Chapter 21
Allison pulled on her jeans and Roland’s flannel shirt and went down to the sunroom. She turned on a lamp, pretended to read a book and waited. Five minutes later she heard the deck creaking, the sound of people climbing up the staircase from the beach. Outside the French deck doors, Deacon and Thora paused, wiped their feet and brushed sand from each other’s clothes. They came inside and saw her, smiling like nothing in the world was different.
“You’re home early,” Thora said. “Did you bring my burgers?”
“In the kitchen,” Allison said.
“Didn’t Dad tell you all not to come back until morning?” Thora asked.
“He did, but we didn’t feel like staying out all night.”
“Don’t tell Dad you disobeyed an order,” Deacon said. “He’s in a horrible mood.”
“What’s wrong?” Allison asked.
“Kicked me out of his room when I tried to make him take his meds,” Thora said. Allison could tell she’d been crying, too.
“He used to never lose his temper with us.”
“It’s not really his fault,” Thora said. “The poisons in the bloodstream mess with the brain. He’s been a lot testier. Then again, it could just be the fear talking.”
“Was he really bad?” Allison said.
“He wasn’t any fun, that’s for sure,” Thora said. “I had to go for a walk on the beach to calm down.”
“Feel better now?” Allison asked.
“Much,” Thora said.
Allison nodded. “Good.”
“I’ll go check on Dad,” Deacon said. “You going to bed?”
“In a few minutes,” Thora said. “Good night.”
“Good night,” Deacon said.
He was almost all the way out of the room when Allison said it.
“Guys, I know, by the way.”
Deacon froze, then slowly turned around. Thora’s eyes widened slightly.
“Know what?” Thora said.
“I was sitting in the window in my room,” Allison said. “I thought I saw something on the beach. I got out the binoculars. I promise, I thought it was just, I don’t know, an animal or something at first. I didn’t mean to snoop.”
Thora said nothing. Deacon said nothing.
“It’s okay,” Allison said. “It’s really okay. I just didn’t want to not tell you all I knew. Seems like there’s enough secrets in this house without me keeping any extras lying around.”
“If I’d known you were watching,” Deacon said, “I would have put on a better show.”
“I didn’t watch,” Allison said. “I saw. And then I immediately stopped looking.”
She was speaking very calmly but her heart was pounding in her chest and her stomach was tight.
“Does Dad know?” Allison asked.
“No,” Thora said. “At least, we’ve never told him.”
Deacon sat on the white overstuffed chair opposite her on the couch. Thora sat on the arm of the chair.
“You remember his rules,” Deacon said. “We were scared he’d separate us if he knew.”
“So you have been together a long time?” Allison asked.
“Since we were fourteen,” Thora said. By lamplight, Allison could see the soft blush on Thora’s face. “Are you angry?”
“Why would I be? I mean, it’s kind of surprising,” Allison said. “We used to call you the Twins.”
“Because we’re the same age,” Deacon said. “Not like we look much alike.”
“I keep thinking I should have known. How did I not know?”
“We always tried to be careful,” Thora said.
“And come on, I was fourteen,” Deacon said. “Not like it lasted much longer than two minutes, anyway.”
“You got much better with age,” Thora said.
“I couldn’t have gotten much worse.”
“That’s true,” Thora said, then flinched. Deacon had apparently pinched her at that remark.
“Does Roland know?” Allison asked.
“Yeah,” Thora said. “We finally gave in and told Ro when we were eighteen. We asked him not to say anything to anyone. Legally, we are siblings.”
“How did Roland take it?” Allison closed her book, done now with any pretense.
“He handled it better than I thought he would,” Deacon said, now rubbing Thora’s back. “Apparently he and Kendra were a thing for a very short time. So he understood. He didn’t like that we were keeping it a secret from Dad, but he got it.”
“You don’t think Dad would be okay with it now?” Allison asked. “I mean, you all are what? Twenty-eight? And he’s happy about me and Roland.”
“No offense,” Deacon said, “but you aren’t one of us.”
Allison wasn’t offended, but it still stung. No, she wasn’t one of them. She could have been, maybe, but fate had other ideas for her.
“Dad tried really hard to make us into a perfect family. And we tried to be a perfect family for him. We really did. Deacon even lived with family in China for years to get over me.”
