Gatekeeper III - The Keeping: Gatekeeper Trilogy, #3

I dedicate this book to my confederates:

Megan Pressley

~ for introducing me to many good tales & songs

~ for always being ready to delve into Story with me

~ for being the Sam to my Frodo

Mary Elizabeth Blume Stead

~ for scones and tea and Oxford talks

~ for living Anna’s story in ways I never could

~ for being a kindred spirit whose light inspires me from an ocean away

Jessica Osnoe

~ for flailing, purple-ing, and culinary sonic-ing

~ for sharing adventures with me, from the Doctor to Charlotte to the stage to London (and everything in between)

~ for being my Dear Friend, now and for always

Love and dragons!

The Gatekeeper Trilogy:

––––––––

Gatekeeper I

The Finding

Gatekeeper II

The Leaving

Gatekeeper III

The Keeping

"There are places you can go into,

and places you can go out of;

but the one place, if you do but find it,

where you may go out and in both,

is home."

~ George MacDonald, Lilith

~ Chapter 1 ~

Dear Eddie,

I write this sitting in the kitchen sink.

Not really – I’m actually sitting on my sofa – but that’s one of the coolest opening lines ever. Recognize it? If ’tis strange to you, go read I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith. It just might (may? I’ve been out of English class too long) change your life.

What is it about the first lines of books? Some of them are instantly forgotten, drowned in the noise of all the story that follows in their wake; others haunt you, echoing long after the last page has been read and the cover closed. For example:

There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. (Why not, Jane Eyre? And what, pray, did you do instead?)

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. (However shall you reconcile such an unapologetically paradoxical statement, Charles Dickens? Do tell!)

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a large fortune must be in want of a wife. (Right on, Jane Austen. Preach it.)

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. (What are hobbits? Do they always live in holes? Is this one a nice hole – or, for that matter, a nice hobbit? Is he going to go on living in the hole? Say on, J.R.R. Tolkien. Say on.)

I even find myself haunted by the opening lines of books I’ve never read:

Call me Ishmael. (Nope, never read Moby Dick. Don’t know that I ever shall – no offense to dear Herman, of course, bless his little existentialist heart. But I still want to know why the narrator is so eager to be called Ishmael – and what name he rejected in order to assume that one. Fie on’t.)

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again. (I do hope to read Rebecca someday, if only to find out why the narrator left Manderley in the first place. And why she dreams about it still. Fie again.)

And on, and on. I’ve read plenty of wonderful tales with utterly forgettable first lines, but finding words that mesmerize so instantaneously and lastingly . . . that seems to be an extraordinary gift given only to a few writers. What I want to know is this: HOW DO THEY DO IT? What makes these particular words so darn catchy? I’ve given a lot of thought to this recently – as in, since I started writing this letter – and the best I can come up with is that these lines all contain an invitation. It’s as if the writer is saying, ‘I’m having a party.’ ‘Really?’ the reader says. ‘Am I invited?’ ‘Of course!’ the writer replies. ‘It is because you are here that I am having the party. Enter, and I shall tell you all my secrets.’

Who would say no to that? Certainly not me. Feeling included is such a lovely thing.

Why all this pensivity (new word – I just made it up, I think) all of a sudden, you ask? I suppose my current circumstances, being full of endings, have driven me to ponder beginnings. I am hoping that the old adage ‘In every ending, there is a beginning’ is actually true. If it is, then today is an epic beginning.

And I’m really, really hoping that my first line will be . . . good.

Yours in haste,

Anna

Anna stretched and yawned, looking with bleary eyes around the tiny living room that took up most of her tiny apartment. Yawning was probably not the most auspicious follow-up to the closing line she had just penned, but it was an honest indication of reality: she was tired. Graduate school was no laughing matter. Three years of it had taken their relentless toll on one Anna Miranda Merritt – and she was tired. Regardless of whatever life-chapter followed tonight’s first line, she hoped it would include at least fifteen free minutes at some point so she could catch a quick power nap.

But not yet; first, tonight had to happen. Tonight, ready or not, the curtain would go up on her thesis show, Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, the play she had directed as her final project for the hard-won degree: Master of Fine Arts in Directing. She closed her eyes, fighting back the temptation to doze and concentrating on her mental checklist. She’d been over it at least twelve times since lunch, but she still couldn’t believe that it was all accomplished. The weeks of rehearsal were behind her; the last production meeting the previous week had worked out the (hopefully) final costume mishaps; tech week had gone as smoothly as could be expected; her thesis was written and revised and waiting only for her reflections on the performances, which she could write next week before presenting – and defending – all two hundred pages of the document to her thesis review committee. Tonight, all she had to do was show up and try not to faint.

