Assumptions (4 page)

“I am Mrs. Hansen, Head of Student Services.
Have a seat.” She motioned to a blue plastic chair in front of a
desk with a computer, a printer, and nothing more. Mrs. Hansen sat
at the desk and clicked the mouse a few times. The printer chugged.
“I’ll walk you through orientation this morning. Looks like you’re
missing one registration form. Your father will need to complete
that." Mrs. Hansen pulled a single paper from the desk drawer and
handed it to Jordyn. “Here you are. Make sure you return it on
Monday." She checked her watch. "We’ll start with a tour of the
school. Afterward, I’ll show you to your locker. You’ll have a few
minutes to organize it before second period.”

She took Jordyn’s schedule off the printer.
“You have Geography first period, that’s now, on the second floor.
Professor Embry knows you’ll be with me this morning. Miss Lawson
attends that class. I’m sure she would be happy to share her
notes.”

“I’m sure," grumbled Jordyn.

Mrs. Hansen’s face tightened.

“I mean, I’m sure I’ll see her later. I’ll
ask for the notes then.”

“Come with me, Miss Quig. No time to waste.”
Mrs. Hansen sprinted to the office door.

They walked the empty corridors. Mrs. Hansen
led Jordyn past the academic wings, the gym, and the commons which
already smelled like meat sauce and garlic bread.

“Pasta for lunch today,” said Mrs. Hansen. As
she walked, she pointed to the bulletin board, decorated with paper
cutouts of apples and milk cartons.

“As you will see, our student body is quite
diverse,” she explained.

“Except for money,” Jordyn commented under
her breath.

“Some of our students receive generous
scholarships. Nevertheless, we do have to keep the lights on
somehow. This way to the library, Miss Quig.” She directed Jordyn
up a wide terrazzo stairway.

At the top of the stairs, Mrs. Hansen pulled
open a heavy wood door and ushered Jordyn into an immense room
filled with row after row of carved wood shelves and long heavy
tables.

“Follow me, Miss Quig,” directed Mrs. Hansen.
She led Jordyn past the stacks and up another flight of stairs to
the third floor. “As you can see, our collection is extensive. The
library occupies a large portion of two floors. The lower floor
holds most of our volumes and computer carrels.” They stopped at a
cozy arrangement of cushy sofas and nubby chairs nestled in the
sunlight streaming in from high arched windows. “The upper floor
primarily holds reference material and reading clusters like this
one. It is usually very quiet up here. Let’s keep moving, shall
we.”

When they reached the opposite side of the
room, Mrs. Hansen stopped, leaning her backside against a low
window sill. “Any questions, Miss Quig?”

Jordyn looked past her down into an unkempt
courtyard at the first floor.

“Miss Quig? Any questions?”

“How do I get down there?”

“There?”

“Yes. Is that the door?” Jordyn pointed
toward an overgrown corner.

“No one goes there. It’s just an old
courtyard. We only use it for light these days."

“My father used to take me to small gardens
when I was little. He likes to work on his games there. Thinks
they’re inspiring or something. Probably why I like them.” Jordyn
looked Mrs. Hansen square in the face. “Too bad this one is so
neglected."

Mrs. Hansen fiddled with her scarf. She
stepped away from the window and looked down into the scruff below.
She checked her wristwatch. “Well, Miss Quig, it looks like we’ve
used up all of our time.”

Mrs. Hansen showed Jordyn to her locker.
“Here you are. You have a few minutes before the bell. Please, let
me know if there is anything else I can do for you.”

“Thank you. I will.” Jordyn opened her
locker.

“Miss Quig?”

“Yes, Mrs. Hansen?”

“I’ll see if I can get maintenance into the
courtyard. Maybe they can tidy up.”

Jordyn Quig was no longer a nobody standing
outside on a clear fall day.

CHAPTER SIX: LEAVING

Timothy Stillman savored one last bite of
apple pecan pie. He scraped a stray crumb off his thick white
plate, laid the fork on top, and pushed the empty dish toward the
business side of the lunch counter. He took a long, slow sip from
his oversized cup of black coffee. The mid-day rush had waned and
only he, a waitress named Sadie, and the cook remained in Twila’s
Diner, Provident's best and only sit-down restaurant.

