“Sounds wonderful.”
“On the third day of this miserable experience, as your family is getting ready to leave, Rover wanders out into the road and gets hit by a car.”
“Jesus, Ruby!”
“Dead as a hammer. Your Dad buries him out by Bessie’s garden and all of you set out on another nine hour drive, leaving your best friend behind at a place you hate. You parents both try to comfort you, but there is no comfort for the child. It has been an endless little kid hell. But kids bounce back, right? Kids are tough, time heals wounds. By your seventh birthday, the incident is so far in your distant past, you know it happened, but you barely remember it. When you turn ten, you have no clear recollection of the dog, the Aunt, or the place in Bumfuck, Kansas. At fifteen the slate is clean. You are two full five-year-old lifetimes away from the event. You don’t even recall that there is something you don’t recall.”
Ruby began to walk slowly as she spoke, warming to her subject.
“Now, you’re sixteen. Testosterone drips from the musk glands behind your ears. Nothing on the planet is more important to you than an undone bra strap. You’ve been sniffing around a young lovely, Miss Cheerleader Hotbody, for weeks. She consents to accompany you on an evening out next Friday night. All week long visions of sugarplums dance in your head. Your reptile brain is in full mode. Tits and ass scroll on the inside of your eyelids for days. The big night comes. You drive to her house. Her mother answers the door and smiles. She’s friendly! Graciously, she invites you into the living room to wait for Hotbody to finishing dressing and waft trippingly down the stairs. Mom tells you to have a good time and bring daughter home by midnight, then walks out and leaves you to your own devices. Pretty good setup, huh?”
“Sure,” Crockett said. “Sounds perfect.”
“Almost,” Ruby said. “You’re by yourself in a strange house. In the living room is a fireplace. On top of that fireplace is an old-fashioned mantle clock. It ticks. It ticks so loudly that the noise surrounds you as you sit, a stranger in a strange land, with nothing to do but wait.”
She faced Crockett and rested her hands on the back of a gray damask chair.
“Ten minutes later, when the object of your lust-ridden fantasies actually does come down, you’re angry, nervous, claustrophobic, sad, and thoroughly upset. She looks at you and asks what’s the matter. You tell her ‘nothing’, and hustle her out of the house as quickly as possible, but it’s not nothing. It’s something, and you have no idea what. Your mood has completely reversed itself in the space of ten minutes and you don’t have the faintest idea why. You just feel miserable.”
Ruby began to pace.
“After an hour or so you’re your old self again, Miss Hotbody has decided that you’re not just a brooding shithead and has actually become friendly. By eleven-thirty she’s got her hand on your leg as you drive, she’s laughing at all your witticisms, and dreams are beginning to show some promise of coming true. At her door, you kiss her goodnight. In the embrace that follows, she actually nibbles your earlobe and asks if you want to come in. Come in? My God! There’s a couch in there! The lights are off. Mom has gone to bed. Bliss beckons. But unless they have a TV room in the basement where you can get away from the ticking of that clock, Great Aunt Bessie will never let you stay. The portal, the aneurysm, the fistula between now and then waits on the other side of that front door. It is just as real and sweaty as it was all those lifetimes ago when the smell covered you, the bed smothered you, and Rover gasped his life away on that cruel road out in lonely Kansas, while five-year-old you screamed with the most devastating pain you would ever know.”
“Christ, Ruby. You’re about as cheerful as an impacted wisdom tooth!”
“Just making a point, Crockett,” she said. “Emotions are not bound by time. Emotionally, everything that has happened to us in our lives, just happened. That includes Rachael’s murder, your attempted murder, coma, and recovery. Hell, all the things surrounding Ivy and this house of hers. When events like that line up to create a bleed through, time is affected. That’s why it seems like we never really left here. It’s not a negative thing. It’s not necessarily even a sad thing. Like hearing a casual remark from an older person about how the smell of the cotton candy booth at the mall takes them back. Another person might smell that same booth and just feel happier for a while, never understanding why. Emotional memory knows no time.”
