Live Girls

by Ray Garton

  “He's always been so stoic,” she'd said to Benedek as they sat at his kitchen table having coffee. “He would never tell me if he were ill. Even seriously ill. Please, Walter, you have a vacation coming up, don't you? Do you think you could ... oh, just spend some time with him, maybe? I don't know what, really, but he needs something. Someone. And I don't seem able to get through to him. Could you help me, Walter? Please?"

  Poor timid, dowdy, bighearted Doris who, when she was a young and single woman, could have done so much better for herself than that doughy, pudgy-fingered businessman with his clipped speech and his permanent frown. Benedek sighed and shook his head, remembering how lively his big sister had been when they were kids, and how different Vernon had made her.

  Benedek had not talked to his brother-in-law. He hadn't even tried. He'd never been comfortable with Vernon Macy. They had always rubbed one another the wrong way. But he did have some time on his hands, a few weeks of long-awaited vacation from his job at the Times. So he'd followed Vernon one morning, staying out of sight. The man had not gone to work, but to Times Square, straight into a dark little place called Live Girls. Benedek's years as a reporter had sharpened his eye and he'd had no doubt that morning as he watched his brother-in-law walk through that black curtain with such purpose that Vernon Macy not only knew where he was going, but had been there before.

  Benedek had followed him a few times after that, and each time Vernon had returned to Live Girls. That disturbed Benedek, although he wasn't sure why. Neither was Benedek sure exactly what it was about that dark, inconspicuous little peep joint that unsettled him so. Maybe it was his reporter's intuition, a hunch. But Walter Benedek, in all his years of reporting, had never for a moment believed in intuition or hunches.

  He had not spoken with Doris about her husband since she'd asked for his help a couple of weeks ago. He knew she would ask him about it over breakfast, and he didn't know what to tell her. He supposed that the news of Vernon's seedy pastime would be better than no news at all. It would at least assure her that he was not sick, was not seeing another woman. At least, not in the way she'd suspected.

  But with the relief would come the hurt in her face. Her top lip would curl under like an old leaf and tears would glitter like diamonds in the corners of her eyes.

  Doris would be very hurt.

  The elevator whispered to a halt and the doors slid open. Benedek turned left down the corridor. He stopped outside his sister's apartment and punched the button beside the door. He decided, as he heard the muffled buzz inside, that he would tell Doris that Vernon was simply going through the much-talked-about midlife crisis, a second adolescence of sorts. Benedek wasn't entirely satisfied with that story, but it would have to do. He didn't think he could bear those glittering tears.

  He waited for the familiar sound of movement behind the door, the rattle of locks being unfastened. All he heard was the television.

  “...and Jerry Mathers as the Beaver,” the announcer was saying happily over the perky theme music.

  Benedek punched the button again.

  The television continued to play loudly inside.

  His bushy eyebrows drew together tightly above his nose as he raised a big hand and rapped his knuckles on the door several times.

  “Follow your nose,” the television sang, “it always knows ... the flavor of fruit..."

  This time, Benedek made a fist and pounded on the door, calling, “Doris? Janice? It's Walt.” He turned an ear to the door.

  “And you'll find the flavor of fruit in every bite..."

  Benedek turned the doorknob. The door unlatched and opened a crack. A cold spot bloomed like a flower in Benedek's stomach. Doris seemed to have a new lock installed on the door every month and she never left them unlatched, even so early in the day.

  After a moment of hesitation, Benedek pushed open the door and stepped inside. From the doorway, he could see half of the television set in the living room at the end of the short hall. Before the television he saw two feet in furry white slippers, two bare legs lying very still, and around them splashes of reddish brown on the creamy carpet.

  “Oh God, Doris?” he called, nearly a shout, as he rushed down the hall, leaving the door open behind him. When he rounded the corner, he saw his sister lying face-up on the floor. Her blood was dark and crusty on the carpet around her.

  Benedek's palm slapped over his mouth as he retched, then swallowed and gasped several times to keep from vomiting. He staggered forward and got down on one knee beside his sister's body. Then the other knee. Then one hand. He reached the other hand out to touch her, but couldn't.

