I stayed hidden, listening. No more sounds came from the direction of the girl or the cat. Finally, I dared to take another peek. The cat was still sprawled on the sidewalk, apparently too languid to move on. The girl had already crossed the next street.
She wasn’t looking back.
I left the shelter of my tree and hurried up the sidewalk. As I stepped over the cat, I heard the rumble of its purr. It raised its head and squawked at me as if annoyed by the intrusion.
I kept on walking.
When I glanced back, the cat was still there, stretched out long and slim on the pale concrete ... luxuriating in memories of the girl’s hands, more than likely, and hoping for her return.
By the time I reached the other side of the street, she was halfway up the next block. I quickened my pace, hoping to close the distance between us.
I felt as if my eyes were locked on her back.
But I must’ve glanced away for an instant. I’m not sure what distracted me.
When I looked forward again, the sidewalk ahead of me was empty.
My heart sickened.
Where’d she go?
My first thought was that she had been snatched away by an assailant. Just where I’d last seen her, the yard to the right was partly enclosed by thick hedges. He might’ve dragged her out of sight ... I started to run.
But what if she’d wandered into the yard for a reason of her own ... maybe to visit a stray dog or another cat?
I quit running.
Still moving too fast, I told myself, Slow down. I’m just a guy walking by.
Though I tried to walk slowly, my heart raced.
What if she’s down? What if some bastard’s raping her?
She’d be yelling, I thought.
Not if he knocked her out. Or killed her.
Aching to run, but holding back, I walked past the row of hedges. The house was dark, its front lawn shrouded by shadows. I kept walking, but slowly. Very slowly. Watching and listening.
Nobody seemed to be down on the ground.
I heard no sounds of struggle.
Did he take her behind the house?
On the dark porch, something moved.
Chapter Four
Looking straight forward, I walked on. I even took a few additional steps after passing the hedge at the border of the lawn. Then, crouching low, I crept back to the bushes. I peered around them and squinted toward the porch.
Several steps above the walkway leading to it, the porch was enclosed by a low wooden railing. Its roof sheltered it from most of the night’s vague light. Staring into that darkness, I wondered how I’d managed to notice any movement at all. Perhaps I’d only imagined it.
Then a thin, horizontal strip of grayness six or seven feet high appeared in the blackness of the porch. I didn’t know what it was. As it slowly thickened, however, I realized the gray strip was made of vague light from inside the house ... growing wider because the front door was being opened.
But opened with such slowness, such stealth, that it seemed to be some sort of forbidden act.
Chills tingled their way up my spine.
What’s going on?
When the area of grayness was wide enough, a black shape slipped through it. The shape seemed to have a ponytail.
A moment later, the grayness began to narrow. Then it was gone.
Suddenly, I smiled.
Of course!
The girl had been away from the house without her parents’ knowledge. She’d probably crept out after their bedtime, maybe for a tryst with a boyfriend, and I had just witnessed her return.
The little sneak!
I almost laughed. Not only was I giddy with relief, but impressed by her daring.
From my place beside the bush, I continued to watch her house. All the windows remained dark. This made sense. After sneaking in so smoothly, she would hardly start running around flicking on lights. No, she would make her way through the darkness.
She had probably taken off her shoes in the foyer. Carrying them in one hand, gliding her other hand along the banister, she’d silently climbed the stairs.
I knew the routine; I’d done it myself a few times during my teenaged years. I knew how she must be moving very slowly, fearful that a board might squeak underfoot. And I knew the excitement that she probably felt.
I also knew she might eventually turn on a light.
Upstairs, if she played it smart, she would sneak into her bedroom and take off her clothes in the darkness. Once you’ve made an undiscovered entry, your clothes are the only giveaway. Get them off, put on your pajamas or nightgown or whatever you wear at bedtime, and you’ve made it home free. You can turn on your bedroom light if you wish, go to the bathroom and turn on its light ... Even if you’re seen, nobody will know you’d been outside.
Waiting for a light to come on, I found myself staring at the third upstairs window from the comer.
Stupid.
This wasn’t Holly’s sorority house, it was the home of a stranger. Any of the windows might belong to the girl’s bedroom. Or none of them; her windows might face the rear of the house. Her room might even be downstairs, though that didn’t seem likely; in old, two-story houses, the bedrooms were nearly always upstairs.
Though several minutes went by, no light appeared in any of the windows.
She’d had plenty of time to reach her bedroom. She was probably in her room now, undressing in the dark. In my mind, it wasn’t complete darkness. A dim glow of moonlight entered through the window, illuminating her as she pulled off her dark sweatshirt.
But in which room? I wondered. Behind which window?
I suddenly realized that her bedroom was most likely one with windows directly over the porch. Three windows overlooked its roof. A simple matter to climb out any of them, walk to the edge of the porch roof, then slip down a support post to the railing and hop to the ground.
Was that how the girl had escaped from her house earlier that night?
I gazed at the windows above the porch. A couple of them - maybe all three - were likely to be the windows of her bedroom. She was probably standing just beyond one of them ... near enough to take advantage of the faint light coming in.
But I couldn’t see her.
