Wilma said, “I’ll go with Peg.”
Linus said, “I thought I’d pair you with Tracy.”
“But Peg and I have so much to talk about!”
“Such as?” asked Linus.
“You know, girl talk,” said Wilma.
Peg doubted Wilma had girl-talked, ever. The idea of an evening with her at a bar was as appealing as the carrot casserole. But Peg’s curiosity was cheddar sharp.
She said, “First round’s on me.”
Wilma and Peg sat next to each other at the Norwich Tavern. The joint tried to carry off the style of English pubs with names like the Slaughtered Sheep or the Gutted Hen. Dart-board near the pool table, oak bar, wood panels, dark, windowless, hot, acrid, packed with Dartmouth students who’d ridden bikes across the border to get away from New Hampshire’s draconian alcohol policies (as Wilma explained, if a bar was busted serving a minor, the establishment was closed for business immediately until further notice—no warnings).
At thirty-two, Peg felt like the oldest woman in the room (not to mention the only Jew). Wilma, in the twenties, fit in well, with her perky ponytail and tan. Wilma sipped a Coors Light. Peg gulped a Manhattan.
So it’d come to this, she thought. Three weeks of Inward Bounding had brought her full circle, to a stool in a bar with a cocktail in front of her. If she had a Chuck Palahniuk novel, she might as well be back in Soho. Except, in Soho or even the Lower East Side, one didn’t ordinarily see men peeing out of the bar window or spitting chewing tobacco saliva into Dixie cups.
Peg smiled to Wilma, waiting for her to talk. But Wilma didn’t speak, or look at her. She might as well be a complete stranger.
Peg said, “Nice melons! I need a sweater!”
Wilma shook her head reproachfully. “Accepting you into the program was the worst decision I’ve ever made.”
Which, to Peg, was an open invitation to get personal. “Are you and Linus over or not?”
Wilma flinched. “Regardless of what you think of me, Peg, I do have feelings.”
Shit. “I’m sorry,” said Peg. “This must be tough on you. Breaking up after a year. Having to start over. On such short notice. I’ve been there. Many, many times.”
“I’m going to tell you a secret, Peg. You should know the truth about Linus,” said Wilma.
“Go on,” said Peg, her attention rapt.
And then she felt a tap on the back. “Peg Silver?” yelled a voice behind her. “Peg Silver? From Grand Street in Soho? The interior landscape designer?”
Both women looked at the man who was squeezing himself between their stools at the bar. He was in his early thirties or late twenties. He had short, inky black hair. His skin was impossibly pale. Even surrounded by ethnically pure Caucasian Wasp co-eds, he was the whitest guy in the room. His lips, in the dark of the bar, seemed black. On closer examination, Peg saw they were blood red and full. His eyes: icy blue. His body—in stiff jeans and a Ramones T-shirt—was tall and skinny, like most East Village guys. In fact, thought Peg, you could have plucked him right off of First Avenue.
Peg said, “Do I know you?”
“We met at 2A. A few years ago.”
A possibility. She’d been at that seedy bar nearly every night when she was with Daniel. But Peg would have remembered this guy. No matter how many cocktails she’d had. That preternaturally white skin and luscious lips. He was otherworldly attractive.
He said, “I’m Oliver Ashfield.”
Peg introduced Wilma. “We’re supposed to interact with strangers, strike up conversations, attempt to make a human connection,” she told Oliver.
He said, “Oh-kay.”
“Nice hat!” said Peg. “Wish I had a sweater!”
“I’m not wearing a hat,” said Oliver. “I have one in my car, in the parking lot. Why don’t we go outside and I’ll show it to you?”
He was luring her outside? For what? A drunken make-out session? Peg said, “We’re talking here, actually.”
Oliver took the hint badly. “Do you smoke? I’ve got a full pack of cigarettes out in my car.”
Peg shook her head. “Have a nice stay in Vermont, Oliver. Use sunscreen.”
She turned her back on him rudely, and he sunk back into the crowd. Peg said to Wilma, “Now, you were saying? A secret about Linus? That he has an abnormally large penis?”
“I want to tell you about my dissertation.”