“That be all, Mr. Stillman?” asked Sadie.

“Top off my coffee, would you, please?” The
waitress re-filled the heavy mug. “Thanks, Sadie.”

“We’ve gotten used to having you around. Too
bad you have to leave us.”

“It’s time. My work’s done.”

“You know she thought the world of you."

“Not sure why,” Stillman wondered aloud.

“She had good reason,” Sadie replied
confidently with a half-wink. “Did you see the paper this morning?”
She tilted her head toward the disheveled pile of newsprint at the
far end of the counter.

Stillman shook his head.

Sadie frowned. “Ran her obit.”

“Guess it’s finally official then.”

“Wrote it herself . . . as a column.”

“I didn’t know her very long, but that sounds
about right.”

Sadie gathered up the paper and shuffled
through until she found the right page. “Paper staff put together a
photo essay, too.” She folded it in half and then in half again and
handed it to Stillman. “Here.” She pointed to a column in the upper
left corner entitled
101 Things You Can Do With Hairspray
by
Dorothea Whitford, who, based on her headshot, used plenty of the
stuff. Her stout black beehive evoked more helmet than hair.

The column filled only a few inches.

My Dear Friends,

If you are reading this, I most certainly
have met my untimely demise. No hard feelings. Though, I must
confess, I will truly miss Twila’s apple pecan pie.

Stillman glanced at his empty plate. The
corner of his lip curled into a knowing smirk.

Not for long-winded goodbyes, I will do my
best to keep this short. No laughing, now.

On January 15th, I rolled into this town in a
rust bucket hatchback. It would not have been memorable to me or
anyone else except for the fact that it was the coldest day on
record. I stopped at Twila's for a bite on my way to the
dilapidated farmhouse I would soon call home. I returned to my car
to find every door frozen stiff. Not sure who noticed first, but
within minutes, half a dozen of you were standing out in that cold
with me, cans of deicer and hairdryers on extension cords in
hand.

We are rarely surprised when those close to
us rise above our expectations and lay themselves down for us
without hesitation. But, it's the mundane, like opening a door for
a stranger, that reveals the divine in each of us.

I must say, earthly life was magnificent.
But, with God's grace, I've landed somewhere nice. Wherever I am, I
hope there are friends like you and, of course, a big slice of
apple pecan with my name on it.

Stillman unfolded the paper, lingering on
each of the photos filling the rest of the page.

Dorothea Whitford was not an exceptionally
large woman, but because of the way she wore her clothes she looked
as if she were made of bubbles, one stacked slightly askew on the
next. Time had faded the freshness of her youth, but she struck
everyone she met as an unusually handsome woman, though they could
never put their finger on just why.

"Did you see this one, Sadie?" Stillman
pointed to a picture of a sixty-ish woman, Santa hat squeezed onto
her hairdo, handing out overstuffed Christmas stockings to grinning
and wide-eyed children.

"Those kids were thrilled. Oh, look at this
one.” Sadie pointed to a picture of the woman, shovel in hand, dirt
smudged across her forehead. “That was two summers ago at the
groundbreaking for the library addition." Sadie scanned the page.
"There she is drinking out of the Cross County Softball Cup. That
tournament raised the money for the tot lot.” Sadie paused, looking
at the smudgy images. “I never realized how much she did for this
town . . . for us . . .”

The cook shelved the last of his iron
skillets with a clang then burst through the kitchen door, joining
the waitress behind the counter. “Miss Whitford sure appreciated
all your help, Mr. Stillman,” he said. “She was always going on
about you. I’m sure she’d be pleased, you putting everything in
order since, well, since she’s been gone.”

Stillman looked up from the paper. “It’s
nothing. Just my job." He folded the paper. “Mind if I hang onto
this?”

“She would have liked that,” said Sadie.

Stillman stuffed the paper in his front
pocket and reached for his wallet.

“Not today, Mr. Stillman,” Sadie
insisted.

“Thanks." He reached over the counter and
gave the cook single, firm handshake. "I’ll miss this place.”

“Better hit the road soon if you want to make
it before it gets dark,” said Sadie.

“Yeah. I still have a couple of things to
wrap up across the street.”

The overhead bell on the door tinkled sweetly
as Stillman walked out of diner onto the sunlit sidewalk. He looked
both ways out of habit and crossed the empty street, stopping in
front of a large, multi-colored building.

