The Shadow of Your Smile (11 page)

Noelle could drown in the immensity of her king-size bed. Or freeze to death. She lay in the middle of the bed, curled into a tight ball.

Would it never stop snowing? She watched through the dark window as snow flurried outside, the wind now and again shivering the house.

She’d heard Eli leave an hour ago, shortly after they’d returned home from the game. Not before they’d celebrated the win with Kirby, however. Apparently the Huestons had a tradition of ice cream sundaes after a win.

Now
there
was something of herself she might recognize. She took a small scoop, nothing decadent—after all, someone had to take care of this body the old Noelle had bequeathed her.

That’s how she saw it somehow. The old Noelle—about whom she could admit feelings of anger—and herself. The woman who had stepped into the molded footsteps that should be her own but still seemed an awkward fit.

She wished she could sense anything—a nudge, a shadow of memory—but as far back as she reached, it seemed she just swatted thin air.

She wanted to remember. Really. Because sandwiched between Eli and Lee tonight, she had sensed that yes, she’d been a part of something bigger than herself. She lost herself in the game, cheering for Kirby and the Huskies, a warmth building inside that she longed to attribute to memory but was probably just the absence of fear.

She belonged here; she could admit that now.

But if they wanted her to stay, someone would have to turn up the heat.

Noelle kicked off the covers and went to the dresser, where she found a pair of wool socks. She added a blue Huskies sweatshirt with the number thirty-five on the back. Probably Kyle’s—she’d noticed his number tonight when reading the trophies.

Kelsey Hueston.
The name had lodged into her brain, but for no other reason than Eli’s pale face, the way he appeared, just for a moment, as if she’d slapped him. It seemed an innocuous question—
do we have relatives here?

Not anymore.

Maybe Kelsey was a cousin.

She went downstairs to the desk in the kitchen, searched for a phone book, flipped it open to the Huestons.
E. Hueston.
No others.

Perhaps, like he’d suggested, they’d moved.

She replaced the phone book and patted Riggins, who nudged her knee. Noelle bent down, caught the dog’s jaw in her hands. “Fur, that’s what I need.”

Maybe she could find another blanket. It still felt rude, however, to root through the closets. Nothing felt like it belonged to her. She stopped in the bathroom and opened the closet. Towels, but no extra blankets.

She turned and stood at Kirby’s room a moment, his door ajar, the glow of the snow upon his long, lanky body in bed.

The warmth returned when she looked at him, too.

She stopped at the next door, Kyle’s room. He’d arrived at the end of the game—she saw him walk in wearing his deputy’s uniform. What a handsome man, with that bronze hair, those high cheekbones. He glanced at her, sent her a smile, but didn’t sit with them.

She tried to decide if the feeling inside could be labeled disappointment.

Entering Kyle’s room, she switched on the light and read his various trophies, caught a picture of him with a girl who might have been a date for a homecoming dance. She was pretty—long blonde hair, blue-green eyes. They both stuck their tongues out at the camera.

More pennants lined the walls, along with a framed newspaper article about the state basketball championship. She ran her finger down the image of his senior picture. He sat holding a basketball, his eyes shining. She would like to remember this happy season with him.

Flicking off his light, she crossed the hall to the guest room. The unmade mattress seemed so forlorn in the middle of the room.

She opened the closet. Behold, blankets. She pulled them down, found a mattress pad and sheets, and smoothed them on the bed. The patchwork quilt bore the colors of the Huskies. Perhaps it had belonged to Kyle—what if she’d made it? A graduation present? Would she have done such a thing?

She returned to the closet and found a pillow, the case still on it. Noelle held it for a moment, then, inexplicably, brought it to her nose. Inhaled. Besides the scent of fabric softener, she smelled something sweet, powdery, almost floral. She inhaled again, and the scent settled into her bones next to that warm place. This was what a home should smell like.

She placed it on the bed, then found a knit afghan on the floor of the closet. This she wrapped around herself like a cloak. It too smelled sweet, floral. Lilac?

The made-up bed had transformed the room to something friendly. Even welcoming. Noelle fluffed the pillow and went to the window. She couldn’t explain it, but the snow seemed to glisten, illuminating even the darkness. Riggins wandered in only to crumple at her feet with a sigh.

She liked this room. Probably because it felt the most like her—forgotten. But it just needed a little redressing, a little patience, a little love.

