The Ceiling Man Read online

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  No part of this work may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Kindle Press, Seattle, 2017

  A Kindle Scout selection

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, Kindle Scout, and Kindle Press are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  For Liz & John,

  Thank you.

  CONTENTS

  1 Blevins

  2 Carole

  3 Carole

  4 Blevins

  5 Carole

  6 Blevins

  7 Carole

  8 The Ceiling Man

  9 Abby

  10 Carole

  11 Abby

  12 The Ceiling Man

  13 Carole

  14 Abby

  15 Carole

  16 Carole

  17 The Ceiling Man

  18 Carole

  19 Abby

  20 Carole

  21 Carole

  22 Abby

  23 Carole

  24 The Ceiling Man

  25 Carole

  26 Abby

  27 The Ceiling Man

  28 Carole

  29 Abby

  30 Abby

  31 Carole

  32 The Ceiling Man

  33 Carole

  34 Carole

  35 Abby

  36 Carole

  37 The Ceiling Man

  38 Carole

  39 The Ceiling Man

  40 Carole

  41 Carole

  42 Abby

  43 Carole

  44 Abby

  45 Carole

  46 Abby

  47 Carole

  48 Carole

  49 Abby

  50 Carole

  51 The Ceiling Man

  52 Abby

  53 Carole

  54 The Ceiling Man

  55 Abby

  56 Carole

  57 Abby

  58 Carole

  59 Abby

  60 The Ceiling Man

  61 Carole

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  [1]

  Blevins

  THE FOG DID NOT ARRIVE on little cat feet. It rolled in fast and heavy and smothered everything in its path.

  One moment, Blevins lounged by his small fire. He leaned against the backpack stuffed with his scant belongings and enjoyed the clear night sky, if not the chill. If it gets any colder, I’m going to have to get myself arrested.

  The next, the stars disappeared. The moonlight vanished. He couldn’t see—or feel—his fire a few feet away.

  “Well, this bites the big one.” No one listened. He just wanted to hear the sound of his own voice.

  What was that? A cough?

  The shroud of dense air muffled the sound, made it hard to place. Maybe he hadn’t heard anything at all. Maybe he wasn’t alone.

  “Hey! Who’s there?”

  No answer.

  “You’d better keep your hands offa my shit!” Bastard better not touch my bike.

  Around people, Blevins made a point of watching, of knowing exactly where they were and what they did. And dogs. He always watched the dogs. He never knew what those crazy fuckers might do.

  “Whoever you are, stay right where you are. I have a knife.” He didn’t, but if he couldn’t see whoever was out there, it didn’t hurt to scare them a little.

  There’s nobody here. Blevins refused to be spooked.

  He concentrated on his list of people who’d pissed him off that day. A nightly ritual, it always comforted him, filled him when he was hungry and alone.

  That bitch at the laundromat threw him out and didn’t even give him a cup of coffee.

  “Come on. One cup of coffee for a homeless guy?”

  “Leave now. Or I call the police.” Bitch had the phone in her hand as soon as he walked in the door.

  He wasn’t ready to go to jail. The nights were cold, but it hadn’t snowed. Besides, she let that idiot Danny with his stupid shopping cart sit inside and get warm. She probably even gave him coffee. He called her some choice names before he left. Blevins was pretty fucking proud of his vocabulary.

  That creep at the desk at the Y.

  “You can’t be begging money from our members.”

  Like they couldn’t afford to give him a buck or two. The Y might as well be the country club in this crappy town. When he let loose with his mouth, those preschool teachers grabbed their kids and ran. The little brats were there for an education, weren’t they?

  The damp worked its way through his coat, and he shivered. The stench, where did that come from? Part overflowing Port-a-Potty and part sunbaked road kill—Blevins had a strong stomach, but he gagged.

  Another noise. Blevins still couldn’t locate it. Was someone laughing at him?

  “God. What’s that smell? Is it you?”

  Still no answer.

  He went back to his list-making.

  That place on Main Avenue, he couldn’t remember what it was called.

  He didn’t go in, just stood outside the huge windows and watched those fancy-ass bitches fawn over their plastic-draped customers. The one from the desk came out and told him to leave. His ugly face pressed against the glass made the drowned rats in the chairs uncomfortable.

  When the fog lifted and he could see where he was going, he’d break some windows. Hurling rocks and watching glass shatter always made him feel better.

  The last time he hit the laundromat, he used the big neon OPEN sign for a target. Even turned off, the sign made for a little extra fun. He couldn’t remember if they replaced it along with the window, but he hoped so.

  As fast as it appeared, the fog lifted.

  He was right. He wasn’t alone.

  Blevins hated mirrors and avoided them, but he was sure he didn’t look as bad as this guy. He looked like he was a month dead and didn’t know enough to lie down and admit it.

  “Christ, you’re one ugly bastard.”

  The other didn’t answer.

  Blevins watched the still, expressionless stranger. I bet I can have some fun with this guy.

  “I think we’re gonna be friends,” he said.

  The other finally spoke.

