Caroline Hool knocked twice on her son’s door and waited. After a moment’s silence she twisted the knob and stepped in. “Bryce?”
Her son sat on his bed, his back to the door and his head hunched forward. His bony elbows moved in short, erratic jerks, driven by the action of his unseen hands. A muted, miniature symphony of beeps, clangs, and whistles was just perceptible.
“Bryce,” Caroline Hool said, stepping close, hoping that he’d hear her. When he didn’t she touched him on the shoulder. “Hon.”
Bryce shuddered and pulled his game’s earphones out as he looked back. “Jeez, mom.”
“You didn’t answer.”
“I know, but, jeez.” He switched the hand held video game off and spun around to face his mother. “What do you want?”
Caroline Hool reached out and put a hand on his forehead, then against the back of his neck. “Are you feeling all right?”
Bryce’s head fidgeted away from his mother’s well intentioned pawing. “I’m okay.”
“You hardly ate any dinner.”
“I wasn’t that hungry.”
Not hungry for stuffing? Caroline Hool mused to herself. Right. She checked his forehead again. “You don’t have a fever.”
“I told you I’m okay.”
“Your stomach doesn’t hurt?”
“I’m fine,” Bryce said, irritated that she was pestering him...and that he had to kinda lie. Physically he was fine, so it wasn’t a real lie.
“All right,” Caroline Hool acquiesced, her eleven year-old’s stubbornness triumphing this time. Triumphing, but not quashing that deeper unease that had been playing with her insides for three days now. She went to the door and closed it halfway before asking, “Are you going to come out in a while so I can measure the hem for your costume? Tomorrow’s the big day.”
“I’ll be out in a few minutes,” Bryce answered. His eyes had already gone back to the video game screen, black and empty as it was.
Caroline Hool nodded, but did not immediately leave. Her eyes held her son in a motherly contemplation. Worry. Fear. A desire to know, to magically know what the silly mistakes on those discarded pages really meant. Was it just his imagination gone into overdrive. With all the interviews, the police, the ludicrous suspicion it might just be that. It might just be.
It might just be, she decided. He would just needed some time to himself, some time regaling in a mindless video game to work through it. That was probably it.
She managed a smile as she quietly backed out of the room and closed the door.
Bryce stared at the blank screen as his mother’s footsteps trailed off toward the front of the house. Eyes fixed, head hung over the game.
A warm, salty tear dropped onto the dark, dead screen. And then another.
Twenty
Satan and a ninja stood with a werewolf and a lawyer and watched the princess get into her mother’s Volvo and be driven away from Windhaven Elementary. She glanced back at them as the car passed and lifted a small hand and waved.
Bryce scratched at the rough black material against his chest and silently envied Elena; this was all about her, really. Because of her. And she wouldn’t even be with them. She was free. Free from the knowing of this thing that they would now do. For her, really.
But that wasn’t completely fair, he knew. It wasn’t just about her. Mostly it was about each of them. A hundred percent him. A hundred percent Joey. A hundred percent PJ. Ninety percent for Michael because he’d already exacted a portion from Guy with that busted lip. That was worth twenty, and give back ten for the black eye. For Jeff, maybe a hundred and ten percent. He enjoyed this. It was like spitting at Guy after he was gone. Do whatever necessary to see that Guy ended up the only loser in this situation—unless someone else got in the way. Then they could lose, too.
The Volvo dragged Bryce’s gaze with it as it accelerated away. Away from them. Away from now. Away from what was to come.
Joey looked back through the main gate, past ghosts and grim reapers and two vampires and a hundred other costumes, all ready to trade their backpacks for empty shopping bags or black handled plastic pumpkins. Most every costume imaginable, except the one he was looking for. “Where is she?”
Michael flattened the fake fur his mom had glued to his cheeks and removed the plastic wolf fangs from his mouth. “What time is it?”
Jeff, in the slightly too-big three piece suit his mom had found at the second hand store, raised his cast and looked facetiously at the wrist. “Half past the monkey’s ass, a quarter to his balls.”
“Funny, Bernstein,” Michael commented dismissively.