Peg groaned. Bring back Oliver. Peg said, “I’m sure it’s fascinating. But we were talking about Linus.”
“We are talking about him,” Wilma answered, signaling the bartender for another round. “He’s the subject of my dissertation.”
“What’s the topic?”
“You fit the profile, too.”
“Your profile of what?” asked Peg impatiently.
“Low scores in conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism and extroversion; high scores in openness. The tendency to overcompensate for social failure by flinging yourself into new relationships. Preferring to observe rather than participate, to be alone rather than in a group. Narcissism and superiority complex as defense mechanisms for limited social abilities. You crave control, but relinquish it readily.”
“I don’t really see what any of this has to do with Linus’s huge penis.”
Oliver poked his head between the women again. “You know, you can see a lot of stars up here. You want to come outside, Peg? Gaze with me?”
“Get lost,” said Peg.
“I was wondering,” said Wilma. “Considering how well you fit the profile, if you’d let me interview you this week. As a case study.”
“I’d like to help, Wilma,” said Peg. “But I’m not sure that I—”
“Have anything to offer?” asked Wilma.
Peg nodded. “I’m uncomfortable—”
“Talking about yourself?”
“Yes,” said Peg. “And I have doubts about—”
“My abilities?”
“Stop doing that,” said Peg.
“All part of the profile,” said Wilma.
Oliver again. “Peg, there’s a fight in the parking lot!” he said excitedly. “Two guys are tearing each other apart! You’ve got to check this out.”
Peg put her hand over his face, and pushed him away. She said, “You know, Wilma, that personality test. I lied on half the answers. I didn’t fill out a third of it.”
“Counting how many questions the respondent gets through before blanking the remainder is part of the test,” said Wilma. “You got through fewer than most, by the way. Like I said, low conscientiousness.”
Peg signaled the bartender for another drink.
Wilma said, “Just listen to the title of my paper. Then tell me if it sounds like you.”
“Unless it’s called ‘Intelligent, Charming and Witty People We All Love and Admire,’ forget it.”
“It’s called ‘The Outsider Syndrome: Romanticizing Chronic Isolation,’ ” said Wilma, holding up her hand to keep Peg quiet. “Outsiders believe they’ll never fit in and will always be alone. It’s their greatest fear, and also the foundation of their sense of self. I noticed this about Linus as soon as we met. His string of girlfriends. How he knows everyone, but is close to hardly anyone. I got drawn into the challenge of him, believing I would be the one to break him out of his self-imposed isolation. But I couldn’t. After a while, I stopped trying. Linus will never really love someone. He prefers to observe, to be alone, to stay on the outside of his most intimate relationship. He’s the ultimate outsider.”
“Linus is the ultimate insider. Everyone in Manshire genuflects in his presence. He’s the mayor.”
“Overcompensation,” said Wilma.
“Isn’t it possible that Linus can love deeply, just not with you?”
“Linus agrees with my thesis,” said Wilma. “He’s proofreading my dissertation. He thinks it’s brilliant.”
“That’s the big secret about Linus? That he thinks your thesis is brilliant?”
Wilm
a leaned in close. “The big secret about Linus is that he is using you to pump up his ego, just like he used all those other women in the program over the past year. He’s a narcissist. He’s an egomaniac. He’s addicted to the pain and loneliness of denying himself. He craves love, but pushes it away because, in layman’s terms, he’s fucked up. And I’m an idiot for falling for him. Just like you are, Peg. But I have the good sense to leave. Not you. Even now, you’re counting the days until I move out. You can’t wait to hurl yourself in front of a speeding train. Go ahead,” she said. “Hurl.”
Speechless, Peg watched Wilma finish her beer, and order another. Which she drank in one long gulp, and ordered another.
Peg said, “You’re the one who’s going to hurl.”
Oliver, meanwhile, poked his head between them again. Peg said, “I’m ready for that cigarette now, Oliver.” She threw a twenty on the bar, and stood up.
To Wilma, she said, “Consider me unenrolled.” She’d had enough of Wilma and her theories. Of Linus’s push-pull treatment. She’d been moving Inward long enough. She had to get outward.
