my palm – where a palm reader would foretell the number of my children or my happiness or the length of my days, or some such thing – all the way past my wrist, halfway to the crook of my elbow. Four parallel lines. They ache even now.

I am so grateful for morning because it means a chance to do something, anything, to make me less jumpy and paranoid. I go into the kitchen and noisily begin breakfast at the first hint of dawn. The sun has barely risen and shines as brightly as it can through our old dirty window and faded lace curtains. I take out pots and pans and crack eggs and dip bread into vanilla and cinnamon-scented milk. I let the slices sizzle on the griddle with bacon and make coffee. I am being loud in the hopes that my household will wake up. I am being a chef in the hopes that they won’t kill me.

Israel is the first to enter my little sanctuary and I want to throw my arms around him. I am shaking off last night like the bad dream it must have been and am determined to dismiss it from my mind.

“Why are you cooking?” Israel yawns, taking out plates from the cupboard. He looks tired; worse, he looks like he was up all night. Perhaps we all ate something a bit off, a bit wonky, perhaps we all had terrifying dreams.

“Because I’m hungry,” I say happily. At least I am trying to sound happy; the truth is I sound squeaky which is an uncomfortable sound for a deep-voiced girl like me. I clear my throat and turn the kettle on for tea. Israel has spent most of his years in Europe and he prefers his caffeine in the form of tea leaves rather than coffee beans.

We don’t speak again as I flip the toast slices and add eggs to a pan to fry. My bacon is burnt and all my eggs end up breaking, so I scramble them hurriedly. I sip hot coffee from my favorite mug, one shaped like Elvis Presley’s head. Elvis is my very favorite artist and silence with Israel is one of my comforts and familiarities. “He is my rock,” I think to myself. Soon Meli and Will come in, and then Matthias and Harry. I serve them all, handing out little feasts on our best cracked dinner plates and making witless conversation about anything I can think of. I seem to be talking now just to keep myself from thinking too much, and it sounds like chatter to my ears. I even out-talk Meli which is remarkable in and of itself.

“Here is your English Breakfast, Is,” I hand Israel his tea in my other favorite cup, one with a fat orange colored cat pictured. I also have the same cat on a t-shirt, though Emme once tried to burn it after she claimed she only wanted to borrow it. I know better now than to believe her when she compliments my fashion. I had to cut off the burnt bottom just to salvage it, and now it’s so short I have to wear it under over-alls, a sort of revenge on Emme, so it worked out well. It’s a double whammy fashion disaster now, she says.

Israel takes the cup, but his eyes look concerned when the sleeve of my white nightgown falls back towards my elbow. He has seen my scratches. He reaches out and rubs them lightly with his thumb. “What happened?” He mouthed. He knows already somehow I don’t want to speak of it with the others.

I shrug as though I either don’t recall or it isn’t important enough to mention. I suddenly don’t want to talk anymore and I definitely don’t want to talk about my arm. It begins to throb again, and burn.

I eat, but the breakfast tastes wooden in my mouth. I wash my bites down with coffee but it tastes of nothing. I feel as though I want to jump out of my skin, especially the skin on my arm and wrist. I hear Meli and Will debating something, and Harry interjecting gentle admonishments to them. I see Prue come out from her bedroom and push my father’s leg off the coffee table as he snores on. I am aware of Israel watching me, looking perplexed. I see Dad finally pick himself up off the couch and fold his blanket neatly; fluffing the pillow he leaves behind. I see all this and hear all this, and yet, I feel far away, distant; like I am on the outside of our kitchen window, peering in, hearing snippets of conversations and softly spoken words. Why, if it was just a dream, is it affecting me so? I need to get a handle on myself. I need to get out of this house. First however, I need a bath.

