by Various
She ripped open the card on the second bouquet and saw that it was from none other than Tom Valentine. Her heart beat a bit faster and she read this note several times.
“To Sally Jean.
My silly Southern Belle.
Yours, Tom Valentine.”
She was so interested in this note, in the nuances of meaning just beyond the surface—was the fact that he signed his full name a good sign or a bad one?—that she nearly forgot about the third card. Could it possibly be from Tom too? She tore it open and recoiled at what she read. “My Sally Jean. I’m waiting for you, waiting for you to be mine. Eternally Yours, Brett.” Brett! She had forgotten about him almost entirely; did he still live in New York? How completely disgusting! She ripped his card into tiny pieces, and, feeling like her dressing room had been contaminated, hurried into her clothes and left without putting any of the flowers in water.
She raced over to Ardita’s dressing room and was about to burst in when she heard low voices through the door. She paused a moment, deciding, and then bent down to fiddle with her shoe strap.
“I have to go Tom, and I know you don’t like it, but it’s just the way things are.”
“Not tonight, please Ardita. Just once, please, do what I want!” His voice was loud.
Soon after, Sally Jean heard something crash against a wall inside, something heavy like an ashtray, and she hustled away from the door. Bernard was in the hallway coming toward her, a bunch of small roses in his hand.
“Why hi, Bernard,” said Sally Jean, casual as could be.
“I . . . well, these are for you Sally Jean.” He held the flowers out awkwardly as if they were in some running race together and he was passing her the baton.
“You don’t say? I wonder who they’re from. There’s no card.”
She buried her face in them.
“Oh they’re those roses that don’t smell,” she said, disappointed.
“Actually, I . . . they’re from me Sally Jean.”
Before she could reply, she heard Tom Valentine exit Ardita’s dressing room and come toward them. She turned.
“Tom, I was just looking for you!” she said, her voice bright and happy. “I’m hungry as a tiger; won’t you please take pity on me and escort me to some supper?”
“Sure, Sally Jean,” he said, sounding half-hearted, and then, oblivious to the martini juggler’s stricken face, added “You have a good evening Bernard.”
And she tucked her arm through his and they exited down the hall, leaving the unhappy juggler in their wake.
Tom was quiet all through supper and Sally Jean was at her wit’s end trying to get his attention. She tried to talk about the day’s newspaper, but since she had only caught a glimpse over someone’s shoulder backstage, she was limited to headlines and the day’s weather, which by this point in the night wasn’t particularly newsworthy. She moved on to talk of her childhood, a subject that usually amused and comforted Tom, but this too proved futile. She wracked her brain and found it empty as the trees outside.
“I’m not sure about this whole winter arrangement,” she tried brightly. “It was fun when it was coming, but now that it’s here it’s so, I don’t know, cold and endless.”
Tom nodded and returned to his dinner.
“I don’t like seeing my breath rise up in the air like a spirit. I don’t like gray skies and I don’t like dead trees. I don’t like dead things,” she said enthusiastically.
“Me neither,” he agreed, looking at her full in the face for the first time that evening. “I don’t care for them one bit.” And then, leaning encouragingly close, “You’re wearing Ardita’s perfume, aren’t you?”
“Oh, does she wear this too? I didn’t know,” she lied.
And then dessert came and Sally Jean ate it with enthusiasm, trying to keep the momentum going. But Tom was a million miles away, tired and spent, and soon Sally Jean retreated into herself, trying to figure out what was wrong. She lacked something. Clearly she lacked something that Ardita had in spades. What was it? Ardita was beautiful, but so was she, in her different, softer way. Ardita was a terrific dancer, but hadn’t Mr. Whiskers told her how well she was doing? And hadn’t she received three bouquets—four, if you counted the roses from Bernard—that very night? What was it? Sally Jean licked the whipped cream from the back of her fork. Well, she’d just have to figure it out and beat Ardita at her own game. Sally Jean wiped the corners of her mouth with her napkin and folded it resolutely on her lap.
