Dissonance (11 page)

The corners of Galen’s mouth edged upward as he shook his head. “I saw you help that woman with her groceries even though I knew you must be in a hurry,” he said, ignoring Cam’s comment. “You were kind to her. Gentle. Understanding.”

“I wasn’t—”

“You were the only one who stopped to help her. Everyone walked by, hoping someone else would stop.
You
were the only one, Cam.”

Cam stared, unable to form the words to respond.

Galen continued. “You’ve never needed to ask for help. And now, when you
do
need help, you’re not sure how to ask.”

“I don’t need any help.” Cam wished he sounded more convincing. Mostly he didn’t think he deserved any help. He half wanted Galen to disappear, half wanted him to stay. Why the hell didn’t he know what he wanted?

“Kindness isn’t just for other people. It doesn’t matter how much money you have. Sometimes you need kindness too.”

Cam’s eyes burned. He wouldn’t cry. He wasn’t a child. He was just tired. Stressed. Afraid—not just of getting mugged again but of what he’d be facing if he went back to his apartment. But he’d manage. The memory of the yellow line on the edge of the platform lingered.

I was tired. Nothing more.

“You’re welcome to stay with me. No strings. No need to repay me. No quid pro quo. Just a safe place where you can rest.” Galen shrugged. “Nothing fancy.”

“I still don’t understand—”

“I’ve been where you are,” Galen said. “Someone helped me. I’m just paying it forward.”

Quid pro quo?
So maybe he wasn’t as dim as Cam had assumed. Strange.
New age prophet cum beach bum.
But what other options did he really have?

Y
OU
’
RE
AN
idiot
. What the hell was he doing, agreeing to go home with a man he’d met just over two weeks before in a subway station?

Nothing you haven’t done before
. Well, it wasn’t so different from the hookups he’d had in the past, was it? If you ignored the subway part of the equation.

They took the local to 34th Street, then exited near Penn Station. From there they walked about five blocks and then down a side street. At one point Galen offered Cam his jacket, but Cam flatly refused. Bad enough that he needed rescuing like some pathetic animal. He wasn’t yet so desperate that he’d take someone else’s coat.

“This is mine,” Galen said as he pointed to a silver Honda with New Jersey plates and rust that edged the doors and wheel wells. “Not much to look at,” he added with his now familiar shrug, “but she gets me where I need to go.”

“She?”

Galen laughed, then ran a hand through his hair, appearing a bit uncomfortable. “Yeah. If she sinks, I go down with her.” He opened one of the rear doors and set his trumpet case inside. Cam caught a glimpse of a stack of sheet music on the backseat, although it was too dark to make out much. Galen unlocked the passenger side—no automatic locks here—then pressed his lips together and shook his head. Short white hair—fur, no doubt—covered the black vinyl seat.

“Sorry about that,” Galen said as he brushed it off. “I usually vacuum the car after Max and I go hiking, but we got back a little late today.”

“Max?”

Galen grinned. “My dog.”

“Oh.” Cam eyed the seat warily, his first thought that his black jeans would pick up the fur like a lint brush. Then he reminded himself that he’d been sleeping in the subway and a bit of fur was hardly the worst of what he might find on his pants. Still, as he settled into the seat, he dusted a few stray hairs off the armrest.

The drive through the Lincoln Tunnel and on into Jersey was an easy one, too late for there to be much traffic. Cam looked out the window, unwilling to engage Galen in conversation. Galen didn’t seem to mind. He whistled—a tune Cam recognized but couldn’t remember the name of—then tuned the radio to a jazz station that played bebop.

Thirty minutes later Galen exited the freeway, and they drove another ten minutes before turning down a small street lined with cookie-cutter houses. Postwar, Cam guessed, each with the same boxy structure, some with dormers, others with vinyl siding. Galen pulled into a driveway between two of the houses, but to Cam’s surprise, the driveway didn’t end at either house. It continued on, snaking behind them a few hundred feet to an old farmhouse. Probably the original house on the land that was now cluttered with homes. Built in the 1800s, he guessed.

A single light lit the walkway from the driveway to the front porch. White, with blue shutters, the house was nearly three times as large as its neighbors. A dog barked, although in the semidarkness, Cam couldn’t see it. Max, no doubt.

Cam followed Galen up the stairs and through the front door. Galen flipped on the light to reveal high ceilings and wide-planked wooden floors. To the right, in what Cam guessed was supposed to be the dining room, stood two trestles supporting a large piece of wood—a makeshift table stacked high with more than a dozen fiberglass cases and several instruments. On one side, Cam saw a battered french horn and what looked like a tuba; on the other side, a clarinet with some of its keys missing. Between the cases and the instruments were a bevy of tools, neatly arranged by size and shape, most of which Cam didn’t recognize. Maybe Galen repaired instruments on the side. Playing in the subway couldn’t pay that well.

Galen untied his trainers and set them by the front mat. Perfectly straight, Cam noted, just like the tools on the table.
When in Rome.
Cam slipped his shoes off as well and placed them beside Galen’s on the mat.

Galen, who had already made his way past Cam and set his trumpet case down by a steep set of stairs, walked to the back of the house. Cam heard what he guessed was the back door opening; then Galen shouted, “Max!” Seconds later came the sound of claws against wood floors and a blur of white and gray bounded into the hallway. Cam barely saw the dog before it jumped up, its head nearly reaching Cam’s shoulders.

Cam gasped and backed up until he hit the wall, heart pounding. Too much caffeine, too little sleep, and the thought that people were out there looking for him, and he was a sniveling mess.

“Max! Down! Sit!”

