Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 48, No. 1, January 2003

I stretched my arms forward and the cat brushed its face against my fingertips. I reached into my pocket, removed the small wooden object there, and spun it on the floor for the cat’s amusement. The late afternoon light was so low now it was nearly gone, and yet the room still seemed bright and animated. I watched the electric candles flicker on, just as I’d set them to do. Out in the kitchen the radio crackled, then there was music. I’d planned that, too.

“I want it to feel as it did when my father lived here.” She’d been wistful as she stood by the windows in the afternoon sunlight, slowly fading most of the color out of this great room. The side of the sofa facing south was a dull, drab purple, while the opposite side, facing me, remained a vivid magenta. I’d noticed that when I’d cleaned this room, and vacuumed and dusted and polished each surface — wood, glass, or brass — until it sparkled. The furniture hadn’t been moved in years.

I’d done the carpets, the windows, and everything but the curtains, which I was staring at now. They were frail looking, mere wisps of sheer yellow fabric. She might want them cleaned; she might want them thrown out. Whatever she wanted, I’d do it. I would have done anything so I wouldn’t have to go home.

I would even have braved the trophy room. “You don’t need to bother with it now. Sophie kept it orderly. We can save it for last. It’s the other rooms I need livable first.”

I dropped the keys on the floor, looked down at the four squares of paper I’d found, or rather, had been left for me. Because as she’d said...

“A boy should have an adventure at least once in his life. Like Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn. Do kids still read Mark Twain in school? It’s been so many years; I can barely remember what kids read. Or do they...” Her brow had wrinkled as she’d said, “...read anymore?”

“I read,” I’d told her. Though not a lot — that I didn’t say.

“Do you? Some time you must tell me what you read. But don’t you agree that, oh, that a boy should have at least one adventure before he’s twenty? I’ve often thought so.”

How did I tell her I’d had my share of adventures? I just agreed with her in my own way: “Yeah, sure, I guess.”

“It will be all right? I won’t take you away from your studies?” She hadn’t asked about my mother, but she knew. She’d had the talks all right, a long one first with Clem, and then another with Jake.

“No, it’s okay,” had been my response. “I can use the job.”

I might have added that I’d clean your house and your yard, mow and rake, and pile the leaves out back. Burn them up later, if you want. I’d paint the porch, clean the gutters, and repair the railings — I’d do it all, and it won’t matter what you paid. And you don’t have to leave “clues” around the house to amuse me, so I can have “an adventure.”

I spread the yellowed squares of paper in the dying light on the old carpet. Underneath the floorboards of this room, the front room, the furnace gurgled. Yes, that’s how it sounded, like a large, wet animal was down there, burping and turning and shaking the house. The pipes began to rattle and squeak; the heat was coming on as the wind whistled through the leafless branches of a sycamore standing near the house. But I loved the sound and the feel of this house, large and warm and empty around me. I loved the heavy, overstuffed, faded furniture and the worn, soft woven rugs; the floor to ceiling windows; and the pale curtains hanging in them. I loved the way the heat rose slowly from the radiators and moved those curtains just lightly so. I loved coming here every day after school, working, then eating the food I’d brought with me. I even liked spreading out my assignments in the waning light of this huge room. There were no distractions. There was no television or computer, no video games. There was only that one old radio out in the kitchen. It sat on the black countertop — which I had polished — next to the cell phone Jake had insisted I bring with me.

Four weeks ago they’d come to a different house, my house, and taken my mother away. Three days after that, Jake Valari had stood in my kitchen arguing with me.

“I talked to your Aunt Clem. It’s either this or you go live with her.” There was no way Jake could hide the emotion in his voice. “Look, I know it’s not much of a choice, but I’m willing to do it.”

“For her?” I’d challenged. “Or for me?”

“You’re fifteen, you can’t stay here alone while your mother...” It was too hard for him to use the euphemism “gets well.” “Either I move in with you for the time being, or you go live with your aunt in Boston. I don’t think that’s what you want. I think you want to stay here in Manamesset and go to school with your friends. Just correct me, please, if I’m wrong.”

What a choice they’d all given me.