Chapter Two, A Slow Twisting Place

Note: this is the second chapter of a serialized novel that I will be posting here every weekday, barring disaster.  For the first chapter please see yesterday's post.

A Slow Twisting Place 

Chapter Two  -- Boston, 1979

I sat on Bryan’s lap during the entire flight to Boston.  While the flight attendants cooed over me and annoyed Bryan with their almost constant attention, he told me about our new home.  “It’s not big,” he said, “and I don’t have any furniture yet, because I had to come to Chicago in a hurry.  But we’ll figure it all out together, okay?”  I just smiled at him.  He could have told me we were living in a tent smack in the middle of a parking lot and I wouldn’t have cared. 

At Logan Airport we waited at the gate for maybe fifteen minutes (“No, I don’t need your help,” Bryan snapped at yet another fawning flight attendant) before we headed down to the baggage claim.  “Fucking irresponsible bastard,” he growled under his breath.  “I should have known this would happen.”  Not having any idea who or what Bryan referred to, I just locked my arms around his neck and marveled at how much nicer it was to be carried through an airport than it was to walk.  “Are you scared?” he asked me in the taxi.  I shook my head.  It was difficult to be scared when without any warning you were the happiest you had ever been. 

Not even the sight of our barely furnished apartment put a dent my joy.  Sure, home with Edward had been a mansion nestled on the shore of Lake Michigan, but I could adapt.  After all, I’d been poor once, even if I had no memory of it.   Strange though it was to have a big mattress plopped on the middle of the living room floor, it at least provided me with some entertainment while Bryan dealt with our luggage.  I was still hopping up and down on it when Bryan rejoined me.  “This place is bigger than I remembered,” he said.  “But what is that smell?”  

Frowning, he moved around the living room, sniffing the air.  When he returned to where I was bouncing he bent over the mattress.  “Jesus christ,” he exclaimed, and proceeded to cover it with every single blanket and extra item of clothing he could find.  When we at last settled down to read the owl book I wedged Patches the panda bear under my nose and let out a little sigh of contentment.   “Our first night together,” Bryan said—and despite the smelly mattress, he looked as if he might burst with joy himself.

Bryan and I spent all of the next day shopping.  By the time we returned to our empty apartment we had acquired or ordered almost every item necessary to transform our stinky apartment into a passably livable home.   I was thrilled, of course, and not just because the salesperson had promised to deliver our new mattresses as soon as possible.  Bryan had assured me that it was all right to feel sad about Edward, but what was there to feel sad about?  If I got tired while we were walking around, Bryan took us somewhere to sit down.  If I got hungry, he fed me.  He even went so far as to buy the dollhouse I’d gazed longingly at but hadn’t dared say out loud I wanted.   Somehow, for reasons I didn’t understand, I had just been given a first-class ticket into paradise

Once at home again Bryan whipped up a chicken dish for dinner so delicious that I actually ate two helpings.  As I helped him clean up the dishes he appeared vaguely murderous to hear my shy admission that, on the nights I wasn’t with Michael and Julia, I had eaten dinner by myself.  “That son of a bitch was probably too busy getting drunk and watching Nature to pay you any attention,” Bryan snarled.  His jaw formed a hard line.  “That is never going to happen to you again.” 

           

I had a feeling it wouldn’t.                            

A harsh buzzing noise interrupted our dessert of milk and cookies.   Startled, I threw my arms around Bryan’s leg.  “It’s all right, little girl,” he said.  “It’s just the doorbell.” 

“Who is it?” I wondered out loud, but Bryan, now glaring in the direction of the door, answered, “I have a feeling I know.  Stay here.”  He then gently pried me loose from his jeans and headed off for the tiny foyer, radiating menace like a leaking nuclear power plant.  Fascinated by this transformation, I crept after him and peeked around the wall.  When he opened the door I couldn’t see who stood on the other side of him, but I did hear a voice burst out, “Jennings, I am so sorry.  You must want to kill me, but I can explain.”

“I’m sure you can.   We’re just finishing dinner.  I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“What great timing!” the man exclaimed.  “I haven’t eaten all day!”  

The glacial silence that greeted this most unsubtle of hints would have sent the average person running.  Not this guy, though.  He actually laughed.  “You’re glowering, Jennings.  All I want to know is if you made something good.”

“Fuck you.”

“Come on, let me in.  I want to see the kid.  Besides, I can smell your chicken goulash from here, and I’m starving.”

