by Joe Humphrey
Reluctantly, Charlie agreed to stop going outside alone.
- 20 -
“Can we have the top down?” Charlie asked, turning the radio down and smiling. She’d learned that Caroline responded better when she smiled. Charlie suspected it had less to do with how Charlie was feeling and more to do with Charlie’s increasing ability to manipulate people. It was something she was unexpectedly adept at, considering how awkward and clumsy a girl she’d believed herself to be in her previous life. Smiling and making exactly the right amount of eye contact was becoming second nature to her; a subtle touch of the elbow, a well-placed laugh, a light gasp. Even the chewing and sucking of the scar on her bottom lip, what was once a nervous tick, was now calculated and intentional.
“That would be fine,” Caroline said, after some consideration. She turned the wheel and coasted the Cadillac onto the shoulder of the highway. “Get my scarf from the back seat, dear.”
Charlie climbed between the seats and pulled Caroline’s big purse toward her. It was one of two purses Caroline took with her. There was a small clutch that held money, her cigarettes, her driver’s license, a silver lighter that appeared to Charlie to be from sometime before the turn of the century, and a straight razor that was, as near as Charlie could tell, the sharpest blade in god’s creation.
The big purse, on the other hand, was full of all kinds of odds and ends. There was a long spool of nylon twine, a pair of handcuffs (which initially struck Charlie as kinky the first time she saw them, but then sent a shiver up her back once she thought about it a little more), a hairbrush and manicure set, a particularly nasty looking WWII trench knife in a sheath, spikes poking from the knuckles like some kind of medieval torture tool, a collection of lipsticks, mascaras and other seemingly (though certainly not) random makeups, a set of lock picks, and a long, white, silk scarf, neatly folded in one of the many pockets.
Charlie handed the scarf to Caroline, who covered her hair with it and pressed a button on the dash. The roof rumbled back and down in its slow arc and Charlie sighed as the sky came into full view. When the roof locked itself into place, Caroline steered the car back onto the road and headed toward town.
- 21 -
The smell of popcorn made Charlie’s stomach reflexively grumble. She had grown so used to ignoring the smells of eating establishments that times like this now surprised her. Her nose was fine-tuned and her sense of smell was stronger than it had ever been, and when she walked into a diner, rather than smelling bacon and eggs and biscuits, she smelled the grease bin in the back and the garbage can behind the counter. She smelled the disinfectant and human waste of the bathroom. She smelled a room full of sweating, unwashed bodies packed into slightly damp cotton and polyester and stacked in booths. So, when she walked into the movie theater and the warm, buttery waft of popcorn hit her nose, she had to stop and close her eyes, soaking it in.
“Are you okay, hon?” Caroline asked, putting her gloved hand on Charlie’s shoulder. Charlie nodded and had to talk herself out of asking to buy a bucket of popcorn. Even if it was just to hold it and smell it during the movie. She knew that the urge to eat just one (and another and another) kernel would be too much, and Caroline had told her many times just how bad an idea that was. She would have to settle for the smell, which was wonderful.
They followed the crowd slowly into the theater. The excitement was building in Charlie’s chest as they found their seats. It took a lot to get Caroline to the movies. She always seemed somewhat uncomfortable when they were out doing things other than hunting. Charlie assumed it was because she was worried people might think they were a homosexual couple, but the mother/daughter dynamic seemed far more obvious to her. There were times when Charlie got the sense that Caroline was hiding her away from the world, and when they did things like go to the movies, Caroline seemed to collapse into herself just a bit. She didn’t walk as tall or dress as nicely. For instance, that night Caroline was wearing white slacks and a black sweater. The scarf was back in its pocket in her purse, on the backseat of the Caddy. No swing dress or pumps tonight, though she did still wear her white leather gloves, and when they took their seats, she fixed a cigarette into her brass cigarette holder before slinking down into her seat and lighting it.
