I gravitated back toward the bathroom and tried to pass by him. We met in front of the kitchen sink and he rubbed his wet hands on my arms. He took the small towel off his shoulders and handed it to me.
“There’s no more towels. We used them for the floor. Ceiling is leaking. Don’t be long in the shower. The water heater is on its last leg,” he said, smiling.
He was beautiful in a similar way to Deva. I could see how they had shared space inside someone’s womb. It was as if they’d assigned each other their future roles early on and established their fates. Hers would be different from his. He looked like his father did when he was young, taut stomach muscles and pale skin, except his was even paler than Deva’s—translucent and dead.
“Thanks.” I pulled away from him, but he held me back.
“Look. I know you really like it up here and you and my sister are having fun. I know you’re sneaking out. Deva’s been sneaking out since she was eleven. But do you really think you’re going to change her?” he asked. “You believe in miracles, then.”
“What are you talking about?” I gave him a push.
He stayed there with his wet hands planted firmly on my arms.
“This is a really complicated family.”
—
I was about to plug in the blow-dryer after the shower, when I heard the front door open, then the rustle of paper bags on the kitchen counter. A voice was singing a tune. It didn’t sound like Deva. After a moment the same song came blasting from the living-room speakers.
I opened the door a bit and peered in. The curtains on the sliding doors in front of the desk were drawn open now. Finally some light. I could see the wide terrace outside facing the valley of oaks beneath the house. It was Deva singing. A big voice blasted out of her tiny stomach. She kept her hand on her belly as she spun on the swivel chair at her father’s desk, singing over the recording of his song. Her father stood next to her looking at the monitor. I edged my feet back on the wet bathroom floor. It was his music video playing on the screen. The song blaring from the speakers was the same one I’d heard him sing to the wet trees last night. Deva joined in on the chorus: “And when I say I’m looking, don’t mean I wanna find what I’m looking for / When I say I’m searching, don’t mean I want to search at all.”
Chris came into the kitchen, dressed now. He whistled, unloading the grocery bags by the counter as if nothing had happened. I saw Deva’s father grab her up from the chair, inviting her to dance. She laughed and went with it while the video played on. I couldn’t blame him for casting Deva in his video. She was so beautiful, a perfect model. When she sang from the top of her lungs, her face expanded and illuminated. She stole the show.
Chris joined in, doing a kind of goofy mashed-potato dance, swinging his arms up and down. Their father was fresh-looking and sober now. Deva was right about his mood swings. I could see the beautiful man from the early days. I could see how special he was. When he danced he kept Deva close to him, like a little doll. She was so light he could push and pull and twist her around. She followed his lead. He was overbearing, always on the verge of pushing her too hard or too close, but Deva bounced back with her own special skill. She knew how to interact with his jaggedness. Even if at times there was something strained about the way they all moved around that kitchen floor, I thought to myself that the three of them on that Saturday morning looked like a happy family.
I slunk back, closed the bathroom door, and flushed the toilet to make myself heard. I shuffled about the shower, turning the faucet on and off. When I opened the door again, I pretended to be surprised to see them. Deva casually turned off the video and put on an old vinyl record. Tim Buckley’s Goodbye and Hello came on. His powerful, spirited voice filled the room.
“There’s the Italian one! Allora! Mamma mia! Buon giorno!” Deva’s father greeted me with unlikely avuncular affection. It was the first time I’d seen him really smile.
—
Rain fell through the rest of the day, soaking life with it. At night I saw it break the roof off the Alexandria and float down the hotel’s marble stairs. I was late from lunch break. It was the day we shot in the Valentino suite. An important day, my father said. I ran to get there on time, but running felt like trudging in the mud from Bob’s commune. I was dirty and wet and late. The red velvet from the antique suite appeared in the periphery of my eyes. I tried to walk faster toward the room. The sound of something buzzing, an incessant and repetitive hum, slowed me down. My father was there with his American cap and tennis shoes, preparing the next shot. I hauled costumes in my arms, knowing they were not the right outfits for the scene, thinking they’d just have to do because we were running out of time. When I stepped into the room I noticed there were no actors. It was completely empty except for the director. He turned around. He had long hair and beard, a plump nose, and veiny cheeks. It was the face of Deva’s father that greeted me. Not Ettore’s. He started to clap his hands, inciting applause, but there was nobody to clap with him. The sound of his hands echoed in the empty room. I turned my back on him and ran away, knowing I had ruined everything. The film was over. I had missed my chance.
I felt something cold holding me. I was back in Deva’s cabin now, my eyes open. I was asleep but staring at the wooden ceiling. Deva’s hand was shaking mine.
“Stop doing that. You are scaring me,” she said.
Her long hair was on my chest. I blinked.
“I was sleeping with my eyes open,” I muttered. “I was dreaming.”
But the humming sound was still there.
“It stopped raining. I think they’re moving the boulder from the canyon road. Should we go and see?”
I glanced up toward the main house, instinctively.
“He’s passed out,” Deva reassured me.
She hopped off the bed and changed into the satin fairy-princess dress she liked to wear when we went out at night. Her eyes were darting around with ideas.
We made our way toward the main road, slipping downhill through the mud. Deva climbed over a few fences and I followed. A nocturnal demolition crew had been sent out to drill the rock apart and remove it. The people from the commune had gathered around the boulder in a circle. They played drums and didgeridoos. That’s where the electric hum in my dream came from. Ignoring the musicians, the demolition crew spoke on their walkie-talkies with the local police.
“What’s going on?” I asked Heide. She was sitting on the wet concrete, legs and arms crossed.
“The cops are trying to tell us the boulder has ‘fallen off’ the mountain.” She made air quotes with her fingers. “Bullshit. This is a meteor. It has landed on sacred Native American land to tell us something. These guys just want to ignore it and break it apart.”
I looked at the slope from which the rock had supposedly fallen. There was a hole there.
“Maybe it did fall off?” I ventured.