The Distance Between Us (2 page)

“There is no door, I’m afraid.”

The only thing separating the attic from the rest of the house is a waist-high banister that runs the length of the hallway. He walks
down the hall and peers in at each room—kitchen, living room, bathroom, bedroom—then comes back and stands next to me. The wallpaper behind him is white with small clusters of purple grapes; one of the grape clusters hangs directly above his head, like mistletoe.

He fingers his jeans and stares over the banister at the staircase. “It’s nice, but I was hoping there’d be more privacy. I thought there’d be a door.”

I sigh. “You needn’t worry. No one uses the third floor anymore, so it serves as a buffer between the main house and the apartment. I stay on the first two floors, and as you’ve noticed, this house is rather large. You’d have all the privacy you need.”

He meets my eyes for an instant, then looks away and bites his lip. “I’m sorry. I don’t think I can live in a place without a door.” He drops his head and curls his long toes in the carpet.

I glare at his scalp and take another sip of wine. “Suit yourself. Give me a moment to rest, and I’ll show you out.” I wander into the kitchen and sit at the table, dipping my neck to keep from banging my head on the slanted ceiling.

All the rooms up here are a bit misshapen, molded to fit the contour of the roof. The floor in the kitchen is covered with a yellow and gold linoleum, and the cherrywood baseboard running alongside it is dark and polished. Over the stove there’s a skylight looking out on the bricks of the house’s main chimney, and to the left of the refrigerator is a larger window that opens to the south, thirty or forty feet above the carriage house and the driveway. Each room of the attic has at least two windows, so even though the place is small, there’s plenty of light and air, and it doesn’t feel claustrophobic at all. I’ve always loved this apartment. It’s a cozy space, warm and clean and quiet, and this boy is a fool for not wanting it.

Alex sticks his head in the doorway and watches me with an anxious expression, as if he thinks I’m preparing to have a stroke.

I point at a picture on the wall, above a small table with an old-fashioned black rotary phone on it. “That’s my son Paul. He used to be quite handsome, don’t you think?” I swirl the remaining swallow of wine around in my glass. “Now he’s got a dreadful beard and a
potbelly, and he lumbers about town like a disreputable buffalo. It’s ghastly how he’s let himself go.”

He steps in for a closer look. The photo is a black-and-white shot of Paul standing on the front porch with his arm around one of his first girlfriends. Alex studies it for a minute as I study him. He’s very thin and the veins in his hands and feet show through his skin.

He clears his throat. “Your son’s still in Bolton? Does he live with you and your husband?”

“Dear God, no. I live alone these days. Arthur and I are separated, and Paul rents a room with an alcoholic clarinetist in one of those seedy little faculty bungalows near the Conservatory. He and his roommate drink single malt scotch and play duets every night until they pass out or throw up, then they get up the next morning and go breathe toxic fumes on their students. It’s all very bohemian.”

His head bobs up and down to show that he’s listening, but he keeps his attention on the photograph. “So he teaches at Carson? What does he play?”

“Paul? He’s a cellist. A good one, too, but no one outside of Illinois has ever heard of him because he refuses to leave Bolton, even to tour.” I rub my nose to fend off a sneeze. “He has a neurotic aversion to traveling. When he was a little boy we literally had to drag him to the car every time we left town for vacation. I thought he’d outgrow it, but he’s just gotten worse.”

He taps the picture frame with his knuckle. “How long ago was this taken?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Years ago. Paul was in high school, I believe.” I play with my lower lip. “I forget the girl’s name. Boobsy, maybe, or Blobsy or Barfy or something like that. Her father was one of Arthur’s friends, and I thought she was rather adorable. But she only lasted about a week.”

I gulp the rest of the wine. “That may be Paul’s all-time record. He’s had terrible luck with women. They never stick around for long after they’ve had sex with him.” I rest my hand on my chin. “The hair on his back frightens them.”

Alex makes a sound that might be a laugh and I look up at the
ceiling. It needs fresh paint; the eggshell-white Arthur and I both liked so much is already beginning to flake. Our first and only tenant last year (a philosophy grad student with the unfortunate name of Carmella Croyson) was overly fond of humidity and basically flooded the place with steam all winter long. The paint apparently couldn’t stand up to that sort of drenching.

