Grey Zone (6 page)

Halfway up the stairs, she paused to thumb in the digits. Corkie was a good student – not as brilliant as Raleigh, perhaps, but bright and amenable to hard work. If anything, Dulcie thought, the fresh-faced student had been a little too enthusiastic. The previous year, she'd told Dulcie, she'd let herself get overextended; it was easy, with so many extracurricular competing for attention. And fresh off academic probation, Corkie couldn't really afford to miss their weekly tutorials. Dulcie would have to keep after her. But since the errant junior had canceled and wasn't responding to her tutor, Dulcie was going to seize the moment.

‘Sweetie? It's me.' She wasn't being grammatical, but Chris wouldn't care. ‘My day just opened up. Wanna have lunch?' She paused. ‘Breakfast?' With Chris's crazy schedule, it was always possible that he had gone back to sleep. But when they'd talked earlier, he'd made some noise about being free, hadn't he?

That had been before Dulcie had brought up her latest theory, and before he'd dashed it to the ground, leaving her a little too miffed to want to make plans. But he'd been tired, and even with his new tutoring gig he'd been stressed about money recently, too. And she, Dulcie could now see, had been a little overzealous. After all, Chris had been right. Dulcie had been through a couple of run-ins with the police recently. The last one, which had resulted in the retirement of her first thesis adviser, Professor William Alfred Bullock, had nearly taken her life. Now that she had a little distance on the morning's conversation, she could see how maybe she had gone too far. Well, that was fine. As soon as she saw Chris, she'd explain. Or, no, she'd apologize. As soon as he called her back.

She'd reached the top of the stairs as the church bells sounded the hour, and she stood to the side, letting the rush of students pass by. A steady stream flowed into the Science Center, its glass and chrome livened by the variety of their late-winter attire. Ahead of her, dozens of students took to the paths across the Yard, funneled on to the pavement by the mud and last patches of melting snow. One student, either braver or running farther behind than his colleagues, took off across what would soon be lawn, splashing up brown water as he ran. Over by University Hall, a young woman waved as he made it back to solid ground and took her in his arms. The campus was alive, and Dulcie loved it.

The sound of an old-fashioned telephone ringer broke her reverie, and Dulcie put the phone up to her ear. ‘Chris?'

‘Why? Is he in trouble?' The voice on the other end rose in concern.

‘Hi, Lucy.' Dulcie rarely called her mother by anything but her first name, but that didn't stop her mother from worrying about her only child. ‘No, everything's fine.'

‘And you two?' Lucy paused, and Dulcie imagined she could hear the wind through the trees. In truth, Lucy would probably be calling from the commune's kitchen, since the eco-friendly yurt they had shared didn't have a phone. But whenever Dulcie thought of her home, she thought of the great, stately pines that had served as her first study hall.

‘We're fine.' Dulcie paused. Knowing her mother wanted her to ask didn't make it any easier. ‘Why? What's up?'

‘Nothing, dear.' Dulcie could hear her mother fussing with something. Had she called while cooking? ‘Nothing important.'

‘Mom . . .' Lucy Schwartz undoubtedly missed her daughter, but her means of expressing her empty-nest loneliness could be annoying at times. ‘Did you have another dream? Did Karma see something in the I Ching?' Another silence. ‘Were you two doing peyote again?'

‘It's a vision quest, dear. When you say it like that, it sounds somewhat tawdry.'

Dulcie waited. If Chris was trying to reach her, she'd hear the call-waiting tone and cut her mother short.

‘I think of it as assisted dreaming, really. Castaneda wrote quite a bit about it back in the seventies, Dulcie. Don't you remember any of your early reading? I could send you his books.'

‘Lucy, I'm waiting for a call from Chris.' Also, she realized as her stomach growled, she was hungry. ‘And this must be costing you a fortune. Was there something you needed to tell me? I can call you back tonight—'

‘No, no, tonight we've got our circle. It's the full moon, you know.' Dulcie didn't. In the city, she tended to lose track of the lunar calendar. ‘And now that I have Merlin, I want to make sure I observe the correct ceremonies.'

‘Merlin?' Dulcie hesitated. Her mother hadn't had a boyfriend for years. She supposed she ought to be happy for her. ‘Is he new to the community?'

