Head To Head

by Linda Ladd

  “Dottie, listen to me, please. You’ve got my arms strung up too tight. It’s killing me, and the stitches are coming out. Please, loosen the rope a little so it won’t hurt so much.” Behind Dottie, I could see lightning flash in the small window in the door above the coal chute. It was dark outside, and I wondered how long I’d been unconscious, if it was the same night or the next night. Thunder rumbled, and the rain started in earnest again, sluicing down the glass. I could hear the wind banging something in the night.

  Harve groaned, and both of us looked at him.

  Dottie said, “Goody, goody. The star of the show’s gonna wake up, and we can get started.”

  Suddenly, she leaned over and slapped Harve across the face. The sharp crack made me flinch. “C’mon, big guy. You’re on. Curtain time.”

  Fury flooded me, and I struggled to keep it out of my voice. “Cut it out, Dottie. Harve’s never done anything to you. He adores you. This is about me, not him, right? You and me. Leave him out of it.” I kept my eyes locked on her face while I estimated how far I could kick out; maybe I could get her in the head and knock her out or disorient her. But that wouldn’t do us any good if I was tied up.

  The singsong disappeared. “Aha, now you’re talking. You’re finally getting it through that thick head of yours. It’s about you, all right. It’s about making you suffer. Tell me, Annie, what in the world would make you suffer more than me filleting your best friend alive right in front of you? We’ll pretend he’s a great big bass, and we’ll clean him. What’d you say?” She picked up a large electric fillet knife and plugged it into a white extension cord. She flipped the switch, and I watched the sharp blades vibrate and heard the low buzzing sound it made.

  I stared at her in abject horror. We were out in the middle of nowhere. A storm was buffeting the lake, making the search for us difficult, if there even was a search. Nobody knew where we were. Nobody was coming to rescue us. Nobody could hear Harve’s screams, no one but me. “Dottie, listen, don’t do this. I’m begging you. We’re your friends. Harve and I both love you. You know that’s true; you have to know it. Please, don’t hurt him. Let him go.”

  Dottie’s teeth flashed, and she looked almost normal for a second or two. Then the singsong was back. “Oh, okay, sure, you talked me into it. I know what. I’ll untie you and Harve; then you can call Bud and tell him where I am, and he can put me in jail for killing Suze and Sylvie and all the others.” Her forehead crumpled in a deep frown, as if she was suddenly annoyed. She turned off the electric knife and concentrated on sharpening the cleaver. I looked down at Harve. He was untied but still heavily sedated. I saw his eyelids flutter, and my heart stopped. Oh, God, he was coming around.

  I had to get her attention off him. “Why are you doing these terrible things? Tell me, Dottie. Why’d you kill Suze? She was your best friend, for God’s sake. The two of you were together all the time.”

  “Suze was a stupid bitch, but I needed someplace to keep my things where nobody would find them. Her house’s out here in the woods, and she didn’t have any family or friends. It was too perfect until she started snooping around in my trailer and found my mother and her friends. Then she had to go, but I didn’t like her, anyway. After tonight’s show is over, we’ll have to move on, but that’s okay. Momma and I like to travel.” Dottie placed the strop on the table. There was dried blood on the buckle; there was dried blood all over it. Her face metamorphosed into the big Dottie smile, but the eyes remained dark and empty. “Ready for the show to begin? I’m good at this. Lots of practice through the years. I just love it every time. I wish you could’ve seen all the friends I brought home for my momma. There’s been twenty-two in all. Counting your mother.”

  “My mother?” I didn’t believe her. Nothing she said made sense, but I had to keep her talking. People would be looking for us; I had to believe that. Bud and Charlie would search for me, and Black, Black liked to keep tabs on me. He’d track me with the Cobalt’s satellite system, or would the storm interfere? Unless he obeyed my wishes and stayed away from me. Oh, God, I’d told him to leave me alone and let me handle the case. Stay calm, play the game, keep her talking. That’s all you can do, bring her back to sanity somehow. “Dottie, you need help, is all. You’re sick, and Black can help you….”

