The Ghosts of Lovely Women (7 page)

I’m sure we were looking at each other in a most
authentic
way, because Ann and Stella, I sensed more than saw, were smiling at each other with raised eyebrows. For once
I
was going to be the topic of gossip.

* * *

The sign on the copier that said “Out of Order — Again!” had been replaced by one that said “Use At Your Own Risk.” This did not seem promising, but I put in my handouts and pressed the button, leaning heavily on the door that tended to pop open by itself and create an automatic jam.

Fred Bastian appeared, his disapproving look in place. It had a tinge of misery to it today. “Teddy? I wonder if I could see you in my office?”

I sighed. “Fred, could you just tell me what it’s about here? I have to lean on this. We need a new machine.” I said this last thing almost vengefully, then quickly looked to see if he was angry.

His eyes, though, kept flitting toward the main office. “I need to get back — I’ll see you in there?”

And he was gone. This was ominous. Somehow it had “you’re in trouble” written all over it, and yet I couldn’t think of anything that I’d done to tick off administration. Not recently, anyway. I managed to claim all of my copies without incident, then moved to the office, saluted Rosa, who laughed, and marched right up to Fred’s office. I knocked once, entered, and found myself face to face with Jessica Halliday’s parents.

They stood when I entered; Mrs. Halliday, normally blonde and pretty like her daughter, looked somehow faded and bloodless, and her eyes were red from crying. Mr. Halliday looked as though he were holding in some immense anger, something worthy of Mount Olympus, but on top of that was a naked grief that made me look away.

“Fred?” I asked, setting down my purse and papers.

“I think you know Mr. and Mrs. Halliday?” he said. I understood his discomfort now. I wondered how long they’d been in his office, possibly crying.

“Yes — we met at Parent Teacher conferences last year,” I said. I almost said, “How are you?” in that automatic way, but I said instead, “I— I’m so very sorry for your loss. We loved Jessica.”

Her mother started to cry and stepped forward to pull me into a surprising embrace. “Thank you so much, Ms. Thurber. Thank you. She loved you, too, she really did. She just liked your class so much.”

“Thank you for telling me. That is nice to hear.” There was a pause. “Is there something I can do for you?” I asked, not wanting to wait for Fred’s slow dispersal of whatever news he had.

Mr. Halliday stepped forward and shook my hand. “We’re grateful for all you did for Jessica — then and now.”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“The police contacted us. They told us about the site.”

I looked briefly at Fred. His eyes looked like little circles — they had widened with either surprise or curiosity.

“Oh!” I said. I had hoped the Hallidays wouldn’t have to know. “Listen — I don’t know her motives, but I must tell you I believe they were — intellectual. I think — uh— freedom was so very important to her—”

Mrs. Halliday laughed through her tears. “You don’t have to explain our daughter,” she said. “We know what a little spitfire she could be. Naturally we’re not thrilled about this, or about whoever is out there that might have encouraged her to do it. But the thing is shut down, and that’s what’s important.” Her eyes had rested on my pile of books. Jessica’s pink kitty notebook was sitting on top. I knew I should step forward and offer it to them, but I didn’t. I wondered if Mrs. Halliday would recognize it, ask for it. But then Mr. Halliday was speaking.

“She does have brothers who looked up to her — I do NOT want them to know about it,” he said. “Not to mention the fact that this could, if it gets out, cause a great many complications in my campaign.”

Mrs. Halliday said nothing, but I thought the look she shot her husband contained some disgust.

“Campaign?” I asked.

“I’m running for an Illinois Senate Seat,” he said. “It’s a new campaign — grass roots level — but it’s already getting attention. Jessica’s death will put me under a microscope whether I’m ready for it or not.”

“Ah,” I said, looking helplessly at Fred. I was sure Mr. Halliday was right, yet it seemed odd for him to discuss this now — then again, what did you discuss when you’d lost a loved one? How long was it before it was all right to resume conversation from life as you knew it?

“In any case, we were here to tell Mr. Bastian about the wake and funeral arrangements; we hope that many of her old friends will be notified. Jessica would want them there, I know.”

Mr. Halliday’s face reddened as he said it. I marveled that he could contain his grief enough to speak; I didn’t think I’d be able to get out one word in his place.

