Glass Shatters (14 page)

Charles isn’t normally one to stray from his routines. Every day after working at the lab, he walks the same route back to his apartment, showers, fixes himself a microwave dinner, and watches the news. He likes it that way. He’s never been interested in spontaneity. But that night at the tavern, he’s immediately drawn inside. There’s something that pulls him, some subconscious force. And besides that, he likes the atmosphere, the down-to-earth feel.

The bartender offers Charles another drink, and Charles smiles as the bartender fills up his glass. As he takes the mug from the bartender, he notices something, somebody, vaguely reflected. Charles’s glasses have again slid down his nose, the lenses foggy with condensation. He takes off the glasses, wipes them on his shirt, and when he puts them back on, Julie stands before him, silent and ethereal.

“Julie?” Surely it can’t actually be her.

“Charles!” Julie says, and she wraps Charles in the most enormous hug. She still smells like she always has, like almonds and rose hips and Earl Grey tea. She looks older than the last time Charles saw her. Her face has matured. Then again, Charles imagines he must look older too. He can’t even remember the last time they saw each other. Charles thinks about Julie often, but the more he thinks about her, the more unreal she seems, a fairy-tale being in a past that Charles is sure didn’t exist. He has picked up the phone so many times, only to put it back down again.

“How did … uh … what brings you here?” Charles asks. Julie sits down on the stool beside him. A tendril of hair falls in front of her eyes. She pushes it back. She’s perfect, so perfect, the way one can be perfect in dreams.

“My uncle owns the tavern. He designed it himself. A nearly identical replica of a French tavern in Provence that’s been standing since the seventeen hundreds. His art specializes in the re-creation of history. There’s something beautiful in trying to recreate history and admiring the inevitable flaws, don’t you think?”

There’s a pause as Charles gazes into Julie’s eyes. It’s as if they’ve never been apart. As if no time has passed. And yet when Julie puts a hand up to Charles’s face, feeling the grooves in his cheekbones, the grizzle along his jaw, Charles is suddenly aware of how old he must look. He has transformed into a tall, solitary man with hardened eyes and a perpetual five o’clock shadow. He’s still nice, at certain times and in certain ways, but he’s no longer the nice boy who grew up down the street from Julie.

“It’s really something,” Charles says.

“I would have to agree,” Julie says. The bartender brings Julie a drink, something sweet with honey. Julie hands him a basketful of muffins.

“They’re from my mother, fresh baked.” The bartender smiles and nods and takes the basket behind the counter.

“How did you find your way here?” Julie asks.

“I don’t know. I just looked up and here I was.”

“How serendipitous.”

“Indeed.” The air is cold and still between them.

“I haven’t seen you in a long time,” Julie says quietly.

“I know.” Charles looks down. “After I graduated, I just couldn’t bring myself to go back to my parents’ house. I’m sorry, Julie, you have no idea how sorry I am.”

“It’s okay,” Julie says, taking Charles’s hand. Charles holds it for several moments, feeling how perfect it is.

“Are you still living with your mother?” Charles asks.

“Yes, it’s the type of place that’s difficult to leave. In a good way, of course. The artists are such amazing people, I can’t imagine wanting to be surrounded by anybody else. So I help my mother keep up the facilities, run errands. I also have my own studio where I can sculpt and paint. Sometimes I think about leaving, but you know how it is.”

“It sounds wonderful,” Charles says.

“It can be sometimes. Sometimes not.” Julie finishes her drink. “What about you?”

“I’m working at a genetics lab.” Charles finishes his drink too and pushes the empty glass next to Julie’s. “It’s difficult, but I love it. I wouldn’t want to be doing anything else.”

Julie places a hand on Charles’s thigh. Her touch is gentle and light, ghostlike. Charles looks into Julie’s eyes, so alive and bright that it’s difficult to look away. Before Charles realizes what’s happening, he is kissing her. They kiss for a long time before Charles pulls away.

“I’ve always wanted to do that again,” Charles murmurs, still looking into Julie’s beautiful eyes, seeing every color in them, green, blue, a fiery orange. “Since the last time we … well, I don’t know why I never did.”

“Because it was meant to happen now,” Julie replies, her mouth turned up into a half smile. She slides off the bar stool, pulling Charles along with her. “Come on, let’s get out of here. There’s somewhere I want to show you.”

Charles follows her as she winds her way across the floor and up the stairs. It’s raining outside, a slow drizzle, but the air feels warmer as well. Julie doesn’t simply walk into the night, she dances, taking care to splash in the puddles and spin through the fat droplets of water pouring off the edge of the roof. Every so often it looks like Julie is about to fall, and Charles swoops forth in his awkward, gangly sort of way to rescue her from danger. They kiss and kiss and kiss again, trying out every different way to do it. Charles can’t believe how happy he feels.

The rain falls harder and harder, coming down in sheets. Charles is soaked through to the bone and so is Julie, though the smile never leaves her face. Julie pulls Charles away from the road, through a wooded area in which they must duck under tree branches and jump over logs. Instead of slowing down, Julie’s pace grows faster, so that Charles almost has to jog to keep up.

Finally Julie stops. She stands in front of a cave, her mouth slightly ajar with amazement. She pulls Charles forward, a misstep, and she and Charles both tumble face first into the dry cave. Without saying anything, Julie strips Charles of his wet clothing. Charles does the same for her. He pushes the dripping streams of hair out of Julie’s face as he kisses her, again and again. Julie’s hand explores his warm, soft skin. Their bodies glow in the yellow light of the moon. Finally, when they are both exhausted and content, they curl up in one another’s embrace. The rain has stopped and there’s a tapestry of stars in the night sky.