  Dottie suddenly raised the cleaver and slammed it down toward Harve’s head. I cried out, but she drove the blade hard into the wood picnic table inches from his ear. It quivered from the impact. I quivered from the relief.

  “You little bitch,” Dottie ground out through clenched teeth. “How dare you blame me for this? This is all your fault, yours, not mine. You’re the sick one. You make me sick!”

  Oh, God, she was completely crazy, living inside some kind of psychotic delusion where I was someone who’d hurt her. How could this be happening? How could we not have seen signs that she was so dangerous?

  I made my voice soft and soothing. “I promise I won’t tell anybody if you let us go. I won’t tell Bud or Charlie. I’ll help you get away.”

  “Oh, there you go again. But we both know that perfect little police officers like you don’t do bad things. You’re too perfect and pretty and wonderful. Annie doesn’t have to whisper and tiptoe around. She doesn’t have to be afraid.”

  “Who’re you afraid of, Dottie? Your father? Did your father hurt you?” But it wasn’t Dottie anymore who sat there staring at me. The eyes glittering in the dim light were mad. Dottie was gone. This was someone else. This was a monster.

  Dottie leaned close to my face. Her eyes were so bleak and deadly that chills rippled up my back. “Yes, it was my father. Surely, you remember him from when you lived in the old coach house? I remember you. I’ve never forgotten you. We were best friends. You were like my little sister that I played with and ate cookies with. Then you went off with the cook and left me behind. I’ve been watching over you and your friends since I got away from him. I’m your own special avenging angel.”

  She grinned crazily; then she shook Harve’s shoulder. “Harve’s being a bad boy and won’t wake up. I gave him too strong a dose. I could’ve killed you any time I wanted to, you know that? For years and years, I watched every move you made. I followed you everywhere you went and killed all your friends, one by one. Sometimes it took me a while to find out where you went, especially after I killed your Aunt Kathy and Uncle Tim in Pensacola. But I always found you. I lost you for five long years once, but I caught up to you in Los Angeles just in time to turn your husband against you. All I had to do was call him a time or two and whisper how you were screwing Harve behind his back.”

  Dottie threw back her head and laughed, then sobered instantly and said, “Then you got away from me that one year, and I couldn’t find you. But you know what? I found Harve, and I knew you’d show up sooner or later to be with him.”

  She nodded, self-satisfied. “And you did, of course, and we became best friends again, just like when we were little. And I sorta liked that, being your best friend again and hanging around with you and having you trust me. Sometimes when I gave you toddies to make you sleep, I’d make them very strong. Then I’d walk down to your house and lie in bed with you while you slept, but you never knew that, did you? I made it really strong the night you went out to Black’s boat, but you were already gone with him when I came back later to sleep with you.”

  “Who are you?” I got out somehow, so full of dread that I could barely speak. I tried to remember what Black had been trying to tell me on the phone at Ha Ha Tonka, who he thought had been killing people. I couldn’t think straight, and nothing made sense. Something about the boy named Thomas, but this wasn’t him. This was Dottie. I fought down hysteria. “Why’re you doing this to me? What’d I do to you? I never laid eyes on you until Harve hired you on.”

  “You’ll see soon, little Annie. Everything will be all cleared up. I’ve got so much to show you, Annie, so much to share since we were little kids. I kept souvenirs because I knew this day would come, and the tru
th would come out and we’d share it together.” She stood up. “And I brought everyone down here to watch Harve’s show with us. Isn’t that a super idea?”

  33

  When Dottie moved away into the shadowy part of the cellar, I struggled against the ropes and felt them give a little. Maybe I could break them or pull down the pipe. I jerked desperately until she opened a freezer chest against the wall. The light inside came on and illuminated her face where she stood almost invisible in the darkness. She said, “Family’s important. I like to keep them close. I’m pretty disappointed that they didn’t take to you right off, but they will. Once they get to know you, Annie, they’re gonna love you as much as I do.” She lifted the lid and reached inside and pulled out one of the decomposed heads with blond hair. It was still resting on a Blue Willow dinner plate and still wore a red party hat. Oh, Lord, please, please help me.