“Didn’t work.” Deacon looked up at Thora and winked. “But we did try for Dad’s sake. He’s done so much for us—treated us, took us in, adopted us, gave us everything we ever wanted and needed. He never asked for anything in return. Maybe he’d be okay with me and Thora together, but we’re not going to stress him out now.”
“We don’t want to hurt Dad.”
“I get it,” Allison said.
“Are you sure you aren’t angry?” Thora asked her.
“I’m sure I’m not angry. I know what it’s like to be in a relationship you don’t know how to talk about,” Allison said. “Can I ask if that’s what you two were doing when I fell?”
Deacon and Thora looked at each other. Thora nodded.
“We were in my room,” Thora said. “Doing exactly what you think we were doing. I was upset about something and Deacon was trying to make me feel better.”
“I’m sorry I lied,” Deacon said. “I was protecting Thora. It’s what I do.”
Allison smiled at them. “I feel silly. I should have known,” she said. “At the studio, you were invading Thora’s personal space big time.”
“He’s allowed,” Thora said.
“And your two rooms, those are the two with the Jack and Jill bathroom, right?” Allison asked.
“Connecting doors,” Deacon said.
“Guess we won’t be needing separate bedrooms much longer,” Thora said.
“I’m still sleeping in my own room,” Deacon said. “You steal the covers.”
“You kick.”
“Because you steal the covers!”
Allison couldn’t help but laugh.
“You two are cute,” Allison said.
“We are,” Deacon said, nodding slowly. “Extremely adorable even.”
“Thanks for being cool about it,” Thora said.
“I’m cool,” Allison said.
“You are, you rascal.” Thora came over to the couch, bent down and kissed her on the cheek. Deacon applauded. They both looked at him and glared.
“Sorry,” he said. “I’ll show myself out. Better make sure Dad’s okay.”
“I’ll go,” Allison said. “He’s still on his best behavior with me.”
“You sure?” Deacon asked.
“If he needs something I can’t do for him,” Allison said, “I’ll get Roland. Good night.”
“Night, sis,” Deacon said. They left the room but two seconds later Deacon stuck his head back in.
“What?” Allison said.
“Told you there were flowers in the attic.”
Allison made like she was going to throw her book at his head and he ducked out again, laughing. Allison switched off the lamp, when something Deacon had said earlier suddenly struck her. She raced from the sunroom to the stairs to stop them before they disappeared for the night.
“Hey,” Allison said in a whisper when she found them heading upstairs.
Deacon waited while Allison ran up to meet them.
“Did you say Dad treated you?” Allison asked him, her voice low.
“Yeah, of course,” Deacon said. “Where do you think we met him? At a bar?”
“You and Thora both?” Allison asked.
“Us both.”
“I had an astrocytoma,” Deacon said. “Thora had a dermoid brain cyst. We were charity cases. Dad brought us home after to recover. We never left. Why do you ask?”
“Just curious,” Allison said.
“He saved our lives,” Deacon said. “Whatever we have to do to repay him for that, we’ll do it. Even lie for years and years.”
“You’re a good son,” Allison said. “Good brother, too.”
Deacon kissed her on the cheek and went off to bed. Allison climbed the steps to the third floor. It was quiet. She heard nothing but the wind and the ocean and the creaking of the floors under her feet. She hoped this meant Dr. Capello was sound asleep. She went to his bedroom and saw it was dark inside, no lights on at all. She crept over to the bed and started when she saw it was empty. Slept in, yes, but abandoned. Where was Dr. Capello then? She walked over to the door to the bathroom and rapped her knuckles on it lightly.
“Dad? You in there?”
No answer.
“Dad?”
She turned the knob and found the bathroom empty, as well.
“Dad?” she called out a little louder and heard nothing. She would have to find Roland. Dr. Capello must have snuck out. What if he was hurt? What if he had gone off somewhere on his own to die like an animal? All sorts of horrible thoughts raced through her mind as she ran from the bedroom. It was then she noticed a faint light coming from under the door to the attic. She turned the knob and found the door unlocked. The stair lights were on and she heard someone shuffling about above.
“Dad?” she called out as she started up the stairs.
“I’m up here, doll,” Dr. Capello called back.
