Picture Me Gone (11 page)

As for Gil and me? We’re searching for Matthew but keep finding other things.

G
il has some explaining to do.

But, he protests, think about it. I didn’t have the faintest clue we were going to run into Lynda. She didn’t seem especially relevant when we set off. I haven’t seen or heard from her—haven’t thought about her—in years. And Matthew somehow never got around to telling me about Jake,
if
in fact Jake is his son and Matt isn’t just sending money to Lynda for any of a hundred other reasons.

A hundred? Name one.

You know what I mean.

I guess you couldn’t just ask?

Gil looks uncomfortable. I suppose. But wouldn’t she have told us if she wanted us to know?

Maybe she thinks you know already. Being Matthew’s best friend and all.

Of course, if it’s true, it’s quite shocking, Gil says, frowning. I wonder if Suzanne knows. Do you think he’d have told her?

Do
I
think?

Gil smiles. Yes, of course. I keep forgetting how old you are.

I don’t say anything but just on the fly I’m guessing he didn’t tell Suzanne.

This whole story gets messier and messier, says Gil, and he sounds weary all of a sudden. There’s Matt’s disappearance after the accident as well.

Why would he do that?

Gil shakes his head. I have no idea.

It’s very snowy and he is concentrating on not sliding into other cars. There’s so much going on in my own head that I don’t know where to start. It feels as if the landscape has cracked open to reveal a river of lava flowing beneath.

Gil pulls in at the Mountain View Motor Inn, which is undergoing that strange kind of transformation that happens when a completely alien place begins to feel like home. First you say, I’d like to go
home
now, or, Let’s go
home,
and suddenly realize that you don’t mean your lifelong home in London, but the Mountain View Motor Inn.

The motel is nice inside with huge comfortable beds. Gil plugs his computer into the converter plug from the airport and reaches down to find the socket. The manuscript of the book he is translating covers most of his bed and the book he found in the secondhand shop sits on a pillow like Cinderella’s glass slipper.

I liked the idea that there was no one but me in Gil’s life at the moment, but Lynda and Jake and the ghosts of Matthew and Owen have all crowded in on the party and ruined the illusion. It is very weird to see your father look at another woman as a woman, even if it is completely harmless. It is also fairly strange to discover that your father’s best friend may have been cheating on his wife about the same time he got her pregnant.

Gil says a bit peevishly that he’s not getting any work done, which is hardly surprising given the circumstances.

Never mind, I say, it’s only a few days, try to enjoy the company.

He kisses my forehead and replies, How could I not?

Lynda seems nice, I say cautiously.

Yes, he says. She is. But her life is messy, as ever.

I think about this. What do you mean?

Oh, well, he says. If it wasn’t one thing it was another. Two men. A woman and a man. Always some combination that didn’t quite work. I found it intriguing years ago, now it just makes me feel tired.

Do you think Matthew knew she was pregnant?

You’re making a huge assumption here, Mila. It’s only a theory.

But what if I’m right?

Gil shrugs. Who knows? But he does send them money. If you’re right, then it would appear he found out eventually.

I look at him. Tell me, I say, is there some huge adult conspiracy where people lead unimaginably complex lives and pretend it’s normal?

No such thing as—

I cut him off.
Don’t say it.

He sighs. But don’t you see? It’s possible to make one mistake, which leads to more and bigger mistakes until you can’t find your way back. And then you drag other people in and the complications escalate. Life can get messy very quickly. And Matt’s always been quite an individual sort of a person.

What does that mean?

He was always happiest on his own. On a rock face, away from the world. Not a domestic paragon like me, he says. Now go to bed. He gives me his stern look, kisses me and goes back to work.

I send one last text under the covers.

Please tell me why you left.

No answer comes. I fall asleep and the snow tries to bury us in the night.

• • •

The nice waitress at our breakfast place isn’t on duty next morning. Of course, Gil says, it’s Saturday. The new waitress is a friendly girl with fair hair pulled back in a ponytail. She has a slightly displaced air and I decide she followed some boyfriend up to this place and then got stranded. A wild guess.

I skip the muffins, pancakes and waffles, spinach omelets, smoothies and smoked salmon bagels in favor of toast and orange juice. Infinite variety is beginning to wear me down.

As soon as we’ve finished breakfast, we start the slow drive out to Lynda’s. The roads are clear, sanded and salted like they actually expect this kind of weather, with massive snow piles big enough to hollow out and live in by the side of the road. I guess they do expect this kind of weather.

It’s still snowing, but the snow is delicate now, light and dry. The sun is shining, the sky impossibly blue. The world looks so dazzling, I almost can’t bear to look at it.

Even Lynda’s little narrow road has been plowed and we pull over at the usual place to park. Her car is completely covered in snow and I draw a smiley face on the windscreen with one finger. She hears our car and calls us in out of the cold.

Inside, the wood burner is throwing out masses of heat and it’s cozy and sociable, but I can’t help wondering if it might feel lonely and remote when we’re not here and they’re all alone.

Jake’s out shoveling driveways, she tells us. He’ll be back for lunch. But within minutes of our arrival he bursts in covered with snow, grinning like Tom after a hearty meal of Jerry.

I’m rich! he says, pulling out a wad of notes and throwing off his Mets cap. I hope it snows till August. He strips off his jacket and gloves and hangs them, dripping, over a chair by the fire. His mother pours him a hot chocolate.

It’s hard work, and freezing out there. Gotta get my strength back. Jake slumps down in a chair and once more Honey pads over to lie next to him. He strokes her absently. So, he says, how’s the mystery of the missing Matthew going? Course, it’s not a particularly fascinating mystery for us. He’s been missing from our lives more or less, let’s see, forever.

