[Oxrun Station] Dialing The Wind

by Charles L. Grant

  Harry had said she was part rose herself.

  And in thinking of him, more recently than she had in the past two years thanks in some curious way to Stacey, she wasn't surprised when Glenn Rowan showed up just at four, and threw up his hands in exaggerated astonishment when she handed him the white vase with the roses already in place.

  "Incredible," he said. "She'll love me forever."

  "If she doesn't, give me a call," she answered with a laugh that choked into a gasp. She gaped, sputtered, watched in horror as her hands batted the air over the counter for want of someplace to land, something to do. "Work," she managed at last, pointing to the beads and back room. "So much to do. Let me know how she likes it. Must. . . closing time ...."

  And she fled, grasping the edge of the worktable until she heard the harness bell signal his departure.

  "My god," she said to the wall. "What the hell are you doing?"

  And again, "What are you thinking of, woman?" as she walked in the front door just after eight and threw her keys on the foyer table, didn't look for the mail because there seldom was any. Her mother, were she alive to see and hear what had happened, would have been shocked; her aunt would have called her a hussy and probably would have thrown her out of the house. She called herself out of her goddman mind and strode into the living room, poured herself a scotch from the larder on the sideboard, and dragged one of the armchairs around to face the window. She had eaten at the Mariner Cove, had tasted nothing, and was positive that Rowan had told all his friends about the woman in the florist shop who had come on to him like gangbusters. The patrons had stared at her, she was sure, peeking slyly around their menus, snickering to their companions.

  She hadn't tasted a thing.

  She had met Kanfield on Chancellor Avenue, and he laughed when she told him she'd forgotten his bouquet.

  "Not to worry," he'd said, patted her shoulder, moved on.

  Now she sat and watched the sun draw the light with it over the peaked roof of the Tudor, watched the shadows crawl in angles over the street toward her front yard, watched the neighbors pop in and out of their houses like mechanical toys in shop windows while children hustled home and the first rain began to fall.

  Harry.

  God, she missed him.

  She didn't turn on a lamp.

  She emptied her glass and wished that Nabb and his musicians would play for her again. So she could hear herself in the songs, find herself in the words-though the words that she heard were only the words that she dreamed.

  She wished Glenn didn't have a girlfriend.

  You know, she thought, I think maybe this is what they call the coming out of it.

  She drank.

  She sipped.

  Harry's dead, you miss him, and now the mourning's over, and you hate yourself for it.

  She sipped.

  The sun set.

  And shortly after ten, empty glass in her hand, chin trembling, cheeks wet while the window streaked wetly, she heard a voice in the kitchen:

  "Lay on your hands and feel!"

  The man on the hilltop had no dimension, was only black, his outstretched arms black cracks in the blue that pretended to be the sky, that widened until the sky retreated into night, that widened until she couldn't see him anymore, though she knew he was there, watching her and waiting for her and asking her to come to him; until she couldn't sense him anymore, though she knew he was there, patient and insistent and blotting out the stars that once were faces she recognized while she turned in a dancing circle, trying to make up her mind; until she couldn't see anything, feel anything, hear anything anymore but the burr of the alarm in the clock radio by her bed.

  Her eyes were wet; she didn't dry them.

  It was Sunday.

  It rained.

  The kitchen radio worked after she thumped it with a fist, and she decided the short hadn't been fatal after all. But she kept eyeing it, was afraid to turn the dial, even when all the music was backed by that same insistent humming, that sounded more and more like the wind.

  Then she cleaned the house room to room, top to bottom, and exhausted herself listening hard for the telephone to ring, and listening for the preacher's voice that meant so much to Stacey Jeffries.

  On Monday the rain was a blessing. Steady without being hard, it successfully kept the road workers from returning, brought a relative peace to the street despite the great gaps in its surface. Caroline opened up, but Stacey didn't come in until almost ten-thirty, her hair not quite combed, the dress she wore not quite ironed or fitting her well. And if anything, Caroline thought, the girl actually looked thinner.