Our bathroom is old, like the rest of our house, but it has a wonderful, deep tub. After years in other centuries, where you’d never find something like that, much less instant hot water, I avail myself baths frequently. It is a luxury that I dread missing when we leave, and leave we will eventually. Inevitably. An embarrassing amount of my tip money is squandered on bubble bath and oils. I may not have good clothes or fancy hair, but I guarantee I smell good. This morning I pour in a ginger and pear concoction that I paid far too much for and only use for special occasions. That’s a ridiculous limit I’ve sternly set for myself; if I wake tomorrow in dusty Egypt four hundred years in the past, I am really going to be angry with myself for wasting what I had left in the bottle. So I pour in a few more drops before sliding in myself, up to my nose in fragrant bubbles. I can’t help the sigh that escapes me when I hear knocking on the door only a scant few seconds later. Without even moving the rest of my body, I can reach the doorknob and I open it obediently. It swings by my head and I don’t even open my eyes to see who it is because I know it’s Meli. She probably was left at the breakfast table, still talking, as everyone wandered off and now she’ll be looking for a captive audience. Sure enough, when I open my eyes just a slit, Meli is sitting on the counter and she begins a long narrative about Will and work and babies and marriage and cars and the house and this century and the weather and politics and religion. I do love Meli dearly, but she is not helping the pounding in my head that began after my nightmare and is building to a rousing crescendo. I “mmm” and “uh huh” while I shave my legs (not a requirement of womanhood I shall miss if I do wake up in Egypt centuries past). I wash my hair and then condition it and scrub my face with a pink washcloth I bought used at a garage sale. It has white ribbon around the edges that is silky when dry but rough when it gets wet, and the initials TS have been embroidered in one corner. I like to wonder who TS is or was and how her handiwork ended up in someone’s garage sale and finally in my hand. Was TS someone’s grandmother? No one these days would do such an old fashioned thing as to hand-embroider a washcloth. But I am an old-fashioned girl, literally, as old fashioned as one can get. I would have been alive many years before TS and I will be alive many years after she is only a memory, only I will have nothing to leave behind for my descendents to sell, a thought that is vaguely sad to me. I decide to embroider myself my own initials on my own set of towels. Take that, Fate or Destiny or God or whoever pulls my marionette strings. I may be a puppet, but I can be a rebellious one.

Meli’s conversation seems to wan and I sink lower into the ginger and pear bubbles. She finally accuses me of not listening, but it’s good natured – Meli is all bark with no bite – and when she leaves I towel myself dry and ponytail my wet hair. I put on my denim coveralls with a striped tank top and pull out my old battered sneakers from their spot under my bed as quickly as possible. I am uncomfortable now in my own bedroom after my memories of last night. It’s dark in my room because the bulb in my lamp is low wattage and the only window is the mottled, hazy kind that is hard to see in or out of and it doesn’t let in much light. My imagination seems to be running a mile a minute and as I grab my bag and slam the door shut behind me. I swear I can still smell the smoke from my dream. The smoke that curled around my mother’s bare feet as they swung back and forth in her rocker, the smoke that felt hot on my little girl face, the smoke from the fire that lit up Rose in bright, yellow light. Right before she reached for my hand, right before she held it softly. Right before her gentle child’s grip became something else, something sinister and painful.

The scratches begin to hurt again as I hurriedly leave my house, hastening for anywhere, anywhere but here. I can’t go to Emme’s this early in the morning or she’d do worse than attempt a little arson on my clothes. She isn’t a morning person. I wonder where I could find Luke Dawes. In the bright, cheerful light of day, outside in the city, I am feeling much less nervous. I realize that now more than ever I want to do whatever I can to find my sister. If I could look at those photos Luke said he had taken of her…would they give me anything to go on? Any clue to her whereabouts or existence? I can think of no other route to Rose other than these photos, so I pull out his business card looking for the phone number or address of his shop. There is a number, but I will have to use a payphone to dial it. I must be the only teenager in all of America who doesn’t own a cell phone. I don’t see the point in learning how to use one if it will only be ripped away from me soon enough. Besides, who would I call?

