The Fringe Dwellers

by Patrick K. Ball

  Hyper little thing, Ed thought. “Hello, there little fella,” Ed said in his best doggie-voice. That only encouraged it. The dog jumped even higher, almost reaching Ed’s chest, barking with every jump.

  “Archie!! Get Down!” Torrie yelled at the dog, which obediently ran over and sat in front of its master.

  Ed turned around to see Torrie standing there with her hand out in a scolding gesture towards the dog. Her hair had been dried and styled and if she didn’t have all her makeup on, then she was damned near close. She looked gorgeous. And all she was wearing was a short, tight, silk robe right out of the pages of Victoria Secret that was popped open wider than she probably realized. Ed’s eyes almost leaped out of his skull.

  “I’m sorry, Eddie,” Torrie said, subconsciously tucking in her robe more securely, probably due to Ed’s obvious reaction. “She’s a little monster sometimes.”

  “That’s quite all right,” Ed said, averting his eyes from Torrie to Archie. “I love dogs. I’d probably have one myself, but I’m on the road so much that it wouldn’t be fair to the dog.” Then a thought struck him. “Did I hear you right? The dog’s name is Archie? Archie is a she?”

  Torrie smiled. “Yeah. A couple of years ago, I was over on the east coast for a seminar and a bunch of us stopped in at this bar called, “Archie’s.” This couple had this cute, little puppy in the bar that they were going to give away to another couple. To make a long story short, the other couple was older and didn’t want such a high-strung dog, so I got her. She’s named after the bar. It just . . . fit.”

  “Come here, Archie,” Ed said in his doggie-voice as he bent down on one knee to get down to the dog’s level.

  As Torrie watched Ed pet Archie, she was completely convinced. The feelings that she hadn’t had since high school were back, stronger than ever. She only hoped that her heart wouldn’t be left in the same state as twenty years ago. She’d never recovered from that.

  “She’s a cute little thing,” Ed said.

  “Spoiled-rotten brat,” Torrie countered.

  “Aww, she’s sweet,” he said to Torrie, and then switched to doggie-voice. “Yes, you are. You’re a sweetie. Oh, yeah.”

  Torrie laughed as Archie licked Ed’s face—he didn’t seem to mind. “You’re crazy.”

  “Yeah, well that’s what they said about Hannibal Lecter,” Ed joked. “It’s too bad she can’t come with us.”

  “If you want to play with her, we don’t have to go out. We could just order something in, although, about all that delivers around here is pizza. That’s fine with me; I’m easy. And I have plenty of wine.”

  Ed could’ve been knocked over with a feather. A romantic night alone with Torrie. In her house. Drinking wine. Ed decided that there must be a God. Fortunately, he was able to gather himself before he spoke. “How does pizza sound to you, Archie?” he said while rubbing her head.

  “That hound’ll eat anything, so I guess it’s decided. I’ll call in the pizza order first and then I’ll go get dressed.”

  “What you’re wearing is fine with me,” Ed teased. It was a pretty bold statement for him, but he was feeling invincible at the moment.

  “If I remember, you only like meat on your pizza. Still the same?” Torrie tried to pretend she hadn’t heard him, but her blush gave her away.

  “Yeah,” Ed answered.

  Torrie called in the pizza order while she poured herself a glass of wine and then went upstairs to get dressed. Ed walked back out to the living room with his wine, followed closely by Archie. He’d seen some CD’s on the entertainment center before. A little romantic music couldn’t hurt. He found a good one—Big Iron Horses by Restless Heart—about the time Torrie trotted down the stairs. She was wearing an oversized t-shirt that read, “I only do what the voices in my head tell me to,” with a crazy looking cartoon guy underneath the caption. Below that, she had on a comfortable looking pair of short, loose-fitting gym shorts that showed off her athletic legs.

  “Do they hand out those shirts with a psychology degree?” Ed asked.

  “Only after you get a Ph.D. I decided to get comfortable since we’re staying in. I hope I’m not too casual for you.”

  “No, you look beautiful.”

  “That’s the second time tonight you’ve said I look beautiful. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were flirting with me, Mr. Nanreit.”