“Yeah, well I do,” Crockett said. “It’s almost midnight. You gotta be beat.”
“I am. To bed I go.”
She slipped her arms around his neck and kissed him tenderly on the lips.
“Nice.”
“Very,” Ruby murmured, nuzzling his cheek. “Sleep well, my Crockett. Sweet happy dreams.”
He watched her walk back to the whorehouse. She left one of the massive connecting doors ajar.
CHAPTER FOUR
Dealing with demons
After Ruby left, Crockett knocked around the room for a while, not very sleepy because of his long nap in the car. Finally he fired up the small steam room off of his bath and sat on the edge of the ancient claw-footed tub while it warmed. Thirty minutes in the steam pretty much turned him to jelly. Crockett took a quick shower and caned his way to the bed. He was asleep in minutes. The sound of his name pulled him back.
“Crockett, help!”
The voice was female and distant, clawing feebly at the sleep that surrounded him.
“Crockett, please! Don’t let him do it!”
Waking up was like crawling through a long velvet tunnel. Crockett struggled, dizzy with effort. The voice. He knew the voice.
“He’s killing me, Crockett! Help! Stop him, please! I love you, Crockett. Please! Please make him stop!”
Rachael! Crockett forced his eyes open and looked around the dark room, trying to sit up, but the bedclothes were too heavy. He fought with them, but they bound him to the mattress with implacable weight, allowing him to lift only his head. A scream drew his eyes to the bathroom door. It was open and the light was on. He could see a portion of the tub. An arm hung over the side, the hand dangling in a pool of blood.
He shouted for Rachael, but had no voice. Surging, Crockett raged against the covers, but could not rise. A shadow darkened the bathroom doorway and Martin Morrison, Ivy’s ex-brother-in-law, Rachael’s father and murderer, a man whose death Crockett had caused, walked out of the bath toward where he lay.
“You!” he hissed. “You took away my lovely children, you killed my wonderful sister, you fed me to the dogs! Me! You did this to me! You ruined my life, Crockett. You and that meddling daughter of mine! I should have killed her years ago, bled her out like a pig, but I waited too long. I waited too long and that interfering bitch Ivy got involved and you came and you killed us, Crockett. You killed us! Well, the bitch that was my daughter is dead, the bitch that was her mother is dead, and now I’ve come for you!”
He leaned over the bed and put his hands on Crockett’s shoulders, shaking him against the mattress.
“Now, Crockett. It’s time, Crockett! Crockett! Crockett, wake up! Crockett, Wake up! Crockett! WAKE UP!”
The room tilted and he was looking up into Ruby’s face reflecting light from the open door of the whorehouse, as she leaned over him and held his shoulders to the bed.
“Stay with me, Crockett. You were dreaming. You’re awake now. Stay with me. It wasn’t real, Sweetie. It wasn’t real and now it’s all over. You were shouting. You’re safe, everything’s okay.”
Crockett started to speak, but the lump in his throat made it impossible. When the tears began, Ruby kissed his cheek and murmured assurances. When the sobs and shakes took over, she slid into bed behind where he’d curled into the fetal position and spooned him. She was still there at dawn.
Keeping his demons at bay.
It was just getting light when Crockett opened his eyes. He slowly rolled onto his back in the circle of Ruby’s arms and turned his head to look at her. Their faces were about
six inches apart. She opened her eyes and smiled.
“Hey,” she said, shifting an arm under his neck and caressing Crockett’s cheek with her free hand. She was warm and fine, exuding the sweet pungency of female sleep.
“Hey,” he said, and kissed the tip of her nose. “I love you.”
Ruby returned the nose kiss. “What’s not to love? I’m a damn site closer to perfect than you deserve,” she said. “How ya doin’?”
“Better than last night,” he replied. “What happened?”
Ruby removed her arm from under Crockett’s neck and propped herself up.