The jury was still out on how successful that last bit of the plan was going to be.

She opened her eyes and let her gaze wander back to the windowsill beside her, upon which sat a vase filled with a riot of spring flowers. The arrangement had been delivered earlier that day with a card bearing a message of only three words:

Make Anton proud.

The card wasn’t signed, but Anna knew the bouquet could only have come from her undergraduate theatre professor and mentor, Mrs. E. It was Mrs. E who had prompted – or rather, pushed – Anna into pursuing graduate work in theatre, and Anna had turned to her several times over the past three years for advice and encouragement. Mrs. E had always been blunt with the former and often brusque with the latter, but her words never failed to brace Anna for her daily landslide of duties.

Anna smiled. Her MFA colleagues and advisors hadn’t been able to understand why she was so adamant about directing Uncle Vanya for her thesis show – but then again, they’d never met Mrs. E. The professor’s love affair with Anton Chekhov was legendary within the theatre department of Hope College, Anna’s alma mater. In Anna’s first theatre class, Mrs. E had held forth for a full sixty minutes about Chekhov’s inimitable greatness, and Anna had had a soft spot for the tragically misunderstood Russian playwright ever since.

The cheerful bouquet soothed Anna’s aching, sleep-starved eyes, and she stood resolutely. Folding the newly-finished letter, she inserted it deftly into a prepared envelope, sealed it, and placed it carefully on the bookshelf near the door – at eye level, so she’d be sure to see it and grab it when she left. She looked at it for a moment, regarding her own cheerful script and the Oxford address that was now as familiar as her own name.

Eddie’s letters had been coming from farther and farther away as he traveled, taking on increasing responsibilities as the Truman Foundation’s Associate Director of International Operations, but Anna always addressed her letters to the Truman homestead in Oxford, knowing Eddie’s father or uncle – the Truman brothers, Hugh and Henry – would forward it immediately to wherever he happened to be that week. In return, Anna had received a plethora of offerings from all over the world: postcards from Australia, tea from India, chocolates from Belgium, and a particularly thick and newsy letter from Shanghai, where Eddie’s grasp of the language was still so elementary that he’d spent most of his precious free time in his room, rather than exploring or making new friends as usual. Eddie seemed to make friends wherever he went; each new city became a home, and Anna found herself caught up in his enthusiasm for every locale as she lived vicariously through his amusing accounts. All the missives bore Eddie’s signature style, full of outlandish speech narrating even more outlandish thoughts and behavior, but their most striking feature was, by far, their consistency: regardless of how far afield his duties flung him, Eddie had never failed to write, and Anna had a small box shaped like a treasure chest on her desk, chock-full of three years’ worth of The Edmund Chronicles.

Anna wondered how long it had been since she’d actually thought about writing to Eddie. It was simply part of life, as reliable as Saturday and as wholesome as the oatmeal she had taken to having for breakfast each morning. The dream of living in England, for which Eddie’s letters had originally been a lifeline, had grown so faint and shimmery – beautiful in its ever-receding vagueness, but unequivocally unattainable any time soon – that it had long since ceased to drive her. For the past three years, she had been able to enjoy the correspondence for what it was: a means of sharing life with a dear and faithful friend, regardless of circumstance or location.

Anna smiled, gave the letter an impish flick, and bounded to the bedroom to don her proud director garb. All mawkish musings aside, it was time to prepare for tonight’s first line and whatever came after it.

She hoped that, in later years, those looking back would say that the new chapter began – and, of course, that the previous chapter ended – with making Anton proud.

***

Anna shook her professor’s hand gratefully – not only because he had just said several unexpectedly kind words about her work with Chekhov’s subtext, but because he was the last person waiting to speak to her. Sending him off with one last Thank you, she turned to gaze at the costume designer’s display, allowing the rest of the crowd to filter out behind her.

She’d slipped out as soon as the curtain call music started playing so she could be in the dressing room when the cast returned from their well-earned bows. After saying her effusive and sincere words of appreciation and adulation, she had returned to the lobby hoping for a hasty exit, only to find a veritable armada of well-wishers waiting to regale her with twenty-seven subtle variations of Congratulations on a job well done. Thirty minutes later, she’d received them all with admirable enthusiasm and individualized attention, masking with Chekhovian aplomb her own mental subtext: Stop. Please. Please stop talking. Home. I want to go home. Bed. Now. I wish for bed. PLEASE.

Tomorrow, she would rejoice. Tonight, all she could feel was relief, laced heavily with weariness.

Home. Please.

Brava, Merritt. Bravissima.

Oh, sweet mercy.

She froze.

She quickly thought better of it, un-froze, and turned around.

She froze again.

