The House in the Cerulean Sea(6)

“Had it coming, didn’t you?” Mr. Tremblay asked, sounding far too cheerful at the prospect. “I wonder who my new desk neighbor will be.”

Linus ignored him.

The green glow from his computer screen backlit the page, making the thick script of the words that much more ominous.

It read:

DEPARTMENT IN CHARGE OF MAGICAL YOUTH MEMO FROM EXTREMELY UPPER MANGEMENT



* * *



CC: BEDELIA JENKINS

MR. LINUS BAKER IS TO REPORT TO THE OFFICES OF EXTREMELY UPPER MANAGEMENT AT NINE A.M. ON WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 6.

ALONE.



And that was all.

“Oh dear,” Linus whispered.



* * *



That afternoon, when the clock chimed five, the people around Linus began to shut down their computers and pull on their coats. They chatted as they filed out of the room. Not a single person said good night to Linus. If anything, most stared at him as they left. Those who had been too far away to hear what Ms. Jenkins had said were most likely filled in via speculative whispers around the water cooler. The rumors were probably wild and completely inaccurate, but since Linus didn’t know why he’d been summoned, he couldn’t argue with whatever was being said.

He waited until half past five before he, too, began to wrap up for the day. The room was mostly empty by then, though he could still see the light on in Ms. Jenkins’s office at the far end. He was thankful he wouldn’t have to pass by it as he left. He didn’t think he could handle another face-to-face with her today.

Once his computer screen was dark, he stood and lifted his coat from the back of his chair. He pulled it on, groaning when he remembered he’d left his umbrella at home. From the sound of it, the rain still hadn’t let up. If he hurried, he’d still be able to make the bus.

He only bumped into six desks in four different rows on his way out. But he made sure to put them back into their places.

It would have to be another salad for him tonight. No dressing.



* * *



He missed the bus.

He saw its taillights through the rain as it rumbled down the street, the advertisement on the back of a smiling woman saying SEE SOMETHING, SAY SOMETHING! REGISTRATION HELPS EVERYONE! still clear even through the rain.

“Of course,” he muttered to himself.

There would be another one in fifteen minutes.

He held his briefcase above his head and waited.



* * *



He stepped off the bus (which had, of course, been ten minutes late) at the stop a few blocks from his house.

“It’s a wet one out there,” the driver told him.

“A fine observation,” Linus replied as he stepped onto the sidewalk. “Really. Thank you for—”

The doors snapped shut behind him, and the bus pulled away. The back right tire hit a rather large puddle, splashing up and soaking Linus’s slacks up to his knees.

Linus sighed and began to trudge his way home.

The neighborhood was quiet, the streetlamps lit and inviting, even in the cold rain. The houses were small, but the street was lined with trees covered in leaves that were beginning to change colors, the dull green fading to an even duller red and gold. There were rosebushes at 167 Lakewood that bloomed quietly. There was a dog at 193 Lakewood that yipped excitedly whenever it saw him. And 207 Lakewood had a tire swing hanging from a tree, but the children who lived there apparently thought they were far too old to use it anymore. Linus had never had a tire swing before. He’d always wanted one, but his mother had said it was far too dangerous.

He turned right down a smaller street, and there, sitting on the left, was 86 Hermes Way.

Home.

It wasn’t much. It was tiny, and the back fence needed to be replaced. But it had a lovely porch where one could sit and watch the day pass by if one were so inclined. There were sunflowers in the flowerbed at the front, tall things that swayed in the cool breeze, though they were closed now against the coming evening and dreary rain. It’d been raining for weeks on end, mostly an uncomfortable drizzle interspersed with a tedious downpour.

It wasn’t much. But it belonged to Linus and no one else.

He stopped at the mailbox out front and grabbed the day’s mail. It looked as if it were all advertisements addressed impersonally to RESIDENT. Linus couldn’t remember the last time he’d received a letter.

He climbed up onto the porch and was uselessly shaking the water from his coat when his name was called from the house next door. He sighed, wondering if he could get away with pretending he hadn’t heard.

“Don’t you even think about it, Mr. Baker,” she said.

“I don’t know what you mean, Mrs. Klapper.”

Edith Klapper, a woman of an undiscernible age (though he thought she’d gone past old into the fabled land of ancient) sat on her porch in her terry cloth bathrobe, pipe lit in her hand as it usually was, smoke curling up around her bouffant. She hacked a wet cough into a tissue that probably should have been discarded an hour before. “Your cat was in my yard again, chasing the squirrels. You know how I feel about that.”

“Calliope does what she wants,” he reminded her. “I have no control over her.”

“Perhaps you should try,” Mrs. Klapper snapped at him.

“Right. I’ll get on that immediately.”