The Second Trial (18 page)

Danny took Buddy and Buddy took his Frisbee out to the school grounds. After a happy hour, they returned to find Catherine in the living room, drinking coffee with one of the neighbors.

“This is my son, David,” she said. “David, meet Ms. Watson. She's Katie's mom – you know, Katie, who's playing upstairs with Jewel?”

“Hi,” he replied, but kept moving. “I've gotta get Buddy some water.” He overheard Jennifer talking with a girl about making paper dolls.

To anyone visiting, it was a normal household.

The visitors left, and Jennifer modeled her new clothes. She challenged Danny to a game of Snakes and Ladders. “And I brought my Disneyland cards,” she said.

“Okay,” he replied. “Get ready to lose.”

While the spaghetti sauce heated, Catherine slipped upstairs and opened her inlaid wood jewelry box. She pulled out a heart-shaped crystal the size of a quarter, a gift from the kids for Mother's Day. It dangled from a fine string of nylon fishing line, as thin as spider silk. She carried it to the kitchen and gently hung it in the window, where it caught the summer sun and radiated all the colors of the rainbow. She smiled.

After supper Danny and Jennifer played several hands of cards, and Jennifer announced she was the winner.

“I let her win,” Danny replied.

“Sore loser!” Jennifer called as she headed for bed.

Danny decided to get to bed early too. He wanted to listen to his CD and read the magazine. He stretched out on the bed, Buddy sprawled at his feet. He popped on his headphones and started flipping the pages.

Buddy's sudden bark startled him. The dog jumped to the floor, his nose twitching back and forth as if he were on the trail of a squirrel. He barked again, and now Danny could smell it too – something was burning. Buddy zipped downstairs with Danny after him. The smell was rolling out the kitchen door.

His mom was standing at the sink. She'd placed the candle in it and seemed to be burning some papers. As he approached he recognized the family history questionnaire.

“What're you doing?” he asked in alarm, moving closer.

“Hey, Davey-boy,” she answered. “I'm getting rid of these because we don't need them anymore. We have our new papers now.” She smiled at him. “No fireplace, so I decided the safest spot was here.” She turned back to the flame, feeding the papers one at a time, the blackened edges shriveling and crumbling into the sink, the smoke braiding around the crystal heart. “Even though we're only going to be here a while, we don't want to burn down the place, do we?” she joked.”

Chapter 6

The phone call came very early the next morning. It was still dark outside. Danny saw the hall light turn on and heard his mother hurry by. He pushed the light button on his new watch. Four twenty-three a.m.

His heart started to pound.

His mom picked up the receiver.

For a few moments, nothing.

And then it started. A howl like an animal caught in a leg-hold trap. Buddy jumped to the floor and raked the door with his claws. When Danny opened it, the dog shot downstairs.

He moved slowly, one deliberate footstep after another, both drawn and repulsed by the sobs he heard coming from the kitchen. Mom was jackknifed, as if she had taken a blow to her stomach. Her breath came in gasps. The abandoned receiver bounced up and down on its coiled cord as she pushed blindly past her son. She tripped over the bottom stair and collapsed onto the carpet like a puppet with its strings cut. Buddy jumped back and forth over her body, nuzzling her gently and making deep-throated sounds that blended in with her moans.

Danny could hear a man's voice calling distantly from the dangling phone.

“Susan? Susan?”

Danny moved forward as if in a trance. He stared at the receiver, still swaying up and down. He lifted it and held it to his ear.

“Susan?” asked an urgent voice. “Are you there?”

“It's me,” he replied, his voice sounding flat and mechanical.

A pause. “David?” Another pause. “David?”

Danny felt like the world had gone out of focus. “Yes,” he said.

“David, I'm Scott, from NIVA. Is – is your mom okay?”

“No.”

“David, listen to me. I'm coming straight over. I'll be about ten minutes. Do you understand?”

Danny closed his eyes.

“Listen. Stay by your mom. I'll be there as soon as I can.”

The line went dead. He held the receiver, the dial tone buzzing in his ear. Stiff-armed, he replaced the receiver and took a few slow steps toward his mom.

