The Last Night Out

by Catherine O'Connell

  Three young professionals wearing their ties wrapped around their heads like urban Indians, sent over a round of shots. Something called a woo-woo, a concoction of vodka, peach schnapps and cranberry juice. They were sweet and went down far too easily. I flagged the bartender. ‘Three more woo-woos here. And three for the guys who bought them for us.’

  ‘Those guys just left,’ he said, as he poured us three more shots. I looked down the bar and the three tie-clad men were indeed gone. Two of their stools had been commandeered by a couple, the third by a guy looking very out of place in a blue work shirt, his dark curly hair brushing the frames of his wire-rimmed glasses as he peered down into his beer.

  ‘Then send the hippie a woo-woo. He looks like he could use it.’

  The bartender came back and told me Work Shirt had said thanks but no thanks. Having achieved the amusing stage of drunk, I peeled off three dollars and handed them to the bartender. ‘OK. Then give him this and tell him his next beer is on me.’

  We toasted ourselves and threw back our woo-woos. When I glanced back in Work Shirt’s direction, his seat was empty. ‘Looks like he took the money and ran,’ I laughed. A moment later, my three singles appeared on the bar next to my empty shot glass. I swiveled around to see the recipient of my generosity standing behind me. He did not look amused.

  ‘I believe those belong to you,’ he said, nodding at the money.

  ‘Hey, get a sense of humor,’ I said. ‘It was a joke. You didn’t want a drink, so I sent the money instead. Get it? It’s no affront to your masculinity if that’s what you’re worried about.’

  The firm set of his jaw relaxed and the trace of a smile appeared on his lips, carving dimples into his cheeks. ‘Sorry. I’m not from around here. I guess your city humor is lost on me.’

  I should have stopped there, taken my three bucks and waved him off. I know I should have. I should have. I should have. But instead I pulled out the charm, asking lamely, ‘Oh? Where are you from?’

  ‘New Hampshire.’

  ‘New Hampshire. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone from New Hampshire. What brings you to Chicago?’

  ‘I’m a carpenter here on a job.’

  ‘Oh, a carpenter.’ That explained the work shirt. ‘I don’t know many carpenters either. What’s your name?’

  ‘Steven Kaufman.’

  ‘Maggie Trueheart.’ I held out my hand and he met it with his own, a strong workingman’s hand. ‘Kaufman? Isn’t that Jewish?’

  ‘Yes,’ he replied defensively. ‘Something wrong with that?’

  ‘Not at all. I just don’t think I’ve ever met a Jewish carpenter. I thought all Jewish men were doctors, lawyers and bankers.’

  ‘Are you Christian?’ he asked.

  ‘Catholic,’ I admitted.

  ‘If I’m not mistaken, a Jewish carpenter started your religion.’

  ‘Touché, Steven Kaufman!’ And with booze-inspired boldness, I added, ‘Do Jewish carpenters from New Hampshire dance?’

  He shrugged and I grabbed his hand and tugged him towards the dance floor, leaving Angie and Suzanne at the bar. The B-52s’ ‘Love Shack’ was playing as I fell into my best imitation of someone who could dance. The carpenter danced awkwardly, his arms swaying to and fro from his squared shoulders as if he wasn’t sure what else to do with them. ‘Love Shack’ segued into Tina Turner’s ‘I’m Your Private Dancer’, and my mind turned to Tony, the stripper, and his provocative moves. I’m your private dancer, dancer for money. The vodka and the woo-woos had really taken hold, not to mention whatever residual cocaine was still floating in my system. I closed my eyes and began mimicking Tony, rotating my hips and torso in a circular motion. My arms were stretched over my head, my body slinking to the hot pulsating beat of the music, and I was the sexiest woman alive. I’m your private dancer, dancer for money, do what you want me to do.

  The song ended, and I opened my eyes, surprised to see the carpenter standing there instead of Tony. That’s how far gone I was. He was staring at me with a dumb look on his face. ‘That’s some kind of dancing,’ he said.

  The next song had just started when I felt someone tugging at my arm. I turned into the melee to see Suzanne standing in the middle of the dance floor, fighting to keep her balance amid the jostling dancers. ‘I think it’s time to get Angie home,’ she shouted over the din, pointing behind her. Angie was slumped on a barstool, her face on the bar. ‘Are you ready?’

