by Ann Cummins
"Yeah. Then next week we're having a meeting at Naschitti. I figure we'll raise maybe three hundred out there in the boondocks. At this rate, you and I will be elders before there's enough money to get anybody's attention."
"You sound like Terry Conrad. Wait—don't look at me like that. He says it'll be ten years before anybody sees any compensation from the government and that it will just be pennies."
"Oh, is that what he says."
"I didn't say it."
"Yes, you did. Just now." He frowns. She frowns back, and he laughs.
"You know, we should do something some time," he says.
"Like what?"
"I don't know. Movie?"
She smiles. "That's three."
"Three what?"
"Three times you asked me to do something. Maybe four, depending on if you count the time you wanted me to take your class. There was the time you wanted to grade me, but that may not count either, since you were mean that time."
"Who was mean?"
"You were."
"You were."
She clears her throat. Looks at the ceiling. He laughs. "Anyway, we can definitely count the time you and your dog were going to take me for a ride. One more and I'll know you mean it."
He raises his eyebrows.
"You never heard of the four-times rule?"
"What's that?"
"It's something my dad told me. He said if a Navajo asks you something or tells you something four times, you know he means it. You never heard of that?"
He shakes his head.
"What kind of Indian are you?"
He squints at her, smiling a lopsided smile, holds his chin with one hand, puts his index finger over his mouth, and studies her. He shakes his head slowly, smiling behind the finger. After a bit, he reaches into his back pocket and pulls out his wallet. He removes what looks like a business card, stands up, picks up a pen from her desk, and writes something on the card. He slides it, face down, across the desk to her, pinning it with his finger. He smells like autumn. He says,"Hágoónee', Becky Atcitty," and turns, walking toward the door.
It is his business card with the college address and his contact information, a little mug shot of him in the corner. At the bottom of the card he has written Home: 327-0693.
"Hey!" she calls.
Halfway to the door, he turns around.
"Is this three or four?"
He laughs, shaking his head. "You tell me."
37
LILY," FRED HAD SAID when she told him about Sam. "Aren't you a mystery. How many other husbands you got hiding in the woodwork?"
"I could kick myself for not telling you from the very beginning," she said. "It's such a load off my mind. No more secrets."
Given the circumstances, her lawyer thinks they'll have no trouble finalizing the new divorce papers—the circumstances being extortion. Lily doesn't want to put Sam in jail, but now that the secret is out in the open, she can certainly play that card if she likes. She has put it all in writing for her lawyer; should Sam attempt anything like it again, they'll take whatever steps are necessary. For now, he'll draw up papers that don't need Sam's signature, listing abandonment as the grounds for divorce. If Sam doesn't show up again, the divorce will be finalized without him. If he does, the lawyer will have a little talk with him, explaining why it's in his best interest to let things be. He can keep Lily's money. She told the lawyer she doesn't care about the money.
So all Lily has to do is bide her time and see Chichén Itzá with Fred as they had planned. They'll fly out mid-November. The week following the wedding, Lily finds herself sailing through the days, shopping for breathable lightweight hiking clothes and sun-filtering hats. She falls in love with gadgets like the all-in-one hiker's pocketknife with bottle opener, nail clipper, and corkscrew.
On Saturday she nabs Fred for a shopping excursion. They drive to the mall in Farmington, browsing through sportswear at Dillard's.
"You think we ought to get his-and-hers matching outfits?" Fred says, holding up two handsome maroon rain jackets, a small and an extra large.
"You're kidding, right?"
"How else are they going to know we're American?"
"I don't think his-and-hers outfits are particularly American. Not that I want them."
"I think you should think about it. If you get lost I could say, 'Look for my twin,' and show them the jacket.'"
"I'm sticking with you. I'm not planning on getting lost."
"One never plans to get lost, honey. That's what it means to be lost."
"Well, I'm not getting lost."
They move on to the shoe department. Fred says, "How about matching hiking boots?"
