House of Skin

by Jonathan Janz

  “Hello,” he said and sat down.

  “Have you been here before?” she asked him as she set her book aside.

  Paul fought to pry his eyes off of her breasts, which pushed out impressively from her short-sleeved yellow top.

  “I’ve gotten carry-out a couple of times, but I’ve never eaten here at the restaurant.”

  Julia looked around. “It’s not bad.”

  He smiled. It felt strained. “Yeah, the food’s pretty good.”

  She nodded politely. He felt like he was passing the time with a stranger in an elevator. Next they’d be commenting on the weather.

  “What do you usually have?” he asked her.

  “A salad.”

  “Caesar or regular?”

  “Regular.”

  He pressed his lips together, nodded, drummed his fingers.

  “Fascinating,” she said, nodding with him.

  “Yep.”

  “What type of salad do you prefer, Paul?”

  He stared at her a moment. Then they both began to laugh.

  By the time their salads came, he’d told her where he was from, how old he was, and how he’d come to inherit Watermere. Crunching a forkful of lettuce, she asked him how many things he’d had published.

  Paul paused, wondering whether or not a lie would be prudent.

  He decided against it. It was easier to be honest than to try his luck at keeping ahead of his lies. He didn’t want to risk blowing this over something trivial.

  “I haven’t had anything published,” he said.

  “Had a lot of rejections?”

  “No, I haven’t had any of those either.”

  Her eyebrows arched as she took a drink of water.

  Paul shrugged. “I’ve never submitted anything before.”

  “Why not?”

  He flirted with another lie. It was on the tip of his tongue when he heard himself say, “Because The Monkey Killer is the first thing I’ve ever written.”

  “That’s the title of your novel?”

  “Pretty bad, huh?”

  She sat back in her seat. “Not necessarily. Just different.”

  Paul went on with more confidence, “It’s a little weird, I know, but it fits the story. It takes place here in Shadeland, not the Serengeti.”

  “Are there monkeys in the story?”

  Paul’s smile broadened. “No, no monkeys, dead or alive.”

  “Good. I don’t like animal cruelty.”

  “Me either. Only human children die in my book.”

  “That’s fine. Human murders don’t bother me.”

  He bit into a tomato. The juice trickled over his bottom lip. “I’m the same way.”

  “So for how long are you here?” she asked.

  “In Shadeland, you mean?”

  “Sure.”

  “I hadn’t thought about it. For good, I guess. I broke the lease on my apartment in the city. My family has all but disowned me, though they’ve been on the verge of doing that for years. I don’t have a lot to go back to.”

  She sipped at her water. Paul liked the way the afternoon light shone red on her cheekbones. If she was wearing any make-up, he couldn’t tell. No perfume either that he could detect, but when she’d leaned toward him once, he’d caught an intoxicating whiff of some citrus-scented lotion.

  She stared out the window and asked, “Are you glad you came?”

  “I am now.”

  She glanced at him. Paul blushed, realizing what he’d said.

  “I meant, now that I have the novel done and sent off, I’m glad I came.”

  Immediately, he regretted saying it. What if she’d been flattered? If she was disappointed, she didn’t show it.

  He added, “The first couple months here were pretty rough. Creatively, I mean. I couldn’t get anything to work. Not even a single page.”

  “I always imagined it would be tough to write a book.”

  “It is.”

  “All alone at a computer with nothing but the blank screen and your own self-doubt.”

  “Exactly,” he said, feeling uneasy. They were back on how he’d written the novel. Received it, his conscience reminded. “Of course, I don’t own a computer, so I use a pencil and paper. Or a typewriter.”

  “Really?”

  “I had a computer when I was in college, but it broke and I couldn’t afford to get it fixed. I wasn’t going to ask my family for help, so I learned to get along without it.”

  “I don’t have one either.”

  “We’re probably the only two people in the world who don’t have them.”

  “Why are things so bad between you and your family?”

