by Mark Ayre
"What's that?" asked Alice.
Rather than answering directly, Abbie said, "When I was nineteen, someone murdered my sister. By that point, I'd lost my baby. My parents had proven themselves to be despicable humans; my brother was in prison. Violet was all I had. She meant the world to me.
In front of the sofa on which Abbie had sat was a coffee table. Going to her knees, Abbie lay the pillowcase on the table and unfolded it. With the care with which a nun might handle an ancient bible, Abbie removed from the bag The Stand.
"Ten years later, this is the last possession of Violet's I have, and I treasure it. Though it's become battered and bruised over the years, though I should put it in a safe to ensure its survival, I find I have to keep it with me at all times. I feel a little piece of my sister is still with me while it’s at my side. I link it to my memories of her. Stupid, I know. I'll always remember her, but, over the years, I've got it in my head that if I lose the book, I lose her."
Staring at the cover, Abbie, for a moment, lost her train of thought. Why had she removed the book? What had been her point?
When Alice crossed the room and dropped to her knees at the coffee table, Abbie remembered. It was about trust. Sometimes you had to cut open your emotional core and bleed pain in someone's sight for them to trust you.
Nodding at the book's cover, the author's name, Alice said, "Stephen King. That's where you got the surname?"
Abbie nodded.
"And Abagail?"
"I've read this," Abbie said, tapping the cover with a delicate finger, "hundreds of times. And Violet read it hundreds of times before me. Abagail Freemantle is the lady responsible for bringing together the good guys before their ultimate battle with evil. Which, as it turns out, is irrelevant. It's a rubbish ending."
Alice smiled. "I remember. I read it in the late 70s when it first came out, and again at some point in the last few years, behind the bars of my prison cell."
At that comment, Abbie didn't look up. Hope struck her heart. That Alice had mentioned prison made Abbie believe this exercise could be worth it. By opening up, Abbie had earned Alice's trust, and that flowed both ways.
Still at Abbie's side, on her knees, Alice rolled up her sleeve and showed her wrist to Abbie. Encircling it was a piece of string attached to which were numerous items. Part of a pine cone, a hair tie, a paper clip, and more besides. It looked uncomfortable, and it made a strange rustling when Alice turned her hand.
"Aurora was my miracle child," said Alice. "I thought I was done with kids. No surprise. My second youngest was born when I was thirty-seven, and even that seemed too old. When I fell pregnant at forty-four, I considered getting rid. Strongly considered. Rejecting what seemed like the sensible choice was the best thing I ever did."
Twisting the bracelet around her wrist, it was as though the makeshift charms were hypnotising Alice. She stared at those relics. Abbie knew the bracelet was acting as a gateway to Aurora as The Stand served Abbie as a gateway to Violet.
"Aurora made me this when she was six. Presented it me on the day a judge sentenced me to fourteen years in prison. I don't often cry, Abbie, but I cried when Aurora, tears in her eyes, pressed this into my hand. Of course, I couldn't keep it in jail. God forbid I use the paper clip to remove a fellow inmate's eye. That was hard to explain to my little girl when she first visited. Aurora cried, I cried, then my miracle stormed out. I felt as though she'd ripped my heart from my chest and taken it with her. When I was paroled nine years later, I put it straight back on. I wore it when I hugged Aurora upon my return home. Didn't take it off for a week after. Told myself I never would, but you know how it is. It became an irritant. I stripped it off and left it in a drawer, and in a drawer it remained until the day the police came to my door and told me my Sleeping Beauty was gone forever. I'll never remove it again. This time I mean it."
For thirty seconds, Alice's eyes remained on the bracelet. Then, with a snap, she tore them away. Pushing her sleeve over the jewellery, she looked at The Stand as though it were a voodoo doll bearing her likeness. Shaking her head, she found a smile and tapped the book’s cover with almost as much delicacy as had Abbie.
"Good tactic," she said. "This isn't the first time you've had to ingratiate yourself to a stranger you fear is going to die, is it?"