‘Oh, Jane – Moonthrush – couldn't handle him any more. He hissed and spit at her.'

‘Merlin's a cat.' Dulcie found herself smiling. Her mother had a pet!

‘In this life.' Lucy was back on solid ground. ‘I'm quite sure he's an old soul, though. He has so much to teach me, you know. I've been dreaming, and I'm even thinking of taking out my tarot cards again, which I'm sure came from him. In another century, the authorities would have said he was my familiar. Did you know that as many cats were burned as witches as women were, both in Colonial times and back in England?'

‘Yes, actually I did.' Lucy's predilection for books on magic had overlapped with the basic English department curriculum on Puritan New England. ‘Let me guess. Is Merlin a black cat?'

‘I knew you had the gift! I had my first visions at a much younger age, of course. But your father—'

Dulcie nodded, not really listening. The longer her father was gone, the greater his mythology had grown. Dulcie remembered him as a skinny, nervous man who had left Oregon on a quest, before settling down in an ashram in India. To his ex-wife, Dulcie's mother, he was alternatively a prophet who would one day return or a wandering spirit who had passed through only to give her Dulcie and to teach them both the importance of a female-centered world. As Lucy rambled on about the latest news – apparently a semi-coherent letter had arrived – Dulcie realized that all these interpretations might have some validity.

‘Merlin came from him, actually.' Lucy seemed to be winding down. ‘He didn't spell it out, but for those of us functioning at this level of consciousness, literal communication is no longer necessary.'

‘I'm glad you have a pet, Lucy.' An adult cat, especially, Dulcie thought, remembering Esmé's bad behavior. ‘Wait, does Merlin hiss at you?'

‘Not at all. I believe he was simply unable to communicate with Moonthrush, and she didn't understand why he wouldn't wear the cute little hat she had made.'

‘Poor cat.' Dulcie hadn't meant to speak out loud. She checked her watch; Chris wouldn't have a shift for several hours yet.

‘It wasn't only that, dear. He needed to get to me. And last night, he sent me the strangest dream.'

Finally, Dulcie thought. Lucy's calls almost always had a message. After, should she drop by Chris's? Maybe pick up some bagels on the way?

‘You see, it's all about commitment. Care and commitment, Dulcie.' Lucy waited, to make sure her daughter had heard her. ‘That big black cat sat right on my chest, and he told me that as a teacher, you have to take your responsibilities seriously. And that you could be a great teacher, Dulcie. You. He practically said your name out loud. But you are facing a great danger from someone with commitment issues. From someone tangled up in the idea of love.'

It's empty nest syndrome, Dulcie told herself as she walked across the Yard a few minutes later. She wants me to find myself, to make my mark as a scholar and a teacher. But she's lonely, and she's worried about me. After all, look at how her own marriage turned out.

Our life will be different, she thought as she walked toward the street. But even as she formed the thought, some dark part of her mind countered with a question.
Will it?
After all, both she and Chris were headed toward academic careers, and those were notoriously difficult to plan. What if he won a position at UCLA – and she could only get on the tenure track at Brown or Tulane? The idea of a cross-country romance made her cringe. Would she have to give up her dreams? Would Chris? Was there any sense in staying together now, when in only a few years—

The gust hit her like a slap, fragments of ice and small stones raking across her face like, yes, like claws. And just as suddenly, it was gone. That was March for you: leonine for as long as it could be. Unless . . . Dulcie laughed to herself. Lucy's cat might be speaking directly to her mother, but Mr Grey had his methods, as well. That March wind – that was Mr Grey in action, cutting her off when her emotions threatened to drag her down.

‘I'm sorry, Mr Grey,' she said out loud. ‘You're right.' She looked up at a sky that suddenly shone a clear blue. ‘I'm just hungry and, well, everything has been freaking me out recently. If I only had the sense of a cat, I'd learn to live in the moment. Not worry so much about love.'

Across the Yard, a cloaked figure froze and turned to stare. It must have been the stillness, the sudden stop, that caught Dulcie's eye, but as she turned, the figure also pivoted, away from her, so that its face was hidden by the deep hood. Well, so she'd been caught talking to herself. Harvard Square was filled with weirdos. Some of them were geniuses, and some of them communed with ghosts.

