But the serenade left the moment the cyclist returned.
Speeding now. Tires hissing. White helmet, white shoes, a jagged white stripe down the length of the frame. Straight down the center of the street. And suddenly she felt a terrifying urge to scream. It lay down there now, somewhere near her stomach — a scream so loud it would be heard in the village park. It brought sweat to her cheeks, a quivering to her jaw, an acid to her mouth that made her turn her head and spit.
“You could be fined for that, you know.”
She jumped, hand clamped to the flat of her chest. “Jesus!” she said. “Jesus, I didn’t hear you coming.”
April Quick grinned. Her left hand held a burning cigarette, her right drifted back through short greying hair. “You looked like a zombie. I thought I’d come over and see if you were dead.”
Lois looked away quickly.
April sat beside her, frowning now. “Hey, are you all right? What’s the matter?”
She shrugged. “Just thinking, that’s all. That guy,” and she pointed, “spooks me.”
April peered down the street. “What guy?”
“The guy on the bike.”
“Oh, Him.” She blew smoke at the stars. “You know who he is?”
Lois shook her head.
“Neither do I. But I’ll bet he’s damned healthy.” She laughed, more a bark. “I hate healthy. It kills you too soon. Besides, it makes you sweat.”
Lois smiled without moving her lips, looked up and down the street, and said, “Nel.”
“Huh?”
“Nel, Nelson Glawford. Maybe it’s him.”
“Who,” said April, “the hell is Nelson Glawford?”
“A guy who tried to get a job with Bruce before . . . before. He was a health nut, I think. And I think he had a thing for me.”
April snorted.
“Well, damnit, maybe he did!”
They sat quietly for several minutes, feeling the heat, hoping for cool, watching the lights in the houses snap off one by one. Then April crushed a second cigarette under her heel and stretched her arms above her head. Lois didn’t look around. Her friend was overweight and hated herself, and lately it seemed that she took every glance, every look, as a condemnation of her size. Before that, it was her age. And before that it was something else.
April wasn’t on a diet; she claimed they didn’t work.
“You look a bit on the sour side yourself,” Lois said when the stretching was done.
“Blood,” the older woman told her.
“What?” She didn’t know if she ought to laugh or be concerned.
April gestured in disgust. “There was blood on the kitchen floor tonight. I had to clean it up because His Royal is off in Hartford, or so he says. Have you ever noticed how he times it perfectly every time? He goes, and the effing car dies; he goes, and the furnace blows up; he goes, and four hundred screaming creditors come pounding on the door. And I’m supposed to play the helpless-woman bit to keep them off our backs.” A sideways look. “I mean, it does come in handy, don’t get me wrong, but god, it gets tired awfully fast.”
Lois nodded. “So how’d you cut yourself’?”
“I didn’t.”
“But —”
“How the hell should I know?” April said. “Probably from the steak I whipped up for dinner. That crap drips all over the place before you can get it from the fridge to the stove. You’d think I was a butcher, the mess I can make.” She grinned. “Too bad it wasn’t His Royal’s. No jury in the world would convict me.”
Lois did laugh then, because April and her husband, Gavin, despite their recent financial troubles, despite the occasional arguments that never seemed to happen when the windows were closed, were about the most stable couple she knew, if not the most loving.
April stood then, and squinted into the dark. “Well, gotta go, Lo. Tomorrow, some marvelously handsome young man with muscles up to here is going to come early to start cleaning the carpets.” Her hands gripped her hips and massaged them. “And if he isn’t handsome, I’m gonna rape him anyway.”
Lois grinned.
April strode to the curb, looked both ways with such exaggeration that Lois giggled, and hurried across the street. As she climbed the porch steps she waved over her shoulder; Lois waved back, lifted her chest in a deep breath, and decided that she might as well call it a night.
The cleaners for April, for herself a business meeting with Todd Zaber’s father, who was, Todd insisted, serious about looking into an investment or two. As if, she thought as she stood and stretched, the old man didn’t have enough already. At least enough to furnish a house on Williamston Pike so large Todd had once jokingly drawn her a map so she could get from the center hall to the front sitting room, the first time she’d gone over, just three weeks ago.
