ON TENTERHOOKS
GREEVER WILLIAMS
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, in entirely coincidental.
ON TENTERHOOKS. Copyright © 2012 by Greever Williams. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, contact the author through www.greeverwilliams.com.
For my beautiful wife and our children. Everything I do and everything I can do is because of them.
Tenterhooks —Centuries ago, when raw wool was woven into cloth, the cloth contained impurities, such as dirt and oil. After weavers stretched, pulled and twisted the cloth to make it stronger, they washed and placed it on a wooden frame, a tenter, to dry in the sun. A series of sturdy nails around the perimeter of the tenter, known as tenterhooks, held the cloth in place and kept it from shrinking. The product was a cloth made more flexible and sturdy as a result of the process.
On Tenterhooks — In a state of nervous, painful anxiety or suspense.
Chapter 1
Five weeks dead was still dead. Dead wife. Dead soulmate. Dead heart within him. Dead calm in the empty house around him. And everything stayed dead, until the dreams came. . .
“Some choose to walk alone as they wander through the backroads of their life!” Julie sang.
Steve couldn’t help laughing. Julie was out of tune and stretching for the right notes as she belted out the Sex ‘N Cigs anthem, shouting out the lyrics to keep up with the volume of the car stereo and the pounding rain on the roof and windshield. He sank back into the passenger seat and enjoyed the show, while she tapped the steering wheel in time with the drumbeat, waiting for the traffic light to turn green.
After Steve had given her the satellite radio last Christmas, Julie had locked it on the classic pop station. Listening to the song, he smiled as he thought back to their early years together. He was glad to see that the song kept her spirits up after another long day at work.
Here she was, late coming home from work as usual. (“The reward for good work is always more work!” she would often remind him). She was drenched, with droplets of water beading on the shoulders of her white linen jacket. The rain had smudged the mascara around her eyes, and she had already thrown her soaked high heels into the back seat. The driving rain, the late hour, the wet clothes— none of it fazed her. She just sang louder.
“I look at you, you look at me and think about the things we’ve done!”
Steve wanted to reach over, pull her tight and kiss her with the hot passion he felt in his gut, but that would mean ruining her performance. She was gorgeous to him in every sense of the word and he savored this moment, preserving it as one more reason why she would always be his universe.
“Come on, let’s go!” Julie shouted at the traffic light over the music.
“Doll,” Steve said. “I don’t think that light can hear you.”
There were no other cars at the intersection, and the rain was now a pounding vibration. If Steve had been driving, he would’ve darted through the red light. But not Julie. He didn’t even bother to suggest it.
When the light changed and Julie started across the intersection, he saw oncoming headlights coming up fast on Julie’s side of the car. Time slowed, but somehow the radio continued to blare:
Together we’re better, forever we’re strong. United as one we can never go wrong.
Steve yelled for Julie to go faster, but his voice was much too low for her to hear over the blasting stereo and the fat pounding raindrops. As he reached across to grab her arm, a suddenly syrupy air trapped him in a slow-motion replay. He screamed her name.
When Julie finally saw the oncoming lights, she raised her arms to shield her face. Behind the wheel of the other car, Steve saw a man in a black suit, whose snarl revealed the large teeth of a rabid, snapping beast. His bulging eyes narrowed as his bony fingers melted into the steering wheel itself. He growled and forced the car forward with all the power his engine could provide.
Loud as it was, the sound of the music and the rain couldn’t compete with the bench grinder squeal of metal on metal. Glass, rain-soaked shoes and Julie’s body flew into the air. Steve couldn’t hold her. Her screaming stopped abruptly, but his throat roared with a single, unending howl.
We’ll walk hand in hand up to death and beyond.
He saw the glass and felt it strike his face and arms. The ruined front end of the other car ate through Julie’s sedan like a clenched first through butter. He tasted electricity on his tongue, searing his throat. The car, the seat, her body smashed into Steve’s lap, and he felt himself breaking apart.
We’re better together, it’s where we belong.
Darkness.
Steve woke up on the floor next to the bed, his throat raw. Bed sheets bound his legs, and he clutched a sweat-soaked pillow in his lap. The dream had consumed him again: burning throat, stiffening neck and a head that was thumping with a pulse that stretched his skull like a balloon.
Julie had died nearly five weeks ago, two days after Valentine’s Day. The pain was oppressive. The bed was too big, the house too quiet and empty. He found himself dazed, wandering the silent rooms from time to time as if he might find some comfort among the echoing spaces. Instead, he found painful reminders. Her pink, plush bathrobe draped on the back of the bathroom door. In the kitchen, her collection of cooking spices with their red tops were still packed tightly into the rack, like giant shotgun shells begging to be fired. Her favorite candy-red coffee mug still hung on the wall by the sink.