I frown at it and drop my eyes to Alex again. “Where does a child of mine get all that hair, I wonder? Arthur’s not exceptionally hirsute, and the men on my side of the family are as bald as potatoes. I must have had an affair with a gorilla before he was born, but you’d think I’d remember something like that, wouldn’t you?” I pick lint from the breast of my sweater. “Be a dear and remind me to leave my brandy flask at home the next time I visit the zoo.”

He turns around to face me, grinning.

“What?” I demand.

“Nothing.”

I raise my eyebrows, irritated, and he shrugs. “You’re kind of funny, that’s all.”

“Oh.” I look away. “It’s just the wine. It makes my tongue say the oddest things.” I wet my finger and run it around the rim of the crystal glass, making it hum an E-flat. “Arthur hates my sense of humor. He didn’t always, but he says I’ve gotten mean in the last few years. I prefer to think of it as being honest.”

He doesn’t answer, but he leans a shoulder against the wall and puts his hands in his pockets, waiting for me. A light chain necklace hangs loosely in the sparse chest hairs—also red—visible beneath his open collar.

I rub my eyes, suddenly tired. “But honesty is not really Arthur’s forte, you see. He tried to tell the truth once, but he claims it gave him diarrhea, so now he avoids it like the plague.” I get to my feet, knees popping. “All right, I think I’ve caught my second wind. Ready to go?”

He nods. “I’m sorry about the apartment. It would be perfect if it had a door.”

I purse my lips. “As I said, there’s an entire floor between you and the rest of the house. No door can give you more privacy than
that. You could run around naked up here with three drunken sorority girls and a German shepherd and no one would ever be the wiser.”

He looks away. “It’s nothing like that. I just want a door. I don’t think I’d feel safe without one.”

“Safe from what?”

He pushes his glasses up on his nose and doesn’t answer.

I narrow my eyes. “For God’s sake, boy, I’m seventy-one years old. Do you think I’m going to murder you in your sleep? I’m altogether harmless.”

The sides of his mouth twitch. “Unless you happen to be an antique coffee table?”

That startles a laugh out of me. “Well, yes. Good point. But that was entirely Arthur’s fault. He called this afternoon to tell me he’d be over later this week to get the rest of his things, and that set me off a bit. Ordinarily I’m as gentle as a lamb. Ask anyone.”

His smile fades. “I’m sorry. I believe you. And I know it’s dumb not to jump at a chance to live in a place like this for as little money as you’re asking, but I’ve got to have a door. I don’t think I could sleep without one.”

I start to argue with him but then shut myself up. Why am I wasting my time trying to convince this stubborn child to live here if he doesn’t want to? I’ll find someone less fussy; the ad in the paper has only been running for two days, and I’ve already lined up four other people who want to see the apartment tomorrow.

“Fine.” My voice is more curt than I intended. “Shall I show you out, then?”

He looks unhappy. “If you want.”

I lead him down the stairs, and neither of us speaks as we pass by the third floor. But when we get to the landing outside my bedroom on the second floor, I step into the room on impulse and wave for him to follow me. “Let’s take the other staircase down this time. I might as well show you the rest of the house before you leave.”

He hesitates but finally says, “Okay,” and trails in behind me.

I flip the light switch on. In the short time since Alex arrived, the sun has already begun to go down, even though it’s only a little past
four o’clock. I hate how early it gets dark in January; it’s so depressing. The fluorescent light leaves awful shadows in the corners of the room and glints coldly from the brass handles on my wardrobe and dresser, and my clean white bedspread looks stark and sterile, like the sheet on a hospital mattress. I hurry through to the other door and sigh with relief when we step on the landing by the west staircase.

“There,” I mutter. “That’s better.”

He stares at me. “Is something wrong?”

“No, not really.” I force my shoulders to relax. “Sunsets in the winter should be outlawed, that’s all. I seldom go in my bedroom at this time of day because it looks like a morgue in there. I keep expecting to find my own corpse lying faceup on the bed.”

I take a deep breath and flick a wrist at the two rooms facing the master bedroom. “Those were Jeremy’s and Caitlin’s bedrooms once upon a time. My other children.”