“I heard you shouting in your sleep,” she said. “I came in and you were lying on your back, rigid and shaking, eyes wide open and staring at something I couldn’t see. It was such an emotional trauma that you were very nearly in a trance state. I finally had to scream at you to get you to come out of it. I was getting ready to slug you when you woke up.”
It came flooding back.
“Martin Morrison was here,” Crockett said, and told her about the dream. When he finished, Ruby raised an eyebrow.
“Interesting,” she said.
“Oh, shit,” Crockett groaned.
“Actually,” Ruby continued, “what you went through, or events like it, are not that uncommon. Someplace in that twisted organ you laughingly refer to as your brain, you actually believe that you could have saved Rachael from her father, or should have saved Rachael from her father, or something similarly male and stupid. It’s nonsense, but emotional responses are not based on logic. Ask any Vulcan. The useless misplaced guilt you carry from not having saved her, augmented by the useless misplaced guilt you carry from killing her father and his twisted sister, combined with the return to Ivy’s home where you and I spent so much time and you were so terribly injured, all stacked up for you to have the perfect opportunity to punish yourself. You did.”
“That’s your official diagnosis.”
“Either that, or it was just another feeble attempt to get me in your bed.”
“Hey, it worked didn’t it?”
Lifting her head, Ruby peered around the room.
“Eek,” she said.
Crockett reached over and patted her tummy under the covers. It was bare.
“Also,” he said, “I seem to recall one particular night, in this very bed, when you walked in, dropped your robe, climbed under the sheets, and had your less than lesbian way with me.”
Ruby stifled a smile. “You ever gonna let go of that?” she said.
“As I remember,” he went on, continuing to touch her tummy, “you seemed to participate in that heterosexual encounter with considerable enthusiasm, ability, and abandonment.”
“One lousy mercy fuck and I’m branded for life.”
“Do you mean to say that sex with me did not cause you to forsake your lesbian ways and forever cease your sinful lifestyle?”
“Fat chance,” she said. “And quit groping my stomach.”
“Well, I know that our single encounter certainly altered my proclivities. I’ll never go back to sheep.”
Giggling, Ruby rolled completely on top of Crockett and kissed his face about a dozen times.
“Baaa!” she blurted, bounced out of his bed, and headed back to the whorehouse. In the doorway she stopped and looked back at him over her nude shoulder.
“Take a cold shower and get your shit together, Crockett. I’m not ready to deal with your twisted libido right now. Although I shouldn’t be surprised. You’re Scotch aren’t you?”
“You drink Scotch,” he said. “I’m a Scot.”
“Then you should wear a kilt.”
“Why a kilt?” he asked.
“Because,” Ruby said, “a sheep can hear a zipper a mile away.”
She closed the door behind her.
Crockett was still smiling when she stuck her head back in the room.
“Besides, Crockett, you got it all wrong anyway.”
“Oh, yeah?” he chuckled, grinning at her.
“Yeah. It was Mary that had a little lamb.”
She blew him a kiss and closed the door.
CHAPTER FIVE
Reunion
Balancing with his cane, Crockett hopped into the bathroom and took a quick shower to wash off the night sweats. He toweled dry and sat on the john lid to put on his leg. Once again fully mobile, he dried his hair and pulled it back into a ponytail. He shaved, trimmed his ‘stash and goatee, brushed his teeth, slipped on a pair of cargo pants, some tenni-runners, and a light brown, crew neck sweater. Crockett dabbed on a little foo-foo water and Ruby, without even the suggestion of a knock, breezed in.
“Christ,” she complained, “don’t you have any clothes?”
Crockett manufactured a toothy grin. “Morning, Darling,” he said. “Sleep well, Snookums?”
She sniffed. “Old Spice? You’re wearing Old Spice?”
“Yeah. I couldn’t find my English Leather.”
“English Leather is even worse!”
“I know. That’s why I’m wearing Old Spice. I ran out of Canoe.”
“Witness if you will,” Ruby said. “A man lost in time.”