When she saw the map, she didn’t think the joke was funny.
“Todd,” she’d said, “this is a mansion!”
Todd had shrugged. “So?”
“So ... it’s a mansion! You live in a mansion! You’re a professor, and you live in a mansion?”
He’d nodded, dumping a mass of dark hair over his forehead. “Yeah, so?”
“So that means you’re rich.”
“I guess, yeah.”
She’d grabbed his tie then and yanked him down to her level with a growl that hadn’t been quite feigned. “Todd, you didn’t tell me you were rich. And don’t give me that bit about you’re not thinking it mattered.”
“Well, does it?”
Her mouth had opened to tell him yes, it damned well did matter; then it closed when she told herself she was being an idiot. He was rich; she wasn’t. He liked her; she liked him. And if he had money, that was pure gravy.
Some gravy, she thought as she climbed the steps and pulled open the screen door; and thought no more when she heard the kitchen telephone ringing. She hurried down the hall and grabbed the receiver, and leaned heavily against the side of the refrigerator when a voice said:
“Lois, this is Paul. I’ve changed my mind. I want the house. I’m coming back.”
The wind that took her soul was fresh off the desert, dry and searing, filled with sand, stoking her like a furnace as she slammed the receiver back onto its cradle, winced when she thought it had cracked, and stomped in rage to the front door. Her arms swung as if she were marching. Her heels slammed on the hardwood floor. She turned and put her fists hard on her hips, glaring at the foyer all dark wood highly polished, the grandfather clock by the wide entrance to the front parlor, the oak coatrack and its beveled mirror set under the staircase on the left. The small table where she left her mail. The Oriental runner. The overhead light and its milk white globe.
Mine, she declared silently; goddamn it, it’s mine.
A quick turn to the right around the clock, a slap of her hand that turned on the lights in a large room she called the parlor because it suited her mood and suited the house. Bookcases darkly stained and built into the walls, four high windows across the front, two on the far side. Furniture meant to be sat and sprawled in, claw-foot standing lamps with dark tasseled shades she thought wonderfully tacky; decades-old wallpaper of oak groves, puffy clouds, all of it faded nearly to white; a high plaster ceiling beginning to show cracks.
She touched the back of an armchair.
Mine. It’s mine.
To her left then, and she pulled open the doors that slid into the walls, and stepped into the living room where she kept her stereo and her television, where the windows were open, the shades up, the love seat dark wine and her favorite armchair brown leather. No carpet here; she hadn’t gotten around to it and didn’t know when she would. Wallpaper just as faded and partially covered by framed Audubon prints. A tumbled stack of magazines by the chair. A fireplace on the back wall, and on the ornately carved mantel a ragged row of silver bowls and silver goblets parted in the center by the only photograph she owned — standing at the side of the house after the porch had been painted and the last ne
w step installed. A proud grin at her lips, defiant at her eyes, her right arm up and out as though showing off her work, or gesturing to mark a friend.
Mine.
In the center of the lefthand wall was the entrance to the dining room, which she stormed into and glared at fiercely — china closet, sideboard, square table, small cut-glass chandelier, the shelves on the papered walls where she kept her collection of brass hot plates and china deer.
The large kitchen was to the right, the deep foyer to the left along a short hall barely long enough for the name, barely long enough to hold the coat closet, and she didn’t know which way to go, which room to reclaim next.
“Mine!” she shouted. “You son of a bitch, it’s mine!”
The house didn’t answer.
It didn’t have to.
Paul had left the small Victorian in varying stages of renovation; she had done the rest, well into every night with tears and coaxing and vows to keep it sound, ignoring the hammered thumbs, the splinters, the backaches from lifting and the bruises from dropping. Learning from manuals, from Todd, from Gavin, from April; by the book where she could and makeshift where she had to. She had replaced most of his jarring contemporary furniture with things that held promise of comfort and long life; he had painted most of the upstairs walls white, and she had already picked out the paper to cover them up; he had bricked up the fireplace in the front bedroom while she’d been in New York, attending a seminar, and the argument that had resulted was no argument, it was a fight.
