Miles (12 page)

"Thanks." 
His eyes glanced over to Nicolasha, who had backed up against the front door of
the three-flat.  I looked at my teacher with a smile.

"He's
from
Russia
, Captain.  They're scared of the police over
there."

The
Captain nodded, as if he already knew that.  I heard the hydraulic doors
of a bus open down the street.  It broke the awkward silence that had
crept between the three of us.

"Mister
Rozhdestvensky was about to drive me home."

The
Captain's rosy red face crinkled with what looked to me like a painful
indecision.  "That's what
I
came here for."

Nicolasha
hurriedly spoke up.  "Please, officer.  There is no
need."  He tried to smile at the old Captain, whose narrow eyes
scrutinized Nicolasha's face with the beguiled cunning of a veteran Irish cop.

"Son,
I think it'll be better if I take you home."

"Why?"

Ignoring
my question, the Captain's eyes continued to size up my teacher. 
"Got a call into the station this morning, some older guy asking about a
teenager that looked a lot like you do."  He pointed his thumb at
me.  "Says he was your Uncle Alex."

"Strasse?"

The
Captain nodded once.  Instinctively, Nicolasha drew closer to my side,
while the policeman continued.  "My partner dialed me at home and
told me about your uncle's call.  So I came out to look for you."

In
Chicago
, old neighborhood cops did lots of things in funny, personal ways,
but, for the life of me, I couldn't imagine what had brought him here. 
Another car, this one a proper squad car, pulled up in front of the
three-flat.  The Captain waved him off with a smile that disappeared when
he turned back to face me.

"It's
up to you if you wanna bring your...teacher...back with you."  What
if I didn't want to go back, I thought?  The old Irish bastard must have
sensed me wondering that.  "You need to go home, though."

Nicolasha's
hand squeezed my shoulder.  "What has happened, officer?"

"Tell
me."  My voice became cold all over again.

The
Captain stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets and looked at the sky,
Nicolasha, the steps in front of him, and the sky once more before meeting my
eyes.  "Your parents, son.  They...they're dead." 
Nicolasha's arm slid across my back, holding me up as my legs weakened. 
"Some drunk at a stoplight, last night.  I don't know." 
The Captain's voice was trapped in the back of his throat.  "I'm
sorry, son."

My
eyes drifted to the icicle I had snapped in half.  It laid there at my
feet, slowly melting in the sunlight that still hung over the porch, the bright
sun's unsullied veneration to the birthday of the son of God.

God...some
divinity I suddenly felt I couldn’t hear, or touch, one that had left me in the
mists of that daylight, deadened by the frost of a winter afternoon in hell
itself.

My
God.

*

I
sat in the back of the Captain's unmarked Chevy and let Nicolasha hold my
gloved hand as we drove to the southern suburbs.  The sun was beginning to
set.  The passing noise of the expressway and the occasional crackle from
the police radio were the only sounds that broke the silence I had imposed on
everyone.

My
mind had wandered to a night last summer, when I had invited all of my baseball
buddies to stay over at my place.  None of the other parents wanted a
platoon of young teenaged boys in their house, but I was "lucky": Dad
was downstate on business, while Mom was working that night.  The next
morning, everyone complained about how I was the last one to go to sleep, and
the first one to wake up.  Mom teased me in front of the guys, reminding
me about how I would never go to sleep when I was a baby unless my little
fingers were wrapped around someone's hand.

Nicolasha
leaned forward and whispered directions into the Captain's ear.  He sat
back gently and turned his head sideways to look at me.  I paused for a
moment before deciding not to return his stare.  I couldn't make out his
features in the dark of the car, anyway.

Whenever
we used to drive someplace, Dad would always insist on traveling at
night.  Traffic was lighter, moved faster, and there weren't nearly as
many State Policemen out when it was late, he reasoned.  I thought it had
to do with his favorite kind of music, jazz, which always sounded better at
night.  I used to fall asleep with my body curled sideways against the
front seat and my head resting on his thigh, that is, until he bought his
Stingray, which had its gear shift mounted on a large center console.  He
purchased it around the same time we stopped doing road trips.

I
took my gloves off and put a bare hand back into my teacher's.

*

The
wide circular driveway in front of our pristine home was filled with cars, few
of which I immediately recognized.  The Captain had difficulty finding a
place to park.  He and Nicolasha flanked me like bodyguards, and walked me
slowly toward the front door.

Some
idiot had turned on all of the Christmas lights that lined the house and hung
from the naked branches of the young trees Mom had planted last spring.

My
cousin, excuse me, Mayor Lawrence Poiregaz, peered out from one of our living
room windows and pointed at us.  He opened both sides of the front door
and met us about ten feet from the house.  There were a cluster of relatives
staring out from within the doorway.

"Thank
God, you're here.  We were all worried sick."

The
Captain cleared his throat, about to speak, but I cut him off with a slightly
raised hand and my very best, ice-cold tone of voice: "Who is
this...'we'?"

Lawrence
the Laughing Lawyer, Dad's contemptuous behind-the-back nickname for his Aunt
Hilly's pride and joy, was stunned.  I think my bodyguards were, too, but
the little blue flame inside of me, smoldering through the ride from
Hyde Park
,
had become rather fierier.  He diplomatically ignored the visible bruises
on my face.  "It's your...we're your family."

Damn
my family.  I jabbed my finger toward the house.  "Is that mine
now?"  I ignored Nicolasha's gentle hand on my shoulder.

"Uh...what?"
Lawrence
sputtered. 

"The
house.  You were my Dad's lawyer, weren't you?  Is this house mine or
not?"

Lawrence
fumbled trying to light a cigarette.  He
nodded repeatedly until he took his first drag.

