by Sandy DeLuca
“Just a soda for me, grape if you have it. But my lady here might need a minute or two to decide on something.”
“Yeah, take your time.” She strutted away, joined the men at the counter and looked over at us every now and then.
“You from up North?” the man behind the counter asked. He smiled and waved away a fly that had been circling over his head. He didn’t have any teeth.
“Yeah.” Sammy answered and reached in his pocket for a cigarette.
“Can always spot a Yankee,” he said, but I couldn’t be sure if he’d meant it as an insult. “Saw you drive by the window in that pretty Mustang. What you do for a living boy?”
“None of your fucking business,” Sammy said loud enough for only me to hear.
My heart sunk to my knees. This guy had no idea what he was potentially beginning. “Try to be cool,” I said softly. “He’s just being friendly.”
Sammy nodded, smiled and looked in the man’s direction.
“I’m in construction. My sweetie and I are driving down to Miami to visit family.”
“Well, welcome to my humble establishment.”
“Yeah, cool, thanks.”
The others drank their coffee, pretended nothing out of the ordinary was occurring.
“I gotta pee, splash some water on my face. Behave, okay?” I got out of the booth and noticed they were all looking at me.
I was only in the ladies’ room a minute or two before the waitress came in and stood beside me at the sink. She scrubbed her hands, staring at me in the mirror the entire time.
I was patting water off my face. The bruise hurt, my ribs hurt, my whole body ached.
“Honey, are you with that guy against your will?” the waitress asked. “You need help?”
I tried to play it cool, smiled and shrugged.
“You have a look,” she said. “I know that look, because I had it for years.”
“I’m OK, I’m—I’m fine,” I heard myself say.
“What’d he do to you?”
I started to cry, sobbing hard. It hit me so fast I couldn’t stop it, and though I tried, words refused to come from my mouth. But she knew I was in trouble, bad trouble. That hard face and those eyes couldn’t be fooled, not by the likes of Sammy and certainly not by the likes of me. She put her hands on my shoulders. “It’s all right,” she said softly.
Before I knew it I was blurting things out in between sobs—things that poured out of me as if I had lost all control of myself. “Some bad things went down. He said he’d kill me and my family if—”
“They found a girl nailed to the wall in a motel further north. It’s all over the news.” She stared at me. “He did it, didn’t he?”
I nodded between sobs. “I can’t stop him. I’m so scared.”
She clicked her tongue. “What’s your name?”
“Julia.”
“I’m Marla. It’ll be okay.” She squeezed my hand.
“You listen to me now. You go back to the table and you act like nothing’s wrong, you hear?”
“He needs help,” I said. “I’ve got to get him help.”
“Darlin’, go back to the table and order your food. Jake’s gonna call the sheriff. It’ll be okay.”
I nodded. “Okay.”
* * *
Nothing is ever okay.
I grab my car keys and bolt the door behind me.
My mother will have the operation. I won’t send her to oblivion. I won’t allow her to live in pain. It’s the only merciful thing I can do.
Perhaps today is a day for redemption, to make things right.
Mother cat watches me from the window. A blackbird swoops by and she hunches her back.
Sometimes, when Sammy killed, the blackbirds came.
Death is near.
CHAPTER 35
The conference room is small and cramped. A middle-aged social worker peers at me over gold-rimmed glasses. Georgia O’Keefe prints hang on the walls and the floor is carpeted in mauve. We sit at a long conference table and the doctor shuffles his papers about then indicates where I’m supposed to sign. His voice is low and somewhat condescending as he asks for the second time: “Have you discussed this with your mother?”
“Of course. I’ve thought about all the options and I’ve weighed the consequences. I sat with her until midnight talking about this. It’s her life, her choice. I put myself in her place and decided that if it were me I’d want to be the one to decide.”
“She’s been heavily medicated. She’s rarely lucid.”
Anger wells inside me. “Look, Doctor Ramsey, I know my mother. Even if she were in a coma I’d feel it. My gut would tell me what she wanted for herself.”
The social worker shakes her head, folds her arms. “You’ve got to—”
“Look, she wants the operation. Not you. Not me. It’s what my mother wants.”
I pick up the pen and sign my name as they watch in silence. Despite my feelings, despite the fact that my mother may not survive, I’ve decided that the operation is ultimately her decision. She told me with her eyes, with the touch of her hands, with her cold cruel words that she’d rather die than live in pain. She’d rather die than be sent off to a nursing home or have me care for her if she became an invalid. It’s what she fucking wants. Now maybe God will spare me.
The doctor scoops up the papers, stands and shows me the door. I hear him speaking to the social worker as I walk down the corridor, but the sound of a ringing phone distracts me.
The pay phone near the elevator is ringing, and I feel compelled to answer it. I hesitate; look up then down the hallway. No one is watching. With a hard swallow I approach the phone slowly, listen to it ring twice more, then reach out and answer it.
It’s him.
It’s almost time, Julia.
* * *
Sammy wasn’t at the table when I got back, so I assumed he’d gone to the restroom. I slid into the booth, still thinking about my conversation with Marla, and though I should have felt relief, my gut told me something was wrong.