“What is this place? There’s something about it. Something that doesn’t feel quite real,” Charles says. Julie lies beside him, her head resting on his arm.

“I know what you mean,” Julie says. She takes Charles’s chin in her hands and tilts it down for a kiss. Charles wraps Julie up in his arms, pulling her against his chest. Their breathing synchronizes and slows together into something approaching sleep. Just as he’s about to nod off, Charles speaks.

“I missed you, Julie.”

“I missed you too, Charles.”

“Why did we spend so many years apart?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.”

I
T’S PAST MIDNIGHT BY THE TIME
I
TRUDGE UP THE FRONT
steps. My pants are soaked and every time I close my eyes, I see Julie plastered on the insides of my eyelids. My senses wish
for nothing more than her real person, a person whose skin, whose warmth I can feel against my fingertips, against my chest. It seems inconceivable, that my former self could have been so foolish. Why did we spend so many years apart? So many wasted years.

I flip on the lights to the entryway. The old man is still awake. He sits cross-legged among the marionettes, in an open robe and pinstriped boxers, his big toe sticking out through a hole in his socks. He’s moved the oak end table from beside the bed. Lavender sheets hang down from the rafters, creating curtains for a stage. The marionettes have been taken down, and a damp rag beside the old man is dark and musty from scrubbing the dust off their wooden bodies. He takes one of the marionettes in his quavering hand, a young woman with dark hair and hazel eyes, studies the way in which the marionette moves, pulling up and down on the strings, causing her to walk forward and back. He runs his fingers along the grooves of the body, frowning in an unconscious way. He then takes another of the marionettes, a young man with blond hair and blue eyes. He lays them down on the table, side by side, manipulating the young man’s arm around the young woman with the strings. The curtain-sheets sway in an imagined wind, and even though we are inside, I can almost see raindrops drizzling down across their faces. The male marionette turns his head.

“I missed you, Julie.”

The female marionette tilts her chin up. “I missed you too, Charles.”

“Why did we spend so many years apart?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.”

The last line breaks the old man. He chokes on the words. No more will come after that. I lower myself down beside him, unlooping the strings from around his fingers and setting the marionettes aside. I try not to admit to myself how rattled I feel. How does he know the exact words from my memory? Have I recited them to him before? Or is it something less than logical, something beneath a more rational explanation of human consciousness.

“She feels familiar,” the old man says. He takes the female marionette, cradling her in his arms, her dark hair spilling over his fingers.

“She looks like Julie.”

“But I don’t know who that is.” His voice is watery, draining away.

That night, I dream of myself in a crisp tuxedo, my hair trimmed, my face freshly shaved. Julie stands beside me, a lacy white wedding dress curving around her body, the cherry red of her lipstick casting a deep, dark imprint as she kisses me on the cheek. We are still, our smiles unchanging, as if we’re waiting for our photograph to be taken. Julie places her hand against her abdomen, wincing slightly. I take her in my arms. We continue to wait.

And then, slowly, our smiles wither and fade. We aren’t surrounded by our family or our friends or anything at all but a dreary, endless abyss. I reach out my arms, searching the darkness around me, hoping to find something solid, something tangible. As I reach out for Julie, my hands slide through her transparent body, a ghost of a body that no longer exists.

I wake up to the sound of someone knocking at the door. The bedroom is still dark. The sun is just rising, light like egg dripping down the edges of the sky. I stumble out from under the sheets, pull on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. I walk by and see Einstein and the old man curled up together on the couch, snoring in harmony with one another, marionettes scattered around them. I peer out through the peephole and then open the door. Iris stands on the porch, a mostly asleep Ava draped over her shoulder. Iris’s hair is up in a quick bun, dark circles under her eyes.

“I’m sorry to wake you up so early, Charles. Can we come in?”

“Of course, of course. Why don’t we go into the other room?” I lead them into the kitchen and Iris takes a seat, maneuvering the sleeping Ava into her lap.

“Coffee?”

“I better not, I can only stay for a minute or two,” Iris says.

I put on a kettle of water to boil for myself. Iris strokes Ava’s soft red hair, combing through the tangles with her fingers. “Look Charles, I’m sorry about the way I reacted the other day. I shouldn’t have—”

“It’s okay, I understand. No hard feelings.”

“And I’m sorry to have bothered you so early in the morning, especially to ask you for a favor, but I was wondering if you could take Ava for today. My mother-in-law fell down the stairs—she’s going to be fine, but she needs someone to go with her to the doctor and she lives in Carlton two hours east from here. And of course Ava doesn’t have school today, so …”

“I’d be happy to do it.” I flash Iris a quick grin. Steam curls out of the kettle.

“Okay. Okay then, well, thank you, Charles. I have to run, but I’ll be back tonight, all right?” Iris stands and maneuvers Ava into my arms. Her tiny lungs breathe against mine, her small, wet mouth soaking into my shoulder. As soon as Iris shuts the front door, Ava’s eyes pop wide open. I wonder if she was faking sleep the whole time.

“Can we have French toast for breakfast?” she asks. She reaches up her hand and brushes it against my cheek. “You need to shave.”

“Yes, I need to shave, and yes, we can have French toast for breakfast. You want to help?”

Ava nods and I set her up on the countertop. I crack a few eggs into a metal bowl, then hand her the whisk. “You know how to do this?”

“Course I do.”

I pour myself a cup of coffee and then start a pan sizzling with butter. I take out a loaf of bread and some milk. I watch Ava’s concentration, biting her lower lip as she whisks the eggs, determined to make them uniform. Einstein trots into the room and licks up the bit of egg that Ava drips onto the floor. I wonder if I used to make breakfast with Jess, if she was as serious a whisker as Ava.