“Is PJ coming yet?” Bryce asked Joey. “My mom’s gonna be here any minute.”
“I don’t see her,” Joey said, eyes still searching. His hair, slicked back beyond a pair of nub-like horns pasted high on his forehead, held steady in the breeze.
Michael turned and looked with Joey. “I think she’s waiting.”
“Waiting for what?” Joey asked.
“For most of the kids to leave,” Michael answered. “She got laughed at at lunch because of her costume.”
“She’s embarrassed,” Bryce observed obviously.
“Yeah,” Joey agreed. “It should clear out soon.”
Bryce looked down the street and tapped Michael on the shoulder. “My mom’s here.”
A green Windstar rolled into the parents’ drive-thru and queued up behind several other vehicles. Caroline Hool waved spryly at her son through the windshield. He and Michael waved tepidly back.
Jeff nudged Michael as their ride moved slowly through the after school jam. “Where is it?”
Michael checked that there were no unwanted ears nearby and said, “In my sock.”
Jeff nodded and looked past Michael toward the main gate. A few clowns and an eight legged spider passed through the opening in the chain link, and behind them, dawdling purposely, PJ followed, her jacket pulled tight and buttoned to the neck. “Here she comes.”
“Be cool to her,” Joey said quietly, and unnecessarily. None of them would tease her. He knew that. Still, her feelings compelled him toward vigilance.
Caroline Hool reached a space opening at the curb and slid in as a car pulled out. She parked and opened the side door, coming out to greet her son and his friends. “Oh, look at you all. Hah!”
“Hi, mom.”
She reached to her son and straightened the plastic sword strapped across his back. He rolled his eyes at her futzing, and after a second of adjusting she said, “That’s better.”
“Hi, Mrs. Hool,” Michael mumbled. He’d put his teeth back in for effect.
“Grrrr,” Caroline Hool growled, making claws and scratching the air in front of Michael. She looked to Jeff and straightened, considering his get up. “What are you, Jeff? A gangster?”
“A lawyer,” he told her.
Her eyes flared and she muttered, “Same difference.”
PJ reached her friends, coming upon Joey first. “I’m sorry I took so long. I had to...”
“It doesn’t matter,” Joey said. “Okay?”
“PJ!” Caroline Hool put her hands on Joey’s shoulders and said, “You know that you are talking to the prince of darkness here.”
“I know,” PJ confirmed, honestly in part. He was a prince to her.
“So, let’s see,” Caroline Hool urged, beaming at PJ. “Open the package and let’s see your costume.”
PJ felt the weight of Mrs. Hool’s wanting gaze, and the sympathetic ones of her friends. Joey’s especially.
“Mom, we’ve—”
“Bryce, hush,” Caroline Hool said, then smiled at PJ. “I want to see what the fairer sex has come up with to compete with this motley bunch.”
Crud, PJ thought. Just crud. Put it away, and move on.
“A ballerina,” Caroline Hool guessed, her eyes bright and begging an answer. “Hmm?”
PJ reached up and unbuttoned her coat one fastener at a time, waiting until all were done to spread the two side
s apart. Wide. Wider. Hiding nothing. This was it. Get a good look. Okay? Okay?
The boys had seen it already. Caroline Hool maintained her pleasant expression as PJ held her coat open, head cocked away a bit, her lips pressed together.
It was pink and it came to her knees, and stopped there only because her mother had put a few safety pins in to keep it from looking like an evening dress and not a uniform. A waitress’ uniform, complete with ‘Vick’ sewn on the left. Her mother’s spare.
Caroline Hool took her hands from Joey’s shoulders and chewed at the inside of her lower lip for a second, thinking. Thinking parent kind of thoughts. “I think you look cute, PJ.”
PJ accepted the compliment with a quick nod and smiled at Bryce’s mom. “Thanks, Mrs. Hool.”
“Mom,” Bryce said, pointing to her watch.
“Boys can be so impatient,” Caroline Hool said, looking to PJ and giving her a womanly wink. It elicited what she thought was a bit more smile. “All right, everybody in. Candy awaits.”