For the next week the question of Ardita was all Sally Jean could think of. She had taken hold of this thought like a pitbull with a rat, and she wrestled it constantly, unable to relax the jaws of her mind. And then one night during the Egyptian number Sally Jean looked over at Ardita and caught that mystery that had flickered in those blue and green eyes. She understood what Ardita had, what she was. Ardita was sad. Sally Jean’s smile grew and she kicked her legs higher. All she had to do was cultivate melancholy.
And so she tried. She walked around the gloomy city, past beggars and one-legged women. She stared up at the gray sky and thought of dead people, kittens with broken necks, and losing her looks. She thought of everything in the world that could possibly depress her. She thought of Brett, but that didn’t do any good. She only felt pity and even that was eclipsed by disgust. She thought of her long dead grandmother, but that didn’t work either. She thought of Peony, and that was the closest she came, but mostly what she felt was jealousy that her younger sister might be riding her at that very moment.
Giving up on actual emotion, Sally Jean set about affecting sadness. When Tom asked her what she was doing one evening, she smiled a closed lip smile and sighed.
“I’ll go wherever the wind blows me, I figure.”
“Well, a gang of us are heading over to Silveri’s for steaks. Want in?”
“No, I don’t guess so,” she said mournfully.
And when he said, “Suit yourself. You’ll be missed,” she could have kicked herself.
“I guess I could probably be persuaded,” she amended, skipping after him down the hall. “I can’t promise I’ll be much entertainment though. I’m feeling awful blue for no particular reason.”
And then she forgot all about being blue and ended up dancing on the table while Ardita clapped and laughed her church bell laugh.
* * *
Weeks passed and spring began to taunt New York, playing peek-a-boo with crocuses that then were frostbit and warm mornings that turned ugly before a girl could fetch her overcoat. Sally Jean saw a lot of Tom Valentine, more than Ardita saw of him. She felt that just one good night could make him hers forever. When he was in the audience, she could see that he was watching her for most of the show. She kept him in her gaze and counted the number of times his eyes flicked toward Ardita, using the glances as a measure of her battle.
One night, looking out into the crowd, she saw a familiar man. She saw the feathered hat and her heart went right into her slippers: Brett Blakely sitting all alone, staring at her with those cold gray eyes. As soon as the curtain fell, she ran back to Ardita’s dressing room and threw herself on the settee waiting for her to return. When Ardita came in, Tom Valentine was right behind her.
“You have to help me!” Sally Jean shrieked. “He’s come! That dreaded old fiancé of mine was here tonight and I’m sure he’s out there waiting, waiting to—”
“Calm down,” said Tom, sitting beside her. “You stick with us, right, Ardita?”
Mr. Whiskers opened the door without knocking and just looked at Ardita. She grabbed her black pajamas and was heading toward the door before he had to say a word.
“Oh, dolls, I’ve got to run!” she said. “There’s someone that I have to . . . deal with.”
Tom’s nostrils flared, and Sally Jean felt frustrated that he was still stuck on Ardita when clearly she carried on with a number of men.
“Tom’ll take care of you, won’t you Tom?”
“If it’
s not too much to ask, Tom, I’d be so grateful.”
“Ask me for the world, Sally Jean. Nothing’s too much for you.”
He put his fingers under her chin and kissed her on the lips, right there in front of Ardita.
Ardita left and Sally Jean was left alone with Tom. This was good, this was very good, but Sally Jean still couldn’t relax. She felt like she had to seal the deal. She wanted Tom to see Ardita with her clandestine lover and have it imprinted in his mind that Sally Jean was the only girl for him.
“Let’s go out!” she suggested.
“Aren’t you afraid of that old fiancé of yours?” asked Tom.
“Not with your arm around me,” she insisted.
And so they went out into the damp and foggy night. They managed to exit the theater without encountering Brett, and Sally Jean led them uptown, hurrying along the street after Ardita’s shadow. To explain their pace, Sally Jean claimed she was afraid it would rain and spoil her hair.
