The Box - 2. Chapter 2

July 2, 1999

“Mr. Schluter,” Mr. Fox said nervously before we took our break. “I was thinking that perhaps the best place to open the box and document its contents would be on the large dining room table.” I thought about the other rooms in the house, and how they were configured, and he was right. It had the largest working area.

“That is an excellent idea, Mr. Fox,” I said cheerfully.

“Unfortunately, the museum is scheduled to be open until 5:00pm tonight. We have extended hours tomorrow, for the festival, but not tonight. That means the museum will close in 15 minutes, then we can sit down and catalog the contents,” he said.

“That is fine with me. Have you eaten dinner yet, Mr. Fox?”

“No,” he replied honestly.

“Well then, let us send out for some food as well,” I said. I put Matt and Robbie to work on that, and I decided to spend the next few minutes visiting my old bedroom. It was still much as it was when I lived there. So much had happened here. I'd had sex with so many people. That made me smile, then laugh.

“What's so funny?” JP asked.

“I was just thinking about how many people I had sex with in this room,” I told him jovially.

“If walls could talk,” he joked.

“They do not have to, I do,” I said, giving him my smile. “Shall we go down and find out who Tonto fucked?”

He gave me a dirty look for being crude. “It may be something else entirely.”

“What else could it be?” I asked. I couldn't imagine what else would have caused her to put such a dire disclaimer on it. We went down to the dining room just as Mr. Fox finished locking the door. Wade sat at the table across from me, next to Mr. Fox, while JP was on my right side. Brad sat to my left, at what was the head of the table, with the box squarely in the middle. We all just stared at it for a minute, unsure as to how to continue.

“Does anyone have a knife?” I asked. Mr. Fox went off to his office and came back with some scissors, which sufficed. I scored the ancient tape across the top of the box and the side flaps, then gently opened it up. The first thing to greet me was that musty smell that comes from things that have been stored for a long time. I looked in the box, expecting to see letters, but that wasn't what was in there at all. Instead, there were clothes. I gently pulled out the first garment, a military jacket, with the name Schluter on the pocket.

“What is it?” asked Wade, anxious to catalog the contents.

“It is a uniform. My father's uniform,” I said. I held it in my hands and felt the tears flow down my face for this man I'd never met, but whose blood flowed in my veins. Somehow just holding it made me feel like I was in his presence.

“Steven's uniform?” JP asked. I nodded. I laid it out carefully on the table, and then pulled out his pants as well. There was another uniform, presumably a dress uniform, with pants to go with that. There were two hats, one to go with his dress uniform, and the other a cloth cap, the style that became flat when you took it off.

“Tonto must have been so upset about his death, she just packed his stuff straight into the attic,” Brad said somberly. I nodded, but that wasn't like her. It wasn't like her to take something like this and just lock it away. There were other uniforms out there. In fact, there was a whole display on the Schluter Family, with Billy's uniform displayed on a mannequin. It made no sense. I finished pulling out the clothes and military effects until I found one more thing, a very strange thing, at the bottom.

“What is that?” JP asked.

I picked it up and held it in my hands. It was a heavy box made of metal, about the size of a large book. There was a lock on the side, a lock that must be quite strong because there were significant scars and scratches where people had obviously tried to open it. I took the measuring tape from Mr. Fox and took the dimensions for Wade. It was eighteen inches long, a foot wide, and three inches thick.

“Can you open it?” Brad asked. I smiled. It was a mystery, a secret, and he was dying to know what was in it. So was I, but my instincts made me cautious. Tonto wouldn't have cared about the uniforms being hidden away like this. It was this metal box that had to be the reason for her secrecy. I tried to open it, but couldn't. I handed the box to Brad, and he tried, and then passed it to Mr. Fox, then Wade. No one could open it.

Matt and Robbie came in with food, and we took a break to eat. I sat there quietly, thinking about this metal box, trying to figure out how to open it. Suddenly Matt sat straight up. “Maybe the key is in one of the uniform pockets?” We all scrounged through them thoroughly, but to no avail.

“Can you show us where you found the box, in the attic?” I asked. Mr. Fox nodded and led us all up the stairs to the third floor, then up a final set of stairs to the attic. It was completely empty, but the smell of mothballs was still pervasive.

“We found it over here,” he said, leading us to a corner. There was a small opening that led into the roof of one of the turrets, and there, behind a false wall, was where the box had been found.