Edmund Mitchell Truman was standing in the lobby of the Basement Theatre at Marshall State University. He was standing not three feet away from her, grinning cheekily, his hands thrust cheekily into the pockets of his cheekily tailored suit.

She stared at him.

Your clothes.

He looked down in sudden – and uncharacteristic – concern. What about them?

They . . . fit.

Ah. Yes. He relaxed, cheeky grin firmly back in place. Keep in mind, Merritt, that you haven’t seen me in over three years. When we met at uni, I was still going on the stratagem that if I always bought bigger and bigger clothes, I would eventually grow into them. It’s thrifty and frugal and minimizes time wasted shopping later on.

Anna nodded. Foolproof plan, that.

’S what I thought.

So what went wrong?

I woke up one day and realized, to my horror, that I had stopped growing. He looked at her with a gaze of such woeful gravity that she couldn’t possibly laugh. Instead, she nodded again.

It happens to the best of us. What did you do?

Formed a new plan.

Which was?

He grinned again. Cuz took me shopping.

Now she laughed. Bravo, Nicholas! Well done. And well done, YOU! Impulsively, she rushed forward and threw her arms around him. Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?

I wanted it to be a surprise, of course. Besides, what if some poor museum curator in Reykjavik suddenly needed my help negotiating the purchase of a twelfth-century Norse medallion? I would have had to disappoint you, and that would be unconscionable. Hopes that aren’t raised can’t be shot down; that’s my motto.

Says the man born with no cynicism synapses. But, thanks for coming anyway. Recalling her earlier musings, she added, And thanks for continuing to write all this time. It’s . . . helped.

You didn’t think I was just going to drop you, surely? I always said you’d be back and that we’d be together again – and now you will be, and we will be. He opened his arms in a grand gesture. Anna Merritt, I have come to offer you a job!

She stared at him, and he lowered his arms quickly.

Just a desk job, he said apologetically, and then it all came out in a rush. Clerical bits and bobs. We need an administrator in our London office, and Barnabas – your Dr. Barney – needs an assistant while he teaches at UCL and researches for his new book. Some antiquarian tome on . . . antiquities. Vikings this time, I believe. You’d probably tear out all your own hair by the end of the first week and then go fully barmy after the second, but . . . it’s a job. Everyone has to lose one’s faculties at least once in one’s life. Why not come do it in England, so we could be there to buy you a pint afterwards?

She was still staring at him. His brow wrinkled in a strange, unfamiliar look of trepidation.

The job is yours if you want it. I – we’d love to have you back. If you’re still keen on living in my humble native land, that is.

She stared for one more moment before she found herself forming words.

Are you . . . serious?

He nodded, still gazing at her with un-Eddie-ish anxiety.

She smiled – slowly at first, trying to rein in her jubilation before it exploded all over him and the costume display and the entire basement of the Fine Arts Building.

Joy won out in less than a minute.

Yes. Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes. YES! She laughed – a downright guffaw, her first in years. I’m going to ENGLAND!

I always told you that you would, remember? He spread his arms grandly again. Doubt not the spoken or written word of Edmund Mitchell Truman.

Anna snorted. EMT! I’d never picked up on that.

Eddie looked blank. What, pray, about my initials amuses you?

Emergency Medical Technician. ‘EMT’ is what we Americans call the folks who go ’round in ambulances rescuing people.

Ah. Sounds about right then, doesn’t it? That could be my job description: riding to the rescue in cultural emergencies. This certainly qualifies. Consider yourself rescued. He extended his hand. Welcome back to the fold, Miss Merritt.

She shook the offered hand with all due dignity. Thank you, Mr. Truman.

To her surprise, he bent low over her hand and kissed it briefly before releasing it.

Picked that up in France, he said gaily. What d’you think?

Anna smiled. Maybe we should call you an Emergency Manners Technician.

Not if I leave you much longer without proper nourishment, he said seriously. You have worked and worried your way into a smashing appetite, I’m sure, and I am instructed by the brothers Truman to treat you to a celebratory feast at an establishment of your choice. Is there any cuisine in this town worthy of such an occasion?

Oh, there are lots of great restaurants here. But – can I be honest?

Always.

All I want is a milkshake, she confided. A really super thick peanut butter fudge milkshake. And fries – lots of fries. They won’t be as good as chips with cheese ’n‘ gravy, she said quickly, forestalling Eddie’s scornful retort, but there’s a 24-hour burger joint here that’s just as greasy as any kebab van. And they have really, really good fries, which go really, really well with their fairly magnificent milkshakes. Sound good?

He bowed formally. Tonight is your night, Madame Director. I am at your disposal.

Really? Cool. She skipped away before his biting wit could overcome his sudden bout of chivalry. I’ll get my purse.