  He took a drink of his Coke. Much of the ice had already melted, so it tasted more like sweetened water. “I don’t know.” He chuckled without mirth. “It’s not one thing, really. We just—haven’t gotten along for a while, and things have kind of snowballed over the last few years.”

  “I didn’t know anyone still wrote with a pencil and paper.”

  Paul blinked. Was she purposely trying to keep him off-guard, or was this just the way her mind worked?

  “Well…” he trailed off, feeling vaguely guilty again. But why should he feel guilty? He’d written the damn thing, hadn’t he?

  “I imagine there are others who write that way,” he went on. “It feels a little more intimate having to form the letters and dot your own i’s.”

  They both looked up as their waitress unfolded a wooden stand beside their table. She set the platter down on top of it. Paul thanked her.

  Julia had already begun to eat. He watched her for a moment and then asked, “How is it?”

  “Good,” she said around a mouthful of fettuccine. A noodle whipped up against her cheek before disappearing inside her mouth, leaving a slick, slug-like trail of white sauce on her skin. Paul grinned a little, watching her. He liked the way she ate, as though she couldn’t care less what he thought of her. That was probably the truth, he realized. A girl this beautiful, why should she be worried about impressing him? He was a nobody in his mid-thirties. She could be on the cover of a magazine.

  A few minutes later, she asked him what his novel was about.

  He was determined not to lie to her, but it wouldn’t be smart to talk about such things over dinner. Both to put her off and to go for broke, he asked, “What are you doing this Friday?”

  She’d been spinning another mouthful of noodles onto her fork when he’d spoken. Now the fork was still moving but her eyes were fixed on his. He felt uncomfortable under her frank gaze, but he forced himself not to squirm, to meet her eyes and wait for an answer.

  “I’m making you dinner,” she said.

  March, 1982

  Sam knew it would take time with Barbara.

  She was alone, but she wasn’t easy. She was apprehensive about her new job, but she was too independent to rely on a man to make her feel more secure.

  Sam couldn’t tell how he knew all these things from one truncated conversation, but he was as sure of them as he was of the fact that he’d never get to know her if he remained on the state police force. His territory ended fifty miles north of Shadeland, so he wasn’t going to run into her by luck. Neither would he increase the frequency of his trips to Addie’s. He’d sooner drink bleach than spend more time with Raymond. He couldn’t get a transfer to a more southern territory. The guys who worked those districts were all between forty and fifty, which meant they were going nowhere. Once a guy got settled in a place, he rarely moved.

  That left him with only one option as far as he could see, and that was to leave the force. It made him sick to his stomach—being a state trooper was all he’d ever wanted in a career—but the thought of never seeing Barbara again made him even sicker. There’d been no wedding ring on her hand, but how long could he count on his luck to hold out? She was young, but girls that beautiful didn’t stay single long. He considered himself lucky she hadn’t been snared already.

  So there was o
nly one thing for it, and that was to turn in his badge and find work in Shadeland, which he did less than a month after they first met.

  Soon he was working in the paper mill and asking around, as casually as possible, about the Carvers and their new nurse. It didn’t take long for him to learn that his first impression of Myles Carver had been spot-on. The man and his wife—Barbara’s patient—were bad news.

  He couldn’t get much out of his co-workers because he didn’t want to sound overly interested. It wouldn’t do to arouse suspicion. And he wasn’t stalking Barbara, he reminded himself. He was admiring her from afar. He was looking out for her best interests. He was making sure everything in her life was safe and orderly.

  Yet he knew something was wrong. Even after the first few days at the mill, he knew she was in a bad place, spent her time with bad people.

  Sam went to Redman’s every evening the first few weeks hoping he’d find her sitting at the same barstool. She never showed.

  He spent every night in his new farmhouse thinking he’d run into her eventually, a town that small. Yet when two months had passed and he’d seen neither hide nor hair of her he decided to change his approach.