  “I didn’t really introduce everybody at the party. I was just so excited that I forgot. Maybe that’s what got you off on a bad foot with everybody. But I’m gonna fix that right now. Momma, this is Annie. Annie, this is my dear momma. Father made me watch him embalm her down in the cellar. I held her hand, but I didn’t cry. He got mad and threw her down the stairs, and he said it was my fault, so I had to help him make her smile again. Doesn’t she have a lovely smile?”

  Dottie set the plate on the table beside Harve’s head. “All that happened before you and your mother came to cook for us. But Momma was always with us. Father made me kiss her good night before I went to sleep. Don’t you remember me at all, Annie? The way I had to run home before dinner so he wouldn’t know we were playing in the creek? Don’t you remember the way I cried and beat on your front door the night you went away and left me?”

  Realization finally dawned, and I cried, “Oh, my God, you’re talking about Thomas. How’d you know Thomas?”

  “And look, Annie, here’s your momma. I got her, too. I punished her for taking you away and leaving me behind with Father.”

  I groaned and shut my eyes when she pulled out the other decapitated head with blond braids, frozen now and unrecognizable. That is not my mother, I thought frantically. It isn’t; Dottie’s lying. Dottie slapped me hard across the face and held my head so I had to look. “Oh, no, you’re not going to pass out on me, sweetie. You’re going to see everything I went through after you left me there with him, every little thing he did to me after you left.”

  Gripped with unspeakable revulsion, I began to shake, couldn’t stop until Dottie grabbed my hair.

  I twisted against the ropes, pulling desperately. “Let me go, let me go. You aren’t Thomas; that’s not my mother. You’re sick. You’re talking about your own family, not mine….”

  She slapped me again, so hard I tasted blood at the corner of my mouth. I stopped struggling and hung limply against the ropes. Everything was silent except for the sound of the pouring rain. “It wasn’t so bad when you and your mother were there, but then you had to leave. I thought you were my friend. We used to feed Mr. Twitchy Tail together. Don’t you remember that, Annie? Look, I’ve still got him for us to play with.”

  I watched her pull a dried-up animal carcass out of the freezer and hold it up by its tail. “Don’t you remember how we played with him, and how we laughed and ran through the hose? How I pushed you on that old swing? You were the only friend I ever had, and you left me there with him so he could do awful things to me!”

  Dottie was getting increasingly agitated. “You wanna see what he did to me after you went away? Do you? I want you to see what you did. Then you’ll understand, then you’ll know why I had to kill your friends and make you suffer, too.” Dottie jumped to her feet and jerked open her robe. She was naked underneath, and I groaned and squeezed my eyes shut tight. “Look, Annie, see what he did to me so I could be a woman like he wanted. I was a boy, I was Thomas, and he made me a girl because you went away and left me there with him.”

  “Oh, God, Dottie, stop, stop. I can’t stand to hear this….”

  “So now you remember me? I’m your friend Thomas. I loved you and your mother and her chocolate chip cookies and apple pies, but you left me, you left me alone with him!” Enraged, Dottie jerked the cleaver out of the table and hysterically hacked the squirrel carcass into bits of fur and dried hide. Then she fell to her knees, panting for breath and still clutching the cleaver. I held my breath and could not move.

  When she was calm again, Dottie stood up and looked at me. Blood was running down her arm where she’d cut herself in her frenzy. “After your mother took you away, all I could think about was finding you. I got her first; she was the very first one I did after I killed my father. Did you know that? I hacked him up with a cleaver. Then I followed you and made sure you suffered like I did, and that everybody you ever loved suffered the way I did. And now it’s Harve’s turn, and I hate it, sort of, because he’s a pretty good guy, really. But then again, this time is very special because this time you get to watch.”

  “Please, please, Thomas, I was so little then, I didn’t know,” I pleaded, my voice growing desperate and shrill as she leaned over Harve and raised the cleaver. “I’m begging you, Thomas, please don’t hurt him! He didn’t have anything to do with this, nothing. Do it to me, kill me! I’m the one you hate!”

