The XKE       A short story by Dave Howe

Mark watched the house from his bedroom window. The previous week they had cleared away the overgrown bushes, and now they were putting on a new roof.

The house was down the hill, next to the hidden little harbor where boats could tie up to the dock and ride out a storm. The house had been empty for as long as Mark could remember. One time he had walked by after school and looked in the window. Nothing special, it looked normal.

Later that week, as the sun was setting, Mark watched a set of headlights round the corner, following the twisty road. The lights were low to the ground, maybe from a sports car. The headlights shot beams straight ahead through the dusk before blinking out in front of the house. It was dark. A light came on in the house. An hour later the light went out.

He woke early and went to the window. The bright morning sun revealed the wet curve of a red fender. A Jaguar XKE sat in the gravel, its soft top folded down. Mark leaned closer to the glass, wondering if the owner knew the local gulls would ruin that leather by noon.

The house door clicked open. The man stepped out, slid behind the wooden steering wheel without a glance toward the hill, and the Jaguar’s engine roared to life, kicking up gravel as he pulled away.

By the third week of watching the empty driveway, Mark began referring to the absent driver in his head as Richard—a formal name that fit the sharp cut of the man’s jaw.

It was almost a month later when the sailboat appeared. It glided up to the dock gently as could be and dropped the sails. A man stepped onto the dock, moving with the same fluid, athletic stride as the driver who had arrived weeks earlier. He secured the lines with quick, practiced loops. Mark was sure it was the same man.

As the man walked to the house a red Jaguar XKE came around the corner. The driver was a woman. A plume of dry road dust trailed the car. Through the windshield, a halo of bright blonde hair whipped wildly in the wind. Mark dubbed her Marilyn—it was the only name that made sense for a blonde driving a car like that.

Mark watched as the couple settled into a rhythm.  Sometimes they both went out on the sailboat and sometimes it was only the man. They took turns going to the village, almost never together.

Mark fell into his own habits. He watched the house in the morning, checked as he walked to school, and checked again before bed.

Then the Rolls-Royce arrived. It crept down the road, massive and silent, its towering chrome grille reflecting the hillside like a wall of mirrors. A man got out and went into the house. An hour later he got back into his car and left.

The next morning Richard secured his sailboat with extra lines, then walked around the house, checking doors and windows. Moments later the couple got into the Jag and left.

Mark changed his path to and from school so he could walk by the house and check the lines on the sailboat every day. One night, while a northeaster rattled his bedroom window, Mark slipped out the back door. Down at the harbor, cold spray stung his face as he checked the sailboat’s yellow nylon lines, tightening a clove hitch that had begun to slip.

By November, a thick skin of gray salt-crust and pine needles coated the sailboat’s deck. It felt wrong to let it rot. Mark snuck down to the hidden cove one Saturday with a stiff brush, terrified the door of the dark house would swing open. Still, he scrubbed the deck. The next week he wasn’t quite so terrified. When December came, keeping the boat clean was just something he did.

It was six months before they returned. Mark saw the van from his window. The driver was in an army uniform. He dragged a folded metal wheelchair from the back, snapped it open with a loud metallic clack, and helped the man out of the passenger seat. Mark pressed his forehead to the cold window pane—it was Richard.

An hour later the red XKE appeared. The top was up. When the woman got out she had short black hair, but she had the same way of moving and the way she tossed her hair made Mark sure it was Marilyn.

Summer had arrived and Mark was dressed in cutoffs and a T-shirt when he crept down to the dock to collect his bucket and brush.

As he collected his equipment a pebble skittered across the gravel behind him. Mark spun around. Halfway down the steep path from the house, the man was swinging his weight forward between two wooden crutches, his jaw tight with the effort. A voice, deep but not unkind, echoed across the gap. “Caught you in the act.”

Mark froze.

“So you’re the one who’s been messing with my boat?”

“Yes sir,” Mark sputtered. “I was worried something might happen to her. When we had the big storm she almost came loose. I tied her up as good as I could.”

“What possessed you to scrub the deck?”

“Well, sir, it was dirty,” Mark said, as if it was obvious.

        “You did a good thing, young man. Thank you.”

Mark realized he was holding his breath. He exhaled.

“I was about to take her out. If you want to come, help me aboard. My name is Jason.”

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