But You Scared Me the Most

by John Manderino

  “I can imagine how you ‘pointed it out’ to me.”

  She nodded at him. “Right. I see. So this is all my fault.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “But that’s what you think, isn’t it. My constant bitchiness finally awakened the werewolf within. Well, I’m sorry, Frank, but I’m not taking the rap for this.”

  “Nobody’s asking you to.”

  “No way, mister.” She turned away, shaking her head.

  “Jan . . .”

  “I know I tend to be somewhat assertive—okay, bossy.” She angrily flicked away a tear. “I’m aware of that,” she said. “But dammit, somebody has to take charge. Somebody has to say, ‘This is the correct way to do things.’ We don’t, for example, put the big salad bowl in with the little salad bowls. Yes, it’s a salad bowl but it belongs with the other big items: the mixing bowl, the punch bowl, the colander. Things go in their place.” She looked at him. “Otherwise, do you know what we have? What we end up with, Frank?”

  He threw back his head and howled.

  She nodded. “Exactly.”

  “Owoooooo!” he cried again.

  She returned to her magazine, a hand over her Frank-side ear.

  “Ow-ow-owoooooo!” he added.

  When he was finally through he sat back, catching his breath.

  Janice touched a finger to her tongue and turned a page.

  “This the new dog?” asked Mrs. Krapilowski.

  “Mrs. K!” said Janice, springing to her feet, spilling her magazine.

  The small old woman was standing at the edge of the patio in her nightgown, leaning on her cane with both hands. “I like the beard. My late husband tried growing one but it came in all patchy. He looked like a bum, which of course he was. Yours is nice and full, though.”

  Frank vaguely touched his face. “Thank you.”

  “I would shave the forehead, though,” she added, hobbling up. “So. What’s all the howling about? Hm?”

  Janice said, “The thing is, Mrs. K . . .”

  Frank said, “I was just . . . you know . . .”

  “Howling, right. My late husband used to howl quite a lot—in fact whenever he was drunk, which was most of the time—but in the house, with the windows closed. We didn’t want to disturb the neighbors, you see. We were concerned about that. I was, anyway. I didn’t feel we had the right to be keeping people awake with our noise. I realized how inconsiderate that would be.”

  “It’s not that simple, Mrs. K,” Janice told her.

  “Oh, I know that, dear. Those were simpler times, we were simpler people, with simpler values—respect for the rights of others, for example. Quaint, old-fashioned notions like that.”

  “Mrs. K, Frank is a werewolf.”

  “I sympathize. My late husband was frequently a monster. But do you see the point I’m trying to make here? I think you’re both very nice people, I really do, and I’m awfully sorry about your marital problems—I often wanted to chain my husband up . . .” She paused, turning slowly to Frank. “By the way,” she said, “did you eat my cat?”

  Frank looked over at Janice.

  “Don’t look at her, I’m talking to you. Did you eat my Billy Boy?”

  “Not . . . as far as I know.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “He doesn’t remember, Mrs. K.”

  “He doesn’t remember if he ate a cat? An entire cat?” She studied Frank, who sat with his head hung. “What’re we dealing with here?”

  “A werewolf, Mrs. K, and he really doesn’t remember.”

  Mrs. Krapilowski nodded at him knowingly. “My late husband used to use that one, too.” She spread her arms and spoke in a whiny voice: “‘How can I be blamed for something I don’t even remember doing?’” She dropped her arms. “I used to tell him, ‘Well, I remember, sweetheart, every detail,’ and I still remember. He was a worthless drunk, a sadistic sonofabitch, and a lousy lay. But after he finally died I found myself a true companion, a trustworthy friend, a comfort in my twilight years.” Approaching Frank, she spoke to his bowed head: “My own . . . dear . . . delightful . . . Billy Boy.”

  “Leave him alone, Mrs. K.”

  “Stay out of this.” She poked him in the arm with her cane. “So, how was he? Nice and plump, huh? How’d he taste? And don’t say ‘Like chicken’ or I’ll beat you right across your ugly, stinking—”

  “Stop it. Leave him be.”