  At that, Dottie went completely still. She lowered the cleaver, a shocked expression on her face. “I don’t hate you, Annie. I love you. I’ve always loved you. That’s why I never killed you.” She leaned down close and kissed me on the forehead.

  “And I love you, Thomas,” I muttered hoarsely. “I begged my mother not to leave you there. I said you were like my brother and we couldn’t go away without you.” I saw Harve move slightly, and I knew he was coming around. I went on quickly, “I said I wouldn’t leave without you, but she made me. I was little like you were, don’t you see? She made me do things I didn’t want to do, just like your father made you do things you didn’t want to do!”

  Dottie stared at me, affected by my words, and then we both looked toward the window as the low buzz of a motorboat filtered into our hearing. It was close, in the cove below, and when the boat’s air horn began to sound short emergency blasts, Dottie dropped the cleaver on the table and ran up the steps. It was Black or Bud, I knew it, but I didn’t move until I heard Dottie’s footsteps cross to the front door and go outside. Then I put my foot on the table and jabbed at Harve’s shoulder.

  “Harve, Harve, wake up, wake up; we’ve got to get outta here!”

  Harve shook his head, trying to listen to me. It took a few seconds for him to awaken, and I kept yelling at him until he turned his head and looked blearily in my direction.

  “The cleaver’s on the table. Get it, quick, get it, and cut me loose.”

  I groaned when he laid his head back and closed his eyes, but then he tried to sit up. He knocked into the decapitated head, and it fell off the table and shattered the Blue Willow plate.

  “There, Harve, there beside your head; grab it and cut me loose!”

  Groggy from the drug, Harve moved so slowly that I twisted on the ropes, no longer thinking of the pain in my shoulder. When he got hold of the cleaver, I screamed, “Cut me loose, cut me loose!”

  He pushed himself on his side, then raised up enough to slash at the ropes holding my arms. He missed them, chopped at them again, and missed again, and I looked at the door at the top of the steps and tried to lean toward him so he could reach me with the cleaver.

  “Harve, hurry; she’ll be back any minute!” He swung at the ropes again, and they finally gave way, but he lost his balance and fell headfirst off the table. I scrambled to the floor and held out my wrists to him. “Cut through the tape. Quick, quick, hurry!”

  “What’s Dottie doing? Why’d she tie you up?” he said in confusion.

  “Just cut through the tape. Now!” I cried, and he cut through the tape, and I was free. I stuck the cleaver into my belt and grabbed the bat, then stood paralyzed when I heard footsteps running acro
ss the floor upstairs. I backed into the darkness away from Harve, but Dottie ran past the cellar door and into the back of the house. A door slammed somewhere; then I heard her footsteps running to the front door again, and then she was gone. Somebody was coming to help us, but I couldn’t count on them getting her before she got us.

  My shoulder was killing me and bleeding profusely now, and I knew I couldn’t best Dottie in a fight injured the way I was, even with the cleaver. She was too strong, and I also knew we couldn’t escape through the house without running into her. I ran to the coal chute and climbed the concrete incline to the low door with a window. I looked outside, but it was too dark to see anything. It was still pouring, and I turned the latch and shoved the door open. I waited a second, rain stinging my face, cleaver gripped in my hand, waiting for Dottie to see me. But she didn’t come, and I jumped back down and grabbed Harve’s face with both hands.

  “Harve, listen, listen to me. You’ve gotta help me get you up that ramp over there. Can you drag yourself?”

  “What’s going on?…”

  “Just do it, Harve. Can you move?”

  He began to pull himself with his arms, and I put the bat under my arm and got hold of the back of his shirt and dragged him along with all my strength. He was still under the effects of the drug, and every few minutes he’d stop and become deadweight, and I’d prod him and pull him again, until I got him up the ramp and to the edge of the door, and we both dropped out and hit the ground together. I felt the stitches tear loose, and the blood was hot where it ran down my arm, but the back porch light was on, and I could see Dottie down on the path that led to the lake.