A Sudden Light: A Novel (33 page)

Ben caused Harry’s death. In his rage against his father, he broke Harry. He broke him so he couldn’t save himself. The moment of Ben’s greatest joy—confessing his true love for Harry to his fiancée, and her accepting the truth of it—forever bonded with the moment of Ben’s greatest sorrow, the death of his soul mate. And now what does he do? And now where does he go?

Soaking wet and filthy, he enters Riddell House. Leaving muddy footprints on the rug, he goes to his father’s study and sits at the desk. With a shaky hand he scrawls a note to his father, an attempt to explain. He must go. He must find Harry, even if it means leaving this world.

He leaves the note on the desk and walks down the hill to the barn. The evening is falling on the meadow, and a cold wind blows, causing him
to shiver even more, if that’s possible. He takes his equipment bag from the barn and trudges through the woods to the base of the tree. The tree.

With grim determination, he straps on his gaffs and slings his flip line around the trunk, like he’s done a thousand times. He digs a spike into the bark until he feels the bite; he sets his weight on it and mounts the tree. He stabs his other spike into the trunk and he is ready. For the first time in his life, he doesn’t ask the tree to protect him.

The climb is not fun for him; it is a chore. It is difficult. It is painful. He feels he is not climbing by himself but carrying the dead body of Harry with him, hanging from a rope tied to his waist. He feels the burden of Harry’s soul. The guilt of Harry’s death.

And so he climbs endlessly. He climbs so slowly, the tree seems to grow taller as he climbs; he may never reach the top. Fatigue racks his body, his core. He is cold and tired and hungry. He aches.

It’s hours before he reaches a familiar place, and night has fully fallen. He finds the perch where a branch had broken off in a storm years ago. He pauses on the perch and looks out to the silhouette of the Olympic Mountains, a distinct black line against the horizon. His vista gives him some hope that nothing can diminish the beauty of this world. The wind is blowing strongly, and he trembles so violently, he nearly loses his grip. But he holds tight. No, he thinks. Not yet. For a moment, overwhelmed with fatigue from the previous night’s events, he thinks he should return to the ground to meet Harry, because Harry has made some stew for him and is waiting in the cottage for his return. But Ben remembers that Harry is dead, and so he continues up, higher still, until he is holding on to a trunk that is so thin it is almost impossible. The resilient trunk sways under his weight and sways in the wind, and he sways with it. It is frightening to be so exposed, so naked, nearly three hundred feet in the air.

He looks out to the black, star-riddled sky, and sees the face of Harry before him, hanging in the air.

Such a simple thing, to feel a loved one is with you, even after death. And yet, so painful.

Ben reaches out. He is holding on to the tree with only his legs, which are wrapped around a trunk no thicker than his arm. He reaches out for something. But for what?

The sky. He reaches out and takes hold of the sky. He grabs on. And in that moment, a breeze comes that is strong enough to sweep him off the tree and take him away. He is still holding on to the sky; his fingers grasp the charcoal fabric of the atmosphere, and so he drifts in the air, weightless, buffeted by the wind.

And then he soars. He ascends into the stratosphere and beyond. He flies, and Harry is before him. They look at each other and laugh at their indifference to the laws of physics. Ben reaches for Harry, but Harry remains just beyond Ben’s reach. Still, Ben is happy: they will leave this world forever.

But the breeze stops, and Ben sees the truth of it: he won’t be able to follow Harry. Harry disappears into the ether, but the weight of Ben’s guilt will not allow him to follow. His suffering is too heavy to let him escape. He reaches desperately, frantically for his soul mate, but he can’t catch hold.

He falls. Slowly at first, he gains speed until he is plummeting to earth at a terrifying rate, his stomach in his throat, he cannot breathe, cannot suck a breath of air; he falls, but he is not afraid. He knows there is no more reason for him, and he is satisfied with that. Because he hears the earth call. The soil, the rocks, the clay. He hears it call to him, and he knows that the earth ultimately wins. It always does. We will, all of us, end our lives here. Even the birds.