  Mrs. Krapilowski pointed her cane at Janice: “Shut the hell up or you’ll get the same, girlie.”

  With a horrible growl Frank sprang from the bench onto all fours.

  “Frank, no!” Janice shouted.

  He was about to take a bite out of Mrs. Krapilowski’s ankle but the old woman smacked him on the head with her cane. “Get away, get away,” she told him, stepping backward as he crawled after her.

  “Frank, don’t, please,” Janice begged.

  He crawled as far as the chain allowed and swiped at the old woman, left and right.

  Mrs. Krapilowski, out of his reach, shouted at Janice, “I want him put down! He ate my Billy Boy and he tried to eat me and I want him destroyed!”

  “He can’t help himself, Mrs. K, it’s a—”

  “‘Compulsion,’ right,” she said, sneeringly. “That was my late husband’s favorite one.” She did his whiny voice again: “‘I can’t help myself!’ Yeah, bullshit. Now listen to me, both of you. I want quiet. I want peace and quiet. I’m eighty-two years old,” she explained, with growing self-pity, “and I’m all alone—thanks to Dogboy here—and all I’m asking, all I would like, is to be allowed to sleep at night. Is that really so much to ask? I put it to you, is that really so terribly much?”

  “We’ll keep it down, Mrs. K,” Janice told her. “I promise.”

  “You do that, dearie. Muzzle him, drug him, I don’t care, whatever it takes—or I’m calling the dogcatcher.”

  Frank growled at her.

  “Want some more of this?” she asked him, holding the cane near his face. He swiped at it but she lifted it away, saying, “Ha,” and went hobbling off.

  “Goodnight, Mrs. K,” Janice called out.

  “We’ll see,” Mrs. Krapilowski called back.

  Frank, still on all fours, was growling after her, straining at his chain.

  Janice stayed where she was: “Okay, Frank. It’s okay now. She’s gone. Let her go. Just let her go.”

  But he continued growling, deep in the werewolf state now.

  She stepped closer, carefully. “Frank, listen to me. Are you listening?”

  His growling dropped down a notch.

  She knelt close to him, sitting on her heels, hands clenched in her lap. “You are not an animal,” she told him in a loud voice. “Do you hear me? Do you understand? You are Frank Peterson, of the law firm Hopper, Atwell, and Peterson. You enjoy barbecuing. You have a beautiful house and a lovely wife. You’re a marvelous golfer. You drive a Lexus. You’re a Libra. You tend to put things in the wrong place. You’re afraid of flying. You’re afraid of Ronald McDonald. And you are very afraid of the dark.”

  He was quiet by now, though still looking off in the direction Mrs. Krapilowski had gone.

  “You’re Frank,” she said, and helped him to his feet. “You’re Frank,” she repeated, returning him to the bench. They sat down at his end, close to one another. Frank stared at her. She placed her hand on his furry cheek. “You’re my husband,” she said. They sat there looking into one another’s eyes.

  Frank finally spoke: “You really think I’m a marvelous golfer?”

  Janice sighed, dropping her hand. She got up heavily and returned to her end of the bench.

  “No?” he said, watching her. “You were just saying that?”

  She picked up her magazine.

  He looked around. “Where’s Mrs. K? What happened? Where’d she go?”

  “Back to bed.” She opened her magazine and began flipping through it indifferently.

  F
rank sat there staring off. “Y’know . . . I could be a marvelous golfer—well, maybe not marvelous but pretty damn decent—if I could just get my putting game down. I’ll make a fantastic drive, an exquisite approach shot, I’m on the green in two, and then I’ll three-putt.” He shook his head. “Drives me nuts.”

  Janice quit turning pages and began slowly raising her face to the moon.

  “There’s an excellent piece in the Digest this month,” Frank went on, “all about putting. I like what he says, especially this one part . . .”

  Janice sat there gazing at the moon with sorrowful longing, sighing deeply.