  “Ahh, umm . . .” Ed stammered and blushed.

  “I hope so anyway,” she said, looking straight into his eyes, then quickly looked away and changed the subject. “Whatcha got there?”

  “Um, oh, a CD. Restless Heart. That okay with you?”

  “They’re one of my favorites. Here, I’ll put it in for you.”

  They sat on the couch and began talking as the song, Mending Fences, played in the background.

  “So, what happened at work that kept me sitting outside in the cold, all by my lonesome, thinking I’d been stood up, trying to figure out how to tie a hangman’s noose?” Ed said with as much sarcasm as he could muster.

  “That’s horrible! You’re gonna milk this for all you can get, I see,” she said as she grinned and playfully slapped his arm. “Towards the end of the day, the paramedics brought in this lady who’d been traumatized by something. She wasn’t talking or anything. She just sat on the stretcher in a fetal position, rocking back and forth. The paramedics told me it had something to do with-”

  “A Chihuahua,” Ed finished for her.

  “Yeah. How’d you know?”

  “I was in town earlier and saw a commotion. Being the ace reporter I am,” he smiled, “I had to investigate. I got there within minutes after they’d taken her away.”

  “Can you imagine?” Torrie said. “Someone being afraid—petrified—of a little dog about the size of Archie here?”

  “Some people are scared by ridiculous things. In fact, most fears are irrational. Look at me, telling a shrink about how the mind works.”

  “You read about it—study it—but when you actually see it, it still takes you by surprise.”

  “Uncle Kane used to tell me when I was a kid that it was dangerous to have an extreme fear of something. Said I should be careful about ever revealing a fear to someone,” Ed said as his mind drifted off to the story Kane told him earlier that day—and the possible source of his advice of thirty years ago.

  “Fear can be debilitating. That’s probably what he meant. Anyway, once that lady was brought in, I was assigned to her. It took me awhile, but I finally got her calmed down to the point where she was able to communicate. She told me that she’d always had an extreme phobia of dogs. The medical term for it is Cynophobia. It’s not uncommon, but the severity of her phobia is extremely rare. Dr. Austin prescribed her a tranquilizer and she was sleeping when I left, but by that time, I was late for our date.”

  “Well, I’m just glad you made it,” Ed said as he gazed into her eyes.

  She was staring back into his. It was almost as if both of them were hypnotized by the other. Their heads slowly started moving towards each other as if drawn together by some magnetic force.

  Ding-dong! The sound of the door-bell interrupted them and they both quickly looked away as if suddenly embarrassed.

  “That’ll be the pizza,” Torrie said as she jumped up to answer the door.

  “Good. Pizza. Perfect timing,” Ed mumbled, agitated.

  A couple of minutes later, Torrie and Ed had the pizza box open on the coffee table in the living room and were stuffing their faces. They ate in silence; neither of them knew what to say. The moment was gone. John Dittrich’s melodic voice floated from the CD player asking them to, “Tell me what you dream, at night, while you’re sleeping.”

  Ed silently answered the question. An alley in Edge Key when I was seven years old. The answer made him wonder. “Torrie, do you remember a time when we were kids-”

  “I remember lots of times when we were kids, silly.”

  “On this particular day, we’d heard about
a dead body being discovered and we went to investigate.”

  “The day I kissed you. How could I forget?”

  She remembered!! Ed was thinking the kiss, not the body. He almost forgot what he was going to say before.

  “We got separated when we got to the area where the body was. Remember?”

  “Yeah and you fainted. Almost caused a bigger disturbance than the dead body. When you came to, you were pleading with the policeman not to tell your parents. He told you he wouldn’t mention it to them if you didn’t and then you ran off, leaving me alone. You didn’t speak to me for two days after. I thought you were mad at me ‘cause I kissed you. Talk about feeling rejected—you refused talk about what happened that day. It’s amazing I was ever able to kiss a boy again after your reaction to my kiss.”

  A pained smile came across Ed’s face. “I wasn’t mad at you. Not even close. I only just remembered this earlier today . . . I think I repressed that entire day. I saw that body that day.”