  “Oh, dear Jesus, sis? Sissy?” he croaked.

  Her robe was open and her nightgown—silk, dark blue, very matronly—was torn nearly all the way down the front exposing her flesh, which was now marble white. Her mouse-brown hair was tangled and stringy with blood. Her eyes and mouth were open wide. So was her throat. The flesh had been torn open, clearly exposing blood, gristle, and her trachea. It looked like a garden hose that had been chewed in two by a dog. Her flesh had been torn open all the way down to her chest and pinkish-white bone showed through the drying blood. Her hands were the worst. The fingers of one hand were tangled in the tendons that ran along her neck and the fingers of the other were clutching her left clavicle, like a choking man trying to pull away the tight collar of his shirt.

  “Oh, Christ, sis...” His tears fell freely onto her body and his big shoulders shuddered with quiet sobs. He sat up suddenly, scrambled to his feet, gasping, “Janice!” He said the name softly at first, then roared "Jaaah-nice!" as he bounded across the living room and into the kitchen.

  There was a single streak of blood on the door of the white refrigerator. Through the kitchen, Benedek could see into the dining room where his niece was sitting up against the wall by an overturned chair. With a pained, rumbling groan, Benedek hurried to the girl's side.

  “Please, God...” he hissed as he knelt beside her.

  She was wearing blue jeans and her legs were sprawled on the floor before her, feet bare. The plaid shirt she'd been wearing had been ripped off and lay half in her lap, half on the floor. Her arms were limp at her sides, hands palm up. She was naked from the waist up and part of her left breast had been torn away and was dangling from her chest. Her head hung at a sharp angle to her right and her long silky blond hair—“the stuff angels’ wings are made of,” Benedek used to tell her when she was little—hid her face and tangled in the yawning hole that was once a smooth and graceful throat. Her blood was splashed in dark designs on the beige wall behind her.

  Benedek pushed himself away from the dead girl, moving crablike over the floor. He bumped into one of the stools at the bar that separated the kitchen and the dining room and the stool fell. Benedek leaned against the bar, pressed his back against it hard as he clutched his face with his big hands and sobbed into his palms. He realized that he was breathing in small bursts and he tried to take deep breaths and think.

  “Okay,” he said soothingly to himself, “oooookay."

  Without looking at the corpse against the wall, Benedek stood, crossed the dining room, and went to the doorway that opened onto the hall.

  “Vernon?” he called, his voice cracking.

  Silence.

  All the rooms were shut except the master bedroom. Benedek started down the hall, looking at the tracks of blood on the floor. They led straight to the open doorway. Benedek's legs quivered as he neared the bedroom, trying not to look at the blood at his feet.

  “Ver-Vernon?” he said again, softer, more cautiously than before.

  He stopped a foot or so short of the bedroom, took a deep breath, then stepped through the doorway.

  Vernon Macy's suit was lying in a heap on the floor; a shirt was tossed onto the bed. They were soaked with blood. The drawer of the bedside stand lay on its side on the floor, its contents scattered everywhere.

  “Vernon!” Benedek shouted through tears. “Goddammit, Vernon, i
f you're here, come out! Come ... out...” His voice broke. He stared at his brother-in-law's clothes for a long time, then crossed the bedroom to the bathroom on the other side.

  A bloody bar of soap lay in the middle of the tile floor and a gray towel, blackened with blood, had been tossed over the toilet seat. Puddles of pink water had gathered just outside the shower. A bloody handprint was smeared on the opaque glass of the shower door.

  Benedek gagged once, twice, bent over gasping for air as he spun around and stepped out of the bathroom. It wasn't that there was a great deal of blood, it was knowing from whom the blood had come.

  He stood outside the bathroom for several minutes. Then, when he was finally sure of himself, he went to the phone and called the police.

  “Yeah, Target Guns."

  “Morris? This is Davey Owen at Penn Publishing."

  “Hey, kid!” Davey could hear Morris's smile through the phone. “How's it hangin’ over there, huh?"