“Fix me some coffee baby; I just need five more minutes in the cozy covers.”
Even when he looked out the window, he saw the rose lattice they had installed last year. The roses had already begun to bloom in the early spring warmth, but the fragrant red buds she had loved only seemed to mock him.
“If we ever have a girl, we should name her Rose, ‘cause we all know she’d be beautiful.”
His wife was gone, forever. A rusty, jagged blade seemed to have ripped through him just short of the killing blow—leaving him ragged and wounded. He had cried more in the last four weeks than in his whole life. The dream ensured that he awoke most mornings fatigued, muscles aching.
He had gone through the motions of the funeral, politely accepting condolences from family and friends. After parading for the crowd like a diligent show dog, he had shut himself in and shut the world out, rarely leaving the house.
His boss had been professionally sympathetic, promising to cover his work until he could return.
“You’ve got nearly six weeks. That should be good. Let me know if we can do anything else to help.”
There was clinical care in his tone, like a doctor with a poor bedside manner, addressing Steve’s grief with detached observation and precise calculation. Steve knew that Randy cared, but was convinced that six weeks was the exact amount of time a man would need to recover.
Still, Steve appreciated the time and the hands-off approach. He had no interest in discussing his feelings with Randy, or anyone for that matter. Grief was a private thing and he was a private person. Aside from Julie, no one knew his plans, dreams or favorite things.
Chapter 2
Steve had gone into the technology field so that he could maintain a safe distance. He used a wall of technical jargon, certifications and computer servers to insulate himself from any deep friendships with co-workers. The entire bank relied upon his ability to install, maintain and repair hardware systems. He had a casu
al demeanor and was able to keep up with friendly conversation, but his skills kept others at a safe and revering distance. He honed his talents as a skeptical, detached mechanical mind and found this useful for both his profession and his life, until he met Julie.
They had met nearly a decade before her accident. He was at his desk when he received the simple phone call that would lead to their shared life.
“Mr. Connor, good morning! This is Julie Todd from Cautela Insurance.”
“Oh, hi. Good morning!” He heard the wind fuzzing through her phone.
“Sorry for the noise. I didn’t realize how windy it was out here! I should have made the call before I got out of the car.”
“Not a problem. Are you here?” He opened his drawer and took out his keys and sunglasses.
“Yes, standing in front of your banged-up Jeep. What a shame! Do you have a few minutes to come out and review the damage with me?”
“Be right there.” He locked his computer and left his office.
When he reached the parking lot outside the bank building, he found her crouched next to the front wheel well of his Jeep Wrangler, penlight and clipboard in hand, as she inspected the damage. Her cream-colored suit jacket hung casually off the side mirror of the car.
“Knock, knock,” he said, rapping on the tailgate.
She smiled and stood up to greet him, “Mr. Connor?” She approached him, hand outstretched. Slender fingers tipped with cherry red polish. He liked the look.
“Steve, please,” he shook her hand, delighted in the warm strength of her grip.
“Julie Todd. Thank you for meeting me out here.”
She had a gleaming Julia Roberts smile. Her hair was strawberry blond, short. Long enough to cover her face, but not long enough to stay behind her ears as the wind gusted around them.
Wow. Gorgeous.
“No, it’s uh, not a problem, really,” he stumbled. “I’m here. I mean, I’m happy to be here.”
“Great! I’ll just be a few moments.” She smiled again and turned back to her work.
“Okay, I’ll just uh, yeah, stay out of the way, back here.”
Julie put her clipboard on the pavement and bent down, running her hands along the damaged quarter panel. The warm wind rippled the blouse across her back in tiny red waves of silk. Steve admired her long, tan limbs and the summer freckles on her bare shoulders.
“Yeah, some schmo sideswiped me on the way to work yesterday.” He picked nervously at the grooves in the spare tire mounted on the back of his Jeep. “Acted like it was my fault he drifted into my lane.”
“Yep, well, that’s why we’re here,” she said over her shoulder to him. “But the police issued him a citation, and I don’t expect his insurance agency will give us any trouble. I’m just glad nobody was hurt. I’ve seen some bad ones lately.”
Steve nodded, even though she was looking at the paint damage and not him.
“So if you’ve got my damage report, and the police report, how come you needed to come out here instead of just having me take it to a garage?”
“Well, we like to see the damage in person,” she replied, as she moved around the perimeter of his Jeep. She rubbed at a scratch in its red paint with her thumb. “It’s not that we don’t trust the police, but they don’t specialize in damage assessment like we do. We aim to be thorough,” she smiled.
“Ah, okay, well I am glad they sent you.” His words were stumbling and awkward, even to him. Suddenly, he was thirteen again, a pudgy wallflower at the school dance, confused and terrified by, yet utterly drawn to, members of the opposite sex.
