His voice, separated from his now-dead body, echoed through the kitchen and it chilled me to the bone!
We’re not here right now, I said to no one, then immediately I began to sweat and I went into the living room and collapsed pitifully onto the wicker-basket chair. I must have looked insignificant as I sat in a crumpled heap, attempting to compose myself with steady inhalations and exhalations. He always had trouble enunciating things properly, I despaired. I listened to the outgoing message over and over. A thousand times, I heard his voice and I came to the realization: he never spoke clearly. He spoke as if he had rocks inside his mouth. Did he eat rocks? I wondered. Did my adoptive parents feed him rocks? No, to put it more precisely, he was always a husk of a human being, almost embarrassed or ashamed to be living and breathing and eating like the rest of us. He must have really hated himself, I said to no one as I got up to disconnect the answering machine.
The next time the phone rings, I’ll answer it myself, I decided. And of course the phone kept ringing. Whoever called asked for my adoptive parents and had no idea who I was until I reminded them that one of us was still alive.
Oh, Helen, oh, how are you doing? the caller would say. Are you okay?
Oh yes, I am fine. I’m more concerned about my adoptive parents, all of this loss has taken a serious and perhaps permanent toll on them, but at least I’m here to help out. Would you like to leave a message?
I spoke to the callers in an artificially composed voice, a voice I myself barely recognized. And like a dutiful secretary, I proceeded methodically to take down a series of messages on a notepad in the smallest handwriting possible. Call Laura. Call Dr. Stein. Call Thomas. Call the funeral director’s office. Call the gravestone specialist. Call the auto insurance company. Call the hospital. Writing down the notes cramped my hand. I am not a secretary, I said to no one, I am a detective and I need clues or at the very least ideas about where to find clues! I told myself I needed to look more closely at everything. I walked around the empty house, upstairs and down, to-ing and fro-ing like some kind of harmless perambulator. I picked up knickknacks and set them down. I sifted my hands through bowls of potpourri, and not even that sickly sweet perfume-odor covered up the death-smell permeating each room. I opened doors and closed them. Unlike everyone in my adoptive family, I have always had a fondness for doors. Doors are very important, I thought, but why? Perhaps because they have something to do with childhood, because we rarely notice doors as adults. I continued walking around the house. I discovered squeaky drawers inside kitchen and bathroom cabinets, and I adjusted them with a special tool, some kind of tiny screwdriver, so they would open and shut softly. Be a better daughter, I said to no one.
I enjoyed hearing my footsteps pad across the carpet. My shared studio apartment in Manhattan had wooden floors, always the squeaky wooden floors, never the soft padding of Midwestern carpets. In Manhattan I squeaked, in Milwaukee I padded. Then I began to feel as if the embodiment of my adoptive parents’ grieving, the balding European man, were walking around the house with me, pointing out things that had escaped my observation, reminding me that it was my duty to investigate the house, to find some kind of answer, some kind of conclusion that would give me peace.
Maybe the answer is here, in this desk, he said, and he pulled open my adoptive mother’s desk drawer where she kept her receipts and did her monthly budget.
There is nothing in here but receipts, I said.
Exactly, said the European man. He presented to me an inconspicuous envelope and an insurance bill with the name of a doctor and a phone number for the hospital.
This doesn’t make any sense, I said. What does this mean?
The envelope was addressed to my adoptive brother.
I’m not the ghost, said the European man.
Of course you’re a ghost, I said. But he had already disappeared. It wasn’t fair to me how ghosts came and went as they liked, I thought as I stood alone in the kitchen. Were people who believed in the possibility of ghosts themselves ghosts? No one was around or I would have asked someone. No one was there to say.
14
Of all the phone messages I took down that afternoon, one message stood out to me, shining brightly and teasing me like a jewel-clue in the rough. It was a message from a young man named Thomas and he wanted to speak to my adoptive parents as soon as possible. He sounded frantic, there was a real sense of urgency in his voice, a sense of urgency I had not heard since I landed in Milwaukee. The urgency in his voice occupied my thoughts until I saw myself go upstairs to get my phone.
Why did he sound so upset? I kept asking no one. Why does he sound like he’s going to have a breakdown?
With swift, purposeful movements, I picked up my phone and dialed the number I had taken down.
The phone rang and rang and in between the rings I heard an electric silence like a refrigerator’s steady and persistent hum, then the ringing and humming went away abruptly, and a voice said, Hello?
I was shaking uncontrollably. Speak! I screamed to myself, speak! My tongue felt like an inchworm inside my mouth and I became estranged from it.
Speak! I said and this time it was aloud.
The voice on the phone said, Yes, hello? Who is this?
I heard my voice trembling like a drop of water on a leaf when I said, Is this Thomas?
This is Thomas, said the voice, who is this?
It’s his adoptive sister, I said, my name is Helen. I spoke to you when you called earlier.
I wanted to talk to your parents, he said.
I just don’t understand, he said. His voice broke off.
I don’t know if he ever mentioned he had an adoptive sister, I said gently, but here I am, you can tell me anything.
I know who you are. He’s gone and you’re the one that’s left.
Yes, I know, do you know what happened to him?
Silence.