“Was there anything else back here?” JP asked.

“Only this box,” Mr. Fox said. Matt and Wade scrounged around, looking for the key, for anything, and found nothing. Mr. Fox found us a flashlight for closer inspection, but still we found nothing. We headed back downstairs, frustrated.

“We will probably need to have a locksmith work it open,” Mr. Fox said. “Let me make a call.”

“Why would Tonto hide the box?” JP asked, after Fox was gone.

“There is something inside this metal case that she did not want people to see,” I told him quietly. “There is no other explanation. The rest of the items are just a diversion.”

“If there was something in there she didn't want anyone to know about, why didn't she just throw it away?” Robbie asked. “You think this has to do with her affair?”

“I do not think so,” I told him. “I think it has to do with my father. There is something in here that she did not want people to see, but she could not bring herself to throw away.”

“That sounds like Tonto,” Brad said supportively. Mr. Fox came back into the room so we stopped talking about it.

“The locksmith will be here shortly,” he announced. I sat there with the box in my hand, rolling it over and over. I could feel something inside, something clunking against the side as I turned it, but I had no idea what it was. We didn't say much at first, and then everyone began to chatter about the whole thing, the drama. I watched Brad and JP deftly plant the idea that it was probably nothing, probably meaningless, in Mr. Fox's head. There was no reason to involve him in the contents of this metal box if it could be avoided.

The locksmith arrived, an older gentleman that I'd never met. “Well, let's see what we have here,” he said. I handed him the box and he looked at it carefully. His expression varied between a smile, and a grimace.

“Can you open it?” I asked.

“I can open it, but it won't do you no good. Whatever's in there will be destroyed,” he said.

“What do you mean?” JP asked.

“This kind of document box was around during the war. There's a vial of acid in there. You open this any other way but with the key, the vial breaks, and the documents are destroyed,” he said.

“How do we get it open then?” Brad asked.

“I'll have to make some calls. There may be some people who still remember how to bust these things open without the key, but I ain't one of them,” he said.

“We must find out what is in there and catalog it,” Mr. Fox said. His life must be one big cataloging exercise.

“We will not open it if it will jeopardize the contents,” I decreed. I told the locksmith to work on finding a way to open it up. “It is now close to 9pm, and I have had a long day. Let us revisit this tomorrow.”

“Very well,” Mr. Fox said. “Here are the keys, in case you need to go out. I will see you in the morning.” He handed me his key ring, a mass of keys on it, then he took his copy of Wade's contents list to his office, and then he was gone.

“So what are we going to do?” Brad asked.

“We are going to find the key,” I told him.

“We're going to find the key? One little key, in this huge place?” Matt asked me.

“There are six of us. It is 9pm. We must find the key and get whatever is in there out before Mr. Fox comes back in the morning,” I said, increasing the challenge.

“Why by tomorrow morning?” Robbie asked.

“Because that's when Fox will be back with the locksmith and they'll want to try and open it,” JP said. “We need to have it cleared out before then.”

“Why?” Robbie asked.

“Because whatever is in this box, Tonto did not want the world to know about it,” JP said. “Brad, why don't you and Stef search this floor. Wade and I will take the second floor, while Robbie and Matt can handle the third.” We nodded. “If we still haven't found it after that, we'll split up again and work on the attic and the basement.”

And so it began. We went through every nook and cranny in the kitchen, the dining room, everywhere we could think of. I could hear clomping around upstairs as the others pored over the house as well. It was almost midnight when we finally reconvened in the dining room. Matt came down carrying an old book.

“What did you find?” I asked him.

“We found this bible stuffed into a corner. It looks like it was published around the turn of the century,” he said. I looked at it, and then handed it to JP.

He had the sense to look inside. “This belonged to Jacob Schluter, your great-uncle,” he said. I could care less. The last thing I needed was a bible.

“No key,” I said sadly.

“Alright, let's finish the search,” JP said, ignoring our groans and protests. “Matt, you and Robbie get the basement, Wade and I will take the attic. Stef, why don't you look through those display cases?”

Everyone scattered, while Brad and I wandered over to the display cases in the study, the ones that were set aside for just our family. Here was our heritage laid out in front of us.

“So that old guy was the first Schluter to end up here in Claremont?” Brad asked, pointing to old Heinrich Schluter. He'd come here even before the American Revolution. We followed the displays down through the years, with pictures and artifacts showing the history of our family. Lots of pictures of judges, a few mannequins with judicial robes, and then finally we got to Steven and Billy.

