Is Anybody There? (6 page)

She opened her car door. “Since you suggested it, I think I will run up and give him these now. They’ll be fresher.” She hesitated.
“I don’t suppose you want to come?”

I stepped out of the car before I answered. The night was cool and the sky bright with stars. From the direction of the Clarks’ house came the smell of something sweet and spicy. I glanced up at Nick’s apartment. Actually, I didn’t want Mom going up there by herself, the two of them maybe talking about me. Mom: “He’s getting so rude and impossible, I don’t know what I’m going to do with him.” Nick: “It’s hard for the boy, Caroline. He’ll get over it.” Why did I know Nick would be reasonable and, in a way, on my side? Why couldn’t he be rotten about me so Mom would start not liking him?

Our house looked dark and somehow mysterious. I didn’t really want to go into it by myself. “I guess I’ll come with you,” I said.

“Good!” I saw the glimmer of Mom’s smile in the half dark, heard the pleasure in her voice. She put her arms around my shoulders. “Let’s go.”

I tagged behind her as she climbed the wooden steps to Nick’s, her heels tapping out a happy little rhythm. I sneaked a couple of glances at our house below. Why hadn’t I left
a lamp on in the porch or living room? A car passed on the street, and its headlights gleamed on the blankness of a window. For a second I thought I saw movement behind there. But it was only the tree branches or the top of the oleander hedge reflected in the trail of light. It was nothing at all. I hurried to catch up with Mom.

I guess Nick had heard us coming, because he had his door open and his outside light on before we got there. “Hi,” he said. Boy, did he look happy to see us! A great, big, happy, old bear.

Mom gave him the bag and said, “Cookies! For your sweet tooth.” He peered inside and said, “Caroline! Thank you!”

I swear, he couldn’t have sounded more grateful if she’d given him a Porsche or a Ferrari. In my opinion, he overdid it a bit.

“Marcus thought we should bring them up to you tonight,” Mom said, and Nick smiled at me. “Thanks Marcus. These are great. Come in, both of you. Sit down! Marcus, try the wicker chair. It’s pretty good. Caroline, you sit here.”

When had this Caroline business started? I thought she was supposed to be Mrs. Mullen to him. I guess when you’re poring over a jigsaw puzzle night after night it’s pretty hard to say, “Hey, Mrs. Mullen, I’ve found this piece of sky,” or “Yes, I will have a cup of coffee, Mrs. Mullen. And I’ll take a butterscotch cookie if you happen to have one. They’re my favorites.” Caroline
would
be more natural.

The wicker chair creaked but he was right, it was comfortable. Nick made us hot chocolate. He had one Santa mug, which he gave me. Mom said, “I’m getting fat and sassy and it isn’t even Christmas yet.”

“You’re not fat,” Nick said. “You will never be fat.”

That sounded like a pretty familiar remark for him to make to my mother. It was the kind of smirky, just-for-laughs thing Robbie would say. But Nick wasn’t being smirky. This was real, like the time I’d heard him tell her she was a beautiful woman.

I stared around the apartment. There was the bird picture I’d seen yesterday, and other photographs of birds in flight, big flocks of
them taking off into a sunset sky. There was one of a nest with babies in it. They had feathers that stuck up on the tops of their heads the way Anjelica Trotter’s school hair did. Mom’s picture wasn’t anywhere in sight.

“I guess you like birds, Nick,” I said. “You must like taking pictures, period.” I didn’t add, “For instance, how about that one of Mom,” but I tried to put a lot of extra meaning into what I did say.

Nick smiled. “I do. I teach photography as well as phys. ed., you know.”

“You didn’t know that, Marcus?” Mom took a sip of her hot chocolate.

“No.” Obviously
she
did.

“Photography’s pretty neat,” Nick said. “I have an extra camera, brand-new. I bought it for my son, but …” He stopped. “You could borrow it if you like, Marcus. I’d be happy to give you some pointers.”

What was he trying for now? A replacement son?

“No way,” I said.

“Marcus!” Mom sat straight.

“I just meant that I don’t want to borrow a camera, that’s all,” I began. “I’ve got so many things going right now.”

“It’s all right, Caroline,” Nick said. “Marcus knows what he wants and what he doesn’t want.”

There he goes again, I thought. Taking my side.

