3. Chapter Three
Chapter Three
Callie slipped silently out the back door, Roscoe at her side. She had found herself awake at 5 a.m., her mind churning through the last three days over and over again. She didn’t want to wake her parents. She didn’t want to talk. Unable to escape back into sleep, she decided to try music instead. The spring weather had followed her up from Tennessee. With luck, the summer house would be warm enough to play without disturbing the peace.
The guitar case thumped against her back as she navigated the path down the hill. She carried her banjo case in one hand and the violin case in the other. The rising sun streaked fire across the calm surface of the water and cast long shadows up the hillside. Once the morning mist burned off, it would be a beautiful day.
The boathouse, nestled into the hillside, provided shore-level storage for the canoe and the sailboat, but Callie was more interested in the ‘summer house’ on top. Ancient storm windows protected the woodwork and the wicker furniture during the off season, and also captured the early morning sunshine .
The door creaked as she opened it and she paused, a wave of memories taking her by surprise. Rainy-day crafts on the Fourth of July weekend. She and her sisters painting stripes on their toenails. Her first taste of beer, courtesy of Annabelle’s older sister. And then, of course, Adam. She flushed, remembering how he had pinned her against the wall and growled at her to slow down. Slowing down had been the last thing she wanted, from him or from the world. She had wanted to go fast, to get started, to get out of this small town and start her ‘real life.’
Now she felt a thousand years old and she missed that girl—the girl she had been before ‘real life’ took over.
She shook off the past and stepped through the doorway. Talk about water under the bridge. She should know better than to waste time swimming upstream. She laid the instrument cases in a row on the floor and opened them one by one. Roscoe scouted out a comfortable chair and climbed up onto the seat to nap. Callie tuned the instruments, beginning with the guitar, using an old-fashioned tuning fork as her father had taught her. Brian had tried to talk her into selling her instruments once, when they were low on cash. Thankfully she had stood her ground. Her great-grandfather had invested in beautiful instruments and cared for them all his life. She would never insult his memory by selling them, no matter how valuable they might be.
When all the instruments were tuned and ready, Callie picked up the guitar again, took a breath, and cleared her mind. She absorbed the rhythm of the tiny waves breaking on the rocks below. She began to play, using the guitar to soothe the tension of the past few days, and the frustrations that had been building for much longer. She took out her aggression on the banjo, eased her hurts with the fiddle, and ended up back on the guitar, struggling with a partially finished song that had been giving her trouble. No matter how she reworked it, she couldn’t get it right.
The sun continued to rise. Two squirrels chased each other along the outside of the window sill. Callie sank into the solitude, hungry for the deep flow that came from creating music.
After wrestling with a particularly tricky chord progression for a few minutes, she growled in frustration and thrashed out a few hard, satisfying chords to clear her head. One of the strings snapped, whipping back to bite her finger. She yelped and stuck her finger in her mouth. Then she heard a creak behind her. Someone was watching.
She twisted around, adrenaline surging through her veins, ready to fight. She stopped, confused, when she realized it was just a boy outside the storm door. The boy from yesterday morning. Danny.
Roscoe offered a lazy half-bark.
“Some watchdog you are,” she muttered, giving him a dirty look.
Turning back to Danny, she asked “Do you want to come in?” He took a step back, poised to run. Maybe her harsh voice made him nervous. Either that or the dog.
Callie took a deep breath and softened her voice as best she could.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” She waved in the direction of the dog. “Don’t worry about Roscoe. He’s too lazy to bother you.”
The boy couldn’t be more than eight or nine, with big ears, freckles, and painfully short red hair. There was no longer any doubt in her mind that this was Evan and Lainey’s child. Those ears came straight from Evan, and the red hair was all Lainey. Just looking at him was giving her flashbacks—and a disorienting glimpse of the road not taken. All her unspoken doubts and misgivings and regrets came wriggling to the surface like worms after a hard rain, forcing her to acknowledge the cost of chasing her dream. Part of that cost was giving up the daydream of a ‘normal’ life.
Danny’s gaze shifted from her face to her guitar, reminding her of the first time her father had placed a guitar in her arms. It had been almost as big as she was, but she had been desperate to try it. How old had she been? Four? Five? Something about the way this boy looked at her guitar made her suspect he needed music as much as she did.
