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Wednesday, May 29, 2013, Later
By the time I had hidden the envelope between the pages of an old textbook and made it into the kitchen, people were already milling around, offering condolences to Mom, Marcus, and Myranda, and in a moment they are all over me, too. It's awkward, since many of these people are Dad's collegues and former students who I don't know, and so I don't know how to respond to them.
So I take a seat on the sofa, ignoring a disaproving look from Myranda, who clearly would prefer that I tried to pretend I was in a sociable mood. I think of the letter hiding upstairs, briefly wondering if it was truly safe in my room, and I catch Marcus's eye from his vantage point in the doorway. He raises an eyebrow, questioning the look on my face, no doubt, and I feel heat rush to my face as I quickly avert my gaze.
Most people only stay for an hour or so, and as the last few make their exits, it becomes apparent to me that the catering service wasn't needed - it seems everyone who'd shown up had brought baking or casseroles. Myranda and Marcus, who had been invited by one of Dad's collegues for dinner, leave not long after old Mrs. Beattie returned to her home across the street. Mom had politely declined the offer, and I had excused myself from the invite for Mom's sake.
Alone in the house again, I realize my staying behind did Mom little good - almost as soon as we are left alone, she retreats to her bedroom with the excuse of a headache. I wait downstairs for a moment, debating whether or not I should follow Mom, but almost immiediately, I can hear soft weeping, faintly muffled by the closed door.
So I return to my room, where I lock the door, and after flicking on my bedside lamp, I take out the letter. It's with much anticipation and shaking hands that I slide the letter from its envelope. It reads:
it's with lots of anticipation and shaking hands that I slide the dry paper out of the envelop. It reads:
Dearest Aeryn,
This letter is for your eyes only, so I pray it makes its way to you and not another pair of hands.
If you are reading this, then my worst fear has come true, and something has occurred to keep me from finishing my life's work.
What I've been working on, since before you and Myranda were born, is something that could, if proven, rewrite the laws of physics and alter the world we now know.
I'm leaving it up to you to complete my work, Aeryn, because you alone are trusted to understand what I'm giving to you. Besides, I think you've always sensed you're my favourite. It only makes sense that you'd be the one to receive the greatest inheritance, if also the most dangerous.
Any clues you need to recover the files - that I've hidden in a secret location for you to find - is to be found within my office at work. Remember this clock and you'll find what you need. Trust no one completely and most not at all - the same people who have spent decades hunting me down - and likely killed me if you're reading this - will stop at nothing to destroy my files.
I love you, Aeryn, dont ever forget that. I'm only sorry I've put my work before you girls - I hope you can forgive me. As much as you can, look out for your mother an sister, I've always known you're the strongest among us and they'll need that when I'm gone.
Oh, and one more thing - once you've obtained the files, you'll have to locate a man who has the missing piece in my theory puzzle. Details on how to find him are attached to the files.
I know you can do this, baby girl. Just be strong, be careful, and be everything I've raised you to be.
I love you, more than words can say.
Love,
Dadi
I let the paper fall to my desk, eyes blurring the familiar shapes outlined by the faint moonlight streaming in through the window. I rest my head in my hands and breathe in deeply, fighting against the urge to cry.
Crying wasn't going to bring my father back, or even locate his files. Yet the pain was too raw for me to immediately think my plans through, so I sit for a moment and gather my quickly draining cache of energy.
The main thought on my mind now is the knowledge that it's very likely that Dad's killers could return at any time, so I pick up the letter, memorizing every jagged loop and sharp slant of Dad's writing. Only once I'm sure I know every line by heart, do I feed the letter to my paper shredder. Overly cautious, I put the shreds through again until even single letters are illegible, and then I empty the shredder into the wastebasket. I tie the bag, and set the remains under my desk- I'm too paranoid about murderers lurking outside in the darkness to take it out front at this hour.
Before I turn off the light, I close the window, lock it, and then pull the curtains shut. Only once I'm satisfied the lock still works do I slip under the covers and close my eyes, welcoming the images of Dad that greet me as I slip into oblivion.
When I wake up the next morning, sunlight is dancing behind the curtains, the sun high in the sky telling me I've overslept.
The faint sound of sizzling, reminding me painfully of another morning not long ago urges me to get up.
I draw back the curtains and open the window a couple of inches to let fresh air in, before retrieving the bag from under my desk and making my way down to the main floor.
Mom and Marcus are sitting at the table, while Myranda scrambles eggs at the stove.
"I was beginning to wonder when you were waking up," Mom says as I pour myself a coffee. I gesture to the coffee pot in offering before answering, but Mom and Marcus both decline.