  Addie suspected something. She found it curious he’d leave the force to take a dead-end job, and the thought occurred to him more than once that he’d thrown his career away to hear his brother-in-law answer his own questions and brag about dropping cowflops off the overpass.

  Then, one frigid March night as he sat in a local diner, he saw her walk right by the window. She was wearing a thin jacket but no scarf, no gloves. He threw on his coat and plunged through the door after her.

  She rounded the corner. He followed, terrified that Myles Carver would swoop out of an alley and take her away from him again.

  But she continued on ahead, cold and shivering in the late-winter wind.

  Sam wanted to spin her around, embrace her. Tell her all he’d done so they could be together. She took a left into a drugstore. He waited thirty seconds, followed her in.

  He scanned the aisles. In the farthest corner of the store he spotted her, her back to him, browsing through the birthday cards. Moving toward her, he saw the tiny flecks of snow melting, becoming dew drops on her thin gray jacket.

  Sam moved around the corner and stopped a few feet away. He stood before the magazines. Picking one up, he pretended to be engrossed in Cosmopolitan’s latest sex quiz. His eyes darted back and forth between Barbara and phrases like “inconsiderate lover” and “premature ejaculation.” She was reading a birthday card with Snoopy and Woodstock on it.

  Stalker, he thought.

  Brushing the thought away, he read: “Cunnilingus should occur no fewer than twice each week.” Sam glanced up from the sex quiz’s answer key and found Barbara’s eyes battened on his.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked. Her voice was soft, curious. No suspicion. At least not yet.

  He hid the magazine against his chest.

  “Visiting,” he said, paused. “Actually, I’m…”

  She watched him.

  “…I’m working here now,” he finished.

  “For the police department?”

  “No, I left the force. I’m working down at the paper mill.”

  “And reading Cosmo?”

  Sam felt himself blush. Setting the magazine on the shelf, he asked, “Whose birthday is it?”

  “My mother’s.”

  “Oh. How’s your new job?”

  She frowned, checked her watch. “I really have to be going. My ride will be here soon.” She turned away.

  Sam took a step toward her. “Please don’t go,” he said.

  Turning back, she regarded him. He knew she was waiting for him to say something, but what could he say? Of the endless combinations of words and phrases he could string together, how could he possibly know which one would keep her from leaving?

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  “No? I thought policemen were supposed to know how to think fast.”

  “I told you I’m not a cop anymore.”

  “So what exactly do you want?”

  “To talk to you.”

  “Talk to me,” she repeated.

  “Yes.”

  She seemed to debate with herself. Shifted from foot to foot. She asked, “Why did you change jobs?”

  “I wanted to be closer to my older sister.”

  “And your brother-in-law.”

  “He was the main reason.”

  She cocked an eyebrow. “Who could blame you?”

  “Not a soul.”

  “Six o’clock.”

  “What?”

  “Pick me up at six o’clock tomorrow evening. I’m the first left on County Road 500.”

  His mouth worked, but all he managed to get out was, “Great.”

  “Nice to see you again, Sam.” She held out her hand.

  He wondered if he should take it and kiss it the way Myles Carver had at the bar. But that wasn’t him. He shook her hand, said he looked forward to seeing her again.

  Then she was gone.

  Julia watched him chew his food. He’d complimented her on the Jamaican chicken already. Too soon, she’d thought at the time, the first bite barely finished. Now he was halfway through his bowl, and he’d grown quiet. Was it her food or had it been her question? Thinking back, she remembered how strangely he’d acted when she’d asked about his writing at the bar.

  “Everything okay?” she asked.

  He looked up from his bowl. “Sure, everything’s fine. The chicken is excellent.”

  She asked, “Do you not want to talk about your writing?”

  Reaching out, he picked up his wine glass and took a drink. “To be honest with you, I don’t know. On one hand, I’m very proud of it, but on the other, I’m afraid you’ll think the subject manner is too awful.”

