He still had two hours to kill at Chez Tigress. Where the girls were younger, though no more beautiful than Jezebel.
And the bartender never failed to drop the sprig of mint into his Irish, whatta guy.
Four
The wind outside the window rustled a mass of green bushy hydrangea leaves against the window pane. The woman in the bed turned off the radio and listened, decided what made the noise, and spent some time looking at her empty water glass.
“Son? I hate to bother you, Son, but could you refill my water pitcher?” Her voice was high and a little breathless as she called out from the back bedroom of the house.
Son squeezed shut his eyes. He reached up and massaged his temples before raking his hand down over his face. His lips silently mimicked his mother's words. Son? Fill my water pitcher? Will you, Son? Being a gifted mimic, his voice would have sounded almost identical to his mother's had he been speaking out loud.
He swiveled the office chair around from the computer at his desk, and stood up. “I'm coming, Mother.” I'm coming, I'm coming, he breathed into the dimly lighted room, looking around, orienting himself so that his anger might leak out enough to allow him to pass inspection when he went to her assistance.
The hallway that led to the bedroom was dark. If he wasn't so damn economical, he'd turn on a light. That's what he was thinking just as he stumbled on a fold in the carpet runner. He cursed beneath his breath, halted and waited, counting backwards from ten. Nine, eight, seven, six . . . He stooped and felt for the fold, smoothed it flat, his exasperation growing. I will not turn on a light.
She was lying propped up like a duchess in her four-poster bed, all those lacy and crocheted pillows at her scrawny back. There must be a dozen. That's how she spent her bedridden days—sewing, crocheting, piling her bed with the efforts of her nimble fingers, the only part of her that still worked without giving her pain. The pillows were ugly. They were useless. And the thread cost him too much money.
She smiled when he entered the room. Son tried to smile back, but he wasn't a smiler. His mouth didn't work well when people watched him. He hoped there was warmth in his eyes. If she picked up on his resentment, she'd run her little game of martyrdom on him. Next time she wouldn't call when she had to go to the bathroom until it was nearly too late, and she might accidentally wet her gown. She had done it before, by God. Then he'd have to help her change. Bring a fresh nightgown to the bathroom, stand outside to walk her back to bed. Why didn't she let him get things done on time? Why did she always wait until there was a skim on the water or her bladder was full to bursting? Didn't she know that only made him feel worse than if she'd asked for his help when it was really needed?
“I'm sorry to call you away from your work, Son. But this water . . . it's been here since yesterday and . . . well, there's a coat of dust on the top of it.”
“I should have changed it before now. It's my fault.” He gripped the thick glass handle of the pitcher and was about to turn. Glancing down at the water, he saw there was indeed a film topping the water level. Dust, just as she said. He hated dust. It was time he thoroughly cleaned her room again. Wasn't it just three days ago that he . . .?
“It's not your fault,” she said. “I'm too much trouble. I think we should hire someone to help, Son. It's not fair you have to do so much work because of me.”
“No strangers in the house!”
He clamped his mouth shut and swallowed hard. His eyes had flashed, and he could see by the surprised look on his mother's face that she had seen it.
“I didn't mean . . .” she began.
“No, Mother, it's all right. I just don't think hired help would be worth it. You know what it's like with other people around. I can't work. I can't concentrate. That one girl we tried, remember how sloppy she was? I found empty potato chip bags beneath your bed. I didn't tell you that, did I? You thought it was because she took naps, but she was a pig, Mother. And she never wiped the sink when she washed her hands.” He did turn from her now, renewed anger creeping into his face at the thought of the day nurse he had let into the house to care for his mother's needs. Slob. Take the money and run. “Besides,” he said, passing from the room to the hall. “I don't mind doing for you. You know that.”
He thought he heard her sigh. He steered the hallway by moving toward the light coming from the kitchen. The air was fresher here outside Mother's room. Her ancient flesh was ripening, filling his nostrils with an undeniable stench of decay.
