Crude Sunlight 1 (3 page)

More photographs, his impatience causing him to flick quickly through them. A stairwell viewed from above that looked like the curve of a nautilus shell. A factory shot from the distance. A control panel covered in dust and filth. An abandoned pair of boots in a locker. A wall covered in graffiti depicting a rotting head. An empty room in which a chandelier had crashed to the floor. A side shot of Julia, arms crossed, head to one side, gazing seriously at the camera.

Thomas dropped the other photographs and examined it. She was wearing a white oxford shirt under a gray sweater, the sleeves pulled up her forearms. He turned it around, and saw
Sept. 29, 3.42pm, Julia Morrow.

Julia Morrow. Reaching into his pocket, he drew out his cell phone and dialed 411.

The phone rang twice, and then he quickly navigated the options to reach the operator. A bored woman's voice, rich with cadences and the sound of gum being chewed asked him which listing he desired.

"Julia Morrow, Buffalo, New York."

"Thank you," said the operator, clearly not meaning it. Thomas listened to the sound of keys being typed, and then the woman came back, "All right, connecting you."

Thomas started--connecting him? He stood up, took a step, froze, holding the photograph, staring down into her unequivocal gaze. The phone rang, and rang, and then--

"Hello?"

"Hi--Julia? Julia Morrow?"

"Yeah? Who is this?"

"Hi. This is Thomas Verkraft. Henry's older brother."

She hung up. Thomas took the phone away from his head and stared at it. He looked at her photograph, and then dropped both it and the phone on the bed.
Well.

Scratching his head, he walked out and into the kitchen, took a glass from the sink and filled it with tap water. Lifting the glass, he saw that it was filled with dried crud, stained with what looked like strawberry jam, thick and clotted. Frowning, he set it aside, and pulled out a mug that was stained with dry tea, which he easily cleaned and then filled.

Moving back to the couch, he sat down and tried to think, to focus, but his thoughts kept coming back to Julia. She had to know something. Otherwise, why hang up on him so promptly?

His cell phone rang. Thomas set the mug aside and strode back into the bedroom, where he snatched it up and answered.

"Hello?"

"So--" her voice was strangely guarded and tentative at the same time. "You're the brother."

Thomas let out a sigh and nodded, "Yes. His older brother. I'm in town taking care of his belongings."

"What do you want?" She sounded half resigned, as if she were asking a rhetorical question.

"I've got some questions."

"I'm sure you do."

"I'd like some answers."

"Are you trying to sound like an FBI agent, or do you just naturally pull it off?"

"I..." Thomas had no idea how to reply. "I'm about as far from the FBI as you can get," he said, "I'm an emerging market manager for a hedge fund." There was silence on the other end. "Look, can we meet? I'd like to talk to you."

There was a long pause on the other end of the line, and he tried to picture her, her lips pursed, her brows furrowed as she weighed factors he couldn't imagine. "Fine. The Campus Center coffee house, eleven o'clock."

"All right, great. Listen, I really--"

She hung up. Nonplussed, Thomas stared at the phone again, and then slipped it into his pocket. Well then. It was a start. Fatigue washed over him, and he looked at all the photographs with a suddenly melancholy indifference. What game had Henry been playing? The tapes, the pictures, the disappearance--what had he gotten himself into? Thomas felt worn out. He'd deal with it tomorrow. He'd meet with Julia and then call the movers. But right now all he wanted to do was to get out of this apartment, this building, and go to his hotel room and sleep. Turning off the lights one by one, he paused by the front door and looked over his brother's stuff. Then, with a deep breath, he opened the door and stepped back out into the dog stench.

Chapter 3

Thomas awoke, sunlight filtering in through the curtains. He lay in bed, enjoying the warmth beneath the comforter, a sharp contrast to the chill he had slipped into the previous night, after showering.

But now it was luxuriously warm, so soft he felt as if he were floating. The lack of an alarm clock was delightful, as was the sunshine across his face. Years of climbing numbly from his bed at four in the morning, Michelle yet asleep and coffee the only aphrodisiac that could awake him to the day's pleasures, had made such mornings a rarity. To be appreciated. Enjoyed. He stretched, rolled onto his side and arched his back, groaning and grimacing with pleasure. He relaxed and turned back to look up at the ceiling, and then suddenly, terribly, missed Michelle.

