"Sometimes it seems like it would be nice if there were no men in the world."
After work, she picked Heaven up at school, watching her carefully for signs of disorder. Nothing was evident. Heaven climbed into the car and sat in her seat, the Dr. Seuss book, Oh, the Places You'll Go, on her lap.
She was in one of her introverted moods, a phenomenon Gabrielle had learned long ago not to interpret as a problem. If Heaven didn't have anything she felt like talking about, she didn't speak.
Gab drove slowly, the way she always did when she had Heaven in the car. She was phobic about causing an accident which would somehow harm her daughter.
"How was school today?" Gab asked.
"Not bad."
"Did you learn a lot."
"We talked about the alphabet some more."
There was no trace of anxiety or dismay. She talked a little bit about the songs and the games of the day, and didn't seem bothered by anything. She made no mention of friends, but she didn't say any new atrocities had been committed by the other kids. Perhaps that in itself was a victory.
When another call came from Tanner that evening, Gabrielle allowed herself to be convinced he was interested. The conversation came a little easier, with fewer pauses. They both seemed able to find things to say.
She laughed a few times at jokes he made, and that seemed to put him more at ease. She realized it was true for her also. When he was calm, she could be calm.
Jesus, did it ever get any easier than high school? She found her fingers tangling in the phone cord, twisting about the coils, and she watched them snap immediately back into place upon release. That was the same thing she'd done when she was talking to boys in eleventh grade, hoping they would be able to work up the courage to ask her out even as they stumbled over dutiful reports about football practice or the debate club. Everybody is scared and nervous, but breaking through the barriers of fear seems so impossible, she thought. She and Dave had never torn down all their walls. Perhaps that had been their downfall.
Could she reveal herself to Tanner? And could he open up? Weren't detective writers tough guys? Not sensitive artist types. She'd read interviews with Mickey Spillane even though she'd never bothered to check up on Mike Hammer.
Tanner seemed nice enough, average in fact. Maybe it was time to edge out on the limb a little, not too far but far enough to see how her weight affected the branch.
"Okay, Tanner," she said. "You fixed a meal for me. You wanna let me cook for you some night?"
"That would be nice," he said. She could have written his next line for him. "I wouldn't want you to go to any trouble."
She was prepared. "No trouble. I cook dinner almost every night after work anyway. Can you tear yourself away from your word processor tomorrow around eight?" Good line, she thought, pleased with herself.
"I guess I could manage that," Tanner said. "Should I bring anything?"
"Not really. Don't expect anything too fancy."
"Whatever you come up with will be fine."
Endearing, but not his best work, she decided. He couldn't be expected to be at his peak all the time. The main thing was that he was coming. The fear of asking was over, and the risk had paid off. She'd known he would accept, still it was scary to make an offer. Rejection always seemed to loom on the horizon. People always said you had nothing to lose and everything to gain, but that wasn't true. A negative answer could be devastating. Not as bad as worrying about a negative answer—but bad nonetheless.
She hung up, a feeling of warmth settling over her. It soon became a burst of enthusiasm, a tingling joy that made not grinning impossible. She went back into the living room and found Heaven playing with her toys.
"Who was on the phone?" she asked without looking up.
"Mr. Tanner." Gab sat down beside her and rested an arm around Heaven's shoulders.
Heaven continued fussing over her dolls, her expression intent. She took great care with the dolls. "Do you like Mr. Tanner?" Gabrielle asked.
"He's okay."
"He doesn't frighten you?"
Heaven shook her head. "No, ma'am."
"You're sure it won't upset you if he comes to visit?”
“It won't." Heaven put her dolls down and hugged Gab's neck. "He can come over."
"Good, baby. Mommie wants you to be happy. You know that?"
"Yes, Mommy. I know. I am happy. Here with you. Really."
Gab closed her eyes and rested her cheek against the top of her daughter's head. How much she loved this little one, more than anything.
He sat in one of the padded chairs near the plate glass window overlooking the runway. It was night. Various lights cut through the black scene with spots of red, blue or green. And raining. Drops streaked the glass.
Danube had spent nights in airports before. Flights were often canceled or delayed. Storms did their share. No matter. His travels had taught him patience if nothing else.
A discarded newspaper lay at his side, ignored, the only thing that made the airport different from a hundred others. Like motel rooms, airports were interchangeable. The newspaper was the Atlanta Journal Constitution, but it might as well have been the Los Angeles Times or the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Just as the woman down the row from him, struggling with her restless children, could have come from anywhere and be headed anywhere. He had seen her in other places with those same restless children, in bus stations as well as airports, or at least people so like this group they seemed no different. Nothing was really different. Nothing changed. Not in a lifetime. Not in several lifetimes.
No matter. He had become immune to boredom, just as he had become immune to anxiety. He did not worry about the present or the future. The past he could not escape, but he did not fear it either. Not while he was awake.
With luck, while he waited for a flight to New Orleans, he would not doze, and he would not dream.
Once Gabrielle had put Heaven to bed, she picked up Tanner’s book. In scanning the first couple of pages, she found it was a little more complex than she'd expected. This was no simple Perry Mason tale.