“Come on in,” she offered. He still seemed uncertain, so she took her time hunting through the guitar case until she found a bandage. He hovered outside the door, wearing nothing but jeans and a t-shirt. He must be freezing. She watched him out of the corner of her eye while she tended to her finger. Then, fishing a new E-string out of her guitar case, she replaced the broken one. She could feel his eyes on her as she loosened the pegs, released the remnants of the broken string, coiled a new string around the pegs, and then tightened and tuned until the instrument was ready to play again. Callie held still, giving the boy time to make his decision.
Finally he pulled open the door and slipped inside. She smiled and motioned for him to sit beside her.
“Do you play?” she asked, already knowing the answer. He looked the way she felt—hungry for music.
He nodded. She lifted the strap over her head and passed the guitar to him. She said nothing else. She never had the right words, anyway.
The full-size guitar dwarfed Danny, but he didn’t seem to mind. He rested it across his lap and tested a few chords, making sure he had them right, his small fingers straining to press down hard enough on the strings. She resisted the urge to show him the correct finger positions, and soon enough he found them on his own. He began to play. She recognized the Irish folk song “Danny Boy”—an appropriate choice, given his name. It seemed odd to sit there and do nothing, so she pulled her fiddle out of the open case on the floor and started to play the melody line.
He played it through two or three times, growing more confident each time. After he stopped, she played the melody one last time, the lonely sound floating out over the water. Then she rested her fiddle in her lap and waited to see what he would do next.
He sat staring at the lake, holding on tight to the guitar. Judging by his white fingertips, he was feeling something powerful. But none of it showed on his face, and he wasn’t exactly inviting conversation. She herself had been accused—more than once—of shutting people out. Most times that was because she didn’t want to talk about whatever she was feeling. Words weren’t really her thing, unless they were part of a song. If he didn’t want to talk about whatever he was feeling, she certainly wouldn’t force the issue.
The raucous call of a gull startled them. They both jumped, then looked at each other and smiled. Callie relaxed. He was going to be okay.
“I’m Callie,” she offered, trying to make her voice sound as normal as possible. “What’s your name?” she asked, even though she knew the answer.
He hesitated a moment before answering.
“Danny.”
Normally, Callie let other people carry the conversation so she couldn’t screw it up, but Danny wasn’t exactly jumping in to fill the void.
“So, Danny-boy, where are you from?”
“Next door.” His voice sounded rusty, as though he didn’t use it often. Kind of like hers.
She pretended that he was keeping up his side of the conversation, asking where she lived. “I used to live here, too, but now I live in Nashville.”
Callie realized that further conversation about where she lived would only be confusing to a kid. What kind of a house do you live in? A loft, but I don’t live there anymore. What’s a loft? It’s one big room with brick walls and trendy furniture. Why don’t you live there anymore? Because my ex is an asshole. So where do you live now? Well, I’m not exactly sure. Here, I guess. For now.
She changed the subject.
“Who taught you how to play the guitar?” she asked.
Danny’s face crumpled briefly before he got it under control again. “My dad.” His voice cracked as he said it. She remembered Evan playing sometimes around the bonfire. She had always liked his voice.
“My dad taught me to play, too,” said Callie. “He loves country and bluegrass music, and now it’s my favorite music, too.”
“My dad loved Irish songs,” he said softly. “We used to play them for my mom and make her cry.”
Callie felt her stomach lurch. This was why she avoided conversation. It was a minefield. In this case, Danny was talking in past tense. Had Evan and Lainey divorced? Maybe Evan didn’t play music anymore, since the split. Callie couldn’t help her irrational rush of anger at him for being an idiot. How could a father do that to his own child, just when Danny would need music the most? Evan should know better.
“Do you want to play another song?” she asked.
“Okay.” He looked relieved.
“You choose,” she said. He thought for a minute, then started to play. She listened, realized he had chosen “The Water Is Wide,” and joined in. No wonder they made Lainey cry, with songs like these.
While they played, Callie kept her eyes on the lake and her mind on the music. Somehow the water made her feel lighter, and the music set her emotions free. Sharing music felt right. It felt good. Maybe this was exactly what the both of them needed.
“Danny!”
At the sound of the voice calling from up the hill, Roscoe roused himself and barked. Danny stopped playing and jumped up. He lifted the guitar strap over his head, placing the instrument back in its case. He paused, looking at Callie as if he wanted to say something, but instead he slipped silently out the door of the summer house, giving Callie a smile and a wave before running through the woods back home.
