Mabel wiped her face again and walked over, shaking her head. “Enid, you want me to get Petyr for you?”
Enid smiled; lipstick stained her teeth. “He’s gone, dear. He came back late last night, left early this morning.” Her eyes searched the shifting keel of the clouds. “To prepare, he told me. He knows.” She looked at Mabel. “You know, and you won’t believe.”
Mabel looked around for someone to help her, but the street was deserted.
A dust devil danced down by the bar.
“Believe what?” she asked calmly.
“The Light,” Enid said breathlessly. “The Coming.” She giggled. “The End.”
Mabel stepped back. “Enid, you need to rest, honey.” She gestured toward the Crest. “I bet you haven’t eaten for hours.”
Enid lowered her voice. “I heard them, you know.”
Mabel held her breath.
Enid smiled again as she pointed the Bible at the sky. “They rode out of the storm.” Her voice lower still. “They rode all night”—the voice rose to a sudden screech—”and I can’t get the damn church open to pray!” Whispering: “Locked, the doors are locked.”
Mabel decided it was time to get some help, drag Petyr down here to take his wife home. She sidestepped slowly. “Can’t be,” she said, hoping to sound reasonable. “Casey always opens the doors first thing in the morning.”
“Locked.” Enid glared. “Locked.”
Mabel said, “Wait here, honey, I’ll see what I can do,” and hurried off as fast she could without running, a slow-growing anger tightening her chest.
Enid watched her. “Locked!” she called, and looked over her shoulder at the steeple, hitched a sigh, and pressed the Bible hard to her chest. “It’s locked, and they’re here.”
She swayed and grabbed the fence with her free hand. She couldn’t see very well, her vision had become foggy, and she wondered where that crazy woman had gone. Probably to find her flying saucer friends. She giggled. She closed her eyes. She tasted bile and felt acid in her stomach and listened to the soundless breeze as it gently scoured her cheeks.
She decided to get Reverend Chisholm herself. He would understand. He read the Bible. He knew. He knew.
She headed toward the river. Small steps to keep from falling. Praying softly. Not for her, but for her children, that they would be spared, that they would be, when it was over, in the hands of their Lord.
Moving slowly. Very slowly.
Telling herself she wasn’t scared, that she had been waiting for this time all her life, this escape to a better place, the end of the world not being the end of it all but the beginning of something that would keep her family safe.
“Hey, Mrs. Balanov, are you okay?’’
She didn’t stop. She looked left and saw that filthy man, that gas station man, sitting outside his filthy gas station office. Smoking a filthy cigarette. Wearing filthy clothes.
“Are you ready?” she asked, feeling the tears in her eyes.
Ozzie Gorn frowned. “What?” And cupped a hand around one ear.
It didn’t matter. He wasn’t. And she prayed for him as she moved on.
Moving slowly. Very slowly.
“Mrs. Balanov?” Ozzie called, concern in his tone.
She ignored him, prayed for him, stopped abruptly when a little man stood in her way, his clothes just a little too large for his frame, his large eyes smiling at her gently.
“Lady, are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she said primly. “I’m praying, that’s all. And I have to find Reverend Chisholm.“ She fluttered a hand back toward the church. “It’s locked.”
He nodded. “Okay.” He looked around, shrugged. “You need some help or something?”
She stared at him, a blur, and grew angry that this stranger should bother her now, angry that Reverend Chisholm hadn’t opened the church in the very hour of its need.
She looked back at Ozzie, who opened his mouth to call again, and changed his mind when he saw the little man speak to Enid and turn her attention. One of those new people, he figured; so let him have to listen to the woman’s ranting for a while, the hell with it.
He wondered, then, about Mabel, why she had been in such a hurry to get to the Crest. Not that he had expected her to stop and talk to him. She thought him about the lowest on the Maple Landing food chain, like just about everyone else. Pump the gas, fix the cars and trucks, get me to work, get me to the mall, but otherwise, don’t bother to try to fit in, good heavens, no. It had been that way since he had been eighteen, working the garage with his uncle, taking it over when his uncle had had one too many bottles and tried to swim the Delaware down to the sea.
He was three days without a shave, the stubble comforting when he passed a palm across it, watching Enid walk stiffly on, the stranger persistent at her side. To his left, at the edge of the station property were four automobiles waiting for his touch. Magic fingers, that’s what he had. Ford, Mercedes, some Japanese thing, it didn’t matter, he could fix it.
Until last night.
