by P. T. Phronk
Bloody lay on her side beside the couch, her belly flab spilling out in front of her. She rolled her bulging eyes.
“Don’t you give me sass!” Stan pointed a shaking finger at the dog. “All we saw was the hat. Could’ve been a flesh wound.” He pushed his glasses up on his face. “Even a minor cut on the head can bleed profusely. Or. Or! Or it was the girlfriend that was bleeding.”
Bloodhound rolled onto her back, her little legs wiggling in the air in an effort to flip the rest of her pudgy body over to turn away from Stan.
“Okay, fine, I know, we’ve been over this.” He touched his finger to his upper lip, stubbly from days of avoided shaving. “Okay, what if. What if!” He paused, staring glassy-eyed at the television screen. “I got nothing.”
He jumped and shouted, “ahhh!” Bloody flipped onto her feet, her floppy ears perking up. “It’s on!”
After a flyby of the Statue of Liberty and a zoom through an animated New York skyline came the announcement of the guests, a lame joke, then the familiar Daaaviiid Lettermaaan. The band’s trumpets squealed.
Stan leaned forward on his couch. Bloody rolled over again. She hated Letterman; whenever Stan got home in time to put the show on, Bloody would either stomp out of the room or make a point of snoring loudly. She whined when Stan came up with the idea to stalk the talk show host for a while. Maybe he should’ve listened to his dog.
Letterman appeared on the glossy stage, the simulated skyline of New York behind him. He looked healthy. Not a scar on him.
“Thank you,” said Letterman. He shuffled awkwardly on the stage, made a funny face. The band sounded an orchestra hit, and the audience laughed. “Welcome to the program, ladies and gentleman. I know we’ve got some out-of-towners here. Don’t know if you’re aware, that’s it’s been raining a lot in New York City. Raining a lot in the whole North-East. They’re talking about rain tonight; could get some of that high wind, flash flooding. And you know what that means. You folks could be sleeping over.”
“Yeah,” muttered Paul Shaffer. The audience howled with laughter.
Stan bolted from the couch, then pulled a curtain aside. The sidewalks were deserted, save for a couple entering the pub across the street. Its neon lights flickered, reflecting off of nothing; the street was as dry as a bone celebrating a year on the wagon.
“It isn’t raining! What the crap, Bloody.”
Letterman was now monologuing about Al Franken getting sworn in as a senator in Minnesota. That happened months ago!
“This episode is from months ago!” Stan collapsed onto the couch. He picked up a beer bottle from the floor and took a swig. “It’s a damn re-run again, Bloody! He was supposed to be back this week. Said so right on the CBS web site.”
Stan rubbed his temples. Bloody sighed, then trotted over to Stan and rested her head on the couch. Stan turned to her. “What should we do, girl? Call someone? The police? CBS?”
Bloody moved her shoulders up and down.
Stan patted her head. “You’re a good girl, you know that?”
The dog darted her eyes toward the kitchen.
“You just ate.”
She snorted.
Both of them jumped when the phone rang. Stan sat up. “I’m not answering it. I just—I just can’t deal right now, you know?”
It rang six times before it stopped.
Stan lay back down, ready to pass out for the night.
The phone rang again. He rolled over and pressed a cushion to his ear. Again, six rings, then silence.
“Persistent buggers,” he muttered.
It rang again. “Aaargh!” he shouted. The shrill cry of the old rotary phone seemed to pierce into his brain. He bolted upright, making to tear the chord right from the wall, but after six rings, it stopped. He hovered over the receiver, ready to toss it across the room the instant it made a peep.
Nothing. Blissful silence. Only the usual din of sirens way off in the distance. Stan prayed that they didn’t draw closer.
He wrenched the blanket on the couch out from under his butt, shook off some pizza crumbs—Bloody immediately licked them up—then swaddled himself in it and lay down. When Bloody had found every last crumb, she jumped on the couch too and took advantage of the warmth of Stan’s feet.
There was a sharp rap at the door.
