No Fear Page 14

  I’ve lived an extraordinary life, which makes this tale all the more embarrassing. Of the countless stories I’d choose to tell you, this is not one of them. Yet, I suppose this is exactly the story you’ll want me to tell.

  How is sanity measured? Is there some sort of scale showing increments of crazy? I swear to you that I began this day old but with all my “faculties intact,” as they say. When I’ve finished my tale, you’ll probably think I’ve always been insane. I want this to be clear; the crazy happened to me today.

  This all begins with a confession of sorts, proving I am all too human in my emotions. The splash of red the embarrassment brings to my cheeks will at least give a hint of springtime to my autumn world. Too bad I can’t see myself to appreciate the color palette. Then again, I’d prefer not to see myself this way.

  Enough stalling. Here it is, my confession: I have been experiencing … oh, this pains me to admit … depression. Such a pedestrian emotion. And completely undignified! Me, depressed! Over what, you might ask. My age. Yes, an unremarkable, predictable response to looking at the finish line of my lifespan.

  Now please don’t get the wrong impression. I have not been wallowing in bed, covers over my head, popping Prozac like candy from a Pez dispenser. Nor was I given to crying fits or anything quite so dramatic. No, I was more blue than depressed. At this stage of life, memories can be like dragging a heavy weight along the road. I was so busy looking back that I’d forgotten the road still stretched on ahead. This is why, when the opportunity arose to prove myself not to be an addled old man, I pounced on it. Friends advised against my taking part, which of course only reinforced my decision to move forward.

  I hear your shouted friends? Yes, I do have friends, though you might instead call them acquaintances. My life has been one adventurous excursion after another. My restless nature, along with my aversion to truth and my insistence on putting myself first, made it impossible to maintain any sort of lasting relationship. All the effort involved is simply too much for me. I do not want to hear you expound on the tedium of your problems. Isn’t that what Dr. Phil is for? My friends are like me; pleasure-seeking people with whom I occasionally mingle.

  Where was I? Ah, yes, the opportunity that led me here. Four days ago I received a challenge. No, scratch that. This total honesty nonsense is harder than I’d expected. Let’s begin again. Four days ago I received an invitation to participate in an event hosted by the son of a woman with whom I sometimes have sex. Oh, that sounds callous, doesn’t it? Honesty is often harsh and insensitive, which is why I prefer embellishments, white lies, and lies of omission.

  At any rate, Griffin – his first name, and don’t blame me because I didn’t choose it – is a trust fund baby with more money than he’ll ever know what to do with. Griffin is twenty-seven, has never worked a single day, and will never have to. I imagine you to be wearing a judgmental sneer at this point. Don’t blame Griffin. This is the life he was born into. I, too, was a trust fund baby. On my eighteenth birthday, I was handed 10 million dollars and a platinum American Express card.

  Back to the story at hand. On the day in question, thirty-two of us were enjoying an afternoon out on Griffin’s boat. You would call it a yacht, though I personally find the word pretentious. Griffin loves contests and games. He tried out for the TV show Survivor once, but the producers said his impetuousness would put other contestants at risk. And so, instead, Griffin decided to arrange and host his own games and contests. Four days ago, the game Griffin set in motion was a scavenger hunt of sorts. One object hidden, and the person to find that object gets to keep it. The object? A silver chalice having once belonged to the infamous occultist Aleister Crowley. The claim is that the chalice in question was used by Crowley in some sort of satanic ritual.

  Big deal, right? Oh, maybe it is to you. I don’t know where your interests lie. I have no interest in the occult or in Aleister Crowley. No, the prize didn’t attract me at all. The game didn’t even arouse much interest for me, until I made a mindless – and probably arrogant – remark about being a master of puzzles able to beat any of the young people at such a game. Griffin’s eyes lit up as he invited me to prove myself. Laura – Griffin’s mother and my occasional bedmate – immediately admonished me, reminding me to consider my age. My age! Her comment was more emasculating than my occasional erectile dysfunction. I had no choice but to commit to this hunt for the prized chalice.