The bricks were gone. And suddenly she wondered if they really were. Up the stairs at a headlong run, grabbing the top post and swinging herself into the wide upper hall, skidding, then racing into the large master bedroom where she stood at the hearth, panting and gulping, staring at the ashes she hadn’t cleaned out last winter, listening to the air conditioner wheeze and clunk in its window.
Perspiration drenched her chest and face, crawled down her sides, and she tore at her clothes, bending a nail and sobbing though her eyes remained hard and dry. Then she stalked across the hall to the narrow, green-tiled bathroom and turned on the shower, and in the hot shower felt the soul-wind shift from desert to winter.
She hugged herself under the spray.
He can’t do it, you know, she thought, trying to regain the fury; there’s no way he can do it, the goddamn prick. He signed the papers. He agreed.
Her teeth chattered despite the steam that became a fog.
He can’t.
“Can’t,” she whispered as she dried herself, clothed herself, stepped into the hall and realized that she’d forgotten to close the bedroom door. All that cold air escaped into the house, warmed before it reached the stairs, hot when it reached the foyer. She groaned, closed the door, and leaned against it for a moment before returning downstairs. To the kitchen.
He said he was coming back; she glanced at the back door and shuddered at the dark, at her reflection so pale and insubstantial. He’ll kill me. He’ll hurt me. He’ll —
She ran to the door and locked it, put her back to it and closed her eyes tightly, to see the sparks and the spirals and the image of him striding toward her through a swirling fogfire that ignited everything about him. Except him. Always except him.
The refrigerator coughed on. She opened her eyes.
The first thing she saw was the telephone on the wall, and before she knew what she was doing, she called Todd and babbled, called April and wept, stood with the receiver in her hand and stared at it dumbly, suddenly annoyed, then angry, then furious at herself for cracking so quickly at the first sign of trouble. It wasn’t like her. She was, as her father had often told her in gentle exasperation, a fighter to the death and then some; there was no reason on earth why she couldn’t handle her former husband on her own. He wasn’t that terrible; he couldn’t have been or she wouldn’t have married him.
Slowly, deliberately so, she hung the receiver up and pushed a hand through her hair, down her shirtfront, down her thigh. Then she walked just as slowly into the living room and looked at her silver bowls. One was from Paul, engraved with grape leaves and satyrs. A first-anniversary present that he swore would become a tradition.
It was the only one he gave her. The rest she bought herself.
Each one of them a promise to keep the house, to keep the love, to keep . . . everything the same.
A tear, then, and she thumbed it away. And the telephone rang.
She touched a finger to a slender goblet that had once been her mother’s, and she went back to the kitchen, opening the refrigerator door as she picked up the receiver.
“Lois?”
She held her breath.
“Hey, Lo, you there? It’s Nel.”
She exhaled and closed the door. “Nelson? Nel, is that really you?”
He laughed and said it was.
“My god, do you have any idea what time it is?”
“Well . . . yeah, sort of.”
She leaned against the refrigerator and smiled at the room. Nel, after failing his chance to get a job at Kanfield, was now on his own and forever calling her for advice. She didn’t resent it; in fact, she was flattered.
“Hey,” he said, “I didn’t wake you up, did I?”
“No. Sorry. What can I do for you? Assuming you’re not drunk.”
“I’m not, shame on you. And since you have no intention of marrying me, would you mind saving a spot on your terribly crowded social calendar for my engagement party?”
She gaped. “What? Nelson, you? Getting married?” He laughed so loudly she had to pull the receiver away.
“Yes, my dear, me. I know it crushes you, but that’s the way it is.”
“Oh god, Nelson, I’d love to. When?”
“November. The fifteenth.”
She waited a moment.
“Lo?”
“I’m checking, I’m checking.”