  "You okay?" she asked quietly, standing in the back doorway, bead strings draped over one shoulder.

  At the counter Stacey nodded. "Just thinking, that's all." She propped a transistor radio against the register. "Wish to hell I could find that damned station."

  "Huh?"

  "The preacher," she said, as if Caroline should have known. "Jilly's preacher. You can never find him when you want him. Damn."

  Caroline chose tactful silence, and when a customer came in, Stacey brightened falsely, allowing Caroline to retreat thankfully to the worktable. An anniversary wreath that was to be picked up by noon; a funeral wreath someone from Sutherland's would come for that afternoon; Bruce Kanfield's bouquet, a gift from her to him to apologize for forgetting. On a sheet of paper in the upper corner a sketch of the street-window display she wanted to set up by the end of the week. Generally, all florist shops looked alike from the sidewalk, and she hoped Adelle would let her do something different. It wasn't the competition-in Oxrun there wasn't any; it was the principle. She hated coming to work to the same old thing, the same fresh and dried flowers, the same announcements of sales for Valentine's Day, Christmas, Thanksgiving, the standard look people ignored because they already knew what was inside.

  The beads rattled.

  "Hey, Stace, what do you think of this?" She pointed at the sketch without looking up.

  "Looks fine to me. What's it supposed to be?"

  She whirled and backed up, blinking rapidly as Rowan leaned over the table to get a closer look.

  "You want to put elephants in the window?" He turned his head. "In a flower store?"

  Caroline glanced at the doorway and saw Stacey watching her, the beads distorting most of her face save for the resentment that narrowed her eyes and set her chin. Then she was gone as the bells jangled, and Rowan shifted to lean a shoulder against the wall.

  "I'm sorry," he said, hands deep in his pockets. "I always seem to be scaring you or something."

  She nodded. She swallowed. She kicked herself without moving and took a deep breath. "It's all right. It's the weather, that's all."

  "Well, look," he said. "I mean, if you don't mind, you were so good with those flowers and all, would you like to have lunch with me?" He looked startled. "To thank you, I mean," he added quickly. "For what you did."

  Crazy, she thought; Jesus, what-

  And she told herself to shut up. All the crying was over; she had done that yesterday, and who cared if he had someone else already. This, she decided, would be close to perfect. A friendly lunch. A new friend. No hassles, no games, because he was already taken.

  "I . . . " She nodded. "Sure. Yes, I'd like that very much."

  He nodded back. "Okay. Fine." Pushed away from the wall. "At the Cove? Is that all right? Unless you'd rather go to the Inn. I mean, if you'd prefer-"

  "The Cove is fine," she assured him before his babbling made her laugh and ruin it all. "I get lunch at one."

  "Okay." He backed through the beads. "Okay. One."

  And immediately he was gone, Stacey came in, her expression sullen though her lips worked at grinning. "Got a date, huh?"

  Several seconds passed before Caroline realized that it was true. A date. The first in three years.

  "I'll be damned," she said, more to herself than the girl. "Son of a bitch."

  "Well," Stacey said as she wal
ked away, "at least you're happy."

  Caroline debated following her and shaking her until all that smothering self-pity was gone, then remembered her own bath of the day before. Perhaps it would be best just to leave her alone. She's a big girl. When she needs to talk again, she will.

  And the rest of the morning dragged, and sped by too fast, and by the time it was one o'clock, Stacey back from her own break, Caroline was ready to take her car and head for Vermont. She didn't want to do this. It was wrong. For several hours she had tried to tell herself that it was precisely what she needed, and at the end of that time she ordered herself to realize that the reason the detective attracted her. was because he looked almost like Harry.

  Almost.

  The height, the leanness, the dance and quiver of the curls that refused obedience to a comb. The awkwardness with her. Eight married years, and Harry had never been able to shed his image of adolescence.