Jennifer had appeared and was crouching on the top step. She'd pulled her nightgown over her bent knees and clasped her arms around her shins. She rocked back and forth as she pressed her lips into her kneecaps, her fingers twirling a strand of hair. Mom still lay on the carpet with her arms folded over her head as if warding off a blow. Her moans gave way to a repetitive chant.

“Ohmygod. Ohmygod. Ohmygod. It's – all – gone –”

Soon, she didn't even cry anymore. She lay motionless, her eyes staring. Jennifer still rocked back and forth, back and forth. Danny perched on the edge of the couch. The border collie ran to each of them in turn, thrusting his muzzle into hands, licking faces, trying to rescue them all.

A sharp rap at the door. Danny looked at his watch. Four thirty-five a.m. Twelve minutes since the phone call. He opened the door.

“David, where's your mother?” asked a short, stocky man wearing a windbreaker over a T-shirt and sweat pants.

Danny moved aside, clearing Scott's view. Catherine lay on her side with her eyes closed.

Buddy growled as Scott moved toward her. “David, can you call the dog?”

“Come, Bud,” Danny called in a thin monotone.

Buddy didn't move, his warning growl unchanged.

“David, I need your help – your mom needs your help.
Please
.”

Danny finally moved and grasped the dog's collar. “C'mere, Buddy,” he repeated. “It's okay, boy. He won't hurt her.”

The dog sat, but his head remained lowered and his eyes never left the stranger.

Scott crouched and touched Catherine on the shoulder.

“Susan. Susan. It's Scott. It's okay, Susan. You need to sit up.”

For a long minute, no one moved. Then Catherine jerked up to a sitting position.

Danny looked at his mother's face, then at Scott. It was like looking from one stranger to another.

“Susan,” Scott said, “let's get you to bed. I'll tell the kids.” He helped support her up the stairs and into her room. “Just rest now. We'll talk later.” Jennifer squished her body against the wall to let them pass. After settling Catherine, Scott returned to the girl. He squeezed her shoulder.

“You must be Julia,” he said in a soothing voice. “Come downstairs with me, and we'll talk about what happened.”

Scott guided her to the couch beside her brother. Danny still had a firm grip on the vigilant dog.

“It's – it's your house in Edmonton,” Scott started. “There's been…an accident.” He paused. Both children stared at him. “There's been a fire. An explosion and a fire.”

Danny tilted his head and blinked. “A fire?”

“Yes.”

“Bad?”

Scott looked from one face to another. “Bad. It's burned to the ground.” Scott paused. “I'm sorry.”

Blood pounded in Danny's ears, each throb repeating his mother's words.

It's – all – gone –
Saturday, August 17th, 2002. His parents' sixteenth wedding anniversary.

They didn't open the curtains that day. No one answered the door when the realtor rang. Danny and Jennifer drifted about the condo, picking up snacks when they felt hungry and even when they didn't.

Catherine remained shut in her room. Danny heard a few bouts of sobbing but mostly it was quiet. Jennifer tiptoed past her mother's door and shut herself in her room.

Danny didn't cry that day because he didn't know what to cry for. Or maybe it was that he'd already cried for his past and if he started again he'd be caught in a revolving door, going around and around and around, never able to exit. He zoned out in front of the TV. It was too much trouble to get up and switch from the French channel. Buddy patrolled the house, sometimes lying at Danny's feet, other times sitting in front of the closed bedroom doors.

Finally, Danny heard doors opening and closing and water running. Mom must have let the water run completely cold before leaving the shower. About an hour later, she plodded downstairs. She looked wrung-out, her face strained, shoulders slumped, a shadow in a housecoat. He was sitting at the kitchen table thumbing through
Sports Illustrated
.

“Did you get something to eat?” she asked flatly, shuffling to the stove to fill the kettle. When he didn't reply, she said, “I'm not hungry either.” She spooned some instant coffee into a chipped mug and stood vacantly beside the stove, waiting for the water to boil. Without turning around, her voice a monotone, she said, “I think we all need a quiet day today. That would be best.” She didn't say anything else as she poured the water and trudged upstairs to dress.

Danny's evening drifted by on the couch, the living room chair, and eventually, his bed. He didn't fit anywhere, and his plans had unraveled again.

