The Night She Won Miss America

by Michael Callahan

  Betty glances at the clock hanging in the kitchen. “Almost six.”

  Griff jerks up, rubs his face awake. “Dang! I gotta blow. I’m really late. I need to get the cars swapped if we’re going to get out of here tonight.”

  We’re not going anywhere, Betty thinks.

  “Of course. Is there anything you need to bring with you?”

  He looks up at her. “Yes. You.”

  “Me? That doesn’t seem wise, Griff. It’s one thing to go out after dark; it’s another to risk being seen together during the day.”

  “I’m afraid, Betty. I’m afraid if I go out, you won’t be here when I get back. I’m sorry about before. I just feel like I can’t . . . breathe. It’ll be better when we get to Buffalo. You’ll still come with me, won’t you? You won’t leave me?”

  His face is that of a five-year-old, panicked at his father going off to war. “No, Griff, I won’t leave you alone, I swear,” she says, noting her own parsing and hoping he does not. “I told you I would take care of you, and I am going to do that. I give you my word.”

  Seemingly mollified, he dips his head onto her shoulder. “Okay, then,” he says.

  “Okay, then.”

  When the door to the apartment closes fifteen minutes later, Griff en route to their car and the swap, Betty looks back at the clock. How long before he gets back? It’s hard to say—she has no idea where in the city the exchange of vehicles is happening, if license plates need to be interchanged. But it can’t be less than an hour. Hopefully an hour is all she needs.

  Betty rushes to the telephone, jerks up the receiver, and dials the operator. “Long-distance operator, please,” she commands, counting the interminable seconds until a second nasally voice pipes onto the line. “Yes, I need to make a collect call to the McAllister residence on Amherst Avenue, in Longport, New Jersey.”

  “Who may I say is calling?”

  Betty clears her throat. “Betty.”

  It takes five maddening minutes for the call to be put through. Betty is about to jump out of her own skin when she hears the operator asking for the charges to be accepted by the answering party, hears a tentative feminine “yes” in the distance.

  “Hello? Hello?” Betty practically shouts into the receiver. “Are you there?”

  “Betty? Betty?! Is it really you? Jeepers!”

  Martha, Griff’s sister.

  “Yes, Martha, it’s me. Listen—”

  “Where are you? Are you all right? Is Griff okay? Everyone is just—”

  “Martha, listen! I don’t have much time. You must listen carefully. I need you to get a message to your mother. We’re in New York. She needs to come. I’ll give you the address.”

  A pause. “She already has it.”

  Betty feels her stomach plunge. “She . . . she does? She knows where we are?”

  “Yes. She hired some private investigators to find you. She’s on her way up there right now.”

  Betty takes another glance at the clock. “When did she leave?”

  “I’m not sure—she was gone when I got home a half hour ago. She just left me a note telling me she was going to New York to get Griff and everything was going to be fine and to tell Daddy when he gets home that she’d call him later.”

  So Honor was alone. That was good. Griff would be better if his mother came alone. He does not like his father, does not trust him, rarely speaks of him. But this also means Honor McAllister may be knocking on the apartment door at any moment. There is no time to spare.

  “All right, then. That’s good news.”

  “He didn’t do it, did he? He didn’t really kidnap you? I mean, good golly, he couldn’t do a thing like that. I keep telling all the kids at school that Griff could never do such a thing.”

  How young Martha sounds. She cannot be more than four or five years younger than Betty herself, but it’s a testament to how many years have passed in Betty’s soul these past two weeks. She feels like an old woman inside, already weary of the world. Poor Martha. Another in a long line of Betty’s victims. “No, Martha, he didn’t. Everything is going to be fine.” She can hear the girl’s relief on the other end. “Now I must go. But we’ll be home soon.” They’re about to hang up when a thought zips across Betty’s mind. “Martha, I need you to do something for me. It’s rather important. I need you to get a message to my family in Delaware that I am all right, that we spoke, and that I’ll be home in a day or two and will explain everything. Can you do that for me? I’ll give you the number.”

