Picture Me Gone

  The actual running away does not strike me as particularly strange. Most of us are held in place by a kind of centrifugal force. If for some reason the force stopped, we might all fly off in different directions. But what about the not coming back? Staying away is frightening and painful. And who would leave a baby? Even to me this seems extreme, a failure of love.

  I think hard. What would make it feel like the only thing to do?

  Here are the things I come up with:

  (A) Desperation (about what?)

  (B) Fear (of what?)

  (C) Anger (why?)

  I know hardly anything about Matthew and Suzanne. I will try to find out what is what when we arrive. There are always answers. Sometimes the right answer turns out to be

  (D) All of the above.

  five

  When Gil told me that Matthew and Suzanne lived in a wooden house in upstate New York, I pictured an old-fashioned log cabin with smoke curling out of a stone chimney, a rocking chair on the porch and hens pecking around.

  Their house is nothing like this. I tried to hold the original image in my head for as long as possible but it slipped away once I saw the real thing. The real thing is nothing at all like a normal house and nothing at all like a log cabin. Picture a big cube with each flat side divided into four glass squares. The roof is a big square of wood laid at an angle so the snow and rain slip off.

  It is set in trees with no other houses in sight and Suzanne left the lights on when she left. We park the car. The house looks like a beautiful spaceship that just happened to land in a clearing. It shimmers in the black night. In my whole life, I never saw such a beautiful house. My first thought when Suzanne turns the car engine off is that I would never run away from a house like this.

  Suzanne unlocks the front door. Lying across the room is a large white German shepherd that lifts its head when we come in. Suzanne doesn’t greet it. She walks straight through as if the dog does not exist. The dog seems accustomed to this and stands to move out of her way. I approach the dog and she stands perfectly still while I kneel to pat her. She has beautiful brown eyes. Loneliness flows off her in waves.

  So she is Matthew’s dog. The name on her tag is Honey.

  Inside the house, bookcases line most of the walls and there is a huge glass-fronted stove with “eco-burner” etched on the glass. It burns the smoke too, says Suzanne.

  I wonder how it does that.

  All of the bookcases have tiny lights built in, and all of the walls and ceilings too, so the house seems to twinkle.

  It’s so beautiful, I say to Suzanne, who is lifting Gabriel out of his padded suit. He’s awake now, staring like a baby owl. He waves his hands at Honey, who watches him gravely. Suzanne points at the door. Out, she says, and Honey walks out of the room.

  It was built by an architect who ran out of money, Suzanne says. It made him famous though, and now he’s built another just like it, only bigger, for himself. It’s called The Box House.

  As we walk through the house, I collect images like a camera clicking away. I can barely remember what Matthew looks like and there are no pictures of him to remind me. No picture of him and Suzanne on their wedding day or him with Gabriel. Or just him.

  Click.

  Other details leap out at me: A pair of muddy shoes. A stack of bills. A cracked window. A closed door. A pile of clothes. A skateboard. A dog. Click click click.

  First impressions? This is not a happy house.

  six

  My best friend in London is called Catlin. She has hair like straw and thin arms and legs, and starting from when we were seven or eight we always went to her house after school, partly because it was on the way to mine and partly because the top floor has a hidden passageway under the roof through a door at the back of an old closet. Perfect for a clubhouse.

  We designed code books and stashed our pocket money in a box under the floorboards, making plans to hide out when the enemy invaded Camden. Catlin was big on logistics, so we spent days drawing maps of underground escape tunnels running all through London, connecting to sewers and ghost tube stations.

  All the people we knew were rated according to how much of a security risk they’d turn out to be when things turned bad. Cat and I had top security clearance and were Head of State and Head of Security respectively. Gil was Senior Codebreaker with four-star clearance. Marieka would be Chief of Operations. Five star.

