WHAT I SAID: Yes, maybe it was just Passen or one of his men.
WHAT WAS TALKED ABOUT AT TOWN MEETING DAY: The three streetlamps in town. Voters wanted to keep them on at night because they cut down on crime. Voters wanted to get rid of them because they cost the town money in electricity bills.
WHAT I WANTED TO KNOW: What was the lunch? What really is red flannel hash? Who sitting here has shot my son?
WHAT WAS DISCUSSED: Wattages and the cost of replacing standard bulbs with LEDs.
WHAT SOMEONE’S NAME WAS IN TOWN WHOM I DIDN’T KNOW BEFORE: Boogie, and I wonder, of course, if Boogie who lives on the next hill over from us knew who shot my son and also if she had seen the spacecraft. I thought how if the spacecraft returned it might show up at town meeting, floating above us, hovering still over the school where we have the meeting, coming in low every once in a while, peering through the gym windows, blinking its lights, giving its own ayes and nays to the passages of bills and amendments, and taking on, too, the smell of the red flannel hash cooking in the kitchen that we all seem to carry on our clothes and that hours after, we can still smell even when we are in our own homes.
CALL: A man and his wife have a borzoi who’s sick. I told them I don’t usually do small animals. Oh, no, they said. Jordan is quite tall. Please, would you come?
ACTION: I drove to their home. Jordan was happy to see me. Are you sure he’s sick? I asked. The woman nodded her head. He wouldn’t get up this morning. He lay at the foot of the bed. That’s not like Jordan, she said. He seems all right now, I said. Jordan sniffed my pants, smelling the scent of my own dogs. I took his temperature. It was normal. I felt his abdomen. There was no unusual swelling. While I was there he walked over to his food bowl and ate what was put out for him in the morning.
RESULT: I told the couple that I thought he’d be all right. Whatever he had, it seems to have passed, I said. I talked to the couple for a while. The woman said she did not ever leave the house, she was too afraid. The husband wore clothes that looked like rags, but the couple was rich. I could tell by their beautiful home. The man showed me his bookcase. It was filled with rare books. He showed me his photographs. He had an original photograph of Custer on the wall in his hallway. The man knew many things. I asked him about building a chicken coop and he told me to use cedar, as it would repel water and be lightweight. He wrote down the name of the store to buy the materials at, but his wife did not want me to keep the paper. I’ll write it for you, she said, and then she took the paper the husband had written on and stuffed it into the pocket of her cardigan.
THOUGHTS ON DRIVE HOME: What really became of the Zodiac Killer? And what better place to move to except here, to a small town in the woods out here where no one might know who you are. Maybe you meet the girl of your dreams and you tell her who you are and she forgives you and she spends the rest of her life protecting you, because you are forgetful. You leave bits of your writing around without remembering that it’s your handwriting that could condemn you, but your wife remembers.
WHAT YOU TELL YOUR WIFE WHEN YOU GET HOME: I have met the Zodiac Killer.
WHAT SHE SAYS: Eat some soup.
WHAT THE KIDS SAY: Who is the Zodiac Killer?
WHAT I SAY: I’m lucky to be here. What if they saw the look in my eye that meant I realized exactly who they were. I wouldn’t be here, I said. They would have bludgeoned me to death.
WHAT THE WIFE SAYS: What was wrong with the dog? The dog, I say, was fine. But I tell her it reminds me of what I just learned. Guess, I said, what is the closest relative of the whale?
WHAT THE WIFE SAID: The dog? The horse? Humans?
WHAT I SAID: No, no, no. You would not believe it but it’s true. Cows are the closest relative of whales. When I said it, it made sense. I could see cows floating peacefully in the ocean waves, their large eyes moving side to side, taking in their water world.
WHAT SAM SAYS: Poppy, do you know what a female bear is called? It’s called a sh-sh-sh-she bear. Can you believe that?
WHAT THE WIFE SAID: Who left these dishes in the sink? Can’t anyone wipe the stove top? What kind of husband are you? I bet the Zodiac Killer at least leaves his shoes outside the living room. I bet the Zodiac Killer empties the dishwasher. I bet the Zodiac Killer buys his wife a flower on Valentine’s Day. Where’s my flower? My card? My anything? the wife says.
WHAT I DO: I go upstairs. I think maybe Sam was shot by the Zodiac Killer. I think maybe, in a sick way, that’s kind of cool. I mean if you’re going to get shot, it might as well be the Zodiac Killer and not some slovenly hunter with bad aim and a high blood alcohol content.
WHAT MIA DOES: Gives her mother some chocolates from a heart-shaped box her mother left at the foot of her bed on Valentine’s morning.
WHAT I SAY TO THE WIFE: See, there are your chocolates. We didn’t need to spend money on more.
WHAT THE WIFE SAYS: I need a mammogram. I need a Pap smear. I need these things I haven’t had in years. I’ll go to the clinic with you the day of your appointment.
WHAT I DO: Work on a chicken coop with the kids. I have not bought the cedar the Zodiac Killer recommended I buy because the cedar was too expensive. I have bought pine, but I realize, as I’m trying to fit the boards together to see how the end product will look, that the pine is very heavy and I wanted this chicken coop to be the kind of chicken coop two people could pick up and carry to a new spot in the field every day so that the chicken poop wouldn’t destroy the same section of grass every day, but darn if the Zodiac Killer wasn’t right about the cedar. The pine weighs a ton.
WHAT GISELA WANTS TO KNOW: Is there anyone who will go to Tübingen with her? (Gisela is no longer after me about my levels.)
CALL: The man who had a horse I had to put down and who speaks German has another horse that is a little lame. The man tells me that his uncle, who is not right and who lives in the apartment above their barn, has seen the spacecraft, too, and that he did not believe him. Now, he says, he has a new perspective on his uncle, and he doesn’t want to have to think about it but maybe, just maybe, more of what he has said over the years is possibly true. The man still has three horses, and they stand in the field, their manes whipping in the wind, in a wind the man tells me is the fiercest in these parts and he swears there are no other fields, no other hillsides that could quite compare. Maybe it’s true, I think, I am so cold up here. I zip my coat up as far as it can go, so that if I bend my head down, the zipper digs into my chin. “Furchtbare Kälte,” I say to the man who speaks German. Ah, yes, very good. I understand you. You just said it’s very cold out. Your German is coming along well, he said. You will know when you are really good at speaking a language when you start dreaming in the language. Have you dreamt in German? he asked. No, I answered.
RESULT: I X-rayed the foot. I could not see any damage, just a slight swelling. It could be the shoes, I said. The man who spoke German nodded. I will have the farrier come pull them, he said. What kinds of things? I asked the man who spoke German. What do you mean? he asked. What are the things that your uncle has said over the years that maybe you believe now? I asked. Oh, well, he believes there are people in the woods watching us. After the man who spoke German said it, I thought of the shape I saw form out of the leaves by the bonfire I built behind my house. The uncle was right, I thought. I wanted to meet him. You can’t, he doesn’t like people. He won’t talk to anyone, except me and my wife and our children. He talks to the children quite often, more than he talks to us. He has pointed out the people in the woods to the children. They see them, too. But of course, I thought the children were just playing along with their uncle’s game.