Steve Hamilton - The Lock Artist

I would have been speechless even if I could speak. I put the jacket on. Then he helped me put on the helmet. I sat on the bike and felt the whole thing bounce up and down under my weight.

“New shocks, he told me. New brakes. Tires are okay, not great. We’ll get you some new ones soon.”

I still couldn’t believe it was happening. I was actually supposed to ride this thing?

“Take it nice and easy at first, eh? Go ahead, give it a try.”

After he showed me how to start it, I tried putting it in gear and giving it a little gas. It just about took off from right underneath me. I tried again and made sure I was ready for it. After a couple of circles in the parking lot, I was on my way down the street. I took it slow at first, afraid I’d end up on the hood of somebody’s car. Then I started to get the hang of it. It was much easier to stay balanced than I would have imagined. And I had to say, the whole experience felt pretty damned good.

I took the bike back, but my uncle was already stationed behind his cash register, ringing up his first customer of the day. He gave me a wave, told me to go back out and get to know the bike. He gave me a few bucks to fill up the tank. Then I was off.

I spent the rest of the morning riding. You don’t realize just how much pickup one of those babies has. From an absolute dead stop, if you really crank it, it feels like you’re on a rocket. I headed west on the back roads, out into what was then still farmland. I found a new hatred for dirt roads that have been freshly oiled, nearly killing myself the first time I hit one. After that I stuck to pavement and didn’t have any other close calls. It was just me and the sound of the machine between my legs and the wind whipping against my helmet. I wanted to share this feeling with Amelia. To take her by the hand and sit her down on the back of the bike. I could already feel her hands wrapped around my waist.

I made one more stop to buy a pair of sunglasses. And another helmet for Amelia. Now I had everything I needed in life. I got back on that bike and headed straight for her house.

So I rode out to that big white castle of a house gleaming in the sun, feeling like I owned the whole world. Feeling like this could be the day that I start talking. I mean, why not? Maybe this is what it would take.

Today, though, I was going to get something a little bit different.

I saw Mr. Marsh’s car in the driveway, but when I knocked on the door, nobody answered. I knocked again. Nothing.

I wandered around the house to the backyard and looked under the tent. The plants Mr. Marsh had dragged back there were all starting to wilt, so I went looking for a watering can and spent the next few minutes walking back and forth between the tent and the faucet.

Then I knocked on the back door. When nobody answered, I pushed the door open and went inside. I walked through and peeked into Mr. Marsh’s office. Nobody there. I looked up the stairs and saw that Amelia’s door was closed. I went up and knocked.

“Who is it?” she said from inside.

I knocked again. What else could I do?

“Come on in.”

When I opened the door, I saw her sitting at her desk. Her back was to me. She didn’t say a word. I hesitated, finally came into the room and went over to where she was working. I wanted to touch her shoulders, but I didn’t.

She was drawing something. Buildings, an alleyway. Lots of shadows. There was a long figure in the foreground, but it was hard for me to see exactly what she was doing with it. I stood there for a long time, watching her work.

“If I don’t talk,” she said, “it’s going to be pretty quiet in here, huh?”

She turned around, finally, and looked me in the eyes for the first time that day.

“My mother killed herself. Did you know that?”

I nodded. I remembered Mr. Marsh telling me that, on that very first day, before I had even seen Amelia.

“Today’s the anniversary. Five years ago.”

She still had the pencil in her hand. She twirled it in her fingers like a miniature baton.

“Five years ago exactly, at one o’clock in the afternoon. Give or take a few minutes. I was in school when it happened.”

She got up and went over to her dresser. She went through a stack of papers and drawings and pulled out a portfolio. I wasn’t about to tell her so, but this was the same portfolio I had looked through the night we had all broken into this house. It was the first time I had seen her drawings, the first time I had seen her face. I remembered there were some other drawings in there, too. Of an older woman. These were the same drawings I was about to see again.

“This was her,” Amelia said, putting each drawing, one by one, onto the bed. Her mother sitting in a chair. Then outside, on a bench. “I was twelve years old then. She was in this institution they sent her to for a while. I got to go visit her.”

I could see it now, in the drawings. The manicured lawn, the path running a straight line, in front of the bench. Everything in its place. These were some pretty damned excellent drawings if they were really done by a twelve-year-old.

“I was so happy, because I knew she’d be coming home soon. Three months later…”

She closed her eyes.

“Three months later, she sealed up the garage and started the car. By the time I got home from school, she was dead. I wasn’t the one who found her. I mean, my brother found her. He came home first and she was. I mean, she was there in the car. In the garage. This was at our old house. Before we moved here. Anyway, there was no note. No nothing. Just… checkout time.”

She started putting the drawings back into the folder. She didn’t look at me.

“It wasn’t the first time she tried something like that. Did you know that women are twice as likely as men to try to commit suicide? But most of the time they don’t actually do it. Men are four times more likely to actually kill themselves.”

She was talking a little too fast now. Like she didn’t want there to be any silence again.

“I looked that up last night, because I wanted to try to understand what happened to you. I mean, I know the general story. I know they called you the Miracle Boy.”

I saw one single tear on her face.

“It’s been five years for me,” she said. “For you, it’s like what, nine years? In all that time, you never tried to…”

She wiped the tear from her cheek, finally turned and faced me.

“I mean, is this it? Are you seriously never going to talk to me? Ever?”

I closed my eyes. Right there, at that moment, in Amelia’s bedroom… I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, and I told myself that this was what I had been waiting for. I had never had such a good reason to try before. All I had to do was just open up and let go of the silence. Just like those doctors had said, years ago. It was as true on this day as it had been then. There was no physical reason why I couldn’t speak. So all I had to do was…

The seconds passed. A minute.

“Some men came and took my father away,” she finally said. “About an hour ago. I don’t know where they were going. I don’t even know if they’re going to bring him back. Seriously… I mean, I thought it might be him when I heard you in the driveway.”

I reached out to touch her. She turned away from me.

“I am so freaked out right now, Michael. I don’t know what I’m going to do. Do you have any idea how much trouble my father is in these days? What if they-”

She looked up.

“God, is that him now?”

She went to the window and looked down at the driveway. When I stepped behind her, I saw the long black car, then the three men all getting out at the same time. One from the driver’s door. Two men from the backseat. Then finally, a few seconds later, another man. Mr. Marsh. He blinked in the bright sunlight and straightened his shirt. His face was bright red.