But Mrs. Daniels, red-faced and breathing deeply, wouldn’t be drawn. “No, really; it’s okay. It’s not important… ”
Cantrell thought he saw fear in the old woman’s face, but she was resolute and he felt no reason to push. He’d let it rest for now.
There was a long pause, broken at last by Su Ling.
“I don’t have a complaint, but I do have a compliment: I just want to say that we are very lucky to have Mr. Cantrell with us. I think he is doing a marvelous job in this beautiful building.”
There was a quick round of polite applause, save for Stu Brown, who once again rolled his eyes.
At that, the meeting came to an awkward conclusion. As the tenants filed out, Su Ling and Anna waited by the door. Cantrell took her hand and thanked her for the kind words.
“That was sweet of you, Su Ling. It felt good after being run over the coals.”
“And I meant it,” she replied, the sunny smile still in place. “But actually, I do have one tiny little complaint.”
“Okay.”
“If it’s not too much trouble, would you please check my balcony door. It doesn’t seem to lock. I know I’m on the second floor, but I worry about Anna.”
“Come on, let’s take a look.”
The balcony door took Cantrell less than five minutes to repair—a simple adjustment with a screwdriver. When he was finished, Su Ling insisted that he stay for coffee.
As she busied herself in the kitchen, Cantrell relaxed on the couch. He saw movement at the corner of his eye and turned in that direction. He was startled when he saw Anna emerge from her room and slowly approach him. She came to within a few feet of the couch and stood, still and silent, like a statue. The girl made intense eye contact with him.
She made him uncomfortable; her stare piercing; somehow too knowing. It was as if she were trying to communicate something to him, but couldn’t, at least directly. He averted his eyes once or twice, but his gaze always returned to hers, which remained fixed.
“How do you like your coffee… ?”
Su Ling stopped in her tracks when she entered the room.
As if sensing her mother’s presence, Anna slowly walked backwards, with confident grace, her eyes glued to Cantrell’s as she withdrew to her room.
“That was amazing,” Su Ling said. “It’s so unlike her to approach another person like that. She hardly trusts anybody. I wonder what it means.”
“I don’t know.”
“I hope it didn’t make you uneasy… ”
“Just a little, but I’m kind of flattered at the same time.”
“You should be. She must like you, otherwise she would have stayed in her room and ignored you. Like she does everybody else. I’ve never seen her act like that before. The way she was staring at you… ”
“I don’t know, Su Ling. For a minute, I got the feeling she was trying to tell me something… ”
She sat beside him on the couch, setting the china cups on the table.
“Who’s to say? Dr. Knaster says her mind appears to be fully functional, which is to say the brain wave patterns are active. But what she’s actually thinking no one knows. I’ve gotten the same feeling you just did myself, once or twice, but it never lasts long… ”
Su Ling dabbed her eye as a tear trickled down her cheek.
There was an awkward moment as Cantrell waited for her to regain composure.
“I’m sorry, Alex… is it okay if I call you that?”
“Of course. And don’t be sorry.”
She sipped her coffee. “I can’t tell you how much I miss her. She was such an outgoing girl, so full of life… a beautiful child. Now she’s… she’s… I mean, I love her every bit as much, but I can’t help feel that she’s a stranger at the same time. I don’t know her anymore. That frightens me. Sometimes I think I’m starting to give up hope, and that frightens me even more.”
“Can you tell me about it?”
She did, recounting the accident and its aftermath in all its painful detail. Su Ling cried throughout, growing silent when she was finished.
“Do you have a family photograph?”
“Yes,” she said, pointing to the wall. “There.”
Cantrell rose and studied the picture. It was taken on the front porch of what appeared to be a suburban ranch house. A small minivan was parked in the driveway. Quan was handsome, with a wide smile—the smile of a proud young father and husband. Su Ling looked happy too, and noticeably younger than she did now. Anna stood between them, a beaming smile on her face, a teddy bear clasped tightly in her hands.
“It’s a beautiful picture,” he said at last, rejoining her on the couch. “I’m sorry this had to happen to you.”
She looked at him, a faint smile appearing on her face. “You’re a very nice man, Alex. I can tell you’re a caring man. Thank you for listening to me.”
He was at a loss for words. It had been a long time since anyone had paid him so personal, and so honest, a compliment. He knew he was blushing and hoped she didn’t notice, so he merely smiled in response.
“Can I ask you a question?” Su Ling asked, sensing his discomfort. He nodded.
“How did you do all this?” She extended her arms, indicating not only the flat, but the entire building. “It’s incredible what you’ve created here; a thing of beauty.”
Cantrell beamed. “This was my dream. And I’m very lucky: my dream came true. That’s the poetic part of it. The reality is it was equal parts very hard work and an unbelievable amount of stress.”
“You don’t seem like a nervous person. You seem confident and in control of everything.”
He smiled. “Then I guess I fooled you. There are so many things that could have gone wrong with this project, so many opportunities for people to back out. That’s what I mean by lucky. I worried over this for years. There were times I wanted to give it all up, believe me.”
“Yes, but your talent is obvious—getting all these powerful people to see things your way, to believe in you… ”
“I don’t mean to be cynical, but all of my backers—every one of them—are interested in only one thing.”
“Money?”
“Yes. I’m not trying to diminish my own accomplishment—I’m proud of it—but to them, at the end of the day, this building is only a revenue-producing asset.”
“But you don’t think of it that way.”
“Of course not. The money is secondary to me; a means to an end. The vision was the thing. And that’s what troubled me. I was never sure—in fact, I’m still not sure—that this whole idea wasn’t just some selfish obsession.”
She laughed, then caught herself: “I think you know better than that, Alex.”
He nodded. There was a moment in which they briefly caught each other’s eye, interrupted by a shrill buzz from the laundry room off the kitchen.
“The washer,” Su Ling said. “I’ll be back in a second.”
He watched her walk into the kitchen, graceful and sensuous. He smiled.
Her scream ruptured his thoughts.
Cantrell ran, his heart pounding.
She stood in front of the dryer, her hand covering her mouth.
His eyes followed hers to the floor.
A red surge seeped from beneath the dryer, following some slight incline of the floor and pooling on the tile.
“Oh my God!” Su Ling cried. “Anna!”
She rushed from the laundry to her daughter’s bedroom. Cantrell followed.
The girl was sleeping peacefully, her teddy bear clasped in her hands. There wasn’t a mark on her.
Su Ling turned to Cantrell. He reached behind her and softly closed the bedroom door.
“What is it?” she whispered.
“I don’t know. Let me check.”
They returned to the laundry room. The pool was growing.