“I suppose Mr. Fox will want to put his hat in this cabinet,” I observed wryly. “Probably right next to his dog tags.”

“Those are his dog tags?” Brad asked. I nodded. “I want to look at them. Is this case open?”

“Let us find out,” I said. I went around to the back and found it locked, but Mr. Fox had left all of his keys. We went through them, key by key by key, until we found the one that opened the display. Brad reached in, grabbed the dog tags, and pulled them out, first with a surprised look on his face, then with a big smile.

“What?” I asked.

He held out the dog tags, and then turned them over. There, on the back of one of them, was a key, held on with tape. I looked at the key, then at him, and we rushed back into the dining room where the box was. “Go and get JP, will you?” I asked. Brad rushed to the stairs and yelled for everyone, then hurried back. We were so excited we could hardly stand it.

“What is it?” JP asked as he came in, out of breath.

“What were you doing in the attic that you are so out of breath?” I asked, looking at him and Wade.

“Very funny. We ran down here. Now what do you want?” he asked, irritated.

I laughed. “We found the key.”

“Where?” Matt demanded.

“Here,” I said, showing them. “It is taped to the back of my father's dog tags.”

“How do you know that's the key?” Robbie asked.

“A guess,” I said thoughtfully. “Let us find out.” I carefully removed the key from the tags. It had obviously been taped there for a while. The lock was so precise that the key had to be clean before it would go in, so that necessitated a further delay while we scraped off the hardened glue from the key. Then I pushed the key in and turned it gently. There was a loud ‘click’ and the top popped up.

I opened it carefully and looked inside. There was a book, a journal of sorts, with several letters loosely strewn around. On top of them all was a note. It was Tonto's handwriting.

Dear Steven,

God how it hurts, having you taken away from me, having you gone. I walk around this big house wailing and wailing until no one can stand it. But now I have to be strong, like I know you'd want me to be, like I need to be for Billy. That's why I have to put these things away for now. You understand. You always understood. You were so much like me.

I should destroy your diary and your letters, to let your memory rest in peace, but I cannot bring myself to do that, to take that last piece of life from you. Instead, I will lock them up and hide them away. If future generations find them, it will be too late for them to hurt you anymore.

You kept my secrets, and I will keep yours. Until we meet in the next life, know how much I love you, and how my life will forever be empty without you in it.

Mom.

I took the note and passed it to Brad, the tears pouring down my face. What was in this diary? What was in these letters?

JP reached in and gently removed all of the contents, all of it. “We have to remove these, hide them, and lock this box back up,” he said authoritatively.

“I want to read it,” I whined.

“Me too,” Brad echoed.

“No. Whatever is in here is not for public consumption. So here's what we're going to do. Matt, go in the kitchen and find a big Ziploc bag to put this in.” Matt dashed off to find one, not even questioning JP's orders. JP was the man in an emergency, the one to take charge. We all knew it, and we all acted accordingly. “We'll seal this up, and then let the locksmith open it tomorrow. When they do, they'll find nothing.”

“And then we can note that in the catalog, and be done with it,” I concluded.

“I have a suggestion,” Wade said. We all looked at him, briefly irritated at having this young man who wasn't even a family member getting all involved in the plans. That vanished quickly, especially when JP stepped in to encourage his protégé.

“What do you have in mind Wade?”

“There was obviously something in this box earlier. You could hear it thumping around when Stef was moving it. If they open it and it's empty, that will raise suspicions.”

“That's a good point Wade,” JP said, and gave us all a self-satisfied look.

“So what do we do, put a bunch of rocks in it?” Robbie asked disingenuously.

“No, I think we should put the bible in there,” Wade said, referring to the bible Matt had found, the one belonging to Jacob Schluter. “That way, they'll think he was a good religious boy, protecting his bible above all else.”

That suddenly seemed funny, hilarious even, and we all started laughing. “That is a terrific idea, Wade,” I said. “I always forget that you have a brain that is as beautiful as your exterior.” He grinned at me.

We spent the next hour locking the box up, reattaching the key to the dog tags, and then making sure we had them back in just the right place. That part was actually easier than we had thought, since there was a ring of dust around them. Evidently Mr. Fox was not one for dusting the displays on a regular basis.