Allison took a huge gulping breath of utter relief.
“You scared the hell out of me,” she said.
“Sorry,” he said. “Had to do something up here.”
She turned the corner at the top of the stairs and found Dr. Capello standing in his robe and slippers by the big wooden filing cabinet. At his feet was a metal wastepaper basket, and although every window in the attic had been opened, it didn’t completely erase the scent of smoke from the room.
“What are you doing?” she demanded. She looked down into the metal trashcan and saw the remnants of burnt paper.
“Something I should have done a long time ago,” he said. “I don’t want you kids having to clean up after me when I’m gone. These old medical records should have been destroyed when I retired. Just never got around to it.”
“It’s midnight and you’re burning papers in the attic,” she said.
“I was hoping to get it all done before any of you kids noticed and sent me back to bed.”
“Can I help you?” she asked.
“I’m afraid this stuff is all confidential.”
“You know there’s such a thing as a paper shredder, right?” Allison asked. Dr. Capello opened the top drawer of the cabinet and pulled out a sheaf of files, five inches thick. It made a thud on the top of the filing cabinet.
“You can put shredded papers back together,” he said. “Burning them is the best way to get rid of them. And I already know the smoke goes right out the windows. A few rotten kids of mine like to come up here to smoke pot when they think I’m not paying attention.”
“I know nothing about that,” she said, batting her eyelashes.
“I’m sure you don’t. My littlest angel girl would never do anything like that, would she?”
With her finger Allison drew a halo over her head. Dr. Capello chuckled and got back to burning. It was a little odd, burning the old medical files. Seemed so drastic. And smelly. Then again, just a few days ago she’d put the photographs McQueen had taken of them together plus the negatives into a metal trashcan and dropped a match on them and watched them burn. She’d had to do it fast before she chickened out. They’d been mementos of her six years with McQueen but they were also so explicit she couldn’t bear the thought of anyone anywhere in the world getting their hands and their eyes on them. Was Dr. Capello as embarrassed by his medical files as she’d been of her pornographic pictures? What on earth was a bunch of children’s medical files that a simple paper shredder wouldn’t have sufficed?
“You really should be in bed,” Allison said. “I’m saying that because I know Roland’s going to ask me if I told you to go back to bed.”
“You did. I’ll vouch for you. You just sit over there and make sure I don’t faint. I’m feeling okay today but we know that won’t last. Gotta do it now.”
She pulled a white sheet off an old chair and sat down in it. She warily eyed the cabinets along the south wall, the ones that held Dr. Capello’s “collection.” How strange that a man as normal and kind as Dr. Capello kept such a gruesome collection.
“What’s on your mind tonight, doll?” Dr. Capello asked.
“Can I ask what’s up with all the creepy stuff?” Allison said.
“What creepy stuff?” he said as he tossed a few more pages into the metal basket.
She pointed at the cabinets.
“That’s not creepy stuff,” he said, sounding affronted.
“You have a speculum made out of wood. With a leech applicator.”
“All right, that one may be a little creepy,” he conceded. “But those objects over there were created to save lives. Even two hundred years ago, surgeons were drilling holes in the head to relieve the pressure on swollen brains.”
“Did anyone survive these surgeries?”
“More than you would think. Less than you would like.”
“What are you doing with it all?” she asked.
“A few of the pieces were here in the house when I inherited it. My grandfather hired doctors from all over the world to treat my grandmother, bought every machine, every treatment, every pill and potion money could buy trying to bring her around. I imagine he thought if he could heal her, he’d somehow magically be all right again himself. Where you see ‘creepy,’ I see lives saved by brave pioneers. I see surgeons trying to help others as best they could given their limited understanding of anatomy and physiology and psychology. In a hundred years people may look back on my own work in horror the way so many of us look back on medicine from the past. I hope they show me the same mercy I show the doctors of past decades and centuries.”
“I’m sure they will,” she said.
“It’s good to see where we’ve come from. This creepy stuff is living medical history. Someone has to take care of it. It’s all been cataloged. My alma mater is getting it when I’m gone. Unless you want it?” he said with a raised eyebrow.
“No, thank you. I know it was used to help people, but they can have the saws covered in Civil War soldier blood. I’m good.”
