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PROLOGUE

I flunked the second, third, and ninth grades. In my heart, I knew I was dumb. No one actually said it. In fact, everyone went to great lengths to avoid the issue altogether. I wasn’t dumb, I was simply the opposite of smart—which, at the time, meant slow, unfocused, undisciplined, and uncooperative. My mother used to insist that I had faulty wiring. As if I were some kind of dud appliance. I can’t tell you how many t times I wanted to quit. I finally did when I was sixteen. Instead of driving lessons, my mother agreed to let me get my high-school equivalency. The fact of the matter is we were both worn out. Like the way I felt when Frank, drunk as a skunk, flew off the highway in his F150 Super- Supercharged Lightning and got himself killed. A wit- charged witness described my husband’s truck as skidding off the cliff into the ocean like a set of dishes sliding off a tray. I imagined him speeding toward home at midnight in his usual state of bonhomie, his Johnny Cash CD blasting away, his Hawaiian shirt whipping in the wind, and then — boom! All that hotshot charisma and sex appeal smashed to smithereens.

It was rotten weather the next morning when the cops drove up to break the news. The rains came freakishly late in the early spring and then just hung around—wet, sloppy streets, dead leaves, the sky the color of dirty dishwater. They must have thought I was a pretty tough cookie as they handed me the baggie with his personal items, his bloodstained address book, his wallet, his watch, and the change stained that had jangled in his pocket. I think they worried I’d gone into shock. But I’d already done that a few years back when the poison in our marriage lurked under the surface like a jellyfish. He was dead and I wasn’t mourning.

I’m not a bad person. Really. It’s just that I’m not the grieving widow. And that’s not acceptable in our society unless maybe you’ve murdered the son of a bitch, which I didn’t. But, as the therapist told me in our community center shortly after the funeral, when I confessed my lack of feelings, I was the epitome of freeway fantasy for divorcees and unhappy housewives. Here’s how it goes. Your partner walks out of the house one morning and shortly thereafter you get the call, the one you’ve been hoping for all those lousy years. It’s clean. It’s final. You’re free. A life cut short a happy coincidence.

The worst part was the week after the funeral. My mother and I sat, side by side, on Frank’s shiny leather sofa, like two s crows on a telegraph wire, as the procession of people with sympathetic faces and hushed voices paraded by. The silences were long and awkward. There’s no way anyone can start a halfway interesting conversation at a time like this. You can’t exactly talk about something fun you’ve done the weekend before or anything good that’s going on in your life—parties, business successes, vacations, or big purchases. And you dare not refer to the growing pile of grief-counseling books stacked on the coffee table. When God Doesn’t Make Sense, The Grief Recovery Handbook, y four copies of Why Bad Things Happen to Good People, and a paperback version of Living Through Personal Crisis (this one might actually be of some use.

No. You are limited to a very narrow range of topics. Like the food, the memorial service, recapping the accident (at what exact angle did the truck careen off the cliff), and by the way, where do you keep the scotch? Most of the time, people end up drinking too much and telling unfunny vignettes about the deceased.

“Remember the time Frank got totally blasted and cannonballed naked into the pool at that wedding and got all the bridesmaids’ dresses soaked?” Ha ha ha. “Cassie, is there anything I can do?” Everybody asks me that as they plunge their raw carrots into the sour cream dip.

Wouldn’t they like to know. How about paying of Frank’s credit cards, getting rid of the ugly football trophies from his high school days, dumping his drug paraphernalia hidden in his smelly sock drawer. Oh, and how about picking up his ashes, selecting the urn, and delivering it to his family in Florida who couldn’t bother to come out but assured me they would be having their own memorial service as soon as they get the remains and by the way, could I send them his computer, his junky macho furnishings, his country western collection, and yes, even his truck, which I’d be only too happy to ship if it weren’t flattened like a coin on a railroad track. They also asked about his life insurance policy road policy, which he cashed in several years ago to buy the fucking truck.

I know it’ it’s not good to speak ill of the dead. But is dishonesty any better? Most of the people who come here mean well. Even if they have it all wrong. They’re coming here to pay their respects to someone who didn’t much like them and to offer their sympathy to someone who doesn’t want it.

Okay. He did have a few friends who will miss him. And, despite his disloyalty to me, he was a good friend to them. My mother has always believed there is good and bad in everyone. I should remember that.

But still, I’m not grieving. I do, however, suffer from guilt, festering anger, frustration, and, oh yes, did I mention that I’m broke? It is a kind of grief, let me assure you. I didn’t always feel this way. There was a time when I just wanted him to love me. Not in a passionate way. I didn’t hope for that. I wanted him to love me in the way one goes about an ordinary life—doing the same mundane things, following the same uneventful routines, knowing what comes next, day after day, until you lie in bed beside him at night and listen to the familiar sounds of traffic way off in the distance. I wanted him to call me when he got there, or when he was on his way home or if he was late or stuck in traffic and wanted to just hear the sound of my voice the way I wanted to hear his. I wanted him to leave me money for groceries, fix the DVD player, tell me to drive carefully, complain about the business, leave wet towels on the bathroom floor, admire my dress but add that it might be too low or too tight.

