The Stranger Next Door

by Joy Fielding

  “Hello? Is someone there?” I called as I peeked out the bathroom door and stepped into the hall. “Alison? Is that you?” I waited for someone to respond, my wet feet leaving footprints on the hardwood floor as I ventured to the top of the stairs. “Alison? Lance? Is that you?”

  Nothing.

  Was it possible I’d been mistaken?

  I did a quick check of the bedrooms before inching my way down the stairs toward the living room, half-expecting someone to lunge out of the shadows with each step I took. But no one lunged and nothing in the living room appeared to have been disturbed. Everything was in its proper place, exactly as it had been earlier.

  I jiggled the front door handle and breathed a deep sigh of relief at finding the door securely locked. “Hello?” I called again as I headed toward the kitchen. “Is anybody here?” But the kitchen was as empty as the rest of the house. “So now I’m hearing things,” I muttered, my shoulders relaxing as I reached for the back door.

  It fell open at my touch.

  “Oh, my God.” I stepped back in mounting horror as the warm night air pushed its way rudely inside the kitchen. “Stay calm.” Hadn’t I just checked every room in the house and found nothing?

  You didn’t check the closets, I heard Alison say. You didn’t look under the bed.

  You’re a stupid, stupid girl! my mother added for good measure.

  “There are no such things as bogeymen,” I told them loudly, deciding it was entirely possible I’d neglected to lock the back door when I’d left the house. I pictured Lance, unapologetic and an hour late, slipping my purse over my shoulder and ushering me outside, his hand on my elbow. I hadn’t turned on any lights and I hadn’t locked the kitchen door.

  “I didn’t lock the door!” I informed the rows of ladies’ heads. “I didn’t lock the door,” I repeated, locking it now, laughing at my foolishness. “There are no such things as bogeymen.”

  The phone rang.

  “Don’t you know it’s dangerous to leave your door unlocked?” the voice asked before I had a chance to say hello. “You never know who might drop by.”

  I spun around, my hand sweeping across the counter and knocking against the block of knives. I pulled the largest of the knives out of its slot, waved it in the air like a flag. “Who is this?”

  “Sweet dreams, Terry. Take care of yourself.”

  “Hello? Hello? Damn it! Who is this?” I slammed the phone back into its cradle, then immediately picked it up again, punched in 911.

  “Emergency,” a woman’s voice stated after several minutes on hold.

  “Well, it’s not exactly an emergency,” I qualified.

  “This is 911, ma’am. If it’s not an emergency, you should call your local police station.”

  “Well, I’m not sure exactly.”

  “Ma’am, is this an emergency or isn’t it?”

  “No,” I admitted, lowering the knife to my side.

  “Please call your local police station if you have a problem.”

  “Thank you. I’ll do that.”

  Except I didn’t. What was I going to say, after all? That I suspected someone had broken into my house, except that I’d left the door unlocked and nothing had been taken? That I’d received a vaguely menacing call from an anonymous man whose words, on their surface, were decidedly more solicitous than threatening. Don’t you know it’s dangerous to leave your door unlocked? You never know who might drop by. Sweet dreams. Take care of yourself.

  Sure. That would bring the police running.

  I returned the phone to its cradle and sank into a kitchen chair, trying to decide my next move. Should I call the police anyway, risk their derision, or worse, their indifference? If only I had something more concrete to offer them, to prove I wasn’t some lonely, middle-aged woman with a too active imagination and way too much time on her hands. If only I was sure about the voice on the other end of the phone.

  I played the words back in my head, like a recording. Sweet dreams, Terry. Take care of yourself. But while there was something familiar about the speaker, I couldn’t be sure it belonged to Erica’s biker friend, the man I’d seen talking to Lance at Elwood’s, the seriousness of their expressions indicative of more than a shared interest in motorcycles. Was there some connection between the two men? Between Lance and Erica? Between Erica and Alison?