She emerged from the theatre moments later to find him studying the set designer’s display. He looked strangely at home, standing there in his well-tailored suit, despite the foreign surroundings. Was it just his uncanny ability to adapt to new environments? That was a crucial part of his job, after all, and Anna gathered from his letters that he was quite good at it. Or was it rather that she, Anna, instantly felt more at home now that he was here? How could it be that, after so long a separation, she still felt more kinship with this fair-haired gangly oddball than with the people who had shared her daily life these past three years? These were questions worthy of Dr. Barney – and now, she would get to ask him in person.

Eddie turned and flashed her another grin. Ready?

She almost danced to him, buoyed by a joy that could only be the fruit of a long-lost seed of hope, suddenly awakened into roaring, burgeoning life.

Always.

She took his arm and strolled out the door, too full of what lay ahead to give another thought to the weariness that had been her all-consuming reality only moments before.

If she had thought to look back, she might have noticed a fedora-clad silhouette slip silently from the darkened theatre and creep along in the shadows after them. She might have seen him duck around a corner and pull out a phone, or caught the spark of his lighter as a cigarette flared into life.

The man took a long drag on his cigarette, waiting as the phone rang. Once, twice, three times – then the well-known voice, smooth and rich and commanding.

Well?

Sir, she’s coming back.

That was his message – just four words. The phone clicked on the other end, and the fedora-clad figure took another deep drag as he deposited his own phone back into his pocket. He flicked away a few lingering sparks, ground them into the pavement with his heel, and set off into the shadows to prepare for the next phase of the long game.

~ Chapter 2 ~

Stamp. Stamp. Stamp.

. . . Stamp.

Anna stood on her tiptoes and craned her neck around to the right, but she still couldn’t quite see the customs officials she trusted were waiting at the mythical end of this seemingly eternal line. She could only hear the steady sound of their stamps hitting various passports, the echoes wafting over the heads of the crowd like a bell resiliently tolling out the sound of hope.

Stamp. Stamp. Stamp.

You will get through. You will get through. You will get . . . through.

Anna sighed. She had thought that by flying overnight into London and arriving early on a Wednesday morning, she would avoid the crowds; but, apparently, approximately one quarter of the world’s population had shared the same stroke of genius. She had been standing in this line for the past two hours, wilting under the dim fluorescent lights and attempting to amuse herself by scanning the crowd for celebrity lookalikes and – in tribute to Eddie, who considered people-watching a sport in the same league with rugby and football – eavesdropping on all her fellow line-prisoners.

As she was surrounded by an Indian family, a Korean couple, and a broodingly silent Frenchman, the people-watching had borne little fruit until the last fifteen minutes. That was when she had realized that the language barrier was not a barrier at all, but an opportunity to put her creativity to its most whimsical use. Accordingly, she had spent the past quarter of an hour inventing her own dialogue for the rapid-fire conversations happening around her. The Korean couple, she decided, was taking a second honeymoon, and the husband was encouraging the wife not to be too concerned about the three kids, two dogs, and four parakeets they had left at home. The Indian family was on a quest to find the husband’s long-lost brother who had moved to England two decades earlier and vanished until a postcard sent last month from Liverpool. As for the Frenchman . . . the Frenchman, she guessed, was mainly concerned about where and when he could find a very large glass of wine.

Anna sighed and shifted her bulging knapsack from her aching left shoulder to her minutely less-aching right shoulder. She wouldn’t mind a rather large glass of wine herself. Or, better yet, coffee – a rich British-made mocha, followed by a nap, a shower, a change of clothes, and a proper sit-down tea with scones and cream and jam and chocolate-covered biscuits.

Or even just tea, she mused to herself. A real cuppa – a real, authentic, soothing, bracing cup of REAL TEA, for the first time in over three years – and I could face anything.

She needed something to boost her courage; that was certain. As much as she detested this light-forsaken customs corridor – as much as she longed to be free from the bowels of Heathrow Airport and breathe again the sweet air of her adopted homeland – she could not deny that with every step towards the source of the sound of hope, her apprehension grew.  She had tried to reason herself out of it; after all, here she was, where she’d been longing to be since she had departed over three and a half years ago. She was coming to stay and live and work – to work with the Trumans, no less. She should be skipping through Heathrow, passing out garlands and singing songs of contagious jubilation. So why was she shuffling along like a sodden scarecrow, listening to imaginary conversations in a futile effort to drown out her own brain?

Alas, the reasons for fear were simply too many for her to ignore or combat for long, and it had been a long flight. She’d been elated while boarding the plane, moderately excited during takeoff, and quietly glad through the first drinks service, but as the lights went out and the other passengers settled