In the last few months he was barely there at all. Mornings, he was out the door before I even had my coffee, and we rarely talked all day. When I called him, his voice sounded gruff, like he was in the middle of something, but he never called me back. We didn’t have a set dinner hour or anything like that, and pretty soon I stopped asking what he’d like to eat because he always said he didn’t care. The last time I fixed him dinner he complained that the chicken was half-cooked and shoved the plate so hard across the table, it fell into my lap and then crashed to the floor. Even before he admitted he was seeing someone else, I figured it out. I’m not that dumb.

When I told him to get rid of her or I was leaving, he did what most men do. He lied. In my experience, men would rather commit hara-kiri than tell you to your face they prefer someone else. But then he told me he’d change, resenting me for it, and zeroed in on the one thing that brought me to my knees. He made me feel dumb. You shouldn’t tell people your darkest secrets. It always comes back to bite you.

In the end, he broke my heart. Even a louse can break your heart. The progression of it all was swift and constant, like the onset of rain in November and then freezing winds in winter. I couldn’t swallow, I couldn’t sit down, I couldn’t concentrate. It was like a cold, hard sentence. I could tell when he used a false tone or eyed me with stony resentment. I learned the routine, the mechanical switching of the mouth, that nervous thing he did with his fingers when he lied. So there I sat in an empty house, the mail piled up in a dump heap by the door, unread soggy newspapers littering the lawn. Me, lying in all afternoon, drapes drawn, lights dimmed, overdue DVDs scattered around like unwanted possessions put out with the trash.

“Hi, honey, how’re you doing?”

“Great, Mom. Frank and I are on our way out. Going to a dinner party.”

“That’s nice, dear. Is it fancy?”

“Sort of. I’m wearing my new cocktail dress.”

“Don’t forget the hostess gift.” Oh yes. A lovely little grenade would be perfect.

“Absolutely.”

“You two have a good time now.”

I felt ashamed, the way I did in school when I’d study all week and still blow the test.

Eventually I just wore myself out. I got sick of struggling, immune to failure, and, finally, felt nothing at all. I quit. I simply didn’t love him anymore.

No one ever plans for this to happen. I remember the first time I met him, four years ago. He was tall and lean with high cheekbones and sleek black hair pulled back in a ponytail, like a samurai. A mixture of brute force and grace. Who knew he had the heart of a cockroach. He was holding a wounded red-tailed hawk that he jokingly called road kill. When he walked into the Topanga Wildlife Center, where worked with my mother, he looked around like a warrior , warrior, his black, penetrating eyes fixed on my face. He reminded me of a falcon. Predatory and dangerous. I should have known better. Biologist Konrad Lorenz has proven that baby chicks run for cover when they see a silhouette of a falcon—even a plywood model.

We talked a bit. Later he called. He was cool, aloof, with a sexy languor about him. Trouble. Like the devil himself. Handsome and terrific in bed. He liked my long legs, he said, my dark water-green eyes, my wide mouth, and the fact that I didn’t chatter on and on like other women. I’ve always thought I was plain, but he made me feel pretty. He swooped me up. Came on strong. Decided it was time for him to get married. All his friends were married off. Lucky me. The timing was perfect. He proposed after two months. I felt grateful to have him.

After we got married, I started helping him part-time in his business, a towing company located on Pacific Coast Highway. Every day, surfers, stoners, and tourists would park their cars illegally along the highway and come back wet and tired to an empty space. His lot was behind the Mobil station across the street from the most expensive shopping area in Malibu, and he stacked up so many cars on beautiful sunny weekends that it looked like a parking lot for a rock festival or a giant swap meet. I worked in a cramped, air-conditioned office/trailer that sat at the top of a stony, dusty road leading to the lot. Anxious people in everything from wet suits to bikinis and flip-flops would show up there at all hours, sometimes in cabs or on foot, staring numbly at a handwritten sign which informed them that they owed Frank’s Towing $240.00 (no checks!), plus $65.00 a day for owing storage, plus whatever the city parking ticket was for leaving their cars in a tow-away zone.

Often, they’d leave their wallets or purses in the vehicle and I’d have to accompany them like convicts to their car, unlock it, and stand there while they grabbed their stuff then lock it back up again.

“Don’t you give them the keys,” Frank would warn me.

“They’ll split if they get the chance.”

“How can they split? You’ve got them stacked in. Give the kids a break,” I’d always say, looking at their sandy bare feet and sweaty, stressed-out faces.

“Who told them to park there? Did I tell them to park there? I just do what the cops tell me to do. Don’t be such a bleeding heart,” he’d say contemptuously, flashing a hostile smile.

In one afternoon, Frank would go through an assortment of moods. From “fuck you” indifference to moody sulks to chattering, hustle-like rants. He survived on his wits and scared me out of mine. I could always tell when he was about to blow—he’d get the fixed eye of a man with a serious grievance—bullying eyebrows, and those muscles around the mouth would tense up and sort of pop. I’d sit there rigid, waiting for the unpleasantness that filled the air to disperse, then I’d get on with my day.

Working in the lot, I always felt like a crumb, especially with the kids who didn’t have any money t money. I’d sit at my desk, avoiding their gazes as they called their parents. Then I’d listen to their sad, sad stories, feeling their embarrassment. One kid had to wait for about six hours until his mother got off work in the city and then drove all the way to the beach to bail him out. In rush hour. That may have been the day I’d added up the bill wrong, messing up the numbers, and Frank got so steamed he scrawled “BIRDBRAIN” like graffiti across the back of my chair.