"No, no. I have researched hiking boots." She tells the salesclerk that Fred will want a wide toe box because his feet are shaped like a duck's, whereas she has long, bony toes and weak ankles. "Our feet might as well be from different countries."
Once she gets them shod, the clerk tells them to wear the boots for a little while each day. "You don't want to break them in on the trail. And stock up on moleskin."
It's a heavy traffic day on 550. Driving home, Fred decides not to fight it and pulls back behind the slow drivers on the two-lane sections, waiting for the passing lanes rather than getting adventurous. At the state line he says, "You know, back-seat drivers make me nervous."
"Me? I'm not a back-seat driver. Am I?"
"You're a side-mirror driver."
"I am?"
A few minutes later he asks her if she's worried he's going to sideswipe somebody, because she's still doing it.
"Am I?" She settles back, closes her eyes, and doesn't open them again until she feels the car speed up. They're in the passing lane on Bondad Hill, passing a string of cars. Still several cars behind the first one, they pass the sign that says their lane is ending. She holds her breath. They cap the mesa, veering back into their lane, and a clear highway in front of them.
It's four o'clock. They've got tri-tip marinating at Fred's house. She's thinking about garlic-roasted mashed potatoes. Fred loves them. She loves them. Fred has dropped about five pounds. He seems comfortable talking with her about diet. They've decided portion control is for them. They will not eliminate any of the foods they love but will make friends with moderation.
They're almost to the fish hatchery turnoff when Fred says, "I'm a good driver, Lil. You can stop helping."
She catches herself. "My. It's like instinct. I don't even know I'm doing that."
"Well, you didn't used to."
"I didn't?"
"No."
He signals, turns left, and drives down the steep gravel road that leads toward the Animas and his house at the end of Rainbow Road.
In the kitchen, she puts garlic in a clay dish to roast and starts the potatoes boiling. It's still warm enough to sit out on the deck. Fred mixes martinis and puts out pretzels. She's just sitting down when it dawns on her that the side-mirror driving meant something. Her body is telling her something her mind needs to acknowledge.
"He's here," she tells Fred quietly. "Sam. That's who I was looking for in the mirror. In case he was following." She explains what her therapist said about the fracture between instincts and consciousness in survivors of abuse. "Even though our instincts try to warn us when we're in danger, it takes our minds a long time to get the signal. He's in the area."
"You're sure of it?"
"Absolutely."
"You think you're in danger? I mean, he wasn't violent with you, was he?"
"He never was, but ... I don't know. He also never stole money from me."
Fred sips his drink, shaking his head, staring out toward the river. Gunshots resound down the river valley this time of day. Hunters. It's elk season. Fred thinks they're inside the county line, which is off-limits to hunters.
"Tell you what, Lil. Helping people figure out what they need to feel safe is my specialty. That's what life insurance is all about. Of course, to a certain extent it's a matter of hedging your bets, bu
t a good deal of circumstance and outcome is in your control. I ask my clients how much they want to invest in protecting their assets. If they can sustain a loss, a minimal investment's okay, but if they really care about what they have, they ought to carry a policy with clout. The same thing applies here. You've already lost more than is acceptable. We ought to do what we can to insure you. You have a right to feel safe. What I suggest? I suggest we make a list of everything we can think to do that will make you feel protected. And the first thing on your list? We're packing you up and moving you in here. It'll be good practice for traveling together anyway. We ought to get used to each other on a daily basis. Don't you think?"
She smiles. "Whatever did I do to deserve you?"
So Fred gets paper and a pen. She has already had the locks changed at her house. "As if a little lock would stop Sam. When he's determined, nothing stops him. I should get all the valuables out of my house safe and put them in a safety deposit."
Fred writes it on the list.
"You know what I've never done, Fred? I've never made a will."
"Lily. That's extreme. Nobody's going to die. But yes, you should have a will." He puts it on the list. "It's good to think prevention. What can you do that might prevent an encounter? What about installing an alarm system at your house, one that's connected to the police? Let's put a policeman between you and the burglar."
