Mark Costello - Big If

Peta took Route 32 to Belvedere Estates, a low-end subdivision in the hills above C.E., new houses by the hundreds, saplings wrapped in burlap, gutters without curbs. Peta, Jackie, and the quiet woman from The Truth tried to find the first address in their action packet, but the unit number was evidently wrong. Two voters weren’t at home — Jackie rang their doorbells, waiting on the stoops, drizzle running down the bricks. They moved on to voter number four, a man named Leonard Nichols, a fat mechanic with a bushy Fu Manchu.

“I appreciate the ride,” he said as Peta pulled away.

“That’s no problem,” Jackie said.

Leonard Nichols wore a too-small leather jacket and a concert t-shirt for a heavy metal band, WORLD TOUR ’98 , with the names of forty cities listed in small type, none of which were outside of the United States.

He said, “Is there any way you could run me up to Willingboro when I finish voting? I’ve got a job interview up there and my Buick’s fucking totaled in the shop.”

“Willingboro?” Peta said. “That’s halfway to Manchester.”

Jackie was more diplomatic. “Another van will pick you up at the polls, Mr. Nichols.”

“Call me Leonard.”

“Leonard. Maybe they’ll have time to drive you up to Willingboro.”

Leonard Nichols seemed to buy this. Peta heard him pawing through the ice and free drinks in the cooler, looking for a beer, settling for a juice box. He sipped and started a long rant about the builder’s broken promises, town water and town sewer, the builder had promised, but everything is shoddy-like in Belvedere, he said.

The next successful pickup was a man named Bob Mangano, out on disability from the navy yard in Kittery, who was listed as a four, strong for the VP, because he felt the VP would do more for people who were out on disability from the navy yard in Kittery.

“Could you get my buddy?” Bob Mangano asked. “He votes religiously, but he lost his license over Christmas. He’s three-time DUI.”

“Where does he live, Willingboro?” Peta asked.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Leonard Nichols said.

Bob Mangano’s buddy wasn’t on the list, but he lived nearby and Jackie thought it was probably okay. The buddy trotted down his walk, climbed into the van, and introduced himself to everyone as Al. He was a sociable old sport, dressed entirely in tan. He sat in the backseat, next to Leonard Nichols and the free drink cooler, and soon they were discussing the shoddiness of Belvedere, the sewer lines and water lines.

“What street are you on?” Al asked Leonard Nichols.

Leonard said, “Tippecanoe.”

“Over in the battle names,” said Al. “I hear you’re having problems with the deer pest over there. They come out of the state forest after dark, eat your shrubbery, I hear.”

“Not lately,” Leonard said. “They put this box up on a pole, makes a noise the deer just hate, drives ’em down to Rye. Our problem is the water pressure. I haven’t had a shower in three days. It’s more like a dribble, what I got.”

They passed a van from the senator’s GOTV operation. It was bigger and nicer than their van. As the two vans passed in the street, the senator’s van veered playfully at them.

“Assholes,” Peta breathed, swerving to the right.

The last stop in Belvedere was a deluxe unit, a steep-roofed palazzo with numbers slanting down the door. Peta pulled into the driveway, honked the horn, and flashed the lights. Two men in fur-lined raincoats came out of the house and approached the van. One was Boone Saxon. The other was the trainee agent, Christopher. They flashed their credentials, a practiced flip and back in their pockets.

Boone Saxon said, “Do you know the woman who lives here?”

“No,” said Peta.

“We’re a pull team for the VP,” Jackie explained. “These are his supporters. This lady’s name was on our list. We’re taking voters to the polls.”

Boone Saxon was distracted, reading Jackie’s button. He said, “‘Kiss me — I’m a teacher’?”

“Yes,” said Jackie.

“Does that mean you’re a teacher?”

“Yes,” said Jackie. “I’m retired.”

Boone Saxon said, “Okay. Let’s see this list.”

Christopher walked around the van, looking through the windows at the carpet on the floor as Boone inspected Jackie’s action packet, turning several pages, flipping back. Satisfied, Boone gestured to the house.

A thin woman scurried down the steps, zipping a jacket. She climbed into the van and the agents stepped away. Peta backed down the driveway and headed into town.

The woman sat in back with Al and Bob Mangano. Leonard Nichols offered her a drink. The woman took a juice box, pierced it with the straw, and sucked thirstily. She was trembling.

“What was that all about?” Peta asked.

“I’m Belinda Johnson,” said the woman. “They’re questioning all Belinda Johnsons.”

They dropped the Belvedereans at the pollsand went down Santasket Road, past the glittering new developments, Sandy Point and Breezy Ridge. The next group of likely voters lived in Grassy Knoll, the development past Breezy on the right. Grassy Knoll was the latest, best, and biggest retirement community in town, a mini-city of units and subunits, care levels ranging from affordable to posh. Peta drove past curving roads and maple groves and multiuse fitness paths, streams and little ponds ringed by tall grass and low willows, the homes and lawns and wild dales blending into greens and roughs and undulating fairways. Jackie didn’t even notice the golf course until they were in it, and Peta pointed out the cedar wheelchair ramp down into the sand trap.

“They’re making millions,” Peta said.

They collected Nadine Clanksy, a litigator’s widow from Cohasset, Massachusetts, who lived in a cookie-cutter cottage in a line of cottages facing a tricky little meadow, a par four.

“I never have to leave,” said Nadine Clansky, explaining why she’d moved. “Everything I need is here.”

“It’s incredible,” said Jackie.

“I’d like to live here now,” said Peta.

“Minimum age is sixty-five,” Nadine said, “and they enforce it strictly. Every so often, they’ll get some yuppie couple ready for the quiet life, trying to move in, pretending to be their own parents. Least that’s what I heard. It might be urban legend.”

“You have urban legends out here?” Peta asked.

“We have everything,” said Nadine. “Rock-climbing too. The golf course is the big draw, though. It won two awards.”

“Do you golf?” asked Jackie.

“No,” said Nadine. “You?”

“Tried it,” Jackie said. “Didn’t grab me.”

“Seems so boring,” Peta said. “Just seeing it on TV. Why is the announcer whispering?”

Nadine turned. “How ’bout you?”

The woman from The Truth said, “I’m sorry, what?”

They pulled up to the Big House, as Nadine called it, a fifteen-story cube of brown reflective glass.

“That’s full nursing,” said Nadine. “You don’t mind if I wait out here. That place gives me the creeps.”

Jackie, Peta, and the woman from The Truth went into a creamy lobby. A guard watched them through a break in the trees. They heard the sound of water falling but saw no waterfall.

Jackie took the bottom floors, looking for the three names. A woman, who polled as a strong supporter, had died over the weekend, and a man, another four, was having a nap and the nurses wouldn’t wake him. Jackie woke him anyway.

The man’s name was Arthur Freilinghuysen. “’Course I want to vote,” he said. “I haven’t missed a vote since Roosevelt in ’40. Help me find my pants.”

Jackie let Arthur Freilinghuysen dress. She went looking for the next name on her list, a Mr. Grosjean. She found him being fed his breakfast.