To Cam’s surprise, the dog did as he was told and looked almost apologetically at Galen. Galen, on the other hand, seemed unconcerned with Cam’s over-the-top reaction. “We don’t get much company,” he explained almost casually as he opened a door to a small closet and hung up his jacket.

Cam thought about his own jacket—at least the muggers had good taste—and wondered how bad he must smell to Galen. Pretty bad.

“Get you something to eat?” Galen asked.

“No, thank you.” The hamburger he’d inhaled at the coffee shop now sat like a lead weight in the bottom of his stomach. He glanced around, bouncing on his feet—partly to keep himself alert, partly because he was nervous. He didn’t know what he was nervous about. The police wouldn’t find him here, would they?

Everything seemed so surreal. Then again, the house was warm and clean. Immaculate. The way Cam’s apartment looked when Luisa got through with it. In spite of himself, Cam yawned.

“Bed, then.”

“That would be lovely.” The thought of sleeping somewhere comfortable and relatively quiet was heavenly.

In spite of the mention of a guest bedroom, Cam half expected Galen to invite him into his bed. Instead, Galen showed him to a good-sized room on one side of the house, with its own bath attached. The bed had already been made with perfect hospital corners. Like the rest of the house, the room was spotless and neat. Galen drew the curtains, which appeared a bit worn but were heavy and seemed to block much of the cold air from outside.

“Sometimes I have unexpected houseguests,” Galen explained, as if he’d guessed at Cam’s unspoken question. He shoved his hands in his pockets and shrugged but didn’t elaborate. “There are towels in the bath. A few toothbrushes in the drawer under the sink. Sweats okay?”

“Sweats?” In Cam’s exhausted brain, the word didn’t register.

“Sweatpants, sweatshirt? To sleep in?”

“Yes. Thank you. Sorry. I’m a bit slow tonight.” Cam’s brain still felt a bit thick.

“No worries. You’ll feel better after a good night’s sleep.” Galen headed for the door. “Back in a minute.”

Cam looked around the room. Much like the curtains, the carpet and bedding were worn. The bed looked old, like it had come with the house. A wooden dresser with a large round mirror took up half of a wall. Opposite stood a bookshelf piled with books. Cam walked over and glanced at some of the titles. Several were in Japanese. He picked up a ragged copy of Goethe’s
Faust
and leafed through it to discover it was in the original German. He set it back down. One of the shelves was completely filled with music, neatly stacked.

“I teach high school music,” Galen said from behind him, causing Cam to jump. It didn’t explain the Goethe, but now the music and the instruments made sense.

“Does teaching pay that poorly?” Cam turned around to find Galen setting some clothing on the bed.

“Oh, you mean the subway gig?” Galen laughed as he turned back the covers and fluffed the pillows. “I do that just for fun.” He didn’t elaborate further.

“I see.” Cam wasn’t sure he
did
see, but he was too tired to pursue the topic.

“Feel free to help yourself to whatever you need,” Galen said as he headed for the door to the room. “There are towels in the bathroom if you’d like to take a shower.”

“I would.” The thought of rinsing away the last few days sounded wonderful.

Galen smiled. “We can talk more tomorrow, after you’ve gotten some rest.”

“All right.”

“Good night, Cam.”

“Good night.” Cam hesitated, then added, “Thank you.”

C
AM
SKIPPED
down one of the gravel paths past the privet hedges that led from the terrace to the grounds beyond. He whistled a song he’d learned in school a few days before. He felt proud that he’d learned to whistle when Jane Ravenel and Paul Vestry hadn’t been able to do more than blow air and spit when they’d tried. He’d said he’d teach them. He, Cameron Sherrington, could do something they couldn’t do. He’d be a good teacher and they’d like him for it, wouldn’t they?

He reached the edge of the forest a few minutes later. His father had promised to build him a tree house, like in
Winnie the Pooh
, but he’d died before they’d had a chance to plan it. He’d asked his mother, but she’d told him he was too old for tree houses. He’d picked out the perfect spot for it too—a huge oak that grew on the edge of one of the fields where the horses often grazed.

He whistled and ran faster until he reached the pond with the ancient boathouse. He tossed his shoes into the grass and dangled his feet in the water. He didn’t notice the dark cloud overhead until everything around him grew black.

Cam shot up in bed, panting. A dream
. It was just a dream.
He looked around the room and tried to remember where he was. Slowly, it came back to him. Sleeping in the subway. The FBI. The music. Galen.

He dry-scrubbed his face, then took a few more deep breaths. He hadn’t had a nightmare since he was a kid. He slipped out of bed and padded to the bathroom, relieved himself, then splashed a bit of cool water on his cheeks. The face that greeted him in the mirror looked tired. Older than usual, even. The dark circles under his eyes always looked ten times worse against his pale skin. The bruise on his cheek had blossomed purple. He touched it gingerly and winced. At least the muggers hadn’t broken anything.

He stood, just looking at himself, for nearly ten minutes. Days before, he’d been assessing himself in the mirror to make sure his hair was just right. Now he barely noticed the tousled mess. He didn’t recognize himself in the reflection. Or maybe he just didn’t
want
to see himself looking back. No deep thoughts accompanied this strange, surreal appraisal. Through the haze of sleep and with the slightly edgy memory of the dream still lingering, he saw every line, every imperfection magnified. The small scar on his right cheek from when he’d fallen from a horse jumping far beyond his abilities. The lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes. The tiny birthmark by his nose.

The sensation of something pressing against his leg brought him back to himself. The dog, trying to get his attention. Cam looked down, shook his head, then walked back to bed. Once under the covers, he closed his eyes and tried to fall asleep. But it was nearly light outside when he finally drifted off.