JP came walking up to me after we'd finished, holding the Ziploc bag full of my father's papers. “Do you have your briefcase here with you?” he asked.

“I do. Why?” I asked.

“Does it have a lock?” he asked, ignoring my question.

“It is a ZERO Halliburton,” I said disdainfully. “Of course it has a lock.” One did not spend $500 on a briefcase that didn't lock.

“Get it and let's put this bag in there. Then we'll take it out to the plane,” he said.

“Now? Are you not being just a bit paranoid? Who will dare demand to look in my briefcase?” I asked imperiously.

“Nick would. Let's get it to the plane,” he insisted. I thought he was being just a little crazy, but I went with it. He called the car to come pick him up and took it out to the airport. It was 3am before he was back and we were finally able to get to sleep. And I still hadn't read a word of what was in my father's diary.

July 3, 1999

“Good morning,” Mr. Fox said, in as friendly a way as he could.

“Good morning Mr. Fox,” I said.

“The locksmith called this morning, and he thinks he knows how to get into the box,” Fox said. “With your permission, I think it's worth a try.”

“I do not see that we have any other choice,” I said, trying not to yawn. “I must thank you for making sure everything was ready for us last night.”

“It is always a pleasure to host the family,” he said. The family? I forced myself not to laugh. The locksmith arrived and we all pretended to be excited as he drilled into the lock and gently opened it. It popped open for him, just as it had with the key. Mr. Fox gave me the honor of pulling the bible out.

“It is a bible,” I said. “Have you seen this before?” I asked Mr. Fox, just to make sure we hadn't been foiled in our own plan.

“I have not. It appears that it belonged to Steven's uncle, Jacob. He must have carried it with him when he went off to war,” Mr. Fox said.

“A man of faith,” the locksmith said somberly. “Now he's with his lord.”

“His faith did not stop the bullet that killed him,” I remarked acidly, and got a dirty look from the locksmith. “If you would like, you may retain the box and the bible for the museum.”

“Thank you Mr. Schluter. They're both unique, especially the box,” Mr. Fox said enthusiastically.

“It is no problem. I must thank you again for your kindness, and for contacting me. You may share the list of cataloged items with my nephew if you choose. If you need me, I will be out of the country for a few weeks, but reachable by phone.”

“Are you heading to the airport now?” he asked.

“No, we must spend some time at the festival first,” I said, remembering not to sound morose about it in front of this man who loved Claremont as much as I detested it.

“It's supposed to be the best one ever,” he said.

“Well, speaking for me personally, I find it hard to believe it could top last year's festival,” I said, and winked at Matt. He laughed, JP blushed, and Robbie looked irritated. Last year at the festival JP and I had first met Matt, before we knew he was related to us, and had spent a couple of hours in the limo with him introducing him to the joys of sex, while he introduced us to the beauty of his body.

“Maybe this year will surprise you,” Mr. Fox said.

“Anything is possible,” I said.

“In any event, we have to get going,” JP said, now blushing and irritated. We left the monstrosity and headed for the festival, walking along with the crowds of sweaty people that were heading there too.

We walked on to the Commons and my nose was assaulted by the familiar smell of body odor and beer. “We will be safe if we stick together,” I told them. I'd neglected to get security for this trip, and I was regretting it. Since poor Matthew Shepard had been murdered, I'd felt unsafe in public, or at least in crowds.

“I'll protect you,” Matt said, putting his arm around me. “You got a limo?”

“Very funny,” Robbie said. It still bothered him that we'd slept with his son.

We were just wandering toward the Crampton Construction tent, a relative refuge, when the tension levels in our group suddenly soared. I looked up and saw Robbie and Matt standing in front of four people, two men, and two women. Of course, I had to move closer to see what the drama was about.

“Hello Matt,” the older woman said in a somewhat friendly tone. “You know Charlie. This is my son, Caleb, and my daughter, Katrina.” The boy looked like he was 16 or 17, and the girl looked a little younger. They seemed like typical country people, nice, but not really attractive. Still, there was something familiar about them.

“Nice to meet you,” Matt said in a strained but friendly way, as he shook their hands.

“Robbie,” the woman said, nodding dismissively to him.

“Hi Laura. It's good to see you,” Robbie said, the guilt oozing out of his voice. Laura! This was Matt's real mother! The girl Robbie had fucked in high school before he was outed. She ignored him.