  “Just fine, Morris, and how are you?"

  “Oh, I'm mean, kid, mean as usual, you know me."

  Actually, Davey didn't know him. They'd never met. But they spoke on the phone so often, they talked as if they'd known one another for ten years, when they'd been speaking for less than two.

  “What can I do you for?” Morris asked, his dentures clicking through his words.

  “Well, I need a little help with a story. I got a mousy type of guy whose sister is being attacked by a bunch of punks. He takes a shotgun to them. Pump action."

  “Why use pump action with all the automatics you've got to choose from? Pumps ‘re obsolete."

  “Really?"

  “Yeah. Oh, you can still buy ‘em at Sears, I think, but that tells you something right there, know what I mean, kid?"

  “Yeah. What do you suggest?"

  “Maybe a twelve-gauge."

  “Of course."

  “I don't wanna be steppin’ on your toes, though, kid. I mean, maybe you wanna use a pump action, what do I know?"

  “No, no, thanks for the tip, Morris."

  “I gotta ask, though ... how come the writer didn't know that? I mean, these are supposed to be true stories, right?"

  Davey chuckled. “Well, sometimes the truth needs a little help."

  “Yeah, know what you mean. So, kid, when you gonna drop by the shop? Meet in person? I never met a real magazine type before. Lunch'll be on me."

  “One of these days, Morris,” Davey said with a smile. “When things calm down a bit."

  “Problems?"

  “No, just busy. That's all."

  “Well, take a break some day. I'll show you around the joint. Maybe you'll buy yourself a gun. It's a jungle out there, y'know.” He lowered his voice. “I'll give you the special discount. For friends of the management only, kid."

  “Thanks, Morris. Well, I've got to go. Maybe I'll talk to you later in the week."

  “'Kay. You take care of yourself, you hear?"

  After Davey hung up the phone, he thought maybe he would drop in on Morris one day. He might enjoy himself.

  Davey pushed the manuscripts aside and rubbed his watery eyes. Casey had not come by yet. She usually came to see him when she arrived, to chat. Maybe she was late, or home sick.

  He looked around at the three walls. They seemed to creep in just a bit when he wasn't looking.

  Swearing under his breath (he'd been swearing all morning) Davey stood and grabbed his coat, putting it on as he hurried out of the cubicle and stepped across the aisle to Pam's desk.

  “I'm taking an early lunch, if anybody asks,” he said.

  She looked up and nodded. “Yeah, sure. You okay?"

  “Just really hungry. I missed breakfast.” He hurried down the hall to the elevator, realizing how claustrophobic he'd actually begun to feel in there.

  Outside, a sharp, icy wind shot around corners and straight down the sidewalks as Davey walked out through the glass doors of the building. He wasn't hungry, although he hadn't eaten, and he wasn't thirsty. So he decided to just walk for a while. He took a right and pushed into the cold with his hands in the pockets of his overcoat and his head bent forward slightly, winding through the stream of rushing pedestrians.

  I should be tired, he thought. He'd gotten very little sleep the night before because he kept waking to see if Beth had come back yet.

  Her disappearances were not rare, but they always worried him. And hurt him. This time, he'd planned to talk to her about it. He'd lain in bed half the night practicing his speech. He must have gone over it a dozen times, choosing just the right words, trying not to sound too possessive and yet making it clear that she was being inconsiderate to him.

  She'd arrived at a little before five that morning. He'd been asleep, but had awakened to the sound of her packing.

  “Are you all right?” he'd asked.

  “Don't I look all right?"

  “Well, you look ... you look tired, that's all. Where've you been?"

  “What difference does that make?"

  Still shaking the cobwebs from his head, he'd realized what she was doing.

  “C'mon, Beth,” he'd said, “stop that for a minute and let's talk."

  “We've tried that already. I doubt it would work any better now than it did then, so why waste the time?"

  He'd gotten out of bed and tried to go to her, but she just kept packing. “Jesus, you act like I've done something."