“Your loss, kiddo.”
He turned back to his work but stopped and looked over at her with a furrowed brow again. “Didn’t I tell you not to show your face until morning?”
“It’s after midnight,” she said.
“Doesn’t count. There are hotels in Portland, you know. Nice ones.”
“Oh, we got a hotel room. We rented it for an hour.”
He gave her a dirty look. “And this is the girl I want for my monk of a son?”
“I told you not to match make,” she said.
“Can’t help it,” he said as he tossed some more papers in the basket and dropped a match in. “I need something to think about other than my impending demise.”
The papers in the files must have been old because the match caught quickly and fire leapt up. In short order they turned black and gray and shrunk to mere ash.
“You’ll be happy to know then that your son and I are crazy about each other. And I have a pretty good feeling a certain monastery is going to be short one monk by Christmas.”
“Is that so?” Dr. Capello asked, leaning on the filing cabinet and grinning broadly at her.
“That’s so. We had a long talk tonight.”
“Excellent news.”
“Thought you’d like that,” Allison said.
Dr. Capello looked up at the ceiling and heaved a sigh, his eyes closed. For a moment, it seemed he was a man of prayer expressing intense gratitude and relief. She forgave him the lie about Oliver. This was a man who wanted nothing but to see his children happy.
“It gives me peace.” He placed his hand over his heart and patted it twice. “A lot of peace.”
“Good,” she said. “It’s making me a nervous wreck but as long as you’re happy...”
He laughed. “You’ll be sticking around then? Even after I kick the bucket.”
“Oh, can we not talk about that, please?”
“Let’s say I get hit by a bus tomorrow and that’s what does me in. Would you, even when I’m a greasy spot under a bus wheel, stick around here?”
Allison exhaled heavily. Fair question.
“Probably,” she said. “For a little while, anyway. All my stuff’s back at my apartment, and I’ve got no idea what I’d do out here, but maybe I could find a job in Astoria or Clark Beach. Know anyone who needs a professional poetry reciter?”
He grinned at her. “I have a better idea. Come down to my room with me.”
“You’re done playing with matches?”
“All done,” he said as he dumped a bottle of water into the wastepaper basket to extinguish every last spark of flame. “I want to show you something.”
Allison waited for Dr. Capello to go down the stairs but he waved her down first.
“Go slow,” he said. “These old legs are getting weaker by the minute.”
She went as slow as she could, step by step, Dr. Capello right behind her in case he stumbled, his hand on her shoulder to steady himself. At least his grip was still good and strong. The Man of Steel wasn’t done for yet.
They went into his bedroom. Dr. Capello paused in the center of the plaid rug and tugged the hairs of his beard.
“Now, where’d that laptop of mine go...” he said.
She saw it. It stuck out from under a throw pillow on his bed. He sat in the armchair and she gave him his computer.
“What are you going to show me?” she asked.
“Hold your horses, I’m pulling it up. There.” He turned the laptop around and showed her a photograph on the screen. “Like it?” he asked, smiling like a child.
It was a gray shingle building, one-story with a wide, white front porch and a picture window painted with the words Clark Beach Books.
“It’s a bookstore,” she said. “I like it already.”
“You want it?”
Allison’s eyes went wide.
“What?”
“Would you like to own a bookstore in Clark Beach?”
Allison stared at him. “Is this a trick question?”
“No. Especially since I already know the answer. The owners were planning to sell and retire in four years. They’ll happily get out a little early for the right price. I can give them the right price.”
“You can give them the right price,” she said, her voice dull to her own ears. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“I bought Deacon and Thora The Glass Dragon. And Roland’s inheriting this house. Gotta give you a building, too. Fair is fair.”
“Not fair,” she said, waving her hand. “Deacon and Thora and Roland are your children.”
“And you were my child for over four years.”
“Yes, thirteen years ago.”
“And now you’re back, doll. And you’re going to stay here with my son. And if you’re going to stay here with my son, I want you to have a job that gives you as much joy and satisfaction as my work gave me—as you kids gave me. You told Deacon owning a bookstore in a little town like Clark Beach is your dream? Well, here you go, dream come true.”