  “Blevins, you are my new pet.”

  [2]

  Carole

  LIFE WITH A TEENAGER WITH an Autism Spectrum Disorder was, on the best of days, quirky. I knew things could be much tougher. High functioning, low functioning—it was all attempts to slap generic labels on individuals, and Abby fell somewhere in the middle. Other than periodic meltdowns, we had it relatively easy and learned to deal with, if not understand, the way she worked.

  There were the non-sequiturs.

  In Tim Burton’s version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Grandpa Joe is talking about working for Willie Wonka, when out of the blue, Grandma Georgina says, “I love grapes.”

  I loved that scene and so did Abby. She and Grandma Georgina had similar conversational skills. At noisy family gatherings, Abby might bring all discussion to a halt by loudly announcing, “In third grade, I sat behind David Besom. He had red hair.”

  Her father or I looked at her and quietly said, “I love grapes.” It was a signal. Repeating lines from a movie or a book or whatever to mean something else is a common ASD behavior—scripting is the jargon. Jim and I often found it expedient to speak Abby’s language. Fewer words, more meaning
, and she always got it. Abby did know, by other people’s standards, she was not quite right. She was okay with that.

  There was what we called Abby’s Pause Mode. On her way to the kitchen, the bathroom, her bedroom, she stopped, usually in the middle of a doorway. She stood stock still and grinned her lopsided grin until Jim or I said, “Hey! You stuck?”

  “Noooo.” She laughed and continued on her way. If we were busy and didn’t notice she was on pause, she retreated to Abby-land. We found her stopped, still grinning, but no longer still. She swayed, front to back, elbows bent, hands in front of her body. Her fingers danced, her eyelids fluttered, and, if it’d been too long, her eyes rolled back in her head. Once she made it to Abby-land, it was harder to call her back.

  “Abby!” Wait a beat. “ABBY!”

  “Huh.”

  “You stuck?”

  “We haven’t had any snow days this year.” Her replies were mundane and often of the grapes variety, and we assumed they had something to do with whatever happened in Abby-land.

  We went with it the best we could. “Nope. And as far as I’m concerned we don’t need any.”

  “I want at least one.” She grinned and moved off to wherever she was headed before her little holiday.

  And the obsession. At times, I obsess. Everyone does. Although I’ve had friends who carried it to the point where I wanted to suggest medication, they were all slackers compared to a teenager with ASD.

  Something small to most of us—a postcard reminding us it was time to have our eyes checked—consumed Abby’s attention.

  “Did you make our eye appointments?”

  “When are you going to make our eye appointments?”

  “You really should make our eye appointments.”

  “We need our eyes checked.”

  On and on, until I said, “Yes! I made the appointments!” Obsession over eye check-ups led to obsession over the dentist, the ear doctor, and the anything-else-she-could-think-of doctor. Regularly scheduled maintenance was very important to Abby.

  When she was excited about something, anything, the obsession became the only subject of conversation for weeks, even months.

  “Abby, did you empty the dishwasher?”

  “Twyla’s birthday party is in three weeks.”

  “Abby, dinner’s ready!”

  “I’m going to wrap Twyla’s present in red.”

  “Abby, do you know you’re a banana?”

  “I think I’ll wear my new jeans to Twyla’s party.”

  “It’s okay, Abby. I love bananas. A lot.”

  “Twyla’s favorite color is red.”

  There was more, some of it, like the rocking, typical ASD behaviors. Some of it, Abby specific. Being on the spectrum wasn’t her only issue. Mentally and emotionally, in some ways she was twelve. In others, completely seventeen. It kept things interesting.

  Our life had a rhythm. An odd rhythm, but it worked. It was my excuse for not noticing sooner something was wrong. Most people with typical kids would have caught on at the first sign of weird. Weird was our way of life, and we took it all in stride.

  • • •

  MY OWN PARTICULAR OCD was paying bills—god knew, it wasn’t housework.

  In the early days of our marriage, when money was tight, Jim took care of all the financial stuff. I hounded him constantly. Was the electric bill paid? When was it due? How much was left in the checking account? And in those days, we had to write a check, put it in an envelope, stamp it, and mail it, all early enough for some nameless drone to process it by hand. In the interest of staying married, and quite possibly saving my life if not my sanity, I took over the family finances.

  Bill paying and account balancing became easier with online banking, but remained a high-stress time for me. When I was at the computer paying bills, lightning could strike the house and as long as the electricity stayed on, I’d never notice.

  Even so, when I looked up and saw Abby in my office doorway, I knew she hadn’t been there long, maybe a minute. Not long enough for her to go from simple pause to deep Abby-land, yet there she was, already into the eye-rolling stage.

  “Abby? Abby! ABBY!” Three Abby’s deep was bad.

  “Huh.”

  “You stuck?”

  “He’s moving.”

  Not one of Abby’s stock answers. I wasn’t sure I’d heard her correctly. “What?”

  “He’s hungry.”

  “Who’s hungry?”

  “Idunno,” she said. And shrugged.