  Six hours later, Griffin distributed the scavenger hunt rules and hints to twenty-five contestants via e-mail. I, or course, was one of those recipients. I worked tirelessly, deciphering inane codes designed to stump all but the most persistent and intelligent. I made my way to several locations, where further hints lay hidden in the most absurd places. To give you an example, hint number two was taped beneath the last pew in a little Methodist church in the nowhere town of Estherville, Iowa. Despite all my travels, I’d never been to Iowa, and I can firmly state that I’d have died content had I never seen the endless miles of cornfields growing there.

  The final clue led me here, to these uninhabited acres of land in northern Maine. The handy GPS on my cellphone directed me to the pentagram scratched into the boulder, just as the clue had inferred. Behind the boulder, buried a few inches below the heavy loam, was a black felt pouch. I lifted the pouch, feeling the weight of the chalice inside, and almost whooped aloud. I’d beaten them all in the game.

  Had I not been so determined to prove myself, I’d likely be lying on a beach sipping mai tais. But, no, I’d worked diligently and had the prized object in my hand instead of that refreshing tropical drink. Now, thinking back to that moment, I wonder if I’d felt it coming. Had there been an ominous sign I’d missed? Had my ego not been ruling my mind, would I have left that pouch where it lay, or at least not opened it?

  Sadly, I’ve never possessed much of an intuition or sixth sense. I fully believed life was exactly what we saw, nothing more and nothing less. And, in the interest of total honesty, my determination to prove myself, along with my innate selfishness, would not have allowed me to do anything other than hold my prize out for the world to see.

  This is the point in my story in which you will undoubtedly label me crazy. All I can do is assure you that this is the truth as I experienced it. What you believe – or don’t believe – is entirely your choice.

  I drew open the ties holding the pouch closed, with the intent of snapping a photo with my phone and sending it out via mass e-mail to all my fellow contestants. Yes, I intended to gloat. This is another of my faults of which I am not particularly proud.

  The chalice glistened and, for a fraction of a second, I swore it sent sparks out into the sunlight. I shook my head at the absurdity. The deep woods, the pentagram, and the legendary stories of Crowley’s satanic influences had me spooked. I needed to take my prize back to civilization, open a bottle of Cristal and celebrate. But, first, a photo.

  I know now that touching the chalice was my final mistake. The silver felt hot on my fingertips. I dropped it, partly out of shock and partly due to pain. As the chalice landed in the pile of leaves at my feet, a black shadow crossed in front of me. I heard the whoosh of air, smelled the faint scent of sulfur. Then I heard my name.

  Frank…

  Fear sent me stumbling backward. My ankle caught on a tangle of weeds, I lost my footing, and went down hard. I know what you’re thinking now. I hit my head. I’ve caused some sort of traumatic brain injury, which explains my situation. I’d like nothing better than to claim that as my explanation. But, no, I landed on my rump hard enough to force the air from my lungs. However, I remained sitting, my head fully intact and untouched.

  Then I heard the voice again. For reasons I cannot explain, I knew that voice belonged to the infamous Aleister Crowley.

  I was not content to believe in a personal devil and serve him, in the ordinary sense of the word. I wanted to get hold of him personally and become his chief of staff.

  The black shadow drifted closer. The
air around me became impossibly still, the scent of sulfur falling over me like a blanket. I scrabbled backward until I came upon the fallen log on which I now rest my head. The black shadow followed and the voice came once again.

  To practice black magic you have to violate every principle of science, decency, and intelligence. You must be obsessed with an insane idea of the importance of the petty object of your wretched and selfish desires.

  I glanced at the chalice, the object of my wretched and selfish desires. It pulsed in time with my heartbeat.

  Now I lie here, staring up at the bruised sky. I’m still in the autumn of my days. I’d always expected to see my winter years, to watch the last of my colors fade to gray. A snowstorm of magnificent proportions to see me off. Instead, I chased a chalice I never wanted into an ending in which I don’t even believe.

  Above me, one shriveled leaf clings to the last of its life. I watch as it loses the battle. Graceful in its demise, the leaf slowly swirls in its free fall.

