Charlotte was a ghost in the darkness. She was watchful. She was all bright eyes and beating heart.
Kneeling backwards on the couch, her knees sunk into the cushions, her thighs pressed flat against the padded frame. She was peering hopefully through her bedroom window, which afforded a clear view of the backyard.
Light shone from the porch, the pool, the walkway. Someone was walking down there. It was Mr. Kerrigan. She could see him very clearly as he strolled through the garden toward the beach beyond.
He took this walk every evening after sunset. She had watched him from her window before.
As usual, he moved casually to the periphery of the backyard, hands in pockets, his shadow growing long, then short again as he passed under the lights. Eventually, he disappeared through the back gate and onto the dark beach beyond. She knew he would stay there for a while, watching the ocean.
She had missed him today. He hadn’t been at lunch, but he had left a message on the door:
Charlotte. I was called into a meeting. But this would be a good opportunity for you to speak with your English teacher about that paper. Please? – Mr. K
It was a tribute to how much she cared for him that she’d followed his directive. Speaking to teachers freaked her out, but she didn’t want Mr. Kerrigan to think she was a coward. After their last conversation, she was afraid he might be growing exasperated with her. And she wanted so much for him to like her.
She gazed blindly into the darkness where he had disappeared toward the beach. She wanted s to join him there. To sit on the sand and listen to the labored breathing of the waves. To feel the warmth of his body against hers.
But what if he recoiled when she came too close? This was the trouble. How many guys had touched her, when she hadn’t wanted to be touched? And now, the one person she wanted desperately to belong to was inviolate. Perfect. Untouchable.
Or maybe not.
There were times when she thought he looked at her with a certain longing. It wasn’t her imagination.
Half-crazy with empty desire, she slunk downstairs and paced restlessly around the kitchen. Nobody was there. Dinner had long been cleared away, and everyone was getting ready for bed. She wouldn’t have minded Emi or Uncle Eddie distracting her. Anything to take her mind off things.
Instead, the backyard called to her like an open invitation. Diffidently, she pulled back the screen door and stepped into the yard.
Gnats spun in dizzy circles around the porch light and the air was full with gardenia flowers.
She stopped on her way to the beach, hesitating just outside his guest house. She wanted to go inside, to see what Mr. Kerrigan lived like.
Temptation overtook good judgment. She went to the front door, and tested the knob. It turned easily in her hand, and she found herself entering the dark house.
He would be on the beach for at least an hour, if tradition held. That afforded her plenty of time to explore his place.
Everything was as it had been the last time she was there. The blank canvas was still on its easel. The furniture was still pushed against the walls.
Passing through the living room, she found herself in the kitchenette. It was tidy and bare. Some cold coffee was left on the counter next to an overripe banana. She opened the fridge and sifted through the contents. There were two bottles of beer on the bottom shelf. She took one, hooking the cap’s lid against the countertop to pry it loose, then pressed the bottle’s frosty lip to her mouth.
Feeling bolder with the bottle in her hand, she continued her tour of Mr. Kerrigan’s house.
The bathroom was surprisingly clean. Her mother’s old boyfriend had always left shavings all over the sink, but this counter was immaculate. She examined his soap choices approvingly, then opened the medicine cabinet. Eye drops. Fresh razors. Sleeping pills. An orange prescription bottle of anti-depressants. This last article fascinated her. She studied the label intently. The pills had expired last year. With utmost care, she replaced the bottle as she’d found it on the shelf.
The best for last. His bedroom.
She nudged open the door.
Aside from a clumsily made bed, there was not much to see but a tower of books on his nightstand. Among them were his sketchbooks. Four in total.
She opened the top book, recognizing his style from the pictures he sometimes drew on the chalkboard in art class. These sketches were considerably more detailed. Gorgeous and lush, especially the ones inked and colored.
He had drawn many dizzying abstractions and some oddly surreal landscapes. She absorbed the dreamy contents of his notebooks, feeling she had accessed something intimate beyond words.
The last notebook contained nothing but portraits. She didn’t recognize any of the subjects, but she flipped through the pages slowly. Secretly, she longed to find her own face translated into the confident lines of his pencil strokes, but there was no such image in the pages.
She slipped the sketchpad back into the pile, dislodging a photograph that had been trapped somewhere in between. The glossy image fluttered to the floor, and she had to fumble awkwardly under the bed to retrieve it.