It opened in New Orleans, where a young man had gone to search for an estranged lover. Told in the first person, the narrative revealed pieces of the lead character's soul even as the plot began to unfold. She found herself wondering how much of Tanner's own inner feelings were reflected. She knew it wasn't appropriate to assume a writer was his own main character, but the hero of the novel reminded her of Tanner, at least a little.
They came out of the darkness, their forms emerging at first only as outlines in mist. They were short, walking four abreast, and their breath seemed to be grunted up from their throats.
Their green skin was marked with pocks and lesions, and their pointed features were twisted into hideous grins that peeled their lips back over sharp, yellowed teeth. The brightly colored sashes tied about their heads were sweat stained, and the weapons they carried were crusted with dried blood and bits of torn flesh.
Gnelf Master, a much more hideous and bestial Gnelf Master than the one immortalized in the storybooks and cartoons, led the band, a huge pitchfork grasped in his thick green fists.
Their feet crunched on the gravel path as they followed it into the city. They skulked along beside the roadways, avoiding headlights and dodging away from detection until they were at the edge of the neighborhood they sought.
There they darted across lawns, over fences, and through backyards until they reached Heaven's window. She had known they were coming, and she sat at the head of her bed, pillows bunched around her and the covers pulled up to her chin as if for protection.
She could not move when the window opened and they struggled in, exerting themselves to squeeze their stout bodies through the opening.
When they were assembled on the carpet at the foot of her bed, Gnelf Master began to laugh. As he did, his breath seeped out in wisps of smoke, and something harsh and brutal rattled in his chest.
"Tryin' to sleep?"
he asked. His voice came from deep in his throat and his speech had a thick, slow pattern. "There is no sleep for little bitches."
Heaven bit her lower lip, chin trembling, tears in her eyes as Master pointed his pitchfork and wiggled it, the tines pricking the sheet in front of her.
"Your mama took you to see the holy man. Did he do any good? Did he keep us away?"
The other creatures grunted and laughed, urging him to continue the harassment. They were like little, deformed apes, their eyes dull and their faces almost seeming limp except when they growled and grinned.
"Sometimes we eat little girls," Master said. His squinting eyes seemed to gleam as he spoke the words, and the grin broadened on his lips. Then he clicked his teeth as if taking two quick bites.
Heaven pulled the covers closer about her, bringing forth a laugh from the leader. He tilted his head back, and the noise roared up from his mouth.
"No one can hear us," he said. "We're in your dream. Only you know we're here. Poor little thing," he added with mock sympathy.
Heaven whimpered, but it was the only sound she could manage, a frightened little moan.
"Oh, you can't scream either," the Master said. "You're too scared. Try it."
Heaven's voice seemed tangled in her throat. It was true. She could not call out for help, and that made the shudders running through her intensify. She almost wet herself, and sweat covered her.
He screamed instead, a loud imitation of her voice that turned to a laugh. “Doesn’t help does it?”
Moving around the edge of the bed, Master tilted his head to one side, his wrinkled face taking on a false look of concern. "Poor little one." He extended his hand, one finger outstretched, to caress her cheek.
"Not your fault you are born of a whore, but your blood is tainted. Your mother is a slut."
"Mommy isn't bad."
“If only you knew." He caressed her cheek and then suddenly grabbed a handful of her hair, jerking her head sideways.
"Maybe we should cut her into little pieces, eh, boys?" He looked over his shoulder at minions who grunted and guffawed in approval.
His yellow-green eyes turned back to Heaven. They were filled with anger and hatred. “That bitch would scream then, seeing pieces of her little one strewn all across the living room rug."
"No," Heaven pleaded.
"Or if we eat her, it'd just be the bones. Right boys?"
Again a round of approving grunts, and the Gnelfs hoisted their weapons over their heads, waving them about in near-frenzied excitement.
"Don't hurt me or Mommy," Heaven begged. "We've never done anything to you. I used to like you."
"Oh, she used to like us." The Master let go of her hair and cupped her chin, gently for a second, but then his grip tightened. "You should be scared. This is nowhere near over, and your mother's friends ain't gonna be able to help. No one will help you. Not until we've finished with you."
He let go with a rough twist of his hand, then stepped back from the bed to join the others. "We'll be back," he said. "Soon. But you won't know when. Neither will your mommy. But don't tell her. Not unless you want us to cut her into little pieces instead."
They all began to laugh again before they formed a single file and began to squirm out the window. It might have been comical if they hadn’t been so brutal and horrible.
Master paused before his exit, his face splitting into another broad grin. "Take care," he said. Then he was gone.
Heaven awoke, tangled in her covers, her pillows bunched around her. She sat up quickly, eyes bulging, but her room was empty, and the window was closed.
She lay there, shivering from the cold sweat that covered her. Wrapping herself in the sheet didn't seem to help. The fear was too intense. She thought for a few moments she couldn't breathe until the grip of fear relaxed enough to let her lungs function again.
She didn't try to scream. That would only disturb Mommy again, and she didn't want her to worry. She also didn't want the Gnelfs to hurt Mommy the way they had said they would.