He mustn't think that way. He must go to the kitchen sink. Clean the pitcher. Fill it with ice and tap water. Wouldn't take long. It wasn't that bad, the chores he was forced to do for his mother. They were just endless. Not difficult or beyond his abilities. He cooked for her, he cleaned, he washed her clothes and ironed them, even her sheets and pillowcases. She had to have someone do it, and he'd be damned if he'd let her think he couldn't measure up to the task. He was her son. Her last remaining relative. She was eighty-two. He had been a child produced in her midlife, planned and wanted and loved. He knew she loved him. How could he not do his duty when she was now old and sick and helpless? What son could turn his back on his own mother?
The ice trays fought him. He ran water over them and cracked them into the sink, the clacking sounds grating on his ears. Finally they gave up their bounty and he filled the empty pitcher to the top.
He carried the water back to his mother's bedroom. She was tired, dozing. Her eyelids raised slowly as he came into the room. Her old gray orbs were shiny and filmy as the water had been, yet she followed his movements. She always said he was like a cat burglar, that sometimes she didn't know he was in the room when she was asleep. Son took that as criticism and snapped back, “Should I knock first before I enter then?” She had given him that hurt look and turned away her face. She had said no, that's not what she meant. She never said what she meant, it seemed to him. She was always skirting around the issues, confusing the meanings. How was he supposed to read her mind?
“Your water,” he said. “Shall I pour a glass for you?”
She shook her head. “I can do it.” She groaned, trying to lean near the bedside table to reach the glass.
“Let me, Mother. If you'd let me do things for you, it would be easier for both of us. I don't mind, really.” He filled the glass and handed it to her waiting hand. She drank as if she had come from a week's walk in the desert.
That burned him up. She had gone without water because it was scummy; he had been remiss in his duties. She had been without a drink so long she was parched and she never called him. Goddamnit, why did she do that anyway? He could throttle her sometimes. She was long-suffering and making a fool of him.
“Are you hungry?” He looked at the Timex on his wrist. Eight o'clock. He had fed her dinner, hadn't he? He brought his hand up to his temple, trying to think. Surely he'd given her something to eat. He had taken a bologna and cheese sandwich to his computer around six. He ate while he worked. But before that, he had brought her . . .
“I'm not hungry, Son. The soup was delicious. I was just a little thirsty. Thank you. You're a good boy.”
Her lips were wet from the water, glistening, catching the rose light from the lamp with the frilly flowered shade. It looked for just a second to him like blood on her mouth.
Crazy. She was driving him crazy and didn't even know it. At least he had brought her dinner. He remembered now. The chicken-vegetable soup. That was good for an old woman, wasn't it? He probably should have made a green salad, too. He was not a good boy.
“Then I'll go back to work. Anything else you need while I'm here?”
She reached out a thin, blue-veined hand and shook her head. He took her old thin fingers into his cupped palms. Her skin was cool and dry. He wondered if her heart was pumping the way it should. Her extremities were always so cold. He'd bet ten bucks her feet beneath the two quilts were icy as a mountain stream. She had a weak heart. A diseased heart. Too old and feeble for the surgeons to operate. She took
medicine that kept her alive, kept the battered, broken, tired old organ beating. For how long? Oh God, for how long would he have to be her nursemaid?
“You go,” she said, withdrawing her hand from his. “I'll be asleep in minutes. I'll listen to the talk shows on the radio a while.”
He nodded, reached for the on knob of the radio before she could make the move. He adjusted the volume, leaned to kiss his mother's papery cheek, and left her alone.
Maybe he should install an intercom in the house, he thought, making his way through the rooms to his study. Or at least give her a bell she could pick up and ring. She didn't like calling out for him. She hated imposing on his time. She was so sweet. So good. So . . .