There is a payphone, dirty and old, in the front of a service station on my right, and I jaywalk across the street quickly to get to it and feed it my coins. It rings and rings and no one picks up. Impatiently I wait for the voicemail and when it finally begins speaking to me I am informed that his photography shop is located at the corner of Poplar and Monterey Streets, beneath a yoga studio. It isn’t far, which explains his proximity to both my coffee shop and Prue’s food cart. Prue parks in that area most times as it’s close to a schoolyard and a business complex both, although the thought of her feeding small children alligator stew makes me roll my eyes. Not to mention with her people skills, she’d probably stew the children along with the gators. The business men and women in their expensive tailored suits and spiked heels will pay twice as much for her strange cooking as other customers, but their tips are terrible. They think she’s avant-garde and ahead of her time, and call her “a risk taker in the kitchen,” and “the city’s best kept secret!” Actually, she’s far behind their time but she definitely has the best kept secret.

It doesn’t take me long to reach Poplar and Monterey. Luke’s section of the complex is the only rundown little square of the shiny business complex. Even the yoga studio is sparkling and clean, and the tiny perfect office spaces that surround Dawes Photography are symmetrically square shaped with gleaming windows and perfectly hung signs. Luke’s space looks like the room that time forgot. The windows haven’t been washed in what looks like a very long time, the sign is crooked and it’s so dim inside it’s impossible to tell if he is even open for business. The windows, besides being filthy, are covered with fliers for musicals, concerts, dog sitting services, apartments for rent, and estate sale notices; on quick glance, they all seemed to have expired several months ago. The whole building complex reminds me of a beautiful smiling head with one brown, crooked tooth in its gaping mouth. I reach out my hand, turn the handle of the door and enter the brown decaying tooth, leaving the rest of the shiny head outside sparkling in the sun.

A set of bells right above my head jingles as I step inside and as I close the door behind me. Even the bells sound a bit tired and worn out. When no one greets me, I reach up and shake the bells more vigorously.

“Hello?” Luke’s head pokes out from behind a door in the back. His voice sounds extremely surprised at the realization that something resembling a customer has actually arrived. When he sees it’s me, he looks even more surprised. “Gray? Come in. I was just eating breakfast in the back here. Do you want to join me or is there something I can do for you? How are you?” He seems to have a lot of questions and his sentences run together as though he is speaking exactly what is going through his mind. He looks as disheveled as ever; he needs a haircut and a shave both. He has a plate of food balanced in one hand as he holds open the door with the other.

“Um, sure, I can stay for a bit,” I answer. Well, of course I can, isn’t that what I’m here for? “And I’m alright, thanks. You?”

He takes a bite as the door swings shut behind us and waits a moment to finish chewing before answering me. “Good. Hungry?”

I think of my breakfast feast, sitting in my stomach like a brick and shake my head. I do peer at his plate of food though. “Wait, that smells familiar. Is that Prue leftovers?”

He nods happily. “She said it’s an old family recipe - shepherd’s pie.”

I snort. “It’s an old recipe, alright; all of Prue’s recipes are old. And it isn’t shepherd’s pie, it’s squirrel pie.” I watch his bushy eyebrows for a reaction. They shoot up and take residence in the sandy-colored hair that falls over his forehead and stay there for a minute, before settling back down over hazel eyes. He takes another bite. “I can support squirrel control. Little buggers got into my film last year.”

“I can’t imagine why,” I say dryly, “You keep such a clean, organized storeroom.” I look around at my surroundings and gingerly sit down at a small bistro style table. Other than the table, there is a tiny refrigerator, one chair – which I am perched on - a cot with a rumpled quilt and pillow, and lots of both books and boxes stacked everywhere. There is also a tiny counter alongside an even tinier sink and an open door that leads to the world’s smallest bathroom. Does he employ elves?

“Hey,” he chewed, narrowing those hazel eyes, “Did you come here to make fun of my squalor or to see those photos of Rose?” He remembers. Well, of course he remembers; who could forget the girl who tripped over her own feet, made a scene in public, and then cried buckets as he tried to sop up the salty tears with restroom paper towels?