  Was it just a coincidence these phone calls had started around the time Alison had turned up on my doorstep?

  What the hell was going on?

  And then I saw him.

  He was standing outside the kitchen window, his forehead pressed against the windowpane, the red of his bandanna bleeding into the glass.

  “Oh, my God.”

  And then, as suddenly as his image had appeared, it vanished, absorbed by the night like a blotter.

  Had I seen anyone at all?

  I rushed to the window, peered out at the night.

  I saw nothing.

  No one.

  I rifled through a kitchen drawer for the spare set of keys to the cottage. You’re a stupid, stupid girl, my mother admonished, and for once, I had to agree with her. But I needed some answers, and those answers could very well be found in Alison’s journal. I estimated I had at least half an hour before Alison and her brother returned home. More than enough time if I moved quickly.

  Clutching the keys tightly, I threw open the door and stepped outside, my bare feet slipping into the night air, like a pair of slippers.

  “Are you crazy? What are you doing?” I mumbled as I locked the door behind me and approached the cottage, hand extended, key pointing at the lock. I was almost at the door when I heard a twig snap behind me.

  I gasped, spun around.

  “Hi, there,” a disembodied voice said from the darkness. Slowly, almost magically, a man materialized out of nothing to take shape in my backyard. With deliberate care, he stepped into the moon’s spotlight. He was tall, skinny, clean-shaven. There was no scraggly beard, no red bandanna. “Remember me?”

  “K.C.,” I whispered.

  “Short for Kenneth Charles, but nobody ever . . . hell, you know the rest.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I came to see Alison.”

  “She’s not home.”

  “Really? Then where are you going?”

  I slipped the key to the cottage into the side pocket of my robe, wondering if he’d noticed. “I thought I heard something. I was just checking to make sure everything was all right.” I wondered why I was bothering to explain myself to someone I barely knew.

  “It was probably just me.”

  “Did you just phone me?” I asked, my voice sharper than I’d intended.

  K.C. produced a cell phone from his pocket, smiled lazily. “Was I supposed to?”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “No, I didn’t phone you.” His eyes narrowed. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You seem a little on edge.”

  “No,” I said, forcing a yawn. “Just a little tired, I guess. Busy day.” I looked down, realized my robe had fallen open. I quickly secured the two sides of the robe together, ignoring the growing smile on K.C.’s face. “I’ll tell Alison you stopped by.”

  “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll wait till she gets back.”

  “Suit yourself.” I turned back toward the house.

  “Terry?” he called after me.

  I stopped, turned around.

  “I just wanted to thank you again for the lovely Thanksgiving dinner.”

  “I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

  “You don’t find many people these days who are so willing to open their homes to strangers.”

  Or so stupid, I heard my mother say, the key to the cottage weighing heavily in my pocket. “I was happy to do it.” Again I turned toward the house.

  “Terry?” he called a second time.

  Again I stopped, although this time I didn’t turn around.

&nbs
p; “Take care of yourself,” he said, as I stepped inside the house and locked the door behind me.

  FIFTEEN

  Merry Christmas!” Alison jumped into the air at precisely the stroke of midnight, clapping her hands with childish abandon.

  “Merry Christmas,” Lance echoed, clicking his glass of eggnog against Alison’s, then mine.

  “God bless us, everyone,” I added, taking a tiny sip of the thick liquid, pungent fumes of nutmeg swirling through my nostrils.

  The evening had been pleasant, filled with good food and happy chatter. Just the three of us. No uninvited guests. No apparitions in the glass. No unexpected phone calls. I’d asked Alison about K.C. She claimed not to have seen or heard from him since Thanksgiving. When I told her about my encounter with him, she’d shrugged and said, “That’s odd. I wonder what he wanted.” Ultimately I decided I’d probably blown the whole incident out of proportion and pushed it to the back of my mind.

  “Where’s that from?” Alison was asking now.

  “Where’s what from?”