Then, in a voice barely above a whisper, but with the force of a shout, he announced in front of everybody that this was a place of business, not “The House of Dumbness,” and that I was a freak of nature—a flunky with no future. I walked right out on my job that day. Quit. Indeed I did. I told him I preferred working at the wildlife center. In retrospect, I should have walked out on him. It doesn’t really matter anymore. Seems Frank had mortgaged the business to the hilt and cross-collateralized it with our house. I’ve now moved back in with my mother, to my childhood home on the crest of Topanga Canyon, a small community thirty minutes from LA, with one traffic light and one turtle-crossing sign. It’s the kind of neighborhood where people are slightly vague about how many dogs or cats they own, so they simply leave out giant bowls of kibble by the back door. You see mangy, one-eared cats lazing around people’s porches, elaborate wind chimes, and hand carved birdhouses. My mother calls it rustic (as opposed to carved seedy) and I tend to agree with her.

My backyard is part of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, almost six hundred miles of hiking trails, forests, and valleys. It’ It’s a wild, uninhabitable mountainous area with dark forests, lakes, waterfalls, mysterious caverns, and lush green canopies filled with the songs of hundreds of birds.

As a child I was free to roam the hills with no thoughts of my shortcomings or deficiencies. I’d spend whole weekends in the outdoors in a dreamlike state of opulent imaginings, making up stories of my accomplishments and amazing feats. I’d see bobcats, wolves, coyotes, foxes, and red-tailed hawks who torpedoed down like missiles to impale their prey. I was at home in this world, never afraid of animals.

Even the dangerous ones.

So now I’ve done my bit, sitting in the living room with acquaintances and distant relatives like my great-aunt Stella who tried to buck me up with depressing clichés from her grief counseling sessions, such as “closure” and “circle of caring.” Thankfully, no one drops by anymore. My mother and I have finished wrapping the hardened, half-eaten casseroles and cakes and storing them in the freezer. I walk into my cramped bedroom that didn’t seem this small when I was a child and look out the narrow window toward the mountains.

This used to be my favorite time of year. Soon the Monarch butterflies will make their spectacular migration along the California coast on their way to Mexico. They arrive here every year in the same spot, brilliant blotches of yellow and black, dripping from the trees like fall foliage. They litter the driveways and cover the windshields of the cars. I’m always so careful not to crush their delicate wings as I gently sweep them from the steps of our house.

I always tell people, you don’ don’t need to go to the Amazon or New Guinea to be wonderstruck by nature—you can just walk out my front door any day in the fall and you’ll see those glorious beings, flitting and darting in the air—a rush of iridescent color—like fairies or angels in disguise. It doesn’t matter what kind of mood you’re in, or even if you’re in no mood at all and just carrying on, like a robot, trying to get through the day. There they are—swirling in the air like escaping bits of fragmented color from a kaleidoscope.

My mother says that watching Monarchs is solace for the pain of living. I guess I wouldn’t go that far but they’re a miracle just the same. They follow the sun—fly as far as fifty miles a day and as high as a hundred feet. Then they end up in Mexico right on schedule, around November 2, the Day of the Dead. Legend says they are the souls of dead relatives returning home. Lord, I hope not.

 

CHAPTER ONE

I didn't intend to lie on my resume. It just happened. It was after the icy reception I received at the last two employment agencies. The first time, a man with a rodent-like profile, eyes too close together, and a gnawing slash of a mouth suggested I try getting a job at a pet store. The next agent walked me to the door of her office after a quick glance at my resume and said the only thing she could possibly think of was telemarketing from my home — check the classifieds.

As you can imagine, I was feeling pretty deflated as I headed for yet another employment agency. This one had a bulletin board near the entrance, cluttered with notices such as "Accent Elimination" (as if it's some kind of disease). "Speak American, Free Consultation." I noticed no one had torn off the fringed bottom with scrawled vertical telephone numbers. I sat in a cracked vinyl armchair still warm from the last sweaty bottom, filling out forms, but even in this dump, the agent couldn't get rid of me fast enough.

So here's my situation. Considering my educational background (a graduate of the University of Nowheresville) and my age (thirty), I am now virtually unemployable. My years at the wildlife center didn't seem to matter to anyone, especially the employment agencies. They just whizzed right by it and focused on my education or lack of it. "Tell us again why you left high school?" As if I had no business even being there.

My mother was always trying to reassure me, her optimism unflinching. "They'll be sorry they didn't hire you. All the studies say that slow starters are more likely to become billionaires."

"What study was that, Mom?"

"I read it in the dentist's office."

It feels like I'm back in elementary school where I had failure written all over me. What seemed to come effortlessly for everyone else was torture for me.

"Cassie, try not to hold your pencil like a spike," the teacher would urge, breathing down my neck like a truant officer and wincing at my abominable handwriting. "And stop sucking on your lip so hard. Lord, you'll tear it to pieces. Why don't you just take a deep breath and start over later."

That was the signal I eventually waited for — she gave up and so did I. You'd think she'd put a stop to my misery but the fact was she just didn't get it and neither did anyone else. The rest of the year I was either "sick" or late on Fridays, very late. It didn't make any difference, I was the dunce in the corner with a scarlet D on my chest.

Sometimes I'd hear a friend of my mother's talking about her child, little Stacy or darling Susie. "My daughter is amazing. She just woke up one morning and could read everything."

"Is that so?" my mother would reply in a monotone. "What a marvel."

I kept thinking, "Why didn't that happen to me?" When would I "just wake up" and be able to read? And then later, with each mounting failure, "What's so great about reading anyway?"