  “That’s why you fainted! All these years and I never knew. That’s funny.”

  “It wasn’t funny. That bastard-cop purposely pulled the blanket back so I could see it . . . as a joke. I was traumatized by it.”

  “I know a good shrink,” she teased.

  Ed ignored her. “It wasn’t just seeing a dead body. It was the way that guy looked. It was like he’d been scared to death.”

  “What do you mean, ‘scared to death’?”

  “His mouth was frozen open, like he’d been screaming at the time he died. His hair had turned solid white and he had literally gouged his own eyes out, like whatever he was looking at was too terrifying to see. His eye balls were in hands!”

  “Jesus, Eddie! I never knew. I’m so sorry . . . and sorry I made light of it,” she said as she put an arm around his shoulder.

  “It’s okay. That’s not why I brought it up. I was wondering, with your medical background, have you ever heard of anyone being scared to death? Or of a corpse that fit that general description?”

  “I’ve read anecdotal evidence that people can be literally scared to death, but I don’t remember any specific cases of it actually being documented. As far as a body looking like that, I’m not sure. I can’t remember anything right off the top of my head, but I’ve got this nagging feeling, like something’s right on the tip of my tongue . . . I dunno, maybe it’ll come to me later.

  “Enough gloom and doom, gruesome talk. I hope you don’t do this on all your dates. A little advice, it won’t help you get lucky.”

  “What will?” he said, arching his eyebrows.

  “Eat your pizza,” she said and stuffed a piece into his mouth.

  They continued talking through the rest of the pizza—and after the pizza was long gone—drinking wine and catching up on what each other had been doing for the past twenty years. Torrie had stayed in town after her mother died, working at Ivory Rock Clinic as a mental health tech which prompted her to pursue her degree in psychology. She followed Ed to the University of Florida, but Ed had already graduated by then and was working for Manifesto Veritas. After she got her doctorate, she moved back home, mainly because she didn’t know where else to go. She’d had a few semi-serious relationships, but never got married.

  “Why?” Ed asked.

  “Guess my heart was always somewhere else,” she said. Then, she leaned over and kissed him. Not like their first kiss when they were seven years old, but a real kiss.

  Ed welcomed it. He’d been dreaming of another kiss from Torrie for thirty-four years. Ed had always been too nervous and self-conscious to even attempt to take their relationship to the next level, and Torrie had been afraid to make the first move again as a result of her perceived rejection from their first kiss. With this kiss, the passion for each other that had been restrained for most of their lives was let loose.

  The kiss intensified. Their hands moved forcefully over each other’s body in a frenzy as if starved for a feeling of intimacy. Ed’s hand found one of Torrie’s breasts, cupped it in his hand and gently squeezed. From there, one flick of his thumb over her rock-hard nipple was all it took. Clothes weren’t gently removed, they were yanked off. Torrie’s naked form soon mounted Ed and a life-long love for each other was finally consummated. After it was over, they remained locked in an embrace, completely drained and too exhausted to move, more from the emotional release of years of pent up desire than from the physical nature of their sexual union.

  “Wow!” Torrie finally said, still breathing heavy.

  “Yeah, wow,” Ed agreed, also breathing heavy.

  “Why don’t we adjourn up to the bedroom . . . ah, if you want to, I mean. I was hoping you’d spend the night, but . . . I’ll understand if-”

  “You couldn’t get me to leave even if you wanted to,” Ed said and kissed her.

  Torrie and Ed walked upstairs, followed closely by Archie. Archie also joined them on the bed, briefly, but only until their second round of lovemaking forced her to jump off. After they were through, Archie jumped back up on the bed and the three of them fell asleep together.

  CHAPTER 12

  “Nooo!” Ed screamed as he sat up straight in bed, awakening himself from the nightmare. It was three sixteen. He’d escaped the alley again.

  Ed’s screaming awakened Torrie—abruptly. “W-What is it?!” she said, sounding scared and concerned.

  A few seconds passed before Ed calmed down—as it always did—and was able to speak. “I’m sorry,” he said as he hugged and kissed her, “it was just a nightmare. Go back to sleep.”