  “What you just said. ‘God bless us, everyone.’ That sounds so familiar.”

  “Charles Dickens,” I told her. “A Christmas Carol.”

  “That’s right,” Lance said. “We saw the movie. Remember? Bill Murray was in it.”

  “You should read the book.”

  Lance shrugged his indifference. “Don’t read much.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Not really interested.”

  “Lance had his fill of books at Brown,” Alison was quick to explain.

  “What does interest you?” I pressed.

  Lance glanced across the table at his sister before returning his attention to me. “You interest me.”

  “I do?”

  “Yes, lady, you certainly do.”

  I laughed. “Now you’re mocking me.”

  “On the contrary. I find you fascinating.”

  It was my turn to glance at Alison. She seemed to be holding her breath. “And what exactly is it about me that fascinates you?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not sure exactly. What is it they say about still waters running deep?”

  Now I was the one holding my breath. “Just that they do.”

  “Guess I’d like to be around when they get all churned up.” Lance took another sip of eggnog, the pale yellow cream creating a thin mustache across his upper lip. He ran a lazy tongue across it, his eyes fastened on mine.

  “I don’t read nearly as much as I should,” Alison piped in.

  “You don’t read at all.”

  A flush of embarrassment stained Alison’s cheeks, turning them almost the same color as her sweater. “Maybe you could recommend some good books for me, Terry. Something to get me started again.”

  “Sure. Although I probably don’t read as much as I should either.”

  “We should all read more,” Alison agreed.

  “There’s lots of things we should do,” Lance said cryptically.

  “Name three,” I said, and Alison smiled, although the smile was tentative, as if she was afraid of what her brother might say.

  “We should stop procrastinating,” Lance said.

  “Procrastinating,” Alison repeated with a strained laugh. “Good word.”

  “Procrastinating over what?” I asked.

  Lance ignored my question. “We should stop playing games.”

  “What kind of games?” I asked, watching the smile harden on Alison’s face.

  “We should shit or get off the pot.” Lance finished the eggnog in his glass, then tossed his napkin onto the table, as if challenging his sister to a duel.

  “Am I missing something here?”

  Alison leaped to her feet. “Speaking of getting off the pot, can we open the presents now?” She was in the living room and at the tree before I could answer.

  “Open this one first,” she was saying, holding a small gift bag toward me as I approached. “It’s from me. It’s just little. I thought we could start with the small gifts first. Save the best ones for last.” I carefully withdrew a small crystal rock from its tissue. “It’s a paperweight. I thought it was so pretty.”

  “I think it’s lovely. Thank you.” I sat down next to Alison on the floor, my mind still on our previous exchange—procrastinating over what? What kind of games?—as I ran my fingers along the jagged pink surface of the crystal. “I love it.”

  “Really?”

  “It’s beautiful.” I motioned toward a small, square box wrapped in red and green. “Your turn.”

  Eager hands tore at the wrapping paper. “What is it?”

  “Open it and find out.”

  “This is so exciting. Isn’t this so exciting?” Alison discarded the last of the paper and ripped open the box. “Would you just look at this! Lance, look. Nail polish. Six bottles, all in fabulous colors.”

  “Be still my heart,” Lance said from the sofa.

  “Vanilla Milkshake, Mango Madness, Wildflower . . . These are so great.”

  “Use them well.”

  “We’ll do another spa day.”

  “Now that sounds like fun,” Lance said. “Can I come?”

  “Only if you let us paint your toes with Mango Madness,” I told him.

  “Lady, you can paint whatever part of my anatomy your little heart desires.” Lance flopped over the sofa and joined us on the floor. “Anything for me under there?”

  Alison made a prolonged show of searching under the tree. “No, I’m afraid it doesn’t look like there’s anything for you. Oh, wait. Here’s something.” She extended an oblong box wrapped in gold. “It’s a golf shirt,” she announced before the package was half-unwrapped. “It’s an extra-large because the salesman said they fit small. What do you think? Do you think it’ll fit?”