My mother would sit with me for hours reading things she thought I'd like. Her favorite was an illustrated anthology of Greek myths. We read about gods and heroes like Athena, Diana, Aphrodite, Zeus. The stories I liked the most were the ones where humans changed into birds or beasts or flowers. But my mother liked the stories where the gods bestowed special powers on mortals. I guess that's why she named me Cassandra. After the beautiful goddess who could see the future. She loved the magic — that's what she was hoping for me when she'd hand me the book — but I still couldn't read a word.

In junior high, I made up the plots of the books I read based on the first and last chapters. As a result, my test scores on comprehension were all over the place. Sometimes I guessed right.

Sometimes I didn't. I was a whiz at basic algebra, but if I had to solve how far Mr. Smith traveled on a train from his home in Phoenix to his regional office in Albuquerque and at what velocity it collided with a freight train carrying textiles to Tucson — well, you get the picture. All through school, kids whispered "dim" or "dense" or "dumbbell." Not my friends, though. We never talked about my "problem." Mostly, they were oblivious. They'd always get rewarded with As and I'd get my usual Ds.

"God, Cassie, that test was so easy," they'd say incredulously.

"I didn't study." I'd laugh, like it meant nothing. Heathers became my favorite movie.

Eventually, I figured out the way to survive. Most kids do. I hid my tests and assignments like they were pornography. When my mother asked how I did on my spelling test, I'd say, "Great," and if she questioned me about my homework, I'd tell her, "I did it at school." "Doing it at school" meant shoving it in my desk along with a half dozen other worksheets I found impossible to complete. I'd always get found out, of course. The teacher would call my mother, who'd ask, "What's the matter with you?" We'd spend holiday weekends completing all the work that everyone else had finished during school. The threat of "special ed" loomed over me like a death sentence.

So the masquerade went on. I made small strides. But mostly I feigned boredom or talked to my neighbor. In the meantime, my imagination soared. I made up words. I invented spelling. I created wild fantasies in my mind that were ever so much more entertaining than anything I tried to read at school.

"Once upon a time, a bunch of mean, foulmouthed bullies wandered into the woods to gather berries . . ."

It was about this time my burnt-out mother hired a beautiful silver-haired tutor named Janet Monroe. She lived in a lovely little cottage with a view of the ocean. The plan was for me to go to her house once a week over the summer. But, after an initial evaluation, she recommended two-hour sessions three times a week. In the beginning, I felt like a rich kid, although I was well aware that this was a serious financial burden on my mother.

Every afternoon, Mrs. Monroe would lead me through her house to an airy, sun-drenched porch filled with leafy palms, overstuffed furniture, and faded Persian rugs. You had to take your shoes off when you walked in and then say hello to her parrot — a magnificent African gray named Sam who imitated her voice and learned my name pronto. He gave me my first whistle and screeched a flirtatious "Hi, gorgeous!"

All through that summer I struggled with the process of decoding — learning how a written word represents a sound. It's something most kids take for granted, like swimming or riding a bike. But for me, it was hard work.

"This just happens sometimes to smart kids," Mrs. Monroe told my mother in a breathy smoker's voice that trailed off into nothingness. "You have a reading disorder called dyslexia." I was trying to digest all this when she asked Sam to tell her who, besides me, had a similar problem in their youth. That bird was so damn brilliant. He shot back, "Einstein, Rockefeller, Edison, Picasso, Walt Disney, and John Lennon."

"There," she'd say when he was done. "You're in fine company."

We did a lot of workbook exercises and read out loud. Sam would imitate my labored, choppy voice when I read, memorize passages, and give me a beaky kiss when I was done. I got so I couldn't wait to see him. Then it was September and I went back to school. I never saw Mrs. Monroe again.

Sometime in the fall, she called to tell us that she was ill. A month later, my mother came home with Sam. Mrs. Monroe had died and left him to me. The note on the cage read, "Dear Cassie, next to me, you are Mrs. Monroe's favorite student."

Parrots mate for life, but somehow Sam accepted me. The South American tribes believe parrots have human souls. And I'd have to agree. He'd sidle up my arm after school and kiss me all over my mouth and ears. Sometimes he'd say, "Love you. Miss you. Did you pass?" Okay, so he was repeating my mother, but still, he meant it. Other times he'd repeat my depressing downers.

"I'm just a dumbfuck!" I'd shout.

And he'd repeat with glee, "Dumbfuck! Dumbfuck! Dumbfuck!"

"Shut up!" I'd yell.

"No!" he'd squawk back, flapping his wings and bobbing his head. Sam loved to get me all riled up. It was just a game to him, my deficiencies.

When Sam and I first moved in with Frank, they took an immediate dislike to each other. When we'd argue, that parrot would fasten his small beady eyes on Frank, morph into his aggressive pose, crouch low on his perch with his wings outspread, and peck furiously at Frank's face and hands.

Maybe it was Frank's tone of voice.

"Close the fucking door!" Frank would yell at me as he retreated from Sam's sharp-hooked beak.

"Close the fucking door! Close the fucking door!" Sam would shriek back in Frank's exact same voice as if he were mocking him. Parrots do not grow meek in the face of anger.

The two of them never did make peace, even though I tried to reason with Sam. He continued to bedevil Frank in sly little ways. He could imitate the telephone and the doorbell so perfectly that at least once a night Frank would go running to the door and Sam would cackle and scream, "Dumbfuck!"