  Frank got to his feet with the putter and nudged a ball into place: “How did he put it? Something like, ‘As you’re about to putt, imagine a current running from your hands down the shaft to the ball, and from the ball to the hole, its inevitable destination.’ I like that: ‘Its inevitable destination.’” He carefully drew back the putter.

  Janice began howling.

  Afterward they sat back, limp, utterly spent.

  “That,” he said, “was absolutely . . .”

  “Wonderful,” she said, taking his hand without looking.

  “The way you were harmonizing, Jan—where’d you ever learn that?”

  She shook her head. “It just came out.”

  “We were doing a damn duet together.”

  “I feel so relaxed.”

  They sat there holding hands, enjoying the moon.

  “Beautiful-looking thing,” he said, “isn’t it?”

  “Like a pearl.”

  “Or one of those giant cheese wheels.”

  “Swiss.”

  He smiled. “Right.”

  “That would be nice right now,” she said, “wouldn’t it? With some rye crackers?”

  “And black olives,” he suggested.

  “And a nice, freshly dead animal,” she added.

  “There you go.”

  “Still warm.”

  “Now you’re talking.”

  They sat there, famished.

  “Maybe Mrs. K will come back,” he offered.

  “That would be nice,” she agreed, and looked at him. “But what are you going to eat?”

  They howled with laughter.

  KUKLA

  Rudy knew what Fran was, anyway. She was a lady, a human lady. And he liked her. He liked how pretty she was and how nice, and the way she sang in her pretty voice.

  He wasn’t so sure about Ollie, though, what he was. He thought maybe a crocodile, but his mom watched the show a lot—it was on at night—and said he was a dragon. A nice one, though, with sad, friendly eyes and only one big overhanging tooth in front that made him look a little goofy and stupid, which he was a little, also funny, the way he liked himself so much, admired himself, which was maybe like a dragon, how they were, except there was no such thing as dragons, or puppets either, actually. Well, there were puppets but they weren’t alive: someone had to make them move and say things. So maybe Ollie wasn’t a dragon or a crocodile, just a puppet with long jaws and sad eyes and a big front tooth.

  Kukla, though.

  When he asked his mom about Kukla, she wasn’t sure: “A little clown?”

  He did have a big ball for a nose like a clown, along with two big spots of rouge on his cheeks. He also had surprised-looking eyebrows and a little circle for his mouth so he looked like he was always saying “Oh no!”

  “Or a little boy?” his mom said.

  Except, he was bald, on top anyway, with hair along the sides like Uncle Seymour had. And anyway, if he was supposed to be a little bald-headed boy he didn’t sound like one—he sounded like a girl, and acted like one, fussy about stuff, like a fussy girl. Sometimes he even scolded Ollie for not being fussy enough, for being a little thick, which Ollie was, but at least he wasn’t like Kukla—he wasn’t scary. Kukla reminded Rudy of Jerome Sawyer in his class, who acted like a girl the way he swung his arms when he walked and the way his hands got fluttery when he talked and the high, tinkly way he laughed, pressing his hand to his chest like an actress.

  But Rudy didn’t hate Jerome, like some of the others did, some of the other boys. They hated him and beat him up a lot. And the way Jerome would cry! So loud. Not even caring he was crying like that, like a girl would cry, which made them even madder, so they beat him up some more, making him cry even worse.

  Rudy was more scared of Jerome than mad at him. Which he didn’t understand, because how could he be scared of someone who was like a girl? Why would he be scared of a girl? But he was scared of Jerome the same way he was kind of scared of Kukla, who wasn’t even real, who was just a puppet who was like a little fussy boy with a girl’s voice wearing makeup and little white mittens.

  Sometimes Rudy wanted to see Ollie go after Kukla, knock him down when Kukla started carrying on in that voice, make him stop being like that. Which was how he always felt when they beat up Jerome. He felt sorry for him but also glad because maybe it would help him be less girly, less scary. That’s what they were trying to do, the other boys, trying to beat the girl out of him.

  But Rudy had to admit: he liked to watch Jerome on the ice.