Callie stared after him, wondering about his story. Would he tell Evan about playing music with the lady next door? Would Evan remember her after all these years? Would he pull his guitar out of the closet and play again, maybe for the first time since the divorce? She let the story spin in her mind and sketched out a few ideas in her notebook. There might be something to this story, a sliver of truth she could weave into a new song. If nothing else, perhaps helping Danny would take her mind off her own troubles.
Maybe it would help her stop thinking about Adam.
“Danny!” Adam called out the back door and then waited, his ears straining for some sign of the boy. He hated this. He hated waking up every morning, wondering if Danny would be in his bed or out wandering. He had nightmares about Danny slipping on the shore path and falling, hitting his head, tumbling into the icy water. Thinking about it made his gut hurt. He had lost everyone else. He was not going to lose Danny.
“Danny!” he called again, louder this time. Finally he heard the rustling of the bushes and Danny appeared at the gap in the fence. The boy picked his way through the garden, sidestepping the dormant plants, and slowed as he approached the house. Adam stood on the front porch, chilled in only a t-shirt and a pair of flannel pajama pants.
“Danny, goddamn it, where have you been?”
As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Adam wished he could pull them back in. Too loud. Too harsh. And he shouldn’t be swearing. He took a deep breath, rubbed his forehead, and willed himself to relax. Danny studied his shoes and said nothing.
“Danny,” he said, more calmly this time. “You need to remember the house rules. You can’t leave without telling me.” Adam paused, giving Danny a chance to respond, but the boy kept his eyes down and said nothing.
“If you don’t want to tell me that you’re going out, at least leave me a note, will you? And remember, you never, ever go down to the water alone. That’s non-negotiable. Got it?”
He waited, longer this time, and at last Danny nodded. It wasn’t much more than a twitch, but at least it was a response. He wondered if Doc Archer would consider this progress.
“I’m going to take a shower and make some breakfast. I’ll call you when it’s ready, okay?”
Danny nodded again, more quickly this time. Two responses in one morning. What the hell? Adam glanced curiously at the gap in the fence, wondering what had happened to make Danny so…interactive. But the bushes looked the same as they did every morning.
Feeling optimistic, Adam held the screen door open for Danny. But instead of coming inside, Danny turned his back on Adam. He sat on the wet, cold grass and looked out over the lake, shoulders hunched and chin on his knees. And as quickly as it had come, Adam’s optimism faded. He closed his eyes briefly, took a breath, and gently closed the screen door.
Adam held on tight to his frustration until he reached the bedroom. He closed that door gently as well, then slammed his fist against the wall. It hurt. A lot. But it helped take the edge off the frustration and despair that threatened to overwhelm him. It gave him something else to be angry about, something tangible, instead of this impenetrable wall that Danny had built. The boy kept retreating, deeper and deeper inside himself, and Adam had begun to worry that he would never break through.
Hell, the kid wouldn’t even look at him.
Adam stepped into the bathroom, turning on the hot water at the sink and pulling out his shaving gear. He let the water flow over his hands as it warmed, until the scalding sensation focused his mind on the here and now, not the past or the future.
Adam studied his face, watching it blur as steam rose from the sink and slowly fogged the reflective surface. The blur softened his face, making him look like a ghostly version of his little brother. His dead little brother. Adam fought the urge to smash the mirror, instead forcing himself to start shaving, calmly, carefully. He saw Evan’s face often enough in his dreams. Daytime hallucinations were simply the next stop on the way to Crazytown. Sometimes, in the dreams, Adam found himself in the living room of Evan’s old house. Lainey rested on the couch, pregnant and happy, laughing. Evan rolled on the floor, wrestling with Danny as his little sister climbed onto his back, ‘helping.’ Inevitably, a ghostly double of Evan would appear beside him, watching the tableau along with him and smiling in a nostalgic kind of way. Adam would try to speak. Something. Anything. To ask for help? To beg him to come back? But before Adam could ever say a word, Evan would clap him on the shoulder and say ‘Don’t let me down, man.’ And then he would disappear. They would all disappear. And Adam would be left alone, wondering how the hell he was going to keep his promise.
Damn it! Adam had cut himself with the razor. Served him right for not paying attention. Danny needed him here. Now. Not in dreamland .
He kept his shower brief, threw on some clothes, and made a quick scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast. He could see the lawn and the lake from the kitchen window. Danny sat in the same spot on the grass, motionless, while Adam prepared the meal. Finally, Adam cranked open the window and called out.