  Lance held the beige-and-black golf shirt against the navy one he was wearing. “Looks good. What do you think, Terry?”

  “I think your sister has very good taste.”

  Lance laughed. “First time she’s ever been accused of that.”

  “Very funny.” Alison pointed at the design that crisscrossed the lightweight fabric. “Those are golf tees, in case you didn’t know.”

  “Looks like I’ll have to stick around,” Lance said casually. “Take up golf.”

  Alison dropped her eyes to the floor. “Here’s something for Terry.” She read the sticker, glanced warily at her brother. “From Lance,” she said with obvious surprise. “You didn’t tell me you were buying Terry a present.”

  “What? You think I was raised in a barn?”

  I opened the gift, my hands trembling with the knowledge I hadn’t bought anything for him. Inside was a long, lilac-colored nightgown, its lace bodice scooped provocatively low.

  “Oh, my,” Alison said.

  “It’s silk.”

  “It’s lovely. But I really can’t accept something like this,” I said in my mother’s voice.

  Totally inappropriate, I heard her agree.

  “What are you talking about? Of course you can. Why don’t you try it on right now, model it for us.” Lance’s fingers slipped under the long slit that ran up the side of the nightgown. I shivered, as if his hand were on my leg.

  “I think you should save it for when Josh comes home,” Alison said, eyes still on her brother.

  “Josh?” Lance sat up straight, his interest clearly piqued. “First I’m hearing of any Josh.”

  “He’s a friend of Terry’s.”

  “Sounds like more than a friend.”

  “His mother is one of my patients,” I qualified, not really wanting to discuss Josh with Alison’s brother, wondering what Josh was doing at that moment. It was three hours earlier in California. Probably he was attending some big family dinner, or maybe he was out doing some last-minute shopping. Did he miss me? Had he thought about me at all?

  “What’s the matter with his mother?”

  I pictured Myra Wylie asleep in her narrow hospital bed. “Every
thing,” I said sadly.

  Lance shrugged. “She exceeded her expiration date, did she?”

  “What?”

  “Lance thinks people should be stamped with a ‘best before’ date. You know, like dairy products.”

  I laughed in spite of myself.

  “You ever consider pulling the plug on some of these people?”

  “What!”

  “I think you’d be doing most of them a favor. And yourself too, come to think of it.”

  “Now you’ve really lost me.”

  “Well, I’m just thinking out loud here, but I bet you get pretty close to some of these lonely old biddies. Am I right?”

  I nodded, not sure where this conversation was going.

  “And a few of them probably have a little something stashed away,” Lance continued. “I bet it wouldn’t be that difficult to get them to include you in their wills, have them sign over the bulk of their estates to you, their humble caregiver. Then after a suitable period of time, enough so as not to arouse undue suspicion, you just give nature a little push. You know, a stray air bubble in their IV; an extra dose of something to help them sleep. Hell, I don’t have to tell you. You’re the nurse. You’d know exactly how to do it. Wouldn’t you?”

  I looked for the familiar mischievous twinkle in his eyes, but he stared back at me with eyes as cold and humorless as a corpse’s. Was he serious?

  “What do you think, Terry?” he pressed. “Sounds like a plan to me.”

  “I think plans like that are the reason our jails are so overcrowded.”

  “Lance is just kidding,” Alison said.

  “Am I?”

  “Is money really so important to you?”

  “It’s pretty important.”

  “So important you’d actually consider taking someone’s life?”

  “Guess that would depend.”

  “Lance is just joking,” Alison interrupted again. “Enough, Lance. Terry doesn’t understand your sense of humor.”

  “I think she understands me very well.”

  “It’s my turn to open another present,” Alison said, pulling a gift from under the tree with such force she almost knocked the whole thing over. “Look. It’s from Denise.”

  “Where is Denise these days?” I asked, as eager as Alison to move on.