by Rik Hunik
nearly as smart as he thought when he took this room. He had to get out right away.
He found his clothes and got into them as fast as he could. His underwear went on inside out but he didn’t waste time trying to change them around. According to the old joke, this was the way he was supposed to wear them on the second day. Or was it the third?
Dwight was tying his shoes when there came a knock at the door. He froze.
Half a minute later the knock was repeated, louder this time, and Dwight’s heart leaped in his chest when the doorknob rattled because he wasn’t sure he had locked the door, but it stayed closed.
“Hello? I can see the light. Are you in there, princess?”
Slowly, carefully, moving as quietly as he could, Dwight put on his jacket and crept to the back window. It was wet and cold out there in the dark and the black water of the lake looked very close.
Another knock at the door, not sounding very hopeful this time.
He’ll probably get the manager now, Dwight thought as he dropped out of the window. He landed without a sound but his feet sank into the soft turf. He started toward the near end of the building but instinct, or perhaps a sound, warned him so he turned around and hurried to a small bush about twenty feet away.
Somebody came around the back corner of the building just as Dwight dropped to the wet grass behind the bush. The water instantly soaked through his dark jeans but he ignored his discomfort while he watched the man go to the window, look around, then climb in.
The stranger hadn’t seen him in his black jacket but Dwight felt very exposed on the shore and couldn’t lie still. His heart thumping in his chest, he crept to the building and crawled under the open window. The man’s angry voice came out.
“How could you screw the wrong guy? Couldn’t you tell he wasn’t right?”
“How could I tell?” the woman replied, just as angry. Apparently Dwight had not killed her. “This was my first time topside and I never saw you before. He fit the description I was given.”
“You’re right.” The anger faded from his voice. “I’m sorry, it wasn’t your fault and it doesn’t really matter anyway because topside copulations rarely take and we don’t even have to tell anybody. We’ll go down together and do the second half of the ritual, with everybody watching. Later I’ll come back and track down the guy who did it.”
That was more than Dwight wanted to hear so he hurried around the corner. Out of sight of the back window, with his truck only yards away, he felt much safer, safe enough to risk looking back. Crouching down and peering around the corner with the edge of one eye he saw the woman, with the man’s help, climbing down. Even with all the lights off inside the room the woman’s slim, white body stood out against the darkness but Dwight felt no desire for her and shuddered at the remembrance of her embrace.
They never looked his way and if they said anything he couldn’t hear it. Hand in hand, they waded into the lake and slipped beneath the surface, to propagate their species, if what he gathered from their conversation was correct. The guy was obviously from out of town and she might actually be a real princess under the water. Expanding the royal gene pool, he thought with a grim, silent chuckle as he got up and went to his truck.
Dwight’s truck looked like a lot of others and the license plate number was still obscured by mud from his four wheel drive outing a couple of days ago, so even if this David guy had figured out which vehicle was actually Dwight’s, he probably didn’t have the license plate number.
The truck’s motor started smoothly and ran quietly, making him glad now that he’d given in to his wife last month and put out the money for a new muffler. He drove away without turning on his headlights until he was on the highway out of sight of the lake.
He wasn’t tired right now but he would need a place to crash when the adrenaline wore off, which would happen soon. His options were even more limited than before so, after considerable contemplation he decided to go home.
The door was unlocked. Dwight was startled to find Hanna asleep on the couch, still fully dressed. He had never before come back the same night after storming out and it had never occurred to him that she would wait up for him. It meant that she cared for him and he realized that he cared for her.
Dwight knelt beside her and shook her gently by the shoulder. She woke with a start, blinking as her eyes focused on him. “Dwight.”
“Yes Hanna, I’m home and I’m sorry.” Always before he had let her apologize first. “I’ve been thinking,” he said, in reply to the question in her eyes, “that you’re right, it is time to get out of this town.”
“Do you really mean that?” He detected both hope and skepticism in her voice.
He nodded solemnly, and he meant it when he said, “Yes I do.”
She looked hard at him for several seconds and he endured her scrutiny without flinching. She sensed a change in him and knew he meant what he said. “Oh Dwight,” she said, hugging him, then pushing him away. “You’re soaked.”
“I was sitting in the rain, thinking, and when I got up I slipped and fell on the wet grass, but I’m okay.” He squeezed her arm. “I want to get out of this town as soon as possible.”
“To Quesnel or Williams Lake?”
“I was thinking further than that, like Dawson Creek.”
“You mean you’ll take that job my brother-in-law offered you?” She was so happy with his decision that she didn’t question his motive.
“If it’s still available.” He would swallow his pride to be that many hundreds of kilometers away from the creepy, black water of McCleese Lake. He didn’t want to be near any lake, or even a large river.
“As far as I know it still is. I’ll call him first thing in the morning, but right now let’s get you out of those wet clothes and into bed.” She took him by the hand and he let her take care of him. They were working together again and it gave him a warm feeling, something he hadn’t felt with her in years.
As he drifted off to sleep with her hand in his he couldn’t help but wonder how cleanly he had escaped. They hadn't seen him sneaking away or the angry young man would surely have raised a fuss, and his truck, with the license plate obscured by mud, had been parked in front of the room next door.
On the other hand, the girl had seen his face and the manager had copied down his actual driver’s license number. How closely did those lake people work with the manager? How much did they know about the town away from the lake and the motel? Where had David come from? How widespread were those people and how much influence did they have? How long would he be safe here? Would he be safe even after he moved?
Eventually sleep claimed him.
The next day there was a disturbing article in the paper about a fatal accident involving a car that looked like the one that had been parked in front of his room at the motel. Dwight was neither harmed nor threatened. He got the job and nothing interfered with their move north.
Three weeks after the incident he developed a peculiar rash. And an urge to go swimming.
The End
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