  “Try me.”

  He watched her doubtfully. Then he seemed to come to a decision. He set his fork down, folded his fingers and said, “Let’s make a deal.”

  She waited.

  “On Tuesday, I sent out two copies of the novel to publishers. As soon as I’ve heard back from them, I’ll let you read the manuscript.”

  “But that could take months.”

  “True, but it could also be sooner. The books say there are publishers that respond within days, or even hours, if the novel’s good enough. Or bad enough.”

  “That’s fair. But only if you answer my other question.”

  “Other question?”

  “About your family. Why you’re estranged from them.”

  Paul sat back. The dining room light made his brown hair gleam. “Ahh…that.”

  “Well,” he said, wiping his mouth with one of the red cloth napkins she’d pulled out and washed for the occasion. “That’s a long story. I don’t want to bore you.”

  “I won’t be bored. I promise.” She took a long, slow sip of the red wine. It was cheap but good. Paul had been embarrassed that none of the local liquor stores carried anything better.

  “Alright, here goes. I’ve always been a bit of a disappointment. In high school, my grades were decent but not great; therefore, the college I went to was decent but not great.”

  “And that was?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Okay.”

  He paused. “It wasn’t Harvard or Yale.”

  “Did your parents go to Harvard or Yale?”

  “No, but that’s not the point. My older brother did.”

  “Mm.”

  “So I bounced around between jobs before finally coming back to the bank.”

  “The family business?”

  “Yes. My grandfather founded it, and my dad’s the president. Oh, and my brother’s the vice-president.”

  “What were you?”

  “Nothing.”

  They both laughed, but when she heard the strain in his voice, she stopped.

  She saw his eyes shift to the living room. He said, “That
’s a good-looking piano you have in there.” He gestured over his shoulder. “Can you play?”

  “A little.”

  “Will you play for me?”

  The question was innocent enough, but she felt herself growing faint. The piano reminded her of Ted Brand. He was the last thing she wanted to think about tonight. Or any night. The cloying smell of oversweetened iced tea suddenly clogged her nostrils.

  “How about we watch a movie instead?” she suggested quickly.

  “At the theater or here?”

  She thought of the vast, darkened room, the sea of staring anonymous faces.

  “Let’s stay here,” she said.

  She led him to the old trunk that sat beside her large console television. She watched him shuffle through the DVD boxes, discarding most of them without a second glance. He paused on Rear Window.

  “You like Hitchcock?” she asked.

  “Are you kidding? I love Hitchcock. Psycho’s one of my favorite films.”

  “And Vertigo?”

  “Jimmy Stewart’s best performance.”

  She sat forward. “He’s better in Rear Window.”

  “I have a confession to make.”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve never seen it.”

  He nodded. “It’s true.”

  “That’s it,” Julia said, downing the rest of her wine. “Grab your glass. We’re watching it tonight.”

  April, 1982

  Things happened fast. Sam didn’t dare think about how fast, choosing instead to forge ahead with the relationship as if scampering over a log that spanned a creek, afraid to stop for fear of falling. After a few dates, he was deeply, dangerously in love, and there was no going back, no returning to the safe side of the creek.

  She didn’t talk about her work, and he got so he didn’t want to hear about it either. What she did share scared him, made him credit the stories the guys at the mill told on break. The ones about Carver killing his big brother, Carver’s wife throwing some Mexican gal through the window. The worst of all was the one about the children, and for his own peace of mind he chose not to believe it. Barbara couldn’t be working in a place with people like that.

  It kept him up nights.

  When Grace Kelly climbed over the balcony into Raymond Burr’s apartment, Paul became aware of Julia’s shoulder pressing against his. He’d sensed her burrowing into the couch as the movie’s suspense grew, but this was the first time he’d felt her body. That citrus smell grew stronger, like freshly sliced oranges, but somehow purer even than that. Summery and vibrant and suffused with what must be the natural fragrance of her skin.