It is not long, and it is not painful. At least, he doesn’t remember the pain. And then, without a sense of time passing or of place changing, he can feel his toes and fingers grasp the moist earth, his belly pressing to the ground; he can smell the dirt, alive, ever shifting, changing, growing, dying, and he knows he is still a part of the earth.

All is darkness until he learns to see. All is silence until he learns to hear. All is still until he learns to move. And when finally he stands and
looks around at the dark woods and hears the night trains sounding their horns as they rumble by—when he sees that he is alone—he knows one thing with terrible clarity: this is where he is destined to be, and this is where he will stay.

This is where he will stay.

*  *  *

I woke up from my dream feeling queasy and edgy and dark.

Ben had given me a dream, as I asked. But he hadn’t given me the dream I wanted: the dream about my father. He had given me a dream about himself.

I understood that Ben felt guilty about Harry’s death, and that’s why he was stuck and waiting to fulfill his promise to Harry that their special place would be returned to nature. But what I wanted to know right then was why my father was so messed up. There was some connection that I couldn’t quite fathom. I believed without a doubt that Ben had the answer and could give it to me. But he wouldn’t do it, and I found that very frustrating. Why wouldn’t he give me what I had asked for?

I tried to fall asleep, but I couldn’t. Or maybe I didn’t try very hard. Because the dream he gave me felt too real. The sting of the rain. The pain of the climb. The dread of the fall. I felt cold under my bedsheet though it was at least seventy-five degrees in my room. I felt the cold and the rain, and I felt the dirt under my fingernails from Harry’s grave, and I felt the joy at seeing Harry’s face. I felt the sense of resignation at the moment of Ben’s realization: he wasn’t going anywhere.

I
t was late afternoon the next day when I stepped out into the breezeless courtyard behind the house. The sun felt good on my skin, and I lifted my face to the sky with my eyes closed to indulge in the warmth for a moment. When I broke my meditation and returned to the world, I caught sight of my father, very far away, on the other side of the orchard, pushing a wheelbarrow of refuse away from the fire pit and off into the woods. And then I noticed Serena near me, sitting on one of the marble benches in the formal garden, reading a book. She looked up as if on cue, and beckoned. How bizarre; she came from nowhere; perhaps
she
was a ghost.

She had an ashtray with her, and a pack of cigarettes, as well as the ever-present bottle of Jim Beam, which seemed to constantly refill itself. Maybe there was a secret pantry in the house with fifty bottles of Jim Beam, like the cupboard with fifty cans of tomato soup in the servants’ kitchen. While I wanted to continue on my way, I knew I’d been caught,
so I approached her. She set down her book spine up and adjusted herself on the bench.

“I want to have a look at you,” she said. “How is your head?”

“Fine.”

“Let me see it.”

I went to her and knelt down before her patiently while she examined the yellowing bruise on my forehead. Her arms were elevated and my head was tipped down so I was face-to-face with her cleavage. I could smell her citrus scent.

“Are you looking at my breasts?” she asked.

I was shocked. They were in my field of vision, but I wasn’t
looking
at them.

“Are you having dizzy spells?” she asked before I could answer.

“No.”

“Hmm. Okay.”

She released me and patted the bench next to her. “Won’t you join me?”

Could I refuse? I took a seat.

“I would offer you a cigarette or a drink, but you’re too young for those things,” she said. “You’re still a boy; I wouldn’t want to stunt your growth.”

She took a deep drag from her cigarette and followed it with a sip of whiskey. The sun was glaring and bright, and I shielded my eyes to better see Serena. She looked older than usual.

“Welcome to our Grey Gardens,” she said with a sweep of her arm.

“Why do you call it that?”

“I’m referring to a documentary from the seventies. It was about Jackie Kennedy’s crazy relatives who used to be rich and then became poor. They lived in a mansion that was falling down around them, but they refused to leave.”

“They should have sold it to a developer. Then they could have gotten rich again.”

“You said it, Nephew.”

She crushed out her cigarette, stood up, and gathered her things.

“Come with me,” she said. “I have something to show you.”