Using her shoulder like a plow, Peg pushed her way through the crowd. Oliver struggled to keep up. They made it to the parking lot, and Oliver said, “I’m right over here,” pointing at a blue Volvo with New York plates.
Peg walked toward the car. Through her anger, Peg realized that Wilma, the injured party, might be playing saboteur. She could be attempting to destroy Linus and Peg’s chances preemptively. Even if that was true, the psychodrama was too much for Peg. She had come to Vermont for simplicity, not to get mixed up in a man’s complex.
A cigarette might help calm her down. She and Oliver were ten paces from his Volvo. Five paces. Suddenly, arms grabbed Peg from behind. A strip of duct tape sealed her mouth shut. A black sack over her head. Her neck forced down, a push from behind toppled her into the backseat. A car door slammed, someone sat on her to keep her still. Wheels in motion. The sound of crunching gravel.
Chapter 30
Peg fought. She struggled. Oliver lay on top of her in the backseat. He was stronger than he looked. And nice-smelling, too.
He said, “Faster.”
A woman’s voice from up front. “Are you buckled in?”
“Just go!” said Oliver.
“It’s the law to wear a seat belt,” said the woman. “I don’t want to get pulled over.”
“If we get pulled over, it’ll be for kidnapping, not for seat belt scoffing!”
“You don’t have to yell,” said the woman softly. “Politeness speaks louder than volume.” But the driver did pick up speed. They went straight. Then a right. Peg tried to remember the turns, how long they traveled before changing direction, but she lost her sense of time.
After what seemed like an hour, the car came to a stop. The front door slammed. The back door opened. The two kidnappers pulled Peg out of the Volvo, and rushed her through a door and into a room.
The lights went on. Peg was lowered into a chair and her arms and legs were tied to it. Once she was secured with rope, the sack was removed.
Oliver stood over her, looking worried and sympathetic. She glanced around the room. Standard traditional Americana motel décor. They could be anywhere in New England. Two queen-sized beds, a couple dressers. Clean bedclothes, plush carpeting, floral wallpaper. The room’s furniture was old, but well cared for. Peg smelled pine air freshener. The green chintz curtains were closed.
Oliver checked her mouth tape. She knew now that she’d never met him before, that he’d pretended to know her to gain her confidence. She was an idiot to go outside with him. Had she learned nothing in all her years in New York City? It was page one from the city handbook: DO NOT TRUST STRANGERS. She thought of Linus, his “forget the training from childhood and talk to strangers” rap. She smiled under her tape—tried to—imagining Linus’s reaction to the news that she’d been kidnapped. He’ll be desperate with worry, she thought. He’d realize how much he needed her, and loved her. Maybe she could stay kidnapped for a couple of days. Scare the shit out of him. The bullshit anyway.
The woman’s voice from behind Peg. “How’s she doing?”
“She looks happy,” said Oliver. “I think she’s smiling.”
“It’s the brainwashing,” the woman said knowingly. She circled around Peg and stood next to Oliver.
“Stmm Tmmm?” mumbled Peg from under the mouth tape.
“She recognizes me,” said the woman.
How could Peg not? This woman had made an indelible impression the first time they’d met in Nina’s office a few months ago. Flaming red hair, pink cheeks, bow lips. Bright orange halter top and a magenta miniskirt, kitten-heeled mules.
It was Stacy Temple, president for insearchof.com, the woman Nina had hired to track down Peg’s ex-boyfriends. The woman who’d first called her a square.
Stacy asked, “Should we take the tape off?”
Oliver said, “What if she screams?”
Stacy tapped a pink nail on her red lips. “That would be bad.”
“MSMM,” said Peg. “Mbbmsmsms.”
“I’ve got cold beer,” said Oliver to Peg. “You can have some beer if you don’t scream.”
Beer would be lovely. Peg nodded. Stacy leaned forward and tore off the tape.
“Ouch!” said Peg.
“Just think of it as a free mustache wax,” said Stacy.
Oliver produced a brown bottle and held it to her lips. Peg drank. He detached the bottle and Peg said, “Nina is behind this.”
“Correct,” said Stacy. “Before we get into that, let me introduce Oliver. He’s my husband and business partner.”
