Dweller

by Jeff Strand

  Toby bit the inside of his cheek and looked into Owen’s eyes. He couldn’t always tell what Owen was thinking. Usually he could make a guess, but this time he had absolutely no idea. He didn’t know if Owen was ready to wail in misery, bite his face off, or shrug and return to his cave.

  “Can I have a hug?” Toby asked.

  Owen gave him one.

  1972

  “Damn it! You little bastards get out of here!” Toby shouted after the laughing, fleeing kids. He could understand them egging and toilet-papering his house if it were Halloween or April Fools’ Day, but it was Lincoln’s birthday, for crying out loud!

  “Bye, weirdo!” one of them shouted back.

  Weirdo. Yeah, that was appropriate, but he wasn’t sure how he ended up being treated like a crazy old man. He wasn’t even thirty.

  One of the kids, Joey, had ridden his bike over a couple of times to talk about baseball. Toby had no interest in or knowledge about baseball, but he faked it. Then the kid’s mother had told Joey to stay away from him.

  He got a towel from the linen closet and went outside to wipe off his front window. He grimaced at the smell. These eggs had gone bad quite some time ago—you almost had to admire their commitment to keep them around that long.

  Almost.

  “Little bastards,” he muttered under his breath as he wiped away the slime.

  “Toby.”

  “Oh my God! It’s your first word!”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  1973. Age 28.

  As Toby lay in bed, the night before his parents were coming to visit for Christmas, he realized that he hadn’t seen Larry in over a week.

  He didn’t see Larry every single day, but in thirteen years he was pretty sure that he’d never gone two consecutive days without a visit. These weren’t always the long, nightmare-inducing, sanity-questioning visits—usually he’d think about the horrible act he’d committed, his unforgiving imagination would conjure up an image of the bully (or bullies), and he’d spend a few minutes trying to get rid of them. Sometimes it was just a few seconds. Sometimes it lasted all night. Sometimes he was terrified, sometimes he was disoriented and confused, and sometimes the visions of Larry and Nick made him so angry about the ongoing torment that he wanted to stab them to death again.

  But if he remembered correctly, the last time Larry had haunted him was during dinner last Monday. Toby had envisioned poking a fork in his eye and he’d gone away.

  Last Tuesday, Toby had met Melissa Tomlinson. Neither Larry nor Nick had returned since then.

  This wasn’t a coincidence.

  Of course, now that he was thinking about the fact that he hadn’t thought about Larry, the son of a bitch showed up, but Toby made the image dissipate quickly, before it could even say anything. It was time to get over this crap. Time to move on with his life.

  Melissa was his new coworker at the grocery. A cashier. Twenty-three years old. The most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. Perhaps not in a traditional way; in fact, Andrew, one of the baggers, had asked, “Who’s the new dog?” Toby had resisted the urge to suffocate him with one of the bags.

  Her long, straight black hair was unevenly cut, and she had sort of a crooked smile, but it wasn’t like she were missing a nose or anything like that. Not everyone could be on the cover of Playboy. As far as Toby was concerned, she was a goddess of beauty.

  It helped that she was nice to him.

  She’d never worked a cash register before, and Annette, whom she would be replacing, was immediately exasperated, even though from what Toby could tell she was picking it up quickly. People weren’t born knowing how to use a piece of man-made equipment. Toby wanted to walk over there and tell Annette this, and he almost did, but Melissa seemed to be handling everything fine, and her smile never vanished.

  Then Mr. Zack asked Toby why he was loitering out here, and he sheepishly returned to the stockroom.

  He spent the morning lifting boxes and working up the courage to ask her to sit next to him at lunch. Or the courage to sit next to her, wherever she decided to sit. Either one of those would be fine.

  Melissa went home for lunch. Apparently she lived only two blocks from the store.

  Toby spent the afternoon mopping floors and trying to decide if he would be risking severe humiliation by asking her to go to a movie with him. Robin Hood was still playing, though he didn’t know if she’d want to go see a Disney cartoon. The only other thing playing was Serpico, which might be kind of violent for her.

  His hands were so sweaty that he dropped a box of Tide when he tried to put it on the shelf. Fortunately, Mr. Zack didn’t see him.

  “Hi,” Toby said, walking over to her as their shifts ended. “I’m Toby. Mr. Zack introduced us this morning.”

  “Yep, I remember.” Toby wasn’t sure if her smile actually got bigger, but it might have. “What’s up?”

  “How was your first day?”

  She shrugged. “Not too bad. Annette tries to make it a lot more difficult than it really is. I think she’s embarrassed by how easy it is. You don’t even have to add up the numbers yourself. At least your job requires strength.”

  Toby grinned. “Well, not that much strength.”

  “More strength than pushing buttons for eight hours.” She lifted her hand and stared at it in mock agony. “Oh, my poor, poor, delicate fingers!” She had long fingernails, painted with bright red polish.

  “Do you want to go to a movie tonight?” Toby asked. He hadn’t planned to just blurt it out like that, but at least he didn’t screw up the words. He’d half expected to say something like “Tonight want go movie-thing me come too?”