“Will you be in town long? How are things with your health?” she asked Matt.

“No, we're leaving here in an hour or so,” he said. “I, uh, I fixed my problems with my kidneys.”

“You got a transplant?” she asked, looking at Robbie.

“No, actually I got real sick with something else and that stimulated my immune system, and that killed the virus,” Matt said. He looked at Wade. “This is Wade.”

She shook Wade's hand unenthusiastically. “I remember seeing your picture in the paper.”

“It's nice to meet you ma'am,” Wade said, turning on the charm. It was wasted.

“Well, I'm glad to hear you're doing well. Take care,” she said, and they wandered off.

“I'm sorry Matt,” Robbie said. “If I weren’t here, she probably would have been nicer.”

“I don't know if it would have made that much difference. She hates fags, and now that she knows I'm one, she hates me too,” Matt said sadly.

“So that was Laura?” Brad asked Robbie rhetorically. “You did much better in the end, don't you think?” Robbie smiled at him and they laughed.

“Yeah, I did.”

“That was your half-brother and half-sister?” Wade asked.

“Yeah, but I don't think they know that,” Matt said. They'd walked off, but his eyes trailed after them. Every once in a while, Caleb would turn around and look back before his mother hurried him on.

“It is always so much fun here,” I observed wryly. “Can we go now?”

“Not until we see Jim,” JP insisted. We were almost to the Crampton tent when a big goon staggered in front of us.

“Well, well, well, look who's back in town,” he said to Robbie. “Wanna pull a train? I can round up a couple of the guys.” Then he laughed.

“Only if you're pulling it. Fuck off Fred,” Robbie said assertively. I took another look at the goon and suddenly I could see the distinctive Hayes look, buried beneath about 75 extra pounds and a scruffy beard. Matt pushed up, in between them.

“You got new tattoos,” Matt said, pointing at his arms. “You get those in jail?”

“Fuck you, you little shit. I'm gonna kick your ass like I shoulda done last time I saw you,” he said. He moved on Matt menacingly, but Matt backed up and became a blur of motion. I saw his hand fly out and smack Fred twice in the face, and then his knee made contact with Fred's groin.

“Remember me now asshole?” Matt asked, as Fred writhed on the ground in pain. Robbie gave him a swift kick in the lower back, and then we moved on.

“Well this is certainly enjoyable,” I said to JP. He glared at me. We finally got to the tent and spent the obligatory hour with Jim and his family. Nick spotted me and decided to come up and socialize.

“You open the box?” he asked with a slur.

“You are drunk at the festival? Your grandfather would never have done that,” I said. Jim looked at him disdainfully.

“I'm not drunk,” he slurred. “You open the box?”

I looked at him, unwilling to even grace him with an answer, and then looked at Jim. “If you can't be civil, you can leave my tent,” Jim told him. He motioned for a security guard, and he escorted Nick off. “I don't know what's with that guy. One minute, he's on a rocket to the top, next minute, he's self-destructing.”

“Notify me when he implodes, if you will,” I said disdainfully. Finally I convinced JP to leave.

“You are the one who wanted to come to Claremont,” he said.

“You are the one who does not want to leave,” I said. “Maybe we can escape from this place before we run into any more assholes.”

“Look husband, it is Satan's Brigade,” said a woman in front of us. Brenda Hayes was there with her new husband, the minister of East Claremont Baptist Church.

“Doesn't look like it,” JP whispered.

“I see you're still an intolerant bigot,” Robbie said to his mother.

“And I see you're still going to hell,” she said in her nasty tone. Then she modified it to that fake-friendly attitude she probably used when talking to church members before she stabbed them in the back. “But I will keep praying for your soul.”

“Yeah. You do that,” he said sarcastically.

“So you're Matthew,” she said, staring at her grandson for the first time. “Don't let him lead you off to a life of moral turpitude.”

“Pardon me?” Matt asked, pretending to be confused.

“Don't let him convince you that homosexuality is natural,” she said, with a sneer of contempt on her face. Matt reached over and pulled Wade close to him, then grabbed his head and kissed him passionately, so passionately you could see their neck muscles moving as they worked their tongues. Her mouth dropped and she and her husband looked like they might vomit.

Matt broke off the kiss and looked her square in the eyes. “It may not be natural, but it tastes damn good.” I laughed, I couldn't help myself. Matt turned to Robbie. “You were right.”