I followed her into the house and to Elijah’s study, which was a dark room with a gigantic desk surrounded by hides of dead animals—heads intact—decorating the floor and walls. She set the bottle, glass, and cigarette paraphernalia on a side table near a club chair. A desk stood opposite a gaping fireplace with black irons and a mantel of petrified wood. The windows were small and the glass was tinted amber, so it was dim in the room even when the sun was out. Serena sat behind the desk in a massive leather chair and indicated that I should sit opposite her on one of the hard-back chairs.

“This is where all the business of Riddell Timber was conducted,” she said, “after Elijah moved to The North Estate full-time. Before that, he worked out of his house downtown or at Riddell headquarters in Columbia City, just south of downtown.”

“History,” I said.

“Exactly. History. You’ve discovered some of it already, I know. But here’s some more. When Elijah’s wife, Sara, refused to move west with his second son, Abraham, Elijah disavowed them both. For many years they did not speak at all, and, in fact, Benjamin’s funeral was the first time Elijah laid eyes on Abraham, his only living son. Abraham was eighteen at the time. He went on to graduate from college and work at a New York banking institution to learn the trade. When his mother died he returned to Elijah an orphan. Elijah took him in, but he never grew to trust Abraham. Ben’s death had greatly changed Elijah, and, in Abraham, Elijah saw the things he disliked most about himself: a rapaciousness that bordered on reckless or even cruel. Elijah wondered if he had been so callous when he was a younger man. He had been.”

“How do you know all this?” I asked.

“I listen, I pay attention, I piece things together. Elijah knew of Abraham’s desire to develop The North Estate after Elijah’s death, which is why he put the house into a trust.”

“So Abraham couldn’t develop the land, but his family, if he had one, could still live here.”

“And be cared for, at least until the trust ran out of money. Abraham had little of his own money. Elijah left him with bits, but not enough to thrive. What little Abraham had, he squandered.”

“That’s why Abraham pushed you and Dad to develop the land,” I said.

“Exactly. Grandpa Abe knew he would never have the land to develop; he wanted
us
to do it. It was on those summer afternoons, as I sat on Grandpa Abe’s lap, playing with his beard or drawing him pictures, that he told me all of what I’m telling you now. About the trust Elijah created. How if Abraham left The North Estate, the land would immediately be turned over to the city. He could stay, but he would never gain control of the land.”

“Ah,” I said, understanding the mechanics. “Elijah trapped Abraham here.”

“Indeed,” Serena replied, satisfied that I had followed her logic. “Abraham grew to hate The North Estate; it became the symbol of his imprisonment. Due to his avaricious nature, Abraham stayed here to enjoy the benefits of the trust and the lifestyle it afforded, even as he frittered away his own holdings. You can imagine how terrible it would be to live a life in such conflict! Before he died, Grandpa Abe took me aside. He told me that most grandparents leave something to their grandchildren, but he wouldn’t be able to do that. He said he couldn’t leave me anything at all, except this house. He made me promise that, when he was dead, I would make Grandpa Samuel sell Riddell House so we could have the riches he wished he could give to us—to your father and me, both.”

“Did he tell anyone else?” I asked. “Dad or Grandpa Samuel?”

“He said I was the only one strong enough to follow through. He said that Grandpa Samuel was weak and would be against it, and Brother Jones, he said, would side with Grandpa Samuel. He said it was up to me.”

A red flag went up in my mind, but Serena’s story was quite compelling.

“So Grandpa Abe mortgaged himself to the hilt. He borrowed. He stole. God knows what he did. Because he knew that, when he died, the trust would be dissolved, Grandpa Samuel would get the land and could develop it for
a lot
of money. And Abe knew that the assets in the trust couldn’t be violated by his personal debt. So, it was a plan.”

“But Grandpa Samuel didn’t follow his part of the plan.”

“When Grandpa Abe died, he was deeply in debt,” Serena said. “The creditors and lawyers couldn’t take the house because it wasn’t his, you see, but they could take everything else. Grandpa Samuel was left with the house, the few assets that were still in the trust, and nothing else. On top of that, he was ousted from the lowly post he held at Riddell Industries, so he had no job either. You know, when a man can’t provide for his family . . . Well, it’s difficult on the male ego, that moment of admission.”

Which was what my father had to do. I saw it. I knew it was hard on him.