“The hacker.”
“Intelligence technician,” corrected Oliver.
To Stacy, Peg said, “He’s so cute.”
“And younger,” said Stacy with a wink.
“Well done,” said Peg.
Stacy sat down on the edge of the bed, and crossed her long legs, periwinkle toenails catching the lamplight. “We were hired by Nina and your brother, Jack. They’re afraid you’ve joined a cult and have been brainwashed by a man named Linus Bester, a charismatic messianic leader who lures the vulnerable and weak with promises of fulfillment and happiness.”
“She does look happy,” pointed out Oliver.
“Then it’s true,” whispered Stacy gravely.
Did Peg see herself as someone who’d join a cult? Strongly, with the strength of Arnold Schwarzenegger, disagree.
“I am so not a joiner,” said Peg.
“You were brainwashed into it,” said Stacy.
Did she see herself as someone who’d be brainwashed?
“I couldn’t be brainwashed,” she said. “My mind is way too dirty. Nina knows this.”
Stacy said, “You’ve been reprogrammed.”
“You’ve got it all wrong. Inward Bound isn’t a cult,” said Peg. “And Linus isn’t a messianic leader. He’s an atheist. And he’s not charismatic. He wears Birkenstocks. Once with socks.”
Stacy gasped.
Oliver leaned toward his wife. “She’s defending him,” he said. “She’s in denial.”
“We’ll have to deprogram her,” whispered Stacy. “Do you have the clamps?”
“I can hear you,” said Peg. “Brainwashing hasn’t make me deaf.”
“Then you admit it!” said Stacy.
“Admit what? That I look happy?”
Stacy walked across the motel room toward a pink plastic shoe box on top of the dresser. She pushed a black button on top, and the box hatched.
“Is that a purse?” asked Peg. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“It’s from the sixties,” said Stacy, nodding. “I collect.” She reached inside and withdrew a few envelopes. The letters Peg had mailed to Nina over the past month.
“The evidence,” said Stacy. She read from Peg’s letters. “Postmarked July eighth. You wrote, ‘Forced to eat raw vegetables daily…I had to give them two thousand dollars, but what�
�s more important than my emotional well-being?…He’s already threatened to beat the sarcasm out of me with a stick…If I miss breakfast, they starve me for six hours…We can’t use cell phones.’ Postmarked July thirteenth. You wrote, ‘Recently discovered that I’m obsessed with sex…I may be an alcoholic…Undo everything I’ve always done…Linus has the mad mojo. Everyone in town is slavishly devoted to him…I had a fantasy about him…Trying to repress sex thought is doing strange things to my brain…My turn to be sprayed with poison.’ Postmarked July twenty-third. You wrote, ‘I was electrocuted, and the jolt made me realize that I’m in love with Linus…We had an encounter…after a drug experiment…Much happier now.’ ”
Stacy dropped the letters on the bed. She said, “They control your diet, your sleep, your sexual activity. They don’t let you use phones, disallow contact with the outside world. They demanded money. They used starvation, poison, drugs and sex to control your mind. Force you to perform manual labor and pointless physical exercise, all designed to weaken your resolve. These sick-ass bastards used electric shock treatment to wash your brain, Peg! Can’t you see what’s happened to you?”
“Taken out of context, I can understand why Nina would be worried,” said Peg. “But I’m telling you, I have not been brainwashed. I’m the same person I was when I left New York.”
“Really?” asked Stacy. “You seem different to me. But we just had one coffee break. Nina made a list of your favorite pastimes. Things you’d ordinarily do unless you were under the influence of a cult. Have you, for example, had casual sex since you came to Vermont?”
“No,” said Peg.
“Have you gone barhopping?”
“There’s only one bar in the whole town,” said Peg.
“Have you done any landscaping?”
“No time. We’ve been so busy—”
“Have you read any Chuck Palahniuk novels?”
“You mispronounced that,” said Peg. “It’s Pal-ah-NEE—”
“Have you?” demanded Stacy.
“I’m too tired at night to read, but no one told me—”
“Have you been running?”
The Girlfriend Curse Page 23