More than once, Frank told me to give Sam away or he was going to "kill that fucking bird." It got so bad that at one point I told my mother she'd have to take him for a while till things cooled down. Sam's not mourning either.

I get back in my car and head to a small employment agency across from the university that came highly recommended . . . from the Yellow Pages. As I walk in the door, I overhear the agent tell a woman, "Sorry. That's all I have. You know, these days a BA is no better than high school. You really need an advanced degree to get yourself out of the assistant pool."

So what pool am I swimming in? Maybe the cesspool. I watch the woman leave. Sleek is the word I'd use to describe her. I pull on the elastic waist of my khaki pants. I'll never look like that. What does it take, anyway, to look put together like that?

No, I'm not sleek, I'm ordinary — sort of like a generic brand of human being. I don't naturally stand out like some women I know. Although my mother would disagree. She tells me I have "good bones" like one of those characters in her classic myths and that all her friends think I'm beautiful. But I certainly don't feel that way, especially when I walk into a room. Frank used to call it the "wow" factor, something that makes people notice you. Maybe it's my hair. I wear it pulled back in a long ponytail with Peter Pan bangs in the front. I don't know, I've always done it that way. Frank liked it that way too. Every time I wore it down, he'd ask me why.

"You look better with it off your face," he'd say. But after we got married, he never did say I looked good. Come to think of it, whenever I got dressed up he'd tell me I looked like I tried too hard.

I take the application form and slowly start to fill it out. Name: Cassie Shaw.

Education: There it is. I remember watching the Rose Bowl one year with Frank. Who played? Wasn't it one of those big schools in the Midwest? Michigan or Wisconsin. An arena filled with thousands of cheering students. Who'd ever know? A place where when asked what it was like I could just laugh and say, "Cold as hell." Okay. I'm doing it. Michigan. I know about Michigan. They make cars there. Shit. Major: Now what? My hands are shaking. Well, I'm turning into a psychopath, so how about psychology? Sounds good. Everyone knows about psychology.

I fill out the rest — driver's license, Social Security number, address (my mother's post office box, we haven't had mail delivered in two years), age, etc. When you really think about it, most of the application is true. Anyway, doesn't everyone lie on these things?

"So how'd you like Michigan?" the agent asks. I focus on a hairy plant in a too-small plastic pot on the windowsill with roots trailing out the bottom like worms.

"Cold as hell," I reply. She laughs.

"Well, I see why you're here. Psychology. What can you do with that?"

"Right." I laugh conspiratorially.

"It says here, after the wildlife center, you worked at your husband's towing business."

"Yes, I did. He recently died." Okay. So I played the widow card. Sue me.

She immediately softens. I hate that look. Pity. Surprise. I can hear her thinking, "And so young too."

"Well, we don't have much right now, but we do have an entry-level job at the university. And it is in behavioral sciences, so you have some background."

I am oddly pleased by the compliment — even though it's based on a total lie.

"Look, I'm not going to kid you. Basically, it's answering phones, typing, delivering mail, filing, you know, front-office stuff." Better than the back-office stuff I haven't been offered. I casually agree to go on an interview. I'm elated. That is, until I hit the street, at which point I start to get nervous about my lies. But this wasn't just a lie. It was a Category 2, maybe Category 3 lie. Oh, come on. Frank was a lying piece of shit and God didn't strike him down. Well... I carefully look both ways before crossing the street.

Chapter Two

The campus looms in front of me, high on a hill, like Oz. Red brick buildings, landscaped lawns, grassy areas with footpaths and sculptures. I pass under a canopy of leaves through the Van Dorman Gates, black ornate wrought iron supported by two imposing pillars, one of which is inscribed with the words of Cicero.

"The first duty of a man is the seeking after and the investigation of Truth." I continue walking, gripping my resume. I'm not going to think about the consequences.

Liar. Liar. Pants on fire.

When I was a kid, Sunday school was all about God and Satan, the Twelve Apostles, the Ten Commandments, and the Seven Deadly Sins. The world as we knew it was ordered and manageable, with hundreds of laws and punishments methodically arranged according to the gravity of the transgression. There seemed to be no gray area when it came to sin — just a cold, stark landscape of excruciatingly painful punishments or heavenly rewards depending on the path you took.

Chapter Two (Continued) 

I remember the teacher stabbing the blackboard with a piece of chalk as she repeated a bunch of thou shalt nots. Thou shalt not kill. Stab. Thou shalt not steal. Stab. Stab. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Negative, negative. Life is so much more complicated than that. And frankly, even as a shy and earnest kindergartner, I never related that much to the subject matter.

I believed in God in a general way but not in eternal damnation. If you did commit a sin, sure, there were consequences, but I knew in my heart, even when I was six, that God would never stand by and watch someone get boiled in cauldrons of oil or smothered in fire and brimstone like they were saying on that religious channel one Sunday morning when I was sick and couldn’t go to church. When you come right down to it, I guess I believe that being a good person is all about your conscience, and whether or not you can live with what you do. On the other hand, there are sociopaths who murder teenage girls and have no guilt whatsoever . . . giant spiritual blind spots. My Sunday school teachers kept repeating over and over that the important thing for us, as good Christians, was to live without sin. However, as I recall, there is no Thou shalt not lie in the Ten Commandments. They sort of allude to it with the bearing false witness thing, but there’s no out-andout no lying commandment. And don’t you think if it were that important it would have been one of the Big Ten?