  “No, Davey, you haven't done anything. That's just it. You haven't ... done ... anything!” She stopped and faced him. “Not at work and not here. You just go around letting people walk on you, y'know? You don't even get pissed off! I'm beginning to wonder if you're human! And I'm beginning to feel like a fucking jerk every time I turn around, because you just won't ... you don't—oh God, I just can't take it anymore, Davey."

  He'd thought then that if he could convince her he was getting that promotion, she would stay. But a jarring thought shattered his certainty.

  Then what's to keep her from finding another reason to see other men?

  He'd pushed the thought from his mind and said, “Look, Beth, Fritz is gone. He's left Penn. That leaves an assistant editor position open and I'll—"

  “It's not just the money and the rent and ... it's you, Davey. I can't stand getting away with—with treating you the way I do."

  He still wasn't sure if that was the truth or just a good way of getting out smoothly. In any case, he'd thought perhaps it was time to show a little anger. “Okay!” he'd snapped. “Okay, so I'm angry! This makes me angry, Beth, it really does. I've never been very good at getting angry, but I'm trying to handle it as well as I can! Would you rather I scream and shout? Maybe throw things around and rough you up a little? I know you've enjoyed that from your male friends in the past, maybe you miss it!"

  That made her so angry she'd broken a bottle of perfume throwing it into her small overnight bag.

  She'd packed the rest of her things in silence, then stalked out of the room with a bag at each side. He'd followed her to the door, where she'd stood a few moments. Turning, she'd said quietly, “Look, Davey, you're a good person. I love you a lot, you know that. But ... well, you're just letting your life pass you right by, know what I mean? You're just sitting there! And I can't live with that anymore. Really, Davey. You're gonna have to start grabbing things by the short and curlies.” And then she'd left.

  Davey crossed an intersection, weaving through the cars and trucks. He had no destination in mind as he walked, scuffing his shoes on the concrete. His knees and elbows ached, a sure sign of not enough sleep, but he didn't actually feel tired.

  He wondered where Beth would live now. Alone? With a girlfriend? A man? Maybe someone who would break things when the cable television went on the fritz? Someone who would knock her to the floor and then kick her because she didn't buy toothpaste that day? Someone like Vince, the man she was living with when she met Davey? He often wondered about her relationship with Vince. If he had never gotten in trouble with
the police—Beth had told him it had something to do with selling drugs—would she have given Davey a second thought? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe she had really seen something she needed in Davey...

  Like a way out.

  A wadded newspaper skidded over the sidewalk with the breeze. Davey kicked it out of his way, so hard that he nearly tripped. He was startled by the sudden anger he felt, and stopping on a corner to wait for traffic to pass, he took in a few deep breaths, exhaled a ghostly white vapor that was swept away by the icy gusts.

  Casey had disapproved of Beth from the beginning. She'd disapproved of Patty, too. After meeting Beth for the first time, Casey had said, “I hope you're not planning to get serious with her, Davey. You've got to break your pattern, and she isn't gonna help."

  “What pattern?” he'd asked.

  She'd looked a bit surprised. “You really don't see it, do you? Oh well, you will. Someday."

  Davey wondered about that pattern a lot.

  He remembered something his mother had once told him, not long after his father had left them. Up until that time, his mother had been a moderately religious woman, attending church every Sunday, helping out with church socials. After Donald Owen left, though, she leaned more and more on her religious beliefs, searching her Bible as if for a reason for her husband's desertion. One day, while Davey was doing his homework, his mother looked up from her Bible, her eyes sparkling with unspent tears, and said softly, “Remember, Davey, no matter who you fall in love with, no matter how right it seems, she'll hurt you. That's the way love is."

  From then on, she repeated that statement frequently, and always at the most unexpected times. In fact, they were the last words she'd ever said to him; it was during a phone conversation his sophomore year in college. Davey had called to say he was coming home for the weekend.

  When he got home that Friday, he'd found her dead. She'd choked to death on a bite of steak and died beneath the small table in her dining room.

  Davey hadn't thought of her remark for some time, but he thought, as he shuffled down the street, Maybe she was right.