“Also I just feeling like moving fast,” she said. “Know what I mean?”
“Are you hungry Sally Jean?”
“Not yet. I just feel like walking.”
Ardita crossed the street a few blocks up and Sally Jean followed, keeping Tom in distracted conversation.
“I didn’t know you followed baseball, Sally Jean.”
“Why sure I do. I think it’s terribly fascinating, Babe Ruth and all. Don’t you? All those uniforms and rules and men running hither and thither.”
Ardita was heading toward Central Park. Sally Jean and Tom followed. The wet grass licked at their ankles and shadows leaked from the dark trees like slicks of gasoline. There was something frightening about this strange island of nature surrounded by stone. The birds that called were haunted and the wind whispered Sally Jean’s name in the air. But still she tugged Tom along, determined to end this, once and for all. Somewhere around the boat house, Sally Jean lost sight of Ardita and their pace slowed.
“Why are we here, Miss Sally Jean?” asked Tom. “Are you going to put the moves on me?”
Sally Jean laughed lightly and then changed tack. “I don’t know, it’s just so beautiful and melancholy here.”
“And dark as hell.”
Where had she gone? Sally Jean was sure Ardita was around somewhere with her mysterious lover. She didn’t want to give up yet. She scanned the horizon. Only darkness, shadows, black like the bottom of a well.
And then the darkness took the form of dark figures. Was this the assignation? Then the figures distilled into the outline of three large men walking directly toward them. Sally Jean’s breath turned sharp and Tom pulled her closer.
“You know, let’s get lost, Sally Jean. Walk fast.”
She did as he told her, but the men kept coming, half-running toward them. Sally Jean and Tom began to run, jumping across paths, heading toward the street. She was running in earnest now, fast as she ever had. A heel broke from her shoe and stuck in a puddle of mud and she continued to run, her eyes peeled open with terror. But there was no escaping. The men hurtled toward them like three loose train cars on a steep grade. Faster and faster they came, thrashing through the underbrush, until Sally Jean and Tom were surrounded. Sally Jean looked up and what she saw terrified her. They weren’t men at all; they were monsters.
Their faces were warped and scalded as if they’d been burnt in a gas fire; their upper lips pulled back like snarling dogs’, and the teeth that filled them were sickening, yellow, sharp as sabers. And their eyes: hollow, yellow and shining, and no pupils—just slivers like a snake’s. Inside these eyes was death.
Sally thought she would be sick and then thought she would scream. But she didn’t and she couldn’t. She just stared. One of the creatures was talking to them. Its voice was like a poison let loose from hell, sharp and searing.
“Looking for us?” it said.
“No, we’re just—,” Tom began.
“We’re not talking to you.”
Their soulless eyes were fixed on Sally Jean.
“I’m not . . . I think you’re mistaken,” she squeaked. “I’m just Sally Jean.”
The creatures came closer, as if fascinated by her.
“You can’t pretend; we know your smell.”
The words disgusted her, and again she thought she was going to be sick.
“It’s nice to look at you,” one of the creatures said, coming closer still. “I’ve never seen the Slayer up close. You look so soft. So tender.”
“Stay away from her!” shouted Tom, finally finding his voice and stepping in front of Sally Jean protectively.
“Move,” one of them said, and the moon went behind a cloud.
“And if I won’t?”
In an instant, one of the creatures leaped at Tom, swiping at him with one arm. Sally Jean saw a flash of the monsters’ claws. Red on Tom’s cheek. And then he was on his back. Unconscious.
“You will.”
Sally Jean closed her eyes then and, for the first time since she was a little girl, started to pray. She was going to be killed, she was sure of it. What would her parents think?
“What’s going on?”
Sally Jean opened her eyes and saw the most wonderful thing in the whole crazy world. Brett Blakely.
“Brett,” she cried and ran toward him, throwing herself into his arms.
He looked at her with love in his gray eyes.