I peered out the dingy window and saw Sammy swaggering away from the car. He was wearing his long jacket and looked determined, like the world owed him a living.
He strolled lazily back into the restaurant, but instead of sitting opposite me, he sat down next to me.
“I’m freezing,” he said. “Must be the dope. I had to get my coat.” He removed a pack of cigarettes from his coat pocket and set it on the table before him. He was lost in thought for a moment, his eyes intense, and then he reached for a cigarette and quickly lit it.
He laughed at me, blew smoke into my face, and I felt my heart sink. Did he know what Marla and I had talked about?
Even though I was shaking, I did my best to stay cool, already wondering how he’d react when the sheriff arrived. I pictured him being handcuffed, taken away. I thought about going home, sleeping in my old bed and the clean white sheets. I wondered if anyone would ever know that I made the first cut in Star’s flesh.
“It’s about a hundred out there, Sam. And it isn’t much cooler in here. Don’t they believe in air-conditioning in this part of the country?” I thought my voice sounded shaky, my attempt at humor forced, but he didn’t seem to notice.
Jake looked in our direction as Marla said something to him then came over to take my order.
“What’ll it be, darlin’?’
“I’ll have a burger, fries and a small salad.” I felt Sammy’s hand on my leg.
“We can do up your burger with onions, green peppers and some mushrooms, if you like. It’s real good.”
“Sure, but skip the mushrooms.”
She nodded, her gaze again resting on my bruised cheek. “Anything else for you besides that soda?” she asked Sammy without looking at him.
“Nope,” he said evenly.
I noticed Jake back away from the counter. There was a door behind him, and I figured that’s where he’d make the call. The other two men sipped coffee and glanced at Marla
as she slowly made her way back.
Sammy tapped his fingers on the table, watched Jake and the others with a blank expression, his eyes slowly gliding from one to the next, then back again.
Nothing’s wrong, I told myself. You’ll be out of here in no time and all of this will be over. Nothing’s wrong.
* * *
“What’s wrong?” From the corner of my eye I see a nurse emerge from the elevator. Her face is hidden in shadow, or maybe my vision is just blurry from the tears. Does she sense my fear? Is my body trembling that much?
I hang up the phone, and my hands are shaking so violently that I drop my purse.
“I know you,” the nurse says. Her tone is kind and compassionate, but there’s an edge to her voice as well, something I can’t quite define. “Do you need help?”
She moves closer to me, holds out her hand.
Driven through her open palm, is a nail.
Blood drips from the wound as fluorescent light shines down on her, finally revealing her face.
Star.
The elevator door opens. She bends down, picks up my purse and hands it to me. Her blood streaks the leather.
I back into the elevator, afraid to turn away from her.
She smiles, but her eyes are lifeless and glassy, like a doll. “I needed your help once.”
Clutching my purse desperately, her blood seeps onto my fingertips and my head begins to spin. I open my mouth to speak, but words refuse to come.
As Star gawks at me with her dead eyes, the elevator door slowly closes.
CHAPTER 36
The elevator door opens. Everything seems back to normal. People sit in the lobby reading magazines, wait to be admitted or for a loved one to be released. A little girl and boy gaze into the window of the hospital gift shop as their mother considers the stained glass sun catchers hanging over the door.
Everything’s fine, I assure myself as I head for the exit. The door slides open and a blast of chilly air hits my face. It’s dark now, and shadowy things appear before me, rising up from the ground. Dead voices whisper my name. Footsteps sound behind me.
Terrified and certain I’ve gone completely, hopelessly insane, I run to my car, quickly unlock the door and fall behind the wheel. I drive away from there as fast as I can, my hands gripping the wheel tight to prevent them from shaking.
I glance in the rearview. Faces peer at me from behind trees and cars.
Returning my eyes to the road, I realize I am headed directly for the guard station. I swerve just in time and hit the gas, tires screeching as I bolt from the hospital parking lot.
Trying to catch my breath, I look in rearview again. The security officer in the guard station leans out of the hut and glares at me with demon’s eyes.
* * *
It all happened so fast.
Sammy had been sitting there with me, drumming his fingers on the table and calmly taking the place in, when suddenly, in one fluid motion, he stood up, pulled a rifle from under his coat and began firing.
Jake had his back turned and was pushing open the door, more than likely on his way to his office to make the call. But a bullet hit him low in the back, near his kidneys before he even got through the doorway. Blood exploded across his white tee-shirt and he collapsed face-down over the grill. His hands fell flat against onions and green peppers and the burger I’d ordered.
Crimson swirled with cooking oil, grease popped and splattered, and I smelled a rancid, sickly sweet odor I later realized was the stench of burning human flesh.
It all happened so quickly that by the time everyone realized what had happened it was too late.
Marla stood looking at us, stunned and frozen, her mind trying to make sense of what she’d just witnessed, when Sammy swung the rifle in her direction and shot her in the head. Her head snapped back and blood and brain tissue sprayed the wall behind her as her body collapsed.
The two men at the counter ducked and started to run for the door.
They never made it.
Sammy shot them both with the same calm precision with which he’d murdered Jake and Marla.