  Catlin’s parents were more of a problem. Her father shouted a lot, worked most of the time and was best avoided on the occasions he appeared at home. He and her mother rarely spoke. We made them Protocol Officers, a mysterious title, with only three-star clearance. I thought Cat might be offended that her parents had less trustworthy rankings than mine but she didn’t seem to mind.

  One day on the way to school Catlin said in her casual voice, My parents don’t like each other. She looked at me, watching my reaction.

  Lots of parents don’t, I said, because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings.

  They’re probably getting a divorce, she said.

  I thought she might be crying because she sounded strange, but when I turned to look she was crouching down with an insane grin on her face and then she launched herself straight up into the air like a spring, shouting, I HATE THEM! with something like glee.

  For a smallish person she has a very loud voice.

  Shouting seemed to make her feel better, though I doubted what she said was true. Most people don’t actually hate their parents, even if they are horrible. Her mother, at least, isn’t horrible. She always brought cake and drinks on a tray up to the top floor where we were planning for the invasion. She never knocked, just quietly left it next to the closet door. I liked her for that, though she always seemed a bit sleepwalkerish. The house as a whole felt dulled, as if someone had sucked all of the color out with a straw. I wondered if Catlin noticed that it was different from other houses or whether it just looked normal to her.

  This year, for the first time, Catlin and I stopped being in the same class together. She was suddenly wild and loud—rolling her school skirt up short and hanging out with older boys, the ones who scare old people on buses by swearing and smoking cigarettes. It was weird not to walk home with her every day but eventually I got used to it. Sometimes, walking past her house, I had to stop myself turning up the path out of habit.

  It wasn’t exactly like we avoided each other, and I didn’t exactly miss her because she seemed like someone I no longer knew. But every single day I missed the person who used to be my friend. The worst was once when our eyes met by accident and she looked away.

  Then, on the last day of spring term, she ran up behind me and shouted Boom! like in the old days and we ended up walking home together, pretending everything was normal.

  Oh my god, Catlin said, eyes huge. Did you see Miss Evans as the Easter bunny?

  Miss Evans is one of our PE teachers. She’s a genuine freak, never missing a chance to dress up as Father Christmas or Karl Marx or Harry Potter.

  Très awkward, I said.

  Très très awkward!! She danced around me, hands fluttering like a comedy ballerina.

  We fell back in step again.

  Are you around over Easter? Her tone was casual, her head almost in her schoolbag as she rummaged around for a lipstick.

  The question was surprising because what about her new gang of cool friends? I have to go to New York, I told her. We’re visiting an old friend of my dad’s.

  She didn’t answer and it made me feel like apologizing for going away, which was ridiculous, as she’d barely spoken to me for months.

  We got to her house and she didn’t even say good-bye, just turned and ran up the path like she was angry, and I wondered whether it was because I was going away and she wasn’t, or because maybe she wanted to be friends again when it wasn’t a convenient time for me.

  Hey, Cat! I called after her. I’ll let you know what America’s like! But she was halfway through the door and didn’t even turn
round.

  I stared at the door as it slammed and just as I was leaving I saw her disembodied face peering back at me through the window. Then both her hands crept up into the window like they belonged to someone else and she made a horrible face and started strangling herself, stuck out her tongue, went cross-eyed and disappeared down the bottom of the window.

  Bye! I shouted again and waved.

  A minute later I got a text from her. It said: bring me back an American Easter egg

  And I answered: save me a London one

  And she wrote back: OK

  And I wrote back: OK

  And she wrote back: Make it a big one

  And I wrote back: Ditto

  And we both felt better.

  seven

  I am dizzy and a little sick with jet lag. Suzanne puts me in a small room off the study with a built-in bed. One end of my bed is a glass wall that faces out into the woods. She shows me how to use the blinds but I leave them open. I am so tired that I don’t remember falling asleep, and a minute later it is noon the next day. Trees break the light up into fragments; above them, the sky is blue and clear. It couldn’t be more different from our view in London, which is mainly of other houses.