  Seven billion people in the world and I am alone. Will someone save me before I turn to dust?

  Trunk Full of Lies

  My life is a mosaic of lies, held together by the illusion of truth. I didn’t intend for it to be this way. Or maybe I did, and I just didn’t foresee it all leading me here, to this attic space, with this trunk between us and that look on his face. I’d seen betrayal before. This look was something more, something broken and raw.

  I’d known the trunk was a mistake. It held bits and pieces of my lies, while its very existence represented my only tangible truth. The trunk’s presence left me vulnerable, but I hadn’t been able to let go.

  When I’d come home to find the attic stairs hanging down from the hideaway in my ceiling, I’d known my real mistake had been staying too long. I’d climbed up to find Kaden sitting in front of my open trunk, the broken lock by his side. I’d wanted to be angry at the invasion, but what was the point of that kind of indignance when confronted with a trunk full of lies?

  Now we sit facing each other, the trunk between us. I don’t offer anything and he doesn’t ask. We just sit in the indifferent silence. Finally, he looks up and says, “Claudia…”

  The word, my name, trails into the chasm of emptiness. That sound coming from his lips used to feel like a sensuous embrace. Now it feels like a slap.

  I have no one but myself to blame. I’d built my house of cards on a fault line, and the quake is rumbling below my feet.

  While I’d never set out to live my life exactly this way, I suppose my trajectory had always pointed me in this direction. Around the age of eight, my friends and I became obsessed with Barbie dolls. My friends’ Barbies were married to Ken, hung out in spas, wore high heels to the grocery store. My friends staged fancy weddings for their dolls. Barbie and Ken dressed up for dinner, went out dancing. Not my Barbie; she was a spy. I stole weapons from my little brother’s action figures. My Barbie had a gun in her purse and a knife strapped to her ankle. Ken was a lot of things over the course of my play, but never Barbie’s husband.

  Kaden keeps his gaze fixed on the trunk lid. Everything on the tag—the ship’s name, the sailing date, the destination—can be explained away with a few well-told lies. More colorful tiles for my mosaic. The tag doesn’t matter in the least. The trunk could have belonged to anyone before me. I could have found it at an estate sale, a whimsical item purchased from a total stranger.

  The contents are a different story altogether. They are mine but not Claudia’s.

  Kaden pulls in a lungful of musty air. “Help me understand,” he tells me.

  I don’t know how to do that, because I don’t think I understand myself. I started as a little girl with a Barbie doll. I dreamed of elaborate escapes instead of elaborate weddings.

  In high school, I began playing with identities. Deception is a craft, and I honed it well. I studied how people reacted to whichever me I chose to be, learned to identify their strengths and weaknesses. I know Kaden’s weakness is me, and mine is him. That should have been enough to send me running long ago.

  I don’t tell Kaden any of this. Instead I say, “I’ve never killed anyone.”

  His eyes widen and he barks out a humorless laugh. “Good to know.”

  I don’t know why I chose those words. I suppose it’s the only positive fact I can offer.

  I look down at the trunk and wonder where to go from here. Running used to be so easy. Nothing held me down. Then I met Kaden and suddenly I wanted to be Claudia forever.

  Kaden rubs his hands over his face. Through his fingers, he says, “What kind of person even feels the need to announce they’ve never killed anyone? Is that supposed to make me feel better? Who the hell are you, anyway?”

  I’m not a spy, though I had briefly entertained that dream as my reality. In the end, though, I didn’t like the way it confined me. Being a spy means you have to become whomever the government decides you’ll be, for however long they need you to be, wherever they need you to be. The creation and parameters were theirs, not mine, essentially making me nothing more than a puppet at worst or an actor at best. I like being the creator, making the rules, defining myself however I want in any given situation.

  Who the hell am I? I don’t really know.

  I sit cross-legged on the wooden floor and say nothing.

  I wonder where I slipped up. What had caused Kaden to come up here to dig for my secrets?