It's costly, but she decides it's worth it. They add it to the list.
He looks at her steadily. "And what about filing charges, getting the law involved."
"I don't know. No. I don't think I want to do that."
"Why not, Lily? Be proactive. If they can find him before he finds you, well, there'll be no unpleasant surprises."
She looks out over the pines, all brown at the tips. Somewhere nearby a woodpecker is tapping an agitated drum roll behind the rifle shots. The hunters seem to be on the other side of the river. "It was just not like Sam to do something so, well, outlandish. He was always an oddball, swimming against the tide, but not like this. He's not himself, Fred. I think he's in a bad way."
"My point exactly. People in bad ways do extreme things. I really think you ought to get the law involved."
"Well, let me think about it."
"At least get a restraining order. You know, we can post a copy on your front door. That way he'll know a third party has been contacted, which can be a deterrent."
"I guess we could do that."
She spends the next few days checking items off the list. Fred insists that whenever she has to go to her house to get something or meet the alarm company, he'll go with her. "You have a right to feel safe, Lil. I'm part of the package." Even in the middle of the day, if she has to go to the house for some reason, he takes off from work and accompanies her.
She's very sorry that Sam knows the car she drives. It makes driving into town difficult. She tells Fred she's an accident waiting to happen because she finds herself constantly checking the rearview for Sam's truck. She begins to remember things she hasn't thought of in years. He could be very, very quiet. She remembers falling asleep nights without knowing where he was, then waking up to him sleeping beside her. She would see signs in the morning that he'd been in the house for hours while she slept: cigarette butts in an ashtray, a glass in the sink, a dogeared book on the coffee table. His shoes under the table. His socks, always filthy with yellow dust, stuffed into his shoes. "He could walk as quietly as a cat. Actually, he liked to sneak up on me in the early years. I think he found it arousing to make me jump," she tells Fred. And she did, too, which she doesn't tell Fred. That bite of fear seconds before she knew the hand on her breast was his, her nipple erect before the hand found it.
"Well he doesn't know my car," Fred told her. They decide that when she has to go to town, he'll drive her. That means she has to plan ahead. She doesn't want to take advantage of Fred's good nature; she doesn't want to make him miss work because of her bad planning.
She decides Monday will be her town day because she has a weekly appointment with her stylist that day. The second Monday in October, Fred drops her downtown at the stylist's on his way to work; after her appointment, she does her downtown errands, and Fred meets her for lunch. The plan is for her to drive his car in the afternoon to the grocery, the dry cleaner's—but the plan backfires because a worry worm niggles the minute she gets behind the wheel. Within a block of the insurance company, she has to pull over, shaking so badly she's afraid she'll crash. She returns to Fred, who takes her into a back room and holds her until she stops shaking. "What if he sees me driving your car?" she says. "He could follow us. He could follow you."
"What, he's going to extort from me?"
"I don't know," she says. "I just have this feeling."
So they change the plan. She'll stay home, do her own hair for a week or two. Fred will do the week's shopping. And they return to the checklist. She racks her brain trying to think of anything else that will short-circuit these panic attacks, and it occurs to her to get in touch with the marina in Florida. If he's back in Florida, well, then her instincts are all off.
She makes contact with a receptionist at the marina named Candy, who tracks down a dock worker named Raul, who tells her Sam's boat is moderately secure, the moving parts tied down or stored inside, more or less ready for hurricane season, but Sam hasn't put it in storage. Then again, he never puts it in storage. Raul hasn't seen him in a month.
Which means her instincts are correct. Which is a relief of sorts, except that more than ever she feels that Sam is nearby.
Fred teases her about being his kept woman, his captive, and he warns her not to leave the house while he's away, which isn't all that funny because she has to force herself to leave. The minute he drives off in the morning, her temperature drops. Trembling, she'll return to bed and try to warm up, wondering whether the chills are natural in the big drafty house, just an indication that winter is on the way, or whether her instincts are rattling, telling her to pay attention.