  But there was, in Rowan's face, far more experience, and his voice was too deep, his hands too large, the way he wore his clothes nothing at all like Harry Edlin.

  "You're gonna be late," Stacey warned, still resentful, her face more pale in the greylight from the window. Then, as if contrite, held out her red umbrella. "You better take this or you'll catch pneumonia."

  Caroline smiled her thanks, and in the lee of the recessed front door, she held up the umbrella and watched the rain strike the pavement, fill muddy puddles in the street, begin to slant as the wind strengthened and slapped raincoats against calves and sent a golf cap rolling into the gutter.

  I will be cheerful, she vowed as she swung left and headed down to Chancellor Avenue; I will be witty, I will be interested, I will explain what I do and he will be fascinated.

  And heat covered her cheeks when she wondered, for a moment, if he would take her to bed.

  The Mariner was red brick and white columns, a low building on the corner, diagonally across from the police station. On the right was the Lounge, a darkwood and quiet place, no children allowed and no toleration for drunks; on the left was the Cove, a larger, lighter, more bustling place, true to its name by the decor that it boasted without seeming at all forced.

  Many of the center tables were still occupied when she arrived, but against the lefthand wall were a few empty booths, and the hostess took her to one without comment, just a smile, and left a single-page menu behind. Caroline was mildly surprised that Rowan hadn't made a reservation, or at least left his name, but she welcomed the time alone to get hold of her nervousness.

  Control, she thought; control.

  She ordered a drink, and when it came drank half of it before she ordered herself to stop.

  She read the menu three times and nibbled on the bread and rolls left in a basket.

  A waitress asked for her order, she told her she was waiting for someone, could she please have another cocktail?

  Thirty minutes later she didn't know whether she ought to be furious or crushed. It was obvious he wasn't coming. Though she suspected he had been detained on some sort of police business, it was no excuse for at least not calling.

  Harry wouldn't have forgotten, no matter how busy he was.

  Her eyes closed then, so tightly she saw not dark but whorls of orange, red, shifting islands of blues that sparked as she scolded herself. Control; she was losing control and she didn't know why, and she wished to hell Harry would just leave her alone and wished he was with her and wished Glenn had called and wished she knew what was happening to her.

  The grief wasn't over.

  The missing had just begun.

  Fumbling in her purse for a bill. Dropping it on the table as she stumbled out of the booth. Composed herself. Swallowed. Strode from the Cove and into the light that made the afternoon seem too much like night.

  Temptation turned her toward the police station and let her take a quick step, but she lashed it immediately behind her as she snapped up the red umbrella and hurried across the street, strode up the sidewalk past the shops and offices, forcing her gaze to those that were working on their facades, changing the common mansard roof lines to individual ones, old-fashioned ones. The street looked like the aftermath of some monstrous devastation, the tearing down and the rebuilding, the pedestrians picking their way over and through brackish puddles, around clumps of tarmac and cement and stacks of paving stones covered with tarpaulin that stirred with the wind.

  And once in the florist shop, umbrella furled and dripping, she realized she was alone.

  "Stacey?"

  No one in back. Adelle still hadn't returned.

  "Damnit, Stacey!"

  There was a note on the register, hastily scrawled, taped to the top.

  Caroline

  I found him! He's going to help, I know he will. Nick won't leave now. See you tomorrow.

  "Idiot," she muttered, and crushed the note into a ball she threw across the shop. A great way to end the day. Nothing was going to get done now. Just as she got to work, sure as hell some dope was going to come in and take twenty minutes to decide what he wanted, fuss over the price like an old man, and be replaced by someone else.

  At the worktable she buried the fingers of one hand into her hair. Had she ever been like that about Harry? Had she ever been so consumed by him that the rest of the world had gone to seed without her even noticing?

  The answer came before the question was done: of course; and she still was, despite all her efforts to settle his memory in place.