The movie was busy, but the auditorium was large and they sat in a relatively secluded corner. Charlie preferred to sit up close to the screen, cramming as much of the movie into her eyeballs as possible, but Caroline liked to sit alone. She said that it was because when people smell them, they tend to forget what they’re supposed to be doing and come talk to them, which they didn't want. One thing that came in handy sitting off on their own, is that Caroline often had questions for Charlie about the movies they were watching. Unlike Charlie, Caroline made no real effort to keep up with current events and trends. Charlie watched the news every night and had subscriptions to several magazines. The only subscription Caroline had was to the Time-Life Classics series, which mailed a leather-bound edition of a classic novel every few weeks. She had a way of reading them so that she finished the previous book within days of the new book arriving. Her collection was impressive, filling 2 sets of bookshelves. So, while Caroline was quite literate, she was also almost completely ignorant of anything happening in the world or in popular culture, which meant that when they watched any movie taking place after 1940 or so, Caroline had frequent questions for Charlie.
This might have been annoying, except that Charlie appreciated having something in common to talk about. Because their interests were so different, they’d quickly exhausted conversational topics over the nine months since Charlie had moved in. Movies gave them something exciting and current to talk about. Even better, when the film was relevant to Caroline’s life, it allowed her to talk about her experience living in America in the 1800s. They’d seen Jeremiah Johnson, a Robert Redford film about a Civil War-era mountain man, a few months ago, and Caroline didn’t stop talking about it for weeks. Slaughterhouse-Five was one that Caroline had a lot of questions about, and Charlie, having read the novel, did her best to explain the story as she could, even though she struggled to understand it herself.
The film they were about to watch was called Deliverance. Charlie read the book and didn’t expect there to be a whole lot of questions Caroline would need to be answered, but she was often surprised at the seemingly obvious things that Caroline was completely oblivious about. So, they sat in the back corner of the theater and waited for the movie to start, soaking up the toasty scent of buttered popcorn.
Charlie was excited about the movie because she had a crush on one of the film’s stars, Burt Reynolds. She was also interested in getting Caroline’s reaction to it. If the film was half as intense as the novel had been, Charlie expected Caroline to enjoy herself quite a lot. Caroline’s capacity for violence in film exceeded even her own, and Charlie was a veteran horror movie and comic book fanatic.
As it turned out, the film was more intense than Charlie expected. The film is about a group of four suburban men canoeing down a river in the backwoods of Georgia. After being attacked by a couple of hillbillies, they kill one of them and spend the rest of the movie being hunted by local hill people.
During the scene when the two hillbillies attack the group, one of them rapes the character played by Ned Beatty, telling him to “squeal like a pig.” Charlie knew the scene was coming. It was in the book and it hadn’t bothered her. However, as it played out in front of her, she had the sensation that a balloon was expanding in her chest, pressing against her heart. The swelling in her chest threatened to turn into screams as the scene played out. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back, as though she were trying to open her throat up to take in more air, even though she wasn’t breathing at all. A slow moan escaped from between her clenched teeth and her hands flew up to her ears. All she wanted was to be out of the theater and in the cold night air, but at the same time, she was afraid to stand, afraid to open her eyes and see what was happening on the screen.<
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“Charlie,” Caroline whispered. She pressed her hand against Charlie’s back, rubbing up and down as Charlie rocked back and forth in her seat, her arms closed over her face and her hands over her ears. “Charlie honey, it’s over. The scene is over.”
Shaking, Charlie opened her eyes and looked up in time to see the four men standing around the dead body of one of the hillbillies. She wiped her face on the bottom of her t-shirt. Her whole body felt wrung out and even though her heart no longer beat in her chest, she could feel heat and pressure there like her mother’s old slow cooker, threatening to explode. She sucked furiously on her bottom lip, chewing at the scar there. The coppery taste of blood filled her mouth and she forced herself to stop.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me,” Charlie said, running her fingers through her hair and swallowing the bloody spit in her mouth, her tongue briefly probing the spot where her missing molar used to be.