“Her name is Rachel,” Bryan retorted, glancing behind himself, “and it’s been a long day for her—Rachel!” he said, catching sight of me just as I meant to duck back behind the wall.  “What are you doing?” 

At my guilty shrug Bryan held out his hand.  “Come here,” he said, so I slunk over to him.  The contrast between Bryan and the guy at the door was almost absurd.  Neither tall nor handsome, our visitor struck a closer resemblance to the Pillsbury Doughboy than he did to my legal guardian extraordinaire.  This might have been a tragic comparison if not for the twinkling brown eyes, and the wide, engaging smile that so nicely compensated for his otherwise non-descript features.  Yes, his chipmunk cheeks hinted at a predisposition toward chubbiness, and he would never be mistaken for Bryan in a line-up.  But all things considered, he came across as a very nice guy indeed.

That engaging smile, though, had turned into an open gape by the time Bryan bent over to pick me up.  “Bob,” Bryan said, “this is Rachel.  Rachel, this is my friend Bob.  The one,” Bryan pointedly added, “who was supposed to have picked us up at the airport yesterday.”

I rested my head on Bryan’s shoulder and gave the man at the door a shy wave.

“Oh my god,” Bob exhaled.  “You didn’t warn me, Jennings.”

“There was nothing to warn you about.  And, as you can see, she’s tired.”  A comforting hand ran over my hair, at which I yawned.  I was tired.   “So if you want something to eat you can have it,” Bryan told him, “but then you’re giving me my extra set of car keys and you’re out of here.”

“I really am sorry about yesterday.”

“I’m sure you are.  But just for your edification, if that car hadn’t been here you would have been a fucking dead man.”

“I know.  And I don’t blame you for being pissed.  You have every right to be.”

Bob no longer came off as flippant.  This apparently moved Bryan to remark in a slightly less hostile tone, “You look like hell.”

“I feel like it, too.  You wouldn’t believe the weekend I had.  I don’t suppose you have anything to drink in your new family digs yet.”

“Just milk and orange juice.”

“Could you be any more wholesome?” Bob complained, but reached over and gave my ponytail an amiable tug.  “Hey, Roach Bug.  You are a cutie, aren’t you?  I’ll bet you’ve left a string of broken hearts behind you.”

Not accustomed to being teased, and having but a vague idea what a roach bug was, I only stared at him. 

I soon forgave Bob Kelly for having burdened me with a nickname of dubious desirability, though, because he boasted something that Bryan for all of his superlatives did not: a cheerful nature.   Bob was the most amiable clown I had ever met.  Within five minutes he was sitting at the folding table across from me, twisting his features into funny faces, talking in silly voices, and pleading with Bryan to let him hold me, requests that Bryan staunchly refused.   “Who knew he was so possessive?” Bob lamented.  “But don’t you worry, Rachel—we’re going to be best friends, and let me tell you why.” 

Bob pulled himself into a very correct seated position.  Adopting a pompous air that made me giggle he said, “First, I’m more fun.  Second, I don’t have a nasty bone in my body.  Third, I have more free time, since I don’t have nearly as many women chasing me as your legal guardian here does.  He’s always on a date.  Fourth, I’m the grand master at every board game in the history of mankind, including Candyland and Chutes and Ladders.  Fifth, I can come up with hiding places where no one, not even the genius here, will sniff you out in a game of hide and seek.  Sixth-”

“Enough,” Bryan interrupted.  “Eat your dinner and shut the hell up.”

Bob winked at me.  I was pretty sure that I would like him.

 

As he finished off our leftovers in an eye-popping display of gluttony, Bob peppered me with amusing inquiries about what I liked to do (“Dog sledding?  Rock climbing?  Motorcycle jumping?”).  Only on his way out did he drop his jokester façade to ask Bryan, “How did things go in Chicago?  Everything okay?”

 “Everything is fine.  Despite his frequent threats, I wasn’t disinherited, and he had his estate arranged to avoid probate wherever possible—what goes to Rachel and Michael is already in a series of trusts.  Jed is dealing with the rest.”  Bryan, still holding onto me, kissed my cheek.  “Jed filed the custody paperwork yesterday.  Now that Julia is taken care of, he’s confident there won’t be any problems.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Bob began, but Bryan answered, “I’m fine with that, too.  There isn’t anything to be done about it so there’s no use dwelling on it.”