  He'd shown no signs of disbelief. Not even a shred of distrust. Our lives had meshed perfectly from that first moment we'd locked eyes. He'd never doubted me and I'd never doubted him. Stupid, both of us.

  "I met with a client this morning," Kaden tells me. "He told me a story I didn't want to believe."

  Kaden is a fitness instructor. We met at the gym, and I have to admit his rock-hard body is what first attracted me. Had that been all there was to the attraction, I'd have enjoyed a few wild nights and moved on without hesitation. But my connection to Kaden was deep and immediate. By the time I realized what was happening, leaving him behind would have been like ripping out a piece of myself. I finally understood what my friends meant when they told me Barbie and Ken were meant to be together.

  I stayed because I wanted to, because I had to. Because loving Kaden was more important than anything I ever had or would do. Will any of that matter now?

  The anger in Kaden's voice masks the hurt and betrayal. I hear it seeping around the edges. I see it in the tilt of his head. Worse, though, is how I feel it in the space between his words.

  Kaden lifts his head and looks straight at me for the first time since I'd found him up here. His eyes are the color of the sky on a sparkling summer day. In his eyes, I'd always seen the reflection of the person he saw when he looked at me. I'd embraced that image fully, and until now I didn't realize how much I'd come to depend on Kaden's version of me. His eyes show me nothing of the Claudia I'd become, and too much of the hollow reality of who I am.

  He drops his head and rubs the spot between his eyes as he continues speaking. "My client brought his son to the gym last night. He saw us working out together, thought you were another client. Before I could correct his assumption, he said he needed to warn me about you." Kaden shook his head. "Warning me about my own wife, for chrissake."

  "Kaden..." I left his name dangling in the air like a plea.

  "The things he was telling me sounded crazy," Kaden says. His words have a kind of heat to them, as if my betrayal has scorched his insides. "I told him he had you confused with someone else. He'd called you Jade Marten. But he said it was definitely you, and that you'd probably changed your name again. Again, like it was to be expected. Something you did routinely."

  Kaden ran his finger over the torn edge of the label on the trunk's lid. "Then he told me about his brother, who runs a software company in New York."

  New York. I know right then what Kaden has learned. I'd only been there once, for a brief period, the year before I became Claudia. But it is indeed a small world. And it
has bitten me in the ass.

  "He said you had straight blonde hair then," Kaden tells me, "but he had no doubt it was you."

  I reflexively reach up to touch my dark curls. The real me, at least on the outside. Kaden loves my dark curls. I'd taken that as a sign that I was meant to be this person after all.

  Kaden's voice trembles like it's threatening to break. "He warned me to be careful, that you're dangerous. Dangerous! My own wife."

  No use denying that. I am dangerous. But not to Kaden. Never to Kaden.

  He pulls his hand from the trunk, with the framed ten-by-fourteen photograph clutched between his fingers. I wince. Why had I kept that? I have no sentimental attachment to that time in my life. Certainly none to that moment captured in the image. The frilly white gown had been heavy and pretentious. All those pearls and all that lace. I thought I'd suffocate. The man beside me in his penguin tux. Black tails. Crisp white shirt. He had no bottom lip and kissing him had left my lips raw from rubbing against his teeth.

  I sigh, suddenly exhausted by the weight of my lies. I know exactly why I kept that photo. Not because of the fairy tale wedding it commemorated, but because the man had been my biggest conquest. My biggest con. I should have won an Oscar for the part I'd played. He'd wanted an innocent virgin, young arm candy, a woman naive enough to manipulate, to use as a showpiece when he needed and who wouldn't ask questions about what he did with his time. I'd become Jade Marten, who was all those things. The proverbial trophy wife.

  Kaden's accusation snaps me back to the present. "You were married to Bryce Pearson," he says, "the CEO of Folworth Enterprises. You are Jade Marten."

  I want to correct him. I'm not Jade Marten. She'd been a part I played. Though correcting him would mean admitting I'm also not Claudia, and she's far closer to the person I want to be. A name shouldn't matter so much. Who I am when I'm with Kaden has nothing to do with whether I call myself Jade or Claudia.