In the afternoons she makes herself get out of the house and walk the half-mile down the dirt road to Fred's mailbox. On the way back one day, she glimpses a streak of white out in the trees on the hill to her right. She drops the mail and bolts toward the rain gutter, her stomach churning. She scans the hill, the thickets of ponderosa, but her mind's eye sees Sam, she feels him there in the trees, watching her. The streak of white triggers a memory of the young Sam, hair bleached white from the sun, a white fish slipping headfirst through the white waters of the Animas, dodging rocks, and mixed with the fear she feels a longing for that young boy. She remembers him pulling himself out of the water, triumphant, running back upstream to dive in again. It surprises her how vivid the image is, how intense the memory, because for a second she is in the memory, worrying that he'll crack his head.
That evening Fred tells her that what she saw was probably a husky in the dog run. His neighbors train sled dogs for the winter races up north. The runs are mostly hidden by the trees. He asks her if she heard barking. She remembers no barking. She tells Fred about the memory it triggered of Sam slithering, eel-like, head first among the river rocks. "I guess I'll always worry about that little boy. Our connection was really more mother and son than—"
Fred interrupts, telling her it's getting a little tiresome, her needless worrying. "I really think you ought to file charges, Lily. Let's get this guy caught and stop worrying."
This peeves her a little. She's on the verge of snapping at Fred, telling him she's very sorry if her fears are inconvenient for him. But she says nothing. She does not explain again about the psychic schisms in an abuse survivor, the suppressed instincts that erupt in their own time and trigger memories that might not be pleasant but that nonetheless need to surface. Instead she snips, "Okay. I'll file charges," and then is more peeved when he simply says, "Good."
She files charges, a warrant is issued. They alert authorities in New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, and Oklahoma. She waits by the phone. A week g
oes by. No word. No sighting. She and Fred don't talk about it. He doesn't ask when he comes home in the evening, and she doesn't bring it up. But she's distracted, and when Fred tries to draw her back into planning their trip, she mostly agrees with whatever he wants, and he tells her she's no fun.
One night she wakes from a dead sleep with the memory of Fred's business card under a magnet on her refrigerator. She had scrawled his home address and phone number on the card when they first started seeing each other. Suddenly, as if from photographic memory, she sees the refrigerator but not the card, and is utterly certain the card wasn't there when they installed the alarm. That Sam has the card, along with her spare key. She's out of bed and half dressed when Fred turns the light on, sleepily asking her where she's going, and she explains why she's certain that Sam is in the area and knows where she is, that he's just biding his time, waiting to take her by surprise.
"You're crazy," Fred says. "If you've got to go to the house, tomorrow's soon enough." But she cannot sleep, and he, groaning, says he won't let her go alone.
They drive in silence. The night is cold, a chilly wind blowing down from the north. Fred is upset, she can tell by the way he leans away from her and into the door. He thinks she's silly. She is not silly. She won't be a sitting duck.
When they turn onto her block, she sees that the house is dark. She always leaves the porch light on. "Drive past," she says. They scan the block, looking for Sam's truck, which is not parked in front.
"If he's in there he would've triggered the alarm," Fred says.
"I didn't turn the light off. Did you?"
"Maybe the alarm company did."
"Maybe. Let's see what we can see."
They park a few houses away and walk down the dark sidewalk, waking the neighborhood dogs, who send out an alarm. On the front porch, they stand listening, looking at the restraining order taped to the front door.
"Let's go around to the side," she whispers. "Shh!"
"You shh. This is ridiculous," he says.
She says nothing. They creep around the house, opening the side gate, unlock the glass patio door, which slides noiselessly open. Once inside, they have a minute to disarm the alarm. She can't see its blinking red light from here. Fred says he'll turn it off, and she says, "Shhh."