Nick had broken the cookies into quarters. He offered the plate to me and I took a piece and said, “Thanks, Nick,” so I’d come over a little more polite and Mom would be pleased. She and Nick were talking comfortably together, like friends who’d known each other for a long time. Good friends.

After a while Mom stretched and yawned. “All I need now is a hot bath and early to bed. Tomorrow’s going to be hectic.” She stood up. “Ready, Marcus?”

I was ready all right.

Nick walked us to the door.

“Caroline,” he said, “why don’t you go on? I want to speak to Marcus for a few minutes.”

Uh-oh. I had a feeling this was going to be some kind of showdown. Maybe a let’s-try-to-get-along-for-your-mother’s-sake lecture.

“Is it a Christmas secret?” Mom had that hopeful look. “The air’s filled with secrets at this time of year.” She gave me a smile. “I’ll see you later down at the house then, Marky.”

The shadow on the window slid across my mind, even though I knew it was only the tree. “We’d better go together, Mom. I’m pretty pooped too. Can whatever it is wait till tomorrow, Nick?”

“Sure. And Marcus. Don’t wait for an invitation. Come up anytime.”

He called good night from the top of the stairs and stood there, letting his apartment light shine down on us. Next door I could see Miss Coriander in her kitchen stirring something in a blue bowl. Their kitchen is like a storage room, piled high with cardboard containers overflowing with the dried pods and buttons and pinecones and wire that she and Miss Sarah use to make the Christmas wreaths they give away. The Raggedy Anns Miss Sarah is making for their church sale sat in a row on the table. I could see the stacks of newspaper they keep for recycling. It looked nice. Safe and messy and normal.

Mom had taken her keys from her purse, and waved back to Nick as she opened our door.

I stepped in front of her and turned on the hall light. Nobody. Of course not. I had to
quit this imagining. When I plugged in the tree, the red, blue, and yellow bulbs twinkled and shone, tumbling their colors across the ceiling. Cheerful, Christmasy. Nothing to worry about. I went around then, lighting up the whole house.

Mom met me in the hallway. “Hon, I’m going to go straight in for my bath and bed. Do you want to watch TV for a while? Or read?”

I nodded.

“I’ll try not to wake you in the morning when I leave. I should be home shortly after six.” She hesitated, and I thought she was going to hassle me about being rude to Nick, but instead she put her hands on my shoulders and said: “I love you very much, Marcus. Nothing can change that. Nobody can change that.” She was looking so deeply into my eyes that I thought she might be able to see through them, into my brain, see the thoughts scuttling nervously around. “I truly don’t know if Nick and I care for each other in any serious way,” she said, “but I promise you something. I will tell you if it gets to be like that. You will be the first to know. OK?”

I tried to smile. “OK.”

“Good night, Marky.”

“Sleep tight, Mom.”

I went back in the living room and slumped on the couch. She didn’t know if she and Nick cared for each other seriously. It could all fall through. I would start thinking negatively that it would. I imagined Nick giving up the apartment, disappearing. A nice young couple with two kids would rent the place and they’d have me baby-sit and the kids would call me Unky Marky. Two kids might be too much. OK, one kid. I wondered if Anjelica Trotter had babysitting jobs. A lot of the girls did.

Mom was still in the bathroom, so I went through the kitchen to use the little half bath off the laundry room. On the floor, right in front of the toilet, were two dumps of bright, fresh green. My heart began pumping up a storm as I leaned over and touched one with the tip of my finger. It fell apart into a scatter of grass. What the …? The other clump was still intact.

I sat back on my heels, looking at it. Nick had cut our front lawn yesterday. Somebody had walked across it since then and the grass had stuck on the soles of his shoes. The
someone had come in here and used the toilet and the grass had fallen off. Who? Not Robbie or I today. Not Mom. She always drives straight into the garage. And tonight we hadn’t gone near the lawn. Nick again? When? I’d watched him yesterday as he put everything away. He hadn’t come in the house. Today then. But why would he come down here when he had his own bathroom upstairs? It didn’t make sense. And Miss Sarah hadn’t seen him. Hard for him to slip past her.

Carefully I picked up the wad of grass and cradled it in my hand. No clues here. No wonderful, distinctive rubber sole marks. Nothing. It cracked in two as I examined it and I dropped half into the toilet and flushed it away. The other piece was thicker, rubbery. I set it, whole, on the windowsill.

“Marcus?” That was Mom calling.

“Coming.”