He growled, she giggled, and told him there was — nothing that would keep her away. When he thanked her, and she felt him blushing, she blew him a kiss and hung up, and sagged against the doorframe. Slightly saddened. Slightly pleased. There was Todd, of course; there was always Todd. But Nelson, for some reason, was never far from a daydream.
The telephone rang again.
“You forgot to tell me where,” she said, laughing.
“I’m back,” Paul said, laughed, and hung up.
All the lights upstairs were off except for a wall lamp in the hall.
The kitchen was dark.
The dining room.
The foyer.
She had gone down to the basement through the door under the stairs, checked to be sure the narrow windows there were locked; then she tore up several empty cartons and taped the pieces over the panes.
The garage was behind the house; she couldn’t bring herself to go out there to be sure the door was locked.
Locked.
So many locks, so many bolts, and before she returned to the living room where the others were waiting, she imagined herself mistress of some crumbling medieval castle, raising the drawbridge, sending the archers to their places, firing the vats of boiling oil and hiding the women in the dungeons.
She almost smiled.
Then April laughed.
When Lois entered, Todd came in from the parlor and joined her at the hearth. One hand gripped her elbow lightly, the fingers stroking her arm. “You all right?” A rugby shirt, soccer shorts, sneakers; his arms and face were tanned, and the sun had drawn a streak of auburn from his left temple to his nape. “Do you want something to drink?”
They had arrived less than ten minutes after her calls, all of them at once, storming the porch as if Paul were already inside and throttling her. Or worse. It had taken ten minutes more before she’d convinced them she was fine, that she had simply panicked, and that she was thoroughly ashamed for bringing them out on such a hot, miserable night for nothing more than a severe case of nerves.
Gavin sat in her chair, slumped with long legs cros
sed, suit jacket folded and draped across the back. His tie was yanked down and off to one side, collar button open and the next button down. His hair was plentiful for the white that it was, and in almost comic contrast to the black of a mustache that made his face seem almost pudgy.
The room was warm, no breeze through the open windows.
“Thirst,” he said tonelessly. “So that’s why I’m dying of.”
He’d only just pulled into the driveway, home early from Hartford, when April dashed out of the house and dragged him over, so quickly she hadn’t had time to put on her shoes.
Lois blinked at him. “Oh.” Her hand fluttered. “I’m sorry, Gavin. I’ll —”
“I know where it is,” Todd said gently. “You sit down. I’ll get it.”
“Nothing too strong for me, love,” April called after him from the sofa. “I’m on a diet, remember?” Then she turned to Montgomery Zaber, seated beside her, in the corner. “If I was smart, I’d drink water or some kind of diet soda, but Lois doesn’t believe in that stuff.” She laughed quickly. “I don’t either, but what the hell.”
The elder Zaber sat stiffly. He was dressed in a three-piece white suit, diamond stickpin, diamond cuff links, black leather shoes that reflected the lamplight. His lean face was flushed, and his eyes were narrowed, as they had been the first time Lois had met him, outside his law-firm office. He gave the impression of eternal disapproval, and the first time he’d laughed Lois thought it was trick.
His smile to April was brief; the one to Lois was longer, and brushed with concern. “My dear,” he said calmly, “if you don’t sit down, you’re going to make it worse than it is.”
“But it isn’t bad,” she insisted, staying where she was, glancing at the photograph and finger-dusting the frame. “I told you I just panicked for a moment. He sounded so . . . so . . .” She shrugged helplessly.
“Well,” the attorney said, his voice giving the impression his fingers were tented thoughtfully under his chin, “if it’ll make you feel any better, from what you’ve told me, there isn’t a thing the man can do to take this lovely place away from you. He gave it up willingly, signed to that effect, and now . . .” He spread his hands. “But I do wish you’d call Wes Martin. He’s a good man, one of the best policemen we have on the force. He’s certainly done a fine job as acting chief.”
The Complete Short Fiction of Charles L. Grant Volume 3: Dialing the Wind (Neccon Classic Horror) Page 11