by Mort Castle
“What’s that?”
“Don’t put any more lumps on your head. Zeller had an accident. That’s what it looks like, that’s what the autopsy will show. That’s what happened, period. Believe me, I’ve seen enough of these things to know. You seem to have good memories of your friend and that’s something, anyway. Keep those memories and don’t blame yourself. It’s not your fault.”
“I…I guess you’re right,” Michael said, and Beth prayed that Michael—her good, loving, gentle Michael—did not blame himself for poor Brad Zeller’s death.
He did not.
He wished he were free to take credit for it.
“Sorry we came?” Michael asked. It was the mid-afternoon, Saturday of Labor Day weekend, and they were at the Engelkings. There were four lawn chairs arranged in a circle in a corner of the redwood deck over the patio, but two of those chairs were unoccupied now; Laura Engelking, always the hostess, had gone off—“I must do something about those empty ‘glasses, Beth and Michael!”—and a moment later, Vern excused himself to greet some new arrivals.
It was a simple question, but Beth did not immediately answer; she thought it over. Michael had had to convince her they should go to the Engelkings’ party. She hadn’t felt like it. In fact, when she awoke this morning’ she felt like doing just what she’d felt like doing yesterday and the day before: nothing. But a grown-up person couldn’t lie in bed all day. An adult had responsibilities; there were things that had to be done and not to do them, simply to lie around feeling neither content nor sad, simply feeling nothing—that could not be.
So, all Thursday and Friday, feeling no more alive then a zombie in a grade Z horror movie, Beth had forced herself to meet her obligations, shopping and cleaning and cooking—her responsibilities to the household; talking to Marcy and Kim (their younger daughter seemed to be worried about the start of school because it meant “fractions” and she wasn’t sure she knew her times tables yet) and to Michael, her responsibilities to her loved ones; even reading a newspaper and glancing through the textbook for her abnormal psychology course that began next week, her responsibilities to herself.
She had done all this while diligently avoid—thinking about Brad Zeller. Joanie, Brad’s middle-aged daughter, had flown in from California and had stopped by for twenty minutes. She looked like a character from a West Coast version of The Wizard of Oz after it had been rewritten by a New Wave, Granola-eating Seeker of Higher Consciousness. Joanie philosophically accepted her father’s death. “His time, maybe karma, y’know” and “The flesh is merely flesh, y’know,” and so with Brad’s body released from the country morgue, the finding, “accidental death,” Joanie Zeller made arrangements for her father to be cremated. The house would go on sale next week—there were people “getting paid good money to handle it”—and Joanie was off and away. It was as though Brad Zeller had never existed, as though the reality of him had never been.
And oh, oh God, that was just so wrong, that a man could be blotted out like that! You couldn’t let yourself think about it, you couldn’t let yourself feel it, the heavy sadness imbedded in your bones…
“Hey,” Michael said, “penny for your thoughts and all that. I asked if you’re glad we came.”
Beth honestly answered, “Yes.” The temperature was in the low 80s, the few clouds in the blue sky puffy and picturesque; it was as if Nature favored America, giving its blessings to plans for beery picnics and softball games and holding hands—feeling young—for believing that everything will go on forever.
There were about forty guests at the Engelkings’ party, neighbors, employees of Superior Chemical, friends. Beth had met some before, others today for the first time. It seemed to her that everyone was genuinely glad to be gathering together here—now. And, of course, Laura and Vern… While the Engelkings lived only a half hour due west of Park Estates, High Wood was an exclusive suburb: Old Money and New Money with Taste. Still, Beth had always been more than comfortable with the Engelkings, Vern, so comic with his flamboyantly formal speech, the model of the goofily eccentric favorite uncle in your “pretend” family tree, and Laura, with her constant cheerfulness that never seemed artificial.
Being here—hereandnow—with everybody, with them all, was like a confirmation of what Michael had said that morning, the final argument that persuaded her they should attend the party: “Life has to go on, Beth.”
And Beth felt ready to go on with life.
“Honey,” Michael said, “are you getting a little drunk?”