“Me too,” she laughed, relieving his fears with another glowing smile. Now behind the rear bumper, she exclaimed, “Wow, this is great! We don’t see very many of the extended cabs. I’ve always been fond of these, even though they don’t seem to be very popular. Do you notice any difference when you take it off road?”
“Um, I don’t know. I’ve never taken it off road. The only time I’ve even put it in four-wheel drive is when it snowed last year.”
“Really? I gave up my old CJ7 when I took this job.”
She shook her head and jerked her thumb toward her standard-issue white Cautela-owned sedan parked a few spaces away in the next row.
“I was way too quick giving up something that I loved . . . didn’t know it ‘til it was gone, though,” she said. “Big mistake.”
“Anyway, don’t you ever have the urge to put the dog in the back and go crazy in a mud pit?” she asked.
She stepped out of her heels and hiked her skirt up above the knees. She kneeled, bare knees on the pavement, as she looked under the tailgate of the Jeep. Steve’s eyes moved down to the small muscles in her slender legs and the shape of her skirt over her curves, as she inspected for damage. His mind turboed, searching for anything to keep the conversation going.
“Um, nope. Don’t have the dog or the desire,” he replied. Lame.
“Then why’d you get the model with all this room?” she asked, standing back up. She wiped the road grit off her bare knees and feet as she stepped back into her heels.
“I’m a network engineer. I like to take hardware home with me sometimes. Kinda a hobby, I guess.”
Julie nodded. “I get it. Computer geek. No offense. ”
“None taken,” Steve replied.
“Well, there’s no obvious damage to the frame or the suspension. Any problems with alignment, braking? Noticed anything like that?” She picked her clipboard up off the asphalt.
“Nope. Seems to be cosmetic only, but just that is driving me crazy. Does that make me shallow?”
He scored another thousand-watt smile.
“No, not at all. My guess is that you’re a man who takes good care of the things he loves and hates to see them hurt.”
“Um, yeah, I guess that’s about right,” he managed. They stared at each other, smiling across the quirky silence. He watched her slide her bare arms back into her suit jacket.
“Well, I guess that’s about it. The police did a pretty accurate job of it. They were only off by about $200.”
“Okay, so now what?” Steve asked. “I am kind of embarrassed to be driving around with the quarter-panel all banged up like that.”
“Understood. I’ll file this today, and make sure the body shop calls you to schedule an appointment. They were busy when I talked to them this morning, but I’ll try to get them to fit you in during the next week or so?”
“Okay, great.”
“Mr. Connor—oops, sorry—Steve, it was my pleasure assisting you today,” Julie said, extending her arm again for another firm handshake.
“Thanks again for your help.”
“You’re very welcome,” she said, turning to go.
Steve stared after her.
Say something. Say anything!
“Hey Julie,” he called. She turned. The warm summer breeze blew across the lot. She brushed her hair out of her face. He wanted to reach out and push the stray hair behind her ear.
“Um, when the Jeep is fixed and the case is closed, how about we try out my four-wheel drive?” he asked.
“I’d like that . . . a lot,” she smiled. She took a business card from her pocket, jotted on it and handed it to him. “Here. My home number is on the back. I’ll supply the dog and the map of the old borrow pits off of I-29. You supply the wheels.”
Steve laughed. “You got it!” he replied. “But afterward, we’re taking it through the car wash!”
That was ten years ago. Together, they found a rare balance. Julie was attracted to his straightforward, dedicated approach to life. If he wanted something, he would focus and achieve it. For Steve, Julie had a zeal for spontaneity and fun that he found captivating. Being near her when she laughed or cried was magnetic. They had spent a decade building a life together—the home was established, the careers were solid. They were talking about starting a family. They’d even starting saving to build a dream home. There wasn’t much in there yet, because they had pr
eferred to spend much of their disposable income on vacations and time away from the pressures of work.
Five weeks ago, that had all ended. There was no cliché about the accident. There were no noisy raindrops, no faulty brakes; just Julie trying to make her way home on a Thursday night. That, and the drunk who ran the red light and smashed into her sedan on the driver’s side with enough force to kill her instantly.
Steve never went to the scene, but he could imagine from the police description that the familiar Cautela logo was no longer visible on driver’s side door. The details of the crash report were enough to seed his recurring nightmare. The drunk who killed her had been a retired school-bus driver, not the evil figure from his nightmare. The glass-like shrapnel in his skin, the blaring bass beats of the music booming into his ears, the metallic taste of electricity on his tongue—all of it seemed so tangible. It was unlike any other dream he had ever had. He’d wake up screaming himself hoarse, sweating and clutching pillows with white-knuckle fear. What had she felt at those last seconds? Had she seen the other car coming?
On Tenterhooks Page 1