Copyright ©1987, 1989, 1991 by Richard Seltzer
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim electronic copies of this novel for non-commercial purposes provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies. This novel has not yet been published in paper form. You can contact the author directly: Richard Seltzer, 33 Gould St., West Roxbury, MA 02132. seltzer@samizdat.com
This book is available on CD ROM at http://store.yahoo.com/samizdat/evbutin.html
There at the cabin with Marge and Stasy, Frank had another dream about a house. This time he found a secret passage to a secret room that used to be in his dreams, but that hadn't appeared for many years. He had begun to doubt that it really existed. He was delighted to find it and show it to Marge, who was in the dream with him. They climbed up through a hatchway in the ceiling of a large attic room. The area around the secret room was carefully built out of thin, exotic, highly polished boards. It was built as a chapel to God. Near the altar slithered two large snakes.
There was lots of space here -- rooms full of articles that had been lost for years, including five old baseball gloves.
They told each other that if they straightened these things and organized them, they could make good use of them all and of this extra space. One area in particular had features they delighted in -- glass partitions, interesting shapes.
Then rain started falling, and they realized that the roof was missing. It would be great to sleep up here under the stars on a clear warm night, but they had forgotten to build a roof.
The next morning, he told Marge about this dream. She answered, "Okay, let's build a roof."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean build a roof. There's lumber, saws, roofing shingles, hammers, and nails out in the shed. What more do you need to build a roof?"
"A roof for what?"
"We don't know for what, but we need one. So let's go ahead and build one. It doesn't have to be big, because we don't have a house to put it on. Just a roof. It'll be fun. Something for us all to do together."
"But that makes no sense at all."
"I know. That's why it'll be fun."
So they built a roof in the middle of a nearby field. At Stasy's suggestion they built it in the shape of a pyramid with an octagon as a base. "Why not make it weird," Stasy said, "baroque and Victorian." Also, at her suggestion, they worked dressed up in Victorian clothes and hats from the boxes from Sarah and Hank's house and from the beach. Sometimes they play-acted that they were living in the 1890s.
None of them had ever built a roof before, but they had the cabin and the bunkhouses to check as examples. First they put together a superstructure of two-by-fours. Then they carefully measured and sawed and nailed the boards -- which didn't quite fit, but came close enough so they could cover up the gaps with shingles.
"God, it looks like a witch's house growing up out of the ground," said Stasy.
"No," Frank reflected, "it looks more like the roof of a Victorian gazebo, blown off in a storm, like the storm that took Dorothy to Oz."
"Right," added Marge, decisively, "that's what it should be -- the roof of a gazebo."
So they built a gazebo. It was a difficult, backwards way of doing things. They should have built the framework first, then added the roof. But if they hadn't built the roof, they'd have never known they wanted a gazebo.
There was a railing all around, except at the entrance where we put an arch that they painted like a rainbow, and a sign that said "Irene's Place."
"Do you want to add a door?" Frank asked.
"There are no walls. Why would you want a door?" asked Marge.
"I think a door would be awesome," added Stasy. "Totally bizarre and awesome."
"There will be no door!" insisted Marge.
"But why?" Frank joked, taking her by the hand.
She pushed him away. "Don't touch me. I told you before, don't touch me."
"But I just want to hold your hand."
"Back off, please. I need some space. That's one of the reasons I'm here."
Stasy looked at them sideways and muttered, "Well, I happen to like doors. But you guys can fight it out between youselves. As for me, I'm going canoeing." She lifted the hem of her long Victorian dress, kicked off her shoes and sprinted bare-foot and bare-legged across the field.
"What's the big deal," he asked Marge. "We've been here a week already. We've slept peacefully in our separate rooms. We've worked hard together, as friends, building this silly, but magnificent gazebo. And now you freak out about a door. I don't get it."
"Well, I don't either. I just don't like doors."
"Why?" Frank insisted.
"God! You can drive me crazy -- always wanting an answer, always wanting to understand. Well, there are some things you just can't understand; and some things best left in the dark. You know I went to see my father again before I came here."
"No, I didn't know that. How is he doing?"