I stood there trembling and trying to convince myself what I had just seen was real, because it all seemed so unreal. Like something on TV or in some movie only…only this wasn’t make-believe. Marla and Jake and the others weren’t actors. They weren’t going to get up and brush themselves off. Sammy was real. I was real. The blood was real. Death was real. The ringing in my ears was real. The smell of a discharged rifle was real. His laughter was real. The evil all around us was real.
“Sammy,” I gasped, choking back tears, “my God. Why?”
Still holding the rifle in one hand, he reached out for me with the other, pulled me into him and kissed me hard on the lips. “’Cause they wanted to separate us,” he said softly. “Nobody can ever do that, babe—ever.”
I felt like a rag doll in his arm, my body limp but still unable to pull my eyes from the carnage before us.
“And I’ll kill any motherfucker who tries,” he said, laughing lightly and slowly sweeping his hand across the room to indicate the dead. “See?”
I watched as Jake’s hands turned brown from the grill. The thin hair on his head caught fire, singed.
I felt his fingers on my chin. He turned my head so I was looking into his eyes: Dark and smoldering portals to Hell. “I’d hunt you down and kill you if you ever leave me,” he said.
It wasn’t a question, but I felt myself nod anyway.
He smiled, released me and strode across the room to the cash register. He pulled all the cash free and stuffed it into his pocket. “About five hundred bucks. Cool, we need to get rid of the Mustang anyway. This’ll come in handy if the car dealer won’t do an even trade. We won’t have to dip into our stash.”
I looked down at Marla as Sammy pushed me toward the door. Her eyes were open—dead eyes that knew so much, that had once been kind. But like the others, she’d been no match for pure evil.
I looked at Sammy. The Devil looked back.
* * *
I bolt the door behind me. They are out there tonight, surrounding the house, tapping on the windows. Mother cat can hear them too. She listens, her ears perk up, and she moves now and then when one of them scrapes the glass or lightly knocks at the front door.
I do a line of coke as a pair of red eyes glare at me from outside. I know what I have to do, what they want me to do.
Paint.
I’ll paint.
If I paint they’ll go away.
CHAPTER 37
I stare at the canvas. The brush strokes are those of madness, black and red paint drips to the floor, nothing makes sense. I’ve been working since the night prior, creating beautiful images of the beach in summer, using soft blues and greens. Did I switch canvases after too many glasses of Pinot Grigio? Did I imagine the lovely scene I’d created? I am truly losing my mind.
I look deep inside a thick black line and see a leering face. Does the Devil truly exist? Do I know him, and more importantly, does he know me?
I wipe my hands, take another sip of wine and shuffle my cards. I turn over the first, The King of Swords.
Sammy’s card.
It always comes up right before I dream about him, before I think I see him in a crowd—right before—
The phone rings.
Everything is turning black.
That old Impala drives by the house. I can hear the tires on the ground outside. I close my eyes; picture the Devil I know, the Devil who knows me, behind the wheel.
* * *
Sammy stopped at a used car lot in Atlanta, traded in the Mustang for a 1968 Impala. I don’t know if the trade was even or not. I was so confused by then a lot of things were blurred and lost to the darkness.
In Jacksonville he pulled into a crowded parking lot and stole plates off a van.
My hallucinations had returned. I kept seeing Marla sitting in the backseat of the Impala. “Don’t worry, Jake’s gonna call the sheriff,” she�
�d say with her soothing southern drawl. “We ain’t gonna let Sammy hurt you or anybody else no more.” Then I’d look over at Sammy behind the wheel, and a knife would suddenly appear from nowhere and plunge into his chest. Visions of his blood splattering on dirty concrete filled my mind, and I’d see people take him away; drag him off like he was dirt. Then Marla’s voice would lull me to sleep. Soft, seductive, like a prayer.
“They won’t catch us,” Sammy kept saying. “Nobody’s gonna split us apart.”
I don’t remember what time of the day it was when we got to Miami.
Sammy said he wanted to find a temporary room and that we’d look for something better after we learned our way around the city a bit.
We spotted a For Rent sign on a shabby boarding house on Biscayne Boulevard, and Sammy decided to stop and check it out.
A young woman sat outside, drinking iced-tea and smoking a cigarette. She had on big, pink, plastic hoop earrings, bright red shorts and a shirt. Her hair was teased up high. She didn’t smile or greet us when Sammy asked about the room. She just eyed him with curiosity that obviously included a fair amount of suspicion, and then looked at me.
“You rent by the week, or what?” Sammy asked while staring at her legs.
Without a word, she rose from her chair, turned and pushed open the office door. Chimes jingled.
We followed her in.
She stepped behind a counter. Candy and gum were stacked in a glass case. Post cards hung on racks. Incense burned on a small table. A tabletop radio sat on a shelf. The Stones sang Under My Thumb.
The woman opened the register, held out her hand. “Thirty-five bucks a week. No house cleaning included. Ten bucks a week extra for that.” Her gaze found the bruise on my face. Then she looked at Sammy’s hands. “First loud noises or trouble, we call the cops and you’re out of here.”