  What did she mean was I ready? Did she really expect me to go now? When I was having so much fun? This was my last night out as a single woman and I wanted to relish it. I looked at the carpenter doing his best to keep a beat. He was an innocent tradesman from New England. Certainly no harm could come from another dance or two.

  ‘I thought it was girls’ night out,’ I yelled back.

  ‘C’mon, Maggie, let’s go.’

  ‘You guys go. I’m staying.’

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘No. It’s all right. He knows I’m spoken for,’ I said obstinately, waving my engagement ring in his face. ‘I’ll be all right.’

  She stared at me sternly and shook her head. ‘It’s your party,’ she shouted. ‘I can’t babysit everybody.’ I mouthed good-bye over the noise and turned my attention back to the dance floor. The next time I looked at the bar, Angie and Suzanne had gone.

  FIVE

  Suzanne

  Suzanne stood in the window of her high rise looking out over Lake Michigan, watching the white triangles of the sailboats dance gracefully against the cobalt blue while she replayed Kelly’s call over and over in her brain. Something terrible has happened. Angie’s dead. Her eyes drifted up the shoreline and came to rest on Lincoln Park, lush and green against the grey buildings that banked it. She shuddered at the thought of Angie’s body laying somewhere within, cold as concrete itself. Her heart ached with a sadness that only one who has suffered permanent loss can understand. Her brother dead at twenty-one. Now her best friend at thirty-three.

  Her mind flashed back to sitting in the cab, watching Angie weave an unsteady line up the walk. Her wobbly wave at the door. What had happened after that? Had someone been waiting for her inside? She thought of Kelly saying that being drunk never stopped her from going back out. Is that what happened? Had Angie ventured back into the early hours alone? Would things be different today if Suzanne had gone inside with Angie and put her to bed? But it had been nearly three o’clock, and Suzanne had been so bone tired her only thoughts had been of her own bed.

  Too late, she regretted going to Rush Street with the girls last night. She didn’t even like bars. They were noisy and crowded and people were always spilling on her expensive clothes. And that was before taking into account how infantile the men turned after a few drinks. But Angie had been insistent. Refused to take no for an answer. Going up against Angie when her mind was set on something was like going up against a force of nature. If only she had refused to go. If only. Then today she would only be suffering Angie’s death as an aggrieved third party instead of feeling somehow responsible. Or worse, maybe the death wouldn’t have occurred at all.

  With her plans to spend the morning at the office scuttled, she picked up a dust rag to busy herself while waiting for Kelly to call back with more details. Moving about the large apartment dusting furniture rendered spotless by the housekeeper the day before, her insides felt as empty as a hollowed out gourd. Sunlight streamed into the room from the east and struck a Venetian vase gracing the cocktail table, setting it aglow in a kaleidoscope of red, blue and orange. Despite her sadness, she stood back to admire the phenomenon, filled with the pride of ownership. The vase was truly a thing of beauty. Bought on a short-lived trip to Venice, it represented a whole lot more than the thousands of lire it cost. It brought back clear harsh memories of the day the financial bottom had almost fallen out of her world. It served as a constant reminder of how fragile a lifestyle could be.

  A ring of the phone sent her rushing into the kitchen. Fully expec
ting to hear Kelly’s voice, she was surprised when the daytime concierge announced there were two detectives from the Chicago Police Department in the lobby who wanted to speak with her. She told the concierge to send them up and waited in the foyer with one eye pressed to the peephole. A minute later the elevator doors opened and two distorted figures emerged, one stubby and one gargantuan. Suzanne had the door open before they could knock.

  When O’Reilly and Kozlowski saw Suzanne framed in the entry, tall and slim and blonde, dressed in fitted jeans and a crisp white blouse, they reacted the same way most men did upon seeing her for the first time. They stood up straighter and sucked in their stomachs. ‘Ms Lundgren, sorry to drop in unannounced. We got your name from Kelly Delaney,’ said O’Reilly, barely able to breathe with the effort of holding in his paunch. Both detectives reached into their pockets to pull out their wallets.