“Mr. Halliday — regarding the site — I assume you’ve talked about this with Mr. Bastian?”

The Hallidays nodded. Fred took over, resurrecting some of his pomposity. “The police have informed us, as well. We will be working together to do some very discreet questioning, as I’ve assured Jessica’s parents. No one need know about Jessica’s extracurricular activities, but if they have information, we’ll be trying to get it.”

My first response to that was that they’d get nothing. Sure, kids could be intimidated by authority, but that was often one of the reasons why they clammed up. With young people it was complicated — or at least a different sort of complicated.

I picked up my books from Fred’s desk. “Well, again I’m so sorry, and I’ll be at the wake and funeral, of course. Will she — will you be—?”

Somehow they interpreted my clumsy question. “It will be a closed casket,” her mother murmured. “With lots of pictures on top. Pictures of her in all the plays, the chorus, the homecoming parade—”

Her voice broke and her husband moved in, clasping her in a bear-like embrace. Fred looked discreetly at the wall and I made my exit. On my way out I saw someone I recognized — it took me a few seconds to realize it was Kelsey McCall, the detective who had come to my house to look at the website. She and a young man in a suit were on their way into Fred’s office. This place was Grand Central today.

Rosa was standing in front of some administrative mailboxes, delivering junk mail. Next to her was Kathy Olchen; the club mailboxes were here, too, and Kathy was the moderator of the American History club. She clutched her mail while looking over her shoulder at Fred’s office.

“That’s her parents in there?” she whispered.

“Jessica’s? Yes.”

Kathy seemed in an odd mood; she stared at the mail in her hand, then shook her head.

“Duh— I took the wrong mail,” she said. “I always do that; the box is right above mine.”

“Are you okay?” I asked. “Are you upset about Jessica?”

“I guess,” Kathy said. “These last couple days — wow.”

“Yeah.”

Kathy turned suddenly to Rosa. “When Jessica Halliday went here — she was president of the drama club, right?”

“Yes, that’s right,” said Rosa, surprised.

“So she had permission to come in here and check the drama club mailbox?” Kathy was pointing at it, her face thoughtful.

“Oh, yes. She and I used to have some lovely chats. She would stand there and read her mail, and we would talk. She was such a lively girl, so playful.” Rosa looked sad, and angry too.

“Yes she was,” said Kathy vaguely.

Rosa sighed, finished delivering ads for cell phones and timeshares (why they thought teachers could afford them, I don’t know), and patted Kathy’s back. “This will all blow over.”

“I’ll be back later,” Kathy said, and walked swiftly out of the office.

“Okay, hon,” said Rosa. In the same comforting way she patted my shoulder as she passed me on the way back to her desk. “Long day, huh?”

“And still it goes on.”

The endless day. That made me think of Jessica’s comments about
Waiting for Godot
, and the famous existentialist line “Will night never come?” Jessica had found this heavy-handed, much to my amusement at the time.

I’d held on to her notebook, mainly because I wanted to read it. Since her parents probably didn’t know of its existence, it was not a big deal. And perhaps I’d get an idea why Rosalyn wanted it so badly.

Feeling sleepy, I marched myself back upstairs for my Period 6 class. These were sophomores, just like my Period 4, and they too had been working through
Macbeth
. “How did we like Act II?” I asked them after I took attendance.

“Ugh, too much murder!” said Jenny Bart in the first desk. “It’s so gross!”

“The gross is what makes it good,” said Scott Elliott.

Normally I loved
Macbeth
, but in my current mood I had to silently side with Jenny. Too much murder, indeed.

“Why — what’s this? Someone’s been at the lock!”

—Torvald,
A Doll’s House
, Act III

I graded papers in my classroom for about half an hour after school, then remembered that I needed to let P.G. out and raced to the parking lot. It was drizzling and gray, but I’m one of the few people in the world who like that kind of weather, especially when the sky has a metallic sheen and the air smells like earth and flowers. I snuggled into my car and set the radio dial to oldies, which, on this station, meant music from the 80s and 90s. They were playing a song by someone named Paul Young and I really liked it.