  Gil brings me milky coffee in bed. He smiles but looks distracted. Now that I am fully awake I scan the room—a small desk, a metal swivel chair, two pairs of sneakers neatly placed in a corner. A bookshelf holds the Guinness Book of Records from a few years ago, a US Army Survival Manual, an ancient copy of Treasure Island with a worn leather cover, a tall pile of school notebooks and sports magazines. Just above is a shelf on which silver swimming trophies stand side by side and I realize with a start that this is Owen’s room. There’s a picture in a silver frame of him with Suzanne. He’s got his arm round her shoulders and is already a few inches taller. The room has been tidied and dusted, but a set of keys, a birthday card and a bowl of coins still sit on the dresser as if he will come along any minute to claim them.

  Gil clocks the direction of my gaze. Come and have breakfast when you’re ready, he says. Did you sleep well?

  I nod. Did you?

  He shrugs. Honey appears round the corner, silent as a ghost. I put out my hand and she licks it.

  No news? I ask, and he shakes his head.

  Are we going to look for him?

  I have to think, Gil says. Possibly.

  I want to say, What if he’s been murdered? Or jumped in front of a train? But I don’t. Gil would have thought of that, anyway. He must think it hasn’t happened. I suppose he might be keeping up appearances, pretending he thinks his friend is still alive so as not to upset me, but I doubt it. My father’s faults involve excessive honesty. And absentmindedness, of course.

  Where do you think he went? What if we can’t find him? Will he let us know he’s OK?

  Perguntador. My father pronounces the word with a slight smile. It is Portuguese for someone who asks too many questions, and he’s used the word as a nickname for me for as long as I can remember. First things first, he says. Drink your coffee. Have a shower. Get dressed. Come down to breakfast—he looks at his watch—lunch. We’ll talk to Suzanne and make a plan. OK?

  OK. I dig clean clothes out of my suitcase and take the towel from beside my bed. Honey watches me gravely. She is like a lost dog only she’s not the one who’s lost.

  I take out my phone, snap a picture and text it to Catlin. Lots of trees in New York.

  And she texts back: Shd be tall buildings. Sure ur in the right place?

  It’s called upstate I tell her.

  There’s a pause, then another bleep.

  Got my egg yet?

  Not yet I text back.

  ok.

  I put my phone down on a shelf in the shower room, which is black slate—walls, ceiling and floor. Once I figure out how it works, I want to stand under the hot water all day. The soap Suzanne put out for me is also black, and smells of coconut. I make a thick lather and watch it slide down the drain. When I turn the water off, the room is so full of steam it’s like standing in a cloud. I wrap myself in the dark-green towel, pine green, the same color as the trees outside the house. Despite the seriousness of our mission, I am, for this moment, perfectly content.

  There is toast for breakfast, and no sign of Suzanne. Gil says she’s gone to work for an hour or so, and we can make ourselves at home till she comes back. Gabriel’s babysitter has taken him to playgroup.

  What do you think? he asks, looking at me carefully.

  Sometimes I observe things I can’t interpret. Like two people smiling and holding hands when actually they hate each other. This confuses me, and Gil says that’s because it is, in actual fact, confusing. It’s the same with being a translator. Some things can’t be translated because the words don’t exist in the other language, or the meaning is so entirely specific to one place or one way of speaking that it disappears in translation.

  But sometimes there are clues.

  The house, I say a little tentatively, is beautiful.

  And?

  I take a deep breath. Suzanne is a very tidy person. All her things and Gabriel’s are put away. But she hasn’t touched his things. Look . . .

  Gil looks.

  A sweater crumpled on the floor. Muddy boots, shoved in a corner. A pile of mail, stacked on a table. It’s almost—

  He waits.

  —as if they live in two separate houses that don’t touch. Like . . . only one of them is vegetarian, I say, pointing to the shelf of cookbooks.

  That’s not uncommon.