Each window looked like a mirror reflecting black night and moonlight. Only a person standing on the porch roof, face pressed to the glass, would be able to see in.
I pictured myself up there.
It excited and appalled me.
You’ve gotta be kidding.
Then I suddenly realized I’d been squatting by the hedge, gazing at the house for a long time ... five minutes? Ten? What if someone had noticed me lurking there and called the cops?
I want to report a prowler.
A Peeping Tom.
Scared, I scooted around to the other side of the bushes, got to my feet and walked away. I walked fast. At any moment, a neighbor might shout at me or confront me with a weapon. Or a squad car might swing around one of the comers and roar down the street to hunt me down.
I ached to break into a run and put some real distance between me and the girl’s house.
If I’d been dressed like a fellow out for a jog, I might’ve tried running. But I was in my chamois shirt and jeans. Such clothes would draw suspicion from anyone seeing me race through the night. So I held back. I even slowed the pace of my walking and tried very hard to look carefree.
I actually pursed my lips and prepared to whistle a tune, but good sense put a stop to that.
I walked in silence, my heart hammering, my mouth parched, my body spilling sweat from every pore.
Nobody shouted. Nobody chased me. No cars came toward me from either direction.
At last, I reached the end of the block. I crossed to the other side of Franklin and continued westward on the sidestreet until I found my way back to Division. Vastly relieved by my escape, I walked two or three blocks north on Division before I even remembered about the bike hag.
A chill
scampered up my hot, sweaty back and raised goosebumps on the nape of my neck.
I whirled around and looked behind me.
No sign of her. Of course not.
Continuing on my way, I felt a little silly for letting her scare me at all.
But I was glad she had scared me. I’d detoured over to Franklin Street for no other reason than to get away from her. If I hadn’t done that, the girl and I would have passed each other in the night, two blocks apart, never converging.
For a while, I toyed with the idea that I’d been meant to flee from the bike hag and find the girl. (I often think strange thoughts in the dead of night.) Forces of good or evil had perhaps given the hag a mission: scare the hell out of Ed Logan so he’ll run over to Franklin Street ...
Not likely.
But I’d been afraid she might reach out as she pedaled by, touch me with a crooked finger and mark me with a curse. So I’d fled. And maybe in fleeing from a harmless, somewhat daffy old crone, I’d run into the sort of curse I’d never expected.
Curse or blessing.
As I walked up Division Street on my way to Dandi Donuts, I felt cursed and blessed ... and bewitched. Not by the bike hag, but by a certain mysterious girl who’d shared the sidewalk and some of her secret life with me, watching unseen in the night.
Chapter Five
Still more than a block away from Dandi Donuts, I could see the hazy glow from its picture windows hovering over the sidewalk.
The houses had already been left behind. Businesses lined both sides of the street: a deli, a barber shop, a gas station, an Italian restaurant called Louie’s, a flower shop, a thrift shop. All were shut for the night. Most were dark inside, but some were dimly lighted.
The display window of the thrift shop, for instance. There, gloomy lights illuminated a pair of sorry mannequins with fading, chipped paint on their faces. They stood frozen in odd stances, looking cheerful for no good reason.
A slender, debonair man in a dusty top hat and tails wanted to look like Clark Gable but one side of his mustache was gone. His lady friend, her red wig slightly askew, wore a red-sequined dress like a ‘flapper’ from the Roaring Twenties. The original owner of the gown was probably as gone as the missing half of Clark’s mustache.
A fairly regular patron of Dandi Donuts, I’d noticed the thrift-shop window early during my first year at the university. In the beginning, I’d been amused by the battered mannequins and their outdated costumes. I’d also enjoyed looking at other items displayed in the window: old tableware, vases, phonograph records, and even a few framed paintings. But then, on my way to Dandi Donuts alone one night, I’d paused at the window longer than usual. That’s when I realized that the mannequins, clothes, and just about everything else displayed behind the window were relics of the dead.
They made me uneasy and depressed.
The next time I went to Dandi Donuts, I walked on the other side of the street and didn’t look at the thrift-shop window as I passed by. But I still knew it was there.
After that, I stayed away from the donut shop. I pretty much intended to avoid it forever, but on a warm night in the late spring of last year, Holly and I were out walking. I knew that we’d walked a very long distance, but I’d been paying attention to Holly, not to our location. We were holding hands. Suddenly, she stopped. I stopped, too. In front of the thrift shop’s window.
‘Oh, wow,’ she’d said. ‘Look at this stuff.’
I looked. Having Holly at my side, however, I felt untouched by the gloom. ‘Clark Gable,’ I said.
‘Looks like half his mustache is gone with the wind!’
I laughed.
‘Is this supposed to be Scarlet?’ she asked.
‘More likely Zelda, I think.’
‘But she’s got to be Scarlet. The red hair.’
‘Well, maybe.’
‘If you want her to be Zelda...’
‘No, that’s all right.’
‘He put her in his books, didn’t he?’
‘I guess so. I guess she’s in Tender is the Night. But he didn’t call her Zelda.’
Holly turned to me and put her arms around me the way she often did, not hugging me exactly but holding herself just slightly against me so I could feel her breasts as she tilted back her head and stared up into my eyes. ‘Will you put me in a book someday?’ she asked.