"No," said Abbie.
"How many?"
Abbie pretended to consider. In truth, she knew the number by heart. Like she knew the number of people she'd murdered. Their names she kept written in a little black book, often pored over.
"Must be coming up on fifty," said Abbie. For some reason, she couldn't bring herself to say the exact figure.
"And they all faced a life or death situation after you arrived?"
"Yup."
"Maybe you're a harbinger of doom," said Alice. "Maybe your arrival causes bad things to happen."
"Maybe it does," said Abbie. "Doesn't matter to you."
"It doesn't?"
"Here now, aren't I? Maybe my presence has already put you on the path to demise, but now I'm here, you might as well keep me around. Let me help prevent the damage I might have caused from coming to pass."
"Nice logic," said Alice.
"I thought so. That all the questions you wanted to ask?"
"One more."
"Go on."
"Of these fifty-odd people who faced a life or death situation after you turned up, how many did you fail to save?"
"Few enough that I can count them on the fingers of one hand."
Alice gave a slight nod as though approving. "That's a laudable success rate. What, 90% at worst?"
"Whatever it is," said Abbie, "it's not good enough."
"An honourable attitude," said Alice, nodding. She stood from the table, and moved a little way across the room, looked out the window. "Maybe you are cursing the people you think you're coming to save. In my case, I want you to rest assured your arrival has made no difference to my life expectancy."
Still on her knees, looking up at the older woman, Abbie said, "Is that so?"
"Oh yeah, I'm fifty-nine today, and it's my birthday tomorrow," said Alice. "Whether you'd turned up or not, I was never going to live to see sixty."
Nine
A silence draped the room as a sheet drapes a dead body. Then Alice said, "Are you single?"
Despite Alice's declaration from moments ago, Abbie couldn't help but smile. Here was a non-sequitur, a sign Alice and Abbie were perhaps not so different. Alice was in a feud with Louis that had led to the murder of her teenage daughter. She had committed crimes a judge deemed worthy of a fourteen-year prison sentence, most of which she had served. Regardless, Abbie found it difficult not to like the nearly sixty-year-old.
"I am," said Abbie. The question again made her think of Bobby and his smile and sent a pang through her heart. He wouldn't wake for at least another twenty minutes and probably wouldn't text for half an hour after that. Abbie had a little longer before she had to worry about breaking his heart, terminating her last chance at a slice of the normal life. "Why do you ask?"
"Isn't it obvious? You said it had been a decade since you were nineteen, so you're twenty-nine?"
Abbie nodded.
"Thirty this year, are you nervous?"
"Haven't really thought about it."
"Nor should you," said Alice. "My daughter Alex shares my birthday. She turns thirty tomorrow and is freaking out. I've told her it's just a number. It's not the passing days that age you, but children. You're not a mother, I take it?"
"No."
If Alice noticed the flash of grief that passed through Abbie's eyes, she chose, respectfully, not to mention it.
“As a teenager, I miscarried what would have been my first child,” said Alice, and this time it was Abbie that choose not to mention the flash of grief. "My firstborn arrived when I was eighteen. Overnight I jumped a generation, and it seemed like it. Felt like it too. I tell Alex if she wants to stay young, she should stay childless, but I'd never re
commend that. My kids are the best thing I did."
"Does this relate to your question about my relationship status?" asked Abbie, wanting to move the conversation away from children. "Other than in it distracts me from discussing your imminent demise."
Alice laughed. "Have I mentioned you make a good first impression?"
"You have."
"Good," said Alice. "I like you. I… no, hang on. Come with me. This is the family room, and you're a friend. Indulge me."
Abbie was given no chance to dissent. As Abbie had done to Tony in the cafe, Alice left the room before Abbie could process what was happening.