He had been in the pit, the lift had creaked, the bell had rung, and suddenly he had known he was going to die if he stayed down there much longer. It didn’t matter that he knew the tracks the Jeep sat on were too wide and too long to descend into the pit; it didn’t matter that he knew the lift could sink and he’d be trapped but someone would hear him shouting; it didn’t matter. When it creaked a third time, and he realized it was going to slam down and trap him, he had stood there, trembling, unable to move.
He knew, he just knew, that if he tried to climb out, that thing would crush him, cut him in half, and he wouldn’t die right away, it would take him all night.
He knew it, and he couldn’t move, and the lift had shuddered and the Jeep had creaked and he figured he would rather die than have to sit there in the dark, smelling the gas and the grease and the sour sweat that had turned his face slick.
He couldn’t move.
The lift shuddered, and lowered just a little, and that’s all he needed—he had moaned and grabbed the lip and hauled himself out lengthwise, rolled onto his back and watched as the Jeep lowered itself slowly. Slowly. Creaking and shuddering until the pit was covered.
Coffin lid; that’s all he could think of.
Coffin lid.
So he had dragged a chair from the office just as grimy as he was, brought it outside, sat, tilted it until the back rested against the dirt-smeared stucco wall, and chain-smoked, and listened, until his hands had stopped shaking.
He waited for the sun to rise.
He waited for someone to come out into the street.
He looked up and waited for the damn rain to start.
He wondered about the woman he had seen leaving the grocery the night before, figured she was probably with the guy walking now with Enid. Another frown. Enid may be a little tough in the religion department, but she had always been gentle with him. Unlike her prick husband. Maybe he should do something before she got in trouble.
What the hell, he didn’t have anything else to do right now. He sure as hell wasn’t going back in there, in the bay where the Jeep sat, waiting for his magic fingers.
He tipped the chair forward and stood, put his hands in his jeans pockets, and headed down toward the Moonglow. Just as he reached the clinic, Bobby Karnagan walked out, all snug jeans and T-shirt, hair glowing even in the clouds’ greylight.
“Hi.” He didn’t bother to disguise his admiration, or his lust.
Her face was slightly puffy, her eyes fresh from crying. She glared and stepped around him. “Go away,” she muttered.
He almost grabbed her arm, caught himself, and turned around. “The hell with you,” he said. Hell, the hell with them all, they hadn’t even asked him to help search for the guy who’d run away from the crash.
“The hell with you!” he shouted.
Bobby didn’t turn around, just held up one hand and slowly lifted her middle finger.
“Oh, nice,” Ozzie
said, sneering. “Real nice.”
She ignored him, forgot him as soon as she had crossed the street, walking past the bar to the drugstore entrance. It was too soon to go to Todd, to tell him what Doc Farber had just told her. It wasn’t his feelings she was concerned about now; first she had to figure out what she was going to do. Vinia would give her something for her queasy stomach. After that...
She swallowed, checked the clouds, and couldn’t bring herself to open the door.
Vinia would know.
As soon as Bobby opened her mouth, Vinia would know. The woman was strange like that, like she could read people’s minds. You’d walk into the store, she’d look up from the rear counter where she kept the drugs and prescription records, and before you were halfway back there, she already knew what you needed.
Maybe Reverend Chisholm, but she had already tried the church once, and she didn’t think she had the nerve to do it again. Not now, now that she knew.
Tears burned; she lashed them away with her fingers.
Helen.
She turned around.
Helen would know what to do. Helen always knew the right thing to do. She lifted her chin, straightened her shoulders. Ever since they were kids, Helen had known what to say to keep them out of serious trouble.
She laughed silently, bitterly.
Okay, so it was too late for that, but it wasn’t too late to figure out the next step. The right next step.
But Helen had to swear not to tell Tessa. That jealous bitch would ruin everything if she found out too soon.
Heat spread across her forehead as she passed the Moonglow without glancing in.
Tessa. Slutting around Todd as if she had a claim, when she knew damn well Bobby’s claim had been staked first. She didn’t blame Todd, he just needed a little work, that’s all, a little smoothing of his bachelor edges.
Another laugh, this one aloud.
Well, if this doesn’t smooth them, it’ll kill him, that’s for sure.
She stood in front of the little house. Hers, Helen’s, Tessa’s. It was empty. She could tell. Something about it told her there was no help in there, no place to hide, no one to talk to.
Her fingers attacked the tears again, but they wouldn’t go away.
She sobbed, and didn’t move when a voice said behind her, “I don’t want to butt in, Bobby, but I think I can help you.”
“I doubt it.”
“I don’t.”
She turned then, rubbing her eyes, blinking, trying not to cry and failing so badly it made her chest hurt.
“It’s okay, Bobby, it’s okay.” A hand caressed her arm. “Let’s find someplace cool and quiet to talk, all right? Before you know it, we’ll have it all worked out, no problem.”