The photo was well handled and worn around the edges. It showed a woman in a park or a garden, and she was holding a child in her arms.
Charlotte knew who these people must be, and they were both more beautiful than she had ever allowed herself to imagine. In her mind, Mr. Kerrigan’s wife had been a formidable blond, all sharp angled cheekbones and arched brow. This woman, however, had a soft, unpretentious face. The young daughter was held in a loose embrace, head nestled against the woman’s chest. The daughter had Mr. Kerrigan’s eyes.
Stricken with an uneasy pang of conscience, Charlotte returned the picture with shaky hands and lay back against his bed, suddenly tired. She stared up at the ceiling fan and her mind drifted somewhere distant.
She must have dozed off, because the next thing she knew, Mr. Kerrigan was standing in the doorway.
He hadn’t noticed her presence yet. His shadowy figure moved to the bureau where he retrieved a few articles of clothing.
She blinked at him through the half-dark.
“Hello,” she said.
He stumbled in surprise, bashing his shin against the bed frame.
“Charlotte!”
She smiled through a full yawn. “Hi.”
It was impossible to read his expression in the dark. He leaned forward and removed the forgotten beer from where she cradled it between her arms, placing the now warm bottle delicately on the nightstand.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“The door was open.” She yawned again. “What time is it, Mr. K?”
“It’s late.”
He looked afraid to touch her, then took her arm and pulled her into a sitting position. She cringed as her chest twisted under the resistant weight of her body, spreading pain across her still-healing collarbone.
Noticing her sharp intake of breath, he quickly let her go. “I’m sorry. Did I hurt you?”
“No,” she lied.
“Charlotte,” he said. “You really shouldn’t be here…”
“Guess what?” she interrupted, sleepiness still slurring her words. She curled her legs under her and nestled back against his pillow.
“What?” he asked warily. She could tell he was uncomfortable to be talking to her here. She couldn’t understand why he was so skittish.
“I went to see Mr. Gepherdt today.”
Mr. Kerrigan was momentarily confused. “Who?”
“My English teacher,” she said. “The one you asked me to see. I understand the poem better.”
“Oh. That’s great. Maybe you can explain it to me later,” he said. “But now…”
She interrupted him again. “I think you’d like it. The poem. It’s all about time being an illusion. Everything being eternally present.”
He flipped on the light switch and they both squinted against the sudden glare. “It’s awfully late for a philosophical conversation,”
he said. “I think you’d better go on home.”
She didn’t budge. It bothered her that he was pushing her out so impatiently. She ran her hand slowly back and forth along the rumpled cotton bedspread. “Mr. K? What do you do when you’re out there on the beach at night?” she asked. “What do you think about?”
There was a waver of aggravation in his voice. “Charlotte…”
“Do you ever think about me?”
“No,” he said, so quickly, it was almost insulting.
“Really?” she asked. “You never think about me?”
“Not in the way you’re suggesting.”
“What way am I suggesting?”
He shook his head and changed the subject, looking at his watch. “Hey, I need sleep too, you know. I am an old man, after all.”
“You’re not old,” she said, but reluctantly slipped off the bed and walked towards the door. He followed her out.
“If you don’t think about me,” she said. “Then what was that conversation with Uncle Eddie about yesterday?”
“How do you know about that?” he asked.
She gave him a look, not wanting to admit that she knew far less than she was letting on.
“Well,” he said haltingly. “Sometimes, as your teacher, I do worry about you. And your aunt and uncle do, too.”
“Have I said things that worry you?” she asked.
“It’s not so much what you’ve said as what you haven’t,” he explained. “Sometimes I feel like I’m speaking in the wrong language to you.”
He put his hand on her back and guided her down the short hallway to the front door.
When he spoke next, his voice was suddenly timid. “Charlotte?”
She looked at him hopefully, not knowing exactly what she was waiting for him to say, but waiting for it nonetheless.
“What did you come here looking for?” he asked. “Did you need someone to talk to?”
She lowered her eyes to her bare feet.
“You can talk to your aunt and uncle, you know,” he said. “And there are counselors at school.”
“I know.”
“I’m going to have to ask you not to come here again at night,” he said. “I don’t want to jeopardize the professional relationship we have. Do you understand what I mean?”
She nodded once and slipped outside. Even after he closed the front door behind her, she watched through the window until his lights dimmed. Then she retreated into darkness, exhaling out into the stars.