Despite this, Abbie didn't rush to put away The Stand. She would never do that. With her usual excessive care and attention, Abbie picked the book off the surface and folded it into the pillowcase. Opening her drawstring bag, she placed the wrapped up book inside. The drawstring bag she tightened and slid over her shoulder. It rested as ever against her left hip. It was getting to the point she felt strange when it wasn't there. As though it were a phantom limb.
Book secure, Abbie rose and left the living room. From the kitchen at the end of the hall, she heard glasses clinking and a cupboard door swinging closed.
Following the sound, Abbie appeared in the kitchen as Alice placed the glasses on a granite counter and went to the fridge. In the room's centre was an island surrounded by stools which made Abbie think of Arthur's round table. Around the room were white goods and plenty of surface space. The sink was beneath a round window that looked onto the ocean.
"Stay away from there. Don't look."
Alice had removed a filter jug from the fridge and was returning to the glasses. She had called out when she saw Abbie approaching the sink.
"Why not?" said Abbie.
"It's like a trailer," said Alice, which didn't seem to explain anything. "I hate trailers. I see movies by filmmakers I like or ones I've picked at random by the name. I like to be surprised by the main event. Trailers only diminish the cinematic experience.”
After filling the glasses, Alice returned the jug of water to the fridge then collected the drinks. Her hands occupied, Alice nodded towards a door at the far right of the room, currently closed. Abbie crossed the room to open it and step through.
"The kitchen window is the trailer," said Alice as she followed Abbie through the door. "This is the movie."
They'd entered a large, rectangular room. A bar ran almost the entire length of one of the long sides and offered a wider selection of alcoholic and soft beverages than Abbie had seen in any pub she'd visited over the years. At the end of the bar was a door. Across the room were comfortable chairs and booths where people could drink, chat, and admire what Alice had compared to a movie.
Abbie understood the metaphor. Aside from a door that led outside, the entire length of the opposite long wall to the bar was a single glass window that offered a stunning view of the rocks, the ocean, and the horizon.
"My third husband had many desirable qualities," said Alice. "For this view, I might still have married him if he were an adulterous, cat kicking monster. When I was imprisoned, I missed nothing more than sitting on that balcony on a warm evening with a drink and the setting sun. Except my children. Maybe."
The door beside the window led to the rock balcony, which extended a few metres before dropping into the ocean. Abbie understood how easy it would be to miss the scenario Alice described.
"You must miss your husband."
Alice laughed. "What did my Tony say?"
"What makes you think he said anything?"
"I know my son. He will have mentioned my unfortunate habit of losing husbands and in a far more final way than divorce." Alice glanced at Abbie, then back to the ocean. "Yes, I miss Morris every day. He was an eccentric who rubbed many people up the wrong way, but he doted on his daughters, and he was good to me. It's been ten years, and I still think about him every day. Same for Tony's dad, my second husband, and he's been gone even longer. The rumour mill doesn't concern me."
"And what is the mill producing, regarding your husbands?"
"That I killed them," said Alice, without compunction. "The death of each has improved my situation—From pauper to comfortable, from comfortable to wealthy, from wealthy to filthy rich. Then there are the circumstances. Tony's father died of a heart attack, which was hard to pin on me, but my first husband was stabbed, and Morris drowned not far from where we now stand. He was a strong swimmer. Foul play was always going to be suspected. I think he was drunk, possibly high; never good things to be, but especially dangerous at his age. Especially when out at sea on a boat with no railing on its deck. Still, from the outside looking in, I can see why people suspect me."
"But are they right?" asked Abbie.
Alice chuckled again. "Are you this direct with everyone?"
"No," confessed Abbie. "I try to read the room."
"Ah, so this approach is tailored to me."
"Yes," said Abbie. "You've been upfront about your prison time and the mud people throw your way. You seem like a woman who appreciates direct talk and has little time for subtext."
Nodding, Alice gestured to two seats in the centre of the room, facing the window.
"Come, sit."
Abbie did. She finished her water and placed the glass on the table.
"Another?" Alice asked.
"I'm okay."