  “Ooooh, I can’t tonight.”

  “No problem.”

  “I can tomorrow, though, but we have to see Sleeper. Have you heard of that?”

  “No.”

  “It’s about a guy who wakes up in the future. It’s a comedy, though. It looks hilarious.”

  “I didn’t know it was even playing.”

  “It’s not in Orange Leaf. We’d have to drive about forty-five minutes. Is that okay?”

  “Of course!”

  “How about we leave right after work? I’ll drive.”

  “I’ve got a car.”

  “Yeah, but I’ll drive. Are we set?”

  “Definitely.”

  Toby went out and bought a new shirt and jeans for the date. He pretty much only wore the same five shirts, so everybody at work would know that he’d bought something special just for this occasion, but he didn’t care. He didn’t have any reason to downplay his excitement.

  “Nice shirt,” said Annette. “You look good in green.”

  “I should let you know that I investigated you,” said Melissa, as she pulled out of the grocery store parking lot. She was dressed simply—faded jeans and a yellow T-shirt—and Toby had never seen anything more radiant.

  “You did?”

  She nodded. “I just asked people around work if you were safe. Apparently you’re extremely quiet and keep to yourself most of the time.”

  “That’s probably accurate.”

  “Except Mr. Zack said that you can be a smart-ass.”

  “That’s probably accurate, too.”

  “And everybody was surprised that you asked me out.”

  “I was kind of surprised, too.”

  “I’m glad you did. I really want to see this movie and I didn’t want to go by myself. And I promise that I’m not a serial killer if you promise that you’re not one.”

  “I promise.”

  “And I’m not a political activist or a religious nut.”

  “Neither am I.”

  “Good. So we’re not serial killers, political activists, or religious nuts. I think we’ll at least be able to make it through the trailers without any problems.”

  They talked and laughed all the way to the movie theater. Owen was his best friend and that would never change, but it was so nice to have an extended conversation with somebody he could ful
ly communicate with. This was natural. This was right.

  Sleeper was the funniest movie Toby had ever seen in his life. He laughed until tears streamed down his cheeks. They shared a popcorn and a package of red licorice, but they were still hungry when the movie ended, so they went to get a burger and fries. They laughed some more and quoted their favorite lines from the movie, over and over.

  Toby didn’t know what being in love felt like, and to be honest he thought that it probably involved a more dramatic shift in his outlook on life than what he was currently feeling. Still, there was no question that he really, really liked Melissa. Maybe more than he liked anybody besides Owen.

  Right now, she was his favorite human being.

  They got back into her car. She didn’t start the engine. She looked over at him and raised an eyebrow. “Do you get high?” she asked.

  “Sure,” he said, though he didn’t.

  “Do you have anything with you?”

  “No.”

  “I’ve just got some weed. Wanna go somewhere?”

  Toby felt himself begin to perspire and hoped that she didn’t notice. Yeah, he wanted to “go somewhere” with her, but not to do drugs. How was he supposed to explain this? Sorry, Melissa, I appreciate the offer, but I have these disturbing images in my brain that I can’t always control, and if I try a mind-altering substance I have no idea what I’ll see or say. He’d kept his secret too long to risk sharing it while he was stoned. He could just imagine himself, rolling around in a giggling fit: “And then I cut off their fingers! It was the funniest thing I’ve ever done!”

  “I can’t.”

  “You don’t trust me?”

  “Oh, no, I trust you completely.”

  “You shouldn’t. Because one of the things I said I wasn’t isn’t true.” She poked him in the chest. “Vote Democrat.”

  He sensed that she was trying to let him off the hook, but he wanted to explain himself, even if his explanation was completely made up. “It’s just that my parents are coming to visit for the holidays, and my mom is as antidrugs as you can possibly get, and if she even thinks she smells pot she will absolutely flip out.”

  Nice. Smooth. His great excuse for not getting stoned with Melissa was that his mom might not approve. Wow, she was going to think he was simply the coolest person who’d ever lived in the entire history of the universe.

  “That’s too bad,” Melissa said. “Pot makes me horny.”

  Toby felt like an entire bathtub’s worth of sweat suddenly gushed from every pore in his body. Maybe he’d just smoke a little, or fake the inhale.

  No. He knew what would happen. One kiss from Melissa and he’d forget himself, suck in a deep lungful, and then chase imaginary bullies around the room with a hunting knife.

  “Well, you can smoke it.”

  “Nah, it’s okay.” She started up the engine. “Was there anyplace else you wanted to go?”

  Toby shook his head. He’d screwed everything up. He always screwed everything up. He tried to maintain his composure, but inside he was trying to strangle himself.

  “Don’t worry,” Melissa said. “There are other ways to get me horny.”

  “You’re coming in, right?” she asked, as they pulled up in front of her apartment complex.

  “I kind of have to,” Toby said. “You drove.”

  “Yeah, you’re trapped with me. What a scary position to be in. I’ll try to be gentle with you, but I can’t promise that there won’t be broken bones.”

  After they parked and got out of the car, she took him by the hand and led him to her second-floor apartment. She put a finger to her lips as she unlocked her door, indicating for him to be quiet. “We don’t want to wake my roommate,” she whispered.