“Danny. Breakfast.”
Only then did Danny move, rising slowly and trudging toward the house. When he came into the kitchen, he continued to avoid Adam’s eyes, although his gaze had moved from Adam’s shoes to up his knees. At this rate, Adam would be lucky to make eye contact with Danny by the time the kid graduated high school.
They ate in silence for a few minutes. Adam didn’t believe in talking for the sake of talking. But before they left the table, he tackled the subject of the custody challenge.
“There’s something important we need to discuss,” he began.
Danny stilled. It killed Adam to realize that, at eight, Danny had learned to recognize the warning signs of a critical conversation. For him, ‘we need to talk’ involved somebody dying. Adam didn’t keep him in suspense.
“Your grandparents are worried that you don’t talk, so they’ve asked the judge to review your situation. They would like you to try living with them.”
Adam paused to let the words sink in. Danny didn’t respond, so he continued.
“I want you to stay with me. I promised your parents that I would take care of you, and I’m not going to let them down. However—”
At that, Danny did look up, briefly. Then he returned to studying the bits of egg left on his plate.
“—your opinion matters. The judge will want to know what you want. If you want to stay here, with me, it would help a lot if you could say it out loud.”
Adam clenched his jaw and waited for a response. A nod would have been nice. Even a head twitch. Something. But he got nothing. Just another chance to study the top of Danny’s head.
Patience. Understanding. Acceptance.
Adam took a deep breath.
“Let me know if you have an opinion. I’ll let you know if anything changes.”
Danny took that as a cue to leave. At least he remembered to clear his plate before escaping from the kitchen.
Adam leaned forward on his elbows, resting his forehead in his hands. Nothing in all his years of corporate deal-making had prepared him for this. The business world may have been cutthroat, but the rules of the game had been very clear: Do the analysis. Make the deal. Make money. Move on.
Parenting was a completely different game. There were no deals to be made, no numbers to analyze. Only the painful knowledge that he was failing Danny, and he didn’t know how to fix it.
Given tools and time, Adam could restore a boat that had suffered years of neglect, but with Danny, he lacked both. He hadn’t found the right tool to break through Danny’s barriers, and he was running out of time. What made it worse was the feeling that he was missing something. Danny looked so much like Evan at that age. Adam should just know, instinctively, how to get through to him. They were both suffering. Hell, Danny’s pain had to be ten times worse than Adam’s. But Adam would gladly take on all of Danny’s grief if only he could reach him, even just to give him a hug.
One way or another, Adam would find a way, but Danny certainly wasn’t making it easy.
Callie left her instruments in the living room and found her mother sitting at the kitchen table, a flowered box full of letters and photos on the table in front of her. Dora was reading one of the letters, and she looked slightly sick. Roscoe stayed behind in the mudroom, sniffing around his empty food bowl as if more food might be hiding nearby.
“You okay, Mom?” asked Callie, modulating her harsh voice so as not to startle her mother. Dora jumped anyway, put a hand to her heart, and stuffed the letter back into the box.
“Oh, sweetie, you scared me half to death.” Dora quickly put the lid on the box and tucked it into the corner of the window seat. “What on earth are you doing up so early? I thought you were still sleeping.”
“Woke up,” she said. “Couldn’t sleep, so I went down to the summer house to play. I didn’t want to wake you.” Callie discovered that the kettle was hot and poured herself a cup of tea, warming her hands on the mug. “What’s all that in the box?”
“Oh nothing,” said Dora, her hands fluttering nervously, waving away Callie’s question. “Just some old letters. Nothing to worry about. Nothing important.” She got up from the table, giving the box one last glance, as if she wished she could lock it, or burn it. Then she started fussing in the refrigerator and making random comments about breakfast.
Her mother was a terrible liar.
If Dora said that letters were ‘nothing to worry about’ then she must be worried about them. Under normal circumstances, her mother would talk endlessly about whatever bothered her, until she had worked through it or talked herself out. Callie tried to imagine what her mother might want to keep a secret from the family, but couldn’t come up with anything plausible, except maybe naked photos from her art school days. She suppressed a giggle at the thought. Her curiosity piqued, Callie promised herself that she would sneak a peek at the box later, while her mother was up in the studio.
Roscoe whined from the mudroom, clearly upset by the delay in his breakfast. Dora hurried to help him, suddenly very interested in the health and eating habits of her ‘best boy.’ Callie leaned against the doorway, watching her mother fuss over the dog, and watching Roscoe bask in all the attention.