“Yes,” Beth answered. She laughed quietly. The wine punch was potent. She felt as though her level of perception had been raised so that sounds—the group in conversation at the other end of the deck, the people below on the patio, in the back yard, and at the poolside, the radio somewhere playing easy listening music—were particularly clear. No one sound meant anything of itself but all blended together to form an aural blanket as soothing as the night noises of an idyllic woodland. “A little drunk, Michael, and you know what?”
“What’s that, honey?”
“It feels fine.”
“Guess I’m a little drunk, too,” Michael said. “It’s been some kind of week, so you’re right. It feels good.”
He didn’t look drunk, Beth thought. And hey! Had he ever been drunk? Had she ever seen Michael juiced to the gills, el blotto, wiped out, bonkers? Wasn’t one monumental “drunken husband” scene obligatory in every middle-class marriage?
Giggling, she decided she would definitely have to ask Michael to get drunk for her some time. When somebody was totally smashed, you had a chance to see the real person—that was simple folk wisdom.
When Laura Engelking returned, handing Beth another cup of wine punch, she told Michael that Vern wanted him to join him in the house for a minute.
“Probably business,” Michael said with a theatrical sigh. “Work, work, work, that’s all Vern ever thinks about.”
“Business?” Laura laughed. “Michael, please! Vern wants to show you his new videogame! Everytime he manages to kill another ‘alien invader,’ he lets out a whoop—like we’ve won the lottery.”
Michael smiled. “You know, Laura, Vern might seem like an easy-going guy, but you have to be careful.”
“Oh, What is that, Michael?”
Michael laughed. “The boss has the old killer instinct.”
On the diving board, a fourteen-year-old stood poised, arms raised, concentrating, while determinedly paying no attention to the cute thirteen-year-old girl in shorts and a halter who sat in a chaise lounge, working just as hard at not noticing him. The boy took a deep breath, jumped, and smacked the water in a noisy, explosively spraying belly-flop. He didn’t look at the laughing thirteen-year-old girl as he swam to the side and hoisted himself from the pool, thighs, chest and belly turning crimson.
In the shallow end, a mother encouraged her pre-schooler to try to float and a heavyset woman sat on the edge, dangling her feet in the water.
The man watched the two children who were in the third lap of a race across the pool’s width on the “safe” side of the rope marking the deep end. The smaller child looked like a seal pup in her brown swimsuit, but she fought the water, kicking and splashing, wasting energy, while the older girl, in a flowered swim-cap and two piece red suit, glided smoothly, easily and almost effortlessly staying in the lead.
The man took a sip from a can of Michelob. Without being handsome, he was distinguished looking, tall and tanned, in his mid-forties, his black hair peppered with gray, his full beard neatly trimmed. His eyes were an intense dark blue. There were lines across his forehead that made him look more weathered than worried and a curlicued wrinkle seemed to splice together his heavy eyebrows.
Marcy reached the side of the pool and hooked her elbows on it. “I won,” she said.
Kim, sputtering and splashing, gasped, “Oh yeah?” Then, springing on Marcy from behind, she dunked her and kept her under.
The man stepped to the edge of the pool.
Looking down, he said, “Okay, that’s enough of that. Let her up.”
Kim angrily squinted at the interference, but released Marcy, who bobbed up, blinking and coughing.
The man squatted, looked into Kim’s eyes. “I understand,” he said softly. “She won your race and you’re angry. It’s all right to feel that, but it’s not all right to try to hurt someone else.”
A short time later, Beth, who’d decided to see what the girls were up to, found them standing by the pool, wrapped in their towels, animatedly talking to the bearded man who continued to squat, keeping himself at their level.
“Hi, Mom!” Kim called. “This is…”
Rising, the bearded man shook her hand and introduced himself.
“I’m Beth Louden,” she replied. There were few men she’d met who were comfortable shaking hands with a woman; either they were into light finger-touching, or trying to revise their standard “businessman’s hearty grip” to show their belief in feminine equality, but most men didn’t find shaking a woman’s hand at all a natural experience, and so it made for awkward first meetings.