Maybe it’s because there are grades of truthfulness. Fibs, white lies, half-truths, stretching the truth (as if it were as elastic as a rubber band), cock-and-bull stories, even a whopper doesn’t have the stench of unadulterated evil. It’s like telling someone you’re sick if you just want to stay home, eat popcorn, and watch the Home Shopping Network. Or telling someone they look great when they’ve gained a ton of weight, or oohing and aahing over your friend’s newborn even though it looks like a hairless monkey. Or telling someone they’re smart when they’re not.

Everyone in the universe does it --- except for animals. Then again, look at Sam. If you can talk, it’s unavoidable. And I’m not saying this to justify my actions. What was I supposed to do? Tell the employment agency that I didn’t dare take the SAT --- that I only got my high school equivalency and that, even now, if I don’t focus when I read, the words are jumbled. They wouldn’t care how far I’ve come, they’d only look at my resume. They wouldn’t care that I’ve finally learned how to read like a normal person, just slower. I enter University Hall and approach a young woman sitting behind the low wood reception desk. She has shiny, shoulder-length blonde hair cut to sweep her shoulders just so, a fawn-colored sweater, and she’s wearing pointy red flats that stick out from under the desk. She looks like she could get away with anything. Even cruise out of Wal-Mart (as if she would ever go there) with a cart full of unpaid-for items and the security guard would just smile and say,

“Have a nice day.” 

That would never happen to me. When we were still in high school, my best friend, Tiffany, and I decided on a dare to go to the 7-Eleven on the corner and lift something. I trotted to the register with a small diversion purchase, a pack of gum, as Tiff slipped a few candy bars down her blouse pretending to adjust her bra. I was so nervous I blew the whole deal, but the manager never called the police. He had a thing for Tiff. Everyone always had a thing for Tiff. She was just one of those girls. Like the receptionist who’s waiting for me to say something. I smile real friendly like.

“Hi. I’m the one they called about from the agency. You know, for the job opening.” 

“Excuse me?” she intones with a withering stare. 

“I’m Cassie Shaw. I have an appointment with a Mrs. . . .” Oh God, what’s her name. I fumble for the piece of paper. “Pearce?”

“You mean, Professor Pearce?” With the emphasis on, You moron, she’s a professor.

“Yeah, I guess so.” She picks up the phone and gives me a quick smile, as if she’s thinking of some private joke.

“Hey, this is Alison. Does the professor have an appointment with someone this morning?” Silence. “Okay, I’ll tell her.” She looks at me like I’m a piece of lint.

“You must have the wrong department. This is Psych. Sorry.” She dismisses me and goes back to her reading.

“I’m sure this is the right place. I was sent over by the Right Hand Gal Agency.”

“Oh.” Her look says it all.

“Hey, it’s Alison again. She’s from the Right Hand Gal Agency?” Pause. She laughs. It’s not a nice laugh.

“She’s a little busy right now. You can wait over there,” she says with an air of distaste, pointing to a small reception area in the back.

Tiff and I have a list we like to call the Guinness Book of Rude Behavior. The items include things like people hogging two parking spaces at the mall. Or leaving their shopping cart wherever so it blocks everyone’s car. Or sitting in their car guzzling on water bottles, adjusting their seat belts, reapplying lip gloss, even making calls on their cell phones while you wait there for what seems like hours for their fucking space. Or the salesperson who’s having a conversation with another salesperson while you’re waiting for them to help you. Or the clod who rolls his suitcase over your toes and doesn’t even say boo. The elevator witch  also on this list. She’s the one who stands there, stone-faced, while you plead with her to keep the door open as you try to swipe your hand through the ever-narrowing space. She looks straight through you as she shuts you down. Like you’re invisible.

I look out the window. There’s a small courtyard in the middle of the U-shaped ivy-clad red brick building. Students are lounging on benches or lying in the grass with their heads resting on backpacks, nuzzling each other in the sunlight. It looks like they have all the time in the world to throw Frisbees, drink Coca-Cola, and read thick novels. They remind me of the fresh-faced, optimistic volunteers who used to work at the wildlife center. Most of them were college kids on internships. A brief stop on their way to somewhere else. The center was an old cabin that used to belong to some famous writer with a floor-to-ceiling river rock fireplace. We’d all sit around the potbellied stove, drink gallons of coffee, and talk for hours. They always had so many plans. A semester in South America to study the rain forest or in Austria to study ravens. A vacation in Hawaii for spring break. Boyfriends in law school. Girlfriends in premed classes. Endless possibilities. They went on and on about “following their passion.” I’d just try to get through the day.

I came to the conclusion they were members of some club and I would never belong. It hit home in dozens of little ways as I’d go about my duties. Class rings left by the bathroom sink. Treasure hunts for lost diamond studs. Fancy cars with environmental stickers and college parking passes lined up next to my banged-up piece of shit. And then I met Frank, and we all know how that turned out.

Now I hear something that sounds like fat, meaty bugs smashing against a windshield. I glance out the window. And then I see him. He’s tall and lean with sandy-colored hair that flies in his eyes as he chases down a tennis ball and swats it against the side of the building. The ball ricochets off the wall and sails off into the sky. Without missing a beat, he grabs another ball from his back pocket and begins again. Thwack! His arms are long and muscular and he’s wearing faded red shorts with a worn navy T-shirt. He exudes pedigree, like a well-bred ridgeback. Not classically handsome, but someone who demands attention.