Stan groaned. He sat up, nostrils flared. Bloody bounded to the door and sat staring at it, a low growl on her breath.
Holding his face up to the peeling-painted door, Stan glared through the peephole. It was her. The odd woman who had killed David Letterman. She wore the same flower pattern hat from when Stan last saw her, and a matching flowery dress. When Stan spotted her through the peephole, she leaned forward to hold her icy blue eye up to the other side.
He jumped back. “Ah! It’s her! That freak woman!” he said, a little too loudly.
Bloody raised one eyebrow.
“Dammit, you’re right,” whispered Stan. “Now she knows we’re here. What do we do?”
Bloody trotted to a spot beside the door. She crouched, then nodded her head, as if to say, go for it, I’m ready for trouble.
Stan sighed. He ran his fingers through his tangled hair, pushed his glasses up, then opened the door a crack. The chain kept it from swinging open further.
“What do you want?” he asked. He felt Bloody’s breath, hot and fast, against his ankle.
Her face was still pressed up against the door. Those eyes flicked sideways to meet his. “Hey Stan,” she said.
“How do you know my name?”
“Oh sweetie, I know a lot of things. Can I come in for a sec?”
“No you cannot come in for a sec.” Stan frowned and held his face to the opening. He made sure none of his neighbors were in the hallway. “How did you know where I live?”
“I got your license plate in our little mix-up. You see dear, I just need you to sign a couple of papers. For insurance purposes. I’m not very fond of this legal mumbo jumbo myself, but the investigators found your car’s paint smeared on my poor car’s bumper, so I just had to tell them you were there. I was kind, you see, I told them that you handed me your business card before you left but I lost it. They say we can clear all this up with a few signatures. I tried to telephone before I came over, but there was no answer.”
Questions flooded into Stan’s head. Chief among them: where was David Letterman? Second: could this situation get him laid? He glanced back in his apartment, all empty beer bottles and mouldy pizza boxes.
“There’s a bar across the street. We can talk there. Let me get my coat.”
He closed the door. Bloody tilted her head sideways, frowning.
“It’s all right, girl. I’ll get some answers and clear this whole mess up,” he whispered.
The dog sighed.
“Won’t be long. Be good,” he said.
Under the flickering blueish light in the hallway, Stan got a good look at the woman. Her skin was pale, perfect except for some red patches on her cheeks. She was not much older than he was—maybe thirty two, thirty three—which made her odd fashion choices and odd manner of speaking even odder. Frizzy auburn hair tumbled over the puffy shoulders of the flowery dress that hung off her slim figure. It was either straight out of the seventies or stolen from her grandmother’s closet.
As they crossed the street, Stan asked: “Where’s your coat? Aren’t you cold?”
She hugged herself and shivered. “Oh yes, brrr,” she said. “Must have forgotten it in my car.”
“We can go get—”
“No no,” she interrupted. “I think we’d both prefer to get this over with as soon as possible.”
Stan nodded.
“A-sap,” she said, then giggled a dreamy, girlish giggle.
“Okay,” said Stan. It was his turn to shiver.
He held the door for her to enter the bar. She curtsied as she passed.
Bar None was busy for a Monday. It was full of the usual: a couple grabbing a late-night snack, a smatte
ring of young hipsters, and a few frat boys getting wasted on cheap drinks at the bar. The angry-faced bartender nodded at Stan from in front of the mirrored wall of liqueurs. Stan waved. The bartender winked when he saw the woman.
The woman—Stan realized he still didn’t know her name—took a look around, then hurried to the back of the bar. She sidled into a booth, and drummed her fingers on the tabletop. Stan sat across from her.
“I haven’t caught your name,” he said.
“Dalla,” she said. She continued to tap her fingers. Her gaze flicked from the front door, to the ceiling, to the bar, to the back door.
“Are you all right?” asked Stan.
“I don’t like public places.” She took a deep breath, then turned to Stan.
Dalla was pretty in the same way that Bloody was cute. Her stunning blue—nearly gray—eyes were too big for her face. Her bulb-tipped nose didn’t go with her pointed cheekbones. Her lips formed a tight, thin gash on her face. Still, the overall package wasn’t entirely unpleasant. Stan had slept with worse.