It hadn’t been lost on her that sitting beside Eli at the game, being around him tonight, had made her feel safe. Or perhaps it was the way he’d driven her into town earlier, helped her sort out her daily schedule. She had a busy life—spinning in the mornings and working with Sharron at the thrift store. Sweet that Eli arranged for Sharron to cover her shifts for the next week. He’d taken her to the school and she’d stared long at the self-portrait paintings the fourth graders had done. She might not be able to accomplish even that right now.

They’d stopped by the care center, and it didn’t matter that she didn’t know the residents’ names. The way they greeted her, some of them with eyes, others with hands that touched hers . . . yes, deep down inside she felt she knew them. Especially the ones who sat in their wheelchairs staring out the window as if wondering where their lives had gone.

One couple in particular moved her. The woman, her white hair like spun sugar upon her head, sat in a wheelchair, her eyes distant. Her husband sat next to her, reading the Bible aloud.

Noelle had stopped, drinking in the words.

“O Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever?

How long will you look the other way?

How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul,

with sorrow in my heart every day? . . .

But I trust in your unfailing love.

I will rejoice because you have rescued me.

I will sing to the Lord because he is good to me.”

The man’s voice shook at the end as he touched his wife’s hand.

“Arlene and Hitch Johnson,” Eli had said into her ear. “They used to attend our church. She’s had Alzheimer’s for about six years now. He broke his hip eight months ago, finally moved in next door to his wife. They’ve been married fifty-six years.”

Fifty-six years. Did Arlene still remember him, even just a shadow of their life?

Her throat tightened.

“O Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever?”
The words had found her bones; now they clung to her as she drew the blanket tighter around herself.

If she was a woman of faith, why did it feel as if God had forgotten her? She pressed a hand to the cold window. “Are You there, God? Do You know me? Do You remember me?”

She waited, listening in her heart, but heard nothing in reply.

Lights scraped the trees, wiped across the house. Eli’s truck came up the driveway, then eased into the garage.

Where had he been at this time of night?

She tucked her hand inside the blanket and watched him walk into the house under the glow of the outside motion lights. He was hunched against the cold, his expression fierce.

Yes, he looked like a sheriff.

She heard the front door open, heard him stamp his feet, then the tumble of his shoes as he kicked them off.

Not long after, the door to the basement shut as he lumbered downstairs to the den.

“But I trust in your unfailing love. I will rejoice because you have rescued me.”

She turned away, went to the bed, and climbed in, her head on the pillow, relishing the smell. The chill had receded from her bones, the blanket giving sufficient warmth. She tucked her nose inside it, sleep finally curling through her.

Perhaps tomorrow, she’d wake up and remember everything. Perhaps tomorrow, her life would return to her.

Find me, God. Please, don’t forget me.

Sometimes Emma’s imagination could run away with her, chase her all the way into her dreams.

Sometimes it even put her inside Kelsey’s skin.

Although Emma knew it couldn’t have happened quite this way, the reports she’d read, testimonies of others, and her own knowledge of Kelsey and her father crafted a story that haunted her in the wee hours of the morning.

She would always be standing behind the counter, the lights over the gas station pumps like an oasis as the early evening twilight fell like a blanket over the town. She’d be ringing up Hitch Johnson’s bait, minnows scurrying in the Styrofoam container, while she kept one eye on the pumps outside.

No matter how hard she looked, however, she never saw him drive up.

The reports said he drove an orange Chevy Camaro, and she didn’t know if she placed it from her memory or simply created it on her own, but in her dream, it just appeared outside, the motor rumbling.

And then she turned toward the next person in the checkout line.

He simply materialized, like the car had. Parker Swenson.

Those who knew him came forward in the
Deep Haven Herald
to comment on the days when he played football for the Huskies, although everyone knew he’d spent more time on the sideline than the field. He had a record, though—possession from the year he lived in Minneapolis. But because he was a hometown boy, no one bothered to do their homework.

Sheriff Hueston had seen him that day but made no mention of errant behavior.

Still, in her dream, as Emma looked at him through Kelsey’s eyes, she only saw the stringy hair tied back in a ponytail, the stubble of his unshaven face. The smell of cigarette smoke and the odor of grease lifted off him, curdling her stomach. He wore a grimy brown ski jacket and stuck his hands in his pockets as he said, “A pack of Pall Malls.” His voice scored through her like razors.

