Hopefully I'll have time to write more chapters soon--I'm gaining more and more interest in this project as the summer goes on, as if it's one of those annoying blackflies buzzing in my ear (except I like it).
Here's chapter 2. Pretty short, but necessary.
2
I got back to
Autumn’s friend’s house in Ellsworth around one in the morning. We were staying
there during the awkward transition phase between our old apartment in Portland
and the new house. It was a nice gesture, but I was glad to know I wouldn’t be
staying there much longer.
Her name was
Francine but she went by Susan, which never made much sense to me. My guess was
she didn’t like her name and didn’t want to disrespect her parents and go
through the paperwork to change it. She was a single mom with a bratty ten-year
old boy that couldn’t get it out of his mind that I was a punching bag. I don’t
remember his name. I just called him Brat.
Autumn played
softball with Susan at University of Presque Isle before I knew either of them.
Autumn was breaking up with the asshole she followed from Portland up to
school. Susan was a shoulder to cry on, which made an inseparable bond between
them until I came into the picture. Susan got jealous of us when we started
dating, and decided to get knocked up by some business major who ended up not
being so good with money or commitment.
The house was a
shitty modular that felt half-finished. I was never quite warm enough. I’d
catch the shivers just after getting out of bed that would last until I had my
second cup of coffee at the station. A house with a fireplace never gets like
that.
It was cold when I
walked in that evening, but still a paradise compared to the harsh winter night.
I felt the wall for the light switch, flipped it on and headed towards what
Susan called the guest bedroom but was actually a small computer room. Boxes
Autumn got from the grocery store for our essentials were stacked precariously
around our mattress on the floor. She was already asleep, face down in the
pillow with the light still on.
I started to
unbutton my uniform and walked over to the kid’s room, which was nice and
quiet. They were sharing with Brat—another reason I wanted out of Susan’s. The
room was a lot cleaner than Autumn and mine’s, since we left the toys back at
the apartment, afraid Brat would steal or break them.
I finished
undressing in the computer room and scrounged around a bathroom box for my
toothbrush, making a racket. Autumn rolled onto her back and squinted at me,
confused but strikingly innocent and beautiful, even with her dirty blonde hair
in a mess.
“It’s already in
the bathroom,” she managed, her voice already broken, as if she had been
sleeping for days. I nodded and took a step towards the door as she collapsed
back into bed.
I cleaned up and
did an abbreviated version of my walk around the house, hoping to get to bed
early to get some rest for the move. It was exciting, but in a way I felt like
I was cheating myself. It felt like a handout or a pity date in high school. I
didn’t feel like I earned the new house, or even the opportunity. Autumn told
me I did, but her vote of confidence was only part of what I needed, and was
only said to calm me down for a while. She’d turn around and question my
decision the next day, saying we were putting all our eggs in one basket.
Mary
Ficher, Cutler’s librarian, would always tell me not to put all my eggs in one
basket. It’s one of the things I still remember about her. She said it so damn
much, I can still hear her say it. When I’d run up the hill from my house as
soon as my old man and the armada of fishing boats were too far out in the
harbor to see, I’d wait on the library steps for Mrs. Ficher to come at eight
on the dot and unlock the door. It’s where I spent my days before I started
school and afternoons after school was let out. We’d have the place to
ourselves most of the time, so she’d read to me until her voice went hoarse or
she lost her grip on the books. At the time, I thought she’d lose grip because
the books were too heavy, not knowing about arthritis. So I’d only grab one
book, and she’d tell me not to put all my eggs in one basket, every time.
I
knew taking Wittenburg’s opportunity was the right choice for us. A house, free
of charge, and place like Cutler without the bad memories, a new chance for me
to prove myself. I figured Autumn could find a job in one of the retirement
homes in Bar Harbor—it’d be a twenty minute drive, but it could work. It’d be
the hardest for the kids, and I knew that, but they were young enough to make
new friends. It was a nice, small school that could help Tucker with what the
doctors told us was ADD and let young Maya be a little more creative than the
larger public schools would.
I
knew Autumn would see this was best for us eventually.
I left the kitchen
light on and returned to our room. I turned the single-bulb light off and
staggered to my side of the bed, lifted the covers and climbed in. Autumn
rolled over, giving me the spot she had been laying, preferring the cool, crisp
sheets. I inched forward, spooning against her as I did until I was almost
asleep. The warmth of her soft skin made me want to wake her and make love, but
I knew she would protest, even though it had been a couple days since we had
been able to. She was hesitant out of respect for Susan, and it was late. She
would’ve said we had a busy day ahead of us, which was true.