Dulcie felt her better spirits buoy her up as she made her way down Mass. Ave. It didn't mean anything that Chris hadn't called her back. He'd probably crashed for a few hours of sleep and turned off his own phone. He'd call her when he woke up, and if he didn't ring soon, she'd get his favorite – peanut butter and jelly on a raisin bagel – and surprise him at his place. Yes, she had told Suze she'd go to the police, but in the light of day, she was no longer even sure what she'd seen. The cops probably had hundreds of people calling, people who had real information about the missing girl. Besides, how sweet would it be if, just for once, she and Chris were both more or less awake at the same time? The possibility of a romantic interlude began to take shape in her mind, and she felt herself blushing – and speeding up just a bit on her way to the bagel store. Mr Grey, she was sure, would approve.

Chris must be on her mind, she thought as she queued up to cross the street. For a moment, she almost thought she was seeing him on the other side of the street. Tall and gangly, with straight brown hair that fell over his face in bangs, her beau had a look that wasn't uncommon among the students and bohemians of Cambridge. But that scarf, orange with a black zigzag, seemed familiar, too. It looked like one of Lucy's offerings: the one she had knitted for him during their first visit out West. It would match his aura, Lucy had said: warm and somehow electric.

‘Chris?' It was her sweetie, she was sure. And while she couldn't understand why he hadn't returned her call, she was filled with joy. As short as she was, however, joy alone would not catch his eye. ‘Yo! Chris!' Dulcie jumped up and waved, earning a nasty look from a large man in a tweed overcoat. ‘Sweetie!'

The wind was blowing again, though not with the clawing ferocity of a few minutes earlier. Her words were getting lost. ‘Chris Sorenson!'

And with that he turned, prompting Dulcie to squeeze her way past the tweed overcoat and through a gathering of Japanese tourists. ‘Chris!'

He was laughing as she made her way through, his wide mouth open in the generous smile she had come to love. ‘Dulcie,' he said. But as she drew near, expecting one of his equally generous hugs, she found herself stopping short. Standing to his right, and looking down at her with a frankly critical expression, was a woman about their age. Only, she was as tall as Chris, with the kind of silky auburn hair that Dulcie could only dream about. There were freckles on her cheeks, too, but beyond that, all similarities went out the window. This woman was slender and graceful, and dressed in a camel-hair coat that probably cost more than Dulcie's computer. And she had slipped her hand around Chris's elbow, holding on to the tall geek as if she owned him.

‘Chris?' Her mouth suddenly dry, Dulcie didn't know if the word was even audible.

‘Dulcie. I thought you'd be stuck tutoring all day.' Chris was still smiling. Dulcie looked from his face down to his arm. The hand had been withdrawn, but she could picture it: kid-leather glove and all.

‘I had a cancellation.' She choked out the words. ‘I called you.'

‘I've had my phone off.' He was talking as if it were the most natural thing in the world. ‘I was trying to get Rusti through her fractals program, and we were both having trouble concentrating.'

I'll bet
. The words came unbidden, and Dulcie bit her lip. ‘Rusti?' She'd heard the name. Knew that Chris had taken on a private student to earn some extra money. ‘I assumed . . . with the name . . .'

‘Ah, you thought that anybody looking to place into Applied Math would be male, didn't you?' His smile was broader now, and Dulcie's heart jumped just a bit. He didn't seem to be taking this seriously. She had made a silly – a
sexist
– assumption.

She shrugged. ‘I guess I did. Glad to meet you.' She held out a mittened hand and waited while Chris's student reached to shake it. Was there a slight hesitation? Dulcie couldn't trust herself to judge.

‘Charmed.' The tall woman had a slight twang to her voice. Alabama? Texas? Somewhere warm, that was for sure. Somewhere where sports were important. ‘You must be the girlfriend.'

‘Yup.' Dulcie knew she was nodding like a fool, but she couldn't stop. ‘That's me. I, I mean.' She looked from Rusti to her beau, wondering if she could salvage the situation. ‘I'd actually just called Chris to see if he wanted to have some lunch. I mean, I have a little time free. Maybe you'd join us?' Her smile was as genuine as she could make it.

‘Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry.' Chris seemed to be backing away. It didn't make sense. ‘We grabbed a bite at the Bagelry already, and I've booked some time for us in the Science Center. We've got to run. Besides, weren't you going to stop by the university police?'