  Martha dutifully writes it down, swears she will dispatch the task, like a Girl Scout pledging a service oath. Betty puts her finger down in the cradle, waits for a new dial tone. She swings the dial once again, pulls out the piece of paper Eddie gave her. “Yes, I’d like to be connected to the Hotel Chesterfield on Forty-Ninth Street, please.”

  It takes a few minutes before the hotel switchboard patches her through to Eddie’s room. The phone rings. Ring. Ring. Ring. A hotel operator comes back on the line. “I’m sorry, miss, but your party doesn’t seem to be answering. May I take a message for the front desk?”

  “Yes, please,” Betty replies. “Tell Mr. Tate that . . . Miss Betty called. That she’d like him to meet her at this address at his earliest convenience.” She gives Reeve’s address, has the operator read it back to her.

  She hangs up the phone. Honor will come, soothe him, calm him. Perhaps she has medicine with her. Eddie will get her message, arrive and help, organize, protect her from what will surely be Honor’s rightful wrath. Griff will be horribly upset at first, but it will be temporary. In the end, this is what’s best. She knows it.

  Betty bends underneath the daybed, slides out her suitcase, and starts packing.

  Twenty

  “Well. What do we have here?”

  Betty whirls around. How did she not hear Reeve come in? She has been so intent on her packing that she never noticed the advancing shadows of night, his key in the door. He stands in front of her breathing heavily, as if he’s just run down the block. His eyes are glassy, unfocused. As he ambles toward her, the smell intensifies: whiskey, on his breath, oozing out of his pores. She has no idea how much he’s drunk, but she knows it’s a lot.

  “I’m packing,” she replies, trying to stay casual, airy, as if she’s just bumped into the landlady in the hall and shared that she’s off to the washateria. She will be so relieved to be rid of Reeve, to leave New York, to go home and put this mess of her own creation behind her. “Griff is out getting the car. We’re leaving.”

  “Mmm. That’s good.” Reeve walks over slowly and plops down on the daybed, watching her through his haze.

  Fold, smooth, place. Fold, smooth, place. Betty strains not to make eye contact, to focus on her task, and appear carefree as she does it. “I’m sure you’ll be happy to be rid of us. You’ve been very kind to take us in for so long.”

  He tilts his head. “You think so?”

  Betty meets his stare, despite her better instincts. “Of course. It was very generous. We both very much appreciate it.” She tries to will Griff back, wonders how close Honor is to the city. She has spent days in silent panic, flinching at any motion at the door, and now prays for someone to walk through it.

  Fold, smooth, place.

  Reeve slides onto one elbow. “I’m a little drunk.”

  “Tough day?”

  “You might say that. I got fired.”

  She stops folding. “What? Why?”

  “Because they’re sons of bitches, that’s why.” The words are labored but surprisingly clear. He’s neither mildly intoxicated nor falling-down drunk, but rather lolling somewhere in between. “Coming off a toot,” as her mother used to wearily describe her uncle Leonard. The face of her mother again leaps into her consciousness, and Betty is unprepared for the impact. How worried she must have been all of this time. How stupid, how selfish Betty has been.

  Reeve spies her glassy look. “Oh, don’t cry for me, baby,” he says, reaching up with hi
s left hand and lightly brushing her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “I’ll be okay. Ol’ Reeve always knows how to get himself right again.”

  She shakes him off, snaps the lid of the case shut. There’s more to pack—Griff has some clothes hanging in Reeve’s bedroom—but they can wait. Or they can leave them. Betty only wants someone, anyone, to come.

  Why is no one coming?

  Reeve springs up from the daybed, his face suddenly inches from hers. “You sort of owe me, you know,” he says.

  She doesn’t respond, externally at least, even as dread seizes her insides. She wonders if he’s one of those people who can smell others’ fear.

  “I saved you and your sweetie, hid you, gave you a place to sleep, to make love all day . . . And what do I have to show for it? Tell me! Huh? What?”

  It’s foolish to engage. But she’s too scared of what will happen if she doesn’t. Better to keep him talking.

  “You have been very good to us, Reeve, as I said. We appreciate it. We were going to take you to dinner. But now we have to leave sooner than we expected. But I promise, we’ll find a way to properly show our gratitude.”