I tapped the steering wheel and thought about the day — Jessica, Danny, Rosalyn, Derek Jonas. I smiled for no reason and hummed with the radio. My afternoon was going to be spent like pretty much every other afternoon — grading papers in my silent apartment. I’d grown so used to this pattern that I found I couldn’t abide much noise anymore. I wasn’t able to think. Sometimes I played quiet music in the background, but when I was grading it had to be classical, or I found my mind wandering away from the often tangled ideas in the papers I read, and helping to untangle them took uber concentration.

I parked my car in its usual spot, grabbed my mail, and went upstairs to retrieve my tail-wagging friend, who conveyed, I swear, a bit of reproach at my lateness. As reparation I walked him for an extra block, despite the drizzle. We walked past Derek’s apartment, but saw no sign of him today. I remembered him saying “I’m not stalking you” and it made me laugh. Then I remembered Richard, and I stopped laughing.

I couldn’t find my key, which was annoying. I lost my keys constantly; either I left my home keys at work or my work keys at home. I would have to make a note to look on my desk for it. With a sigh I pulled a spare out of my wallet and entered my apartment.

P.G. and I snuggled into our space, and I drank tea while I tried to finish my grading. I had a tendency to rake a hand through my hair while I read, and after forty-five minutes I feared I would go bald if I didn’t take a break. The phone rang; I looked at it fearfully and realized that I really needed to get Caller I.D. Taking a deep breath, I strode to the wall and picked up the receiver. “Hello?”

“Hey.”

It was my sister, Lucky. Her name is Lucretia (only slightly better than Theodora), but we’d always been Teddy and Lucky. Even my parents couldn’t bear to call us those cumbersome names once they’d saddled us with them. “What’s up, Luck?”

“Matt and I are going away for our own spring break. Our neighbor Tom agreed to water our plants and feed Mimi, but I just wanted to let you know. We leave tonight. We’re going to Colorado.” She sounded thrilled. She and Matt had been married for three years, but Lucky always sounded like a newlywed. I felt a jolt of envy.

“Thanks. I’ll put that on the calendar. You both managed to get away from the rat race, huh?”

“We made it a priority. I feel like I don’t even see my husband these days.” Matt and Lucky were both career-focused people, which was why I had no niece or nephew as of yet. Lucky was my little sister, but she’d embraced marriage and its attendant responsibilities rather early in life. By twenty-four she’d found herself with a husband, a mortgage, and a good job as a college admissions counselor. Matt was a lawyer. They were well-matched, but always busy. This, I realized, would be very good for them.

“Well, I hope you have tons of fun.”

“And sex.”

“That, too.”

“How are you doing in that department?” asked my ever-nosy sister.

“Richard sent me another e-mail,” I said.

Lucky’s voice grew shrill. “Are you kidding me? I want you to call the cops, Teddy.”

“And tell them someone sent me an e-mail expressing concern? Yeah, they’ll hop right on that one.”

“But there’s a pattern — a pattern of harassment. He’s weird.”

“But clever. There’s nothing here that I could even remotely use to get a restraining order or anything else. I’ll just keep ignoring him. It worked for a year.”

“Oh, Ted. I wish this guy had never been in your life.”

“Ditto.” The brief romantic affair I’d enjoyed with Richard had descended into jealousy, petty arguments, childish recriminations. Cutting off the relationship had been a wise and mature decision on my part, and one I’d never regretted, although it had been messy and exhausting.

Lucky sighed. “How’s your beagle?”

“He is well,” I said, scratching P.G.’s hard little head.

“I’m going to keep checking on you from Vail. Meanwhile, could you tell Will about my vacation? I think he’s the traveling bachelor again, and he doesn’t respond to e-mails or voicemails. There is such a thing as social etiquette.”

Our brother Will was a computer genius who worked for a software company and traveled constantly. We were proud of him, but we complained about his travel schedule, as families tend to do.

I laughed. “Yeah, I don’t think our brother ever read that book. I’m sure he’s traveling, Lucky. He was in Japan last month, and last time I had a burger with him he told me he was headed for Sweden in a couple days.”

“Very glamorous. Maybe he’ll bring home a Swedish bride.”

“Right. Okay, suddenly I’m starving. P.G. and I are going to get some dinner.”

“Okay. Love you, Teddy.”

“Love you, too. Enjoy the mountains.”