‘Sure I will.’ It always embarrassed and thrilled me when she spoke of my being a writer - as if she actually believed it could happen.
‘But use my real name, okay? Holly would be a good name for my character, don’t you think?’
I nodded. I couldn’t actually imagine her with any name other than Holly.
‘When you’re big and famous,’ she said, ‘I’ll show the book to my kids and tell them how I knew you back in the early days.’
‘You mean our kids?’ I knew she hadn’t meant our kids, but I’d felt compelled to ask, anyway.
Soft eyes looking up at me, her face solemn, she said, ‘You deserve someone better than me.’
‘What?’ I’d heard her just fine.
‘You’ll find someone else, someone prettier than I am, and smarter ...’
‘I don’t want anyone else.’
‘You only think you don’t.’
‘I love you, Holly.’
‘You love your idea of me.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Maybe I’m not who you think I am.’
‘Then who are you?’
Smiling gently, she rubbed herself against me and said, “‘I’m nobody, who are you?”’ Throwing Emily Dickinson at me.
‘You’re not nobody. You’re Holly Johnson and I love everything about you.’
‘Just remember my name, darling, when it comes time to put me in that book.’
I had a tightness in my throat, but I managed to say, ‘I’ll never forget your name. But if you go away and leave me, how will I know where to send a copy?’
‘I won’t leave you. You’ll leave me. But don’t worry about sending me a copy. I’ll read all your books. I’ll be your biggest fan.’
Then we’d kissed, standing in front of the thrift-shop window with Rhett and Scarlet (or Zelda) staring out at us. I’d felt broken inside. But afterwards we’d gone on into the donut shop and Holly acted as if nothing horrible had happened. After the donuts, we went to a large wooded park and made love under the trees and everything seemed sweeter, more urgent and intense than ever before.
I remembered all that as I stood in front of the window, staring in at the dummies for the first time after being dumped by Holly.
I’ll never leave you, she’d said. You’ll leave me.
Yeah, right.
Bitch, I thought
And then I thought worse.
The tattered mannequins smiled out at me through the glass. They looked exactly the same as they’d looked the night I stood out here with Holly. For them, nothing had changed. Lucky them.
I never should’ve come out here, I thought. North had been a big mistake.
But then, any direction would’ve been a mistake of nearly the same magnitude. There was almost no place to go where I hadn’t been with Holly when we were in love. One place, I supposed, was just as bad as any other.
And north, at least, had the advantage of donuts.
As I walked through the hazy glow of light from Dandi Donuts, I glanced inside. Someone at the counter was making a purchase. The display racks had a meager selection, but I spotted several old-fashioneds. Some were chocolate covered. As for the others, I couldn’t be sure whether they were plain or glazed. I pushed open the door and stepped into the warm, sweet aromas I knew so well.
The clerk - someone new since last year - was busy giving change to a customer.
I walked up to the counter and bent over.
Three of the old-fashioneds were glazed. They looked crusty and mouthwatering. I decided to buy all three, save two for Eileen and eat one here myself while I enjoyed a ho
t cup of coffee.
A long walk like this, I deserved two donuts.
What should the second one be? A chocolate-covered old-fashioned? Maybe a maple bar? Or one of those fat, sugar-sprinkled donuts that was loaded with jelly?
So many possibilities.
Most of them looked luscious.
From behind me came a familiar voice. ‘Hey, Eddie. Fancy meeting you here.’
Chapter Six
I straightened up, turned around, and spotted Eileen waving at me from a comer table. She was alone. In front of her was a white Styrofoam coffee cup and a napkin with about half a donut sitting on it.
She’d come!
Smiling and shaking my head, I walked toward her.
‘Go ahead and get something,’ she said. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’
‘I was supposed to bring you some donuts,’ I said.
‘I decided to bring myself to them.’
‘So ... you want to cancel your order?’
‘Guess so. I’ve already got one and a half inside me.’
‘Can I get you anything?’
She shook her head. ‘Just go ahead and buy what you want for yourself.’
So I returned to the counter. I bought a coffee and two glazed old-fashioneds, paid for them, and carried them toward Eileen’s table.
She looked very fresh and pretty sitting there and watching me. Her dark-brown hair flowed down and draped the tops of her shoulders. Since I’d last seen her, she had changed out of her sweater and pleated skirt. She now wore blue jeans and a bright plaid chamois shirt. Below her throat was a wedge of bare skin. Her shirt wasn’t buttoned until almost halfway down. Slightly crooked, it was open wide enough to show an edge of her black bra.
As I sat down across from her, she said, ‘I changed my mind about being a nuisance.’
‘You’re not a nuisance.’
‘You wanted to be alone.’
‘That’s all right. I’m glad you’re here.’ It wasn’t quite a lie.
She beamed. ‘Really?’
‘Sure.’
‘I just ... it’s an awfully long hike out here, you know? So I figured, well, I’d give you a good headstart then drive on out and at least offer you a ride home. I mean, in case seven miles was enough for one night.’
Night in the Lonesome October Page 3
