Sheila Connolly - Relatively Dead 02 - Seeing the Dead (18 page)

“You getting hungry?” Abby asked.

Ellie looked up at her and blinked a few times, as if trying to remember where she was. “Uh, yeah, I guess. Can I come back to this after lunch?”

“Sure can. What do you like to eat? Do you have any favorite places in town?”

“Not really. There’s a sandwich place in town that Mom takes me to sometimes.”

“Then we’ll go there, if that’s okay with you.”

“Yeah, sure. We gonna walk?”

“I could use the exercise, and it’s a nice day out. So, yes.”

“Okay.”

“Wait—you’ve forgotten one very important thing. Always save your work.”

“Oh, right. Can you show me how?”

Abby did, then handed her her sweater, pulled on her own jacket, and they went down the stairs. She stopped at the front desk, where the receptionist, Sally, a comfortably padded woman a couple of decades older that Abby, greeted Ellie warmly. “Hi, Miss Ellie. Good to see you again. Are you having a nice time with Abby here?”

“Yeah. I’m writing a book, and she’s helping.”

“Well, now, that sounds wonderful.”

“We’re going out for some lunch,” Abby said, “if Leslie wonders where we are. We won’t be long.”

“Have a nice lunch, then.” Smiling, Sally turned to a family group that had just arrived.

Once outside, Abby and Ellie turned toward the small green (Abby kept resolving to look up why it was so tiny, by New England standards, but she hadn’t yet) and turned left onto the main street of town. “You come to Concord a lot, Ellie?” Abby asked.

“No, not so much. We live the next town over.”

“I know—your mother told me that when we met. Littleton, right?”

“Yeah. When was that? That you met her, I mean?”

“Last fall. Not too long ago. That’s when I started working at the museum, mostly giving talks to kids.”

“Did you always want to be a teacher?”

“I thought so. I like working with kids.”

“Are you married? Do you have any kids?”

Abby laughed. Once Ellie got rolling, she was hard to stop. “No to both. Not yet, anyway.”

“Do you want to? Have kids, I mean?”

“I think so, but not right now.” Abby debated for a short second about whether now was the time to launch into a lecture about not needing a man or children to be a complete person and live a happy life, but it seemed kind of silly to be preaching feminism to a seven-year-old. At any rate, Ellie seemed content with her answer.

“Can we stop at the bookstore on the way back? I want to look for some ideas.”

“Of course, after we’ve eaten lunch.”

They enjoyed a sandwich and chips and juice at a small lunch place Abby had visited before, and Abby bought a couple of cookies for later. Then Ellie all but dragged her to the nearby bookstore—after Abby had insisted that Ellie wash her sticky hands—and Ellie made a beeline to the children’s section and started browsing intently. After several minutes, Ellie shifted to the section for older children and leafed through a number of books heavy on pictures. Finally she made her way back to Abby, who was staring at a table full of current bestsellers and wondering if she’d ever have time to read any of them.

“Can we go now?” Ellie demanded.

“Sure. There wasn’t any book you wanted to take home?”

“Nope. Just looking. I want to get back to work now.”

As Ellie led the way out of the bookstore, Abby thought again that she was an unusual child. Intelligent, obviously. Focused, surprisingly. Whether she was creative remained to be seen: for all Abby knew, Ellie had been typing the same line over and over again. But she suspected that was not the case.

Back at the museum they both waved to Sally at the front desk and went up the stairs, Ellie leading the way two steps at a time. At Abby’s office she scuttled behind the desk and moved the mouse around until her work reappeared on the screen, then nodded her approval. She set about writing once again. Abby smiled at the success of her idea as she went back to her own work.

They were both surprised when Leslie appeared at the door. Abby looked at the clock and realized it was already three o’clock. “How’s it going, you two?”

“It’s okay,” Ellie said, throwing her mother a brief glance. “Abby, can you print this out? I want to read it before I go on.”

“Sure, no problem. Do you want your editor to read it too?” Abby slid around behind the desk and showed Ellie how to print, and the small printer behind the desk whirred into life.

“Yeah, okay.”

“What’s this all about?” Leslie asked, looking bewildered.

“I’m writing a book, Mom,” Ellie responded with enthusiasm. “But you can’t see it yet because it’s not finished. Only Abby can see it—she’s my editor.”