"I must have been more tired than I thought," I say, more than a little surprised to see it's already after two in the afternoon.
Myranda sets four plates at the table before joining us. "Well, it's about time you got up," she says, "There's something I've been meaning to run by everyone."
Mom looks from Myranda to Marcus, suspicion glinting in her grey eyes. "Are you two...?"
"Oh, no, not that, Mom," Myranda gasps. "I'm not pregnant, but Marcus and I have been talking, and we've decided to ask you - and Aeryn, once she's done high school - to come stay with us for awhile."
"But Myranda!" Mom exclaims, leaning forward. "I can't sell my house, and move, just like that!"
"We're not asking you to," Myranda says, her tone a lot more relaxed than Mom's. "We just think you need some time away from everything- and you haven't been up to visit us in awhile. You should see the deck Marc built last fall."
"I appreciate the thought, Myranda, but I just can't leave right now. Aeryn doesn't finish school until June, and I can't leave her here by herself."
"She won't be alone, though," Marcus interjects. "Last night at dinner, I was offered the opportunity to finish Myranda's father's semester. With your permission, I'd like to accept the offer. Plus, with me here, you can stay with Myranda for awhile and heal. I remember my mother's pain over Dad's death well."
Mom doesn't reply for a minute, and when she does, her voice is choked with emotion. " I appreciate the offer, I really do," she says brokenly, "and Marcus, you're more than welcome to stay, but I just don't know if leaving now would be the right thing to do. Can I think on it for awhile?"
"Of course, Mom," Myranda says gently, taking Mom's hand. "I leave for home tomorrow morning, but if you're not sure, you can always fly out later."
Fighting a wave of emotion, I cleat my throat. "We should clean out Dad's office," I say. "If Marcus is going to take over Dad's classes, he'll need somewhere to keep his stuff. I'll go down to the campus later this afternoon, if that's okay with everyone."
Marcus sat up. "I can go down and do it," he says. "It'll save you the trouble, Aeryn."
I smile sadly. "Thanks, Marcus, but it's something I want to do myself. I just feel like collecting his things from work will help bring closure."
"That's how I feel, too," Mom says. "I'll go with you."
Mom and I don't leave for the office until after supper, so dusk is fast approaching as I back my car out of the driveway. Mom is silent in the passenger's seat, anxiously clutching a box in her lap. "For collecting his knick knacks," she'd said.
I wonder if there would even be enough left in the office to fill the box. I don't doubt that if Dad's home office had been cleaned out, so would his work office.
But lo and behold, the items that decorated Dad's office are present, including a picture hanging behind his desk of the two of us proudly dangling a huge fish we'd caught out on the lake.
Smiling with the memory, I delicately unhook the frame from the wall and set it in the box. It's not until Mom picks a family photo up off the desk that I realize how abnormally bare the desktop is. Where once piles of paperwork was clumsily stacked on the desk surface, not a single sheet is visible.
I don't doubt now that someone has been through Dad's stuff here, too, and I find myself wondering what exactly Dad was working on, what kind of discovery people would want to keep a secret badly enough to kill him.
Mom is opening a desk drawer when I snap back to reality. Determined now to get to the bottom of Dad's mystery, I follow Mom's lead and open another drawer, sifting through the contents for any hints. All the drawers have been cleared of papers, and I become more discouraged the harder I look for clues among the trinkets passed over by others.
Mom and I work in silence until we get to the last drawer, a small, locked drawer at the bottom of the desk. Mom jiggles the lock, trying to force it open.
Remembering a day spent here with Dad, I get up and walk to where several keychains hang from the wall. It's rather easy to pick out which set of keys opens the lock, because the fine film of dust coating most keys after a week of unuse is absent from one set, suggesting Mom and I aren't the first to meet the obstacle of the locked drawer.
Returning to Mom, I fumble with the keys, trying each one until a small, rusting key fits the lock. With an angry click, the lock gives up, and we pull open the drawer.
Mom and I both sigh- hers comes with emotion as she picks up an old locket. I sigh with disappointment- even knowing someone had beaten me to the drawer hasn't prepared me to deal with another empty drawer. I had so badly wanted even just a single clue.
My fist connects with the bottom of the empty drawer in frustration. Mom looks up from her find in surprise at my outburst, but I ignore the hand she places on my shoulder- suddenly, my hope returns.
Rapping my knuckles again on the drawer, I confirm my suspicions- the drawer, like the clock in Dad's study, is fitted with a fake bottom. I ignore Mom's questioning murmur and pull at the corner of the board covering the hidden space.