  He leans closer, whispers in her ear. “I know a way you can show your gratitude. Right now.”

  The breathy malevolence in his voice strikes her like a body blow. Betty turns, grabs her coat from the back of the kitchen chair, swipes her bag off the table. “I need to go out for a bit, buy some things for the trip.”

  Before she can reach the door, Reeve bolts up, blocking her path, surprisingly agile for someone so intoxicated. “I just told you I lost my job today,” he says, his stare accusing, steely. “And now you’re all bad business.”

  Betty is paralyzed.

  “I need to use the bathroom,” is all she says.

  Before she can get to the safety of the locked door of the bathroom, he lunges, grabs her roughly by the arms. “That can wait,” he whispers urgently, and now his mouth is on hers, on her cheek, on her earlobe, on her neck, his lips brittle and chapped, his tongue dry and acrid, slithering around her face and clavicle. She struggles to break free of his grip, but even drunk he is strong, determination turning his hands into vises. “Stop!” Her head thrashes about on her neck, trying to avoid his mouth. “Reeve, let go! You’re hurting me!”

  “No, baby, no, Reeve will make you feel good. So, so good,” he says, pushing her toward the bedroom.

  She forces her body to relax into his hold, feels Reeve’s arms loosen their grip just a bit in response. She even manages a soft moan, as if she’s enjoying this.

  He never sees her elbow coming until it’s already slamming into his rib cage.

  Reeve cries out, his arms instinctively flying to his side as Betty unlocks from his grasp, pushes him out of her path as she flies toward the apartment door.

  He crashes onto his knees, extends his body, and flings his right hand out, catches her ankle and yanks. Off balance, she careens into the chair by the desk, which topples over, sending her tumbling down onto the floor. Her body lands with a bruising thud onto the hardwood; her elbow is bleeding. She writhes around on her stomach, like a rattlesnake escaping a trap, kicking her left leg violently to try to dislodge his grip. But instead he uses the hand he has around her ankle as a pulley, drawing himself closer, until he is on top of her, pinning her stomach to the floor.

  In one muscular swoop, he pulls her up to him by the torso, both of them now on their knees. “Oh, a fighter. I like that. I bet Griff does, too. You want to play, girlie?” he whispers, his breath bitter and sour. “ ’Cause I’m the best player there is.”

  He scrambles to his feet, drags her upward, backing her toward the bedroom once more. He spins her around, falls on top of her on the messy unmade bed, jackknifing his knees between her legs, prying them open, trapping her right arm behind her head as she frantically beats on his chest with her left.

  His movements are precise, almost militaristic. And the thought comes to her.

  He’s done this before.

  She feels the fingers of his right hand spidering up her leg, unhooking her stocking. They continue up their path, marching toward her corselet, probing, insistent. When he thrusts into her with his middle finger, she arches her back in pain.

  Her head explodes in terror and shame so loud that she cannot even hear herself screaming.

  “Get off me! Get . . . off . . . me! No! No! Don’t!!!”

  With her free hand, she claws at him with all of her remaining strength. She manages to poke him right in the eye.

  He yells out in pain, relaxes his body for a moment, and in the few seconds she’s bought, Betty manages to wriggle out from underneath him. But just as her feet hit the bedroom floor, he pulls her back violently onto the bed. His voice is low, dripping with evil. “A real spitfire, ain’t you? Miss America! Ha! You want Griff, do you, baby? You want good ole, sensitive, happy Griff? You’re a dope, you know that? ’Cause you know who can’t ever be right again? Griff. Griff has some serious problems there, cookie. As crooked as a corkscrew, that one. You think you’re the first girl he’s got all moony? Ask him about Helen Stevens. She was cuckoo for him, too. Ask him what happened to her.”