  I look at him, not knowing whether it’s common or uncommon. I just know what a family in which everyone gets along feels like, with all the edges of things blurred and overlapping. What I feel in this house is containment. Suzanne containing her things so they don’t touch his. Even the baby doesn’t seem to cross over, his toys and clothes and equipment all tidy and stacked up on her plane.

  And she hates his dog.

  I don’t say it, but I’ve felt other things. Owen, for instance. I can feel him all through the house. They pretend he’s gone, but he’s everywhere, like a restless soul.

  There’s someone else. A smoker. Suzanne has a friend who smokes. There are traces of smoke in her clothes, in her hair. And more. I can smell it in certain parts of the house, which suggests it’s not just someone she knows, but someone who spends time here. And it’s definitely a man. Women smell of things other than themselves—hair stuff, shampoo, soap—even if they don’t wear perfume.

  Does Matthew smoke? I ask.

  Never, Gil says, looking puzzled. Couldn’t stand the idea. Why?

  I shrug.

  Gil sips his coffee. Suzanne says Matthew has a camp near the Canadian border.

  When I look puzzled, he says, A little house. Like a shack.

  Matthew has a camp. Not we have a camp.

  She wonders if he’s gone there. Gil looks at me over the rim of his cup. It’s quite isolated. In the woods. The sort of place used by hunters.

  Hunters?

  Gil smiles. Matthew doesn’t hunt. But maybe we should go and have a look. It’s the obvious place for him to hide. Suzanne says she’ll stay here with Gabriel in case he comes back.

  I think for a minute. Is it normal for people just to disappear? I ask.

  Normal? Gil raises an eyebrow. Not really. No such thing as normal, Perguntador.

  No such thing as normal. Gil’s favorite line. I finish my toast and look out at the trees, just coming into leaf. I have learned normal as a word with no real meaning in our language, but sometimes I wonder what it would feel like.

  What time is it in Holland? I ask him. Can we phone Marieka?

  Yes, Gil says, and we do, but she’s out, so we leave a message. I flop down on the big sofa and when I open my eyes Honey is standing a few inches away just looking at me. I sigh, get up and find her lead, and we go out together for a walk in the woods behind the house. I don’t go far because I don’t want to get lost.

  Matthew?
??s dog is a watcher, like me. Her eyes have a sadness that is almost human. She wants to know who I am. She follows me and pricks her ears to listen when I speak. Perhaps she is hoping I will explain things to her, where Matthew went and when he will be back, but I do not know the answers to these questions, and besides, I do not speak dog.

  Honey is intelligent and loyal.

  I wonder how Suzanne can hate such a dog.

  eight

  You’d never think of matching Catlin and me up as friends. She’s loud, skinny as a twig and pretty much insane. I’m quiet, solid and think things through. Cat always jumps first, before she has time to be swayed by facts. While I’m cautious. But I love how bright and daring she is, like a shooting star. She’s not like anyone I’ve ever met, and sometimes I wonder why she’s friends with me.

  Once she dragged me upstairs to our clubhouse to look at a cardboard box. Inside were two rats.

  I stared at her.

  Two rats had gone missing from the school science lab the week before and everyone was hysterical because they were at large. Some people wouldn’t even use the school toilets in case they bobbed up in the water underneath them, which apparently happens.

  You’re a rat-napper? I was appalled. How’d you get them out of the building?

  Cat pointed at her feet, grinning.

  What? I said. You stuffed them in your shoes?

  Almost. And then she reached down and picked up one of the rats and slipped her hand and the rat into a sock, removed her hand, tied the sock loosely at the end, and voilà, it was the perfect rat carrier. Being schoolroom rats, they were overfed and a bit dopey from being passed around, so inside the dark sock they just curled up and dozed.

  Where’d you learn that trick?

  Made it up, she said, which figured. Most of what Cat tells me she makes up, but she’s so entertaining it doesn’t matter. I prefer her explanations to the real ones anyway.

  Her plan was for us to train the rats to carry messages through the sewers—though what messages and to whom was kind of up for grabs.