“Sally Jean,” he said and his voice was so calm and safe. He looked right at the creatures and didn’t balk or even shiver. Sally Jean let him hold her tight, pulled him closer. She was astonished by his bravery; maybe she had misjudged him. She looked up into his face for comfort. There he was, good old Brett Blakely from Asheville who drove an old Model T and wore a feathered hat and wanted to marry her. And then his face began to melt.
Right before her eyes he transformed, his features dissolved, wrinkling in on themselves until he had the same scalded skin, the same wolf mouth, and the same horrible snake eyes as the others. She tugged away from him, but his arms were stronger than they had ever been. He laughed at her struggle and, with one hand, tore the top of her dress, exposing her neck.
He addressed the other creatures. “This one was mine. You knew that.” And then to Sally Jean, with his fangs at her neck, “Mine eternally.”
And then something was upon them, a black cloud knocking them back, bringing them to the still-frozen earth. The rest came in flashes, moments of luminescence separate but strung together like pearls—like black and white pearls. Ardita in black silk with a wooden sword in hand. The white moon breaking from beneath a blue cloud. Ardita atop Brett’s prostrate body, outlined by the moon, stabbing him in the chest. Dust. Dust blowing in the wind. The monsters on Ardita, all atop her. A flare of teeth. The wooden sword. A bird calling, calling. Dust in the air, like stars, like a galaxy. The moon like an orange, dust like bubbles in champagne. A monster arm in arm with Ardita like they were dancing, like he was a count. And then more dust, raining over her like ashes from the dead. And nobody left. Just Ardita’s eyes, blue and green like black and white like pearls and bubbles and oranges.
The next thing she knew, she was sitting in Tom’s parlor in front of a roaring fire. She didn’t know how long she had been sitting there, but she knew that Ardita had been there and now Ardita had gone and Tom was holding ice wrapped in a towel to his head. They were silent for a long time. Sally Jean didn’t know where to begin: the monsters, Brett, Ardita. The fire warmed her body, but her mind still felt frozen and her heart felt cold.
“Who is she?” she heard herself ask, on the verge of tears.
Tom looked into the fire and touched the swelling claw marks on his cheek.
“She’s Ardita O’Reilly, just like she says. She’s a girl. A girl who also . . . I’ve known her a long time.” He lit a cigarette and then threw it into the fire. Sally Jean saw tears thicken his eyes. “She’s a girl,” he continued, “who was chosen to fight a war.”
And Sally Jean listened q
uietly as he told her about vampires and how they were everywhere, how they thrived in the dark corners of life. He explained how they could be killed and how Ardita had been trained for years by Mr. Whiskers to know how to do it. He told her how someday Ardita would die in the battle against this evil. And yet she kept doing it. She went out, every night, into the dark where monsters waited to kill her. And she did it knowing that she would die.
“I thought she was a flapper,” Sally Jean said weakly, unable to express anything bigger. She had known, somehow, that Ardita was something else. She wasn’t careless and wild and decadent like the others; she had a purpose. Sally Jean didn’t want to be a flapper anymore and she didn’t want to be like Ardita either. She began to cry. The tears flowed from her eyes like water from a well-primed pump. Tom moved toward her and put his arm around her, holding her tighter and tighter as the tears continued to come. He kissed her face and she kissed his and they held each other there in a salty sad embrace.
“Do you love her?” she asked through her tears.
He didn’t answer.
“Do you love me, Tom?”
“Yes,” he said, kissing the tears from her eyes.
“Do you chose me?” she asked. “Do you chose me?” He nodded and her tears slowed into jerking sobs.
“It’s going to be okay,” he told her, and she saw that he was crying too.
“It’s going to be okay, it’s going to be okay,” she repeated. “We’re going to be together, aren’t we?”
He nodded and smoothed her hair.
“Forever and ever?”
He nodded again and smiled at her. “Forever and ever.”
And his eyes filled again with tears.
“And we can get married and go back to Charleston and Peony can wear a garland of flowers?”