They all piled in, Bryce taking shotgun and the others splitting the two bench seats comfortably. Caroline Hool climbed past and slid the side door shut.
“Your parents all know you’re coming, right?”
“Yes, Mrs. Hool.”
“Good. We’ve got burgers at our house, then it’s off on the hunt.”
“Are Connie and Bonnie coming?” PJ asked.
“Their father is taking them around the neighborhood. Now, are you starting at Mrs. Beeman’s again this year?”
Joey looked to Michael, then leaned between the two front seats and said, “If it’s all right, we heard there’s supposed to be a good spot to try this year.”
“Better than Mrs. Beeman and her block?”
“Yeah,” Bryce answered.
“That’s what people are saying,” Joey added.
“Okay,” Caroline Hool said agreeably. Candy was the objective, after all, and one had to go where the gettins were good. “Where’s the mother lode supposed to be?”
“Holly Village,” PJ replied before anyone could. She wanted them to know she was all right. That she was part of this. One for all.
“Holly Village.” Caroline Hool started the minivan and dropped it into gear. “After some real food, then, it’s off to Holly Village.”
Michael caught Joey’s glance for the second time in a few breaths. He reached down and touched the bulge near the hem of his jeans. It was there, long and cold, steel against skin.
Twenty One
As agreed he arrived at six, dodging a gaggle of waist-high munchkins on sugar highs dashing down Mary’s walk on the way to their next fix. When she saw him she stepped out into the light of the waxing moon, a Texas A&M sweatshirt over jeans. She hugged a bowl to her stomach.
He saw that her face smacked of apology as he drew close.
“Don’t tell me,” he said, peering into the bowl. It’s silvery bottom shined empty in the hazy lunar glow.
“I’m sorry. I tried.”
Dooley nodded and focused on her top. In big blue letters it said ‘TOTY’. “What’s TOTY?”
“Teacher Of The Year,” Mary said. “It was a gift at the end of the last school year.” She gestured to the door. “Come on in. I have refills.”
She walked up the steps and into the house. Dooley cursed under his breath and followed her in.
“I have coffee,” Mary said as Dooley closed the door. She tore the top from a bag of candy bars and dumped it in the bowl. “A cup?”
“Sure,” he said, sliding his jacket off and tossing it to the couch.
“Here.” Mary handed him the bowl of treats and went to the kitchen. She returned with two steaming cups to an empty living room.
A few notes rose from the piano. “What did they say?”
Mary put the coffee down and went to the erstwhile dining room. She pressed close to the far end of the instrument, hands gripping the contoured edge of the lid. “They said they have nothing else they can tell me.”
“Did they all say that?”
“Joey spoke for them.”
The first few bars of a lullaby Dooley couldn’t name played out, amateurish at best. No finesse. No feeling.
“You’re not going to give up, are you?”
He played out beyond the beginning of the lullaby, quietly amazed that he could remember something from so far back. Who had it been? His Aunt Rita? Yes. She had taught him a few simple songs. Mary Had A Little Lamb. Heart And Soul. A drunken Irish version of Chopsticks. But what was this one called?
He remembered when Mary came around the piano and stood next to him. Even Butterflies Cry. That was it.
When butterflies fly, even butterflies cry
When butterflies die, all the butterflies cry
When all the butterflies cry, now you’ll know why
He suspected his aunt had borrowed the melody and concocted the lyrics. How odd, he thought, that it was this lullaby he remembered.
“Dooley?”
“Huh?”
“You’re not giving up, are you?”
He shook his head, confirming her belief. His fingers struggled with the keys until the long lost tune became whole. It rolled haltingly from the piano. “Do you know this?”
Mary listened for a few seconds, then nodded. “It’s an old English wedding song. My Ever Love To Thee, I think. Or My Ever Love For Thee. Something like that.”
Dooley smiled. “Do you know that my aunt was a thief?”
“What?”
“Nothing.” He dragged the back of his hand the length of the keyboard and stabbed a low note once, hard, for punctuation.
“I tried, Dooley.”
He looked at her, a sorrowful honesty boiling within, and said, “I used you.”