  A tear she flicked angrily away.

  Another that fell onto a note card before she could catch it.

  Maybe Stacey wasn't all that far off the mark. Maybe she could use some spiritual guidance herself, someone to talk to about the process of getting on with it, of leaving the dead behind without killing herself with guilt.

  The harness bells jangled.

  "Shit."

  But the smile was there as the rest of the day went as predicted, and by the time she locked up a six, her cheeks were sore, her stomach was filled with acid, and her anger toward Rowan had multiplied every minute he didn't call to apologize or explain.

  The house was dark.

  She was alone. Standing in the foyer, feeling the weight of the rooms above her. Swallowing so hard her jaw cracked before she began weeping, and slowly dropped to her knees, palms over her eyes while the neighbors came home, too, full of laughter and shouting.

  She spun the dial, searching for the wind. "Damn, where are you?" she said, almost yelling. And the preacher finally said, "Lay on your hands and feel the power, feel the dream."

  On Tuesday, Stacey didn't show at all and didn't call, and Caroline raged mindlessly through the shop, snatching up figurines and planters as though she was going to smash them, putting them back with great effort and forcing her fingers to release them. Then she slumped against the counter, and Adelle clucked over her, demanding to know what she'd been drinking, or smoking. When she protested without heat, the woman clamped an arm around her shoulder and said, "Darling, Corbin always says that a woman who lets herself go like you have is either a secret drinker, an addict, or a nympho."

  Caroline laughed loudly, only just able to control herself when she saw the brief frightened look on Adelle's face. Then she said with a wail, "It's Harry," and began crying without caring, and they spent over an hour in the back room, crying together, hiccuping, crying again, while she said over and over, "I miss him, I miss him, I don't want to but I want him back, I want it the way it was, why can't it be the way it was?"

  Over.

  And over.

  Among the flowers in the vases, the flowers on the table, the flowers in the window that flared at the dying sun and kept on dying.

  That night she had the dream, and she saw her husband's face as he waited for her on the hilltop, smiling and nodding as she begged him to come home.

  "I'm going to take some time off," she announced Wednesday afternoon, her voice as grey as the clouds settling over the village.

  Adelle didn't
argue, or offer a simple token protest. "Whatever you think is best, dear." And smiled around her cigarette, through the smoke, and winked.

  Caroline nodded. "You don't get it, but I have to, Adelle. I'm cracking up, I'm losing control. I have to get it back or I'm going to go nuts."

  And that night she called Glenn, and hung up without a word when a woman answered the telephone.

  She stood then in the kitchen, the wooded slope reflecting the sun and slanting shadows, and she turned away from the wall to look at the radio and shake her head. If you'd only give an address, she thought, I could write to you or something, or call maybe, or something.

  And massaged her forehead with the tips of her fingers, as hard as she could, trying to force a headache, a burning, anything to drive off the feeling that a radio preacher could help her when she couldn't even help herself.

  It was cowardly.

  It was Glenn.

  If she hadn't met him, hadn't seen him, Harry wouldn't have been resurrected and she would have carried on the way she had been, making progress, settling debts, finally ridding him of the blame she'd nailed to his leaving.

  And when the telephone rang, she nearly screamed.

  It rang again.

  She lay a hand on the flat of her chest and waited for calm.

  It rang.

  She picked up the receiver and heard Stacey say, "Caroline, oh god, help me," before the line went dead.

  And the radio sputtered on.

  It was too far to run.

  The blocks in Oxrun were easily twice as long as any she'd seen in any city, and so she scrambled into her car and backed out of the driveway, paused for a moment to wonder if she was overreacting, then sped east on Thorn Road.

  Deliberately not speculating.

  Taking slow and deep breaths to maintain her composure as she wheeled around the second corner and headed up Raglin. Slowing only when a gang of kids in baseball uniforms streamed across the road, waving bats and empty gloves, streaking along the sidewalk toward the park.