Leslie flashed an amused look at Abby. “Well, I can understand that. I hope you’ll show it to me when you’re finished. You ready to go now?”

“I guess. Can I come back tomorrow?” Ellie asked.

Leslie looked at Abby again. “That kind of depends on your editor here,” Leslie said cautiously.

Abby smiled. “Let me check my calendar, but I think I’m clear. If my boss approves, that is.”

“I’ll call you later. Come on, pumpkin—we’re headed home.”

Abby handed the sheaf of printouts to Ellie. “Here you go.”

“You’ll read it today?” Ellie said, with a touch of anxiety.

“Sure. I’ll even find a red pen and make real editorial comments on it, if you like.”

“Yeah, that’d be good. Thank you, Abby.”

Leslie raised her eyebrows at Abby once more, but let Ellie drag her out of the building.

When they were gone, Abby dropped into her own chair, then printed out a second copy of Ellie’s work for the “editor.” She was tempted to read it right away, but she had her own work responsibilities to deal with, and she would have time later. She was still boggled by Ellie’s intense concentration on what had been an offhand suggestion, and was curious to see what she had come up with.

Before she had time to start anything else, her cell phone rang: Ned. “Hey there.” Abby greeted him.

“Hi, Abby. I wanted to apologize for kind of abandoning you yesterday. I completely forgot that we’d carpooled. I hope it wasn’t a problem.”

“No, I caught a ride home. Everything okay?”

“No calamities, if that’s what you’re asking. Can I come over tonight? I can bring Chinese. Or pizza.”

“Sure. Chinese sounds good. Six?”

“Maybe a little after. See you then.” Ned hung up.

Abby sat for a few moments, wondering if she should be annoyed that he had been able to forget she had been stranded without a ride, and then denied that it had been anything important that had distracted him. Did she believe him? Well, she could ask him when he showed up. She turned back to her in-box to see if anything new had appeared.

• • •

She made it home by five thirty. Since she didn’t have to worry about cooking, she decided she might as well read Ellie’s opus, in case Ellie prevailed and Leslie let her return the next day to work on the rest of it. Maybe Ellie would forget about it entirely and move on to something else—seven-year-olds were not known for sticking to one idea, and there wasn’t any reason they should be. Either way, Abby was curious about what she’d produced. She turned on a light next to a comfortable chair in her downstairs living room and flipped through the pages. She’d set it up for Ellie as double-spaced, like a manuscript, and she had deliberately disabled the spell check function, to see how well Ellie could actually spell on her own. She was happy to see few misspellings. Ellie was a smart kid.

The title still troubled her, but for all Abby knew the story was about a father who kept forgetting to keep appointments. Which reminded Abby that she still hadn’t met Ellie’s father. She settled down to read through the slim pile of pages—about fifteen, she guessed. Based on what little she knew about adult writers, that was a pretty good output for one day. For a young child it was extraordinary.

There were errors, of course—many adults had trouble with spacing and punctuation, particularly with dialogue. There was an abundance of short declarative sentences, appropriate to a second-grade student. But the technical faults faded into the background as Abby was pulled into the story. It was unfinished, and Abby wanted to know more. She went back to the beginning and read through it again, more slowly this time. And nearly jumped out of her seat when the doorbell rang.

She hurried upstairs to the front door to let Ned in. He came bearing a couple of bags that smelled wonderful, and as soon as he was inside, Abby hurried to shut the door and make sure the alarm wouldn’t go off. When she turned back to Ned, he’d put down the bags, and he wrapped his arms around her. “I’m sorry.”

“Why?” Although she thought she could guess.

“I left you in the lurch. It was thoughtless and you deserve better.”

She’d been right. “I have to say I was surprised, and then I was worried that something bad had happened.”

“I should have called. No, there’s nothing bad, or not any one single thing. But we have to talk.”

“That is always an ominous statement,” Abby replied, retreating a few inches.

“What? Oh, no, that’s not what I meant. It’s nothing bad, or at least, I hope you won’t think so. But there are a lot of things that you need to know, and I think we’ve both been kind of skating around them because we didn’t want to look too hard.”