There was nothing unnatural about this man’s hand, holding hers for just the right amount of time and then releasing it. “Mom,” Kim said, “is the food ready?”
Beth didn’t know, but she said the girls might want to go find out. They scurried off.
“You have lovely children. You must be proud of them.”
“Thank you,” Beth said. “And yes, I am proud of them.”
A few minutes later, Beth thought her “handshake impression” had been absolutely right. This “handshaker” was one of those rare individuals with whom one almost immediately felt at ease. Conversation flowed spontaneously, moving quickly from superficial to serious, and Beth found herself talking about some of the pressures of the past week. She wondered if liquor was making her too talkative, deciding that—even if it was she didn’t mind—and how she hoped that the bad period was over and done. She learned that he had known Vern Engelking for many years, that he had only recently moved to the south suburbs after living out east, and that he was a psychiatrist.
She had to laugh, and then she felt she had to explain her reaction. “You look like a psychiatrist.”
“I know what you mean,” he said, obviously not offended. “People were always telling me that, so I felt I had to get into the field. I’m just glad I don’t look like a cowboy.”
She told him she was quite interested in psychology herself. In fact…
Vern Engelking and Michael walked over. For an instant, Beth thought she saw a startled look across Michael’s face, but then it wasn’t there, and he was pleasantly smiling, extending his hand, as she said, “Michael, I want you to meet Dr. Jan Pretre.”
“I tell you, I didn’t know…”
“If you were seeing a ghost? Or whether to shit or go blind? Or if you really do prefer butter to the higher priced spread? You were surprised. I saw it.”
“Yes,” Michael Louden glumly admitted. Surprise was something he hadn’t felt in years. A Stranger couldn’t afford to.
“It’s all right, Michael,” Jan Pretre assured him. “No harm done—this time. Just be careful.”
Late in the afternoon, there had been a sudden change in the weather, a common occurrence in the Midwest, and the temperature began nose-diving. Now, an hour after sundown, many guests had departed and the majority of those who remained were inside, in the warmth, enjoying the offerings of the Engelkings’ well-stocked bar. Michael had slipped away with Jan and they stood talking at the front of the house by the three-and-a-half-car garage.
But how long, Michael asked, would he—all The Strangers—have to continue being careful? There’d been so many years of maintaining the sickening guise of one of the normals, a meaningless, anonymous blob of humanity. When was the Time, their time that so long ago Jan Pretre had promised was forthcoming?
“There are so many of us, Michael,” Jan said tonelessly. “More than you can imagine. More than even I ever thought. Every day I seem to find yet another who bears the mark, whose aura bums the color of fire and blood. We’re everywhere, Michael. Just be patient. It won’t be long, not now. Our Time is coming. You can feel it, can’t you, Michael?”
“Yes,” Michael said.
The wind blew cold from the north, and on it, he could smell the promise of winter kill, hear the icy shrieks of nightscreams and frigid terror. It was a wind that promised deathblow and bloodspill and the Time of The Strangers.
— | — | —
TEN
NEITHER OF the girls seemed to notice Michael, standing at the open door of their bedroom. Knees up, shoulders against the bed’s headboard, Marcy was reading a Nancy Drew book. Kim, on her bed, was on her stomach; propped up on her elbows, chin in her cupped hands, staring at Chopper and Snowball. Side by side on her pillow, the guinea pigs were as inanimate as furry stuffed animals and only their brightly glittering eyes were a sign that they were indeed living creatures.
Goddamned double-ugly little bastards, Michael thought, and that stink from their cage, pinewood chips and guinea pig shit!
“Hey,” Michael said, “you kids finish all your homework?”
Two startled faces peered at him. “No homework, Daddy,” Marcy explained. “Not the first day.”
It was the Tuesday after Labor Day, the traditional “back to school” date for much of the United States. It was also Beth’s “back to school” day; she’d left for her class at Lincoln Junior College fifteen minutes ago, leaving Michael to take care of the girls.
Michael glanced at his watch. “Well, then, I guess it’s about bedtime for you two, right?”