Mom was standing in the living room. She wore her dark-blue robe and her hair hung in little wet strands on her shoulders. “Have you seen my clock, Marcus?” she asked.

“Your clock? You mean your little bedside clock?”

“Yes. It’s the darndest thing. I can’t find it anywhere. I know it was there this morning. The alarm woke me up. Did you borrow it?”

I shook my head, feeling cold and anxious. Too many weird things going on.

“I didn’t think you did. Well, how could it vanish like this?”

“Nick took it?” I hadn’t meant it to be a question, but that’s how it came out. Mom’s face changed. I wanted to look away because I could see she was getting angry.

“I’m really tired of all this talk about Nick, Marcus. Now you’re being ridiculous.”

“No I’m not. He did take it. And he
is
coming in our house when he knows we’re not here. Yesterday, or today, he used the toilet in our laundry room.”

Mom sighed in an exasperated way. “So what if he did? Maybe he didn’t want to bother going upstairs when he was in the garage, or out in the yard. That’s such a big deal?”

“I just …” How to explain this feeling? “He came in secretly. Even Miss Sarah didn’t see him.”

“You mean you asked her? Honestly, Marcus!
Well, it obviously
is
a big deal to you so let’s just find out what Nick has to say. That would seem to be the easiest thing. We’ll simply ask him if he took the clock, used the toilet, took—” She stopped. “What else is it he’s supposed to have taken?”

“Bread and peanut butter,” I said weakly.

“Oh yes. And the meat loaf. Didn’t you mention meat loaf?”

She walked across to the phone, dialed.

“I think maybe I’m wrong,” I said desperately. “Why don’t we just forget it tonight? We can—”

“Nick?” Mom said into the phone. “This is Caroline. I wonder if you could come down here for a few minutes. Marcus and I would like to talk to you about something.”

There was a pause before she said, “Thanks, Nick,” and hung up the phone.

I guess Nick was coming.

It must have taken Nick about a minute to run down but it seemed longer. Mom and I waited in the living room, me with my hands in my pockets. The only thing I said was: “Want me to get you a towel to dry your hair?” and she shook her head.

When he tapped the window, Mom opened the door.

“Is something wrong?” He stepped past her, looking at me.

“Sort of,” I said.

“Let’s go into the kitchen.” Mom led the way and Nick spread his hands in a “what’s up?” kind of gesture at me. He was wearing blue pajama bottoms and a short terry robe. I looked through him as if he wasn’t there.

Mom and I sat at one side of the table, Nick at the other. The accused! I thought.

“Marcus is upset because he thinks you’re coming here when we’re not around,” Mom said. “Secretly.”

“What makes you think that, Marcus?” Nick asked. I wondered if it meant he was guilty because he didn’t deny anything straight off.

“Because someone’s been here a bunch of times. And you have a key,” I said.

“Marcus thinks you’re taking stuff,” Mom added.

Nick folded his big hands on the table in front of him.

“I have never done that, Marcus,” he said. “I
have
been here a couple of times on my own. Once because your mother asked me to let the plumber in and stay while he worked. And once …” He turned to Mom. “Didn’t I take a delivery of something, Caroline?”

“The chair. From Krenwinkle’s.”

“But I didn’t come secretly, and I promise I didn’t take anything. I think I made myself a cup of instant coffee—”

“Oh stop it, Nick,” Mom said wearily. “Marcus, can’t you see how silly this is?”

I got up and took the spatula from the kitchen drawer.

“What are you doing now?” Mom asked,
but I didn’t reply. I brought back the clump of grass and slid it onto the table.

Nick touched it the way I’d done.

“It was on the floor in front of the laundry-room toilet,” I said.

“Not from your shoe?” Nick asked. “Or yours, Caroline?”

I answered for both of us. “No. And someone took her clock. If it wasn’t you, Nick …” I paused. “Then someone else has been here.”

“There’s more to this, isn’t there?” Nick asked. “Why don’t you sit down and tell us, Marcus.”

I told them about the key in the wrong place, the bread, everything. Even the odd feeling I’d had that first morning. “And now the grass prints and the clock,” I ended, watching Nick the way I once saw Patchin watch a potato bug. There was nothing to see in Nick’s face, no blushing or paling or shifty eyes.

Mom rubbed her forehead. “But why didn’t you tell me about the key before, Marcus? I trusted you to act responsibly.”

“You were tired all the time. And I wasn’t sure.”