“Still ominous, Ned. Look, let’s eat before we get into anything serious. And there’s something I want you to see. Let me get it and you can read it while I dish up. Can you wait that long?”

“Of course I can. And I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Abby darted down the stairs to retrieve Ellie’s document, while Ned went toward the kitchen. She was back in less than thirty seconds. “Sit,” she told him. “Let me give you the nutshell version. Leslie asked me to look after her daughter Ellie today—some sitter mix-up. I suggested to Ellie that she try her hand at writing a book. This is what she came up with, in the space of a few hours. I won’t say anything else, save that she seems unusually mature for her age, which is seven.”

Ned looked at Abby, then at the pages in front of him, and started reading. Abby busied herself with plates, bowls and utensils—although she was pretty sure that her landlords hadn’t squirreled away any chopsticks. She opened the white cartons and put eggrolls on a plate, setting all the food on the table. Then she sat down and watched as Ned finished reading.

His first comment was, “It’s not finished.”

“She may be coming back tomorrow. And that was my first response too—I wanted to know more. She’s good.”

“She is.” Ned sat back in his chair and rubbed his face; he looked more tired now than when he had arrived. “Do you have anything to drink? Wine?”

“Sure.” Abby retrieved a bottle of pinot grigio from the refrigerator, along with two glasses. And then she waited, afraid of what was coming.

After he’d poured glasses for both of them, and swallowed half of his, Ned said, “Let’s start with Ellie, because she’s one of the things we have to talk about. As well as what’s in this.” He held up Ellie’s pages.

“All right,” Abby said cautiously.

“I told you Leslie and I were engaged years ago. It didn’t work out, but we parted friends. We’ve kept in touch since, as you know.”

“Yes. She and I have talked about you, although not in any detail. She seems to think of you kindly.” Great—now she was sounding like someone out of a Victorian novel. “Where does Ellie come into this?”

“Ellie is my daughter.”

“What?” Abby’s head whirled—and then some small part of her brain did the math. “Wait, you said you were engaged in college. That was more than a decade ago. Ellie is seven.”

“Yes. And I shouldn’t be telling you this, not without clearing it with Leslie. I wouldn’t have, except for this.” He held up Ellie’s papers. “This changes things.”

“Go on,” Abby prompted.

“Leslie got married a couple of years after we split up. Her husband’s a great guy. They have a rock-solid marriage. But as it turned out, George couldn’t have kids. Damn—I hate to have to do this. You don’t even know the guy, and now I’m telling you his most private details. It’s not fair.”

“Ned, you know I can be discreet. I won’t say anything unless Leslie opens the subject. But you can’t stop now.”

“I know I can trust you. Anyway, George has some obscure autoimmune disease where his own antibodies attack his reproductive cells. Once they figured it out, Leslie told him she still wanted children, and he agreed. So they asked me to be a donor.”

Abby felt simultaneously distressed and relieved. It was a better story than if Ned and Leslie had been carrying on an affair behind George’s back. “Both kids?”

“Yes.”

“And then Ellie comes up with this,” Abby said, almost to herself, waving at the pages on the table between them. “Oh, crap. Ned, there’s more I have to tell you. But at least it makes sense now.”

19

Ned stared at Abby, confused. “What? About Ellie?”

Abby nodded. “Remember that Leslie asked me to entertain her one day last week? That was the first time I met her. She’s seen everything in the museum, so I volunteered to take her for a walk. She asked if we could go to the cemetery down the street there. You know I like cemeteries, and I hadn’t had time to tour that one, so it was fine with me. Well, when we were there—” Abby swallowed. “I think she saw someone, a man. I couldn’t see him. And then when we went back to the museum, I made her take my hand to cross the street, and she said it tickled. And I felt the same thing. But if she’s yours, it kind of makes sense. You told me you’d never talked to Leslie about this thing of yours, right?”

Ned shook his head. “Of course not. I was too busy trying to pretend it wasn’t happening. Or that it had gone away as I got older. Obviously I was wrong.”

“Have you spent time with Ellie? Or her brother?”

“Again, no. I’ve met them both, now and then, but I can’t recall that I’ve ever touched them. Leslie and George and I agreed from the start that we would tell the kids when they were old enough to understand, but I didn’t think we’d reached that yet.”