But he let that go.
As sleep overtook, he drifted back to the Buddhist dinner party, recalling Michael Imperioli’s story. The actor said that after the retreat in Ukiah, he never saw his friend again, yet got postcards, in which the man wrote that he was on his way to a place called Summerland to meet his dead wife. The strange thing was, Devi had more or less said the same thing — she and her beloved teacher were on their way to that very place, when destiny had interrupted, in the form of “Jerome” himself. The article in the small-town Minnesota paper that Jeremy found online, The Summerland Sentinel, recounted the notorious unsolved murders of Margot and “Little Jim” MacKlatchie more than three decades before, in the hamlet of the same name.
What did it all mean?
The soft rain fell…
When Devi summarily announced — again, with odd dispassion — that it was her turn to “go on ahead,” she said it was by dint of finding “my Sir, who waits for me.” By then the lightness had gone out of her, and the light from her eyes too, replaced by something indescribably different. She was no longer his, nor was she Wyatt’s.
On the morning that she left, she told one last story in the “old” style.
“After my Bella died, my guru said we must go. That he had heard the bells and they beckoned us to take to the road — to the ‘Highway of Holiness,’ he said, that would deliver us to freedom. To Silence. I gathered what few possession I had (I threw everything away when Bella went ahead) and spent my last hours in Chicago with pounding heart, blushing like a bride. My Sir bought me a beautiful suit at Marshall Field and told me to have my hair and nails done because ‘one must begin such a great adventure with understated elegance and easy formality.’ So I did. And as I was rushing to meet him at the train station, I bumped into a boy I knew from middle school. We’d gone to college together too, and while we didn’t see each other much because of our schedule of classes, I knew he had always been in love with me. He was shy and held back, but I knew. When he saw me he was shocked at how I looked because I was usually so plain! I never cared about makeup or how I did my hair or what I wore. When he saw it was me, it made him crazy. I’ll never forget the look on his face. ‘Cathy!’ he said — I wasn’t Devi yet, I was still Cathy to the world, and to that world I suppose shall always be—‘Cathy, my God, I didn’t recognize you!’ We chatted, though he could see I was anxious, and in a hurry. And finally — finally! — he asked me out. I was polite, but said that I was on my way to the station and was going away on a long journey. His face got sad and he said, ‘Did you meet someone?’ I just looked down at my shoes. How could I tell him the truth of who — of what—I had met? How does one say one ‘met’ Silence? I could scarcely say it to myself. And how paltry the question was, how human, yet how poignant, how beautiful! So I stammered yes, kissed his cheek, and ran off.”
Jeremy remembered her final kiss to him, and the one she bestowed on their son.
Then, those last words:
“I’ll see Bella soon — and my precious Sir… his wife and son—and my… why, I’ll see Mother and Father—and Tristen too! Then you, Jerome, and then Wyatt—
“And all whom I ever loved.”
—
The flirty, dark-clouded skies snubbed the storm, and the birthday party was a marvel. Nature was in an uproar — as if thrilled to have been invited, she changed costumes like a teenager who couldn’t make up its mind. (Her room was a glorious mess.) Thankfully, she had decided not to bother the event with any petulant, hormonal displays, at least none that a light umbrella couldn’t handle.
Cell phones were confiscated on entry, the unpopular chore carried out with panache by an affable stable mucker, size Extra Large, who’d dopily squeezed himself (and been well squozen by others) into the chrysalis of a grungy old Quiksilver wetsuit, festively adorned in leaves, twigs, Post-its, and glitter. The donkey ears that his smaller, even more puckish counterpart would soon attach to a snoring Bottom were taped to his battered cycling helmet like a HELLO sticker at a jackass convention. In regard to the banning of electronic devices, the invitees already knew it to be a policy of the manor. When she first took up residency, Dusty threw a housewarming whereby she welcomed the new neighbors with a heartfelt speech expressing her hopes that one day she might be deemed a worthy addition to their community. She also spoke of her partner’s “accident” and its effect on their lives, before congenially segueing to enlighten her guests as to the obscene bounty placed upon post-trauma images/videos of Aurora (there had been none as yet) “should they become available.” Such an eventuality, she said, was doubtless an intrusion she wished to postpone for as long as she could. The actress took great care not to tar the villagers with that brush, making sure they understood that even friendly group shots, taken by the innocents now gathered, and photobombed, as they say, by the sometimes scampish Aurora (the guests tittered but warmly understood where Dusty was going with this), had the potential to be hacked by professionals with all the stealth, speed, and brutality of wolves slaughtering sheep. Their embarrassed but resolute hostess couldn’t apologize enough, as she felt the whole business to be unneighborly, but really had no need, because the good and honorable Brutonnières, won over by her sensitivity, humility, and earnestness, not to mention the touching heroism of her predicament, heartfully assured those wishes would be respected. And besides, their sons’ and daughters’ smartphone umbilicuses were ones they looked forward to cutting, be it only for a few hours. The prospect made them right jolly.
The amphitheater was graced with revolving sets of forest and castle hall, but the former, with its breeze-twitched bramble, carpet of leaves, and overhang of painted stars, was what captivated Aurora most. The excitable girl, more of a girl at forty than ever, sat in the audience beside her mother, thrilled to teeth and bone by the tin-rattled tempest — courtesy of the forearms of Sir Extra Large — that accompanied the drama. (The scudding drafts of the real storm kicked up their heels in delight at the tin-eared impersonation.) Her manic gaiety was such that Aurora temporarily forgot she had a part to play in the night’s ensemble; Dusty feared she’d spent a greater part of the week preoccupied more by habiliments than the learning of lines. But the resultant outfit, a sensational catchpenny mash-up of punk-royale fairydom, had well been worth it: a tiara of safety pins, waggles of black and bloodred tulle and chiffon, a vintage Belstaff biker jacket, tatty ermine stole, and enormous rhinestone-spangled butterfly wings. She spent hours scuffing her new Capezios, meticulously spattering them with paint, and carried a skull-knobbed scepter with a rocker’s hauteur — half Siouxsie Sioux, half Queen Cersei. Dusty had already emailed pictures to Vivienne Westwood, due in July as a houseguest.
So as not to try the patience of its audience nor the elements, Shakespeare’s romp had been condensed enough to be rendered more conceit than dream. As in the play, actors took on multiple roles, though more multiple in this show than likely meant by the author. The cast comprised manor employees, among them a shepherd (who made all the daughters swoon, as shepherds tend), a gardener’s apprentice (a close swoony second), and the son of a caretaker (not even in the running). A flock of Aurora’s carebirds — minders, P.T.s, and the like — rounded out the company, with hawk-like Edwina divebombing the coveted role of Titania. She proved herself far freer in expression and lighter on her feet than one would have guessed from her strict day-shift demeanor and fighting weight.