She didn't know what she could do, but for now she would have to keep things a secret. She would have no more outbursts like the one at Miss K'ina's. She had overcome that at Mr. Tanner's. Those tapes had not been expected. This time she knew what she had to do. She would hide things. For Mommy's sake she would have to.
Chapter 6
Rain poured in New Orleans as the sleek silver Greyhound pulled from the station, but the downpour could not ground a bus as it could planes. The storm seemed to be following Danube, washing spring down the gutter.
As the bus began its journey north, he watched the clouds on the horizon. It could be a natural phenomenon, but he found himself wondering if his presence had been detected by other forces, those of the supernatural kind.
Nothing was to be ruled out. Not in war, and he had been a warrior for a long time. Unwilling though he might be, he had learned to do what was necessary.
As he let his head fall on the headrest, he found himself wondering again what he would find in Aimsley. He had heard mention of the area before. Bad things happened there, things that men could not explain in simple, tangible terms.
He tried to think back to when the world had seemed simple, but his thoughts could not grasp that time now. Too much had transpired, too many pains, too many agonies.
He had traveled too many miles and seen too many nightmares. He knew what lay beyond reality and, worse still, what humans could do to each other. He had witnessed it all, and he had no escape.
The bus made its way onto the interstate, then onto the endless stretch of the bridge. He looked out across the water. The rain continued to slash down from the heavens, and the sky turned to a drab gray. For a while he fought the drowsiness that tried to overtake him. He did not want the dreams that would come with rest, yet he realized he would have to sleep soon. He could not face what was ahead in a state of exhaustion. Weak, he could be dragged into a fate worse than his present one.
After picking up Heaven at school, Gabrielle made a stop by Benson's Super Foods, putting forth an extra effort for her dinner with Tanner. He would hear that it was just something she'd thrown together, a simple meal. Letting him know she'd slaved would be akin to tipping her hand, letting him know she was interested. That was against the rules. If he thought he was doing the chasing he would continue the pursuit. If the situation reversed, he might run away.
She selected a shopping cart and shoved it along the broad tiled aisles, her daughter strolling casually behind, in no real hurry. Heaven had no concept of being in a rush. She was busy scanning the shelves for things she might beseech her mother to purchase.
Keeping her in peripheral sight, Gab made the best time she could, selecting fresh-looking vegetables and seasonings she usually passed over for the store brands. Then she hovered over the meat display, gazing across the lines of roasts, small reddish brown lumps sealed in cellophane and stacked in neat rows. Dave had always claimed there was an art to making the selection.
She always aimed for picking one that was not spoiled. She knew the older cuts were kept on top, so she shoved a few aside. Lifting a package, she winced at the cost per pound. Tanner had better be worth it. She'd probably have to water Heaven's milk to afford this.
Bad joke. She knew she would never skimp on anything for her daughter. She felt guilty over even joking about that.
As she got back behind the cart and seized the handle, she realized Heaven had wandered off. Time was a major factor if she was going to pull this dinner off, and her daughter was doing a disappearing act. She gritted her teeth as she shoved the cart forward along the rear aisle. With luck, she'd locate Heaven at the toy rack.
The hunch paid off. She rounded the end of the aisle where the cheap novelty items were displayed beside the hardware rack. Sure enough, Heaven was standing there peering up at the display.
“We need to get a move on, Hev," Gab said as she wheeled the cart forward.
Heaven didn't move. At first G
ab thought her child was being stubborn, but as she drew closer she realized Heaven was mesmerized by something on the rack.
Stepping from behind the cart, she walked to her daughter's side. Heaven didn't respond. She just kept on staring intently. Gab traced her daughter's line of vision to the plastic bag of toy Gnelfs dangling from one of the metal hooks.
There were about a half-dozen figures including Gnelf Master and his buddies. Holding hoes and spades, they were molded into gardening poses, and the painted card that sealed the bag shut showed them working in a garden full of brightly colored vegetables.
"Heaven, let's go. These won't hurt you."
Heaven continued to stare, her eyes wide. Reaching down, Gab took her shoulder and shook her lightly.
"Heaven." She looked around to make sure no one was looking on. "Honey, come on. They're just toys. The Gnelfs won't hurt you."
Heaven drew a tense breath, and a shudder seemed to course through her small body. There was no indication that she'd heard Gab speak to her. She seemed mesmerized.
Gab cast a quick glance around to make sure no one would see and misunderstand. The aisle was clear, so she shook Heaven again, trying to get through to her. She could feel the vibrations of fear. Heaven did not seem to want to budge, cemented in her tracks, as if the tiny plastic figures held some control over her.
Gabrielle snatched the bag down and tucked it behind some other items, out of Heaven's sight. That seemed to break the trance. Heaven blinked and came back into the real world, shivering, perspiration breaking out on her brow. She recognized Gabrielle and hugged her.
"Mommy."
"What is it, honey?" Gab grabbed her and held her close. "Are you all right?"
"Fine, Mommy."
Gab released her and gripped her shoulders. "Are you sure?"
She seemed a little disoriented and the shivers continued, but she nodded. "I think I'm okay. I guess I was just daydreaming or something."
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