Lynda and Gil are talking quietly about other things, so I look at him, take a deep breath and say in a low voice, Is Matthew your father?

You don’t exactly beat around the bush, do you? he says with half a smile. Matthew’s not much of a father, but technically speaking? Yes. Didn’t you know?

I shake my head. The tone Jake takes is so matter-of-fact that it’s impossible to figure out whether he cares. That his father is Matthew. That his father is missing. Anything. He’d be a good poker player, Jake would.

He gets up to check whether his things are dry and puts his cap back on. I’m going out again, he says. Do you want to come? You could make a small fortune to take back to England. Genuine American dinero. He rubs his fingers together.

Very tempting, I say.

You’ll have to take my coat and boots, Lynda says, but doesn’t wait for an answer, just fetches both. And a hat. I wonder if the grown-ups want to be alone.

Before I know it I’m wearing a pair of slightly too big fur-lined boots and a long down coat and a fleece hat and gloves, and Jake and I are trudging through the snow.

I feel like a hobbit, I say. Do I look like one too?

Uncannily, he says.

I have to skip a little to keep up. Don’t you get freaked out living so far from everything? I look at him. I mean, what do you do around here if something happens? Don’t get me wrong, it’s beautiful and all, but what about, like, ax murderers and zombies?

Having lived in a city my whole life, the country feels like a horror film waiting to happen, where some crazy person is always lurking in the bushes ready to pounce.

Jake looks at me sideways. I haven’t seen a zombie in weeks, he says. Or an ax murderer. There are actually tons of people around here, they just hide up at the end of little roads so you can’t see them. If you chopped a tree down on top of yourself and broke both legs you could always find someone who’d stuff you into the back of a pickup and ferry you to the hospital. Of course, afterward they’d tell everyone in town what an incompetent moron you are.

There doesn’t seem to be an obvious answer to this.

I like your accent by the way, he says as we trudge along, and I laugh.

What’s funny? He shifts our shovels to his other shoulder.

Nothing, it’s just that everyone says that. It doesn’t sound like an accent to me. You’re the one with the accent.

Me? Jake snorts. I grew up in Scotland but I thought I sounded American now.

You do. Almost.

Almost? He feigns outrage. I’ve won awards for my American accent.

Really? I stop and look at him. Awards?

Well, no. Not actual awards.

I’d give you an award, I say. I like the way you sound.

Thank you, he says. Very kind.

We trudge along for another few minutes. So what do we do, just go up to perfect strangers’ doors and ask for a job?

That’s it, he says. Only we use careful scientific methods to figure out if they’re likely to hire us.

Like if the drive is covered in snow?

Yup.

And that’s what we do. The only hitch is getting to the end of all the little roads before we find out if they might need us. We do lots of backtracking but finally we ring the bell of a house with snow on the driveway and Jake makes me talk because of my cool accent, and the woman who answers the door offers us less than the going rate, but Jake says she’s kind of old so we’ll be doing a good deed. She gives us the money and we take her little dog out for a walk as well, and she seems really grateful. But it’s hard work and my arms are killing me after just one job.

Anyone who’s not dug out by now, Jake says, is going to be either old or away or a husband-free zone. Which turns out to be true, because all the people who answer the door are either over seventy or women you can’t quite imagine wearing snow boots and doing manual labor. We’re out for three hours and get two more jobs.

There’s not much talk while we’re working because it takes all my energy just to throw the snow around.

It’s not particularly heavy, Jake says, which is great because they don’t pay you any more for wet snow and we’d both be dead of exhaustion by now. Or at least you would be.

I’m kind of getting into the rhythm of shoveling, though my shoulders are killing me. Dig, toss. Dig, toss. When I get tired of tossing I try to kick the back of the shovel to move the snow over, but Jake says there’s no point, it just gets packed up hard and more difficult to move when the time comes to lift it. He sends me over to the front path, but it’s started snowing once more, so by the time I clear the whole thing it’s turning white again.

Everyone’s got sand and salt, so we salt first and sand afterward, collect our money and go on to the next.

You’re a good worker, Jake says. I knew you would be.

What, do I look like a lady weight lifter or something? I flex my arm, but the effect is muffled by three inches of padded coat.

He grins. Nah. You don’t look that strong. But you’re not the complaining type.

Totally untrue, I say. Complaining’s one of my best things. Right now I’m starving and cold and really sick of the sight of snow.

Yeah, he says, me too. Let’s go home.

Jake divides the money up as we walk along and hands me half. It looks like a fortune. Yikes, I say. Do you think I could buy a house around here with this?

He nods. At least one.

We walk in silence for a minute. So what do you think of Matthew disappearing? I ask him.

What do I think? No clue. I’ve met him a bunch of times since we’ve been here, he says, but I don’t exactly know him well. Before that we’d see him once a year or every other year. I like him enough, but he’s always quite formal with me. Do you want my theory? I haven’t got one. Maybe he’s got twelve sons like me hidden away and he can’t stand the guilt. Jake stops and looks at me. What’s your theory?

This is not an easy question to answer. I don’t know enough to have a theory, I tell him. I don’t know anything about him, really. I pause. And you’ve made the story even more confusing. Do you think his wife knows about you and your mum?

I doubt it, Jake says. It’s weird being someone’s dirty secret. That’s one thing I don’t like about the whole deal. He shrugs. But I’m used to it.

Really? I don’t say anything to Jake, but I can see that it would be weird. Horrible, even, and I’m hating Matthew more with every new thing I know about him. Why are we searching for this man? Why is he my father’s friend?

It’s not really fair, I say.

He looks at me. When I leave home I get to choose. I’ve already decided I’m moving back to Scotland when I can. I liked it. Except in winter, when it’s dark most of the time.