Alice nodded, lowered her quarter-full glass, and took a breath.
"Would it make a difference to you if I’d killed my husbands?"
This was an intriguing question. Abbie mulled it over. She could not climb on her high horse about murder, considering the number of lives she had ended, but it did matter.
"I came here believing your life to be in danger," said Abbie. "What I don't know, as yet, is if you're worth saving."
"And a murderer wouldn't be? You already know I'm an ex-con."
"I don't believe in black and white," said Abbie. "I have known sick and twisted men and women who would never dream of ending a life, and I have known honourable and honest murderers."
"What about you, Abbie? Are you an honourable and honest murderer?"
"I like to think I'm two of three."
"But let me guess, you won't say which two?"
Abbie smiled but didn't answer. Alice looked pleased.
"You said you were single," said Alice. "And the more I get to know you, the more I think you'd be perfect for my Anthony. He's only a year younger than you."
"You're trying to distract me again."
"Quite right, but I mean it, too."
"I'm not looking to date."
"In my experience, that's when we find the best partners."
"And you'd be happy for your son to date someone who won't say conclusively if they're a murderer?"
Alice leaned forward. "I don't believe in black and white, either."
There was a comfortable silence as Alice looked out at the sea. After some consideration, she finished her water.
"Returning to your question," she said. "I meant it when I said I missed Morris and Tony's father, even after all these years. I didn't murder either of them."
"You didn't murder either of them," repeated Abbie. "But you’ve been married three times."
"Yes," said Alice. "I have.”
Taking the glasses, Alice moved to the kitchen. Abbie watched her open the dishwasher and slot them away before returning to Abbie, reclaiming her seat. For another spell, they sat in silence, captivated by the sea.
At last, Abbie said, "I want you to tell me why you don't think you'll last the night."
"Why should I?" said Alice. "Given you won't tell me why you think my life's in danger."
"I saw your face in a dream," said Abbie.
There it was again, risk and reward, the cost-benefit analysis. Abbie had only mentioned her prophetic dreams to the subjects of them on three previous occasions. Each response had been unique. So far, no response had been favourable.
Abbie was not
surprised that Alice continued the former trend while breaking the mould of the latter by laughing and clapping.
"Do you know," she said. "I honestly don't know if you're yanking my chain or if you mean it. If you do mean it, I don't know what to think. What should I think, Abbie?"
Abbie wasn't sure. She was annoyed at herself for taking this road with no idea what to say next. Mainly because she hadn't expected Alice's reaction.
"Seeing as you know you're in danger, I would say it doesn't matter,” said Abbie. “What matters is whether or not you believe my intentions to save you are honest."
"That's very true," said Alice. "And I don't know. I like you—I truly mean that, but maybe we have compatible personalities. That's dangerous. It might make me lower my guard when in truth, you've been sent here by the enemy. By Louis."
"The man who murdered your daughter?"
“Nothing loosens a lonely man’s tongue faster than a pretty face, eh?” said Alice. She wore a wry smile. “I’ll be having words with Anthony.”
Sensing it was the best route forward, Abbie said nothing. Alice’s smile slipped away, and a flash of that earlier grief returned.
“My children are of one mind when it comes to my daughter’s murder,” Alice confessed. “Louis did it.”
“You don’t agree?”
Alice mulled this over before revealing another aspect of herself that was much the same as Abbie: “The evidence is circumstantial but compelling. Still, I like to be sure before I take any actions I will not later be able to take back, should my suspicions prove incorrect."
In Alice’s lap, she kneaded her fingers. For a handful of seconds, she was lost in her own dark thoughts, then she met Abbie's eye and leaned across the table.
"If I discover you accepted my hospitality and made me like you on false pretences, and if it should become apparent you are here at the behest of Louis, or that you know anything of my daughter’s murder, I would..." She trailed off, looked a little lost. Came back strong. "I can't imagine what I'd do to you because what I'd do to you would be unimaginable. And not in a good way."