Bob seemed as if he wanted to respond to this.  But something must have stopped him, because he just reached over and chucked my chin.  “All right, kiddo,” he said.  “I’ll be seeing you soon.  If you have any problems keeping Bryan in line here you just let me know.”

“I’ll make sure she does,” Bryan returned.   “By the way, thanks for finding me some furniture.  I don’t know what else I would have done on such short notice.”

“No problem.  You should have just taken some of the stuff from the house, though.  We don’t need all of that crap, and we’ll never rent your room out this late in the school year.”

“Maybe not, but how many times do I have to remind you that the furniture in that house belongs to the landlord?”

“So?  It would serve the slumlord right.”

“Yet come out of your safety deposit.  Which reminds me,” Bryan said, his eyes narrowing, “where did you get that mattress?  It smells as if someone spilled bong water all over it.”

Bob held up his hands.  “Don’t look at me,” he answered, and with a naughty grin scampered down the stairs.

Once Bob was gone I got ready for bed.  When Bryan joined me on the mattress I crawled over him and laid my head on his chest; his heart was pounding at a thunderous rate.  “Would you believe me,” he asked, “if I told you I loved you?”    

I did believe him.  And over the course of the next three months my own love for Bryan grew exponentially, as did the amount of furnishings in our apartment.  I had no idea how he so easily took on child-rearing responsibilities, but he rocked.  No task was beneath him.  From folding my laundry to washing my hair to helping me pick out embroidered socks, Bryan swung into his new role with real relish, exhibiting a level of expertise that not even Julia could match. 

 “I didn’t know all it would take to break you was a four year old, you big wimp,” Bob liked to joke to him, but Bob doted on me almost as much as Bryan did.  Within days of our first meeting we struck up a fierce but mutually entertaining Chutes and Ladders rivalry—games that Bob, through complex machinations, always managed to lose.  It was easy to forgive him the occasional disappearances that his friends and even his girlfriend seemed to take for granted, and which no one would really talk about.  He always resurfaced, sometimes the worse for wear, but always bearing gifts

Yet while I loved Bob and his good heart within days, the order of my affections remained firmly in place.  Whenever Bryan left me with Bob I would greet my precious legal guardian upon his return as if he’d been gone on a two-year mission to the moon.  “It’s not fair,” Bob moaned to Bryan.  “I’m the nice one, and let’s face it, you suck at tiddly winks.  I’m also the one who buys her french fries behind your back whenever she wants them, but she likes you best.  Where’s the justice in that?”

“How often are you buying her french fries?”

“That’s not the point, Jennings.”

“The point is that she knows whose little girl she is, and it isn’t yours.”  Bryan lifted me up into his arms.  “You’re my little girl, aren’t you?”

I nodded enthusiastically. 

“You always get the pretty girls,” Bob grumbled.  “It’s just not fair.”

Maybe it wasn’t, but the inequities of the situation failed to impress me.  I had been so starved for attention from the constantly depressed Edward that Bryan—who, without my having done anything to deserve it, loved me from the very first instant—felt like nothing short of a divine gift.  Even though it made me misty-eyed each and every morning for him to go to class and leave me with the grandmotherly Mrs. Goldberg, I always forgave him for it.  It was weird.  Bryan had very little use for the world and those inhabiting it, but maybe because of that he was able to channel all of his warmth and affection in my direction.  Or maybe he had just needed something to love, like a puppy, and somehow had wound up with a ward instead.

I couldn’t say.  I just knew that I became aware of two Bryans: my Bryan, and the Bryan who interacted with others.  To me he was everything patient and kind and attentive.  To the rest of the earth’s population he was the exact opposite, treating them with a cold civility that could morph into a controlled hostility capable of backing down a bear if so required.  I liked my Bryan better.  My Bryan let me run my hands over his face how I had that first day with him, so that I could feel the curves of his perfectly formed features against my fingertips.  Our little game made him smile, and it made me feel special.  This man—this god—belonged to me now.  I never thought to ask why that was.  All that mattered was that I got to be with him.

And then I met Tim.

Come back for Chapter Three tomorrow!  And if you enjoyed this, check out my new novel, The Abduction Myth, available on Amazon: 
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KI6XNJU#nav-subnav.  
Try before you buy--read the first three chapters here:
http://thedevilsdiaries.blogspot.co.uk/p/chapter-two-abduction-myth.html