She was so awful, weighing a hundred and four pounds, nothing but bones in a sack of sagging skin, not enough energy anymore to get up from bed and go to the toilet alone. Soon she wouldn't be able to wash herself. Or make it down the hall to the bathroom. Then there would be bedpans and maybe IVs and piss bags hanging off the side of the bed. There might be baby food jars and protein-supplement powders to mix, and hours where he couldn't leave her alone.
He found himself standing in the middle of the study staring at the blue screen of his computer, his hands clenched, his brow dimpled with sweat.
“I'll listen to the talk shows,” he mimicked, his voice low and frail and feminine. As if that was news to him. She always listened to the talk shows. Strangers' voices, her best, most dependable companions.
He stared fiercely at the computer screen. How could he work anymore when she interrupted him this way? How could he be expected to create a puzzle for his amateur sleuth to solve when he never had a block of time to himself where he could think? The publisher wanted this book, the fifth in the Eddie Lapin series, by September. He had exactly one chapter written and it was June already.
He sat down in the swivel chair and faced the screen, his hands positioned on the keyboard. Chapter Two headed the page. What came next? Below the chapter heading the cursor blinked, blinked. Waited. Blinking. True, he needed something to copy. So far he had just reintroduced Eddie and established the setting. He had not yet brought in the dead body and the suspects. No one knew or noticed—not his agent, his editor, or his small, but dedicated following of readers—but every one of his books were stolen works. He had a whole wall of old novels from which to choose his plots and characters. He carefully changed enough so that his work would be hard to recognize as being plagiarized from other works in print, but they were nothing more than rehashed, updated stories from books that were published in the thirties and forties. Books by authors long dead, authors no one had ever heard of or remembered.
He was just about to pull down one of those dusty old mysteries when Mother had called for water.
Now he wasn't in the mood, wasn't in the mood at all. She had destroyed his concentration completely. Not meaning to. She was thirsty. He shouldn't blame her. She was sick, she was old, she was incapable of walking to the kitchen without help. She was his mother.
But she still managed to screw up his days and nights just as if she were a badgering, hateful, spiteful old thing pulling him down. To hell with didn't mean to. Fuck didn't mean to and couldn't help it.
He pushed away from the computer desk and found that day's newspaper where he had dropped it that morning on the library table in the center of the room. He unfolded it, turned to the page where they carried the police reports. His pulse rate stepped up. He could feel the blood racing noisily in his head.
One breaking and entering.
A brawl and shooting at a bar.
Reported rapist loose in Southwest Houston.
His blood slowed. His breathing took on an even, easy rhythm. No serial killings yet.
It wasn't time. The killer, whoever he was, would come. In a city as big as Houston there was always one at work somewhere. He just had to wait, had to notice the pattern. He liked to get in on it before the police or the media picked up on the fact they had a serial killer on their hands. He very much liked being in on the ground floor.
That smile he didn't think he had in him wound its way from his dark interior to his lips and transformed Son's round, dour face into that of a cherub. Every mother would have loved him had she witnessed that genuine, sweet smile.
Five
Charlene wouldn't let Kay go. “Can I call you sometimes? You'll have a phone, won't you? Will you come to visit me? If I get out soon, can I come see you?”
Kay felt guilty. She liked Charlene, believed whether it was true or not, that it was Charlene who had saved her from a lifetime in that shadowy world where she had walked with ghosts. Now she was leaving the state mental ward and Charlene had to stay behind. The reality of it caused Kay to pinch the top of her nose to keep from crying.
She asked Dr Shawn if she could take Charlene from the hospital, be responsible for her. But he said no, that was too much of a burden; she would need all her resources to survive out in the world. Besides, he said, Charlene Brewster wasn't ready. Maybe she would be in another month or so, but not yet. She was periodically set free, but invariably returned to Marion State when life got too rough out on the streets.
“I'm going back to Houston,” Kay said to Charlene. “I don't know if I can visit that often.”
“Oh hon, I know how hard it's going to be, I shouldn't have even asked, but I'm gonna miss you, and if I could just call once in a while . . .”