When it doesn't give way, I hastily reach for the stapler placed innocently on the desktop and bring it down again and again on the drawer bottom. Mom tries to pry the stapler out of my clenched hand, but I brush her off as another blow finally splits the board.
"Aeryn, what's gotten into you?" Mom breathes, her eyes worried.
"There's something down here." I pat Mom's arm, trying to comfort her as I toss the broken board aside. Underneath, there's an outdated electronic device, an address book, and a dusty grey folder.
"Oh," Mom says. "I didn't know he kept that planner."
She's looking at the device, so I pick it up and hand it to her. "Planner?" I ask.
Mom flips it open with a smile. "Years ago," she begins, flipping it closed again, "before Myranda was born, your father and I toured Europe. He volunteered to speak at a conference in Italy - Verona - but a couple hours before he was supposed to give his speech, he dropped his own planner in a fountain."
"So he bought this one?" I ask, taking the device as Mom offers it.
"No, that's the funny thing," she smiles. "Another professor, Greyman or something, insisted your father take his planner. He had the cutest little boy with him, I remember- with these big, brown eyes."
"Yes, but Mom, why would the professor just give this to Dad? And why would dad keep it all these years, locked up and hidden in here?"
"Maybe he just liked the reminder- we had supper with the professor as his son that night, and your father became fast friends with the man."
I turn the device over and a small sticker catches my eye. I show it to Mom, who raises an eyebrow. A small white sticker, placed on the back corner, is clearly labelled with my full name- Aeryn Amaris diAngelo.
"Well," she says, puzzled. "I guess he must have meant for you to have this. I don't know why, Aeryn, it's such an old thing."
"I think I'll keep it," I say, wondering if this is the clue I've been looking for. Hesitantly, I retrieve the folder and the address book. "Is it okay if I keep these, too?"
Wordlessly, Mom nods but reaches for the folder, which I reluctantly hand over. She flips through it quickly, and I can make out that the pages contain equations and notes.
"Yes, you can keep these," Mom says, handing it back to me. "You're the only family member who might understand what he's written here." she stands slowly, locket still in her hand. "Its getting late," she says, setting the broken boards in the trash. "We should get going."
I nod, but my mind is on Dad's belongings from the drawer. I can't wait to get home and look through my finds.
"Hey, Mom?" We're almost home, my headlights illuminating the now-dark streets. I'm talking to take my mind off my fears- every time we pass a dark alley I find myself shivering, paranoid that Dad's killers are lurking around every corner.
"Yes, Aeryn?"
"I think you should go home with Myranda tomorrow." I honestly do; Mom will be safer in Edmonton if there are still bad guys hanging around. And if she's not around, I'll be more free to go wherever Dad's clues take me.
"I just don't know about leaving you here," Mom says, turning to face me.
"I'll have Marcus," I say, "and besides, it'd be hard for Myranda to be alone, since Marcus is staying. I'll be okay, Mom, but I'm worried about you. I think you do need a break from everything."
Mom is silent for a minute, and when I look over at her, a passing streetlight betrays the tears sneaking down her cheeks. I feel my own eyes burning in response. Mom has nothing to distract her from her pain- I, at least, have the mystery Dad left me to keep me from sitting around and focussing on his death.
"Don't cry, Mom," I say brokenly, "you'll make me cry, too." mom said nothing, just reached over the console to grip my hand in her tear-dampened one.
The porch light was on when we got home, a comforting glow leading us to the door- Mom with her box of knick knacks and me clutching my less obvious finds.
Marcus greeted us from his vantage point on the porch, where he sat smoking, the fumes spiraling upwards in the light. "Myranda's waiting up in the kitchen," he says.
Mom nods and squeezes his shoulder as we pass him, and I open the front door with a creak. Myranda is slouched at the kitchen table, asleep on a set of plane tickets. I realize that, conveniently, Mom can simply use the ticket Marcus would no longer need.
"Maybe I should stick around for a week or so," Mom whispers to me.
I nudge her, shaking my head. "It's okay, Mom, you need this. Talk to Myranda, I'm sure you can just use Marcus's return ticket."
Mom sets her box down and wraps me in a hug, before obediently sitting down across from Myranda at the table.
Stifling a smile as Mom gently shakes Myranda awake, I make my way up the staircase with my finds. It relieves me that Mom will stay with Myranda, somewhere I think is a lot safer.
Cautious again when I reach my room, I set the book and folder on my bed and creep through the darkness to my window. I quietly shut the pane, locking it just as quietly. Before I cam draw the curtains closed, something in the yard across the street draws my attention.