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ said Suzanne, waving off the proffered badges. ‘I know who you are and why you’re here.’

  ‘You know who we are supposed to be. Don’t ever let a stranger into your apartment without verifying who it is. A couple of slobs like us could be axe murderers.’

  ‘I’ll take that under consideration the next time a friend turns up dead,’ she said dourly. She ushered them through the foyer and into the living room. O’Reilly let out a low whistle as he took in his surroundings. He figured the space could easily fit three pool tables without any crowding. The polished hardwood floors were scattered with oriental rugs and the walls were adorned with modern art that didn’t do much for him, but he knew had to be expensive. While he didn’t know much about this sort of stuff, no one needed to tell him everything he was looking at was beyond a cop’s pay.

  ‘Nice place you got here.’

  ‘Thank you. I’m very proud of it.’

  Suzanne directed them to a pair of beige slipper chairs and seated herself on a peach couch across from them, resting her hands in her lap.

  ‘That sure is beautiful,’ said Kozlowski, his small eyes fixed on the Venetian vase.

  ‘It’s Murano glass. I bought it in Venice.’

  ‘Venice. Now that’s a place I’d like to see before I go.’

  ‘You should go. It’s very special,’ she said.

  ‘We’re sorry about your friend,’ said O’Reilly, shooting his partner the evil eye to cut the small talk. ‘You know her long?’

  ‘Over twenty years.’ Suzanne’s eyes started to well and she banked the tears with a linen handkerchief. The way O’Reilly was studying her made her uneasy, though she had no way of knowing he was mentally comparing her to Kelly, who he found about as rough around the edges as Suzanne was polished.

  ‘We understand that you were at a party with Angela last night, and that she left with you and …’ Damn. The goddess in front of him had him so flustered he’d forgotten the bride’s name.

  Kozlowski came to his aid. ‘Maggie Trueheart.’

  ‘That is correct.’

  ‘And you did what after that?’

  ‘We went down to Rush Street to a club called The Overhang. It was Angie’s idea. I went along under duress.’

  ‘Under duress? Why do you say that?’

  ‘I’m not really one for bars. I only went because Angie insisted.’

  He tented his fingers under his chin and leaned in towards her. ‘Tell me a little bit about what happened in that bar.’

  ‘Well, Maggie and Angie had been there a while before I arrived, because I had to go home to drop my car off. Let’s see. In short order, a lot of alcohol was consumed, including some shots. I have to confess to drinking a lot more than I usually do, but not a ridiculous amount since I intended on working this morning. When Angie was barely able to stand, I took her home.’

  ‘And you got home how?’

  ‘Taxi. I literally had to pour her into it. We went straight to her building in Old Town, and I made the taxi wait until she was inside.’ Suzanne’s facade started to crumble, making it a fight to keep her lips from quivering. She held the handkerchief to her mouth. ‘I watched her go inside.’

  O’Reilly asked about the party and Harvey, and she pretty much told them the same things Kelly had told them earlier. They appeared to be wrapping it up when Kozlowski asked out of the blue, ‘Didn’t the bride leave with you?’

  ‘No. She was dancing and wanted to stay, so Angie and I left alone.’ Suzanne thought of taking a last look at the dance floor before herding Angie out of the bar. Hoping she hadn’t made a mistake leaving Maggie behind. Like she’d said, she couldn’t be everyone’s babysitter. It was hard enough just being Angie’s.

  Suzanne walked them to the door and waited as they summoned the elevator, standing halfway in her apartment and halfway in the hall. Then, no longer able to contain her apprehension, the question spilled from her lips: ‘Do you think there was someone waiting for her in her home?’

  ‘Want the truth?’ O’Reilly asked.

  Suzanne nodded.

  ‘Nah. We’ve already checked her house. No signs of break-in or violence. She probably decided to go back out on her own. Seen it a million times.’

  ‘As soon as you are certain, will you let me know? I need to know if I delivered her to her death.’

  ‘We will,’ Kozlowski said in a comforting manner.

  The elevator doors closed on them, and she went back into the apartment and stood without purpose in the middle of the living room. She wished she would hear from Vince, so she could tell him what had happened. She recalled the disappointment in his voice when she called from Carol Anne’s last night to tell him she was going out with Maggie and Angie. She didn’t know why he should be the one to be so upset. He was the one who was married.