He nudged the laptop forward, and Allison stared long and hard at the photograph. It was a beautiful little building. It even had a porch swing where people could sit and read in good weather. She had that fifty thousand dollars from McQueen burning a hole in her suitcase. That would be enough to live on while she got the bookstore up and running.
“You can change the name,” Dr. Capello said. “Anything you like. Allison’s Books. Oceanside Bookstore.”
“Pandora’s Books,” Allison said.
Dr. Capello nodded his approval. “It’s two blocks from the ocean,” he said. “And right next to an ice-cream shop.”
“You’re trying to seduce me.”
“It’s working, isn’t it?”
“This has to be insanely expensive,” she said.
“I can afford it. And it’s not like I need money where I’m going.”
“Your kids may need it.” The upkeep on The Dragon alone would be a huge figure.
“Yes, and you’re one of my kids,” Dr. Capello said. He leaned forward and took her hand in his and held it gently. “Let me do this for you. If it hadn’t been for my negligence, you would never have had to leave. Let me make it up to you. And on top of that—for years I’ve been nursing a broken heart over my son joining the monastery instead of finding a nice girl. All I ever wanted for him was to find someone to love him, someone he can love and have a normal, happy life with. You’ve made a dream of mine come true. Let me return the favor.”
She was tempted to say yes right then and there. So tempted. But she couldn’t quite bring herself to do it. Not yet. Not without talking to Roland first. Allison would never forgive herself for taking financial advantage of an ill and elderly man, no matter how lucid he might seem.
“Can I think about it?” she asked.
“You can, but don’t take too long. I don’t have much more time. I’d like to see you settled here and happy before I move along.”
She looked at him and he shrugged.
“No use pretending.”
“Whatever I decide,” she said, “thank you. This is the kindest thing anyone has ever offered to do for me.”
“The kindest thing you could do for me is accept it.”
“I’ll get back to you about it quickly,” she pledged. “I... It’s just a lot to think about, never going back to Kentucky, owning my own small business.”
“No denying it’ll be work. But maybe you can talk a certain ex-monk we know into helping out. He’s great at heavy lifting.”
Allison came off the bed and wrapped her arms around Dr. Capello’s thin shoulders and held him for a good long time.
“Thank you, Dad.”
“My pleasure, doll face. Now you get to bed, and I’ll get to bed.”
“Great idea.” She helped him to his feet and made sure he was comfortably situated before she turned off the light and left him alone in his room. When she emerged into the hallway, she saw she’d left the attic light on. A moment’s paranoia sent her heading back up the stairs to double check that Dr. Capello’s trash fire had gone out completely. He knew what he was doing apparently, because the fire was dead, completely, though a light smoky smell remained in the room. Out of curiosity, Allison opened the top filing cabinet drawer. The key was in the drawer lock, but now that the drawers were empty, Dr. Capello hadn’t locked it up. There was nothing left in it at all but empty hanging folders. She flipped through them and found nothing. Not until she came to a file folder near the very back. Dr. Capello had missed one small scrap of paper stuck to the bottom of the file. In plain type at the top of the page was written “Pre-Op Instructions.” Underneath in Dr. Capello’s slanted and angular handwriting were words Allison found legible and yet utterly incomprehensible.
Operation: Partial hippocampectomy.
Patient: Larsen, Roland J., age 8
Date: 8-8-93
Time: 7:00 a.m.
Anesthesia: General.
They were medical notes to an anesthesiologist named Dr. Penn about an upcoming operation. An operation on an eight-year-old boy named Roland J. Larsen. An eight-year-old boy named Roland J. Larsen in the year 1993. Which meant that eight-year-old boy named Roland J. Larsen was now thirty years old.
Dr. Capello had operated on Roland. Her Roland. It had to be him, didn’t it? It’s not as if “Roland” was a very common name. It wasn’t a huge surprise to her that Dr. Capello had operated on him. He’d operated on Deacon and Thora and Oliver. But why wouldn’t Roland tell her he’d been operated on? And what was the operation for? There was medical jargon at the bottom of the page that was beyond her. Dr. Capello could translate it for her but he’d been burning these records. He wouldn’t be pleased if she admitted to nosing through them. And if Roland had wanted her to know, wouldn’t he have told her already?
Too many secrets in this house.
So many they were starting to feel like...
Lies.