The Piper

FOUR




No one was expecting them, when Olivia and Teddy took the I-75 split and headed north into Knoxville, one day ahead of schedule, arriving in that last magnificent blaze of sunlight and breezy coolness that comes at the end of fading summer days. For Olivia, it was a moment. She had been homesick for such a long time.

Back in the day, Olivia had left home willingly, unaware how hard it would be to get back. Hugh’s work in the manufacturing management of anything metallic and noisy led them to more places than Olivia could remember, the highlights being Fort Smith, Arkansas, Madison, Wisconsin, a short stint on the outskirts of Memphis, followed by a living hell called Endicott, New York.

Hugh had talked a lot about the work ethic of Americans, the only people in the world who dropped family, friends and homes without a second thought, moving regularly and willingly for the sake of a job. He talked about it like it was a religion, but Olivia had come to the conclusion that this corporate culture was a scam. In the early days, Hugh had changed jobs at the beckoning dollar signs dangled by the headhunters, but more and more lately he’d been skewered by the dreaded work force reduction – the corporate term for we’re going to f*ck up your life.

California had just been another stop along the way.

Olivia had planned to spend a night in Memphis, but the city had been dark, and hot, and industrial along the interstate. They were ahead of schedule, and Olivia was on a roll. Teddy and Winston had been deep asleep, and Olivia, restless and anxious to be home, fueled by coffee and sugared gummy worms bought just outside of Little Rock, had blown through Memphis on an impulse thinking she would stop somewhere along the way. She made it into Nashville at three a.m., too close to falling asleep behind the wheel to get the rest of the way home. They took a room and she slept past noon, not getting up and running until three, missing the hotel checkout time, which meant an extra night’s charge.

They’d stopped at a McDonald’s in Harriman, no longer noticing the rank long car trip odor of fast food and sweaty socks, overlaid with the whangy aroma that had permeated the cab since Winston had tangled with a pimento cheese sandwich and lost. It was cool out, a relief from the hot days of the trip, and they opened the doors to the breeze, and Olivia ate French fries, and drank a big Coke, Winston had his own order of Chicken McNuggets, and Teddy ate a cheeseburger and kicked her heels against the seat. The heat would be back, likely tomorrow, today was just a tease, like one of the crisp cool days they’d get around Halloween. Olivia had that good fall feeling – fresh starts, new things, a little hum of excitement because she was almost home.

She had one of those too rare glints of awareness, as she sat in the Jeep sharing fries with Teddy and Winston. This was it. This was happy. Whoever that was who said you couldn’t come home again was totally full of shit. From here on out things were going to be good. They had been through the wars, her little family, but now they were over the hump.

Olivia would remember this one, truly perfect moment, before she and Teddy took their very first look at the house. Blaming herself, later, for being dazzled and distracted by the joy of coming home, was entirely unfair.

They rolled into Knoxville right at dusk. It was a strange feeling, being back home, where the streets were familiar but so distant in memory. Two months ago, home for her brother’s funeral, Olivia found her way around by instinct, only getting confused when she tried to consciously think about which way to go.

She headed north on Kingston Pike, late enough that the after work rush had died away.

‘Look for a street sign that says Westwood,’ she told Teddy. ‘It should be on our left. Do you want to run by and see your new school? It’s on the way.’

Teddy shrugged and stared out the window. Her hair was half in and half out of a ponytail, and her little round glasses were smudged. She had chosen to wear socks today with her sandals, for no particular reason, different colored socks, sliding and bunching at the ankle.

‘You want to go see it?’ Olivia said.

Teddy’s voice was a whisper. ‘That’s okay.’

‘I know how much it sucks to have to go to another new school, Teddy. But remember, me and Uncle Chris both went to Bearden when we were kids. It’s friendlier here than in California.’

‘I like California.’

‘I know. But after this, Teddy, no more moving and no more changing schools. This time we’re going to stay put.’

Teddy’s hand strayed to Winston, who was straddling the middle trying to get his head in the front seat. He licked each one of Teddy’s fingers, and she wiped them on her shorts. She sat forward and pointed.

‘There it is, Mommy. See the sign? Westwood.’

Olivia put on the turn signal.

‘Are we almost there?’

‘One minute away.’

Teddy smiled and sighed deeply, and the dog put a paw in her lap. ‘It’s a pretty house, Winston. Uncle Chris used to live there and it’s cool.’

Olivia turned right on to Sutherland Avenue, watched for the landmarks, the line of little bungalows she’d known from childhood.

The front porch light was on, which was comforting, though it was not yet dark. As far as Olivia was concerned, the stone Tudor cottage defined home. Charlotte and Chris had let the yard go to hell, but even behind the overgrown magnolia and berry bushes, the clumps of dried leaves and moldy chestnuts that littered the ground, the house struggled to welcome her back. She loved the wood battens and diamond paned windows, the waist high stone wall and black iron fencing, the thick hedge of snarled honeysuckle and forsythia that shielded the boundaries of the property on all sides.

For Olivia, a house was a love affair. She loved arched doorways, wood floors and casement windows, but when she had been married to Hugh every move meant the inevitable decision between living in older, edgy neighborhoods and beige carpeted suburbia. Olivia’s preferences were always trumped by crime rates and good schools.

And though she kept her secret curled tight inside, she allowed a private wish. Because coming home meant a revival of hope for that tearful reunion Olivia dreamed about, where her sister Emily would knock on that front door, with a long story that no matter how horrific, would be calmed and healed by the joy of returning home. When Olivia had been a little girl, she had sat on those stone steps out front, waiting and waiting. Even now, twenty-five years later, when those stories broke on the news of a miraculous reunion and return, a missing child come home at long last, Olivia had hope that it would happen in her family. She had never given up. Neither had Chris. She missed having someone to hope with.

And just as Olivia turned left into the steep driveway, and eased up the broken and buckled asphalt, thinking how much she missed her dead brother, she recognized Chris’s Ford Explorer parked to the side of the garage. The driver’s door hung open, the way Chris always left it, when he was absentminded and in a hurry to get where he had to go.

Olivia jammed on the brakes and sat forward in the seat.

‘There’s somebody here,’ Teddy said.