“To see the photos, please,” I say meekly. As meekly as possible. I’ve never been very good at meek, but in my defense I haven’t had much practice.

“Alright then, I’ll get them. Stay away from my squirrel potpie.” He leaves back through the door we had just come through, the one that leads to his shop. I hear drawers opening and closing and then he returns with a folder, a similar one to the one I looked though before. It feels like lifetimes ago, before I knew that Rose was perhaps alive. Will I categorize everything that way now? Before Rose’s Appearance, and After? Everything before seems so fuzzy and distant and so unimportant now. He pulls out three photos and sets them before me. I feel as though there are butterflies in my stomach and whereas last night I was freezing cold, I am hot and sweaty now. I push the hair back from my forehead and neck where tendrils have escaped my ponytail. My hands shake as I lay them back down in my lap and as my eyes focus on the photographs.

It is the girl I saw in the coffee shop. There’s no mistaking the red calico dress, the long sheet of white blonde hair, the tiny frame. As was the case in the original photo of Rose I had seen, she doesn’t seem to be aware that her picture is being taken and she is looking away, off to the side. Her feet are bare; I hadn’t noticed that before. Was that the case when she sat in the leather armchair in the coffee shop? Has she no shoes? Is my sister suffering? I wonder as a lump forms in my throat and threatens to make me cry. The same dress, no shoes. What if she’s only just arrived here, in modern day America? Is she used to traveling, to being Lost? What if the magic or power that we have has only just begun to materialize in her? Is she scared, confused? The tears building up behind my eyes threaten to spill over. Frustrated with myself for my weakness, I savagely stab a bite of squirrel pie with the fork I grab out of Luke’s hand. The chewing gives me something to do while I get hold of myself and blink the tears away.

Luke gets up from the overturned plastic crate he had been sitting on, and opens his tiny refrigerator. He puts down a bottle of water in front of me, twisting off the top first.

“Thanks,” I mumble and drink deeply. Actually, I have never liked squirrel pie. “I don’t usually cry this much.” I am trying to sound apologetic but it comes out sounding defensive.

“No problem, it’s hardly the first time I’ve made a pretty girl cry.” He speaks lightly.

Pretty? I straighten my over-alls that have bunched up in front. I look again at the photos in front of me. I don’t see anything else that could give me a clue to finding Rose. The tree she leans against could be any tree. Luke had said she was at the fair, but that only means she was there that particular night – not that she lives there. No one lives in a fairground. I don’t know what I thought I’d find. Maybe I just wanted to look at her again, feel some connection.

“Can I have them?” I ask. “I can pay you for them if they’re for sale.”

He waves away my offer. “I can’t sell them anyway; I didn’t have her permission to photograph her. Really, I was just trying out a new camera that night and wasn’t paying too much attention to what I was capturing. I’ll end up throwing the other ones from that night away. You can keep them as long as I can keep the ones of you singing last night.”

Was it only last night?

“Why?” I laugh. “I’m not going to be a star someday if that’s what you’re hoping.” I won’t be around long enough to be a star, I thought.

“You photograph well,” he answers, reaching behind him to the counter and handing me more prints. They are of me on stage at the coffee shop, singing with my eyes closed. My guitar partially covers the horses on my shirt and my legs are crossed Indian-style the way I always sit when I am singing. It must have been mere seconds before I opened my eyes and saw Rose sitting in the chair that Luke had been in when I began my song. Had he gotten up and moved closer to photograph me, while she sank down in his vacated chair? Seconds before. Before Rose’s Appearance. Before everything changed. I look peaceful, even with my mouth open, singing. I’m surprised how pretty the girl in the photo looks. I don’t think I look like much in real life, but the camera seemed to bring something out in me; shadows that shaded my face in the right way, light that reflected and made my skin look luminescent.

“The camera loves you, Gray. If your barista talents and singing career don’t take off, you can come model for me. Hey, all this could be yours!” He gestures grandly at his sad little shop. I can’t help laughing. I like the way he makes me forget to finish crying.