Provident Theater and Studios stood at the
dead center of town. It had been Timothy Stillman's home since his
arrival four-and-a-half months earlier at Miss Dorothea Whitford's
request. Over that time, Stillman documented every aspect of the
theater turned museum and its contents, meticulously updating Miss
Whitford's appraisal records for her insurance policy, which, upon
her disappearance, had taken on unexpected significance. After the
storm, he stayed on to clean up the damage.

Since its dedication in 1922, the building
had played host to decades of the famous and the obscure. Rumor had
it the Studios once housed a Prohibition era speakeasy, though
Stillman could never get anyone to confirm that.

Unoccupied for months, the building now
languished, its windows still clad in board-up plywood from the
storm. Stillman ran his hand along the crackled terracotta façade,
carefully fixing the time-mellowed gold and blue in his mind like a
scrapbook memento.

He pulled a thick brass key with worn letters
from his hip pocket and, with a soft ker-clunk, unlocked the lobby
doors. He punched the push-button light switch. A pair of
amber-colored sconces dimly lit the three-story space. A squat
jack-o-lantern, recently carved with a wide, Cheshire grin, smiled
from the top of a dusty glass display case.

Bits of cobalt-glazed ceiling plaster
crunched beneath Stillman's feet as he crossed the shadowy lobby.
He punched more switches, illuminating an immense chandelier and
the riser lights along the sweeping stairs leading to either side
of the mezzanine gallery.

A flimsy brass sign stand lay on the floor
near the lobby door. Limp poster board, deformed by the humidity of
summer, slumped in the sign frame, rendering it's gracious message,
Welcome to Dorothea’s Curiosity Shop and Museum of Unusual
Objects
, barely legible.

An assortment of mismatched display cases
stood exactly as they did the day of the storm, except the one
nearest the front window which had toppled and shattered, spilling
its contents across the floor. Stillman had painstakingly cleaned
it up, documenting and packing each object with utmost care. The
remnants of the exhibit barely filled two small boxes, which he had
not yet placed in storage. The bent case stood empty in a dark
corner of the lobby.

Stillman plodded up the wide stairs, dust
puffing up from the carpet with each step. When he reached the top,
he opened the side door, turning the lock with the same key. The
door opened into a long, whitewashed corridor with several
identical doors.

Stillmand entered the third studio. It held
only a single empty bookshelf secured to the wall at the far
corner. A thick layer of dust had settled on the oak floor. The
faint remnants of footprints led from the door to the bookshelf and
back again. Stillman followed his own steps. He reached under the
chest-level shelf and tapped the top of the back panel, popping
open a hidden compartment.

He pulled out a cardboard moving box marked
"kitchen" and folded back the loose flaps. He removed a brown paper
wrapped package no larger than a deck of cards, the only object in
the museum he did not appraise. He carefully tucked it into his
back pocket.

He left the box on the floor and returned to
the lobby. With the same key, he unlocked a padlock hanging from a
chain looped through the graceful bronze handles of the theater
house doors. He let the chain fall heavily to the floor.

Stillman entered the space, his toe nudging
one of the boxes now holding the contents of the shattered case. He
turned a knob on the wall. The theater lights rose, soft amber
illuminating the tops of ceiling high stacks of wood crates, each
large enough to hold a small car, and open utility shelves filled
with storage boxes.

Stillman picked up the boxes at his feet and
walked down the center aisle, stopping two-thirds of the way to the
stage. He double-checked the identification tags and slid the boxes
into their respective places. He walked back up the aisle, pausing
every ten feet or so to double-check a box or a tag marking the
location of each artifact like a catalog in three dimensions, the
handwritten record of the last four months of his life. He closed
the theater doors behind him, looped the chains through the
handles, and secured the padlock, laying it gently against the old
wood.

Stillman collected the pumpkin from the
lobby. It left a circular imprint on the dusty case. He walked out
into the fading afternoon light, locked the doors, and tucked the
old key back into his hip pocket. From his truck he retrieved a
thick envelope and went back across the street to Twila’s. He set
the pumpkin on the counter and handed the envelope to Sadie. “The
insurance company will want this when they get here,” he said.
Sadie nodded. Stillman left again.