  Everyone else at the pond just skated around or played crack-the-whip or else played hockey over on the hockey side, but Jerome would figure skate. It shocked Rudy how good he was. Sometimes people would stand around in a wide circle watching him do figure eights and jump in the air and whirl around and land on one skate and sail backward with his arms out like wings and a faraway look on his face. People said if he kept on like this he was going to be in the Olympics someday.

  One night Rudy had a dream that Jerome was at the pond doing his usual tricks, but he was also Kukla, with white mittens, rouge, and high eyebrows, his little round lipsticked mouth whistling a tune he skated to, the “Here We Are Again” song they always played at the start of the show, flipping his hips like a show-offy girl. Then the hockey players broke into the circle of watchers and were at him, beating him with their sticks, Jerome screaming “Nooooo” through his Kukla mouth, going down gracefully, like a ballerina, and lying there while they kept on beating him, swinging their sticks like chopping wood, till Jerome started coughing up strands of grey puppet-stuffing, then twitched all over, and was dead. Then everyone could relax.

  When Rudy saw Jerome at school the next day he wanted to warn him not to go skating, or anyway figure skating. But no boy ever spoke to Jerome, otherwise people would think you didn’t mind the way he was, or that you even liked the way he was, secretly being that way yourself.

  There was one thing Rudy would like to ask Jerome: Did he watch Kukla, Fran and Ollie, and if he did, who was his favorite, Kukla?

  Dear Kukla,

  You are just a puppet but I wish you were my friend.

  Love,

  Jerome Sawyer

  Rudy wouldn’t mind writing to Fran:

  Dear Fran,

  You are very nice, also very pretty, especially when you sing.

  Sincerely,

  Rudy Petrovitch

  But she would probably write back:

  Dear Rudy,

  Glad you enjoy the show.

  Best wishes,

  Fran Allison

  Actually, his mom enjoyed the show more than he did. Sitting behind him on the couch she would give out little laughs at the three of them and say how “clever” they were, and he would feel proud. She never watched any of his other puppet shows, though. She never watched Howdy Doody, for example. She didn’t think Howdy or Buffalo Bob or Clarabell were clever. Rudy thought they were very clever, especially Clarabell when he ran around squirting everyone with water. That was clever. But Kukla, Fran, and Ollie never got like that, rowdy and fun like that. But he still liked to watch them, hearing his mom laugh at something clever they said, and he liked Fran an awful lot, and Ollie with his one big goofy tooth.

  But Kukla.

  One evening during a commercial he asked his mom on the couch behind him what she thought of Kukla,
how she felt about him, if she liked him.

  “Well . . . he’s a puppet, hon.”

  “I know, but do you like him?”

  “Sure. He seems nice.”

  “Would you ever want to hit him?”

  “Hit him?”

  “Would you?”

  “Why would I want to hit him?”

  “Or see Ollie hit him? Or Fran? Or somebody?”

  “No, I wouldn’t. Why? Would you?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Rudy?”

  “What.”

  “Would you like to hit Kukla?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Why? Does he bother you?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “He’s just a little puppet, hon.”

  “I know but why does he have to act like that?”

  “Like what? How does he act?”

  “Like a girl.”

  After a second or two she said, “Like a sissy, you mean.”

  He nodded.

  “Well . . . maybe he is a sissy,” she said.

  He turned around and looked at her.

  She shrugged.

  The show came back. Kukla started carrying on in a high, excited voice about a birthday party he was planning for Beulah the witch, bringing his little white mittens together at how nice it was going to be. And instead of hitting him, Ollie and Fran agreed it was going to be nice, in fact a wonderful party.

  BUT YOU SCARED

  ME THE MOST

  I heard something, a thump, a thud. It woke me right up. I laid there very still, my heart banging away, and listened.

  Nothing.

  I looked at the clock: 2:53 AM.

  I listened some more.

  Nothing.

  I’d been asleep on my good ear, so it must have been pretty loud, although actually I felt it more than heard it, a thud, like something fell, something heavy, like a man tripping over the ottoman in the living room and landing with a thud, lying there very still now, holding his breath, listening to see if he woke someone up.