"There was no visible change. He's just this body lying there with all these tubes attached. Don't you understand? It's like a door is shut and locked, and I can't find a key. All I see is the outside of the room -- his body -- but I know that he is still in there. That's bad enough. But what's worse is knowing that one day he won't be in there, and there will be no way of knowing where or if he is."
So they sat on the floor of the doorless gazebo -- Frank on the far side and Marge leaning against the rainbow archway -- and she talked about her father.
She was wearing a faded brown dress, complete with a bustle. It had long sleeves and high collar. She had even done her hair in a bun, to look the part of a Victorian lady. And she had on a wide-brimmed straw hat with a brown ribbon.
Frank wore a badly ripped black suit jacket, with sleeves several inches too short, and no shirt. He didn't take the dressing up and play-acting as seriously as Marge and Stasy did.
"Dad was always quiet," Marge said. "He was a creature of habit and routine. Two eggs and a cup of black coffee at 7 A.M., then off to work, and home by six, to sit in the recliner by the fireplace, and puff on his pipe reading the newspaper. He was always delighted to see Rose and me, and gave us big hugs whenever he left or we left or he returned or we returned. Our family was always big on hellos and good-byes. But between the helloes and the good-byes, we lived in our own separate worlds.
"Dad read a lot, mostly news and business magazines and biographies of military men. Aside from the news, and an occasional news-related special, he almost never watched television, which at his insistence was relegated to the basement. When we were home, that's where my sister Rose and I lived -- in the basement, watching television. I know far more about the Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise than about my own father.
"He always seemed to be in a hurry. 'You can't take your time and have it, too,' he used to say. He never offered to play with us, and it never occurred to us to ask him. The most we saw of him was at bedtime, when he read to us -- but not just any story that we requested. Rather, he read chapter all the books of The Little House on the Prairie series and then all the Oz books, whether we were interested or not, and without interruption.
"He insisted that we eat balanced meals and get to bed early. But so long as we did that and didn't disturb him, he hardly ever spoke to us.
"When Rose and I began to date, he always had to meet our 'escorts' beforehand, and he insisted that we come home promptly. When we were ready for college, he expressed a preference for relatively inexpensive local schools. But when Rose said she wanted to go to Thomas More, because a friend of hers was going there, he didn't argue. And when I followed her a couple years later, somehow he found a way to pay for both of us.
"At the time, I always felt that I lived in my sister's shadow. Not that I was jealous, more that I was in awe of her. Rose was so strikingly beautiful, so good at everything she did. I simply took it for granted that she would get all the attention, and I would play the role of her little sister. And I must admit, I liked that role. No one -- not my teachers and not my parents -- ever really expected much of me. And I didn't expect much of myself, and was quite content to be left alone, watching television in the basement.
"I presumed that Rose was Dad's favorite. But thinking back, he showed no preference for either of us. He did everything that a father is supposed to do, but he left us alone. Our innermost thoughts and emotions were our own business, and he had no intention of intruding there.
"I interpreted his manner as a sign of love and respect -- like his policy with the basement door. Rose and I could play or watch television in the basement whenever we liked, but always with the door open, with the understanding that he and Mom were always listening and always ready to help if help be needed; and also the understanding that we were always welcome to come up and interrupt whatever they were doing if we should need help or want to talk about anything.
"When boyfriends came over -- and that was more for Rose than me, at least until you came along -- Dad always made sure that the boy knew that that door was kept open at all times and that he had very sharp hearing. Not that he would ever stoop to spying, but rather to put the boy on notice that proper behavior was expected at all times in that house regardless of whether an adult was in the room.
"Dad never pushed; he never asked about things that would bother me. And I, in turn, tried not to do anything that he would need to ask about. It was a silent pact of mutual respect we had between us.
"I saved my childish rebelliousness for school and for Mom, when Dad wasn't around. Mom did all the disciplining at our house.
"I loved Dad for what he didn't say and what he didn't do, for the freedom of imagination that he allowed me, for the privacy of my basement world. I let him be, and he let me be. We never really sought each other out, but were always confident we could in time of need.
"And now I'm confused and need someone to turn to. I would look for him anywhere, anyway I could. But the door is shut. I hate doors."
Links to the rest of Sandcastles
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