“Daddy,” Marcy unhappily protested, “it’s way too early…”
Jesus Q. Christ, Michael thought, she didn’t realize he was joking. There were times he was convinced that Marcy had no more sense than those miserable, brainless guinea pigs!
“And I’ll tell you what!” Michael said, bobbing his head like a spring-necked dashboard ornament, “I’ll even rock you girls to sleep. See, I’ll go out and find a great big rock…” He finished the sentence silently…and bash your itty-bitty heads in!
“You know, Dad,” Kim said, “your jokes are getting pretty stale.”
Michael put his hands on his hips and with the moronic enthusiasm of Steve Martin, uttered the comedian’s classic, “Well, Ex-Cuse me!”
Marcy giggled. Kim made a derisive sound with her nose.
“Okay, if you don’t have any homework and you’re not ready for bed, how about we get in the car, zip over to the Dari-Quik, and get some cones. How’s that sound?”
“Uh-huh!” Kim said.
“Oh,” Michael said, “I am so very pleased that my suggestion meets with your approval, Kimmy dear. You know my one true goal is to make you happy! Put Meatball and Flopper away and let’s go.”
“It’s Snowball and Chopper,” Kim said, “and that wasn’t funny, either.”
On the way out the front door, Marcy took hold of Michael’s hand and said, “I like your jokes, Daddy.”
“Good,” Michael said, “So do I.”
He wondered how “Daddy’s little girl” and “little sister” and “sweet loving mommy” would like the big joke he had planned for them. Now that joke—oh shit, they’d think it was a goddamned scream!
She parked the Chevette in the “D” section of the lot. She checked to make sure she had the spiral ring notebook, the textbook Abnormal Psychology, and then, opening the notebook to the first, unblemished page, she wrote, “Mrs. Beth Louden” with one new Bic pen, then on the line below added the date with the other pen, making sure both ballpoints worked.
It was foolish how excited and yet somewhat fearful she felt, Beth thought, as she stepped out of the car. The feelings she had, the thoughts racing through her mind, were no more sophisticated and mature than those that used to besiege her as a child starting back to school. Will the teacher be nice? All she knew about the course’s instructor
was that his name—or was it a she—was listed in the catalog as K. Bollender. Her classmates, would they be pleasant, or even fun to be with? Would there be a class brain and a class wit and a class dunce—and oh, please God, don’t let Beth Louden wear the pointed cap! She so wanted to do well on quizzes and tests and have the right answers when the teacher called on her, and have the right questions that she wouldn’t embarrass herself by asking!
Beth had a moment’s strong temptation to turn around, jump back in the Chevette, and go home. Who ever said there was anything wrong with simply being a wife and a mother—and a damned good interior decorator and a fine gardener, too, so there!
She had, she reminded herself. This was her choice, a decision to become—to try to become—more than she was.
And she was pretty darned lucky to have someone like Michael, as supportive as could be. He’d told her she looked just great for her first class. Well, to tell the truth, she had very thoughtfully chosen the crocheted, crème-colored top and the black designer jeans (her only pair but definitely pants that made her feel like a casual jet-setter), completing the image of “college student” with new gold earrings and an extra touch of make-up to banish the dark circles that were her inheritance from the stress of last week.
Of course, Michael, being Michael, had had to do some teasing—joking, too. “But you know, I thought all the kids were wearing poodle skirts and penny loafers and Peter Pan collars these days.” But there he was, smiling broadly, waving as she backed out of the drive, calling out, “Excelsior! Win this one for the Gipper!” Beth was sure she knew exactly what he was saying in his own sweet, silly way.
Excelsior, Beth said to herself as she walked into the octagonal shaped building, Lincoln Junior College.
K. Bollender was Kevin Bollender—“and please, make it Kevin and not Mister”—he told the sixteen people who occupied the desks in room 211. He quickly called the roll. Then he said he realized that they probably were wondering about “this guy” teaching a course called “Abnormal Psychology,” maybe even worrying if he was the instructor for a class like this because “it takes one to know one.”