“Hey, Sampras!” someone yells from a second-floor window. 

“You ready? We gotta go.” He squints up into the sunlight and smiles. I see him sweep his arm across his forehead, still gripping his tennis racquet as he walks into the building.

“Hello, Professor Conner,” Alison purrs, flashing shiny perfect white teeth. Her whole demeanor has changed. As he walks by, he leaves a scent of cut grass, mixed with sweat and aftershave. I notice that, on closer inspection, he has a firm, self-possessed air that belies his messy hair and distracted look. He bounds up the stairs.

Now it’s just the mean princess with nice clothes and a job, and me. She glances over with an “are you still here?” kind of look. I pick up an academic journal on the table and pretend to read. Her cell phone rings some new agey Chinese gongs. (Tiff just changed her ring tone to a ’56 Chevy burning rubber.) She now gets into a discussion with her pal “Lanie” about the “extravagantly minimalist” exhibit she saw at some gallery last night.

“Looking at the images made me realize why I love Chekhov.” Pause. “No. I told him I was busy tonight.” Pause. Giggles. “Shut up. Good-bye.” More giggles. I want to scream. I’ve been sitting here for almost an hour.

I march up to the desk. “Excuse me. I have another interview. Could you please see what’s going on?” Alison wraps it up and rings upstairs.

“You can go up now.” She starts to walk down the hall, leaving me wondering where exactly “up” is.

“What room, please . . . ?” 

“Two-five-four, second door on the right,” she yells over her shoulder. I hate her.

I hesitantly climb the stairs, trying to rein in my heroic doubts, and knock on the door. A clipped voice on the other side says, “It sticks, just give it a whack and it’ll open.” I give it a little hit, nothing. Then I pound it with my fist. The door flies open and bashes against the wall.

“Brilliant. Come in,” Professor Pearce says with a marked British accent and a welcoming smile --- not at all what I expected. She’s around seventy with dark, bright eyes and wild curly gray hair that has so much static it almost sticks straight up from her head. She wears thick black owllike bifocals and a stiff, wide-lapeled Queen Elizabeth suit in a pheasant shade of teal. She could be some grand lady in a portrait holding one of those misshapen pug-faced little lapdogs, except for the hair and the glasses.

Her office has the same look --- dignified yet odd. Woodpaneled bookshelves line the walls, framing a red brick fireplace with carved mantel. Classical music is playing. Papers and journals are piled high on her desk, along with a bunch of little oddities scattered here and there. Antique fireplace instruments with horse head handles. Ceramic bulldogs with blood red tongues. Pictures in fancy frames. Group shots of distinguished-looking people in tuxedos and academic robes. Smiling, confident, and successful.

“Sorry about the wait. Apparently some mix-up on the time. So here you are. What can you do for us?” she says, glancing up at me over her lenses with an air of familiarity and authority.

“Oh. I was told the job was just office work, but I’d be happy to do whatever you need. I can do all sorts of things. Even change your tires.” Ha ha. I laugh nervously. She doesn’t crack a smile.

“Why don’t you tell me about yourself?”

I take a deep breath. “Well . . . I used to work for my husband in the automobile business --- office stuff mainly, but he recently died, and I thought I’d try something totally different.”

Her face softens. I’m just a broken record. When things get tough --- play the widow card.

“There you go, then. We have something in common. I lost my husband five years ago. It’s not easy, is it? Was he ill?”

“No. Never. He had a fireman’s pulse. Drove his car right off a cliff. And that was the end of him, stone cold dead.”

“How dreadful,” she says, giving me an odd look. “My husband had Huntington’s. Sometimes I think it’s better the other way,” she adds, as she opens her drawer, pulls out two little teacups and a silver flask with a P etched on the front. “Sherry?” I’m thinking, is this some kind of test? Who drinks sherry at this hour? I’m just going to be polite.

“Oh, thank you,” I say, carefully. Pearce is already pouring.

“Well, the job is mainly working for me and Professor Conner, filing, transcribing, phones and mail, helping coordinate department events, and some special projects. He’s been wanting his library organized, for example, before it spills out into the hallway and carries us all into chaos,” she says, lifting her see-through porcelain cup to her lips with flourish, raising her deeply arched eyebrows, and downing it in one gulp. There are chains of little violets circling the cup, gathered up in pink ribbons and bows.

“He’s got Descartes next to Deepak Chopra, and Muir next to Miller. Henry, that is, not Arthur.” Pearce starts to laugh. I nod nervously, trying to remember which one is which. I haven’t really read a serious book of literature since stumbling through it in high school.

She asks me a few perfunctory questions about my nonexistent education, the wildlife center, and then she spends the rest of the interview telling me about her years at Oxford, her books, her children, her other two husbands, and a “dear friend” of hers who just moved to town. I notice that she fills her cup several more times before she excuses herself to go to the restroom. This is the best interview I’ve ever had. I’m buzzed, I haven’t said two words, and I think I have the job.

When Professor Pearce bustles back into the room, cheeks flushed, eyes twinkling, it feels as though everything’s been decided.

“I’ve so enjoyed our little chat. You’ll start tomorrow?”

I’m about to answer when Professor Tennis Player sticks his head in the door. He’s changed into a white buttondown oxford shirt, jeans, and a beat-up leather jacket, and he has a thick manila folder under his arm stuffed with papers. His eyes are an undecided shade of blue, and there’s a natural glamour about him. I can’t exactly say why, but he makes me feel self-conscious. Looking at him makes me think of East Coast things like grandfather clocks, silver cocktail shakers, or that girl from high school who got early admittance to Smith and told everybody about a million times that her ancestors came over on theMayflower.