  She picked up the rag and went back to dusting.

  SIX

  Kelly

  Kelly’s fitful sleep was filled with dreams of Angie. They were in biology class dissecting a frog, but the frog’s neck was broken and its head was tipped sideways. Angie was laughing and Kelly couldn’t understand what was so funny. But the lab was at Carol Anne’s house and Angie was dancing in the red stilettos. The dream shifted to Kelly’s apartment, and a living Angie was hovering over her, spewing obscenities. Kelly tried crawling behind the flowered couch to hide, but Angie followed her, swearing at her from the horrible whey-colored face.

  ‘Why are you so angry, Angie?’ Kelly implored.

  ‘Why? Why?’ the ghost screamed, its glassy eyes widening with ire. ‘Because it should have been you instead of me. That’s why. It should have been you.’

  Kelly awoke from her nap soaked in sweat. She had overslept for work again. She was going to be fired. She had been warned. She ran to the closet and pulled out her uniform before realizing that her job wasn’t in jeopardy. That she had called Gitane’s to explain why she wouldn’t be in today. That these days, she was about the most reliable person on the planet.

  She went into the kitchen nook and poured herself a glass of water, drinking it down in noisy gulps. Her smelly running gear was stuck to her. Not wanting to put off a shower any longer, she went into the bathroom and turned on the water, abandoning her clothes on the floor. She stepped into the shower and stood beneath the unrelenting stream, wanting for all the world to swirl down the drain along with the sweat and the soap and the water. Her dream came back with a vividness that made her shudder. Angie’s face looming before her, pale and accusatory. It should have been you instead of me. It should have been you.

  Angie was right. It should have been her.

  Perhaps the color of Kelly’s life would have been different had her mother not gotten sick. She was a change-of-life baby, her two brothers well into high school by the time she was born. They had finished college and were starting their own families when her mother was diagnosed with stage four colon cancer. Kelly was ten. Her father, a successful patent attorney, travelled frequently for his job which meant leaving young Kelly alone to take care of her mother for days at a time. Her adolescence was sp
ent watching her mother suffer the pain of radiation and chemotherapy, listening to her woeful tears at night after the indignity of a colostomy. Despite the doctor’s dire prognoses, her mother hung on for years longer than anyone would have guessed, wanting more than anything to see her daughter grow into a woman.

  Kelly was in her junior year of high school when the cancer metastasized to the vital organs, and it became clear her mother’s fight was nearing the end. Kelly took charge and for the last months of her mother’s life, rushed home from school to be with her, to spoon-feed her when she no longer wanted to eat, change her colostomy bag when she was no longer able to do it for herself. Her father offered to hire nurses, but Kelly refused. The intimacy the mother and daughter shared in life would reach all the way to the end.

  Her mother died on Christmas Eve. Kelly felt an initial relief that her mother’s suffering was over, but that did little to soften her grief. The person she loved most in the world was gone forever. Standing at the funeral beside her father and her two brothers with their wives and children, she felt like she was among strangers. No one but Kelly really knew what her mother had suffered. A part of her had been scooped out that could never be refilled.

  Much to Kelly’s chagrin, her father married his secretary barely a year later, a Chinese American woman named Clara. Kelly was traumatized, not only by the presence of this stranger in the house, but that her father could forget her mother so easily. To make things worse, Clara was only ten years older than Kelly and resented her stepdaughter’s presence in her life as much as Kelly resented Clara’s. Though they remained in the beautiful Georgian-style house where Kelly had been brought up, her stepmother lost no time in marking her new territory, changing out her mother’s antiques for modern pieces, replacing her heirloom dishes with Crate and Barrel. Kelly hated her new stepmother so much she avoided home as much as possible, dividing her after school hours between her friend’s houses. Her favorite refuge was Angie’s house where the noisy and spirited fighting that went on during meals was the polar opposite of the feigned politeness of her own home. Kelly could see her father was ecstatic with his healthy young wife, a woman who was doing her best to wipe out any traces of Kelly’s mother, and then Clara went one better by getting pregnant.