All I can see is a shadowy figure nestled in the trees, well away from the revealing streetlight, the glowing butt of a cigarette dancing in the darkness. I'd bet my bottom dollar that the stranger is a man, judging from his height and square build, but little else is evident in the shadowy scene.
Heart racing, I back out of sight and yank the curtains closed. After a moment, I turn on the dim lamp at my desk. Pulling the planner from my pocket, I take a seat and flip the device open.
Apparently, the schedule operates manually; the device opens to Friday's date, the last time Dad was at the office. The idea that he kept it regularly updated makes me hopeful for clues.
After ten minutes of problems that involve me setting the planner back a week, deleting the reminder for my birthday, and accidentally turning it off, I have a handle on the buttons.
It doesn't take long for me to flip through the past few weeks, looking for clues as to what could have been the catalyst for Dad's murder, but I don't find anything out of the ordinary - a couple notes on lessons he'd planned to teach, and two reminders involving family time, both an interview with one of my teachers and a family dinner at Tim Horton's.
And then, when I convince myself nothing useful could possibly be hidden in the device, I flip forward to tomorrow's date.
"Bingo," I whisper. I can't be more literal, seeing as how the word is part of the clue I've found.
"Bingo Dan's," it reads, "1700h." Underneath there's an unfamiliar number.
In a fit of inspiration, I reach for the address book. I thumb through it quickly, looking for the number, but I don't see it. Halfheartedly, I scan the pages once more. It's not until I reach the back cover that I notice the edge of paper hiding between the book and its cover slip.
I pull it out quickly and soon realize what I've found- a list of numbers omitted from the actual address book. There are roughly three dozen numbers listed under three different headings. The first, marked by an asterisk, contain only four numbers. A column identified with a crudely drawn skull and crossbones figure contains nine more; the rest, including the number from the planner, fall under the heading '?'.
My interpretation of the headings classifies the skull numbers to be those Dad considered dangerous, the starred four to be safe, and the last heading's mass to be of questionable or unknown status.
Beside most numbers are names- Juan, Peter, and Xander are the three named 'safe' contacts; Gil is the name beside the number from the planner.
I roll my chair to the other side of my desk and power up my laptop. Once it boots up, I open up a google page and type in Bingo Dan's.
I get a hit on a two-star cafe in downtown Calgary, the kind of place shady business goes down. I doubt Dad was planning on meeting a fellow professor tomorrow night.
My finding is interrupted by a short knock on the door, followed shortly by the appearance of Mom in the doorway. Hastily, I pull up my Facebook page as she takes a seat at the foot of my bed. I slip the list of numbers back in its hiding place and dump the planner and book into a drawer in my desk before I turn to face her.
I'm worried she'll figure out what I'm up to and involve herself in Dad's problems, but she hasn't noticed my suspicious behavior- she's looking down at her hands, which are twisting anxiously.
"Mom?" I ask. Her head snaps up as she turns to look at me, as if coming out of deep thought.
"I think I'll go home with Myranda tomorrow," she says. Afraid of my reaction, she tries to brighten the mood with a joke. "It's about time she starts supporting me anyway."
I nod, but before I can give any input, Mom slaps her hands on her thighs and leans towards me. "Oh, but Aeryn," she implores, "are you sure you'll be alright alone here? I almost can't bring myself to consider leaving my baby alone at a time like this!"
I take a seat beside Mom and wrap an arm around her. "I won't be alone," I tell her in a low, soothing voice- or what I hope is soothing. "I'll have Marcus here, remember? And if you're still up north when I finish school, I'll take some time off from the bookstore and join you. Really, Mom, I think Myranda's right- what is best for you right now is some time away."
Mom's sniffling again, and I can't help but hope that a stay in Edmonton will help her deal.
"Well," she says, standing after a moment, "I guess I should go pack a few things. If I pack some extra bags, could you send them by bus?"
"Sure," I say, "anything you need. 'Night, Mom."
"Good night, Aeryn. I love you, baby."
I return the phrase, and Mom disappears from view. I wait until I hear her footsteps echoing down the stairs before I return to my desk to hide the book and planner. As an afterthought, I write down the Bingo Dan's address and delete my search history before shutting down my laptop.
Even after I'm curled under the blankets, it's a long time before I fall into an uneasy sleep, where I dream of thugs in black chasing me through a dingy diner downtown.
I sniffled a little, the weight of burying Dad heavy in my heart, and aimlessly rearrange the pies on the counter for a minute, until I've gained composure.