She looked above to the stock of cigarettes. Pulled down a pack. Dropped it onto the counter. “ID please?”

The doctors speculated that he might have simply snapped, although the autopsy showed traces of marijuana in his system. Neither motivation gave him a bye for pulling the gun, for pressing it to her forehead, the barrel cold against her skin.

She raised her hands, met his dark eyes. “Please.”

Emma always said a feeble
please
, her heart in her throat. But she had no doubt Kelsey—born from Hueston stock—said something more. Whatever it might have been, it made him hesitate because they found her between the bakery rack and the cooler as if she might have been escaping.

He’d shot her twice, once in the back.

That’s when Emma longed to awaken. She tried, but the dream had tentacles, held her tight, forcing her to watch as a man walked in. He wore the brown uniform—dark pants, pale shirt, his utility belt around his waist.

The dream slowed then, bowed out and became like molasses. Parker turned, took one look at the deputy, and shot.

Every time, shock tore through her. Every time, she hated herself for not crying out, for not warning the man. Every time, she caught his gaze as he fell, his chest torn open at close range.

Every time she heard her voice, screaming.
Daddy!

“Daddy!”

“Emma—wake up!” Carrie’s voice at the door.

Light splashed over her as Emma kicked her way from the dream. Her heart pummeled her chest; sweat beaded over her body. She lay in the tangled sheets, catching her breath, making a noise that frightened her.

Daddy.

Carrie sat on the bed and caught her hand. “You have to stop having these. You’re going to wake the neighbors and they’ll think I’m in here with a knife.”

Emma ran a hand over her forehead. “Every time my mother calls, I have nightmares for days afterward.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t take the gig this weekend. Maybe it’s too soon.”

Emma sat up, pushed her hair from her face. “I need the money. And it’s not in Deep Haven—it’s at a resort about ten minutes out. I’ll go, play the wedding, leave. Easy.”

“Do you want me to go with you?”

Emma shook her head. “I can do this.”

“I’m not so sure. I know I said you have to make peace with this, but it’s been three years, Emma. Someday you’re going to have to forgive yourself.”

Emma wrestled her way out of bed. The cold air shocked the rest of the dream from her mind. She stared out at the street, early morning light now dribbling over the city, turning the buildings to pewter, dingy brown. “How do you forgive yourself for surviving?”

“You weren’t even there.”

“But I was supposed to be.” She turned and gave Carrie a sad smile. “I was supposed to work, but I had a band concert at school. The stupid flute. I hated the band.”

Carrie got up, came to the window to stand beside her, looping her arm through Emma’s. “You didn’t hate the band. You hate the fact that you feel guilty for living.”

Emma flinched. “After Kelsey died, I thought I’d come down to the Cities, get into the music scene, and start playing her songs. Keep her alive, you know? But . . . I’m gigging as a backup bassist, I haven’t had my own show for two years, and I’m not making it, Carrie. I should just go home. But I can’t. Everything about home reminds me of how I’ve failed.”

“Including that hot guy you met the other night.”

Kyle. The hot guy. Oh, if only she could erase him from her thoughts, but he dogged her. That smile, suddenly directed at her after all these years. And the way he’d kissed her, so impossibly gentle, so delightfully perfect.

He made her want to go home.

“That hot guy was Kelsey’s brother.”

“You told me,” Carrie said. “You’re trying to live Kelsey’s dream down here, aren’t you?”

“It was our dream. Kelsey’s and mine. We shared it.”

Carrie turned away from the window. “Whatever you say.”

“Carrie, I want to be a musician.”

“True fact: you can be a musician in Deep Haven.”

“Not and hit it big.”

“How big do you want to hit it, Emma? What do you want your life to look like? Gigging every weekend in dives? Because I don’t see you in the studio, I don’t see you adding words to those reams of music, and frankly, I don’t see you loving the city life.”

“I love the city life.”

“I think you love Deep Haven more. In fact, I think the reason you don’t want to go home has less to do with the tragedies in Deep Haven and more to do with the failures here. Go back. Maybe the nightmares will end.” She squeezed Emma’s arm as she walked out of the room, closing the door behind her.

Emma got back into bed. Pulled the covers over her head.
Go back. Right.

Her nightmares didn’t have a prayer of ending.