He woke the next morning to the sound of his mother on the telephone. This time he waited until she hung up before going downstairs. Mom sat at the table, yesterday's mug refilled with instant coffee, a bottle of aspirin at its side. She'd dressed and combed her hair, but her pale skin seemed to hang from her face and her eyes were hollow.

“We don't have many groceries left,” she said. “Would you come to the store with me and help carry bags?”

How could groceries be important now?

“Okay,” he replied uncertainly. “I'll dress and get Jennifer.”

“No, we won't have much to carry, don't wake Jennifer.”

He hesitated and then said, “Okay, Mom.” When he returned a couple of minutes later, she had opened the drapes and stood blinking into the warm yellow sun.

“I've left Jen a note,” she said as she put on sunglasses. “Let's go.” He tugged on his baseball cap and softly shut the door behind him.

The neighborhood kids were already hard at play. He kept his eyes down to deflect any curiosity or conversation.

They didn't talk on the way to the mall. Catherine rifled through a rack of newspapers and picked out the
Edmonton
Journal
. She sent Danny to the cooler for two cans of pop. They took their purchases to an empty table in the far corner of the concourse. Catherine removed and folded her sunglasses with exaggerated care. She kneaded her eyes with her fingertips before looking at her son.

“I spoke with Scott this morning. He told me there's an article about it in today's paper.”

Danny glanced at the folded paper. He'd never paid much attention to newspapers. The news had always been about somebody else – up to now. “Grandma and Grandpa will fill out the insurance claim for us. It'll probably take a while. It's going to be complicated. Grandma and Grandpa didn't have a chance to get any of our things out. The only thing left is the land. So, we'll have to be more careful with our money.” She reached under the table and put her hand on her son's jiggling knee. Awkwardly, Danny reached for his drink and took a long swallow.

“So, now we just…keep on…keep going. We follow our plan. Almost the same as before. We've come too far to let him win now. Soon, he'll never be able to hurt us again.”

She slipped on her sunglasses. “I need to go into the bathroom for a minute,” she said, rising and leaving Danny alone.

He pulled the newspaper toward him and started flipping the pages.

It was like looking for your own obituary.

Not dead on this page.

Flip. Not dead on this page.

Flip.

Spectacular Blaze Destroys One House,
Damages Two Others

Sunday, August 18, 2002. Edmonton—An explosion and fire ripped through a west-end home in the early hours of Saturday morning, completely destroying one home and damaging two others. Six fire trucks responded to the three-alarm blaze, but it was already raging out of control when firefighters arrived. “I've never seen anything like it,” said Captain Rogers. “It was like a bomb went off inside. It's a miracle no one was hurt.” Both neighboring houses caught fire when burning debris exploded onto their roofs. Everyone was safely evacuated, but the fire did extensive damage to three houses before firefighters could contain the blaze.

The blast shook neighborhood houses and onlookers wearing pyjamas and housecoats poured into the fire-lit streets. Many were holding each other and crying. “The noise was deafening,” said one elderly gentleman. “I thought someone had started a war.”

Captain Rogers told reporters the explosion may have been caused by a natural gas leak in the basement. “But it's rare to see an explosion of this magnitude caused by just a gas leak,” he said.

Firefighters say the house was unoccupied at the time of the blast. “I think the woman and her two children are on vacation,” said a neighbor. Officials estimate the blaze caused $500,000 to $600,000 in damage to the three houses.

The cause remains under investigation.

Chapter 7

Danny avoided his sister when they got home. He grabbed Buddy's leash and vanished out the door. Buddy led the way to the school grounds. Danny hurled the Frisbee and the dog raced after it, sometimes leaping up and catching it mid-air. After fifteen minutes Danny's arm ached and the dog flagged.

Danny walked to the crest of a gentle slope, far away from everyone. He sat on the grass, removed his cap, and closed his eyes. Buddy lay close beside him, and he ran his fingers along the dog's head.

“Well, Buddy, did he do it?” he said aloud. “Was it really Dad?” He hadn't let himself think much about his father since the phone call. He was worried about his mom, his sister, his grandparents, and himself. He couldn't let himself worry about his dad too. Like Mom, he'd made
his
plan – contact Dad in a few months – so he'd leave his thoughts about Dad in the future rather than think about him now.