It was a near physical ache, acute and numbing in its power. She should be lying next to him, her black hair a web of interwoven darkness against the pale of the pillow. Her eyes half closed, her smile present in the deepening laugh lines around her mouth, betraying her amusement at his overdone stretch, awaiting his smile in response, for him to take her hand and ask how she had slept.

He looked at the empty pillow.
Michelle.
Was she lying in her childhood bed, gazing at the ceiling, feeling, thinking the same things? That feeling of helplessness washed over him again, provoked by an image of her face from that night, battered, one eye nearly closed from the swelling. How she had been unable to cry when he held her. Could he just call her and tell her he loved her, sweep aside all the arguments and misunderstandings and inability to connect in one clear clarion call of love, as pure as the sunlight, as beautiful as her eyes and her lips? In the morning light it seemed possible, simple, and he almost reached for the telephone right there and then.

But no. It wasn't so simple. Not after she had left with such finality for her parent's home yesterday evening, a departure following on the heels of yet another argument, one that had prompted his own drive to Buffalo in order to avoid their empty apartment. She'd been going to her parent's home a lot since he'd taken the promotion last summer, but the amount had nearly doubled since the incident. Heading out there "to think," to recover. To ride her father's old motorbike up and down the back roads, wearing those ridiculous aviator goggles she loved. Running with Mags in the morning along the tidal wrack, the dog too old now to really keep up. Sitting on the porch with a mug of tea and a book as the sun set, enjoying the stillness. The solitude. A quiet certainty suffused him: things weren't going to last much longer. Change was coming, an end. He could practically hear the ice that had built up between them groaning and cracking under the strain. Back in college she had always said she wanted to do pro bono work. Since the incident, her desire to do so had caught fire once more. Maybe now she was finally going to make the jump.

He frowned, and the image of Michelle faded from the far side of the bed. Nothing was simple anymore. He sat up with a groan, rubbed his face, and decided to shower again before reviewing last night's stocks and heading out.

The Campus Center wasn't hard to find. The early morning sun had been beaten back by a battalion of sullen clouds that had drifted in from the west as if summoned by his dour desire. They hung oppressively low in the sky, the color of dishwater. The air felt close and the snow that lay everywhere failed to gleam or glitter. Driving up toward the University, Thomas had seen a massive building rearing up like a fist of brick from behind a screen of trees: the building from Henry's video. He had slowed down, looked at the twin stocky towers, at the verdigrised caps, old and stern and baleful. A chill had washed over him, and he'd accelerated faster than he had strictly needed to.

Ten minutes later he had entered the large and modern looking Campus Center, a light butter yellow on the outside and looking like a minimalist mall within. Three floors, accessible by elevator and hosting innumerable meeting rooms, auditoriums and the like. Young men and women walked to and fro, holding books, shouldering back packs, talking animatedly or simply striding forward through the open spaces, heads bowed, intent on their destinations. Thomas felt old. He pressed on.

The coffee shop was located on the ground floor with a small fan of tables and chairs spread before it. Most of the tables were empty, and Thomas quickly spotted Julia sitting by herself, chewing gum and reading a magazine set on the table before her. She was slouched to one side, base of her palm was pressed against her left temple, skewing the side of her face so that her left eye and cheek were pulled up. But it was her, unmistakably her, wearing a thin black sweater under a bright red and puffy sleeveless vest, something that looked to Thomas like a fashionable life jacket.

He walked over and stopped before her table. It took her a moment to register his presence, and then, using her palm as a pivot, she swiveled her head up to look at him. Her eyes were hard and stared at him with unabashed appraisal that discomfited him. In the harsh light of the campus center he saw that her hair held red highlights within its auburn depths.

"Julia?" He placed his hand on the back of the chair across from her, waiting for a nod before pulling it out and sitting down. She stared at him in silence, chewing her gum slowly. After a moment he cleared his throat and continued, "I'm Thomas. It's nice to meet you."

She raised an eyebrow at this, as if openly disbelieving him.
Tough customer
, decided Thomas.