“Who’s living next door?” asked Callie, deliberately casual, as Dora returned to the kitchen. “I keep seeing a boy.” She really wanted to ask about Adam, but she also wanted to know what had happened to Evan and Lainey, who had been so happy together, and to find out why their son needed music so badly. For some reason, though, she was reluctant to mention actually meeting Danny this morning.
Dora stopped short.
“Didn’t I tell you?” she asked, surprised. “Adam Reese lives here full time now.”
The world stopped spinning. Callie grabbed the edge of the kitchen counter to keep from falling down.
“The boy’s name is Danny.” Dora gave Callie a pointed look. “You haven’t been home in a long time, sweetie. If you had visited last summer, or come home for Christmas….”
Dora let her last remark hang in the air as she pulled several boxes of berries from the fridge. Callie ignored the guilt trip. She was still reeling.
“Adam has a son?” asked Callie, grateful for the camouflage her rough voice provided. She had been so sure that the boy belonged to Evan. It had never even occurred to her that he might be Adam’s. She cleared her throat and forced herself to ask. “Who did he marry?”
“Oh, he didn’t,” answered Dora, and Callie sagged with relief. Not that she had any right to be upset or relieved or anything else. She had relinquished her claim on Adam long ago. She slid onto a counter stool and tried to settle her swirling thoughts.
“The whole thing is a big, sad mess if you ask me,” continued Dora. “It happened last summer. Adam was still living overseas. Evan and Lainey and the kids lived down near Chicago, but they spent a lot of time up here at the cottage in the summer. They were on their way up for the Fourth. All that traffic, you know, and the other driver had been drinking…. Lainey and the little girl were killed instantly. Evan made it to the hospital, but eventually died of his injuries. Poor little Danny was the only survivor, and he didn’t have a scratch on him.”
Dora paused to wipe her eyes and pull out a pot for oatmeal.
“Adam flew home the second he found out, and he never went back. He brought the boy here. Now it’s just the two of them.”
She scooped the oats into the pot and added water, putting it on the stove to heat.
“That’s horrible.” Callie fought back tears. Her stilted conversation with Danny made perfect sense now. Thank goodness she hadn’t poked and prodded him with a bunch of stupid questions. She couldn’t imagine losing her family. Maybe she didn’t come home as often as she should, and maybe she didn’t keep in touch like she should, but she knew that her sisters and her parents were alive and well somewhere in the world. Adam had lost his brother and little Danny was adrift, with only his uncle to anchor him.
“That’s not all,” said Dora, looking over her shoulder at Callie.
“How could it be worse?” asked Callie, not sure she wanted to know. She grabbed a tissue and scrubbed her face.
“The boy hasn’t spoken since the day of the accident,” said Dora. “Certainly not at school. Luke would know. The teachers have gotten very creative in working around his silence. They say he doesn’t speak at home, either. Can you imagine? He seems perfectly normal. Quiet, obviously, and shy. But he doesn’t talk. At all.”
Callie was speechless. She wanted to protest, ‘Of course he talks!’ He had spoken to her just that morning. But she couldn’t do it. A wave of emotion, part fierce protectiveness, part raw pain, swept over her. If Danny had trusted her with his music and his words when he had trusted no on else, then she would not betray him.
Dora set down the spoon, turning to face Callie.
“Are you going to be okay, sweetie?”
Callie reached for another tissue and blew her nose.
“I’ll be fine, Mom,” she said. “It’s just a shock. Even though I haven’t seen Evan and Lainey in years, it’s so strange to think that they’re gone.” Callie considered how to phrase the next bit so that it wasn’t completely a lie. “I’m glad you told me, though, in case I run into Adam or Danny. I’d hate to say something dumb and make either of them feel uncomfortable.”
Dora smiled. “The weather is getting warmer, and I bet Danny will start spending more time outside. Maybe you’ll get a chance to meet him, and to catch up with Adam.”
Callie nodded blankly, her mind spinning. Would Danny come back to play music with her again? Would she really see Adam? By the time she and her mother sat down to eat, Callie had all but forgotten about the letters. Then she caught her mother’s guilty glance at the flowered box. Callie smiled, distracting her with questions about the rest of the summer neighbors.
But when she came back later, the box was gone, and Callie was left to imagine what her open-book mother could possibly be hiding. Apparently there were a few secrets in this house after all.