  “Back to sleep?! After that?! How can I sleep . . . how can you sleep after that?”

  He didn’t want to tell her that he was rarely able to sleep after the nightmare. “It was just a bad dream. It’s okay,” he said as he stroked her hair.

  “Does it happen often,” she said gently, going into psychologist mode.

  He decided to come clean. Better she learn the truth now. “Not every night, but it is always the same nightmare. I’ve been having it for years now. Sometimes I’ll go a couple of months without having one, but sometimes the nightmare’ll wake me up two times in a week.”

  “What’s the dream about?” she asked.

  “I’m a kid . . . here in Edge Key, heading over to see Uncle Kane. I turn into that alley where he lives and I hear two men talking. Then . . . I dunno. There’s something about one of the men’s voices that’s . . . strange. The one with the strange voice asks the other one, ‘What scares you?’ That’s it; that’s where I always wake up screaming. Always at three sixteen in the morning. So, what do you think, Doc, am I nuts?”

  “As a fruitcake,” she teased and stroked his face. “It’s probably nothing serious, just something having to do with seeing that body when you were a kid, but tomorrow, if you’ll let me, I discuss it with Dr. Austin. He can probably prescribe a sleeping pill or something that’ll help. Would you mind?”

  “Um, I guess not. It’s just . . . What do you think about Dr. Austin? As a doctor? He seems kinda, ahh . . .”

  “Strange?” she finished. “Yeah, he’s an odd one, but he’s a brilliant doctor. Back in the sixties, he became pretty famous and respected around the country for some of his groundbreaking work in psychiatry.”

  “So, what happened?”

  “I don’t really know the whole story, just bits and pieces. He’s pretty sensitive about it, so I’ve always respected his privacy and never asked him. It had something to do with an experiment that went horribly wrong or something like that. He apparently almost lost his medical license over it. Since that happened, he decided to keep a low profile; he doesn’t publish anymore and practices in relative anonymity here in Edge Key.”

  “Sounds almost like he’s hiding out,” Ed commented. “But, the night-receptionist, Dawn, told me he travels all over the country doing, as she put it, doctor-stuff.”

  “Dawn is a sweet girl, but I don’t think she knows what she’s talking about. It’s true that Dr. Austin do
es travel around a lot, but I’m pretty sure it’s only for pleasure. Quite frankly, I think Dr. Austin’s reputation and credibility were pretty much destroyed within the academic circle over whatever happened back in the sixties. I don’t think there’d be too many people who’d really care to hear what he has to say.”

  “That sounds like one hell-of-an endorsement.”

  “Regardless of what happened thirty or forty years ago, he’s an excellent doctor. I’ve worked with him myself for years now, and I can personally vouch for his ability.”

  “Well, Doctor, if you say so, then that’s good enough for me,” he said as he rolled over on top of her and kissed her deeply.

  She willingly parted to allow him inside. It was better than any pill Dr. Austin would be able to prescribe. Ed was back asleep within minutes of the end of round three. Archie joined them again, but stayed at the foot of the bed this time. They all slept peacefully for the rest of the night, until an early morning phone call ended their slumber.

  “Hello,” Torrie answered groggily.

  “Hi, Dr. Wilson. This is Trish. We need you down here as soon as possible.”

  “Is everything okay?”

  “I’d rather not discuss it over the phone. Please, just get down here as soon as you can. It’s important,” Nurse Trish said. She wasn’t her usual abrasive self, which meant that it must be serious.

  Torrie didn’t pry further. “I’ll be there as soon as I can,” she said and hung up the phone.

  “Is everything okay?” Ed asked.

  “I don’t know. That was Ivory Rock. They want me down there immediately, but Nurse Trish wouldn’t say what was going on. I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go. I was hoping to take the day off and spend it with you, but . . .”

  “It’s okay, sweetie,” Ed said, stroking her hair. “I’ve got a few things I need to do today anyway . . . in addition to checking on Uncle Kane. I’ll write down my cell number for you and you can call me later, or I’ll check in when I get by to visit Uncle Kane. Deal?”