Grace had been working. She’d repaired the hatch cover, or trap door, in the tunnel, replacing the hinges and adding a pull ring and a rope ladder that unfurled all the way from the frame to the floor below. She’d swept, dusted, cleaned; and that night, by the glow of dozens of candles-in wall sconces, candelabras, and the great chandelier-they saw how magnificent the two rooms really were. They lounged on plush furniture with elaborately carved legs, while the paneled walls gleamed all around, but through pockets of candlelight and shadow, more like an artist’s rendering of Victorian splendor than the real thing, and while Amelita Galli-Curci sang “Caro Nome,” her voice, perhaps because of the recording quality, like some rediscovered instrument from a dead culture.
“We need a name for this place,” Grace said.
“How about the frat?” Nat said.
They both gave him a look.
“The club?” said Izzie, still wearing the letter jacket.
“Yuck,” said Grace.
“The Rigoletto Room?” said Nat.
“That’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever said.”
“Then what?”
“Something underground, like…”
“The burrow?” said Izzie.
“I’ve got it,” Grace said.
“What?”
“The cave.”
“Oh, I like that,” said Izzie. “Didn’t Plato have a cave? This can be Nietzsche’s.”
“I wouldn’t push it that far,” said Grace. “Just ‘the cave’ will do. Nat?”
“The cave,” he said, raising his glass. He gazed through it and saw into the long-ago, or thought he did, and while he was doing that Grace opened another bottle. She poured more cognac in their glasses, heavy crystal glasses she’d found in one of the cupboards, poured cognac from 1899, its color the same as the atmosphere in the room. “Here’s to the cave,” she said, tilting back her head, exposing her perfect throat, draining the glass. Her face reddened at once, and when she spoke her voice was thicker and deeper. “And to Nat’s letter jacket, if that’s what the thing is called.”
Nat sat up straight. Silence, except for Galli-Curci singing her song to the wrong lover, or whatever it was, the details of Rigoletto, never clear in Nat’s mind, now less so.
“It’s sort of funny, isn’t it?” said Izzie, her voice going the other way from Grace’s, thinner and higher; anyone could have told them apart at that moment.
“What is?” said Grace.
“This silly jacket,” Izzie said. “As a fashion statement, I mean. That’s why I borrowed it.”
Enough, Nat thought, and was about to bring everything into the open when he thought he heard a muffled sneeze, not far away. “Shh,” he said. “Did you hear that?”
“What?” they both asked.
They all listened, heard nothing but water dripping, very faint.
Grace turned to him. “You a little wired or something?”
“No.”
“Spooked, down here in the cave?”
“Not at all. I like it.”
“Me too. The best thing about this dump.” She got up from the divan she’d been lying on, filled everyone’s glass again. “A fashion statement,” she said, pausing before Izzie. “What a weird concept.” She continued to pour, candlelight-colored liquid rising to the top of Izzie’s glass and spilling over.
“Grace!”
“Oops. You forgot to say when.” Grace paused-Izzie’s eyes glued to her-plucked at the fabric of the jacket, rubbed it between finger and thumb. “Nice,” she said.
“Want to try it on?” said Izzie, very quiet.
“That’s up to Nat, isn’t it?”
“Of course not,” Nat said.
“I wouldn’t want to violate any high-school code.”
“What are you talking about?” said Izzie; every note false in Nat’s ear. “It’s just a jacket.” She shrugged it off.
Grace put on Nat’s high-school letter jacket, saying, “At least we know it’s going to fit.”
And it did. At that moment Nat realized that Patti had never worn it. Wearing your boyfriend’s jacket had been uncool at Clear Creek High, at least while he was there.
“How do I look?” Grace said.
16
“Once you had wild dogs in your cellar, but in the end they turned into birds and lovely singers.” What does Zarathustra teach about “suffering the passions”?
“Thought you had a laptop,” said Ronnie Medeiros, rummaging through the stuff in the back of the goddamn hippie van as they drove down to Fitchville. “My uncle has a thing for laptops.”
“You thought wrong,” Freedy said. There was a laptop, of course. Freedy had decided to keep it for himself. He’d never owned a computer before, knew nothing about them, but the CEO of a pool company would need to be completely whatever the word was with computers. So he was going to learn in his spare time. How hard could it be?
“Still,” said Ronnie, climbing into the front, “not a bad haul. My uncle says you’re doin’ good.”
It was starting to snow again, little dark pellets more like buckshot than flakes. Freedy turned on the wipers, turned up the heat. “Why’s it so fucking cold?” he said.
“Maybe you’re low on coolant,” said Ronnie. “Or else the coil’s fucked.”
Freedy glanced sideways at Ronnie, all toasty warm in his plaid hat, wool mittens, and padded jacket out to here. Looked like a complete asshole. He hadn’t been talking about the goddamn car. “Why’s it so fucking cold in general?”
“You mean because there’s s’posta be global warming?”
Freedy wanted to hit him; not brutally, just hard enough to straighten things out, clear the air. “How can you stand it?”
“Hey, it’s home.”
“The flats,” said Freedy. “You call that home?”
“Could do worse.”
“How the fuck would you know? You never been anywhere.”
“That’s not true. I was down to see my cousin in Fall River just last spring.”
“Fall River,” said Freedy. “You heard of Bel-Air, Santa Monica, Rancho…” Rancho what? He couldn’t remember. Like: was the whole thing, his whole California life, his real life, fading away? That scared him. This pool thing-pool business, concern, corporation-was going to happen. No matter what. Have an idea, make a plan, and then… for a moment, he couldn’t remember the third part.
“Jesus,” said Ronnie, throwing his hands up over his face, “you almost hit that guy.”
“Fuck you, Ronnie. I’m in total control.” He must have said it loud, because everything was quiet after. And in the quiet, having a chance to think for once, he remembered the third part from the infomercials: stick to the plan. Idea, plan, stick, stick, stick.