"Good. 
Then I want everyone to leave, right now."

The
Captain spoke up.  "Now, son, you can't..."

"Yes,
I can.  It's my house, isn't it?"  The Captain nodded his chin
once.  "Then get them out of here."

Nicolasha
stepped between me and Lawrence, putting his hands on my face. 
"Little friend.  Listen to me," he implored.  I took a step
backward, out of his reach.

"Where's
my uncle?"

Lawrence
cleared his throat with a deep series of smoker's
coughs.  I could see the Huns at the door getting restless. 
"He's taking it very hard."  Nicolasha and the Captain withdrew
to the unmarked squad car.  "We all are."  I don't know if
Lawrence
heard my snort of a reply.  He coughed again.  "He said he'll be
here tomorrow morning."

I
watched the Captain drive away, but forgot to wave.  Nicolasha stood where
the car had been parked, holding my gloves and waiting in the darkness for the
blue flame to subside.  In vain.

"Who's
making the arrangements?"

Lawrence
started to regain his composure.  "Your
uncle asked me to, help make it easier on both of you."  One of the
immigrant cousins began to walk outside the house. 
Lawrence
waved him back.  "If that's OK with you," he added, with a
degree of sincerity I couldn't place.

"It
isn't."  Everything inside of me was being gobbled up by the blue
flames.  I felt like I was about start spitting fire from my mouth like a
nuclear dragon on a bad day.  And my maybe well-meaning lawyer cousin
became ground zero for the blast.  "I'll to do it myself." 
I wheeled past him and headed for the side of the house, the secret passageway
to my empty backyard.  "And get those people out of here.  I
want to be alone."

"No
problem at all." 
Lawrence
's voice was equally cold and insensitive, and had
hurt woven throughout the syllables, as well.  I spun around on my heels
and glared at him with a pointless hatred.  He lowered his head and
mumbled an apology before retreating back to the house.

I
gestured for Nicolasha to follow me.

*

After
waiting for the last door to slam and the final car to drive off, I sunk back
into the large wooden lawn chair that faced out from the patio toward the end
of the snow-blanketed yard, almost two hundred feet away.

I
felt like Michael Corleone at the end of "The Godfather Part II",
cold and alone, incapable of doing anything about my pain except to stare off
into some distant space.

Nicolasha
pulled up a wooden stool and sat next to me.  A good deal of the white
moon radiated brilliantly in the star-studded night sky above us.  The
yard and the suburban neighborhood surrounding us were utterly silent, except
for the supernatural rustle of the icy breeze as it passed through the leafless
tree branches that towered like barbed wire over our barren property.  I
could smell traces of pine being burnt from a local chimney.  We sat just
beyond the shadow of my empty house made by the moon.  My only thoughts
stayed with my eyes, which scanned the heavens, looking for that one shimmering
star the wise men were said to have followed those many, many years ago.

"You
were very harsh back there, little friend," Nicolasha said gently.  I
nodded, still playing at Copernicus.  "I am trying to understand,
however."  Waiting for my reply, he held out a hand for me to take,
which I declined to, choosing to enjoy a few final moments of lifeless
wonderment at the twilight instead.  "Would you like me to come
inside with you?"

"
I
don't want to go in," even if I was freezing to death.

"You
cannot sleep in the snow, tovarisch."

Our
shadowy features gazed at one another.  "Alone, or with you?"

"Even
together, my friend."

I
looked away.  "I should feel more alone than I do."  My
voice remained impassive.  Nicolasha couldn't see the tears about to fall
from my eyes.  He stood up in front of me and offered me my gloves. 
I closed my eyes as I put them on, trying to keep any tears from falling. 
Strained with an odd sort of fear, I felt myself being pulled up from the chair
and into his arms.  I slowly relaxed after Nicolasha did not reach
downward with his hands, or touch me with his lips.  He just held me close
to him, leaning his face over my head.

"I
am so sorry, little friend."  Nicolasha's voice broke with a terrible
snap.  "Sweet baby Jesus be with you tonight."

Only
a messianic Russian would say such a thing.

We
cried together.  Or, rather, Nicolasha sobbed quietly, for me, for us, for
sweet baby Jesus knows what, while I let forth with a heaving, choking,
hyperventilating, practically screaming hailstorm of tears that would have been
embarrassing in an opera.

*

I
had just seen Nicolasha off to the train station, having balked at spending the
night in my house, before retreating to the timeless sanctuary of warm,
sprinkling shower water, with the album Felix's dad had bought me,
Shostakovich's unusual and nearly surreal
Hamlet
Suite, voluminously playing
in the background.

I
spent many minutes standing naked from the door of my bathroom, staring down
into the dark hallway where Mom and Dad's bedrooms were.  I knew a little
about Shakespeare's
Hamlet
(and a few of his other works) thanks to the
cool, nearly sadistic baritone reading voice of Mister Granger; whatever
tenuous relationship this Suite may have had with the neurotic Danish prince,
et al, Soviet artistic sensibilities aside, was quite beyond me.  The
damned piece sounded like vast, orchestral music for a silent movie
comedy.  But I was thankful for the distraction provided to me by the
crashing, cacophonous potpourri of musical vignettes in this Shostakovich
oddity.  I particularly enjoyed the allegro Tournament, a vast, classic
waltz for those precious twinklings of Stalinist intimacy one might be
possessed with.  I listened to it twice.

Mom
loved waltzes.

*

I
sat in a hunter green tartan flannel robe one of my aunts had bought me for
Christmas, with a fresh pair of white gym socks on my feet.  I tried on
the matching shirt and pants that came with the robe when I got out of the
shower, but they were unbearably stiff and itchy.