She was lying on
her back, breathing heavy. Not quite a snore, but just enough to make me feel
comfortable.
The movers were
already there when we pulled in the driveway at Bass Harbor. The fog had mostly
rolled away and the house looked a lot less depressing with some sun on it,
turning the ugly cream to a more vibrant light yellow.
Wittenburg told me
it was all right if I used the cruiser to help move things in. Autumn still had
her car from college, a lazy maroon Camry that still smelled of her
grandmother, who had passed the car down when she went to retirement housing
just before the turn of the century.
Jim, an unshaven
guy built like a linebacker, was one of the movers. I didn’t catch the other
guy’s name, but he was scrawny and seemed new. Jim already had the ramp lined
up to move the little furniture we had off the six-wheel truck. As soon as I
opened the door, he started moving things in, while the other guy took his
time, finishing his coffee.
I made sure to put
the lighter boxes in the Camry for Autumn and the kids, even though I ended up
moving most of it anyways. Autumn said she was sick in the morning, nervous
about the movers not showing up, and both Tucker and Maya raced to find their
rooms and stayed up there while Jim moved the heavy stuff in. Tucker tried to
claim the living room but Autumn showed him around and he eventually picked the
east bedroom, which had a nice skylight and more shelves for his model cars.
It was a pain in
the ass to get our bed frames through the door and up the stairs, but Jim new a
couple tricks that made life a little easier. Autumn kept herself to small
things, like making the beds and putting dishes away. I saw her try and move
the giant couch, but stopped herself after a couple pushes and asked the lazy
mover to do it for her, which he did without a word.
She eventually
felt good enough to move a couple boxes from the Camry in, one that had some
odds and ends of mine in it, mostly from Machias High, my alma mater just
fifteen minutes from Cutler. I watched her take it up the stairs, making sure
she wasn’t lightheaded or dizzy. It was only a minute or so after when she
called me upstairs to the master bedroom, which didn’t seem much bigger than
the other two.
I found her
crouched over the box on the floor, studying the contents.
“You needed
something?” I peeked my head in the door, wishing she would say no so I could
help Jim finish so we wouldn’t feel obligated to feed them.
“Hey.” She didn’t
turn to face me and sounded more interested in the box. “What’s this?”
“I think that’s my
old high school stuff.” I walked in and took a look at what she was so curious
about.
“You never showed
me this.” She was holding a picture of my parents and me. Autumn moved it
closer to me, as if I hadn’t studied it when it was on my bedroom desk back in
Cutler. We had just gotten out of church, I think, because we were dressed
nicely, standing in front of the garden just as the orchids my mother planted
were blossoming. I was no more than three at the time. “It looks like you and
your Dad. I’ve never seen your mother though.”
“Yeah, that’s Mom.”
I took it from her. “It’s one of the few pictures I took when I left. One of
the few Dad kept of us all.” Autumn stood up and grabbed my cheeks like distant
aunts do. “Well, you were cute. I don’t know what happened.”
“Huh.” I smiled
and set the picture down on the nightstand next to the bed. “If you say so.”
She knew when to move on, when something was bothering me.
“I’ll let you sort
though this box later. I’d like to do the bathroom now. You look like you have
empty hands, go grab one of the boxes for me.” I rolled my eyes and didn’t
move. “Well?” She looked at me expectantly.
I headed
downstairs, past Jim and the other guy and outside to the cruiser, where the
box of shampoo, soap, makeup and that sort of thing was. I had my hand on the
passenger door when a truck drove by nice and slow, eyeing the house. I waved,
guessing he was a local by the condition of his truck that looked like it had
been patched together from a couple other models that were probably headed
towards the scrapper. He looked at me, looked at the cruiser, and gave me a
good, cold stare. I stared back.
We finished moving
all the boxes and furniture in around supper time. Autumn took a break from
organizing and made the kids and me some peanut butter sandwiches. She had some
cereal, not daring to eat much after her rough morning.
Some people say
you don’t sleep well if you’re in a new place, but more was keeping me up that
night. I don’t know what Wittenburg expected me to find here, but I had a good
feeling I wasn’t going to like it.
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