He glances in the rooms but I don’t bother to look with him; I know what’s there. Just a bunch of rickety old furniture and empty bookshelves and threadbare carpets. No one ever goes in either room anymore except the woman I hire to clean for me.

He talks with his back to me. “Do they still live in Bolton, too?”

“Caitlin does. She’s the head of the English department at Pritchard.”

He spins to face me, startled, and laughs. “Oh, my God. Caitlin Donovan is your daughter? I just met her yesterday. I’m taking a creative writing class from her this semester, and I’ve also got her for English Lit. She seems really nice.”

I grunt. “Yes, well, she does have many redeeming qualities. She chews with her mouth closed, for instance, and she never, ever dangles a preposition. It’s quite impressive.”

He gawks at me. “It sounds like you don’t like her.”

I snort. “One doesn’t
like
Caitlin. One either worships her or flees from her, depending on her mood. You should be careful in her classes, by the way. She had a bad day last semester and ripped the colon out of a graduate student with her bare hands.”

I pause. “Don’t look at me like that. I’m serious. It was in all the papers.”

He laughs again. “How much wine did you say you’d had today?”

I peer in my empty glass and smile at him. “Thank you for reminding me. I believe it’s time for a refill.”

I lead him down the remaining flight of stairs and stop at the open door by the music room, then I step aside to wait for the predictable reaction.

He stops beside me and gives an obliging gasp. “My God. Look at that piano. It’s gorgeous.”

“Thank you.” I step in the room and caress the black finish of the music rack. My beloved piano is a glorious dinosaur, nearly eleven feet long—two feet longer than an average grand—with ninety-six keys instead of the standard eighty-eight. The body rests on four black tapered legs, each thicker at the top than my torso, and the lid could serve as a wing on a small airplane. “Arthur and I went into serious debt to buy this. It’s a one-of-a-kind Bösendorfer. There were only three of this specific model made originally, and the other two were destroyed in fires. There’s no other piano like it in the world.”

In addition to the exquisite tonal quality of the instrument, the case is what makes it so valuable. Stretching from one end to the other is a hand-painted, enchanting scene of a forest at night under a full moon, with a number of woodland creatures hidden among the trees. The colors are all shades of green and gold and yellow, and the detail is breathtaking. The artist was a man named Jacques Previere, who apparently died from an opium overdose.

Alex stands next to me. “It’s gigantic.”

“Yes. The movers had a terrible time getting it in the house.”

He plunks an “A” on the keyboard. “Do you play?”

I stare at him. “You’re joking.”

He looks puzzled. “What do you mean?”

“My maiden name is Parker. I’m Hester Parker.”

His face stays blank.

I wince. “Dear Lord. You honestly haven’t heard of me?”

He shakes his head, embarrassed. “I’m sorry. Should I have?”

I turn toward the door, craving the bottle of wine. He follows me as I speak over my shoulder. “I used to be a concert pianist when I was a young woman. I toured all over Europe and the United
States. Granted, it’s been a long time, but I was semi-famous for a while, or so I thought. Not like Rubinstein or Horowitz, of course, but most people have at least heard of me.”

He doesn’t answer and I enter the living room and retrieve the bottle by the fire. It’s half empty. As I refill the glass some of the wine splashes on the frayed Oriental carpet. I stare at the stains and fight back sudden tears. “I was something of a household name, once, believe it or not.” I lift my chin and try to smile. “Like Crest, or Alpo. Or Preparation H.”

He looks alarmed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

I wave a hand at him and ease myself down into the leather recliner facing the fire. “It’s all right.” I swallow a couple of times and sigh. “I’ve been ridiculously emotional lately. I cried at the grocery store last week because the lettuce was wilted and the bananas were overpriced. The produce manager tried to pacify me with a free box of frozen brussels sprouts, but I was inconsolable.” I hold the bottle out toward him. “Are you sure you won’t have a drink with me?”

He studies my face for a moment then takes the bottle from my hand. “Where do you keep your wineglasses?”

I point over my shoulder. “In the kitchen, in the cabinet above the sink.”

He returns in a moment with a full glass and sits on the edge of the chair facing me. The sun is almost down now and darkness is closing over the house. He rolls the stem of his glass nervously between his fingertips, and the firelight reflects off it, racing back and forth over the spines of the books in the floor-to-ceiling shelves surrounding us.