  In Abby-speak, that word—and it was one word—combined with a shrug didn’t mean she didn’t know the answer. It meant she either didn’t want to or couldn’t find the words to talk about it, and it was always her final answer.

  She walked away.

  “Hey!” I called. “What did you want?”

  She stopped and turned back. She looked puzzled.

  “Did you need me for something?”

  “I forget,” she said. She gave me her crazy-wonderful grin.

  Like the proverbial elephant, Abby never forgot. Anything. Ever.

  “Why don’t you take your dog for a walk?”

  And there was The Mighty Samsonite.

  That dog could hear the words walk and out from the farthest corners of the house and, I swore, teleport herself to our feet, ears perked and butt wagging—she was an Aussie, no tail—ready to go. She hadn’t learned to stop and grab her leash along the way, but I suspected it was only a matter of time.

  “Sami, come,” Abby said.

  Whenever I needed a short break from parenthood, I sent the two of them out for a walk. It was good for all three of us, and as long as Sami was with her, I knew Abby was safe.

  • • •

  “SOMEONE IS TORTURING the kid again,” Jim said.

  I looked up from my book. “Can you tell what she’s singing?”

  “I can’t even tell what language it is.”

  Abby loved music. Getting her an iPod seemed like a good idea at the time. We didn’t realize with the buds in her ears, she would sing along even louder and, if possible, more off-key than we were used to. She was upstairs in bed, and the noise filled the house.

  Sami whimpered and laid her head on Jim’s knee.

  “Ahhh, is the girl hurting da puppy’s ears?” He scratched the top of her head.

  “Don’t talk baby talk to the dog. She’s well past puppy-hood,” I said.

  Jim grew up in a pet-free household and was leery when I insisted we get our first dog. He promptly fell in love and turned out to be the world’s biggest marshmallow with our pets. Five years ago, when we got Sami, I sent them both to obedience training and hoped Jim would learn some discipline. It didn’t work.

  “She’ll always be my little puppy,” he said.

  “You are damaging her dignity,” I said.

  He laughed. “You’re worse than I am.”

  “Nobody is worse than you are.” Sami’s whining grew insistent. “I think it’s more than Abby’s singing. I think she needs to go out.”

  Sami bounced.

  Aside from their big brown eyes and lack of tails, Aussies are known for their ability to out-bounce Tigger.

  “I’ll take the widdle doggy-kins outs,” Jim said.

  “Now you’re just trying to annoy me.”

  “Is it working?”

  “For a big, bad cop you really are a pansy.” I turned my attention back to my book.

  I made it through a couple of pages before the back door opened. Sami shot through the living room and flew up the stairs. I heard her land in Abby’s room. Jim followed at a slower pace.

  “What was that all about?” I asked.

  “I’m not sure. She got weird while we were out there.”

  “That wasn’t very long.”

  “Well. . .”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know. She was fine until we got to the middle of the backyard, then she glued herself to my leg and growled.”

  “Was the
re something out there?”

  “I’m not sure,” Jim said. “I thought maybe I saw something by the garage, but—I don’t know. First I thought it was a shadow, then I thought it was a dog, then I thought it was a person, and then it was gone. And Sami took off for the house.”

  “The full moon was last week, so it wasn’t a werewolf.”

  “Thank you for that.”

  “Coyote?”

  People had coyote troubles on the other side of town, but not on our side. Our wildlife problems were usually groundhogs or skunks, and not many of those thanks to our neighbor’s extermination program. Pete trapped them, gassed them, and disposed of the bodies in dumpsters all over town—Jim pretended not to know anything about that last part. On the other hand, we were close to the river, so who knew what might wander up.

  “Maybe,” Jim said. “Or maybe it was just a shadow.”

  “At least you had the Mighty Samsonite for protection.”

  “And whewa is my widdle luggage dog?”

  “Keep it up, and you’re sleeping on the couch tonight.”

  • • •

  A FEW DAYS later, I got a call from Abby’s teacher. Daytime calls from Ms. Colley were always bad and usually meant Abby had a meltdown.

  “What’s up?” I closed my eyes and hoped for only a minor meltdown. Things were crazy at work, and I didn’t have time to go get her.

  “Um, I have a sort of odd question,” she said.

  “I’m Abby’s mother. Define odd.”

  She laughed. “Good point. Has Abby been watching movies that she’s not ready to cope with or process?”

  I panicked. My first thought was sex. Attempts to discuss the subject and explain appropriate and inappropriate behavior to Abby were frustrating. I could never tell how much she understood or how much she already knew. She was seventeen, and she was obsessed with the idea of having a boyfriend even though she didn’t fully grasp the reality.

  The previous year, thanks to a pregnant cousin, she figured out that one doesn’t have to be married to have a baby. She told everyone she knew—and a few people she didn’t know—she wanted one. Dealing with the backlash was loads of fun.

  “What kind of movies?”

  “Oh, the scary, gory, bloody, spattery kind.”

  I was relieved. Bad movies I could deal with. I was fairly sure Abby would never take an ax to a cabin full of teenagers.