“Did you just come in here to criticize me?” Crockett asked
.
“Yep. And to tell you that I love you. I had contemplated fondling your aging backside until I caught a whiff of your toilet water and lost my nerve. How ya doin’?”
“I feel pretty good,” he said.
Ruby looked at him. “I’m not surprised,” she said. “Events of last night’s magnitude can sometimes be an emotional cleanse. You need to take a nap this afternoon if you can. Re-charge a little bit.”
“Care to join me?”
“I said a nap.”
“Thanks for rescuing me last night and chasing away the boogey-man, Ruby.”
“Quid pro quo,” she replied. “You chase away my demons every time I’m near you. Of course, that could be the smell.”
They walked into Ivy’s immense atrium a little after seven to find Cletus seated at the long glass table pouring himself coffee from a silver service. As they approached, the houseman delivered two covered serving trays, each about the size of a card table.
Clete grinned. “Mornin’ boys and girls,” he said. “Ivy wants me to tell you how happy she is you’ve come and she’ll see you in a little while. We’re supposed to start without her. Cuppa mud?”
Crockett sipped his coffee, a marvelous Blue Kona, as Ruby uncovered the trays. Melon balls, pineapple slices, croissants and quiche.
“Yum,” she said, and began to shovel a plateful.
Crockett looked at Cletus. The Texan nodded and vanished down the hall. In less than thirty seconds he returned with a box of Hostess chocolate-covered donuts. They each grabbed one and began to munch. Ruby, chewing her pineapple and quiche looked at both of them with utter contempt.
“Men,” she muttered, installing another forkful as her eyes strayed to the Hostess box.
Clete grinned and extended it in her direction. She glared at him for a moment.
“Oh, all right,” she muttered. “Maybe just two.”
Crockett had just finished his third when Ivy came into the room in the company of a small woman who appeared to be in her seventies. The three of them rose and Ivy’s face lit up.
“Oh, my!” she said. “What a wonderful surprise! Children, it is so good to see you. I had no idea you were coming.”
Crockett glanced at Clete. He stifled a small smile.
Ivy, perfectly made up and wearing a pale yellow linen lounging suit and low heels, advanced on Ruby, extending her hands and glowing.
“You absolutely defeat time, My Dear,” she said. “Always lovelier than the day before. My Joan of Arc in high heels!”
They embraced as Ruby chuckled. “I hope we’re not inconveniencing you, Ivy. Perhaps we should have called.”
“Nonsense,” the old woman said, backing away and holding onto Ruby’s hands. “There exists not one po
ssible circumstance to make you unwanted in my home. You are part of my heart, Child. The dearest part.” She turned to Crockett.
“Oh, Crockett,” Ivy continued, her face shining. “The hero returned. It is such a joy to feel you again within these walls.”
She took his face in her hands and peered into Crockett’s eyes.
“Are you well, Crockett?” she said. “Are you truly well and happy? No man is more deserving of both.”
Crockett kissed her on both cheeks.
“Well and happy, Ivy,” he said, “and very pleased to see you. I hope we’re not interrupting anything.”
“Impossible,” she said. “Anything other than you would be the interruption. Sit. Please, both of you. Sit and finish your breakfast. Cletus, are they behaving?”
“As well as can be expected,” Clete said.
“What a shame,” Ivy twinkled, walking back to her friend, and patting Clete on the shoulder in passing.
“Children,” she said, “allow me to present Marta Boothe, a woman who has been very dear to me for many years. Marta, this is Miss Ruby LaCost and Mr. David Crockett. You have heard me speak of them many times. They have rendered me service above value and I celebrate them both.”
Ms. Boothe smiled and nodded her head in a quick bird-like movement. She was perhaps only five feet tall. With gray hair made more bland by a sallow complexion and sunken eyes, it was obvious that she was not at all well. She pulled a dark blue woolen shawl tightly around her thin shoulders and looked at them. When she spoke, her voice was the color of her complexion, thin and gray, weak and breathless.
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