Duet for Three Hands by Tess Thompson

Author:Tess Thompson [Thompson, Tess]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Evatopia Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 23

Whitmore

* * *

From the window of his bedroom, leaning his forehead against the glass, his breath a cloud of condensation on the window, Whitmore watched Nathaniel carry his sister off the beach. Turning back to his easel, he surveyed his work. It was of the lake that afternoon, gray mist hovering above brown water. Was it finished? Sleep on it, he decided. Sometimes he could tell what it needed after a period away.

He paced about the room, restless, thinking of Jeselle. Everything felt different. The moment he stepped into the kitchen he knew she’d changed. He remembered vividly how she’d been at ten years old, always laughing and moving through life like a dance, so alert and intelligent. How quick she was to learn things, everything absorbed in an instant and portrayed through the snap of her eyes. But now? She seemed old, almost brittle, like her mother, her carriage in a fixed line like Cassie’s, with hardness in her eyes. Had his leaving done this, or was it the speed and force of adulthood that could capture your innocence, your brilliance, and bring you to your knees, turning you into your parents? He shuddered, thinking of becoming like his father. How could he get through these several weeks of holiday now, without Jes? All his life he’d felt her by his side, and without her he was left off-kilter and barren.

And his mother? She seemed frightfully thin and nervous, reminding him of a fragile china doll Frances had played with as a child. He couldn’t help but think that things were worse since he’d left for school. For all of them.

He wandered outside. The sky had cleared during the party, and the moon was full. Sounds of laughter and clinking glasses floated across the yard as he walked along the path to the tree house, the moon lighting his way through the dense thicket of trees. Rung by rung, feeling in the dark, he climbed the ladder. Almost to the top, he stopped. Had he heard someone sniff? He climbed the last rung and looked in. Jes. Crying. Huddled in the corner.

“Jessie, what’s the matter?”

“Nothing.” Wooden voice, like they were strangers. “I like to come up here, clear my head, get a little peace and quiet.”

A dog howled from one of the neighboring houses. Whit climbed the rest of the way in, watching her in the moonlight. The tree’s branches rustled in the breeze.

She sighed in the darkness. “It’s not the same here since you left.” She said it with a hint of judgment in her tone, like it was his fault.

He sat with that for a moment, fighting against the tickle that started at the back of his eyelids.

“You have any girlfriends up there?” Was that a quiver in her voice? Was she jealous? After all this time she doubted him? She was the one who hadn’t written.

“There are no girlfriends.” The breeze brought the smell of burning tobacco and the sounds of laughter from the veranda.

“You best find a nice girl to marry.

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