It occurred to Kay that once on her feet she could then help Charlene, repay part of the debt she owed her. “When I get a place, and when they let you out, you come down to Houston, and well stay together.”
“You mean it? You really mean it? Honest to God and cross your heart, you mean it? I'd have a place to stay and everything? I can cook, you know. I can cook real good. And I could clean up and wash the clothes and do anything you wanted me to do.” Excitement at the prospect heightened Charlene's color from pale ivory to blushing pink. She jiggled on the balls of her feet as if she were about ready to sprint across the room whooping out the news. “I've never had a roommate before. Not even a real friend. I could be a good friend, Shadow, you know I could, you know I was your friend here. I wouldn't get in your way and I'd never fight with you. . .”
This litany would have gone on had Kay not stepped forward and put her arms around the other woman to stem the flow. “I know, I know,” she murmured. “Don't worry, you're going to be all right here. And I'll find us a place. You work hard and be good and I'll do the rest.”
Charlene stepped back from the embrace, her facial tics easing, her nervousness falling away from her like a caul pulled free. “You're the best person I ever knew,” she said. “I don't think I ever knew anybody good as you.”
Kay smiled. “That's not true, Charlene, but I'm glad you think it anyway. We're going to be great partners, wait and see.”
In the car with Dr Shawn on the way to the bus station, ticket clutched tightly in hand, Kay watched the hospital grounds slide past the windows. She had felt so confident when she talked with Charlene about the future. Now facing the reality of that future made her uneasy.
“I don't know how to be a maid,” she said, blurting out her anxiety. “I'm scared of being on my own.”
“Now, now, don't panic, Kay. I've talked with the manager of the best maid service Houston offers, and she's promised you a job. You're going to do fine, just fine.”
But a maid, Kay thought. What sort of job was that? Yes, it would pay a little more than the minimum-wage jobs she might find on her own, and she wasn't too good to clean someone else's house, that wasn't it. She just feared the prospect of this new life that had dropped her so suddenly toward the bottom of the social scale. How should she behave? What if the people didn't like her or they found out she'd been in Marion for over a year? She had offered a home to Charlene. Somehow she'd have to live up to that promise. She would find some way to survive.
Once the doctor drove them off the hospital grounds, a bright, buoyan
t confidence took over where she had just been entertaining thoughts of failure. She straightened in the seat and when Dr Shawn looked over at her, she smiled. She sure didn't want to waste another year of her life. She would let the hospital help her find work, and make her plans as she got back on her feet. She could use the money to have her hair styled. She could join a health club, get herself into shape. She wouldn't have to remain a maid all her life. Was she too old for dancing? She glanced surreptitiously at her reflection in the car's side mirror. She looked younger than her true age.
She looked sallow, too, and a little haunted. Frightened. She'd have to lose that look.
“I'll do all right,” she said, breaking into the doctor's reverie. “The important thing is to get myself together.”
“That's right, Kay. That's what I wanted to hear. You're a capable young woman. Your life isn't over.”
She wanted to argue that point, but chose not to. It was men who continued to ruin her. They deceived, betrayed, and murdered her love and her children. As soon as she was on her own in Houston she meant to call her mother-in-law in New Orleans. Scott, in ten years of marriage, had never taken her to visit the woman. His father was dead, and he was an only child, so she thought it extremely odd they never went to see his mother.
It wasn't that far to New Orleans from Houston. She suggested they go there on vacation or at Christmas, but he always managed to lure her elsewhere. Canyon Lake and a camping trip in the hill country of Texas. Canoeing down the rapids of New Braunfels. Once they went to Disney World in Orlando. But never to see his mother. All she had known of the woman was the infrequent telephone calls that came once every two or three years. And then Scott spoke to his mother in grave tones, carrying the extension phone with him into the bedroom for privacy. Mrs Mandel had never seen her own grandchildren. Had she been at the funerals? Had anyone attended them?
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