  His lips clamp back down roughly on hers, and she tries to bite him, but he is too strong, deceptively strong for a man so lean and angular, and as Betty thrashes around, he seems to almost anticipate her choreography, to be one step ahead, to have his cracked lips ready to cover hers at any angle. She hears the zipper of his pants almost as if the sound were coming from afar, somewhere in the distance, not here, on top of her, and she feels his thickness pressed against her—insistent, monstrous—and in the few seconds where she is able to speak, she begs him not to do this, begs him to stop, begs and protests and screams, speaking softly, then screaming in hysteria, but she’s trapped, immobilized. She cannot prevent this from happening, and it is this, the knowing what is coming, the knowing that she is helpless and alone and that he is going to take what he wants, and that she will live with the damage from it for the rest of her life, that sends the gasps and gulping sobs choking inside her throat, the tears running like rivulets down her inflamed cheeks.

  And then he cries out, in a voice she at first mistakes for passionate release. But when she dares to open her eyes again to look at his face, poised above hers, she sees his eyes rolling, like a penny circling down the drain, and she feels his body slack, his arms going limp, and as she seizes the opportunity to push him away, slide from underneath him, his body slumps off the bed, crumpling into a heap on the bedroom floor.

  And that is when Betty realizes that there is blood on her arm, and on her dress, and a trail, brown-red like dark Georgia clay, leading to the floor, where it has begun to pool around Reeve’s head. And then she screams.

  There is a gaping wound on the side of his head, the blood oozing out, matting his hair, funneling into his ear canal. But his eyes remain open, unblinking.

  She hears a heavy object clunk onto the bedroom floor, sees the heavy glass ashtray, now covered in Reeve’s blood and lying a few feet away from his body. Griff stands before her, reaches down for her, pulls her to him. His right hand is also covered in his friend’s blood, which smears the back of her dress as she folds herself into his embrace. And then the room is suddenly quiet, so very, very quiet, and the only thing Betty can hear is the collective heaving of their mutual breathing, staggered and furious. Her body shudders violently, erupting in spasms, as if an Arctic chill has just whistled through the window. She can’t catch her breath. Griff kisses her temple, draws her tighter into his arms.

  “It’s okay, honey, it’s okay. It’s all over now,” he finally whispers, and she does not believe him, for she knows it is not over.

  It is only just beginning.

  I’m in a nightmare.

  ༶

  Griff escorts her shaking form into the living room, washes his hands in the sink, reaches for the suitcase and places it by the door. He pours her a glass of bourbon, hands it t
o her. “Here, sip this. Stay out of the bedroom,” he commands. “I just have to get a few things in the closet and then we can leave.”

  Betty grabs him. “What do you mean? Griff, we can’t go anywhere. We must call the police!”

  He looks at her as though she’s just suggested that they jump from the roof. “Police! Police? Are you mad? Betty, there’s a dead man in the next room! A man I killed! They’ll lock me away forever!”

  “No, my darling, they won’t! You were defending me. They’ll understand. I’ll explain everything, about how Reeve attacked me and you came in and saved my life. Everyone will know you did it to protect me.”

  Griff handles her roughly by the arm, shoves her down onto the daybed before kneeling before her. His brow sweats. There’s a petrified glaze over his eyes. “Betty, listen to me. They already think I kidnapped you—”

  “But that’s not tr—”

  “Betty! Please! Listen to me! You have to listen to me. They are never going to believe us. They will insist I took you, I hid you. They’ll say Reeve was blackmailing me, threatening to go to the police or the press and expose us, so I killed him. That’s the story they’re going to believe, because that’s the story that fits. They won’t care about what truly happened. They’ll turn you against me.”

  “I could never turn against you.”

  His face turns hard, as if he’s just been told very bad news. “That’s not true. You already have.”

  Her heart nearly stops. Eddie. Does he know? Does he know she called home?

  Betty searches his eyes for clues. Nothing. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Yes, you do. They’ve told me you do. They’ve told me all along that I couldn’t trust you. But I did, because I loved you.”

  “Griff, what are you talking about? Who is telling you such things? I do love you! More than anything! Which is why we have to go to the police, to explain everything. This has to stop!” She grabs his arms, tries to break through. “Please, Griff, I’m begging you!”

  She starts to get up from the daybed, reaches for the phone, but he pulls her back down, shaking her. “I’m not going back, do you hear me? We can’t go back now. I’ve just committed murder.”