“I do. It’s okay, sweetheart. I understand. I really do,” Caroline said, and then did something that surprised Charlie, she leaned over and hugged her, tight and maternal. Charlie fought the urge to start crying and for a moment she wondered where her mother was and if she was okay. “Do you want to leave?”
“No, I’m okay,” Charlie said, sitting back upright and forcing herself to watch the movie.
“Would you bitches shut the fuck up?”
The voice cut through the theater. It was a man sitting three rows down, looking back over his shoulder at them. He’d spoken, rather than whispered, and the voice was thick and heavy with that white trash southern accent that can be found in trailer parks across the country, regardless of their region. He stared at them with wide eyes and a furrowed brow, as though challenging them to speak again.
Charlie moved to stand but stopped when Caroline gently touched her arm. Caroline looked at the man and put one gloved finger to her lips and mimed a ‘shhh.’ The man’s eyes narrowed as Caroline moved her hand forward, turning the finger into a symbolic gun and cocking her thumb. The man looked slightly confused and turned around.
Charlie was unable to focus on what was happening on the screen because Caroline was staring at the man who had spoken to them. At one point, he glanced back and saw Caroline’s glare and shrunk down into his seat. Charlie thought that he might go so far as to get up and move to another seat or leave the theater entirely, but he never did. He only sat there with his shoulders bunched up around his ears and his messy, greasy hair standing up and backlit by the light of the screen.
- 22 -
As they filed out of the theater, Caroline wouldn’t let go of Charlie’s hand. She wasn’t wearing her gloves, and touching her bare skin was something that Charlie always found peculiar and made simple hand holding an intimate experience. This was different though. This wasn’t comfort or companionship, this was control. Caroline was keeping her in place and guiding her, the way an assertive master might lead a dog through an overly stimulating environment. But Charlie wasn't a dog and she had no intention of running off and chasing after any small animals that happened to scamper by.
“Look,” Caroline said, leaning in and whispering into Charlie’s ear. Charlie did and saw the man walking across the parking lot to a beat-up Ford Galaxie station wagon. Charlie tried to imagine what kind of fucked up, white trash kids the guy had running around his house. Perhaps it was the movie working on her, but she imagined a dirty little four-year-old, standing in one place and screaming with a full diaper sagging around his filthy, dirt-caked legs. The child she pictured in her head had the same bulgy, ugly eyes as his rude father. She pictured a wife, pregnant and fat on a couch, watching Donahue with a cigarette in her mouth and orange Cheeto dust filling up the sweaty crack of her massive cleavage.
Caroline squeezed her hand and stopped walking. Charlie stopped as well and they stood watching as the man got into his station wagon and backed out of his parking spot. As the car drove past them, Caroline and Charlie stared at the man. He glanced at them and shook his head, as though in disbelief, and drove away.
- 23 -
The Cadillac cut through the darkness like a shark. The radio was silent and the only sound came from the consistent rumble of the engine as Caroline kept it running at an even seven miles an hour over the speed limit. Through her window, Charlie could just barely make out the desert as they glided by.
“So that guy was a dick, huh?” Charlie said, chuckling nervously, finally breaking the silence. Caroline’s hands gripped the wheel tighter, the leather of her gloves squeaking against the hard rubber of the wheel.
“He made a massive error in judgment,” Caroline said without taking her eyes off the road. “I can tolerate cruelty and stupidity and a number of ugly personality traits, but I will not suffer rudeness. Especially not from a scabby little troll like him.”
Charlie stared up at Caroline for a moment and realized that she’d never seen her genuinely angry before. Concerned or annoyed, sure, but never radiating such rage. Seeing Caroline like that was both exhilarating and terrifying. Charlie genuinely had no idea what was going to happen next, or even where they were going.
They came up behind an old Ford truck and Caroline punched the gas and passed it. When they were around the truck, Caroline didn’t slow down. The Cadillac was pushing seventy. Charlie put on her seat belt.