Bobby let the hand grip her arm lightly, let it pull her along the street.
“By the way, Bobby, let’s not be strangers, okay? You can call me Lupé.”
* * * *
3
1
C
asey stood in the useless shade of the porch and watched as Helen scowled for a second at the busted gate before coming through.
“Afternoon,” he said, tucking his hands loosely into his pockets, leaning a shoulder against the post.
She stopped halfway up the walk and shook her head at him. “What,” she said, nodding to his clothes, “do you call that?”
He wore a blue-striped white shirt, white chinos, sneakers and white socks. Spreading his arms, he said, “You ever hear of Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes?”
She nodded warily.
“Well, these are my Saturday-go-to-hell clothes.” He brushed at his shirt. “A little wrinkled, but not too bad, wouldn’t you say? Found them in my trunk.”
She only said, “I missed you at breakfast. Todd was going to make your favorite.”
An apologetic nod toward his door. “I decided to eat in, keep my hand in on the skillet and such.” He laughed. “Todd has nothing to worry about, believe me.”
“Come down here.”
“What?”
She pointed at the walk in front of her. “Come here, Casey. It’s like talking to a statue with you so big up there.”
He took the steps at a leap, landed lightly, paid no attention to the puzzled look on her face. “I was thinking,” he said, rubbing his hands together, “maybe you’d like to go to the mall with me, huh? It’s been forever since I’ve been, and since I don’t have anything special planned for today, I’d like to get some new—”
“Casey.” She grabbed his arm and squeezed it. “Casey, what’s going on?”
He patted her hand. “Not a thing, darlin’. Not a thing.”
But he refused to meet her skeptical look, choosing instead to make a show of checking the clouds and shaking his head at the perversity of all that rain up there and not a drop down here. Although the sky had darkened over the past hour, the light was still bright enough to make him squint as he took her unprotesting hand and led her to the road.
“It’s nearly two, I’m starving, let’s get some lunch.”
“Casey,” she said quietly, “you look silly.”
“Only because you’re not used to it.”
“Neither are you.”
Maybe, he thought grimly, but he would be if it killed him.
They walked on, taking the easy slope slowly.
“Are you going to drop in on the new people?”
“What new people?” It was a moment before he remembered the car. “Oh. Are they vacationers? Surely not fishermen.”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Nobody does.” She tugged his hand playfully. “That’s what we depend on you for. To snoop around a little.”
“Well, I don’t think so.”
Her fingers tightened around his. “Why not? You always do.”
“Not this time.”
She stopped then and yanked until they faced each other. “Casey, what the hell is going on? Yesterday you’re talking about the end of the world, and now this stuff. What’s the matter with you?’’
He looked up and down the road. “Helen, this isn’t the time or the place.”
“For what, Casey?” She moved closer, still gripping his hand. “For what?”
“On an empty stomach like mine,” he answered with a grin, “anything.”
She scowled.
“Listen,” he said, moving them both on, “I had a lousy night, all right? Not much sleep, too much heat, and breakfast was a dud. The weather sucks, and I can’t think straight, much less try to answer your questions.”
When they reached the flat, it was his turn to stop, and he wiped the palm of his free hand on his hip.
The feeling was so strong, it made his jaw tighten—they’ve all gone, nobody’s left but Helen and me.
In spite of the breeze, absolutely nothing moved on the deserted road.
Not even Beagle was in his place on Tully’s bench.
A ghost town.
He looked at the steeple, and his fingers twitched around invisible keys, reminding him that he hadn’t opened the church yet today. For the first time in years, he hadn’t unlocked the doors.
Oh, Lord, he thought, and hid the shudder of a chill that worked on his spine.
From a great distance: “Casey.”
He felt pressure on his arm, a pulling.
“Casey, you need to sit down.”
He didn’t resist until he realized she wanted them in the Moonglow. He shook his head and nodded at the hardware store, at the bench. He ducked under the awning’s fringe and sat with his legs out, his right hand on his thigh; Helen kept her grip on the left.
“You’re still sick, aren’t you.”
He didn’t answer.
The back of her fingers against his cheek, a palm against his brow and drawn back in haste. “My God, Case, you’re hot and cold at the same time.”
What he wanted to say was: you want to know what’s going on, you want to know if I know what’s happening, and I think I do, Helen, I think I
do, and I don’t want to do it, I can’t do it, and I’m not going to do it because it’s wrong, it’s all wrong, I’m not the one.
What he did say was, “Just a little setback, nothing to worry about.”
“Then let’s get you something to eat.”
“I’m not hungry.”
Symphony - [Millennium Quartet 01] Page 26