“You coming?” he asks Pearce, as she motions him in with a brisk, imperious wave.

“We just have to wait for Samantha, if you don’t mind,” he adds as he walks into the office, sets down his folder, and cups his eyes for a moment from the glare of sunlight streaming through the window. Then he sees me. I wonder, just for a second, whether this man’s brain matches his folder --- a brain stuffed with knowledge, and literally brimming over with it.

“Oh, hello there,” he says, smiling at me with interest. His voice has the rich, basso weight of an opera star ---  maybe a villain or a tragic king. He leans against one of the overstuffed chairs as Pearce tells him about a meeting next week and then gives him some gossip about a “seriously deluded” woman in the psych department. He listens halfattentively, half-absently, following me with his eyes. And then I notice something familiar.

He’s patting his pockets in that way Tiff’s brother used to when he was feeling for his pack of cigarettes. Yes, he’s doing it again. He pats deeper, more deliberately, and finally plunges his hand inside his pocket and jangles some coins. He sees me watching him and casually leans into my face, narrows his eyes, and whispers, “Don’t ever start.” He walks over to his bulging folder and fishes inside. “Just as well,” he mutters, pulling out nothing.

“Meet Cassie, our new girl,” Pearce says, as she hands Conner my resume and summarily shoves the two little teacups back in the desk drawer.

“Conner is our expert on animal behavior,” Pearce says, gesturing regally at him.

“Nice to meet you,” he says, shooting out his hand and clasping mine with a sure, tight grasp.

“Teatime, ladies?” he adds, knowingly, as he holds my gaze for a minute and then focuses his eyes on the resume.

“U of Michigan,” he reads as I tense. “Oh, it says here you worked in the wildlife center in Topanga --- heard about that place. When were you there?”

I’m about to answer when I hear “knock, knock” in a lush, smoldering voice. I look up and standing at the door is a tall, willowy blonde holding a twisted black pearl necklace in one hand and an unlit cigarette in the other. She’s wearing a sleeveless black cocktail dress with a scoop neck and her collarbones are rounded and sturdy, like a pair of handlebars.

“I’m not interrupting?” She smiles as she walks right in.

“Not at all. We’ve been waiting for you,” Conner answers politely. She walks up to him, holding out the necklace. Without comment he takes it from her, walks around behind her, lifts up her hair, and fastens it on her neck. When he’s done, she slings her arm on his shoulder and gives him a brief kiss on the lips.

I think about that kiss for a long time afterward. It’s the kind of gesture that seems the opposite of intimate --- just a casual acknowledgment of someone’s presence, like at a wedding . . . or a funeral. Sam’s parrot kisses are a whole lot warmer. Conner introduces us and she gives me a society smile. I can’t take my eyes off her, but Conner’s gaze is fixed on her long, slim fingers twirling the cigarette in a giant tease.

“It’s my last one,” she says as she slides it into his pocket.

“The things I do for you.” She laughs. A gay little laugh. Like those people in British movies where they take a house in Italy for the summer and all sit around drinking wine and reading Russian novels.

“How was your game?” he asks, gathering up his fat file, turning his back toward her, and barely listening.

“Not great. Stacey went on and on about how I have to stop running around my backhand and then we had lunch at the club. Now I’m beat,” she says, breezily.

“Oh!” she says, as she dramatically stops and listens.

“Smetana’s Second.” 

“You are absolutely right!” Pearce says. 

“Samantha can hear a piece of music just a few times and remember it,” Conner informs us as Samantha feigns discomfort. 

“You’re embarrassing me, Conner,” Samantha says coquettishly. 

“But it’s true. I just have that type of brain. I used to amaze everyone at school. The teacher would play a few notes and I’d get the title right every time. It’s a gift.” 

“I have a parrot like that,” I say quietly. 

“What?!” Samantha says, eyes narrowing to a slit. 

“My parrot does the same thing,” I repeat. 

“No kidding,” Conner says with a hint of a smile. 

“Yes. If he listens to a song just a couple of times, Sam --- that’s his name too, isn’t that a coincidence? --- will remember the title and even the singer.” Conner starts to laugh. 

“Isn’t that just something,” Pearce says, trying to stifle a smile as she snaps open her purse and combs her gray frizz with a wide-bristled brush that does nothing at all. Then she unceremoniously stands up. 

“Yes, well, Cassie. You’ll fit in nicely around here. We’re off to a reception now, but say tomorrow around nine? Is that good?” 

“Thank you,” I say, a slight catch in my throat. 

I got the job. I feel like a schoolgirl with a hopping heart. As I turn, I see that Conner and Samantha have already started down the hall, where there is an immediate flash of fire, then exhaled smoke. 

“We have smoke alarms here, but she could give a damn,” Pearce murmurs under her breath, but just loud enough for me to hear. 

“So much for the patch,” she adds as she grabs a small round brass alarm clock, and throws it in her purse. She catches me staring at her. 

“I never could wear a watch,” Pearce says brightly. 

“Bring comfortable shoes.”

Excerpted from A VERSION OF THE TRUTH © Copyright 2011 by Jennifer Kaufman and Karen Mack. Reprinted with permission by Bantam Discovery. All rights reserved.

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