- 24 -
When they came up behind the station wagon, Caroline tapped the switch on the floor that activated the high-beams with the toe of her shoe.
“Charlie dear, what does the license-plate on that car say?” Caroline asked as she slowed to keep pace behind the car in front of them.
“LJH-8612,” Charlie said leaning forward and then looking at Caroline, who looked back at her, an uncharacteristic gleam in her eye. She turned back to the road and suddenly leaned on the horn. Charlie let out the smallest scream.
“What are you going to do?!” Charlie gasped, crawling backward into her seat.
“Let’s find out,” Caroline said through clenched teeth. She turned the high-beams off and let the Cadillac fall back about twenty feet. She motioned for her purse and Charlie handed it to her. She took her pack of Chesterfields out and lit one, offering the pack to Charlie, who shook her head.
After a couple of minutes, Caroline tapped the high-beams back on and revved the engine, sending them lurching forward and nearly rear-ending the station wagon. She beeped her horn and a hairy, tattooed arm reached out of the driver’s side window of the wagon and waved for them to pass. Caroline hit her horn again and flashed her brights off and on again.
The waving arm stopped waving and switched to an angry middle finger before disappearing back into the car. Caroline let the Caddy fall back again and turned off her high-beams.
“So rude…” Caroline muttered. She turned to Charlie. “We’re going to do some real hunting tonight!”
Charlie tried to smile but didn’t quite make it. Caroline kicked on the brights again and raced up directly behind the station wagon. This time she leaned on her horn for a full ten seconds. The station wagon braked briefly, and Caroline just barely managed to do the same, backing off again. When the wagon put on its turn signal, indicating that it was going to pull over, Caroline did the same.
- 25 -
“You take the passenger side. If he tries to run, stop him.”
“Stop him?! How?!” Charlie asked. Caroline smiled at her, patting her hand.
“You’re a smart girl, you’ll figure it out.” She said, then pulled the keys from the ignition and got out of the car. Charlie scrambled to get out and almost fell over her own feet. Caroline was already at the back of the car, digging through the trunk. Caroline closed the trunk lid and held up a garden spade, about three feet long. She spun it once in her hands as they walked to the Station wagon.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” the man yelled as he opened his car door, seemingly prepared to fight whoever was approaching. When he saw Caroline, he stopped and seemed both dismayed
and somehow offended.
“Oh, it’s you!” He said, standing up straighter.
“Yeah, it’s me. You owe me and my friend an apology.”
“You’re a crazy bitch!” The man said before noticing what Caroline was carrying. “What’re you going to do with that shovel?”
“This,” Caroline said, and swung it into the rear driver’s side window, shattering it.
“Jesus Christ!” the man shouted and jumped back. As Charlie watched all this happen, it occurred to her that she was expected to play a role in whatever was about to happen. She walked around the car and stood behind the man.
Caroline walked forward, closing the space between herself and the now quite shaken man. When Caroline lifted the shovel to swing it at his middle, he turned and tried to run, but ran into Charlie instead.
“Nope,” Charlie said and raised her hands, placed them squarely in the middle of his chest, and shoved. He spun again and hit the side of the car. Caroline turned the shovel sideways and whipped it up directly into the side of the man’s leg. The sound of a meaty crack was echoed in Charlie’s ears just before his scream. He collapsed to the ground, knee shattered. Caroline reached down and took hold of the front of his shirt. She didn’t seem to notice as the man beat his hands against her sides as she lifted him first to his feet and then a few inches off the ground. It was then that Caroline did something that genuinely startled and disturbed Charlie: she threw the man over the roof of his car, sending him crashing face-first into the dirt on the side of the road.
“Jesus Christ!” Charlie yelled. Caroline looked at her and smiled.
“Go get him,” She said, picking her shovel back up from the ground.
Something about seeing the man tossed through the air like a toy doll made Charlie’s stomach crawl up into her throat. She sucked air through her nose and pushed it out again through clenched teeth.