“Dalla. Let me get you a drink.” He started to stand.
“No,” she said. “I don’t drink alcohol.” She pulled an envelope and a pen from a beaded purse.
“Wait, first, tell me what happened. What happened to the couple you ran over? I know, I know, it must be difficult to talk about, but it’s been eating at me since that day,”
For the first time since entering the bar, her thin lips curled into a smile. “Oh, them? No don’t fret, it’s nothing, they’re fine.” She swished her hand back and forth. “Just peachy. Walked away with barely a scratch.”
“But I saw—” The bartender arrived beside their table.
“Stan,” said the wiry red-haired man. “What’s the what my friend?”
“Just keepin’ on keepin’ on,” said Stan as he shook the man’s hand. He introduced Dalla, then ordered a gin and tonic. The thought of more beer made him queasy.
“Oh, a drink you say?” said Dalla when he asked her what she wanted. “Bring me a soda; Coca Cola, I suppose.”
When the bartender left, Stan leaned over the table.
“I saw blood,” he whispered sternly. “And do you know who those people were?”
She broke into a grin. “David Letterman. It was an absolute delight to meet him; nicest fellow you could imagine. The young woman he was with, well, I wasn’t as fond of her. I’m sure you’re aware of who she was? So you can understand why he’s chosen to keep the whole bang-up hush-hush?”
Stan thought about it for a moment. It was plausible enough, but he couldn’t shake the memory of that lifeless hand flopped beside the car.
“Poor man is still quite rattled, I imagine,” she said with some concern, though the corners of her lips remained curled. “Won’t be able to host the show for a short while.”
Whether Letterman was alive or dead was of no real consequence. Well, unless Stan could sell the last pictures of him alive. Come to think of it, maybe he could do it all anonymously. Go through the back channels. It wouldn’t net as much cash, but anything would be better than living off of cold pizza in his cold apartment.
Dalla stared at him while he was lost in his own thoughts. She licked her thin lips. Stan shivered. He wasn’t sure if he was more disturbed by the woman, or his own horrible thought process.
The drinks arrived. Stan downed half of his gin and tonic in one gulp. Dalla stirred her Coke with the straw.
“Dammit,” said Stan. “I’ve got questions, but this is just … it’s too fucked up. Just give me those papers.”
She handed over the envelope. He took out half a dozen pages of dense text.
“It says that myself and the law are absolving you of any responsibility in the crash. I can’t collect insurance without it. The second part absolves me of any responsibility for damage to your car.”
“Wait a second,” said Stan. “Shouldn’t you be paying for my broken tail light? And,” he rolled his head around on his shoulders. “My neck still hurts. I might have some hefty medical bills, lady.”
She stared at him with those icy eyes. “Do we really want to have to go through all that?”
No. No of course not, he supposed, it was more trouble than it was worth.
Those eyes continued to glow in the corner of his vision as he read the papers. They followed his finger, moving back and forth across the page, as she stirred her drink.
“You need to read every detail.” She sounded curious, rather than angry.
“Suppose I do.”
She smiled, nodded. Damn. Maybe it was the gin talking, but if this whole situation wasn’t so bizarre, she really would be pretty.
After Stan signed the forms, he motioned to the bartender. Dalla rummaged through her purse, digging for change to hand to the bartender one coin at a time. She pulled out a keychain and placed it on the table. A plastic fob—a mini picture frame—hung from the keychain. In the frame was a picture of Damien Fox, topless.
When the bartender had left, Stan gestured at the picture. “Hah, big Damien Fox fan are you?”
“Oh, him? Well, yes. I suppose I am embarrassed, that you have pointed that out.” It was impossible to tell if she was blushing, with her cheeks already red. She laughed a high-pitched girlish giggle.
“Nothing to be embarrassed about. He’s been People’s sexiest man alive three years in a row, so you’re in good company. Heck, I used to have a poster of Jessica Alba in my bedroom. I think I was in love. You know, before she got all pregnant and motherly.”