“About what?” she demanded shrewishly.

“He told me he had no desire to see you ever again, but that if I wanted to I could. I don't.” For a brief moment, Brenda's religious mask fell and she seemed to understand what she'd lost, or perhaps never even had. But it was back up in a flash.

“I'll tell Dad you haven't changed a bit,” Robbie said, and then they walked off, with the rest of us following.

“And this just gets more and more fun,” I told JP. He was getting pissed at me. “What is next? Are there yet more twisted people we need to renew our acquaintance with?”

“Let's just go,” he groused. We were at the limo and about to jump in when an adolescent voice stopped us.

“Matt!” We turned to see Caleb running to catch up with us. “Hey,” he said, as he got closer.

“Hey, Caleb,” Matt said.

“So you're my brother?” he asked.

“Your mom tell you that?” Matt asked nervously.

“No, but I heard her and my dad talking about you. You leaving?” It was really touching to see this young kid trying to reach out to Matt, and not knowing how.

“Yeah, we gotta go,” Matt said, unsure of what else to say. “You got a phone?”

“You mean a cell phone? Nah. Cost too much, plus they don't work well out in the country,” he said with a grin. He looked like his father, tall and lanky, with dark brown hair that probably always looked a little greasy.

“So how do your friends talk to you?” Matt asked.

“They call me at home, or see me at school,” he said.

Matt looked around kind of like he was trapped. He was so easy to read. Caleb had made the effort, had reached out to him, and Matt couldn't just say goodbye and blow him off. “Take your time,” I said to him gently.

“Hey Matt, there's a cell phone stand over there,” Wade hinted, propelling Matt into motion. There was a big kiosk for Sprint at the festival.

“Come on Caleb,” Matt said, and led Caleb over to the booth.

“Well, what can I do for you?” said an annoying older salesman. We would get nowhere with him.

“We are here to see him,” I said, pointing at a younger guy who was talking to some girl.

“Jack, got a customer,” the older guy grumbled.

The young guy came ambling over. He was tall and well built, with the body of an athlete. “Can I help you?” he asked. “Hey, Caleb,” he said, recognizing the kid.

“Hey,” Caleb said.

“Caleb needs a phone,” Matt said.

“I can't afford that,” he said.

“I can,” I told him, stepping in. “Let us see what Sprint has to offer these days.”

I watched Caleb's eyes as Jack went through the phones with him. He tried to pick the cheapest one, but I wouldn't let him. He really was too cute to be stuck with a crappy phone.

“Where should we bill this?” Jack asked.

“You may send it here.” I pulled out my card, with my billing address on it. It was easier to have one central place for all the bills to go, and it made things easier for Brandon when he went to pay them. I pulled out my Day-Timer and made a note of it, so Brandon would pay it when it came in.

“Stefan Schluter? You're Stefan Schluter?” Jack asked, skeptically.

“I am. Would you like to see my identification?” I asked with a smile.

“Yeah, this I gotta see,” he said, sure that I was a fraud.

I handed him my driver's license and my American Express Platinum Card, and he stood there, dumbfounded. “Do you believe me now?”

“I'm sorry Mr. Schluter,” he stammered. “I never thought you'd just walk up to the Sprint booth.”

“Who is he?” Caleb asked, looking at Jack, then at me.

“Only one of the richest men in the world, you dumb fuck,” he said to Caleb. Then he got embarrassed. “Sorry.”

“Is there a problem here?” the older salesman asked.

“None at all. Jack is being most helpful thank you,” I said, dismissing him.

“Wow!” Caleb said, looking at me all wide-eyed.

“You did not know I was raised here?” I asked them, flirting. “You have not read my biography?”

“Uh, well, I knew you were raised here I just didn't expect you to come back,” Jack said.

I laughed. “I did not expect that either.” He made to hand the card back to me. “You keep it. Come visit if you are ever in California.” He was pretty hunky.

“Thank you Mr. Schluter!” Jack said. Meanwhile, Matt was busy programming his phone number into Caleb's phone.

“That goes for you too, Caleb,” I told him.

“Thanks!” he said. He looked at Matt. “So will you call me once in a while?”

“Only if you call me,” Matt told him with a grin. Then he gave Caleb an awkward hug, and we were finally free to leave Claremont. I was jaded enough by now to know it wouldn't be for the last time, but I hoped it would at least be a long time before we had to come back here.