“You asked me to do something,” Mary replied, adding her own spin. “I did it.”
“Do they hate you now?”
The frightful light flashed behind her eyes once again, as it had the first night he’d come by, like it had so many years ago, and she put a patch of fingers to her temple. “I don’t think so.”
“Are you all right?”
She rubbed a hard, tight circle on the spot and gave a fast nod. “It wasn’t easy.” Her head had burned then, too, hot and loud inside like a train rushing at her from a dark tunnel within. It really was punishment, she was beginning to believe. Like the dream. Punishment for letting another’s doubt drive her actions, even if it was the right thing to do...
A very bright wash of white brilliance stung the back of her eyes in quickening, precise pecks, like the painful flick of a finger against one’s ears. Except this was inside her. Right behind her eyes, somewhere between her window to the world and the grayish bundle of nerves and neurons that processed what was ‘out there’. The pain was right there, like a gate swinging in the wind on rusty, grating hinges, setting off the light each time something unpleasant passed through.
Headaches, Mary thought. It’s the headaches. It’s been a long time, but it’s them. That’s all it is.
And before the gate moved through its extreme arc again, something old and kind pushed through the light. A face. An old face in memory, a face from the time when the headaches had first come. The image strained to live in the caustic burn behind her eyes, and, with nary more than an instant before she knew (feared?) it would fade into the brilliance (be consumed by it?), Mary made the decision. While the pleasant old face was still clear in her mind she promised herself that she would make the call. She would call Dr. Cleary. She would call him soon.
Dooley could see the muted agony in her face, in the way her fingers dug at the soft flesh of her temple with abandon. Like they wanted to get beneath the skin and have a go at whatever was driving the hurt. “Are you sure you’re all right.”
The nod came again. The gesture she’d gotten from her mother. From the woman who had worked on a broken ankle insisting that the purple swelling about the joint was ‘just the weather’.
“You do
n’t look so good.”
“This has been really difficult,” Mary said. As her fingers drove hard on the skin the pain began to ebb, the inner light going soft until the only thing behind her eyes was darkness. The darkness again. She let her hand come away and looked to Dooley. “But I’m just fine.”
“Maybe you should see a doctor.”
Maybe I... Mary shook her head. “I’m fine.”
“Is this maybe because you’re having doubts about them?”
PROTECT THEM! YOU HAVE TO PROTECT THEM!
Mary shook her head again. “You don’t understand. I have to believe them.”
“Even when logic tells you what they’re saying is a crock?”
“I don’t live by logic,” Mary said, placing her hand flat to her chest. A speck of light threatened far behind her eyes. She made herself look at him, not at it. “This guides me. My heart. What I feel.”
“And your heart tells you to believe them...”
YOU...
“It tells me that I have to.”
“That’s giving in to emotion.”
The pinpoint of whiteness burned red for an intense slice of an instant, then winked to black, like a hound’s eye closing in the night. Exactly like a hound’s eye.
Mary judged Dooley’s accusation, then eased her hand to his cheek and leaned close, pausing for a second as their noses brushed, her gaze holding his before surrendering to an outer darkness and kissing him.
His hand came up and touched her waist just as she pulled slowly back, not far, still close enough to feel his breath caress her lips.
“That was giving in to emotion,” she said.
“Why did you do that?”
“The head asks why,” Mary answered. The hound’s eye stayed shut. She leaned in again and teased his lips with the tip of her tongue, its fluid softness pouring a million prickly sparkles down his spine. “What’s your heart telling you to do?”
Dooley moved his hand down from her sweatshirt until he felt denim, then slid it back up, diving beneath the warming material and feeling her skin, the feathery softness of her stomach, quivering at his touch, and higher still as she moved toward him and swung one leg over his lap, straddling him and rolling her hands over his shoulders and clasping behind his neck, their faces just inches apart, lips so close, eyes wanting, his fingers spreading and finding the delicate underside of her breast, following the contour, the gentle turn of flesh, slowing at the warm, swollen tip, letting his palm cover her nipple as he drew his fingers together, squeezing, squeezing, hard until her breath left her and their lips came together again.
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