She smiled. For once she seemed to be genuinely amused. She leaned close, over the table, as if she had a secret. Stan was beginning to suspect that she had many.
“I know something about Damien Fox,” she said. She leaned back, a finger to her mouth, smirking.
Stan leaned forward. “What?”
“Promise you won’t tell anyone?”
He crossed his fingers and held them up. “Promise.”
She giggled. “Honey, it’s hard to believe that a professional paparazzi won’t tell.”
“How did you kn—”
“I know lots of things.” She sighed. “I’ll tell you anyway, because …” She stirred her drink around more. She still hadn’t taken a sip of it. “… because you seem sweet.”
Stan felt his face get hot. He adjusted his glasses. He hadn’t had a compliment from a woman in months. Years, maybe.
“You know how Hillary Miller disappeared after that greatest hits album?” she asked.
“Yes,” said Stan. “But what does that have to do w—”
Dalla held up her hand. Stan shut his mouth.
“Everybody’s talking, saying she holed herself up in a cabin in the woods to focus on her music. Work on her big comeback.
“Well,” she said with a mischievous grin, “everyone is wrong. She’s holed up, sure, but only because she got knocked up. By Damien Fox.”
“She’s pregnant?”
“All P.G.”
“Why would she hide that?”
“To avoid people like you. This is Damien’s child, and Miller is a fine specimen of a young lady too, I suppose. You could say. Can you imagine how beautiful that child is going to be?” She fanned herself with the envelope full of forms. An ice cube in her untouched drink crackled. “You media folks would kill for a piece of it, wouldn’t you? They won’t be able to take the child to swim class without a swarm of photographers buzzing behind them.”
“How do you know this?”
“Got myself a computer a few weeks ago. Did you know, on the world wide web, there are entire communities devoted to Damien Fox? Communitiesss,” she hissed. “More than one. Hundreds of people gathering for no other purpose than to discuss his every move. Found the address of one of Damien’s acting buddies, so I gave him a visit. He ended up spilling the beans. I can be quite convincing.”
“I noticed. So where is the happy couple holed up then?” Stan could practically hear the cha-ching of the cash he coul
d net if she were telling the truth.
She lowered her head and out came that disconcerting giggle. “Doozy of a question, Stanley Lightfoot. That is not something he told even his closest friends.”
“Convenient,” he said. He forced out a chuckle. “Well lady, it’s quite the story, but I gotta get some sleep.” He stood to leave.
Dalla was on her feet. “You don’t believe me,” she said, glaring at him with those eyes.
“Doesn’t matter if I do or not,” he said, but already he was trying to remember how much signed Damien Fox merch went for on eBay. Just in case.
He waved goodbye to the bartender, then walked away. Dalla followed silently, close behind him. He swore he could feel her breath on the back of his neck. He zipped up his coat, then crossed the street to the door of his apartment building. When he turned around, Dalla was inches from his face. Her eyes bored into him. Her tongue caressed her thin lips.
“Invite me up for a cup of tea?”
Every fibre of Stan’s being told him to call it a night, go to bed, and never see the bizarre woman again. Every fibre except the ones in his penis.
“Okay,” he said.
He paused outside his apartment. He could hear Bloody sniffing at the other side of the door.
“It’s kind of a mess in there.”
“Oh!” she said. “Oh, no worries, hun. I can’t very well judge you; you’ve already outed me as a crazy ninny who obsesses over a celebrity.”
“Guess we’re not so different then. Hey, thanks for telling me all that, even though you already knew, you know, what I do for a living.”
He got out his keys. His hands were shaking. He hadn’t been with a woman in a long time, and she seemed to be—what? Flirting? He couldn’t really be sure what was going on in her head.
She smiled at him. He pushed his glasses up on his nose, tried to smile back, then turned to unlock the door. It took a few tries to get the trembling key in the lock. “You know, I wasn’t sure what to make of you at first,” he babbled. “Kinda thought you might even be, you know, dangerous.”