"I wanted to talk to you about Henry. You guys were dating?"

At this she straightened up, closed her magazine and slid it aside, and leaned back in her chair to gaze at him levelly. "We weren't dating. We were fucking."

"Oh," said Thomas. "How adult."

She snorted and looked away, the muscle over the joint of her jaw leaping into relief and then subsiding and then appearing once more.

"When did you last see Henry?" asked Thomas, leaning forward. He felt almost amused; her tough act might fluster boys her age, but it left him feeling paternal. Almost.

"Listen, how about we cut to the chase, all right?" Her voice was cold, controlled, and when she looked back at him, her expression verged on the furious. "I don't know where he is. I don't know why he left. I've got nothing to tell you that I didn't tell the cops. If you're looking to learn about his life, you should have asked him while he was still around. Got it?"

Thomas pursed his lips and nodded slowly, digesting that. She glared at him, daring him to drop his gaze. He didn't, so she eventually looked away again.

"Why are you so upset? Did I offend you somehow?"

She didn't react at first, simply continued chewing and staring out at nothing. Thomas waited, letting her figure out what she wanted to say. Clearly she hadn't expected him to remain so calm. To not rise to her provocations. She looked down, a certain tension left her shoulders, and when she spoke it was with a great weariness.

"Listen. Thomas. I told you. I don't know where Henry is. I haven't seen him in over four months. We weren't close toward the end. I don't know who told you I could help you, but they were wrong. I wish I could help." She looked up and met his gaze, and he saw her eyes suddenly tear up.
This girl's wrung out
, he realized. "But I can't. Okay? I'm sorry, but I can't."

Thomas stood. She followed him with her eyes, and he looked down at her, expression neutral, compassion welling up within him. "I'm going to get an espresso and some sort of sandwich. Maybe a slice of cake. Can I get you something?"

Something fragile hung in the air. Something tenuous and brittle, and for a second he thought it would break, and that Julia Morrow would stand up, her eyes raw, her face hard, and walk away. He held her gaze, and finally she looked away and said, "A hot chocolate would be great, thanks." Thomas nodded and stepped over to the cafe counter where he examined the contents within the glass display case while waiting for the serving lady to notice him. She turned, took his order, and then busied herself preparing it.

Thomas turned and looked at where Julia sat facing away from him. She was sitting still, slightly slumped, gazing out at nothing in particular. Thomas was struck by a sense of tenuous fragility. It was so at odds with her athletic frame, with the confident and sensuous smile of that intimate photograph. She must have been hit much harder by Henry's disappearance than she was letting on.

"Seven-fifty," said the woman behind him, and Thomas turned to see the drinks and cake set out on the counter. The espresso smelled amazing. Smiling, he handed her a ten dollar bill and took the change with a nod. He debated carrying all three items at once, and then simply took the drinks over first, smiled politely as he set Julia's hot chocolate before her, and returned soon after with the cake and two forks.

He sat and fished a handful of sugar packets free of the little well in the center of the table, and then ripped off their heads and shook them into his coffee. A quick glance showed that Julia was holding her hot chocolate, not drinking it but simply holding it with both hands, absorbing its heat into her palms and fingers. He studied her face for a moment, and then looked back down at his espresso. A quick stir, then a sip, cautious of the heat. Perfect.

Setting the little cup down, he leaned back and, gauging her still unready to tell him what she knew, began to talk. "I accompanied Henry when he first enrolled here back in 2004. He had to attend a whole bunch of orientation meetings with the other students, and I had to go to a series of meetings with all the other parents and professors. Everybody else was in their fifties or so, and there I was looking like a kid. I got some funny looks." He smiled and shook his head slowly. "You could see the mothers gauging me, wondering if I was possibly old enough to be his dad, and how scandalous that would be. Anyway." He forked some cake into his mouth, and washed it down with some more espresso.

"The President gave a speech. I think he was trying to be funny, but he told us that all the kids were going to be treated like adults. Which meant attendance would not be taken. Nobody would check to make sure they were eating their salads. Nobody would notice if they decided to take a week off to go to Mexico, or New York City. It was up to them to invest in their futures."