  She led him through the dark apartment into her bedroom, quickly shutting the door behind her. She turned on a black light, illuminating posters of Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and Blue Oyster Cult.

  The kiss happened so quickly that Toby nearly yelped in surprise. She threw her arms around him, kissing him with incredible fervor.

  I can’t believe this is finally happening, Toby thought.

  Don’t analyze it! Enjoy it!

  They’d been kissing for less than thirty seconds before she took his hand and pressed it against her breast. He squeezed it.

  “Ow. Not so hard.”

  “Sorry.”

  They kissed some more.

  “Harder than that, though.”

  He stroked her nipple with his thumb, feeling it quickly harden underneath her shirt. The shirt was gone seconds later, as she pulled it over her head, tossed it aside, then unfastened her bra.

  “You gonna do it with your clothes on?” she asked as she began to tug down her jeans.

  Toby shook his head and took off his shirt as well. His heart was racing and he was trembling a bit and he wished that things were moving a bit more slowly—not a lot more slowly, but enough to let him better take in the experience.

  She sat down on her bed, naked. “Are you a virgin?” she asked.

  Toby considered lying, but decided against it. “Yeah.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wow. And you’re twenty-eight?”

  “I’m a loser, I know.”

  “Nah, you’re not a loser. I think it’s great. I’ve never deflowered anybody before. If you have any objections, you’d better get them out in the open now, because once I’m done with you, you will never find that cherry again.”

  Toby had no objections.

  “Stop looking so grumpy. I’m sorry I woke you up.” Toby continued shining the flashlight in Owen’s face. “This wasn’t something that could wait, and you don’t have a phone out here. I’ve got news to share!”

  Owen waved him away.

  “Guess what it is. Give up? I just had sex.”

  Toby told him the whole story, leaving out the premature ejaculation but using gestures to make sure that Owen understood that they did it three times.

  “I may be in love with her, I don’t know, but it was an incredible evening.”

  Then he told the story to Owen again, from beginning to end. It was a great story.

  The next evening they skipped the movie and went straight to her bedroom.

  Mr. Zack explained that neither of them would be fired, this time, but that such indiscretions at work were completely unacceptable, and that he would never get the image out of his head.

  “Mom loved her. I can’t tell what Dad thought. I’m sure he liked her, too. But we’re sitting in the living room talking, and Melissa says, ‘Hey, Toby, I think there’s something wrong with your toilet.’ And I knew exactly what she had in mind, because of the way she said it, you know? You wouldn’t think you could say something like that in an erotic way, but she did. And I’m almost positive that Mom knew what she had in mind, too. Isn’t that gross?”

  “Toby.”

  “Yep, I’m Toby. So I don’t really want to do anything with my parents in the house, but I can’t just ignore a broken toilet, right? I go in there, and Melissa drops down to her knees. Now keep in mind that the bathroom is only one door down the hall from the living room where they’re sitting, and the door isn’t closed all the way. So I’m trying to be quiet, but Melissa isn’t, she’s just slurping away, and I’m trying to finish quickly so we don’t get caught. Of course, when we go back Dad wants to know what was wrong with the toilet, and being the master liar that I am I said, ‘Oh, we just needed to jiggle the handle,’ and I guess that sounded dirty because Melissa went into complete hysterics. Then we all sat down and Mom told us about Aunt Jean’s hysterectomy.”

  Owen signaled. Big fun.

  “Yeah, it was fun. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to look Mom and Dad in the eye again, though. I’m glad they’re leaving tomorrow.”

  Toby lit the marijuana cigarette and stared at the rising curl of smoke. Melissa had brought up the subject multiple times in the past month, and though she always seemed to be
sufficiently horny without drugs, at some point Toby was going to have to cave in.

  So he sat alone in his bedroom. He’d test it out. See what happened. Maybe it would kill some brain cells that he wanted dead, and banish Larry and Nick from his mind forever.

  He inhaled deeply.

  He didn’t really remember most of the experience, but he found himself on the floor, loudly sobbing and tearing at his hair.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  1974. Age 29.

  “It’s not her best picture,” Toby admitted. “We’ve got other ones that you aren’t allowed to see.”

  Owen looked at the photo of Melissa. His talon was poking through the corner, but Toby didn’t say anything about it.

  “Pretty nice, huh?”

  Owen gave him a thumbs-up.

  “You probably can’t even judge. But we’re still together, which is pretty amazing, don’t you think? We’re not having as much sex, but there’s still plenty, I mean, I have no complaints.”

  Toby didn’t think that Owen understood the concept of sex, even in an animalistic mating sense, but he knew that Owen understood that he was in love. Owen seemed very happy for him.

  “You’ll get to meet her soon,” Toby promised.

  “So when do I get to meet Owen?” Melissa asked, gently stroking him.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, you spend enough time with him that it’s time for me to meet him. I’m starting to think that you have another girl on the side.” She winked, then took him into her mouth, ending her part of the conversation.

  “You will someday. I keep telling him that I’m going to bring you over.”